Here’s some info on the new grabs that will be showing up in the coming week. On the ephemeral front, we’ve got two classic Bell Science films courtesy of the AV Geeks archive. Both films are hosted by Dr. Frank Baxter, who you may know better as the odd gesturing fellow from the start of Mole People (MST 803). The first one is The Alphabet Conspiracy which features Hans Conried as the Mad Hatter and animation by Friz Freleng. (The first half of this film already ran in the wee hours of this morning).
The second one is Gateways to the Mind, with animation by Chuck Jones. It also features 10 seconds of clown footage so disturbing that every time I tried to save it to send to YouTube, my editor crashed. [Update 1/4/8: I was finally able to upload it. Do not view with your eyes open.] Since these each weighed in at around 50 minutes to begin with and produced so many grabs they’d have run for at least twice that, I’ve actually split them up into two parts each, that will run separately. But I’ve also added both films to the catalog, so you can request showings in their entirety via the links above.
On the “IS Playhouse” front, the big addition is that after adding the soon to run “Escape to Ponderosa” (Bonanza episode 35), I’ve run out of new Bonanzas to add to the rotation for the moment. So, I’ve taken this occasion to double its presence by dumping seven episodes that haven’t been capped in a while into the playhouse rotation. I’ve tried to trim most of these to a more reasonable number of grabs than on previous runs, which should hopefully make the Bonanza haters out there a little happier about the addition. My impression is that maybe 25% of you really enjoy capping this show, another 25% don’t enjoy it, and the rest of you are just happy to be here (to coin a phrase).
The episodes I’ve just put back into play include appearances from Leonard Nimoy, Ricardo Montalban, and Jack Elam. The “new” episode, Escape to Ponderosa features a fine performance by Joe Maross, who appeared in over 100 TV shows and movies during the course of his career. However, if he’s remembered by anybody under the age of 40 or so (particularly msties) it’s usually for just one of those roles, particularly one line, on The Twilight Zone. He’s the guy who said “I’m the god!” in The Little People (episode 93). Anyway, my aim is to keep Bonanza at around its present level of 5% of the Playhouse grabs by dumping episodes back into rotation as I add new grabs from other sources. Of course, that means it will probably take another year or so to get the 10 episodes I have laying fallow on my HD back into the mix, so I may have to run them for Lorne’s birthday or add them to the request catalog, even if nobody’s going to request them.
If I might backtrack to the subject of Hans Conried for a moment, I’ll point out that by coincidence I ended up watching Peter Pan (with features two of his more famous roles) last night for the first time that I can concretely remember. Well, in as much as you can say you watched a movie when your four year old niece was asking to know why almost every plot point happened. She finally seemed satisfied when I explained “because Captain Hook’s a bitter old bastard, Peter’s an emotionally stunted freak, Tink is a catty b, and Wendy’s getting ready to unleash all sorts of hormones on her body.” At least, she stopped asking me questions after that.
December 2nd, 2006 at 3:25 pm
As to Peter Pan, that’s about how I remember it from when I saw it at about 8 years old – typical Disney, the ‘happy ending’ is about the only upbeat part, the rest is kind of excruciating if occasionally risible.
Oh, you failed to explain the crocodile: He has good taste, and wants to be given a hand. ha ha
Or, He’s a man-eater, not just a hand-eater. Cpn Cook is unfinished business for him.