A couple days ago, I saw an ad on TNT about a new, upcoming series that will be premiering on the channel in two months, on May 31, called Snowpiercer.  It looks uncommon for a TV show, a dystopian story set on board a train.  The iMDB describes its plot as, "Set over seven years after the world has become a frozen wasteland, Snowpiercer centers on the remnants of humanity, who inhabit a gigantic, perpetually-moving train that circles the globe."  The series stars Jennifer Connelly, who won an Oscar as Best Supporting Actress for A Beautiful Mind, and Daveed Diggs who won a Best Supporting Actor Tony Award for the musical Hamilton.. 

There's a point to all this.  Bear with me.  Here's the trailer.
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As I said, it's unique for a TV series.  And a good trailer.  Except for one thing.  For some surprising reason, they chose not to add this line --

"Based on the movie, Snowpiercer, directed and co-written by Bong Joon Ho, creator of the Oscar-winning Best Picture, Parasite."

Really.

The movie Snowpiercer is absolutely terrific, a dazzling, tour-de-force 2013 film that won 33 international awards.  Why on earth they don't mention the TV series' connection to this year's Oscar-winner is beyond me.  Perhaps because it's on a foreign film, but I doubt that because countless TV series have been based on movies -- and few (if any) based on Oscar-winning Best Pictures.  Maybe because the original source is a French graphic novel and they only bought the rights to that -- though I find it hard to believe that they wouldn't buy up all the rights.

By the way, although a Korean movie, it was in English for its international release and had an impressive cast, including Chris Evans (from Captain America and the Avengers movies), Tilda Swinton (Oscar-winner for Michael Clayton). Jamie Bell (who played Elton John's songwriting partner Bernie Taupin in Rocketman), John Hurt (two Oscar nominations for The Elephant Man and Midnight Express), three-time Oscar nominee Octavia Spencer,(who won for The Help). and Ed Harris from The Truman Show, Apollo 13 and Oscar-nominated for Pollock.  Even one of my faves, the wonderful Allison Pill (from HBO's The Newsroom and currently Star Trek: Picard and Devs) has a small role.

The iMDB description of the film is "In a future where a failed climate-change experiment has killed all life except for the lucky few who boarded the Snowpiercer, a train that travels around the globe, a new class system emerges."  In fact, like Bong Joon Ho's Parasite, the film has a strong class warfare center -- with a heavy emphasis on the warfare.

Here's the trailer of the original movie.  It doesn't do the film justice, but you'll get a good idea.  And it's highly recommended.  And yes, the movie is included on my list of train movies that I post every National Train Day.

Thanks to a heads-up from Eric Boardman, he let me know about a remarkable collection of videos on YouTube from a fellow named Don Giller.  Over the decades, Giller recorded pretty much all the episodes of Late Night with David Letterman, and has uploaded about 1,200 clips, comprising full shows, individual appearances, musical numbers and collections that's he's cataloged.  I have to believe they're authorized because you don't hide 1,200 video clips.

It's a remarkable archive of TV and cultural history, and I'm going to post a bunch of them.  We'll see how long this goes on.  

To start with, we'll go with a full show from 1984, this is their 2nd Anniversary Special, since the conglomeration not only gives a wonderful look at the show in its earliest year (after all, being the 2nd anniversary, that means all the clips come from the first season), but also provides a good idea of the talent and lunacy to come.

Almost six years ago, I wrote on my website here about a little-known, limited British “fake documentary” comedy series on BBC America, Almost Royal, that starred a young guy, Ed Gamble, and young woman, Amy Hoggart.  Both were hilarious and excellent, but Ms. Hoggart most-especially blew me away.  (The premise of Almost Royal was that these two -- Poppy and Georgie Carlton -- were supposedly very, very distant members of the royal family who were a bit spoiled and touring America, and the show was about their interaction with real Americans.  It didn’t all work – they fine-tuned things for a second season, but made it worse – but when it was good, it was drop-on-the-floor hilarious.  And the two leads were brilliant.  Most everything they did was ad-libbed)
 
I particularly wrote about the diminutive Amy Hoggart and tracked down some of her comedy work online.  She’s absolutely beautiful – if anyone ever makes a project with Isla Fisher, they should hire Amy as her younger sister.  But also whip-smart, wildly funny and willing to go out on a limb and make herself as rude, obnoxious and offensive to audiences as possible, though with a sort of innocence and sweetness.  Sort of like in the spirit of Andy Kauffman.  And not something you expect from a beautiful woman, often putting herself in the worst light possible.  In her comedy work she has several character, one of whom is 'Pattie Brewster,' who  has written a book on happiness, but admits to "straddling the line between small and creepy."
 
