MERRIE MELODIES / "Have You Got Any Castles" - 1938

Here's a 'books come alive' cartoon directed by Frank Tashlin, it takes place in a library after it has closed for the night...

The town crier sets up this music laced story, it's all about book titles coming to life to entertain us with popular songs from that era.

Firstly, we get to meet our favorite monsters, Mr. Hyde, Fu Manchu, Phantom Of The Opera and The Frankenstein Monster, and they don't seem all that friendly, as always!

But they cut a rug instead, to the applause of an avid audience comprised of characters from the many books in the library.

The Invisible Man does a great little tap dance for us.

Books on Africa come to life with some hot dancing girls, and lots more.

Cab Calloway steps in and sets the mood with some Jive!

You gots yer Little Women...

And then you gots yer Little Men!

Seven Clark Gables sing backup for Old King Cole!

And the audience goes wild!

Then the title song "Have You Got Any Castles" is front and center.

Emily Host's (Post) book is next to Henry The Eighth's, she points her finger and chides him for eating like a pig, but finally starts wolfing down the eats herself!

The Three Musketeers turn bad and become Three Men On A Horse, they steal the keys that let The Prisoner Of  Zenda out of prison, they all escape on their horse, guns blazing...

The books fight back, it's not quiet on the western front now!

All the good guys start chasing the four criminals, even Tarzan gets into the act.

Rip Van Winkle gets woken up yet again (his beard got clipped earlier in the toon) and he's not in a good mood! What's with all the commotion, anyway?!

Rip opens the cover of  "Hurricane" and the wind starts blowing like crazy!

The gale force gusts of wind blow all the characters back to their books...

And, they're all Gone With The Wind!! Rip gets back to sleep after he gags the coo-coo clock bird. So, what a ride, love those Tashlin productions!

AMOS BURKE SECRET AGENT - "The Prisoners Of Mr. Sin" (1965)

The saga of Amos Burke is a pretty fascinating story, and this cub reporter was glad to get this assignment from his Editor, because it's perfect for a Weird Wednesday down in The Dungeon.

The character of Amos Burke was first introduced to American TV viewers in 1961 on the first episode of "The Dick Powell Theatre" that was titled "Who Killed Julie Greer." It was only a single episode and starred Dick Powell in the leading role. The rest of the cast was fleshed out with a who's who of Hollywood including the likes of Nick Adams, Ralph Bellamy, Edgar Bergen, Lloyd Bridges, Carolyn Jones, Dean Jones, Mickey Rooney and even Ronald Reagan.

Interesting enough, the only character that was carried on to "Burke's Law" was his chauffeur Henry, played by Leon Lontoc.

 

"Burke's Law" was on for three seasons running from 1963 to 1966. In the third season, they decided to change Amos Burke from a wealthy police office to a wealthy secret agent, since spy movies were faring so well at the time. It was not exactly a good idea. Both the first two seasons of "Burke's Law" ran for 32 episodes, but season three, after changing the show to "Amos Burke Secret Agent," petered out after only 17 episodes. They also stopped using the words 'Who Killed" in all the titles. "The Prisoners Of Mr. Sin" was episode 7, and aired on October 27, 1965.

As a secret agent, Amos Burke is now a solo vehicle, and his support team of Detective Tison (Gary Conway) and Detective Hart (Regis Toome) are no longer part of the show.

Burke's assignment is to either bring back this Doctor who has disappeared, and if that is not possible, then his job is to eliminate him before the bad guys get all the important information he has stored in his head.

This is just a shot from the opening credits, and I'm only showing it because, what in the Hell is that, a spaghetti gun or a mop?

Agent Burke is sent to some island paradise in the middle of nowhere, and his identity doesn't seem to be much of a secret, because everybody already knows who he is!

The first sweet backstabbing gal Amos Burke meets is Zeeni, as played by France (Dohlman of Elas) Nuyen. France got her Master's degree in clinical psychology in 1986, and has been working with abused women and children ever since.

This is who greets you when you go to visit Mr. Sin.

3' 11" Michael Dunn has the role of Mr. Sin, a little man with a big ego! Michael was Alexander in an episode of "Star Trek."

Mr. Sin is holding the man Amos Burke is looking for hostage, and is willing to sell him off to the highest bidder. There is an auction, and Burke has the highest bid, but Mr. Sin is not an honest man, and takes the check for two million dollars, but doesn't give up his prisoner.

This is where Mr. Sin houses his most popular guests!

