Those were just some of the memorable characters created and performed by entertainer Red Skelton, who made the transition from radio to television in 1951, and began a 20 year run, most of it at CBS. Skelton began his series at NBC from 1951-53, and finished there in 1971. I barely remember seeing the show at the end of its run, when NBC suits tinkered with the format, hoping that Skelton could reel in the same audience that was watching Rowan & Martin's Laugh-In, but it didn't work out that way.
Amazingly, much of the series is in the public domain, and in 2002, Madacy Entertainment released a 2-disc DVD compilation that was entirely from the CBS run, mostly from the mid-to-late 50's.
The disc opens with a December 1954 show with Red hosting the Look Magazine Awards, featuring Bing Crosby, Alfred Hitchcock, Jack Lemmon, Walt Disney, & Judy Garland. Bear in mind this was before Disney began his own television show on ABC. The rest of the set features the following:
*"The Original Da Vinci", a Freddie the Freeloader tale with guest stars Vincent Price & Jackie Coogan.
*"Shipwrecked", with Buster Crabbe and an early appearance by Jamie Farr, well before M*A*S*H made him an icon in his own right.
*"Oil", in which Clem Kadiddlehopper becomes a millionaire after striking black gold. With Carol Channing, Richard Deacon, and a cameo by Peter Lorre.
Here's "Oil":
There's also Mickey Rooney in a Freddie-centric show, with Mickey as a spoof on Perry Mason, and, in another Clem-centric tale, John Carradine appears as a painter whose work is overshadowed by Clem's surrealistic abstractions.
The Madacy package is heavily edited, and some of the episodes, sad to say, were badly preserved. Some sponsor tags were left off and closing credits left incomplete. Art Gilmore, better known for his work on Dragnet, was the announcer for much of the run.
Personally, I wouldn't mind finding a collection that includes the later, color episodes.
Rating: B-. Have to take points off for the packaging issues.
There's also Mickey Rooney in a Freddie-centric show, with Mickey as a spoof on Perry Mason, and, in another Clem-centric tale, John Carradine appears as a painter whose work is overshadowed by Clem's surrealistic abstractions.
The Madacy package is heavily edited, and some of the episodes, sad to say, were badly preserved. Some sponsor tags were left off and closing credits left incomplete. Art Gilmore, better known for his work on Dragnet, was the announcer for much of the run.
Personally, I wouldn't mind finding a collection that includes the later, color episodes.
Rating: B-. Have to take points off for the packaging issues.
4 comments:
It was my parents who introduced me to Red Skelton (not to mention other stars of the Golden Age of TV).
It's a shame TPTB dumped him from his 1971 show. He was getting the ratings but not the demos the suits wanted. From all accounts, I've been told Skelton was a class act.
My parents also remembered the sad tale of Skelton losing his young son to a rare disease. His character, "The Mean Widdle Kid" was based in part as a joke on his son to make him laugh. When the son died, Skelton publically announced he'd never reprise the role of the "Kid" again.
I don't think Junior (Mean Widdle Kid) ever made it to TV. He wasn't included on the DVD, so perhaps by then, Junior, as you noted, was retired.
Quite belatedly indeed:
A cable channel has been repeating Red Skelton's color shows from the mid-to-late '60s.
Red brought back the Mean Widdle Kid just before this period: usually, they cast guest stars to play Junior's parents who were shorter that six-foot-plus Red, who would be attired in an XXL Lord Fauntleroy suit - and hilarity ensued ...
While I'm here:
Red Skelton first met Jamie Farr when he was touring service bases in the '50s.
Red took a liking to Jamie, and he had his writers create a sailor character, Cookie, who had a sidekick called Snorkel ... and that was Jamie Farr's TV breakthrough.
TIL. Thanks.
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