I Think The Andy Williams Estate Has A Case.

There's this commercial running currently during the holiday season.
It's for Infiniti.
The car.
About how there are all these wonderful deals to be had if you decide to buy an Infiniti now.
Dominating the commercial is Andy Williams' recording of "Santa Claus Is Coming To Town".
Only it isn't Andy Williams singing.
It's an Andy Williams sound-alike.
Infiniti paid some guy who sounds a lot like Andy Williams to sing "Santa Claus Is Coming To Town".
How do I know this?
Well, for one, I have an extremely good ear.
For another, I remember Andy Williams' recording.
It's much better than what's in this commercial.
What's in this commercial is a really cheesy version.
Not up to Andy's very high standards.
I know Andy Williams when I hear him.
And this is pretty close.
Similar orchestral arrangement and everything.
But it's not Andy Williams.
And it's not as good.
Andy Williams was a GREAT singer.
Even if he did end up in Branson.
The guy they got is pure ersatz.
Yet, another case of "Old bread, old rolls, they won't know the difference".
(See "Old Bread, Old Rolls", parts one through six.)
So why would Infiniti do this?
Ya think money has anything to do with it?
I'm sure it's a lot cheaper to hire some guy who sounds like Andy Williams than to have to fork over bigger bucks to Andy's family for the rights to use Andy's recording.
I'm sure it's a lot easier to try to get away with this, figuring that even if Andy's family heard the commercial, they might not even be able to tell the difference.
And that maybe, as far as they knew, they WERE being paid for it.
And that at least it's worth a shot for Infiniti to try to pull this off.
No, it isn't as bad as knowing that you have airbags that don't work.
But if you're willing to do that, it's certainly no major leap to try to cheat Andy Williams' family.
And if they're nickel-and-diming Andy's family, imagine how they're nickel-and-diming to use cheaper parts for the cars that they're trying to sell you.
So not only are they stealing from the Williamses, but they're also trashing his memory.
They're trying to cash in on Andy's memory, so I guess they figure that people who might buy an Infiniti still remember him.
Being that it's a holiday commercial, it won't be around for that long.
But if you see it, trust me on this one.
It ain't him.
And if any of you out there happen to know Andy's relatives, you might suggest that they lawyer up.


********

My books ,"Show Runner" and it's sequel, "Show Runner Two", can be found at the Amazon Kindle Store.
Along with the newer ones, "The Man Is Dead", and "Report Cards".
You can search by typing in my name, Cindy Williams, Laverne and Shirley, The Odd Couple, or Happy Days.
Check them out.
You don't need a Kindle machine to download them.
Just get the free app from Kindle, and they can be downloaded to an IPhone, IPad, or Blackberry.
The paperbacks, "Mark Rothman's Essays" and my new novel, "I'm Not Garbo" are not e-books.
But they are available for people without Kindle.
I have many readings and signings lined up for those, and the thing about Kindle is you can't sign one.
If you'd like one of the paperbacks, personally autographed, contact me at macchus999@aol.com.
And now, we've got my reading of my "Laverne and Shirley Movie" screenplay on YouTube, and my 4-hour interview at the Television Academy's Emmy TV Legends Website.
Here's the link:
http://www.emmytvlegends.org/interviews/people/mark-rothman

*****

The Match Game.

About a month ago, in connection with Polly Bergen's death, I wrote an article about Goodson and Todman, the game show producers who turned out "To Tell The Truth", where Polly shined as a panelist.
I implied at the time that I would be writing more about the Goodson-Todman output.
But I got sidetracked by other things.
One of their shows that I had planned to write about was "The Match Game".
With Gene Rayburn as the host.
Not the sleazy, double-entendre Charles Nelson Reilly vs. Brett Somers version from the 70's, where Gene Rayburn was the host.
No. The far more interesting, conservative version from the 60's.
With Gene Rayburn as the host.
That was a completely different and better game.
It was on NBC, Monday through Friday, at 4pm.
It had two celebrities, the same ones, on all week.
Each celebrity was flanked by two civilians, and they all, quite civilly tried to make matches to blanks that needed to be filled in.
Just like the 70s sleazy version.
Except it wasn't sleazy.
There was one week that provided what I thought at the time, was about the funniest thing I'd ever seen.
The guest celebrities were Robert Culp and Bill Cosby, who were at the height of their "I Spy"" fame.
It was a major coup for NBC to get them.
Culp and Cosby, at the time, the two coolest guys on the planet, decided to have their own peculiar brand of fun with the proceedings.
They played the game quite straight, but spent literally the whole week, from beginning to end, each placing an elbow on the table in front of them, and having it collapse out from under them.
This is better known as the "elbow take".
They spent the entire week doing elbow takes.
And it got progressively funnier each time they did it.
You'd think it would be diminishing returns, but it was quite the opposite.
It was done with considerable aplomb.
Until very recently, it made me laugh just thinking about it.
Now, it doesn't.

