#mort sahl

[oldshowbiz]

comedians dressing the same

[electronicsquid]

Mort Sahl shopping for a sports car

(Grey Villet. 1958?)

[loveboatinsanity]

[route22ny]

Mort Sahl in retrospect

Comedian and satirist who revolutionised US standup in the 1950s, skewering politicians of every hue.

The comedian and satirist Mort Sahl, who has died aged 94, was a combination of Lenny Bruce and Bob Hope – with a little Will Rogers thrown in. Like Bruce, Sahl was a product of the 1950s. Like Hope, he was as much a reporter and commentator on the events of the day as a morning newspaper. And like Rogers, who took the US by the heartstrings during the days of the Great Depression, he would walk on stage with one of those papers in his hand and proceed to take a famous figure to task.

Rogers just made jokes about the people in the news, but Sahl specialised in demolishing them. Different from Hope, who employed an army of ghostwriters, Sahl wrote all his own material – and not just for himself; for a while he was President John F Kennedy’s principal joke writer. To much surprise, he later became a close friend of Ronald Reagan.

Unlike Bruce, who used to say that Sahl was his inspiration, he did not shock with obscenities and the drug culture seemed to be foreign to him. Nevertheless, he had the effect of a heat-seeking missile on his targets. When American politicians were in trouble, they had to take cover whenever Sahl appeared on stage or on a television talk show. Kennedy said he liked Sahl because he admired a man who was “in relentless pursuit of everybody”.

Born in Montreal, he was the son of Harry Sahl, a Jewish-American court reporter who had gone to Canada to write plays and go into business. When this failed, he took his wife, Dorothy, and son, Morton, back to the US and became an administrator for the FBI. The younger Sahl would later become the subject of a considerable FBI file about his suspected communist leanings. Nothing stuck, however, and his political affiliations were never clear.

At school in Los Angeles, he was a member of the officer cadet corps. He was drafted into the US air force soon after the second world war and stationed in Alaska, where he worked on the base newspaper. He then went to the University of Southern California to take a degree in city management. Before long, his only connection with that worthy subject would be lambasting it from the stage of a smoke-filled club or a small theatre – although usually his targets were larger.

He almost starved trying to sell his writing before he arrived at the hungry i nightclub in San Francisco in the early 50s, but by the end of the decade and in the early 60s, he was the favourite nightclub entertainer in the more sophisticated parts of New York, Chicago and Los Angeles. What many of the well-heeled and well-known patrons liked about him was that he had no more respect for the leftwing than for the establishment on the right.

He was one of the first satirical comedians to make LP records and sell them, the first being At Sunset, recorded in 1955. He became such an influential figure that Time magazine devoted one of its celebrated cover features to him, describing him as “Will Rogers with fangs”. Sahl also wrote screenplays and occasionally appeared in films himself, including Johnny Cool (1963), Inside the Third Reich (1982) and Nothing Lasts Forever (1984).

For a while in the 60s, his fame and appeal began to wane, but Sahl regarded it as his duty to continue to attack whatever he believed needed attacking. The assassination of Kennedy in 1963 was a landmark: he regarded the president’s killing as he would the death of a close relative. When the Warren commission declared that Lee Harvey Oswald had acted alone, Sahl took it as a personal affront and campaigned to have the findings reversed.

The Vietnam war was perfect grist for the mill of his talent; people began to want to hear what he said about it, and he guested again on the top talk shows. But his stage work faded until the late 80s – when, for the first time, he had a four-week run at a Broadway theatre. He came out on to a bare stage, as he always did, in a pair of slacks and a V-neck sweater. But there was the inevitable folded newspaper and the comment on the world around him.

“Washington couldn’t tell a lie,” he said, “Nixon couldn’t tell the truth and Reagan couldn’t tell the difference.” Although he was a frequent guest at the White House during the Reagan years, the president remained a target.

He would skewer politicians of all parties, latterly including Barack Obama and Donald Trump. Asked what his principal philosophy was, he would say “I am allergic to majorities” and he was known for the stage catchphrase: “Are there any groups I haven’t offended?” In 2004 he described himself as “a disturber”.

When he talked about retirement, he would say: “I’d be glad to relinquish the reins and go on and do something useful ... but I can’t seem to clean up the town.” He carried on performing once a week until prevented by the pandemic.

The New York Post critic Clive Barnes once wrote of Sahl: “The real joy of the man, and his show, is the quickness of his mind and his wonderful sense of nonsense. Forget that the man is clever. Merely think of him as the funniest guy in town.”

Sahl was married and divorced four times. His son, Mort Jr, from his second marriage, to China Lee, died in 1996.

Mort Sahl audio available at the Internet Archive here

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[woodyallenweb]

[liawake]

My life needs editing.