My favorite ad-lib of hers was during an episode of Almost Royal in Washington, D.C. where a political consultant is giving her "brother" tips on running for the town council back in England.  He tells the Georgie that “You have to make it about the people you’re talking to.  This is about you, it isn’t about me.  It’s about you.  It’s all about you.  It’s about you.”  Amy (as Poppy) interrupts and in her snooty, serious, but utterly dry, matter-of-fact way says, “Yes, that’s what I tell all my ex-boyfriends whenever I break up with them.  It isn’t about me.  It’s about you.”
 
My second favorite line of hers comes when they’re with a fast-talking wrestling promoter.  He’s talking himself up, and explaining all his hard work.  And in sort of a snarky, self-righteous way says to these effetes, “You know about hard work, don’t you??”  The “brother” Georgie says, “Yes” – but Hoggart jumps in and instead says, “No.”  The young promoter is stunned, and scathingly and pointedly snarls, “Well, then, how do you earn a living??!”  She looks at him and in as drippingly mundane and snobby way possible answers, “We’re very rich.”
 
The funniest episode was probably one where they hear about a “tea party” and being British love the idea of tea and get invited as royal guests to give a talk.  But it turns out to be a meeting of “the Tea Party.”  Obviously, the show and leads know that, but they act as if they’re clueless in their dealings with everyone and with the speech that Georgie has been invited to give -- which goes on endlessly about his school pals and playing cricket -- that are gut-wrenchingly funny and annoying the bejeepers out of the Tea Party people there.
 
Anyway, I wrote about the show social media, as well, and heard back very appreciatively -- and hilariously-- from both Hoggart and Gamble.  (I'd tweeted that the leads were both smart and funny.  She wrote back that it was the first time she'd been called smart.  He wrote back that it was the first time he'd been called funny.)  I even exchanged a few private Direct Messages with Hoggart, and noted she should be on The Daily Show, which she said would be a dream.  (I don't think she had any idea that I worked in Hollywood and seriously meant it.).
 
But I did seriously mean it.  Someone this funny and this talented and this beautiful should succeed.  But having an unexpectedly edgy personna can be a hurdle.  A couple years passed, but then I had an idea.  I have a friend who had been a writer on The Daily Show for a long time, and then amicably parted ways to work with Conan O’Brien.  I wanted to give him time between the two shows before broaching the subject, which is why I didn't press the matter, but eventually got together with him for lunch.  I knew he still had friends with The Daily Show and pitched him the idea of Amy Hoggart as a correspondent, since she would have been perfect with her sardonic humor and skill ad-libbing.  He was intrigued and thought he’d be willing to do that.  But then a thought occurred to him – didn’t he just see her as a correspondent on Samantha Bee’s show Full Frontal a few weeks back?  Yes, I said, she was on it periodically, maybe once every six weeks or so, not much.  But because she was on at all, and because Samantha Bee came from The Daily Show, too, and they were all part of the “family,” my friend thought it would be too awkward pitching her.  I understood completely – but it was a shame, since that would have been daily.  Ah, well.
 
Time passed.  That was about two years ago.  Which finally brings us to today and the point.
 
The other day, I just saw an ad for a new show starting next week, It's Personal with Amy Hoggart, which is produced by Samantha Bee.  So – Huzzah!!  (I have this odd skill of recommending relatively unknown performers to friends for projects they're casting, who often later become really big stars, or at the very least successful.  The list is bizarrely long.)
 
The show seems perfect for her, though we’ll have to see if audience’s like it.  Apparently, she helps people with issues “despite having no qualifications at all.”  And the trailer shows her putting herself in the most annoying and stupid light.  Audiences will either love that and find it totally endearing -- or think she's...well, small and creepy.
 
Here is the 90-second trailer, so you’ll get to see her and see what I mean.

(By the way, she tells a knock-knock joke in it that at first I had absolutely no idea of the joke – which, being Amy, Hoggart is sort of her point -- telling a joke that makes her look idiotic.  But as I thought and thought, I finally figured it out, and it’s hilarious – as a joke and for its stupidity.)

When I went to UCLA for grad school, I knew it had one of the country's best film and TV archive for a university, though it was difficult for the public to get access to.  It was pretty much only available for academic research, which included students -- and happily I qualified for that.  I didn't access it much, I think I only went to watch two things there, but they were gems.  