I have been reluctant to write about this whole Cosby thing because my point of view has continued to shift.
When that first woman came out and told her story, it seemed full of holes.
This was not her first drink of the evening.
She woke up to find Cosby taking off her underwear.
Why didn't she tell him to stop?
Why did she agree to see him again subsequently?
But then, other counties started to be heard from.
And still other.
And still other.
And more and more, they matched each other's stories.
So maybe the first one was less equipped to tell her story well.
But it still matched the others.
So I have joined the consensus.
I've been looking for the closest comp to Cosby in terms of potential Fall From Grace, career-wise.
First, I thought of Fatty Arbuckle, the biggest star of his time.
Then, he faced a rape and murder rap.
He went to trial, and was acquitted and apologized to by the court, but his career and his life was still toast.
He never had any sustained career.
He was only 46 when he died.
Then, I looked towards O.J.
It seemed to be a better fit.
There still seem to be pockets of people here and there who think O.J. is innocent.
At the time of the verdict, it was the entire black population.
But Cosby has had more than fifty years, making it all the way to age 77 unsullied, or as he might perhaps put it, "unscuttled"
This is unprecedented.
But I think the boat has sailed on him.
I know that nobody has ever gone broke underestimating the American public.
This will certainly put them to a test like they have never faced.

Anyway, they still come out.
More and more accusations.
Same modus operandi.
They all match.
I can't imagine that there can be any serious recovery for Cosby.
Down to the most minute level.
I have a line in one of my plays.
It takes place in the 1980's.
It's a throwaway line: It's only a quarter to eight. Cosby isn't even on yet."
Well, that throwaway line now has to be thrown away.
I'm changing it to "Who's The Boss?"
Because I don't want the audience to be distracted, even for a moment.
I don't want them to stop thinking about the characters on stage, and start thinking about Cosby, whatever it conjures up.
And the accusers still come out.
More and more accusations every day.
Same modus operandi.
They all match.
The same blanks are repetitively filled.
And no amount of elbow takes can put an end to it.
I don't think he can elbow his way out of this one.


********

My books ,"Show Runner" and it's sequel, "Show Runner Two", can be found at the Amazon Kindle Store.
Along with the newer ones, "The Man Is Dead", and "Report Cards".
You can search by typing in my name, Cindy Williams, Laverne and Shirley, The Odd Couple, or Happy Days.
Check them out.
You don't need a Kindle machine to download them.
Just get the free app from Kindle, and they can be downloaded to an IPhone, IPad, or Blackberry.
The paperbacks, "Mark Rothman's Essays" and my new novel, "I'm Not Garbo" are not e-books.
But they are available for people without Kindle.
I have many readings and signings lined up for those, and the thing about Kindle is you can't sign one.
If you'd like one of the paperbacks, personally autographed, contact me at macchus999@aol.com.
And now, we've got my reading of my "Laverne and Shirley Movie" screenplay on YouTube, and my 4-hour interview at the Television Academy's Emmy TV Legends Website.
Here's the link:
http://www.emmytvlegends.org/interviews/people/mark-rothman

*****

How About Chicken?

The two funniest things I ever heard about anyone saying were:
1) At a gathering of A-List celebrities at dinner aboard a yacht, one of the A-Listers initiated a game---"Who Has Met Whom?", thinking that at least one member of this group had met just about anyone that could be imagined.
His first question was "Has anyone met Eleanor Roosevelt?"
Immediately, Warren Beatty's hand shot up. "Actually, I met Eleanor Roosevelt."
From the furthest end of the table away from Beatty, another A-Lister called out to him.
"Did you fuck her?"
That's one.
2) In the 50's a struggling young actor had to take a day job working at the soda fountain at Howard Johnson's, in Times Square.
He hated this job.
He hated the clientele, primarily made up of tourists.
He hated having to discuss with them the renowned 28 flavors of Howard Johnson's ice cream.
One afternoon, a middle-aged lady sat at the counter, trying to make up her mind about which flavor of ice cream she would settle on.
And she prattled on about it, finally asking the young actor what he would recommend.
With this being the backbreaker, he responded "How about Chicken?"
He was summarily asked by management to turn in his apron and his scooper, which he didn't mind at all doing.

