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Wednesday, May 23, 2012

The Frozen Treats Of My Youth




Do any of you remember the Snoopy Sno-Cone machine?

If you aren't sure of what one of these is, have a look at this commercial below.



Or, you can watch THIS LINK here to watch a funny clip from the popular CBS comedy “The Big Bang Theory” where the Snoopy Sno-Cone machine makes an appearance.

I'll just get this out of the way right off the bat. I owned a Snoopy Sno-Cone machine, and I loved it. I really can't remember when I got it. For some reason, I want to say that I got it for a birthday present when I was really small, because my birthday is in May, and May is closer to the summer months than Christmas.

Whatever the case, I can still recall the excitement and anticipation each time we brought out the Snoopy Sno-Cone machine. My mom or my older sisters would help me put ice cubes inside the machine, and then I would crank the handle to crush the ice into a fine powder. Then, we'd add the packet of Kool-Aid or Freshie into the mix to give the Sno-Cone some flavouring (I was always partial to cherry, grape, or lemon lime).



And then came the best part. The eating of the Sno-Cone. I reckon that I ate about a thousand Sno-Cones that summer.

Alas, all good things came to an end, and one day, my Snoopy Sno-Cone machine ended up losing a piece, and it became unusable. I was absolutely devastated over the loss of one of my favourite toys. It wasn't so much the fact that I would never be able to enjoy another Sno-Cone ever again that made me sad. I could get a Sno-Cone any time I wanted whenever a summer carnival came to town. It was more along the lines that something that I loved playing with was no longer available.

I'm tempted to go on eBay to check and see if there are any Snoopy Sno-Cone machines for sale. I know that I've seen some on there, but when people are bidding upwards of $150 for them, that's a price that I'm not prepared to spend! I suppose that I'm not the only one who has such fond memories of the Snoopy Sno-Cone machine, if people are willing to shell out a lot of money to buy one.

But, you know, all this talk about Sno-Cones makes me think about all of the cool summer treats that I used to eat. Well, that, plus all of the wacky summer-like weather we've had this past week. Mid-May in Ontario, Canada felt more like mid-August this year.

And, it dawned on me that before I got the Snoopy Sno-Cone machine, my mom would make homemade popsicles. Back when I was a really small child, money was tough to hold on to, and it wasn't in the budget for us to go to the corner store to buy a popsicle every day. So, she would get an ice cube tray, fill it up with orange juice or fruit punch, stick toothpicks inside the tray, and after a few hours, we'd have instant popsicles.



Here's the funny thing. I always liked the homemade popsicles my mom made me a lot better than the expensive store bought ones. I think a lot of that had to do with the fact that those popsicles were made with love and care every single time. I think that's why I liked them so much.

Actually, did you know that the first popsicles that were invented were homemade ones as well? And that at first, they weren't originally named popsicles?

We'd have to go back to the year 1905, in San Francisco. An eleven-year-old boy by the name of Frank Epperson mixed a white powdered flavouring for soda with water, and left it out on the front porch with a stirring stick inside. He completely forgot about it, and that night, the temperatures in San Francisco dipped down quite low. To Frank's surprise, he went to retrieve the drink and found that the drink was frozen to the stick.

Eighteen years later, at the age of twenty-nine, Epperson began selling his new creation at Neptune Beach in Belmar, New Jersey. Initially, he marketed the creation as the “Epsicle”, and originally filed the patent for the frozen confectionary item in 1924. But, there was just one problem with this. By this time, Epperson had fathered children, and when he ran the name by his children, they hated it! So, Epperson retooled the name, and came up with the “Popsicle” name, which was a portmanteau of the words “pop” and “icicle”.



In 1925, Epperson sold the rights to the Popsicle to the Joe Lowe Company of New York, and in 1989, Good Humor bought the rights to the “Popsicle” name, which by then, was a million dollar industry.

Today, Popsicles have expanded their brand to include other tasty treats. There's the Creamsicle, which is a vanilla ice cream bar that is dipped in a fruit-flavoured ice coating. A variation of this bar substituted ice milk instead of ice cream, and are called Dreamsicles.



TRIVIA: If you enjoy a Creamsicle, make sure you buy one on August 14. In the United States, August 14 is known as National Creamsicle Day.



There's also Fudgsicles (a personal favourite of this blogger), which are frozen treats that have a similar texture and flavour to chocolate ice cream. Over the years, several versions of Fudgsicles have been created, including 100 Calorie Bars, No Sugar Added Bars, Sugar Free Bars, and Triple Chocolate Bars.

They even have a new treat known as Slow Melt Popsicles. These are Popsicles that have a small amount of gelatin included in the mixture that prevent them from melting as quickly as a regular popsicle. I can attest to this fact because whenever I have to do a cold pickup for frozen foods and the popsicles happen to have sat out too long, the Slow Melt ones are still solid, while the regular ones are a smushy box of liquid.

(Of course, by this point, both are too warm to sell, so I have to claim them anyways.)

So, that's a brief history of the Popsicle, and other frozen treats that have been created over the years, and I find it interesting.

But, despite all of the wonderful innovations that have come out of the world of frozen fruit treats, I still maintain that the homemade popsicles and Sno-Cones that I used to make at home as a little boy tasted better than any old store bought popsicle. In fact, I'm actually starting to feel a bit nostalgic about homemade popsicles so much that I just might place a bid on a Snoopy Sno-Cone machine, or make my own homemade popsicles.