Half German, and half Chinese, Greta Chi reminds me of an Asian Diana Rigg.

Robert Cornthwaite has the role of Dr. Waldo Bannister, the man who everybody wants for his brain. Robert has the distinction of being in arguably three of the best movies of the 1950's, "The Thing From Another World," "War Of The Worlds," and "Kiss Me Deadly." He was also in two episodes of "The Twilight Zone," "Showdown With Lance McGrew," and "No Time Like The Past."

 

Mr. Sin is a mean little son of a bitch, and takes great delight in torturing Amos Burke.

He has clamped Amos down so there is no possible way to escape! These secret agent episodes don't seem nearly as jovial and light-hearted as the first two seasons of "Burke's Law."

 

Next, the dripping water on the forehead starts followed by the nails on a chalkboard sounds to make Amos even more comfortable!

All that money's not going to do you much good in Hell Mr. Sin!

Burke manages to turn Mr. Sin's psycho alarm system against him, and gets Bannister out of there alive!

There finally is some levity at the end as.......

.............Amos Burke asks what is this stuff that Banister drinks, "It's not bad." Then Zeeni admits she put some rum in his milk to cheer up Dr. Bannister.

Never willing to give up, Gene Barry and "Burke's Law" returned in 1994 for two seasons!

13 CRAPPY HORROR AND SCI-FI MOVIES I LOVE

 What we gots today is 13 of my favorite crappy horror and sci-fi movies from the fifties and sixties. Six of these have been great fodder for the MST guys to chew on, and boy do they! So, grab a cup of coffee for old Tabonga, sit back and enjoy the ride...

Thank you Phil Tucker for putting this one together for TV in 1960, it's pretty cool and I like it a lot. Aliens Hauron and Nadja are fun to watch, his left arm missing with a blood stained sleeve, and their transmission procedure is just weird! Word is... Plastics!

The MST boys have a field day with this Coleman Francis, Tony Cardoza production, wow is it cheap and crappy, but, not without its charm. They just put layers of rubber cement on Tor's face for makeup, plain crappy. They show off Marcia (woo woo) Knight on the poster but she's only in it for a minute, and never sees the Beast! It would have been a much better movie if they filmed her just flopping around for an hour!

Oh my effing Gott!!.. This thing is such a damn mess, but the MST guys hit a home run here, saving the day, one of my favorites! The ending is the most ridiculous POS in the history of film, a Must See!

This one is on the list if for nothing else, for the mind bending séance scene put on by Dr. Acula, with a messed up voice from beyond, that swizzle stick and the pathetic trumpet sounds, holy scheiss! Tor never looked better though, he's all messed up as Lobo the enforcer. I remember seeing a full page promo shot of him in Famous Monsters, he looked creepy and cool.

This movie takes the cake!! That amateur poster there really captures the movie's quality, or lack thereof. It is so whack! The monster is indescribably ridiculous, what a piece of shit, it's slow as Hell too. Just plain amateur hour. MST saves the day again though!

Holy Crap, Holy Crap. Holy Crap!!! This movie is soooooooo BAD!! Larry Buchanan's take on INVASION OF THE SAUCER MEN is pathetic. But you can't not watch it to see if that military guy wins that five dollar bet. The nighttime scenes are filmed at like, noon, in actual dark scenes you can see the monsters are are just wearing their head pieces, things just don't match, a total mess! AARGH!! Again, MST does its job, Joel comments on the title card, he says... Who wrote Attack Of The, The Eyes Creatures?!.. Mel Tilllis??

The music alone will make you want to beat your head against a wall. The characters are a mixture of weirdos littered with spider women, male dwarfs, a giant spider, a mad scientist, a psycho and a love triangle! Rifftrax recently got their hands on this one. Love the movie and its madness.

I don't know why I like this one so much, but I do, for me it has a certain charm. Plus it has Him in it, Him likes to look at nudie magazines with pages torn out and hung on the wall. The producers were thrilled when they saw the poster for the movie, but when they finally got to see it, they were flabbergasted by the difference between the fantastic poster and the weak-ass movie!

Eegah and I saw this crazy movie when it came out, and boy did we crack up when they showed the little critters up close! They look like Brillo pads with white pipe cleaners sticking out of them, holy cow! Our band Hermanos Guzanos did a 'musical' version, "Brain Eaters," that can be found on You Tube along with lots of other HG 'tunes' there too.