The quotee in both instances was Mike Nichols.

Mike Nichols was a giant, in all respects.
A great wit.
A great performer.
And that rarest of rare things, a great director.
Both stage and screen.
One of the only directors to find sustaining success on stage and screen.
There was nothing about Orson Welles that was sustaining.
Elia Kazan found it, but he had other problems.
I'm not one to easily give out compliments to directors, as I regard most of them as complete hacks.
Writers, to me, are the visionaries.
So I exempt them when I talk bout directors.
Non-writing directors are, for the most part, merely camera pushers.
When I've tried to get my movies made, negotiations usually break down when some studio attempts to foist some hack director on me, rather than allowing me to direct it myself.
I would usually say something like "Look, if you can get Mike Nichols to do it, or Scorcese, or Francis Ford Coppola, I would gladly step aside. Past that, they're all hacks."
And my movie would go back on the shelf.
I want my movies to be made well.
I would much prefer my movies not be made at all than be made badly.
As great as his great ones were, "Who's Afraid of Virginia Woolf", "The Graduate", "Carnal Knowledge", "Silkwood", "Working Girl",
"Postcards From The Edge", he also had his share of clinkers.
"The Fortune", "Heartburn", and I was not a fan of "Catch-22". I found it way too confusing.
But then I was never able to get past page 60 of the novel.
I think that Nichols understood that even a great director can't transcend a bad script.
He might have attempted to with those stiffs, but just couldn't get over the hump.
But even in the stiffs, there were almost uniformly great performances, and staggeringly great photography.
Nichols was clearly a hands-on actors director.
Even in "The Fortune", he put Stockard Channing on the map.
In "Working Girl" he managed to make me a fan of Melanie Griffith, who in subsequently lesser hands, virtually vanished from the screen.
Nichols was a great psychologist when working with actors.
Before "The Odd Couple" hit Broadway, they were a smash in Boston.
The cast, in previews in New York, was already settling in for a lengthy run.
First day of previews, Nichols completely changed the blocking.
This staggered and bewildered the cast.
Why is he doing this?
It made no difference, and it went on to be the smash hit that it was always destined to be.
When asked subsequently about the change of blocking, Nichols replied that he was worried about the cast getting too complacent, and they needed shaking up.
This also speaks to something I also believe in: the over-importance given to stage blocking in general.
Except for key moments in my plays, I have approached blocking as "just let the actors be comfortable on stage, and make sure that they don't bump into each other.
I've essentially taken my cue from Nichols, and his approach to "The Odd Couple"
I'll have more to write about directors as hacks in the future.
When Mike Nichols and Elaine May teamed up, they did this sketch called "The $65 Funeral".
It involved Mike, as the grieved relative, answering an ad for a $65 funeral, subsequently learning that absolutely nothing was included.
May asked "And how were you planning to transport the deceased to the church?
Nichols, bewildered by the question, replied ".....cab?"
He finally settled on the much more expensive Hearse.
Great sketch.
Now that it's Mike's turn, I'd certainly like to think that Diane Sawyer is going to spring for far more than the $65 funeral.
At least for the Hearse.

He certainly came a long way from "How about chicken?".

********

My books ,"Show Runner" and it's sequel, "Show Runner Two", can be found at the Amazon Kindle Store.
Along with the newer ones, "The Man Is Dead", and "Report Cards".
You can search by typing in my name, Cindy Williams, Laverne and Shirley, The Odd Couple, or Happy Days.
Check them out.
You don't need a Kindle machine to download them.
Just get the free app from Kindle, and they can be downloaded to an IPhone, IPad, or Blackberry.
The paperbacks, "Mark Rothman's Essays" and my new novel, "I'm Not Garbo" are not e-books.
But they are available for people without Kindle.
I have many readings and signings lined up for those, and the thing about Kindle is you can't sign one.
If you'd like one of the paperbacks, personally autographed, contact me at macchus999@aol.com.
And now, we've got my reading of my "Laverne and Shirley Movie" screenplay on YouTube, and my 4-hour interview at the Television Academy's Emmy TV Legends Website.
Here's the link:
http://www.emmytvlegends.org/interviews/people/mark-rothman

*****

The Right Idea.