And, with this recipe that I found online, you too can make your own homemade popsicles.

And, yes, I'm posting a recipe that a four year old can do. It's my blog. I can do what I like in it. :)

Here's a recipe for Homemade Fudge Pops, courtesy of the official website of the publication “A Taste Of Home”. Enjoy!

HOMEMADE FUDGE POPS

INGREDIENTS:

¼ cup butter, cubed
½ cup all purpose flour
4 cups milk
1-1/3 cups packed brown sugar
1/3 cup baking cocoa
1 teaspoon salt
2 teaspoons vanilla extract
20 Popsicle moulds or disposable plastic cups (3 oz. Each) and Popsicle Sticks

PROCEDURE

In a large saucepan, melt butter over medium heat. Stir in flour until smooth; gradually add milk. Stir in the brown sugar, cocoa, and salt. Bring to a boil; cook and stir for 2 minutes or until thickened.

Remove from the heat; stir in vanilla. Cool for 20 minutes, stirring several times.

Pour ¼ cupfuls into Popsicle moulds or plastic cups; top moulds with holders or insert Popsicle sticks into cups. Freeze until firm.

Makes 20 servings.

(Oh, and for the record, each pop is worth 121 calories.)

Tuesday, May 22, 2012

May 22, 1992


Welcome to the twenty-second day of May! It's Tuesday, so we're going to take a look back at some of the most significant events to take place on this date in history.

I imagine that there are some of you who are having a birthday today, and to you, I wish you a happy one filled with joy, happiness, and birthday cake. You also happen to be sharing a birthday with the following famous people; Michael Constantine, Peter Nero, Richard Benjamin, Frank Converse, Bernie Taupin, Al Corley, Morrissey, Ann Cusack, Mark Christopher Lawrence, Naomi Campbell, Anna Belknap, Alison Eastwood, Sean Gunn, A.J. Langer, Ginnifer Goodwin, Katie Price, and Apolo Anton Ohno.

Now we're going to take a look at some of the significant events that have taken place on this date in history, beginning with...

1659 – France, England, and the Netherlands sign “Hedges Concerto” treaty

1807 – A grand jury indicts American Vice President Aaron Burr on a charge of treason; that same day, the British town of Chudleigh is almost completely destroyed by fire

1809 – Napoleon Bonaparte is repelled by an enemy army during the Battle of Aspern-Essling

1848 – Slavery is abolished in Martinique

1856 – Congressman Preston Brooks beats Senator Charles Sumner with a cane in the hall of the United States senate following Sumner's “Bleeding Kansas” speech

1859 – Sir Arthur Conan Doyle is born

1872 – American President Ulysses S. Grant signs Amnesty Act of 1872, restoring full civil rights to all except for 500 Confederate sympathizers

1897 – Blackwall Tunnel underneath River Thames opens

1906 – Orville and Wilbur Wright are granted American patent #821893 for their “flying machine”

1915 – Eruption of Lassen Peak

1939 – Germany and Italy sign the Pact of Steel

1942 – Mexico enters World War II on the side of the Allies

1947 – The Truman Doctrine is signed

1960 – Most powerful earthquake ever recorded strikes southern Chile with a magnitude of 9.5

1980 – Namco releases the video game “Pac-Man” in Japan

1987 – Hashimpura massacre in Meerut city of India

1990 – Microsoft releases Windows 3.0

2002 – The remains of missing White House intern, Chandra Levy, are found in Rock Creek Park

2003 – PGA golfer Annika Sorenstam becomes the first woman to play the PGA Tour in fifty-eight years

2004 – Hallam, Nebraska is devastated by a powerful F4 tornado, with a width of 2.5 miles

2011 – The single deadliest tornado in America since record keeping began in 1950 strikes Joplin, Missouri, killing 161 people

Wow...volcanoes, tornadoes, earthquakes...May 22 seems to be the national day for natural disasters.

Today's look back through time doesn't have any natural disasters in it, but it does contain one of the most memorable television broadcasts ever shown.



And, we're only going to go back in time twenty years to May 22, 1992.

1992 was a year in which a lot of long-running series went off the air. “Growing Pains”, “Who's The Boss”, “MacGyver”, "The Cosby Show", “Jake and the Fatman”, “The Golden Girls”, and “Hee Haw” saw their final episodes air that year.

And in the world of late night talk shows, one man hung up his microphone for the final time.



On May 22, 1992, Johnny Carson hosted “The Tonight Show Starring Johnny Carson” for the last time. Three days later, the hosting duties would be taken over by Jay Leno. And below, you can watch Carson's final opening introduction of that broadcast.



Here's the frustrating part about that date. When Johnny Carson hosted The Tonight Show for the final time, I was just eleven years old. And, unfortunately, when I was eleven, my bedtime was at 10:00pm, so I ended up missing the whole thing. In fact, I ended up missing practically Johnny's entire run on NBC. But after watching old clips on YouTube that feature the host in action, I knew that I had to do a spotlight on Johnny Carson. After all, he did host The Tonight Show for thirty years. There's a lot of ground to cover.





Johnny Carson was born in the town of Corning, Iowa on October 23, 1925, and moved with his family to Nebraska when he was eight years old. At twelve, he discovered a magic book at a friend's house and purchased a mail-order magician's kit. He called himself “The Great Carsoni”, and was paid three dollars for his first gig at the age of fourteen. Soon after, he began to perform at county fairs and company picnics, setting the stage for his future career.

