CJMiller starts us off.
What was your 9-5 job after radio? I don't remember you ever talking about it.
In 1975 I got a job teaching radio at the KIIS Broadcasting Workshop on the Sunset Strip. This was one of those diploma mills — not that an actual degree in broadcasting was a gateway to anything.
The school's big lure, which was pretty ingenious, was that the students could actually go on the air on KIIS-AM from 2-4 AM. The station made way more money with this arrangement than if they had sold the time to sponsors, and the school had a perk no other broadcasting academy had. Talk about OJT.
The Workshop also provided assistance in making an audition tape and getting that elusive first job.
I will say this, we had some pretty impressive people on the faculty. Art Hannes, who had been the announcer on THE ED SULLIVAN SHOW and was the original announcer on Orson Welles’ “War of the Worlds.” Also Gene Taylor, who had been a jock and then General Manager of WLS Chicago when they went rock n’ roll. Lee Marshall, whose booming voice was heard on CKLW, KHJ, and KABC among others. He also became the voice of World Federation Wrestling and then the voice of Tony the Tiger. Gary Theroux was also there. He wrote the syndicated “History of Rock n’ Roll and has done major market radio as well.
For me, the attraction was 9-5, Monday-Friday and that’s it. It was my “survival job” as it’s now called. My “real” job was writing spec scripts nights and weekends with David Isaacs and trying to break into the business.
Brian Phillips asks:
Do show "bibles" still exist? What were some of the good ones that you have seen?
Some shows might still have internal bibles, but I’m guessing not many. Now that we have the internet, episode guides and loglines are readily available.
MASH used to have a great one. Each episode received a full page with a detailed description of what happened in the episode. It was very helpful when we were trying to come up with stories to pitch. We knew what had already been done.
None of the other shows I worked on ever had a bible.
From Kendall Rivers:
Now, I'm sure you've already been asked this at least a few times but I'm still gonna ask. About Alan Arbus' Sydney Freedman being such a beloved and popular character, do you know why he was never made a regular? You would think that what he brought to the show and how well he fit in with the cast that he would've eventually become a regular and frankly more Sydney could only have helped the show, especially its last few years.
We didn’t want his character to wear out his welcome. We wanted audiences to be delighted when he made appearances, which was usually a couple of times a season. Same with Colonel Flagg. We made a point to use him only once a season. We just didn’t want to go to that well too often. He was very funny but the character was so extreme that a little went a long way.
There are some characters that are great if used in small doses. Another was Harriett Harris as Frasier’s agent, “Bebe.”
I’m not a TV historian, but I imagine it might go back to Hans Conried as “Uncle Tonoose” on THE DANNY THOMAS SHOW. It was always a special treat when he appeared, but those appearances were doled out very carefully. (And now I feel 100 years old. Anyone else remember Uncle Tonoose? See the photo at the top of this post.)
DyHrdMET closes it out for the year.
I follow a few YouTube channels that post old games for viewing/listening (some are TV broadcasts, some are radio broadcasts). Do you know if any of your broadcasts are available for public consumption?
I also follow a channel which posts some old radio commercials and bumpers, etc. Do you know if your anything from your radio DJ days is on the internet?
To my knowledge, none of my baseball games are online. If someone finds one, please let me know. There are airchecks of my disc jockey days as Beaver Cleaver and later, Ken Levine on several radio aircheck websites like reelradio.com. Consult your local Google.
Happy New Year. Be safe tonight.
37 comments :
WWE and Tony the Tiger is some resume! Ken, I wish you and yours a Happy New Year (hey, we can hope). Thanks, as always, for writing this blog.
Another favorite recurring character was Jerry Van Dyke’s appearances as Rob’s brother Stacy Petrie on the Dock Van Dyke show. If I recall correctly, he was only on three episodes and one of those was a two-parter. It would have been a treat to see more of him.
Happy New Year to all!
“Uncle Tonoose is coming to dinner” was one of many lines that got Danny to do his famous spit-take. Happy New Year to you and your family.
Regarding Sydney Freeman, I thought he basically served the same purpose as Father Mulcahy, and if William Christopher had left the series, it would then have made sense to bring Sydney in as a regular.
