television Archives - Page 32 of 43

My favorite JEOPARDY! week

With everyone at $0, it became the first tournament semifinal ever with no winner. Host Alex Trebek was gobsmacked by the outcome.

I’m a huge fan of the game show JEOPARDY!, which has been on, in its current iteration, since 1984. Seldom, though, have I enjoyed it as much as I did during the second week of the Teen Tournament this month. There are fifteen contestants in week one, whittled down to nine in week two. They play three games, only the winners of which go to the two-game final.

Game 1 of the semifinals was won by the aptly-named high school senior Barrett Block, who looked and sounded like Clark Kent. He had a large, but not an insurmountable lead, was the only one who got the final question correct, and won going away, $28,001 to $100 to $0.

Going into the final question on Game 2 of the semis, Kelton had $16,400, Joe $12,000, and Tori $1,600. Inexplicably, all three wagered everything on the last question, and all got it wrong as well. With everyone at $0, it became the first tournament semifinal ever with no winner. Host Alex Trebek was gobsmacked by the outcome.

It turns out that, with no winner in Game 2, the second-place player with the higher score in Games 1 or 3 would get into the final.

Going into the final of Game 3 of the semis, Emily Greenberg had $18,400, Nilai Sarda $16,200, Leonard Cooper (pictured) $15,200. Leonard bet $15,000; I assume he wanted to have $200 in case he was wrong, which was more than the 2nd place player in Game 1, but he got it right, and ended up with $30,200. Nilal bet $14,200, got it right, and ended with $30,400. Emily also got it right but bet a timid $6,000; she should have wagered $12,001 or more. So Nilal wins, and Leonard, improbably, is in the two-game finals.

Game 1 of the two-day final match:
Scores at the end of the Double Jeopardy! Round:
Nilai $16,400
Barrett $8,800
Leonard $10,000
Nilal and Barrett get right but Leonard gets wrong.

End of game:
Nilai $19,000
Barrett $17,600
Leonard $3,000

In Game 2 of the two-day final match: Leonard has a lead when he picks clue #24 of the Double JEOPRARDY! round:
Nilai $13,600
Barrett $8,200
Leonard $18,200
It’s the Daily Double, and Leonard bets $18,000! He gets it right.
Scores going into Final:
Nilai $14,600
Barrett $9,200
Leonard $37,000

The game ends this way. But as the commenters noted, if Nilal’s answer were correct, HE would have won, not Leonard. Still, it was all very exciting.
*** Speaking of competition, happy 50th birthday to basketball superstar Michael Jordan.

Are you an optimist or a pessimist? Bewitched and Ben Franklin

“Defensive pessimism” – that sounds about the right description of my philosophy.

I know some people who appear to be unrelentingly positive, seeing the 3/4s empty glass as 1/4 full. I appreciate those people, as long as they don’t seem to be wearing rose-colored glasses.

I was commenting on someone’s blog – more on that anon – and I was reminded of one of those peculiar childhood memories that, I believe, color my view of the world to this day.

It was an episode of the 1960s television program Bewitched, starring Elizabeth Montgomery.

I recall very little about the particulars, actually. Couldn’t tell you which Darrin was in it, Dick York or Dick Sargent. We had a black and white TV, so I couldn’t tell you if it was broadcast in color. Don’t even particularly remember the plot.

I DO know, though, that Benjamin Franklin appeared, for some reason. His character was offering up all sorts of aphorisms. One was that he always going through life expecting negative outcomes so that when something positive happened, he would be pleasantly surprised. It was a punchline that was supposed to be funny – the canned laughter told me that – but, to me, it made SENSE. (The exact quote from the show, according to here: “I’m more optimistic than pessimistic. Or perhaps I’m an optimistic pessimist — prepare for the worst, but when the very worst doesn’t happen, I’m pleasantly surprised.”)

Last month, in her V is for Visualization post, Meryl at Departing the Text wrote:

Studies suggest…that optimistic affirmations designed to lift one’s mood, often achieve the opposite effect.

…The Power of Negative Thinking essayist, Oliver Burkeman suggests that there is an alternative approach to help us find that sometimes elusive (holiday) cheer: “…both ancient philosophy and modern psychology suggest that darker thoughts can make us happier.”

According to Burkeman, Albert Ellis (a New York psychotherapist) rediscovered this key insight of the Stoic philosophers of ancient Greece and Rome: “the best way to address an uncertain future is to focus not on the best-case scenario but on the worst.”

Stoics called this worst-case scenario therapy “the premeditation of evils” and they believed that doing this would remove the anxiety “THE FUTURE” relayed. According to Burkeman, modern psychologist Julie Norem estimates that about one-third of Americans instinctively use this strategy which she terms “defensive pessimism.”

Burkeman further posits that: “The ultimate value of the ‘negative path’ may not be its role in facilitating upbeat emotions or even success. It is simply realism. The future really is uncertain, after all, and things really do go wrong as well as right. We are too often motivated by the craving to put an end to the inevitable surprises in our lives.”

“Defensive pessimism” – that sounds about the right description of my philosophy. On the other hand, I think that worrying is highly overrated.