In 1943, he joined the United States Navy, received V-12 officer training at Columbia University, and continued to perform magic. He even managed to post a 10-0 amateur boxing record while serving onboard the USS Pennsylvania!

Following his stint in the Navy, he attended the University of Nebraska, joined a fraternity, and began charging $25 for his magic appearances. He ended up graduating in 1949 with a bachelor of arts degree in radio and speech with a minor in physics.

Now, how's that for having a major that contradicts a minor?

Carson began his broadcasting career in 1950 at WOW radio and television in Omaha, Nebraska, and from there hosted a morning show called “The Squirrel's Nest”. One of his routines on that show was going up to the roof of the courthouse and interview the pigeons, hoping that they would coo all of the political scandals that were happening within.

Okay, so his hosting style was a bit zany in comparison to other hosts...but the public loved it.



Within the next few years, Carson would work at the Los Angeles based television station KNXT, and he ended up getting the gig which would propel him into stardom. Comic Red Skelton was a fan of “Carson's Cellar”, a low-budget comedy show that Carson started up at KNXT which ran between 1951 and 1953. He immediately hired Carson as a writer for his own show in 1953. Then one day in 1954, a freak accident during rehearsals caused Skelton to accidentally knock himself out cold just an hour before the show was to begin. His LIVE show.

So, Johnny Carson stood in for the host while he recuperated in hospital, and this ended up being the start of it all. The following year, Carson was asked to appear on The Jack Benny Show during the opening and closing segments, and Benny was heard to remark that Carson would end up having a successful career as a comedian.



During the next few years, Johnny Carson would end up hosting several quiz and talk shows. He became the host of game shows “Earn Your Vacation” and “Who Do You Trust?”, hosted a variety show simply titled “The Johnny Carson Show”, and was a regular panelist on “To Tell The Truth” until 1962. His stint hosting the show “Who Do You Trust?” was notable for a couple of reasons. One was the fact that the show soon became one of daytime television's most watched programs of the late 1950s, which surprised Johnny a lot because he felt that the move to daytime television would kill his career. And secondly, it was through that show that he would end up meeting a man by the name of Ed McMahon, a man who would inevitably become a huge part of Johnny's life for several decades.

Then came the offer of a lifetime while Johnny hosted “Who Do You Trust?”. In 1962, the then host of The Tonight Show was Jack Paar, and he had decided the previous year that he would be moving on to other projects.

TRIVIA: Jack Paar, himself, was the replacement host for the original Tonight Show host, Steve Allen.

Carson's success with “Who Do You Trust?” lead to NBC offering Carson the gig as host of The Tonight Show a few months before Paar would vacate the hosting chair. Carson initially declined the offer, because he wasn't sure he could handle the pressure of interviewing celebrities within a 105 minute long show for five nights a week.

But after Bob Newhart, Jackie Gleason, Joey Bishop, and Groucho Marx declined the offer to host the show as well, NBC asked Carson again to reconsider hosting. In March 1962, Carson did accept, but it would take six months for him to start, as he was still under contract with ABC until September 1962. So, Carson finished off his run of “Who Do You Trust?” while NBC substituted guest hosts such as Merv Griffin to run “The Tonight Show”.



Finally, on October 1, 1962, Carson, just days shy of turning 37 years old, took over as the third host of “The Tonight Show”. He was still apprehensive about the job at first, and the 1962/63 season was a difficult one in both the ratings as well as Carson's own hosting skills. But soon Johnny began to feel more at home, and by the end of 1963, he had overcome his fears and doubts, and ratings began to improve dramatically.



Assisting Carson in his show was Ed McMahon, who Carson insisted become his announcer and sidekick. And, really, when you stop and think about it, could you imagine anyone else delivering the “Heeeere's Johnny!” opening line better than McMahon?



(Well, aside from Jack Nicholson in the 1980 film, “The Shining”?)





And, Carson really put his own stamp on the show. He created and assumed the roles of several characters on the show including Floyd R. Turbo, Art Fern, Aunt Blabby, El Mouldo, and of course, Carnac the Magnificent. Oh look, here's a clip of Carnac in action below.



There's actually a whole list of these Carnac gags available for viewing. To see the list, click on the link below.


And, just before we get to the final show, let's add some more trivia about Carson's reign as host of The Tonight Show.

Did you know that The Tonight Show had a live band during Carson's entire stint as host? Well, when Carson began hosting the show in 1962, the band leader was Skitch Henderson, followed by Milton DeLugg. The longest serving leader was Doc Severinsen, who served in the position from 1967 to 1992.



Did you know that the theme song for “The Tonight Show Starring Johnny Carson” was written by Paul Anka?

Did you know that Groucho Marx was Johnny Carson's first guest?

Did you know that Johnny Carson very rarely socialized with his guests before or after the show? In fact, when Orson Welles appeared as a guest, he remarked that he was astonished that Carson dropped by his dressing room to say hello to him before the show began, as he wasn't known for doing that.

Did you know that Carson's hosting style was considered to be so “cool” that he often would break for a commercial when the interview was not going as well as he thought? It's true. In fact, Baretta star Robert Blake once compared the experience of being interviewed by Carson to that of facing a death squad. Still, the publicity that celebrities would get from an appearance on the show was worth that risk.