Sophie Tucker was this huge star in Vaudeville.
Mainly in the 20's and 30's, until there was no more vaudeville.
And she was old then.
After that, she was still a huge star in nightclubs.
And she also gravitated to the Ed Sullivan Show, the last vestige of Vaudeville.
That was really my only exposure to her.
I really didn't get her.
She seemed ponderous, pious, self-important, humorless, and imperious.
She sang, or talked-sang, about show business, or patriotism.
It all seemed pretty embarrassing.
Martin Short, in his new autobiography, talks about his character, Irving Cohen, the ancient Jewish songwriter,
as having been based on Sophie Tucker, whom he had only seen in similar contexts.
It was a parody.
He felt the same way about her as I did.
But there was another side to Sophie Tucker, one that I was not aware of until very recently.
There was an abundance of special material written for her when she was in Vaudeville.
Most of it was quite racy.
Most of it was quite hilarious.
Most, if not all of it, was performed by Ms. Tucker quite perfunctorally.
In that same heavy-handed style of hers.
It was, again, the wrong idea.
I learned this by seeking out her albums, which I found easily.
Why did I seek them out?
Because a couple of weeks ago, PBS aired a Michael Feinstein special, which featured other cabaret performers.
It took place at the refurbished Rainbow Room high atop 30 Rock.
Feinstein started talking about some of the stars who had played the Rainbow Room in the past.
And he mentioned Sophie Tucker.
This led to a segue for an introduction of June Squibb, the actress who was nominated for an Oscar last year as Bruce Dern's wife in "Nebraska". (She should have won.)
Feinstein told the audience that Tucker had all that special material written for her, and that Squibb would sing one of those songs that Tucker made popular long ago, "I'm Living Alone And I Like It".
Squibb, seated at a table, with drink in hand, launched into the song, and proceeded to blow the roof off the dump.
Perfect timing, perfect comedic attitude.
She was incredibly funny.
You can check this all out at PBS.org.
I think they are still showing it.
Anyway, this put an idea into my head.
I went to the Spotify website, where it seems they have every album ever recorded.
I found the Sophie Tucker album that contained "I'm Living Alone And I Like It".
It was abominably unfunny.
I then listened to many other cuts on that album.
All racy, all hilariously written, all not well-performed.
There is enough great material out there to make an entire for evening or two for a one-woman show for June Squibb to embody Sophie Tucker in a way that Sophie never deserved, but we as an audience very much do.
Either on Broadway, Off-Broadway, or in a Cabaret.
June Squibb is 83 years old now.
I don't know if she sat at that table, drink in hand because she has trouble walking or standing, but if that's the case, let her just sit there so you can drink her in.
Some enterprising producer is missing a major bet by not following through on this.
An evening with June Squibb as Sophie Tucker is very much the right idea.


********

My books ,"Show Runner" and it's sequel, "Show Runner Two", can be found at the Amazon Kindle Store.
Along with the newer ones, "The Man Is Dead", and "Report Cards".
You can search by typing in my name, Cindy Williams, Laverne and Shirley, The Odd Couple, or Happy Days.
Check them out.
You don't need a Kindle machine to download them.
Just get the free app from Kindle, and they can be downloaded to an IPhone, IPad, or Blackberry.
The paperbacks, "Mark Rothman's Essays" and my new novel, "I'm Not Garbo" are not e-books.
But they are available for people without Kindle.
I have many readings and signings lined up for those, and the thing about Kindle is you can't sign one.
If you'd like one of the paperbacks, personally autographed, contact me at macchus999@aol.com.
And now, we've got my reading of my "Laverne and Shirley Movie" screenplay on YouTube, and my 4-hour interview at the Television Academy's Emmy TV Legends Website.
Here's the link:
http://www.emmytvlegends.org/interviews/people/mark-rothman

*****

The Wrong Idea.

1939.
It was a heck of a year for movies.
Among most film critics and historians, it was regarded as the greatest year for the output of great movies.
Here is just a partial list:

The Rains Came
Dodge City
The Hunchback of Notre Dame
Gunga Din
The Women
Drums Along the Mohawk
Stanley and Livingstone
Union Pacific
Destry Rides Again
Jesse James
Dark Victory
Gone With the Wind
Goodbye, Mr. Chips
Love Affair
Mr. Smith Goes to Washington
Ninotchka
Of Mice and Men
Stagecoach
The Wizard of Oz
Wuthering Heights

It's pretty hard to argue about 1939 and movies.
I'll take it one step further.
To me, 1939 was the greatest year ever for recordings of popular music.
Again, a partial list:

"All or Nothing at All"
"An Apple For The Teacher"
"Are You Havin' Any Fun?"
"At the Woodchopper's Ball"
"Back In The Saddle Again"
"The Boys in the Back Room"
"Brazil"
"Comes Love"
"Darn That Dream"
"Day In, Day Out"
"Ding-Dong! The Witch Is Dead"
"Do I Love You?"
"Don't Worry 'Bout Me"
"Frenesi"
"Give it Back to the Indians"
"God Bless America"
"Good Morning"
"I Didn't Know What Time It Was"
"I Get Along Without You Very Well"
"I Like to Recognize the Tune"
"I Thought About You"
"I Went to a Marvelous Party"
"If I Didn't Care"
"If I Only Had a Brain"
"I'll Never Smile Again"
"In a Mellow Tone"
"In The Mood"
"It's A Big, Wide, Wonderful World"
"The Lady's In Love With You"
"Lydia, The Tattooed Lady"
"A Man And His Dream"
"Moonlight Serenade"
"Over The Rainbow"
"Pennsylvania 6-5000"
"Perfidia"
"South American Way"
"South Of The Border"
"Stairway To The Stars"
"Strange Fruit"
"Tuxedo Junction"
"Tain't What You Do"
"Tara's Theme"
"Too Romantic"
"Two O'Clock Jump"
"We'll Meet Again"
"Well, Did You Evah!"
"What's New?"
"When You Wish upon a Star"

Pretty impressive.
But not necessarily conclusive.
What makes it conclusive for me is a song that was recorded that year that most of you have never heard of, but now consider my favorite.
I never heard of it until about five years ago, when I stumbled across it accidentally.
It was never a hit.
It received virtually no airplay, at the time, or since.
And I have taken it upon myself to make some attempt to give it the kind of exposure it has always deserved.

Throughout the history of American Popular Music, there has been the hip and the unhip.
The great hip bandleader Artie Shaw referred to Bing Crosby as the first hip white man.
Before Crosby, there were already, Fats Waller, Cab Calloway, Jelly Roll Morton, and Louis Armstrong.
It was always very hard to be black and unhip.
For whites, it was very easy to be white and be Rudy Vallee, Russ Columbo, and Buddy Clark.
The early hip black bands, Duke Ellington, Count Basie, Chick Webb, and Jimmie Lunceford easily made way for hip white bands like Woody Herman, the above-mentioned Artie Shaw, Benny Goodman, Stan Kenton, and Charlie Barnet.
Even Glenn Miller, although scoffed by some as being too commercial, was not unhip.
Unhip was left for white bands such as Sammy Kaye, Guy Lombardo, Kay Kyser, and Lawrence Welk.
There was no excuse for these particular bands.
They made a mockery of music in general.
Thus, in 1939, Charlie Barnet's band made an all-out assault on those unhip white bands with his own form of mockery.
A recording was made called ""The Wrong Idea".
Sammy Kaye, upon hearing it on the radio, successfully went through a lot of arm-twisting to get it banned from the airwaves.
So the public awareness of "The Wrong Idea" was very short-lived.
But it can be found on YouTube by typing in "The Wrong Idea-Charlie Barnet"
If you listen to it, which I strongly recommend, you will hear a very sappy instrumental first chorus, after which the vocalist comes in.
It should be noted that the vocalist is Billy May, who was Charlie Barnet's trumpet player, and one of the great hipsters of all time.
He went on to become a great arranger.
He was Sinatra's go-to guy when he couldn't get Nelson Riddle, or when he wanted something a lot more swinging than Nelson could provide.
May arranged Sinatra's entire "Come Fly With Me" album in the fifties.
Probably the swingingest album Sinatra ever did.
May then wrote "Somewhere In The Night", which was the TV series Naked City's title song for about three years.
Until they got Nelson Riddle to write another one.
So go to YouTube and indulge yourself in a treat: "The Wrong Idea", by Charlie Barnet and Billy May.
And then, tell your friends.


********

My books ,"Show Runner" and it's sequel, "Show Runner Two", can be found at the Amazon Kindle Store.
Along with the newer ones, "The Man Is Dead", and "Report Cards".
You can search by typing in my name, Cindy Williams, Laverne and Shirley, The Odd Couple, or Happy Days.
Check them out.
You don't need a Kindle machine to download them.
Just get the free app from Kindle, and they can be downloaded to an IPhone, IPad, or Blackberry.
The paperbacks, "Mark Rothman's Essays" and my new novel, "I'm Not Garbo" are not e-books.
But they are available for people without Kindle.
I have many readings and signings lined up for those, and the thing about Kindle is you can't sign one.
If you'd like one of the paperbacks, personally autographed, contact me at macchus999@aol.com.
And now, we've got my reading of my "Laverne and Shirley Movie" screenplay on YouTube, and my 4-hour interview at the Television Academy's Emmy TV Legends Website.
Here's the link:
http://www.emmytvlegends.org/interviews/people/mark-rothman

*****

Television For And About Jews. Part Two.