I remember Hans Conried as Uncle Tonoose and always wanted more of him. I haven't seen any episodes of The Danny Thomas Show since they aired so I have no idea if they were as good as they seemed at the time. The only exception was the episode that introduced Sheriff Andy Taylor.
Off topic:
For what it's worth, I did recognize Uncle Tonoose, and even remembered the name, although just barely. But after reading your post it got me thinking about that name: "Tonoose" isn't "Bill" or "Jim." It seems pretty likely that character is based on real-life relatives of Danny Thomas, and the name reflects his Lebanese roots. According to Wikipedia Danny Thomas's birth name was Amos Muzyad Yaqoob Kairouz. There were thousands of Maronite Christians from Lebanon who immigrated to the US in the first part of the last century, so I assume his family was Maronite, not Muslim. But it's hard to imagine that he'd be allowed to have a career today with that background. Dr Oz, probably the most famous Muslim in Amercia, keeps extremely quiet about it, and is upset when journalists refer to him by his real name, Mehmet. I've got no grand point here, really, except that things suck a lot these days. But we already knew that.
You don't have to be old and creaky to know Uncle Tonoose. "Make Room for Daddy" has been kicking around quite a bit in recent years on channels like Me-TV, COSI and Hulu. I also recently bought the series of "Fractured Flickers" hosted by Hans Conreid on DVD.
I did a quick search on YouTube, and didn't find any actual play-by-play, but did see where you were briefly shown and mentioned to all of Canada because you were working with Ken Griffey, Sr in 1992.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=MIa074SVfLc&t=2778s&ab_channel=michael681999
And I sent you the other day the feature about you on Major League Baseball magazine from 1991.
And this one, your demo reel. I think it's from one of your YouTube accounts.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=K2_TZ11KApc&ab_channel=byKenLevine
...Marjorie Lord was HOT in the opinion of this little kid back then.
Friday Question: Ken, when you receive a royalty check what details are provided? Does it tell you which episode it is for and where/when it aired? Happy new year!
"Bewtiched" did that very well with Paul Lynde as "Uncle Arthur". Those were great episodes you looked forward to.
"Bewtiched" did that very well with Paul Lynde as "Uncle Arthur". Those were great episodes you looked forward to.
I liked Maurice. He was always making thunder and explosions.
Ma Clavin was an example of a judiciously used recurring character, always leaving you wanting more.
It was something they did well on Seinfeld, too.
Uncle Tonoose! Of course! And then Hans Conreid hosted "Fractured Flickers" out of Jay Ward's shop (and voiced Captain Hook in the Disney Peter Pan. I loved Conreid - he was 100% committed to his character and had perfect comic timing....kind of like the great Frank Nelson, the floorwalker on the Jack Benny Show. ("Hello, Bright Eyes!")
Hans Conried was a genius. His energy was Danny Thomas times five, so yeah. Sporadic appearances worked best.
Actually, this probably goes back to Jack Benny. The side-characters on his radio show were spaced out so that having them pop up was a surprise. The Racetrack Tout (Sheldon Leonard), the Rude Floorwalker/Waiter/Ticketseller (Frank Nelson), Sy (si!) (Mel Blanc) and a BUNCH of others - even the most popular ones were used maybe once every two months. Benny wanted to diversify.
Benny was playing golf with Jack Pearl (Baron Munchausen on radio), whose catchphrase was "Vas you dere, Charlie?" And that was pretty much it. Benny gently suggested developing other bits and giving "Vas you dere, Charlie?" a rest, so that when it would came back it would get a bigger laugh. Pearl said, "I can't do that. My audience expects it." Benny shrugged. About three years later, Pearl's career was dead.
HAPPY NEW YEAR nearly everyone.
A You Tube search for Ken Levine baseball announcer does bring up the demo tape which Ken has posted to this blog. Maybe that could be reposted soon. There are also other clips with him doing interviews plus a Zoom reading of "Going, Going, Gone."
