Consider this an intermission from our Elisberg Industries International Film Festival as we take the weekend off from our presentation of Camelot.  

​On this week’s ‘Not My Job’ segment of the NPR quiz show Wait, Wait…Don’t Tell Me!, the guest is Mark Ronson, a British musician, songwriters and producer who has collaborated with such performers as Amy Winehouse, Lady Gaga, Adele, Robbie Williams, Duran Duran and Miley Cyrus – and won a Grammy and Oscar (for co-writing Best Song winner “Shallow” from A Star is Born.  His conversation with guest host Negin Farsad is…well, semi-good.  Ronson is charming, self-effacing and funny, and does a very good job taking insipid questions and making them fun.  But the questions are insipid and giggly.  (One example.  For her very first question, she says – “For one of my first questions, I want to ask…”  NO, it was your first question. Not “one of the first.”)
 
This is the full Wait, Wait… broadcast, but you can jump directly to the “Not My Job” segment, it starts around the 18:15 mark.

 
On this week’s Naked Lunch podcast, hosts Phil Rosenthal and David Wild invite listeners “to ‘Be Our Guest’ again for a special Call In ‘Naked Lunch’ during which they answer your questions and ramble on about a wide range of topics. Along the way, Phil pays tribute to his late great friend director William Friedkin, David tells stories about interviewing Billy Joel and they both share stories about life and lunch”
 

We continue with the Third Elisberg Industries Film Festival with our presentation of the original 1960 cast production of Camelot.  This video is Act 1, Scene 5, the live on-stage audio and script only, though no video but many wonderful production photos. 

It begins with Julie Andrews and cast singing  “The Lusty Month of May,” which leads into the bumbling arrival of the whimsical ‘King Pellinore,’ played by Robert Coote (who also had played ‘Col. Pickering’ in Lerner & Loewe’s My Fair Lady), who is a befuddled old acquaintance of when Arthur was a young boy.  Queen Guinevere invites him to put aside his unending quest for the moment and spend some time in Camelot.  As he goes off to settle in, Arthur comes in to introduce Guinevere to Lancelot (played by Robert Goulet), a meeting that goes poorly for his total, though unintended arrogance.
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(If you've missed any previous episodes, just scroll down or back if you reach the end of the page.)

As readers of these pages know, I’m a big admirer of Nick Melvoin, who is the son of my friends Jeff and Martha Melvoin.  That's not why I admire him, thought it's a good foundation.  (I've noted Jeff previously, as well, since he runs the Writers Guild Showrunner Trainee Program.)
 
Nick, as some of you may recall if you were paying attention at the last lecture, is currently in his second term on the Los Angeles School Board. (In fact, he was the only School Board candidate in 2022 to win his race with over 50% of the vote – getting 60% -- and therefore not need a run-off).  He's also running for the U.S. Congress to fill the open 30th District seat held by Adam Schiff who is a candidate for the U.S. Senate.

I'll get to the reason for writing all this, but first I have to get to the obligatory bookkeeping.  I'll be pithy in one paragraph, though, and get it out of the way quickly.  Nick graduated from Harvard, has a Masters degree in Urban Education, and got a law degree from NYU.  After that, he did some work for the ACLU, worked in the Obama White House with the Domestic Policy Council, and also clerked in the U.S. Attorney’s office in civil rights cases.  And then, rather than take a high-paying job at a big mucky-muck power law firm, he jumped from all that into -- getting a job teaching in the Los Angeles inner-city in Watts, where he also coached baseball and soccer.  And then helped start a school newspaper.  And runs Camp Harmony, a camp for kids who are experiencing poverty, which he started working at as a counselor 21 years ago.
 
I mention all this today because Nick has had a very good week, happily showing that I’m not alone in my admiration and just yammering in the wind.  And as I like to say, I tries not to steer you wrong.  Just yesterday, for instance, he received an endorsement from Rep. Colin Allred, who is running for the U.S. Senate against Ted Cruz. 

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And earlier in the week, he was featured in a long article in the New York Times.  In fact, not only was he featured in the article, but the Times used his photo at the very top to illustrate it.