This begs the question: was Ben Franklin portrayed accurately in a sitcom a half-century ago? This quote is attributed to him, according to several sources: “I’d rather be a pessimist because then I can only be pleasantly surprised.” So, kinda sorta, yeah.

Jack Klugman died on Serling Day Eve

In 1989, Jack Klugman underwent surgery again to remove the cancer, but this time his right vocal cord had to be removed as well. The surgery left him without the ability to speak…

My fondness for actor Jack Klugman, who died on Serling Day Eve, was quite great. He appeared in four different episodes of the classic television show The Twilight Zone, which I own on DVD. Watch a couple of minutes of In Praise of Pip.

I also possess, on DVD, the classic 1957 murder trial film 12 Angry Men, with a cast that was, or would become, name actors. Klugman was juror #5, the soft-spoken young man, who provides pivotal insight. Watch a brief clip.

Much later, using his fame as Quincy, the fictional medical examiner, the actor had a positive impact on the US legislative process dealing with so-called orphan diseases.

Of course, he was best known as Oscar Madison, the slob sportswriter half of TV’s underrated comedy, The Odd Couple, with Tony Randall as the fastidious photographer Felix Unger. The senior writer of the (Albany, NY) Times Union, Mark McGuire, has been both an entertainment writer and a sportswriter for the newspaper. One of his favorite segments involves them on the game show Password [watch].

McGuire wrote on his Facebook page: “… one of my favorite memories of being a TV columnist was having breakfast with Jack Klugman and Tony Randall at The Plaza maybe a dozen years ago. I later talked to Jack several times over the years, including the day Tony died. A few years ago I introduced Jack to the concept of ‘Odd Couple Day’… which he loved.” From the intro of the show: “On Nov. 13, Felix Unger was asked to remove himself from his place of residence. That request came from his wife. …” That intro came from ABC censors, as McGuire explained, “lest anyone thought they were gay.”

From the Oral Cancer Foundation website: “He was diagnosed with cancer of the larynx in 1974. With surgery and some treatment, he was able to continue acting without much interruption. But Klugman did not stop smoking, and as in many cases of continued tobacco use after treatment, the cancer came back. In 1989, he underwent surgery again to remove the cancer, but this time his right vocal cord had to be removed as well. The surgery left him without the ability to speak… His friends and loved ones helped him through the agonizing pain of the chemotherapy and surgery as well as the rehabilitation to recover his voice. After being silent for years, Klugman is now able to speak in a small raspy voice. He recently received the American Speech and Hearing Association’s International Media Award for his battle to regain his speech.”

It’s little wonder that there was, for about three years, a Church of Klugman.
***
Charles Durning, nominated twice for an Oscar nominee, dubbed the king of the character actors, was a war hero (Normandy, Battle of the Bulge) who didn’t even become an actor until he was 40. I saw him most regularly on the television program Evening Shade with Burt Reynolds, but he appeared in dozens of TV shows, often, but not always, as the heavy. I saw him in, among other movies, The Sting, Starting Over, and Tootsie. Never saw this scene from the Best Little Whorehouse in Texas, though. Charles Durning died at 89 on Christmas Eve.

V is for The Dick Van Dyke Show

The Dick Van Dyke Show was a critical success but hardly a ratings bonanza, mired in 80th place.

According to Vince Waldron’s book (pictured), which I read this past summer (I recommend it), when asked to play the part of comedy writer Sally Rogers on The Dick Van Dyke Show in 1961, longtime actress Rose Marie asked “What’s a Dick Van Dyke?” The 35-year-old actor had been a pantomimist, radio DJ, and local talk show host. He was even the anchor of the CBS Morning Show, but like many before and after him, that program was a failure, even with Walter Cronkite as his newsreader.

Whatever real success he had had up to that point was on Broadway in Bye Bye Birdie. Producer Sheldon Leonard caught the show and signed Van Dyke. Impressively, and fortunately for him, the actor was also a partner in the show’s production company, named Calvada for creator Carl Reiner, Leonard, Van Dyke, and financial backer Danny Thomas.

Carl Reiner, after he left working with TV skit show legend Sid Caesar in the mid-1950s, was offered a number of sitcoms; he said most were terrible. His wife Estelle said, “Why don’t you write something yourself?” So he did. Not satisfied with writing one script, he penned 13 as a bible for the show. He then starred in a pilot called Head of the Family, about a head comedy writer named Rob Petrie, a pair of co-workers and his wife and son, which failed to be picked up by the networks. Reiner thought his work was in vain until Leonard suggested that the big problem with the pilot was…the star.

The show was recast with Van Dyke, Rose Marie, and her suggestion of jokester Morey Amsterdam as writer Buddy Sorell. For his wife, that “girl with three names,” as Danny Thomas referred to Mary Tyler Moore was cast, after Thomas had rejected her for his own show, primarily over her too-perfect nose. Van Dyke was skeptical; she was a decade younger than he was and he wasn’t sure the audience would accept them as a couple.

The show was a critical success but hardly a ratings bonanza, mired in 80th place. I’ve read that the show survived due to the persuasive nature of producer Sheldon Leonard with potential sponsors, or that the wife of CBS honcho William Paley really liked the show. Maybe both were true. Also, fans seemed to find the show in the summer reruns.