There is also this gem, a September 1934 broadcast of the game between the Yankees and Tigers at what was then known as Navin Field (Tiger Stadium) in Detroit. It is the second oldest broadcast of baseball to exist.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=8jGPNgYzElk
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OT: In the wake of John Madden's death this week, I feel that I should post this. It is an SNL clip of "John Madden" in the Cincinnati Bengals locker room following their loss in Super Bowl 16. A fair warning, it is a bit gruesome.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=fhVJou5ueNg
Happy New Year, Ken! (And commenters too.) Thank you for making not just one, but two crappy years in a row, so much more bearable.
Count me in as one of the many of your fans who do remember Uncle Tonoose vividly. I also remember the wondrous Jean Hagen (denied her rightful Oscar for "Singin' in the Rain") as Danny's 'first wife,' replaced by the lovely and talented Marjorie Lord. Agree that vivid supporting characters like MASH's Colonel Flagg needed to be used judiciously.
Gee, I wonder what "Family Matters" would have been like if they hadn't thrown the show to Urkel? Maybe less successful commercially, but I would have kept watching it.
estiv, things may suck a lot but Kathy Najimy and Tony Shalhoub have done all right without having to conceal their Lebanese heritage.
I see Hans Conried all the time in old movies. He was also the voice of Snidely Whiplash in "Dudley Do-Right."
Let's meet here again in a year's time and see if the fever has broken. Be well and safe.
I will always stop and watch a Harriet Harris "Bebe" episode, and a Penny and Stephen episode of As Time Goes By, but as much as I loved Howard Morris, i hated Ernest T. Bass and the Darlings, too.
RIP, 2021 (2021-2021) Good riddance.
Hans Conried voiced Hook AND Mr. Darling in "Peter Pan" -- a nod to the stage tradition of using the same actor in both roles. In the animated featurette "Ben and Me" he voices an agitated Tom Jefferson.
He also appears as a hammy Magic Mirror in "One Hour in Wonderland", a 1950 Walt Disney television special (a nifty bonus feature on the two-disc DVD of the animated "Alice in Wonderland"). He reprised the character a few times on the Disneyland TV series.
Despite his all-purpose accent in most of his on-camera roles, Conried was in fact American born and bred. He crops up in a few of the early Falcon detective movies with an unexpected New York voice.
Hans Conried (1917-1982) and Betty White (1922-2021)
March Game ‘77
She was no stranger to game shows; her late husband hosted Password
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=JtAgiFNmOzs
More Hans Conried. I started listening to radio's "Suspense"; I was a director/transcriber for an old time radio troupe. What I discovered from binge listening was that there was a period in the mid-forties when Conried was on every single week. Sometimes in bit parts, sometimes as second-leads. His most unusual voice was a stumblebum ex-boxer/landlord in an adaptation of Raymond Chandler's "Pearls are a Nuisance." His largest role was probably as a suave, sleazy villain opposite Orson Welles in "The Dark Tower."
Happy New Year, Ken.
I was too young for the KIIS workshop, but I did attempt the Columbia School of Broadcasting. ("Not affiliated with CBS Incorporated") I never finished the program. I'm not sure if it would have done me any good in the long run. My broadcasting classes in college were much more beneficial. Plus, people I worked with used to make fun of C.B.S. graduates.
Maybe I have my terms mixed up, but I thought a show "bible" was the guide that listed the characters traits, backstories and/or show situations so the writers could keep everything consistent. For example, HAWKEYE is from Maine. So a writer must not say he was from Florida. Although, in one of the early episodes of "M*A*S*H" HAWKEYE mentioned a sister that was never brought up again.
"Sideshow Bob" on "The Simpsons" was a character that I felt was a little over used since he was essentially doing the same thing every time. Ironically when he wasn't trying to kill BART, I thought then what's the point? I stopped watching "The Simpsons" years ago. So I have no idea how many times he's been on to date, but I'm sure it is too many.
Breaking News: As I write this I heard that Betty White has died. I can't remember a time when I didn't see her on television in one thing or another. R.I.P.
M.B.
Our Arab-American family loved Uncle Tonoose because all of us had an uncle somewhere like him.
I'm not 100% sure if it's true, but what I read somewhere is that Allan Arbus was offered the chance to be a M*A*S*H regular after Gary Burghoff left, but he declined.
Your suggestion makes more sense though.