They had a full collection of the classic Hallmark Hall of Fame series, and I watched two of them.  One was the emotional drama A Storm in Summer, written by, of all people, Rod Serling, which won  an Emmy as Best Actor for Peter Ustinov, which isn't shabby considering his competition that year included Sir Laurence Olivier.  (I wrote here about the time years latter when I worked with Ustinov and had a wonderful experience related to discussing this production.)  It had originally aired only a few years earlier, and I loved it so much that I wanted to see it again)  The other was much fuzzier in my memory, having seen it as a kid, and I wanted to confirm it was as great as I recalled, and from the perspective of a kid.  It was the great play, The Magnificent Yankee, about Supreme Court Justice Oliver Wendell Holmes and his wife, and it starred the legendary Alfred Lunt and Lynn Fontanne, in one of their rare performances on film or TV.  And happily, it was as brilliant as I'd thought.  The utter shame is that this has aired only once, and as far as I know is pretty much lost to all expect in archives like this.

All of this is to mentioned that at least part of the UCLA Film and Television Archive is available online.  It's limited, of course, but still quite good.  You can check it out here. 

And that in turn is prelude to one of the shows in their archive that I'm able to embed here.  It's a production from the U.S. Steel Hour that aired on January 13, 1960, titled Queen of the Orange Bowl,  What is so notable about the hour-long show is that it stars the legendary host of The Tonight Show Johnny Carson.  It's only his second scripted, character-role (other than small appearances, or walk-ons as himself) and as far as I can, his last.  He took over The Tonight Show two years later.  And the thing is, he does a nice job -- no small thing since, as I said, it was done live.  No re-takes if you screw up and want to do it better.  One chance, and that's it.

The light-hearted comedy concerns a sort of "bohemian" young woman who tries in to get her new boyfriend to take their relationship seriously.  

The show has a pretty good pedigree beyond just Carson.  The female lead is played by Anne Francis, who had a long career is such films as Bad Day at Black Rock and starred in the detective series Honey West.  And supporting performers included Elizabeth Wilson (who played Dustin Hoffman's mother in The Graduate), Al Lewis (best-known as 'Grandpa' in The Munsters), and Frank McHugh (who was Bing Crosby's best-friend in Going My Way.)

Also, the production was directed by Paul Bogart, who later directed over 90 episodes of the series All in the Family.  It was written by Robert Van Scoyk, who had a long career that included two episodes of Columbo and five seasons as executive story editor of Murder, She Wrote, for which he wrote 21 episodes.and three made-for-TV movies.

As you may know, this year is the 50th anniversary of Sesame Street.  This is a very nice behind-the-scenes tribute to the show that was done on 60 Minutes -- but no, not that 60 Minutes, but the one that they do down under in Australia.

So, tick, tick, tick, tick, tick, mate.

As I've mentioned previously, The West Wing always seemed to do especially good episodes for Thanksgiving, but also for Christmas.  This may be their best ending of a Christmas show, one called "In Excelsis Deo."  Unfortunately I can't embed it on this site, but you can watch it here.

I wrote about this piece of remarkable TV history back in 2014, and it remains one of my favorites.  Though there's some background music in it, it's not about music at all, but it will nonetheless sit for today's Holiday Music Fest, mainly on the Fest part.  Back in my initial posting on this site about Kukla, Fran and Ollie, I wrote about how the show's brilliant creator, puppeteer Burr Tillstrom won an additional Emmy Award that was not involved with KF&O, but for his work on his own.  It was for one of the "hand ballets" that he performed on occasion for the satirical news series, That Was the Week That Was.  

That Was the Week That Was was a smart, pointed, very sharp British sketch-comedy show which was brought over to the U.S. in the early 1960s.  Among other things, it introduced to American audiences one of the original British cast members, David Frost.  It's also the show that introduced Tom Lehrer to most Americans.  He wrote periodic songs for the series, and then recorded them for his now-classic hit album, That Was the Year That Was.

And it also brought Burr Tillstrom into the national spotlight in a way people hadn't seen or expected.

​His hand ballets were little vignettes that didn't use any puppets at all, but merely Tillstrom's bare hands, using them alone to evoke some story in the news he wanted to get across.  It was done with great artistry, often movingly.  And one of them so artistic and moving that it won him an Emmy Award.