Did you know that Carson very rarely laughed during interviews...only doing so when he was genuinely amused? Here's a clip of a 1979 interview with Dolly Parton that illustrates this.



Did you know that Johnny Carson's show helped launch the careers of several up and coming stand-up comedians? And, that if Carson liked the performance, he invited the comic to join him in the chair beside his desk for an impromptu interview? Very few comics got that privilege, so it was a dream come true. It happened to Ellen DeGeneres back in 1986. Take a look.



Did you know that in 1979, Carson took Fred Silverman and NBC to court over contract negotiations, and that this court case lead to the show being shortened to an hour in length?

Did you know that “The Tonight Show” would have guest hosts every Monday? Some of these guest hosts included Joey Bishop, Joan Rivers, John Davidson, Bob Newhart, David Brenner, McLean Stevenson, Jerry Lewis, and David Letterman.



Did you know that Johnny Carson instituted a permanent ban on Joan Rivers from appearing on the show ever again (which continued after Jay Leno took over as host)? The reason behind the ban came in 1986 when Joan Rivers left her permanent guest hosting position (a position that Johnny bestowed upon her three years earlier) to host her own show. It was alleged by Carson that Rivers never told him that she was leaving until after she started filming the show, a fact that Rivers denied. Regardless, the new show that Joan started was cancelled in 1987, and Carson, who never forgave her, placed the ban on Joan ever since.

Did you know that the broadcast of July 26, 1984 of The Tonight Show was the first program in American history to be broadcast in MTS stereo sound?

For thirty years, Carson interviewed celebrities, and entertained millions of people with his zany wit, his magic tricks, and his funny jokes. But, all good things had to come to an end, and Johnny Carson announced that he would be leaving The Tonight Show in 1992.

Carson's final episodes aired the week of May 18, and during the first three shows, Carson would show clips of past moments on the show, despite his insistence that he didn't like sentimentality.

Johnny Carson's final celebrity guests appeared on his May 21 episode. Those guests included Robin Williams and Bette Midler. And Bette's appearance in particular was incredibly moving. In fact, you can watch a clip of her appearance below, in which Carson was visibly moved.



Finally, on May 22, 1992, Carson's final show aired. There were no celebrity guests. No Carnac the Magnificent. There wasn't even a desk. It was Johnny sitting in front of the iconic curtain on a stool in front of an entire audience made up of family and close friends, saying goodbye to his audience, both on the studio, and on television. Here's a clip of the final words that Carson ever said on The Tonight Show.



It's been twenty years since Carson said farewell to The Tonight Show, and in the years since, Carson enjoyed his retirement. He made a brief appearance on The Simpsons in 1993, but aside from that, he never appeared on camera again. Carson passed away in January 2005, at the age of 79.

However, Carson's influence in the world of late night talk shows continues to be shown. David Letterman, Craig Ferguson, Jimmy Fallon, Jay Leno, and Conan O'Brien have all cited Carson as being a huge influence on them, and certainly if you watch any of their shows, they all seem to resemble Carson's own format.



Of course, Johnny Carson did it best.

That's our look back on May 22, 1992.

Monday, May 21, 2012

Judith Barsi's Final "Heavenly" Film


Before I continue with today’s blog entry, I wanted to post this link to a Monday matinee that was posted just a few weeks ago.  The link will take you to the entry for Saturday Night Fever, where I talked about the Bee Gees contribution to the soundtrack album.  Sadly, Robin Gibb passed away yesterday at the age of 62.  Thoughts and prayers go out to his family at this time.

Now, onto today’s blog entry.  And this entry also features a tale that is filled with tragedy and lament over what could have been.

When I say the name Judith Barsi, does the name ring a bell?  I imagine for a good portion of you, you probably have never heard the name before in your life.  Yet, she had quite a few credits to her name in her very short career.  She starred in several commercials, had guest appearances in television shows such as “Growing Pains”, “St. Elsewhere”, “Cheers”, and “Punky Brewster”, and voiced the character of Ducky in the movie “The Land Before Time”. 


At first glance, Judith Barsi appeared as a happy and adorable little girl who came to life in front of the camera.  But Barsi’s homelife was anything but idyllic, and by the time anyone realized how serious her situation was, it was too late.

When Judith Barsi began acting at the age of five, her mother, Maria, groomed her to become an actress.  Standing at a little under four feet tall by the time she was ten years old, her mother even went so far as to have Judith endure hormone injections at UCLA in an attempt to help her grow taller.  Now, you’d think that this was bad enough, but it gets much worse.

While Maria Barsi was determined to make Judith a star, Judith’s father, Jozsef Barsi seemed to be more of a destructive influence on her.  His first marriage ended messily amidst allegations of domestic abuse, and family members of Jozsef stated that he had always suffered from low self-esteem, and often took out his anger on those closest to him.


Truth be told, both of Judith’s parents were in less than ideal family situations themselves.  While Jozsef had to deal with the fact that he was conceived illegitimately and was teased by others because of it, Judith’s mother also suffered from psychological and physical abuse brought on by her own father.  Both of Judith’s parents were born in Hungary, but they didn’t actually meet each other until they met at a restaurant in Los Angeles, after both immigrated to the United States at different times.  They fell in love, got married, and had Judith in 1978.