Yes, Danny Thomas was a Maronite Christian. He was from Toledo, where we have a large community of Middle Eastern Christans. And he was known for being religious; I think it was Bob Hope who joked that Danny drove a car with stained glass windows.
I went to a broadcast school here in Ohio mid 70s. At the time it was just under $2,000 [They've changed names two or three times and I think it's up to over $20,000 now.]
Friend took it a few years ago [paid $14,000] and only job he got was as an unpaid intern board op at a local talk station. Soon as he graduated, *BOOM*, fired, so they wouldn't have to pay him and just got another unpaid intern. He never was able to get a paid job in radio. When I went there they "placed" people at stations in towns so small that they would make BumFuck, Egypt like like NYC. I think they were paid in chickens, gophers and hamsters. I basically said "No thank you" and struck out on my own and did just OK.
They hired a few of the big name DJs in town who sometimes were between gigs and became "passing acquaintances". Most of them said they just took it for the extra cash and didn't give a shit if any of their students passed or not. Most of them they hoped didn't cause they were afraid that they'd take THEIR next job they were trying to line up.
Have no idea why anyone would fork over that amount of money now for jobs that are basically non-existent nowadays.
Do you feel like straight to series orders leads to a structure that is worse at hooking in viewers? I watch a lot of first episodes, and I try to decide based on that first episode if I'm going to invest my time in a show, but that's getting increasingly difficult.
I'm sure the pilot process has many flaws, but the incentives it creates mean you guys are making a first episode that's a pitch for why the suits should spend money on the rest of the season. And if that works on the suits and makes it to air, it should work just as well as a pitch for why the audience should spend time on the rest of the season.
With a non-pilot episode, it's often all prologue. I feel like it makes sense when they're looking at a whole season to think that the first part goes in the first episode, but the result is that the inciting incident for the rest of the series is often the cliffhanger at the end of the first episode, and people's reactions to that incident will be what the show actually is, so I'm left to decide if I want to watch another episode just to find out what this show's even about.
Someone gets murdered at the end, and I still don't know if this is going to be a whodunnit, a heavy drama about grief, or for all I know a wacky comedy about clumsy coroners slipping on spleens like banana peels.
I feel like I'm trying to judge a book by its cover, but with a million streaming services putting out a new series every other day, I can't watch a whole season of everything that looks like it might be interesting.
Watching Danny Thomas' show it was always a delight to see Hans Conreid as Uncle Tonoose. I remember him saying, "Uncle Tonoose, strong like bull!" I agree, if he was a regular on the series, it might take away from the fun of seeing him appearing so often.
Uncle Tonoose: "Stronng like bool.”
Just the best.
Danny Thomas (1912-1991) was five years older than his TV uncle, Hans Conried (1917-1982)
Here's my Friday Question:Every once in a while, a TV series will end on a season cliffhanger which is picked right up with the start of the following season. The example foremost in my mind is the end of Season 7 and start of Season 8 of Frasier dealing with Daphne's wedding.
Do they film both parts at the same time to make sure everything matches up (people as well as sets), or do they have to be filmed at separate times because they count as separate episodes and would involve paying more otherwise? That case in particular must have been tricky because Jane Leeves was pregnant when they started the new season.
Hans Conreid played a shifty junk dealer on I Love Lucy and he was hilarious. I seem to recall that he was friends with Lucille Ball from working with her on films. He was a brusque head waiter (uncredited but memorable) in The Big Street, which seems to have been misrepresented in Being the Ricardos as a failure for Lucy. Actually she got excellent reviews for her gritty performance as the lame showgirl and Damon Runyon himself picked her for the part. It's an amazing film though rarely seen now. He also had a showy bit as Francois, a waiter mixing a salad, in On the Town. The highlights of Ball's film career before ILL are often overlooked. She was excellent in Without Love with Katharine Hepburn and Spencer Tracy and Dance, Girl, Dance.
@ Matthew K
I think Hans Conreid was picked for the part of the uncle because their hair looked different. Also, William Frawley wasn't available because he was still playing Fred Mertz on I Love Lucy. Recall that Danny Thomas and his TV family did make an appearance on a Lucy Show. It was the one hour version of ILL titled "Lucy Makes Room for Danny."
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