In any case, the cast was surprised to be picked up for a second go-around. Between seasons, Van Dyke squeezed in making the film version of Bye Bye Birdie.

By the fourth episode of the second season, The Dick Van Dyke Show had made it to ninth place, in part because of a new time slot, right after the phenomenon that was The Beverly Hillbillies. That second season also had a new opening sequence replacing the photo montage. Rob Petrie comes into the living room and trips over an ottoman, deftly dances around it, or rarely, gets around it but stumbles; this opening became as legendary as the TV theme by Earle Hagan; here’s Dick Van Dyke and the Vantasticks singing the theme a couple of years ago.

Despite changing writers (which would include Garry Marshall, later of Happy Days fame) and directors, the show ran five successful seasons, the perfect blend of work and home life. It is one of only two complete series I own on DVD, the other being The Twilight Zone. Interestingly each show has someone from Binghamton, TZ host/creator Rod Serling, of course; and Richard Deacon, who played put-upon brother-in-law of Alan Brady/producer of his TV show, Mel Cooley. Reiner himself would have the occasional role of Brady.

Notable episodes in season 2 included the one I remember the best, What’s In A Middle Name, when young Ritchie Petrie (Larry Mathews) discovers why his middle name is Rosebud; and It May Look Like a Walnut, which involves Laura body surfing on a wave of walnuts, discussed in In Praise Of Laura Petrie’s… capri pants. Walnut was ranked at #8 on TV Guide’s 100 Greatest Episodes of All Time. After that season, Van Dyke costarred in the movie Mary Poppins with Julie Andrews.

One of the funniest episodes of the whole series was “That’s My Boy?”, the season opener for season three; the full script appears in the book The Dick Van Dyke Show: Anatomy of a Classic by Weissman and Sanders (1983). Also, read what Ken Levine wrote about the episode 100 Terrible Hours.

Hope you can watch all the shows here. I’m in the midst of rewatching them at home, but I’ve only gotten through the first six episodes of Season 1 plus Head of the Family.

Dick Van Dyke went on to do other television (notably Diagnosis: Murder, with his son Barry) and movies, but the Dick Van Dyke Show is certainly a highlight in his long career, in which he has received a Tony, a Grammy, and five Emmys. He will receive the Screen Actors Guild’s Life Achievement Award on January 27, 2013. Van Dyke is the artist of the cast drawing above, which appears in the DVDS DVD set.

ABC Wednesday – Round 11

U is for UHF

UHF managed to stick, in no small part because of the All-Channel Receiver Act in the early 1960s, requiring UHF capacity on TVs.

While researching a book about local television that I will almost certainly never write, I discovered that, after World War II, there was a great demand for having local television stations in the United States. TV in those days was limited to what was called VHF (very high frequency) of channels 1 to 13; eventually, channel 1 was reassigned. But with only 12 individual choices of TV stations, there were, inevitably, issues of station signals interfering with other broadcasts.

By 1949, there were just over 100 local stations in the country. While some large cities, such as New York and Los Angeles had four or more stations, other places had only one or two, and some places such as Denver, CO and Austin, TX had none.

So the Federal Communications Commission, the government body in charge of these things, instituted was called the Freeze of 1948, with over 700 applications waiting to be addressed, and only some already in the pipeline getting approved. The freeze was only supposed to have lasted a few months; it ended up taking four years.

By this time, the FCC had offered the stations the opportunity to broadcast on a different set of frequencies known as UHF, ultra high frequency, initially channels 14 through 83. There was only one little problem; most sets were not designed to access the UHF signal! As in any hardware/software balance issues of today, TV manufacturers didn’t want to make sets with UHF capacity unless there were enough stations broadcasting in UHF. And broadcasters didn’t want to invest in a UHF station unless there were enough sets that could air their signal.

There was one workaround: buying a converter. But would people pay for a device to get greater television access when they had been getting it for free? Eventually, UHF managed to stick, in no small part because of the All-Channel Receiver Act (ACRA) in the early 1960s, requiring UHF capacity on TVs. Unfortunately, before that happened, a wager by the Dumont network on the UHF technology eventually led to the network’s demise.

UHF was also clunky, even after the passage of the ACRA. While the set would click to each station between 2 and 13, the UHF dial was like a radio dial of that era, and tuning it to a given setting was a sometimes thing. This meant that getting an outside antenna was pretty much imperative.

Since UHF was less than prime viewing, stations on that end of the dial often broadcast old movies or other inexpensive productions. That was, more or less, the premise of the 1989 movie UHF, starring ‘Weird Al’ Yankovic. You can read the reviews and see the trailer and, at least for the time being, watch the whole movie.

One of the great successes of a UHF station was when entrepreneur Ted Turner bought the struggling television station in Atlanta on Channel 17 and eventually turned it into cable network TBS.

Of course, nowadays, people often DO pay for TV via cable, a dish, or other technologies. TV stations are broadcast digitally, so a given station can have 2 or more different signals. The technology is SO much sophisticated now.

ABC Wednesday – Round 11