But when Judith’s career began to take off in the United States following her being discovered at a skating rink, Jozsef grew more and more paranoid, and soon he became dangerous and unpredictable.  He threatened to kill himself and his family, and even held a knife to Judith’s throat just before she left to film a movie.  The final straw came when after displaying some alarming behaviour on a film set, Barsi broke down in front of her agent, and the truth came out about the abuse that was going on at the Barsi household.

Initially, there was going to be an investigation into the Barsi household by Child Protective Services, but in a stunning move, Maria Barsi dismissed the case worker, stating that she had begun divorce proceedings and that she and Judith were to move to a new home.  But, somehow, Maria didn’t go through with that plan.  She told friends that she was afraid of losing the family home and the belongings within it. 

If only she had known what would eventually happen on July 25, 1988, Maria and Judith might still be alive today.

That night, Jozsef shot and killed Judith and Maria inside the Barsi family home, setting the crime scene ablaze.  Shortly after, he took his own life in the garage.


Judith Barsi was just ten years old when she died.

To say that her death was a huge tragedy is an understatement.  I am absolutely sickened to death over reading about this case because I feel that the very people who were supposed to protect her ended up hurting her the most.  It’s easy to blame Jozsef for the tragedy.  He set it all in motion, and he was obviously emotionally disturbed.  He needed serious help, and because he didn’t get it, his daughter ended up losing her life.  But Maria isn’t entirely blameless here.  She owed it to Judith to get her away from the abuse, and she didn’t do it. 

As I said, the death of Judith Barsi is a tragedy, and it breaks my heart that her ten years on this Earth were filled with fear and abuse.

Strangely enough, Judith’s last credited role was in a movie that was released over a year after her death.  It was an animated film classic directed by Don Bluth, and Barsi played the role of Anne-Marie, a little orphan girl who was desperate to find a place where she belonged.


Of course, the movie that I’m speaking about is the Monday Matinee feature for today, the 1989 film “All Dogs Go To Heaven”.  Besides Barsi, the film also starred Burt Reynolds, Dom DeLuise, Charles Nelson Reilly, and also in his final film appearance, Vic Tayback.  Although this film didn’t do so well at the box office as compared to other Bluth films as “The Secret of N.I.M.H.” and “An American Tail”, the movie later went on to have great success on home video, becoming one of the most rented and sold video cassettes of 1990.


Just as the film’s title suggests, the film depicts a situation in which an afterlife for pets exists.  In the case of Charlie B. Barkin (Reynolds), a mongrel who works for Carface Carruthers (Tayback), a gangster business partner working at a casino fashioned out of an oil tanker in late 1930s-era New Orleans.  With the two dogs fashioning an elaborate con which nets them huge riches, it seems as though both Charlie and Carface are destined for a life of great wealth.


Too bad Carface refuses to play fair.  After deciding that he’s keeping all the earnings for himself, he arranges for Charlie to be taken to the pound.  Charlie ends up being rescued from the pound by his friend, Itchy Itchiford (DeLuise), but his freedom is short-lived, as Carface and his sidekick, Killer, end up killing Charlie.

Now, here’s where our story goes into a bit of a free fall.  Despite the fact that Charlie lived his life in a less than angelic way, he finds that he has gone up to Heaven after all. 

After all, all dogs go to heaven.

But Charlie’s determined to get back to the land of the living at any cost.  And he succeeds in doing this by swiping his “life watch”, and winding it back up again.  This action turns time backward, and Charlie ends up being brought back to Earth.  Of course, no action comes without its consequences, and in Charlie’s case, the tradeoff was huge.  As long as the watch kept ticking, Charlie could not die.  He lived the life of immortality.  But if the watch ever stopped, Charlie would once again die...and this time, he would NOT be going to heaven.  Instead, he’d be taking a direct trip to someplace...warmer.

So, with that warning fresh on his mind, Charlie returns to life on Earth where he reunites with Itchy, and comes up with a plan to open up a rival business that would shut down Carface’s operation for good as a method of revenge.

Of course, Carface has a bit of an advantage in his quest to keep his business afloat...a secret weapon in the form of the little girl with the name Anne-Marie (Barsi).


It turns out that Anne-Marie has a very powerful gift.  She has the ability to communicate with animals, a gift that Carface uses to his advantage by having Anne-Marie help him bet on races.  Charlie decides to woo away the young girl from Carface with the promise that he will find her a home and a loving family if she goes with him.

Alas, Charlie soon goes back to his old ways once more, and ends up treating Anne-Marie the same way that Carface did...using her gift to make money through various animal competition.  But clever Anne-Marie soon realizes what is going on, and calls Charlie out on his scheme, a move that makes Charlie feel terrible.  But Charlie still convinces the girl to stay with him, reminding her that he treated her with more kindness than Carface was even capable of.

Sometime during the film, Anne-Marie ends up finding a wallet that Charlie had stolen from a married couple as a start-up fund for his new business.  She and Charlie get into an argument, and Anne-Marie decides to take the wallet back to its rightful owners.  Charlie soon discovers that the couple has invited Anne-Marie in for breakfast, and that the couple was so charmed by the girl that they talked about adopting the girl as their own.  Charlie then does one of the most selfish things that he could have done.  He pretends to be sick to gain sympathy from Anne-Marie, and succeeds in making the girl leave the home of the nice couple. 