The last article was a prelude to the fact that I found a network on my cable system called The Jewish Life Network, or JLN.
I'm very glad that it is there.
It has quite a few shows that I hadn't seen in many years.
The Soupy Sales Sales Show.
The Dinah Shore Chevy Show.
The Jack Benny Show.
The Original Goldbergs, with Gertrude Berg.
There is also a Jackie Mason Show, that he did in 2005, that was essentially a topical news show.
What does this all add up to?
For one, a whole lot of entertainment.
For another, a whole lot of pandering.
However widely it was known, all of the above names were and/or are Jewish.
Dinah, while she was busy advertising Chevrolets with the big tail fins, never advertised that she was Jewish.
But among the tribe, word leaked out, and I think that's why we are seeing grainy black-and-white kinescopes of her fifties/early sixties variety hour, which was originally shown in color.
Even so, you can tell that it was very well done.
And she could really sing in those days.
Not like when she had her afternoon talk show, when she kept making fried chicken and attempted to sing.
Her pipes were really shot by then.
She should have stuck to frying the chicken.
Yes, Soupy Sales was Jewish.
His real name was Milton Supman.
A lot of Jews know this, and that's probably why he appears twice a day on the JLN.
I have really loved watching Soupy recently, particularly the old black-and-white shows he did locally in New York in the mid-sixties.
The original Goldbergs, with it's sappy sentimentality, and predictable plots, usually involving misunderstandings, and jumping to the wrong conclusions, a la "Three's Company", is salvaged by superior dialogue writing.
Gertrude Berg, the muscle of the writing, really knew how to turn a phrase, usually a heavily accented Jewish one.
She was very much into what Garry Marshall referred to as "verbal spins".
Something I heavily engaged in when I worked for him.
"The Jackie Mason Show" was done in 2005, so it ain't exactly topical anymore.
And it was done when I still thought he was funny.
Hindsight has pretty much changed that.
I don't know how politically correct it would be today for Jack Benny, an obvious Jew, to do a character who was obviously so cheap.
But the JLN doesn't seem to mind.
And neither do I.
His show was wonderful.
Also at the risk of political incorrectness, let me state that the JLN embodies two of the worst qualities of my people: We are notorious braggarts and notorious beggars.
And the JLN thrives in both elements.
The braggadocio involves not only an air of superiority over other peoples, but also superiority amongst each other.
The JLN has Jewish celebrities, such as Jason Alexander, and Lainie Kazan, who I think is going on her fourth face-lift, making on-camera appearances extolling the virtues of this network.
Another is Mayim Bialek, from "Blossom", and "The Big Bang Theory".
The graphics under her picture read "Ph.D. and actress Mayim Bialek"
It's a way of saying to ourselves, and to the occasional Gentile tuning in, ""Not only is she a successful actress, but she's a doctor yet".
One of my father's weirder jokes was he'd ask you "What's a phudnik?
You'd say "I don't know."
He'd say "A nudnik with a Ph.D."
I guess on every level, even among nudniks, there was a pecking order.
As far as begging goes, there is no charity related to Israel that is not ponderously paid attention to during their commercials.
When I was a college age teenager, and my sister was a high school age teenager, living in an apartment building in Flushing, Queens, we would often see this ancient Hassidic Jew, with the long black coat, the black hat, and the full beard, right out of Central Casting, roaming the streets of our neighborhood, relentlessly begging for money.
On Jewish holidays, he got brave enough to go around ringing everybody's doorbell.
You'd open the door, he'd have his hand out, and with a pitiful look in his eyes, say ""Money for Yuntiff?"
"Yuntiff" actually meant "Yom Tov", which meant "the holiday".
It didn't matter which holiday.
Passover, Chanukah, Succoth, Simchas Torah, Rosh Hashanah, Tubishvat, Yom Kippur....
He was there outside your door, ready to say "Money for Yuntiff?"
I, having no money to spare, usually handled this by looking through the peephole, seeing it was him, and not opening the door.
Once or twice, getting caught unexpectedly, I opened the door, saw and heard "Money for Yuntiff?", and said "Wait right here."
And I went to get my sister. I said "Les, there's someone here to see you."
She then came to the door, and embarrassedly turned him away.
This worked twice.
I don't think she's ever forgiven me.
The Yuntiff guy then broadened his horizons.
He started working purely American holidays as well.
Memorial Day, Fourth of July (boy, did he look sweaty in that coat.), Labor Day....
Now, here it is, Veteran's Day, and I'm looking at the commercials on the JLN.
And all I can think of is "Money for Yuntiff?"


