Loud and long and clear

Don't you love a good contagious laugh? I like to think I've got one myself. I remember once in college, I was having lunch in the cafeteria and started laughing at something, and two girls got up and moved to another table. That's how contagious I was.

Anyway, here are a couple of great ones. Dustin Hoffman and a reporter explore the word "cut."



And a religious TV show host nonverbally expresses his opinion of a singing caller.

Jeff... ummmJEFF... Gooooldblum

With his gawky height, not-quite-empty eyes, and apparently random thought process, Jeff Goldblum has been one of the more fascinating Hollywoodians to watch for the past quarter century. The guy's got all kinds of presence, but he doesn't smolder so much as puzzle. Talking with him must be like driving past a setting where you know there'll be an accident in a few moments, but you don't know what kind of accident it'll be.

Here are a couple of clips from an interview with Conan O'Brien, whose reactions are no different from the rest of America's (except maybe funnier).




It's very easy to manipulate clips like this, you realize.



Finally, here's six seconds of him scatting.



Tomorrow: more similarly brief clips - and you know what that means!

Quicker than the eye

Ricky Jay has built himself a fair career as both a writer (Learned Pigs and Fireproof Women) and a character actor, but it practically goes without saying that he'll be best remembered as a master of sleight of hand with a deck of cards. YouTube has all kinds of clips of him doing what he does best that'll make your jaw drop.

This is him doing a "is this your card" trick with multiple audience members.



And here he is flummoxing America's favorite triangle head, Arsenio Hall.



One of the commenters pointed out that with 2:30 left to go, you can see Jay switch cards. I watched it a good half dozen times, I can see how he did it, but the smoothness with which he accomplishes this just makes it all the more astonishing for me.

Celebrities Tell Dirty Jokes Too

Everyone's heard dirty jokes. Everyone's heard celebrities. But not everyone's heard celebrities telling dirty jokes. Why is this?

What's fun about these clips is the way these non-comedians take such pleasure in the telling. I'd heard all four of these jokes before, so the way they're spun out is the real treat for me.

For your pleasure, we have fantasy writer Terry Pratchett...



...actress LeeLee "Don't Call Me Helen Hunt Jr." Sobieski...



...actor Dustin Hoffman, who's thoroughly enjoying the joke-telling process....



...and the one and only Sir James Paul McCartney.

Guest Starring

Christopher Guest has been brilliant for longer than I've been alive. Of late he's been doing his mockumentaries and doing them well. He'll always be immortal for This Is Spinal Tap. Even in the '70s, when nobody knew his name, there wasn't any stopping him.

These clips come from the off-Broadway National Lampoon stage show "Lemmings," where a heavily bearded John Belushi and a long-haired Chevy Chase performed live from New York two years before Saturday Night Live. Here, Guest does (and does in) Bob Dylan and James Taylor.




Trivia time: When Chevy was at his old school, he drummed with Walter Becker and Donald Fagen, who went on to be Steely Dan.

A Little Bike Music

Recognize the guy on the left?



Twenty-two year old Frank Zappa, sans facial hair, appeared on The Steve Allen Show in 1963, claiming he could play the bicycle. I think he just used that as a hook to get himself on TV, then work his real musical havoc/magic, but hey, whatever works.



What surprises me about these clips is how much Steve Allen gets into it. Here's a guy who gave dramatic readings of "Be-Bop-a-Lula" and made Elvis sing "Hound Dog" to a bassett on a stool, and here he is really enjoying himself and the "music." My respect for the man just went up a couple notches.

"I don't have to unpack my bags, do I?"

This is pretty exciting, as far as I'm concerned.

One of the things I've been checking YouTube for semiregularly, ever since I came to it, was An American Family. Considered the first reality program, AAF followed the family of William C. Loud for nine months in 1971 and wound up with 300 hours of footage, whittled down to twelve one-hour programs that aired in 1973. The Loud family (I know at least two bands named after them) came apart at the seams over the course of the show, which introduced the world to Lance Loud, one of the first openly gay people ever seen on television.

It's been hard to see since (confounded music rights); once again, God bless YouTube for giving it a forum, and many thanks to "subcin," the guy who posted it. I recommend watching the other excerpts posted as well.



This is the most famous scene of the series. Bill Loud's come home from a business trip, with no idea that his wife is about to let him know she wants a divorce.

Tall as a shotgun and just as noisy

There's a new movie out about Truman Capote; the New Yorker says, "Don't not not see it." Which makes perfect sense - so many won't consider going because they "already saw it" last year, with Philip Seymour Hoffman's take. But I think it'll be another neat look at Truman, through the prism of fame.

I went through my Capote phase a few years ago, reading everything he did over the course of a few months. It's a procedure I recommend to anyone. "A Christmas Memory" is beautiful, and his day with Marilyn Monroe, from Music for Chameleons, couldn't be more perfect.

Anyway, here's the man himself being country when country wasn't cool, along with Dean Martin, Jimmy Stewart, and Jack Benny. Enjoy.

Judy meets a punk

My freshman year at college, I was working on a paper on punk rock in the dorm lounge and had the Sex Pistols on as background noise/inspiration. Another freshman came down the hall and said, "Are those the strains of 'Anarchy in the UK' I hear?" This was Chris, who would go on to be my roommate and one of my best friends, and today is his birthday. This post is dedicated to him.

Back in 1998, vocalist John Lydon, a.k.a. Johnny Rotten, was a defendant on Judge Judy. I'll give away the suspense and tell you that he wins the case - the fun is in his being so unable to suppress himself in the presence of authority, as he himself notes to the camera with that bludgeoning stare of his.



NOTE: Due to me screwing up, any comments that were posted for the past two months or so only got posted last night. So don't think I've been ignoring your kind words; I've just been a touch ignorant of them. Anyway, the sluicegates are open once again - have at it...

Let it floooooowwww

Today's the day MTV has their awards, and even though I've never seen a show myself, I still have a favorite clip to share.



Jim Carrey accepted his Truman Show award as a damn dirty hippie. The reason Courtney Love is whooping it up so much (well, one reason, anyway): before the show, he'd gone up to her and asked for a light, and she never once recognized him.

Watch out for the language at 3:17.

John Waters: Don't smoke (yeah right)

Here's another nonsmoking clip to match the Plympton of a few days ago...



John Waters simply cannot not be subversive. Thank God. He might be the only person I know of who can make smoking look, not fun, but delicious.

Mmmmmmmm.

John Belushi IS Joe Cocker

This appeared on the third episode on Saturday Night Live; by this point Belushi had been imitating Cocker for five years and could probably do this routine in his sleep. It's on his Best-of; one night I was playing it for a housemate and she said, "It's so obvious that he's lip-synching." It was pretty cool telling her that he wasn't.

For your Sunday pleasure

Here's ten minutes of a really interesting interview from 1969.

One our left, Woody Allen.



And on our right, Billy Graham.



It's a fascinating little debate - they may disagree, but there is respect, and some good laughs besides.

Now, a Long Distance Dedication

My friend Jim in Maine took me to task for having far too few postings in this blog about Casey Kasem. Looking back over the the past few weeks, I couldn't help but see he was right. But rather than look at his longtime career at American Top 40 (if you've never heard his "Snuggles" rant, this is the place to do it), I thought we should have a look at his other memorable works:

as TV pitchman for '70s Jem wannabes...



...as the voice of Robin the Boy Wonder (and doesn't the Joker sound awfully Shaggyesque?)...



...and, of course, as a Hitler impersonator.