And almost immediately, Charlie and Anne-Marie face one dangerous situation after another.  They almost get caught by Carface, they end up falling through a warehouse floor, and almost get eaten by an alligator!  But through it all, Charlie and Anne-Marie grow closer as a result, and it seems as though things might work out after all.

That is, until Anne-Marie overhears Charlie telling Itchy that he doesn’t care about her, and she runs away.  Anne-Marie gets kidnapped by Carface, and soon, Charlie and Itchy find themselves racing against time to locate Anne-Marie and save her from Carface’s clutches.  But when the endgame confrontation forces Charlie to make an impossible choice...which choice will he make?

Of course, I’m not going to tell you how the movie ends.  You’ll just have to watch it for yourselves. 

However, it was nice to see the clip of Anne-Marie finally finding happiness with a family who really had her best interests at heart.  Mind you, Charlie’s insecurity about the situation temporarily ruined everything, but before that happened, Anne-Marie was overjoyed and for the first time in a long time, she felt like a little girl again.


It’s a sadly bittersweet moment that the character of Anne-Marie found happiness and peace, when the actress who played Anne-Marie had none of those things.  The only thing that we can hope for is that if there really is an afterlife in this world, that Judith Barsi has finally gotten the peace that she longed for during her tumultuous decade of living.

Sunday, May 20, 2012

Working Hard For Her Money


It’s Sunday today, which means that we’ll be sticking another quarter into the jukebox to listen to another classic from years ago.  And, today’s artist was someone very special indeed.


This blog entry is going to be a celebration of the life of Donna Summer, who passed away on May 17, at the age of 63. 

To a lot of people, Donna Summer was first and foremost a disco artist, whose heyday was during the late 1970s.  And, yes, it’s true that Donna Summer’s music influenced the disco scene heavily.  But Donna Summer was more than just a disco diva, and as this blog entry will hopefully showcase, Donna Summer ended up finding that there really was life after disco, despite some controversy and some dry spells along the way.

First, let’s take a look at the life and times of Donna Summer.

Donna Summer was born LaDonna Adrian Grimes, on the last day of December, 1948 in Boston, Massachusetts.  She was one of seven born to Mary and Andrew Grimes, and according to Donna’s mother, Donna learned how to sing at a very early age.

Although Mary Grimes often talked about how Donna would sing all around the house, it wouldn’t be until Donna was ten before she made her public singing debut.  It was at her church, and Donna ended up replacing another vocalist who was a no-show.  The priest invited Donna to perform in front of the congregation, thinking that it would be a cute performance.  But, little did everyone realize that out of the small frame of that ten-year-old girl came a huge and powerful voice.  Everyone was stunned at the spectacle, including Donna who started crying right there and then. 

And after that powerful performance, Donna came to the conclusion that she wanted to share her voice with the rest of the world, and aimed to become a star in the recording industry.

In high school, Donna performed in school musicals, and was very well-liked in school, but she was also in trouble at home for purposely violating her curfew.  Just weeks before graduating high school, Donna left for New York City, joining a band by the name of “Crow”.  The band would later break up after failing to get a record deal, but Donna soon found herself auditioning for the Broadway musical “Hair”.  Unfortunately for Donna, she lost the part she was auditioning for to Melba Moore, but when the opportunity came for her to play the same role in the Munich, Germany production of the musical, Donna made the choice to move halfway across the world to pursue her dream.  During this time, she learned German, and participated in several German productions in both English and German.  Right around this time, Donna released her very first single, a song called “Sally Go ‘Round The Roses” in 1971, but it failed to make an impression on the charts.  Nevertheless, Donna was thrilled to have even one single released, and she was determined to release more.

Between 1971 and 1974, she continued to record sporadic singles, and sang back-up for the successful rock band, Three Dog Night.  She also married a man named Helmuth Sommer, and gave birth to a daughter, Mimi, in 1975.  But the marriage soon broke up after Donna had an affair with someone else.  Donna left the marriage but ended up keeping Sommer’s name, anglicizing it to become Donna Summer.


Shortly after giving birth to Mimi, Donna would end up releasing a rather controversial hit.  The song was called “Love To Love You Baby” (inspired by a lyric that Donna had come up with), and the song immediately reached #2 on the Billboard Charts.  The song would eventually become one of Donna’s best known singles, but it didn’t come without controversy.  The BBC reportedly banned the song from airplay due to Summer moaning and groaning throughout the song.  Despite this, the song helped put Summer on the map, and was just the first of many disco releases by her.

TRIVIA:  A sample of “Love To Love You Baby” appears on Beyonce’s smash single “Naughty Girl”.

Really, with songs such as “I Feel Love”, “Hot Stuff”, “Last Dance”, and “Bad Girls”, it wasn’t long before Summer soon found herself at the height of fame in discotheques all across the country.  She even managed to turn the melancholic tale of a cake sitting out in the rain into a number one hit when she covered the song “MacArthur Park” in 1978!  Now THAT’S talent!


(No, seriously...Donna Summer made MacArthur Park easier to listen to...I have always hated that song...but that’s another story altogether.)

So, you’d think that when the “disco sucks” movement of 1979 effectively made disco sales plummet to obscurity that the career of Donna Summer was finished for good.

You would think wrong.

Certainly, with disco becoming the most hated genre of music as the 1970s turned into the 1980s, a lot of artists who thrived during that period soon disappeared into obscurity. 

But Donna Summer was never one of those people.  If anything, Donna continued to grow as an artist with the new decade.

