Newsday TV Books, August 1973.

August lumbers sweatily in with a color Gary Viskupic cover, and Vishnu Winters clutching an assortment of funny headwear.

The piece on Winters talks quite a bit about his surrealistic art.

In the TV Line Q&A, local news anchor Tony Guida has a fan. Plus, Omar Sharif was not married, Helen Reddy was never a teacher, and Lorne Greene did not live in Syosset. (By the way, the answer to the Iberian Airlines commercial question is wrong. More on that in the September post...)

Another WCBS-TV ad (one that will run for the next few weeks) touts reporter and former cop Chris Borgen as both hostage situation negotiator and credible newsman.

Late Monday, Viskupic insets Marilyn onto Norman Mailer, who was that night's Cavett guest. You know it's a long time ago when The Doris fucking Day Show is still on in prime-time.

More Viskupic blowing up on Thursday night, as well as "The Pink Floyd" airing on WNET at 11:30. Sorry, you have school tomorrow--go to bed you derries! (That's Long Island slang for those denim-jacketed burnouts who were usually hammered before homeroom. It's short for "derelicts," duh.)

Chad Everett glowers surgically from the cover of the following week. The story talks about his hobbies, including writing love poetry to his wife, actress Shelby Grant. If you can track down a copy of "Ode to Shelby," lemme know. There's scant evidence it ever existed.

It's an interesting line-up for the TV Line this week: Alice Cooper, Susan Sullivan, young James Cagney and older James Cagney.

Visk conjures a strangely-shadowed Stonehenge for Sunday evening, and the mocking Cashman review of The Dream Maker intrigues.

There's not much of interest in this cluster of ads, really, I just like those swell pipes. Oh, and Danny Downspout's nipples.

The somniferous Howard Cosell, the passionate Yvonne DeCarlo, and the menacing Lee Van Cleef populate Monday's late schedule.

Viskupic combines story aspects for a close-up on The House and The Brain, a late night premiere for ABC's Wide World of Mystery.

It's not Halloween, just Wolfman Jack and an actress named Penny Lane posing for the next week's cover. There's little info to be gleaned about her on the 'nerts (partially due to her rather ubiquitous name) other than some slightly-different photos from this same session.

She's not even mentioned in the story, although that thieving prick Don Imus is.

TV Line tells us that David Steinberg does not live in a haunted house. He just leases it from that dip Elke Sommer.

You have to love these old TV listings. Not only does Joey Bishop get featured as a short-term fill-in host for The Tonight Show, they tell us for how long and even throw in the last time he sat in. You just don't get that kind of detail anymore. (Because who the fuck could possibly care.)

The NBC news special "Cave People of the Phillipines" gets the Viskupic treatment on Tuesday, and then a cluster of Marxes on the following night.

This John Cashman review lets you know that if Edward G. Robinson in a tub is your idea of entertainment, then Key Largo is the movie for you.

Even though she won five years earlier, Cybill Shepherd crowns the new Model of the Year that Saturday evening. I guess the crowning honors went to whichever winner was currently the hottest.

We blast into September with a neat, nostalgic Ned Levine scene showing Captain Video and Howdy Doody and then Bill McTernan's fun article describes other members of the 1949 TV vanguard.

TV Line demonstrates that Long Islanders can't get enough info on Alice Cooper! Can you blame them? Archie and Alice, coo-coo!

Somehow I don't think the Real George Carlin showed up in this Sunday evening time slot. I mean, he was probably more authentic than the guy you'd seen on variety shows for the last decade or so...

That's gonna do it for this repeat-choked last week, but September will continue with the post-Labor Day premieres and all that fun! Stay tuned!

We Interrupt This Blog with a Bulletin. From 1982.

Whoop-de-doo and fina-fuckin-ly! I've at last digitized and uploaded a cassette I have of the infamous live Bob and Doug McKenzie appearance mentioned in Dave Thomas' SCTV book.

Head on over to the Don't Parade in my Rain Facebook page for a bit more description, or just hit the audio-only video (?) right here at my YouTube channel.

Found this pic of WLIR staffers (including betoqued and mustachioed John DiBella) with the hoseheads at My Father's Place in the Village of Old Roslyn, where the show went down.

Newsday TV Books, July 1973.

It's July now in Newsday TV Book reminiscing-land, and as we hit the half-way point of 1973, still-relevant Bob Hope adorned the cover of that first week with a truly peculiar Gary Viskupic color drawing.

The story is a two-pager, mostly about Hope's political leanings and such. I was never much of a Hope aficionado (and even as I read the article I found myself hearing his quotes in the voice of Dave Thomas' impersonation on SCTV). I must admit I do recall a conversation I had with Maria from across the street when we were kids. We had heard that Paul Lynde was honored with some sort of "Comedian of the Year" award, and we both felt that it should have gone to Hope. I remember us reasoning that Lynde always laughed at his own jokes, which we found off-putting. We mulled over that observation and simultaneously realized that the same could be said of Hope, so we further reasoned that Hope wasn't laughing at his own material so much as just smiling with appreciation at the love he receives from his audiences. What a full-of-shit couple of seven-year-olds.