********

My books ,"Show Runner" and it's sequel, "Show Runner Two", can be found at the Amazon Kindle Store.
Along with the newer ones, "The Man Is Dead", and "Report Cards".
You can search by typing in my name, Cindy Williams, Laverne and Shirley, The Odd Couple, or Happy Days.
Check them out.
You don't need a Kindle machine to download them.
Just get the free app from Kindle, and they can be downloaded to an IPhone, IPad, or Blackberry.
The paperbacks, "Mark Rothman's Essays" and my new novel, "I'm Not Garbo" are not e-books.
But they are available for people without Kindle.
I have many readings and signings lined up for those, and the thing about Kindle is you can't sign one.
If you'd like one of the paperbacks, personally autographed, contact me at macchus999@aol.com.
And now, we've got my reading of my "Laverne and Shirley Movie" screenplay on YouTube, and my 4-hour interview at the Television Academy's Emmy TV Legends Website.
Here's the link:
http://www.emmytvlegends.org/interviews/people/mark-rothman

*****

Television For And About Jews.

It used to be, when I was growing up, that TV was much more for and about Jews than it is now.
That's because there hadn't yet been such a thing as a coaxial cable.
Before that, TV was geared pretty much for people in New York City who could afford TV sets.
You know.
Jews.
That's when Sid Caesar was lauded and dominated the airwaves.
Then, after the coaxial cable was laid, around 1958, people in Utah had TV sets, Lawrence Welk owned the airwaves, and Sid Caesar went on a twenty year drunk.
Catering to Jews then became non-existent.
The opposite held forth.
Networks shied away from Jews-in-front-of-the-cameras in droves.
Caesar, Phil Silvers, Milton Berle, Molly Goldberg, Jack Benny, Groucho Marx, George Burns, all gone.
All the Borscht Belt comedians gravitated to Ed Sullivan, where they never left until he did.
The was no Alan King Show, no Henny Youngman Show, and no Myron Cohen Show.
No, Sullivan was their only refuge.
So who did we have left?
Gleason. Irish.
Perry Como, Dean Martin, Italian.
Andy Williams, non-descript American.
Red Skelton, descript American.
Donny and Marie, Utah.
Sonny, Italian.
Cher, I didn't know what the hell she was, but I know it wasn't Jewish.
Jerry Lewis couldn't make a go of it on TV.
They didn't want Carl Reiner playing himself, so they got Dick Van Dyke.
Dinah Shore made every effort to hide the fact that she was Jewish, and got away with it for quite a while.
The Jews were all writers, and behind the cameras.
Oh, every once in a while, the networks got a little brave.
They gave Jackie Mason a sitcom.
Thirteen weeks, and out.
In 1976, there was a successful movie called "Next Stop, Greenwich Village", about a young Jewish boy breaking away from his parents to go share an apartment in the Village.
The following year, due to the aura surrounding me due to the success of "Laverne and Shirley", I was approached by CBS to surreptitiously adapt "Next Stop Greenwich Village" into a half-hour sitcom.
I was as surprised as anyone, knowing the history of such things.
But somebody managed to convince somebody of something, and pretty soon, a pilot for this idea was in the works.
And even more surprisingly, it sold.
We had Pat Carroll and Jack Kruschen as the parents, and a very young Adam Arkin as the breakaway son.
It was called "Busting Loose", and ran for a full season in 1977.
What was not surprising at all was that after about six weeks, CBS begged, yea pleaded for us to tone down the Jewishness.
Pat Carroll and Jack Kruschen were virtually written down, if not out, and the show became a slightly older gang comedy, on the order of "Happy Days", with not one mezuzah in sight.
I bring all this up because on my cable system here in Chicago, I have found a network that is blatantly bucking the trend:
The Jewish Life Network.
It is all, and I mean ALL things Jewish.
I will go into detail about it's programming next time.
Until then, shabat-shalom, everyone.


