Thursday, July 4, 2019
I had intended to do a post on Mad Magazine on some upcoming birthday of William Gaines, the magazine's heroic publisher. But Gaines rates his own post and his legacy was greater than Mad, a…
SOURCE: Trav S.D. at 11:06AM[SHARE]We're coming up on the 50th anniversary of Woodstock; seems like the right year for a tribute to forgotten rock blues genius Alan Wilson (1943-1970). Most people who think they don't know wh…
SOURCE: Trav S.D. at 08:32AM[SHARE]I just received the sad news that author, critic, and one-of-a-kind New York character Ward Morehouse III has passed away, at the age of 73. He was the kind of public figure who mattered a g…
SOURCE: Trav S.D. at 06:54AM[SHARE]We don't usually devote such concentrated attention to another author's books, but in the case of Randy Skretvedt, one of the world's pre-eminent Laurel and Hardy experts, we'll make an exce…
SOURCE: Trav S.D. at 02:12AM[SHARE]Tuesday, July 2, 2019
What a terrific way to start the new month! I had a terrific conversation with Austin Tichenor of the world-famous Reduced Shakespeare Company this morning, for their podcast. The company is…
SOURCE: Trav S.D. at 01:24PM[SHARE]Sunday, June 30, 2019
 Do you remember Toma (1973-74)? I do. I was just a kid, but I watched all the cop shows, and this was a successful one. Tony Musante (1936-2013) played real-life Newark cop David Toma, …
SOURCE: Trav S.D. at 09:24AM[SHARE]Saturday, June 29, 2019
Your grandparents (or great-grandparents) might be dumbfounded to learn that a showbiz figure as major as Ed Gardner (Edward Poggenberg, 1901-1963) and a show as popular as Duffy's Tavern (1…
SOURCE: Trav S.D. at 07:36AM[SHARE]Friday, June 28, 2019
Comedian and impressionist John Byner (John Biener, b. 1938) reached his peak of visibility when I was a kid in the 1970s. Like his rough contemporaries Rich Little and Frank Gorshin he had …
SOURCE: Trav S.D. at 11:42AM[SHARE]Thursday, June 27, 2019
Our new edition of the American Vaudeville Theatre opens in just two days. We're sort of doing a soft open on this li'l experiment, but some old friends have given us some nice attention all…
SOURCE: Trav S.D. at 03:18PM[SHARE]Wednesday, June 26, 2019
Josef Swickard (Peter Josef Schwickerath, 1866-1940) seems like a really unlikely guy to have wound up in in a lot of silent slapstick comedies. Just look at him! The aristocratic looking Co…
SOURCE: Trav S.D. at 12:24PM[SHARE]You can tell that someone is a silent comedy geek " as opposed to just a silent movie geek " if they know Ernest Torrence (1878-1933) primarily as Buster Keaton's rough, tough riverboa…
SOURCE: Trav S.D. at 12:24PM[SHARE]Tuesday, June 25, 2019
Lynne Carter (ca. 1924-1985) was one of the more prominent female impersonators of the late 20th century. Originally from Cleveland, Carter served in the navy in World War Two. In show busin…
SOURCE: Trav S.D. at 10:33PM[SHARE]Monday, June 24, 2019
For some reason (his personality, I guess, sort of aggressive, sort of macho), I remember Jack Carter (Jack Chakrin, 1922-2015) as a TALL man. I would said 6'4″. I did a little refresh…
SOURCE: Trav S.D. at 05:36PM[SHARE]This coming Saturday, June 29, 8pm: I am pleased to report the return of the American Vaudeville Theatre Classic, coming to Under St. Marks . What do I mean by "classic"? Well, somethi…
SOURCE: Trav S.D. at 05:36PM[SHARE]What a joy it is to discover the existence of characters like Ramblin' Tommy Scott (1913-2017) and what a boon, for he appears to have been one of the last purveyors of the old time medicine…