TV Line talks Larry Hooper, Scott Jacoby, Nancy Dussault and the NBC Mystery Movie's Flashlight Guy.

On Sunday night, Johnny Whitaker wide-eyes his way through "The Mystery of Dracula's Castle," a Disney presentation with Clu Gulager (and also the kid who played Johnny's little brother on Sigmund and the Sea Monsters).

On Monday, Not for Women Only declares fat unfunny, and Viskupic responds accordingly, with great sensitivity.

Later that night, here's Lucie on Here's Lucy, and some eviscerating John Cashman movie reviews.

Now on to late Wednesday and some "Comedy News" (I just see Mort Sahl and I laugh!), and WNEW's Reel Camp at 1:55 asks a perennial question.

Viskupic's tone turns ominous as he depicts a blind, voiceless press for a Thursday ABC news special about the first amendment.

A few ads now, first as a "Vacation Values" block (who knew Emilio could ski and surf?)...

...and then one for the Butcher Boy (Meat Market of Port Jefferson), who proffers no gifts and promises no gimmicks, but does serve up the grossest slogan of any food purveyor ever: "We cut anything including our fingers once in a while."

The following week, it's Dick Van Dyke and Hope Lange plugging away for their doomed show, which presented Van Dyke as a talk show host last season but for the coming season will change his character's profession to soap opera star/commercial actor. (Nothing draws 'em in like Dick dancing on a really big toilet.)

The TV Line dishes on deaf Osmonds, ugliest man in show biz Richard Boone, cute Judy Norton and super-cute (and deeply religious) Rita McLaughlin.

Viskupic inks another stark, startling image for the NBC News special about the Sinai.

Far lighter is his Queen Elizabeth holding a giant golf ball and festooned club for a close-up on the British Open that Saturday afternoon.

A rare local ad for WCBS news shows Rolland Smith and Dave Marash having a josh in the newsroom, no doubt hollering to be heard over the clackety-clack of a dozen manual typewriters and the dit-dit-dit-dit of wire services.

A Cootner cover introduces a piece on American kiddie shows taking over the world. Morgan Freeman's a pig. (Newsday said it, not me!)

Bill Cosby is the true victim here... of bad ratings.

Late Monday, Marjoe Gortner brings you the sounds of Nashville...

...and the next night, Chicago is in the Rockies.

To illustrate this ABC comedy special, Viskupic does his familiar "let's-make-this-way-weirder-than-it-really-needs-to-be" bit by giving us gaping mouths where eyes should be.

Also unsettling in her own way, Helen Reddy hosts Joan Rivers and Jim Croce on Thursday night.

Friday night, Viskupic does Harriet, and hepcats stay up and dig on In Concert and Midnight Special. (Every once in a while I like to leave in the groovy font and graphics.)

Holiday Spa continues to MILF this Hot Mommy theme for all it's worth.

Sizzling summer sales include a service employing Lilliputian scalp scratchers.

Finally for this week, a bit more Rolland and Dave.

The profiles of Mike Wallace and Oliver Reed--no wait, that's Morley Safer--grace the next cover.

Their hit show 60 Minutes gets shunted to Friday nights for the summer.

Queries regarding the sounds of Hot Butter and Quaker Oats' ancient astronauts pop up in this week's TV Line.

Visk phones in this Music Country close-up on late Thursday.

The guide is light on content this week, so here are some ads. Custom Meats presents "Cookout Corner," featuring a grill mysteriously manned by a leprechaun.

 

Khrushchev's wife makes your mower last, or something.

Putting the lie to my earlier assertion that local news ads were rare, here's the third one this month.

As we head into August, 25-year-old (!) Georgia Engel is re-introduced to The Mary Tyler Moore Show, now as a semi-regular.

Linc's superfluous glasses, Maggie's Beautiful Machine and the erstwhile Westbury Music Fair get shout-outs in the Line this time out.

Late Monday, Geraldo gets his first shot at a national interview forum.

This Viskupic drawing is found elsewhere on DPiMR, so here's the full page.

Listen, if Bill Fiore and Shimen Ruskin didn't draw you in to The Corner Bar, will the addition of Ron Carey have you bellying up? (The answer, of course, is "of course.")

Just for the fuck of it (as Diet Coke used to say), here's the late-night schedule for the first Saturday of that August. I love when Cashman throws in the odd bit of trivia, as with this Saratoga review.

We close out the month with, yes, another WCBS newsroom ad, but Rolland and Dave have departed for an after-show doobie break.

See you next time! Until then, remember: No parading!
(So yeah, I'll keep working on a catchphrase outro.)