Pleased as I was to see Nick quoted and featured so prominently in such a high-profile venue, the only unfortunate thing was the reason for having the article, which is about the reaction of progressive Jews dealing with those they've long-considered allies in the wake of the Israeli-Hamas War.  

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The article sets its foundation with the opening paragraph --

"Progressive Jews who have spent years supporting racial equity, gay and transgender rights, abortion rights and other causes on the American left — including opposing Israeli policies in Gaza and the West Bank — are suddenly feeling abandoned by those who they long thought of as allies. This wartime shift represents a fundamental break within a liberal coalition that has long powered the Democratic Party."

Nick's quote comes halfway through the piece.  It's first lead into by a passage about conditions in the U.S. that such progressives were facing -- "But in the Hamas attacks, many saw an existential threat, evoking memories of the Holocaust and generations of antisemitism, and provoking anxiety about whether they could face attacks in the United States. And they were taken aback to discover that many of their ideological allies not only failed to perceive the same threats but also saw them as oppressors deserving of blame."

Which brings the article to Nick --

“I am in such a state of despair — in my generation, we have been warned how quickly people would turn on us and we just thought no way,” said Nick Melvoin, 38, a member of the Los Angeles Unified School Board who is now running for Congress and keeps a framed picture of Rabbi Abraham Joshua Heschel marching with the Rev. Dr. Martin Luther King Jr. in his office. “Now we see, this is how that happens: When you dehumanize the group. This indoctrination that many of us have been warned about hit us like a ton of bricks."

For those interested in reading the full article, it's long and interesting, though, as I said, disturbing for what it's about, you can find it here.

And for those interested in finding out more about the good fellow himself, you can find that here.

It's going to be a challenging race for all the candidates, since the 30th District -- being Adam Schiff's -- is so high profile.  But at least with a week like this, it provides Nick with a strong foundation for the rest of the campaign.

​Curtain up.  As the Third Elisberg Industries Film Festival continues, we follow up on the wonderful Camelot reminiscence I posted here yesterday with material that is even better.  This today is the start of the treasure trove I mentioned. 

What we have from this point on is live on-stage audio of the original 1960 Broadway production of Camelot starring Richard Burton, Julie Andrews and Robert Goulet.  Not the full show, unfortunately, but a lot of it.  And all the better, the material is superbly produced, with text from the libretto in split screen so you can follow all the mediocre audio, some of which is hard to make out.  Further, much of the live audio is intercut (blended together, as it were) with video footage from the original cast performing in costume on The Ed Sullivan Show.  For the selections to come that don’t have any of this Sullivan video footage (though much does), they instead use terrific production photos appropriate for the specific stage moments being performed, or even on occasion have silent film footage of the stage production, as well as other clever material to fill in, like Hirschfield drawings.  To put it simply, this is a rare treasure, saving material of a popular culture legend that was believed lost -- and it’s spectacular.
 
Side Note:  This appearance on The Ed Sullivan Show is itself important to theater history.  When Camelot opened, it got positive reviews, but mixed.  And was doing only fair at the box office, uncertain how long the show would be able to run.  That’s when Ed Sullivan came to the producers and offered to do a full hour tribute to Lerner and Loewe.  And as part of that tribute, would let the Camelot producers put on a remarkable 20 minutes from the show.  The day after the broadcast, there were lines around the block at the box office.  And the show ran for over two years.  And has been running in touring companies, community theater, school productions and international performances since – and four revivals on Broadway, including one this year.
 
We start today with two videos which together are most of the first scene from the show.  (The second video picks up the action immediately after the first.) This selection has the live audio of Richard Burton and Julie Andrews on stage, the libretto text and the ​Ed Sullivan Show video footage intercut in.
 
The first video begins with the last verse of Richard Burton singing “I Wonder What the King is Doing Tonight” and then Julie Andrews as ‘Guinevere’ arrives, having run away from her coach bringing her to Camelot to marry the king against her wishes.  One clarification:  this video does not have any video performances, it’s audio and “book” text only.  However, there are good photos to go along with it, and some brief film clips with no sound.

 
And as they say – The show must go on.  And will, because more of this original Broadway cast production of Camelot continues tomorrow.  ​