********

My books ,"Show Runner" and it's sequel, "Show Runner Two", can be found at the Amazon Kindle Store.
Along with the newer ones, "The Man Is Dead", and "Report Cards".
You can search by typing in my name, Cindy Williams, Laverne and Shirley, The Odd Couple, or Happy Days.
Check them out.
You don't need a Kindle machine to download them.
Just get the free app from Kindle, and they can be downloaded to an IPhone, IPad, or Blackberry.
The paperbacks, "Mark Rothman's Essays" and my new novel, "I'm Not Garbo" are not e-books.
But they are available for people without Kindle.
I have many readings and signings lined up for those, and the thing about Kindle is you can't sign one.
If you'd like one of the paperbacks, personally autographed, contact me at macchus999@aol.com.
And now, we've got my reading of my "Laverne and Shirley Movie" screenplay on YouTube, and my 4-hour interview at the Television Academy's Emmy TV Legends Website.
Here's the link:
http://www.emmytvlegends.org/interviews/people/mark-rothman

*****

We Will Be Amused.

I'm writing this the morning of election night.
As usual, I can't wait for events to transpire.
As Spencer Tracy said to his nephew, Jeffrey Hunter, in the 1958 movie, "The Last Hurrah", the greatest spectator sport in this country is politics.
I don't know if this is as true today as it was in 1958.
There are too many people today who don't even know that there is an election tonight.
So now, politics may have been surpassed by Pro Football.
Unfortunately, the major share of the population not aware of the elections are the ones most effected by the outcomes.
Particularly when it comes to the minimum wage and women's issues.
And if they are aware, they can easily be hornswoggled by the Republicans to vote against their own interests.
That people have become this dumb saddens me.
But it also amuses me.
Because none of these issues affect me personally.
I have no dog in any of these hunts.
Oh, I voted.
Also against my own interests.
Just trying to do what I thought was right.
But if my votes don't carry the day, my taxes will remain low, and I'll make out like a bandit.
And I will be amused.
The bullshit that is coming out of every candidate's mouth is highly amusing.
Everything that Chris Christie says and does is amusing and compelling.
Particularly his delusions that he is not in trouble, and is advancing himself.
That people support him for anything is amusing.
Oh, I have my villains in these races.
Scott Walker in Wisconsin, Rick Scott in Florida...
I'm sure if Scott Baio was running somewhere, I'd find a way to consider him a villain too, just on name value.
But if the Scott's win tonight, its just another example of "You can fool all the people all of the time"
And I will be amused.
This whole deal about voter suppression is very dismaying.
It represents the downfall of our democracy.
Which makes it highly amusing when we try to export democracy to other countries, and they say "What about your voter suppression?"
We don't live in the world of Frank Capra movies anymore, where the people rise up at the end and reclaim what is rightfully theirs.
Capra, always a staunch Republican, would probably be rolling over in his grave if he was able to see what has happened to his Party, fueled by the Koch Brothers' money.
This both saddens and amuses me.
It's not like Bush vs. Gore, where I was viscerally and emotionally involved in the outcome.
Justifiably so, as it turns out.
But it can't get any worse than that, so I remain somewhat dispassionate.
And amused.
The Democrats have been acting like wusses, abandoning Obama right and left, leaving him to twist in the wind.
We have been treated to the spectacle of Alison Lundergan-Grimes unable to admit that she voted for Obama.
Politically pointless and cowardly.
It probably will cost her any chance to beat Mitch McConnell.
The Republicans are likely to win the Senate, not that it would make much difference, unless they use it as platform to impeach Obama.
We already went through that with Clinton, and I can't think of anything that was more amusing than that.
And Clinton emerged heroically.
The Republicans won't do anything about climate change.
But I'll probably be long gone by the time the planet is killed off.
So I really don't see any downside to tonight's proceedings.
The difference between politics and Pro Football for me is that with football, I have to have a bet down to care and have a rooting interest.
With politics this year, and probably in the ongoing future, I just have to cozy up to the TV set, and let the curiosity factor take over.
Let the best man win.
Fat chance.

********

My books ,"Show Runner" and it's sequel, "Show Runner Two", can be found at the Amazon Kindle Store.
Along with the newer ones, "The Man Is Dead", and "Report Cards".
You can search by typing in my name, Cindy Williams, Laverne and Shirley, The Odd Couple, or Happy Days.
Check them out.
You don't need a Kindle machine to download them.
Just get the free app from Kindle, and they can be downloaded to an IPhone, IPad, or Blackberry.
The paperbacks, "Mark Rothman's Essays" and my new novel, "I'm Not Garbo" are not e-books.
But they are available for people without Kindle.
I have many readings and signings lined up for those, and the thing about Kindle is you can't sign one.
If you'd like one of the paperbacks, personally autographed, contact me at macchus999@aol.com.
And now, we've got my reading of my "Laverne and Shirley Movie" screenplay on YouTube, and my 4-hour interview at the Television Academy's Emmy TV Legends Website.
Here's the link:
http://www.emmytvlegends.org/interviews/people/mark-rothman

*****