"Big ones, small ones, some as big as yer 'ead!"
"...brought to you by Riunite - Riunite on Ice - That's Nice..."
"It Is With A Heavy Heart That I Regret To Inform You" Dept.:
Merv Griffin died this weekend, and oddly enough, as solid kitsch as Merv was as a performer (some of which you're about to see) and the fact that I'd always kind of written him off as something of a has-been, between the ass-kissey interview style and the game shows and what have you, this one is really affecting me in some ways that I wasn't expecting. Merv is more of an indicator of a kind of performer that we're just not likely to see anymore and more's the pity because it was really all just so much fun. Remember when "entertainment" was fun rather than something that substituted for news?
Scat it MERV! Scat it with Carrol O'Connor!
Click to viewHere's ALF with Merv and Jack Sheldon. Who's Jack Sheldon, some of you ask? Jack is the guy who *wasn't* Bob Dorough in all of those SCHOOLHOUSE ROCK tunes. Jack is the "Conjunction Junction", and "Rufus Xavier Sasparilla", and "I'm Just A Bill" guy. Seeing ALF just makes me miss Jim Henson (who I know had nothing to do with ALF, but who was a much better performer and puppeteer than Paul Fusco, "ALF's Daddy", is...)
He'd have wanted us to have one last laugh on him. If you haven't seen the movie THE MAN WITH TWO BRAINS I'm about to ruin part of it for you:
Goin' back to the beginning to find an ending. "Singin' Roll A Bowl A Ball, Roll A Bowl A Ball, Roll A Bowl A Ball A Penny A Pitch..."