The reason why was because Summer was never afraid of changing or adapting to new styles of music, and in 1980, Summer made the decision to try her hand at other genres of music other than disco.  This change caused Donna to part ways with her old record label, Casablanca.  Soon after, she joined the roster of artists at Geffen Records, where her first post-disco album, “The Wanderer” was released in late 1980.  The album successfully fused the new genre of “New Wave” with classic rock, a mixture that proved successful for Pat Benatar, and other similar artists.  The title track soon reached #3 on the Billboard Charts, and her following album “Donna Summer” also did quite well on the charts.

However, Donna Summer’s recording contract with Geffen would hit a snag in late 1982 when she received the news that she still had to fulfill one more album released under her Casablanca contract.  By this time, Casablanca Records had become a wholly owned subsidiary of Polygram Records, so Summer recorded the album “She Works Hard For The Money” in 1983 to finish up her original contract.


Ironically enough, that album would end up netting Summer another smash single.



ARTIST:  Donna Summer
SONG:  She Works Hard For The Money
ALBUM:  She Works Hard For The Money
DATE RELEASED:  May 27, 1983
PEAK POSITION ON THE BILLBOARD CHARTS: #3

I specifically wanted to spotlight this song for three reasons. 

Firstly, the song was one of Donna’s highest charting singles.  It received a lot of airplay back in 1983, and although it didn’t make the top spot on the generic Billboard Charts, it did peak at #1 on the R&B charts in the summer of ’83.

Secondly, the song happens to have a fantastic message that the music video portrays brilliantly.  The basic gist of the song deals with the workforce, particularly with the women in the workforce, and just how hard they worked to earn every last penny.  In our video, we see a woman who had dreams of dancing on stage at a ballet, but instead traded in her leotards and ballet slippers for an apron and a notepad for taking orders.  She puts in a full day of work each and every day for complaining customers, her ungrateful children, and her equally overworked co-workers.  Eventually, the stress of keeping it all together gets the better of her, and she suffers a mini-breakdown.  But, towards the end of the video, our exhausted protagonist (and all the other women on the street) launch a bit of a revolution, dancing in the middle of the street as Summer herself watches from a distance.

Okay, so the video is kind of cheesy to watch now, but back in 1983, it was very popular.  It quickly became a video played on “heavy rotation”, one of the first videos by an African-American female artist to accomplish such a feat. 


TRIVIA:  Summer was inspired to write the song after meeting an overworked bathroom attendant while she was on tour.  In fact, if you take a look at the back cover of the album that the song appeared on, her picture is featured there (she’s standing to the left of Summer).

And the third reason why I chose this song was because it’s the perfect example of Donna Summer breaking out of her mirrored glass cocoon to find life after disco, and proving to the world that her powerful voice could thrive in any musical genre.

Shortly after Summer released “She Works Hard For The Money”, her success in the United States slowed to a crawl, especially after it was reported that Summer allegedly made anti-gay comments in response to the AIDS epidemic that was widely reported on in the 1980s.  Summer quickly denied making these comments, and claimed that it was a terrible misunderstanding, and actually filed a lawsuit against New York magazine in 1991 after they reprinted the rumours as fact.

In Europe, on the other hand, Summer’s career was still “Hot Stuff”.  Teaming up with Stock, Aitken, & Waterman, she released her 1988 album “Another Place In Time”, which spawned three Top 20 songs in the UK, including the 1989 song “This Time I Know It’s For Real” , which peaked at #7 in the United States, Summer’s final Top 10 hit in North America.

In Summer’s later years, she would release several albums that covered a wide variety of genres, including gospel, dance, and new jack swing.  She also had a few guest appearances on the sitcom “Family Matters” as Steve Urkel’s Aunt Oona.  She never stopped making music, and continued to release albums and perform in concert.

That is until she passed away three days ago from lung cancer...and with her passing, ended the life of a fantastic performer, a skilled songstress, and all in all, a lovely woman.


Donna Summer
1948-2012

Saturday, May 19, 2012

Pinky And The Brain


This is going to sound like it may be a bizarre question, but have you, at any point in your life, had the dream of world domination?

I know it sounds crazy, but I’m sure at some point, most of us have wondered what it would be like to be in complete control of everything in the world. 

So, what kind of leader do you think that you would be?  Would you be a humanitarian leader who makes sure that nobody in the world goes hungry, and that every single person in the world has a safe and happy life?  Or would you be a global dictator, making all seven billion people on the planet cater to your every whim?

To be absolutely honest, I think I would make a terrible world leader.  Not because I would be needlessly cruel, because I wouldn’t be, but because I would be so desperate for compromise between two arguing parties that nothing would get accomplished.

In short, I’d be the “stalemate” leader.

But, there’s a difference between saying that you want to rule the world, and actually doing just that.  Some have said that they wanted to rule the world in jest, while other, more dangerous people have tried to accomplish this goal through terrorist activities and organizations. 

And, then there’s the curious case of the two cartoon characters that are going to be featured in today’s blog.  These two characters are small in stature, and some might even say that these two are nothing but rodents.  To think that this duo’s main ambition was to take over the world was laughable, especially when you consider that they make their home inside of a cage in the interior of a science laboratory.

However, these two weren’t going to let that stop them.  They were determined, they were crafty, and they never gave up hope in their quest for world domination.  I mean, yes, sure, in every episode, they actually failed in their quest, but their bond continued to stay strong with each failure.