In 1963, two years after the Berlin Wall had been erected, a very brief concession was made.  The Wall would open for the Christmas holiday and allow those in the West to travel into East Berlin and visit family and loved ones, needing to return a few days later.

This is what Burr Tillstrom did a hand ballet about shortly after.  And --

-- I found the video of it.  It is one of the favorite videos I've been able to find.  I'm thrilled

The quality of the video is a little rough, especially at the beginning, but it's fine.  And ultimately, as you watch -- one brilliant artist using only his hands -- the quality of the video won't matter one whit.  

And if anyone ever wonders where the humanity of Kukla, Fran and Ollie came from, to bring such life into puppets, now you'll know.

When I posted this last year, I got a perturbed note from a reader who found nothing worthwhile about the video, and took me to task for wasting his time.  In the spirit of the season, I will refrain from anything ad hominen.  I will just say that I feel completely comfortable in recognizing the legend of this piece, and anything else is an understandable matter of personal taste.  Wherever that may lie.  I say this knowing that it's not just my opinion on this, but the members of the of the Television Academy who voted Tillstrom the Emmy Award.

But to be fair, I guess I should add a disclaimer.  If anyone doesn't like old black-and-white video or just looking at hands for three minutes, or politics and history, or quiet, thoughtful, emotional storytelling with the sparsest of action or jokes, centered instead on pure artistry, I get it, and so by all means avoid this.

For everyone else, here it is.

Media Alert.  The Kennedy Centers Honors broadcast is tonight at 8 PM on CBS -- when (among other people, of course) Linda Ronstadt gets her tribute. I don't know if her response to Mike Pompeo was widely known at the time this was recorded and is either commented on or affects the audience reaction, but it will be interesting to see...But even without that, it should no doubt be a joy.

Also, among the other honorees is Sally Field.  If anyone wants to make a bet that no performer says something during her presentation like, "Sally, we like you, we really like you!!", I'm more than happy to take that bet and even give great odds that someone does.

For today's Fest, we have two more songs from the wonderful Mr. Magoo's Christmas Carol, with a score by Broadway composers Jule Styne and Bob Merrill.  I wrote about it yesterday, so you can see all the details here.

This first song is "Winter Was Warm," sung by Belle, Scrooge's former lover from the Ghost of Christmas Past.  When I was a little kid and first saw the show, I absolutely loved it but this particular song was the least interesting to me.  It was nice enough, but let's get on with the story.  I am no longer a little kid, and understand and admire the great deeply-wistful charm of it.

The second song is "We’re Despicable," which comes from the Ghost of Christmas Yet to Come sequence.  It's sung by thieves who have robbed the home of the late Ebenezer Scrooge.  It really is the most unnecessary song in the show -- it doesn't advance the plot or develop character, it just reinforces the situation -- and arguably is the funniest and most fun.
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One of the best made-for-TV animated specials was Mr. Magoo's Christmas Carol.  In fact, it was the very first animated Christmas special on American TV, which first ran on NBC in 1962.  The hour-long show aired annually until 1969, but because the animation was considered a bit primitive, it unfortunately (and in my biased opinion, foolishly, since the special is so terrific and not all that much more primitive than, say, ​Frosty the Snowman) went off the network air, though showed up over the years in syndicated local airings.  Back in 2012, however, NBC did run the show again for its 50th anniversary.

The shame that it hasn't been seen even more is that not only is it wonderfully done (and actually quite a good adaptation of the Dickens story), but it has arguably -- and I'm tempted to say, inarguably -- the best score of any animated TV special made.  The songs are by Broadway composers Jule Styne and Bob Merrill who at the time they were working on this show were also working on their upcoming musical, Funny Girl.  Their score is absolutely wonderful and at that level.  In fact a story is that one day the Magoo producer was walking past the office where Style and Merrill were working, overheard them playing a new song and told how great he thought it was.  They had to explain that the song wasn't for the TV special (though it would have fit), but rather it was for their Broadway show.  The song was "People."

I'll post a bunch of the songs during the Fest, and here for starters are three of them.

This first, "Ringle, Ringle" introduces Scrooge and also Bob Cratchit in the counting house, featuring the voices of Jim Backus and, as Cratchit, Jack Cassidy.

Second is the Cratchit family during the Ghost of Christmas Present section with big "showstopper" of sorts, "(We'll Have) The Lord's Bright Blessing."

​And third is the achingly touching, "I'm All Alone in the World," sung by Scrooge and his younger self from the Ghost of Christmas Past.