Man, what can you say about this total bomb that hasn't already been said. It's a hoot to watch as they work their way through the script. Well, maybe I have something to note that hasn't been discussed before about this 3-D disaster... As Ro-Man is walking up one hill in particular, he's tippy-toeing his way up the trail (he looks so damn silly here), looks like he's a little concerned about falling down, or stumbling. seems like he's having trouble seeing what he's doing because of the stupid space helmet!

The madness never stops! This movie is just plain whack, but I love it, it delivers all the low budget monsters, props and effects you'd want for a good laugh. What's really cool is that Bob Crewe (from The Four Seasons) does a number of tunes throughout the film. What I remember most is the super-crappy makeup job on Dr. Nadir's ears, jeez!!

Here's a weird little movie with a David Hewitt tie in, also known as SPACE MONSTER, a TV movie that made it to the theater circuit. The only thing you'll probably remember are those sexy dreams of one of the spaceship crew, and that little alien (with its tongue hanging out) they found in an abandoned ship just floating around in space, but still, I like it.

I saved my favorite crappy movie for last, wow, this thing is surreal... The theme song is great, the cast is great, and it has one of the most interesting movie monster ever conceived. So, what more could you want from a crappy movie?.. Hope you enjoyed.

HIPSTERS, WEIRDOS, GOOBERS & GOMERS THROUGH THE YEARS (1931-1974)

 

This week's Saturday Night Special is dedicated to all the sidekicks, assistants, buddies, and clown friends from movies and television over the years, you know, the guys who bring the comedy relief, and/or just make the programs more interesting.

 Sometimes they were merely weirdos like Renfield in "Dracula" as played by Dungeon Hero Dwight Frye.

Sometimes they were freaks like Dwight's portrayal of Fritz in "Frankenstein."

Just like Dracula needed Renfield, Dr. Frankenstein needed Fritz.

Eddi Arent provided the comedy relief in a number of German Krimi movies. Sometimes it works, and sometimes he can be pretty annoying!

Although this 1959 show was titled "The Many Loves Of Dobie Gillis," to all of us who identify more with misfits, the star was really Bob Denver as hep cat Maynard G. Krebs.

I'm pretty sure when they developed the character Shaggy in the 1969 cartoon series "Scooby Doo, Where Are you," they were thinking a lot about Maynard!

 

 After Dobie Gillis, Bob Denver was given the starring role in "Gilligan's Island" in 1964, but his character was still a weirdo.

 

As far as I can tell, the first real hipster on an American TV show was Edd Byrnes as the cool cat so cool, he has to constantly be combing his hair in the 1958 TV show, "77 Sunset Strip!"

 

 

It became such a thing that Edd and Connie "Cricket" Stevens even cut a single on the subject.

"Kookie, Kookie, Lend Me Your Comb!"

 

 

Another cool cat, The Fonz as played by Henry Winkler, showed up in 1974 on the first episode of "Happy Days," called "All The Way." Here's some good news, even though the world today sucks, Henry Winkler is still alive and working!!

Probably one of the best examples of what I'm trying to say here is Don Knotts as Deputy Barney Fife on "The Andy Griffith Show." Young people didn't watch this show to see Andy Griffith or Aunt Bee, like Maynard, we watched it to see whatever antics Barney was up to that week!

 As Barney was to Andy, that's how Gomer Pyle was to Barney!

And as Gomer was to Barney, that's how Goober was to Gomer! Although they were supposed to be cousins, I just read on Wikipedia that the first time Andy referred to Goober, he called him Goober Beasley, but after that, they always called him Goober Pyle. Goober Pyle was played by George Lindsey. George was also in "The Twilight Zone" episode titled "I Am The Night - Color Me Black."

Jim Nabors as Gomer was a popular enough guy that he ended up getting his own show, "Gomer Pyle U.S.M.C."

Not all Pyles were created equal. My Mother told me that Ernie Pyle, the Pulitzer Prize–winning American journalist and war correspondent who died in action, was my Grandma's cousin.

 

A lot of cowboys had sidekicks, and not all of them were funny, but Wild Bill Hickok's best pal Jingles as played by Andy Devine sure was. I'll never forget that plaintive cry from the 1951 show,

 "Hey Wild Bill, wait for me!"

Last but not least on this list, is Larry Storch as Corporal Randolph Agarn from the 1965 TV show "F-Troop." Previous to "F-Troop," Larry kept very busy from 1962 to 1963 doing the voice of "Koko The Clown. 

If I did the math correctly, Larry just celebrated his 99th birthday this last January!

I'm pretty sure that's proof that humor is healthy!