They’re Pinky, they’re Pinky and the Brain, Brain, Brain, Brain, Brain, Brain, Brain, Brain, NARF!


Yes, we’re going to take a look back at Pinky and the Brain, a cartoon that defined a generation of kids during the 1990s...and a cartoon that this blogger loved watching very much.

And Pinky and the Brain ended up getting their very own cartoon series on the now defunct WB network from 1995 to 1998.  But, prior to that, these two lab mice made guest appearances on another Warner Brothers creation.


Remember the cartoon series “Animaniacs”?  The show debuted on the FOX network in September 1993, and was created by Steven Spielberg and Tom Ruegger, the duo responsible for the hit smash “Tiny Toon Adventures” just three years earlier.

Animaniacs featured the escapades of the Warner Brothers, Yakko and Wakko, and Dot, the Warner Sister.  The story goes that the three Warner siblings were created in the 1930s, a time period where cartoons such as Mickey Mouse and Betty Boop were all the rage.  They were sealed inside the water tower on the grounds of the Warner studios, and they remained there for sixty years until they broke free.  Most of the stories that the Warner siblings starred in involved their escapades hanging around the studio staff, including Dr. Scratchansniff, Ralph, the security guard, and...


...yes, that’s it.

But, of course, part of the charm that was Animaniacs were the secondary characters of the show.  Slappy Squirrel, Buttons and Mindy, Chicken Boo, Katie Ka-Boom, and the Goodfeathers made thousands of children laugh throughout the show.


Oh, and Pinky and the Brain?  They first appeared on Animaniacs too.  Immediately, Pinky and the Brain became two of the most popular characters to appear on the show, and they proved so successful that they ended up getting their own show which debuted on September 9, 1995.


Part of the success behind Pinky and the Brain is to the credit of the voice actors who portrayed the two characters.  Both Rob Paulsen and Maurice LaMarche are no strangers to the world of animation, as both men have well over one hundred voice credits between the two of them.  But there was something about Paulsen’s portrayal of Pinky and LaMarche’s portrayal of the Brain that made the show more fulfilling to watch. 


For the character of the Brain, LaMarche chose to make him sound a lot like Orson Welles.  The character of the Brain even had a bit of a resemblance to Welles.  In most of the episodes, the Brain is the mastermind behind the duo’s plan to take over the world.  Because both Pinky and the Brain were genetically modified lab mice, their genes were unlike those of any ordinary rodent.  In Brain’s case, he ended up with an oversized brain, which likely became a factor behind his quest to take over the world.

He certainly didn’t let being stuck in a cage stop him from meticulously planning his quest for world domination.  His tail actually worked as a skeleton key in which he could unlock his cage whenever he wanted.  And Brain’s plans were planned out intelligently and with much thought.  He really put a lot of effort into his various plans for world domination.  And, why wouldn’t he?  It was always his dream.

What was interesting was that despite the fact that Brain wanted nothing more than to have total control of the world, it wasn’t for evil reasons.  In fact, Brain felt that by taking over the world, he would use it as a message of goodwill to the planet.  He actually believed that it would be better for the world if he was in charge.  Many of Brain’s plans for achieving world domination had to do with the act of winning people’s hearts so that they would let their guard down, and let Brain take over as a sign of goodwill. 

Basically, Brain used pure manipulation to get what he wanted.

But, Brain’s desire to take over the world might have been linked to a traumatic childhood event.  In one episode, it was revealed that Brain once lived inside a tin can with his family.  However, Brain was taken by force by scientists, and the last thing Brain had seen before being taken away was a picture of the world on the side of the can.  So, it’s entirely possible that Brain associated his plan for world domination with wanting to reunite with his family.

It’s very deep if you look at it that way, don’t you think?

Of course, the show would be quite boring if Brain succeeded in his plans, and in every episode, his plans would fail.


Mostly due to the ineptitude of Pinky.

Pinky was, to put it lightly, the anti-Brain.  And, Rob Paulsen used a high-pitched Cockney accent for Pinky as a sharp contrast to the monotonous deep voiced Brain.

Pinky (named by Brain) is also a genetically modified lab mouse, but unlike Brain, his genes seemed to be affected more negatively.  He’s dim, he’s aloof, he says a lot of nonsensical words like narf, zort, and poit, he’s...well...he’s Pinky!

While Brain acts in a more melancholic manner and acts a bit stuck-up, Pinky is more open-minded, and very rarely gets in a bad mood.  And despite the fact that Brain often inflicts physical harm on Pinky by bopping him on the head, Pinky is determined to assist Brain in his quest to take over the world.

For Pinky, though, it didn’t matter to him how badly Brain treated him.  He loved Brain like a brother, and would have done anything for him.

That’s about all that I have to say about the cartoon itself, but just to close off this entry, here’s one final piece of trivia.

TRIVIA:  The characters of Pinky and the Brain were inspired by real life employees who worked on Tiny Toon Adventures, Tom Minton and Eddie Fitzgerald.  Fitzgerald was the one who inspired Pinky’s “Narf” comment, as he reportedly said it around the office all the time.  The Brain was designed after Minton, but was given the Orson Welles connection after LaMarche joined the voice cast.


“Gee, Brain, what do you want to do tonight?"

“The same thing we do every night, Pinky...try to take over the world!!!”