SOURCE: Trav S.D. at 01:24PM[SHARE]There's not a huge amount to say about the late Al Molinaro (1919-2015) other than he was funny and universally beloved. He may have had the most epic beak in show business history, beating …
SOURCE: Trav S.D. at 01:24PM[SHARE]Martha Sleeper (1910-1983) started out with the greatest possible advantages in show business. Her uncle was J.J. Murdock, who ran the Keith-Albee-Orpheum circuit (in other words, the boss o…
SOURCE: Trav S.D. at 08:18AM[SHARE]Chicago born Rita Oehmen (1917-1995) started out in a vaudeville act with her brother Edward called The Oehmen Twins. At age 20 she briefly performed as a solo, and rapidly got into films. S…
SOURCE: Trav S.D. at 08:18AM[SHARE]Sunday, June 23, 2019
I have long mentally penalized character actor Donald MacBride (1893-1957) for being one of the most annoying parts of one of the worst Marx Brothers movies, Room Service (1938). He's that g…
SOURCE: Trav S.D. at 06:24PM[SHARE]I get the birthday for the late Michael Wilson (1952-1996), Coney Island USA's famous Illustrated Man, from this photo spread of his 1989 birthday party by John A. Moser. Wilson was one of t…
SOURCE: Trav S.D. at 10:33AM[SHARE]Today being the first day of Pride Week (here in New York anyway), we thought we'd use the occasion for a brief tribute to the historic situation comedy Love Sidney (1981-83). Love, Sidney w…
SOURCE: Trav S.D. at 10:33AM[SHARE]I was lured to the rim of this rabbit hole of a story initially by learning about the situation comedy Harry's Girls, a short-lived show that ran on NBC from 1963 through 1964. The premise o…
SOURCE: Trav S.D. at 09:18AM[SHARE]Saturday, June 22, 2019
Today we celebrate the brilliant stage and screen impresario Mike Todd (Avrom Hirsch Goldbogen, 1909-1958). He's my new hero, I think. I look down the list of what he produced, and it hugely…
SOURCE: Trav S.D. at 10:24AM[SHARE]Tim Herbert (Herbert Timberg, 1914-1986) had a wonderful show biz pedigree. The son of vaudeville performer and sketch/songwriter Herman Timberg, he first teamed up with Pat Rooney Jr, perfo…
SOURCE: Trav S.D. at 08:12AM[SHARE]Friday, June 21, 2019
For all her present obscurity, Jocelyn Lee (Mary Alice Simpson, 1902-1980) appears to have been quite the handful. The Chicago chorus girl started out in regional productions of Broadway rev…
SOURCE: Trav S.D. at 03:18PM[SHARE]Dorothy Stickney (1896-1898) was primarily a creature of the stage, although she was also in some well known film and television projects. The daughter of a North Dakota doctor, she attended…
SOURCE: Trav S.D. at 12:36PM[SHARE]It seems madness to me that I only recently heard of the team of Phil Ford (1919-2005) and Mimi Hines (b. 1933). This duo was bursting at the seams with talent, mixing elements of Burns and …
SOURCE: Trav S.D. at 11:24AM[SHARE]Looking into one guy named Jack Arthur this morning has made me aware of another, so we treat of them both. Neither was the same as Johnny Arthur, who appeared in comedy shorts, btw! The Ame…
SOURCE: Trav S.D. at 10:03AM[SHARE]Thursday, June 20, 2019
We salute one of the most appealing of all male Hollywood stars on his natal day: Errol Flynn (1909-1959). A number of Flynn's films are genuine classics. The Adventures of Robin Hood (1938)…
SOURCE: Trav S.D. at 12:42PM[SHARE]Like many of my other posts on major American playwrights (most recently Tennessee Williams), this is adapted from my personal notebooks. I don't deal much with biography here. It's mostly c…
SOURCE: Trav S.D. at 12:42PM[SHARE]It was the early part of Gail Patrick's career that interested me initially. Patrick came to Hollywood to compete in that same "Panther" contest that Lona Andre had " the prize was getting t…
SOURCE: Trav S.D. at 06:54AM[SHARE]Loading more stories…