Mort Sahl

[papermoonloveslucy]

LUCY & HENRY FONDA ~ Part One

1935-1968 

Lucille Ball and Henry Fonda were more than just co-workers. When Lucy first got to Hollywood, the two actually briefly dated. Lucy remembers,

"We worked long and hard, Ginger [Rogers] and I, in front of our mirrors. We used eye shadow, plenty of mascara, pancake [make-up], deep red lipstick, rouge, everything we'd been taught in the studio cosmetic department. Then we went out to Brentwood, that's where the boys lived. My date was Fonda. Ginger's date was [Jimmy] Stewart. Henry cooked the dinner, and after we ate, Ginger and the boys turned on the radio in the living room and Ginger tried to teach them ‘The Carioca.’ I was left doing the dishes. When I finished, we went out dancing at the Coconut Grove. Freddie Martin's orchestra. There we were, Ginger and I in our long organdy dresses, looking just as summery and smooth as we could. The date stretched into daybreak. We'd had a hilarious, wonderful evening that came to an end at Barney's Beanery. Well, it was dark and we went in and light when we came out. Hank and Jim took one look at us and said, 'What happened?' We said, 'What do you mean what happened?' And Jimmy Stewart said, 'Well, your nighttime makeup is on awful heavy for this time of the morning.' And Henry Fonda said, 'Yuk!'"

In 1975 Fonda told this story at “The Dean Martin Celebrity Roast” for Lucille Ball. Ginger Rogers was also in attendance. He added that "If I hadn't said, 'Yuk!', if I'd behaved myself, they might have named that studio Henrylu, not Desilu."

Perhaps it is a good thing that Fonda and Ball never married as genealogists point out that they are related - 8th cousins. The pair acted in three feature films together and made numerous television appearances opposite one-another. Curiously, although he was sometimes mentioned, Fonda never guest-starred on a “Lucy” sitcom.  

I Dream Too Much (1935)

Producer: Pandro S. Berman Director: John Cromwell Choreographer: Hermes Pan Screenplay: Elsie Finn (story), David G. Wittels (story), Edmund North Songs: Jerome Kern and Dorothy Fields 

Cast: Lily Pons (Annette Monard Street), Henry Fonda (Jonathan Street), Eric Blore (Roger Briggs), Osgood Perkins (Paul Darcy), Lucien Littlefield (Hubert Dilley), Lucille Ball (Gwendolyn Dilley)

Synopsis: Annette Monard Street (Lily Pons) is an aspiring singer, who falls in love with and marries Jonathan Street (Henry Fonda), a struggling young composer. Jonathan pushes her into a singing career, and she soon becomes a star. Meanwhile, Jonathan is unable to sell his music, and he finds himself jealous of his wife's success. Concerned about their relationship, Annette uses her influence to get Jonathan's work turned into a musical comedy. Once she achieves this, she then retires from public life in order to raise a family.

"Lucille replaced Betty Grable, an eighteen-year-old stock player... in the minor role of Gwendolyn Dilley, a bleached-blonde gum-chewer visiting Paris with her parents and little brother.” ~ Kathleen Brady, Lucille

Gwendolyn Dilley (Lucille Ball): "Culture is making my feet hurt."

TRIVIA

At this point in her career, Lucy was a platinum blonde. She had dyed it from her natural mousy brown to get more attention from casting agents and producers. She did not begin coloring her hair its trademark red until the technicolor film Du Barry Was A Lady in 1943.

A brief clip of Lucy in the film is included in “Hollywood the Golden Years: The RKO Story: A Woman's Lot” (1987).  

The Big Street (1942)

Producer: Damon Runyon Director: Irving Reis Screenplay: Leonard Spigelgass, based on the short story “Little Pinks” by Damon Runyon

Cast: Henry Fonda (Little Pinks), Lucille Ball (Gloria Lyons), Barton MacLane (Case Ables), Eugene Pallette (Nicely Nicely Johnson), Agnes Moorehead (Violette Shumberg), Sam Levene (Horsethief), Ray Collins (Professor B)

Uncredited actor Hans Conried played a waiter. On “I Love Lucy” he played Harry Martin in “Redecorating” (S2;E8) and Percy Livermore in “Lucy Hires an English Tutor” (S2;E13), both in 1952. He also did two episodes of “The Lucy Show,” both as her music tutor Dr. Gitterman in 1963.  

'Queen of the Extras' Bess Flowers made numerous uncredited background appearances on both “I Love Lucy” and “The Lucy Show.”  

Uncredited actor Gil Perkins (Mug) later turned up on a 1970 episode of “Here's Lucy” (S2;E21).  

TRIVIA

During filming, Lucy's new husband Desi Arnaz felt so insecure about leaving Lucy and Fonda alone together that he’d often pop by the set to keep an eye on them. His paranoia so exasperated director Irving Reis that he finally banned him from the set.

This was Lucille Ball's favorite of her nearly 80 films. She felt her performance was unjustly ignored by the Academy.

Damon Runyon also created the source material for the hit Broadway musical Guys and Dolls (1950), which starred Robert Alda, who went on to make several appearances on “The Lucy Show.” The two stories share the character of Nicely Nicely Johnson. When the film version was made by MGM in 1955, Lucy and Desi were also under contract to the studio. A brief clip of the film was inserted into the middle of an episode of “I Love Lucy” called “Lucy and the Dummy” (S5;E3), although the clip was removed after its initial airing. Further, when Lucille Ball first came to Hollywood, before becoming a contract player at RKO, she worked for Sam Goldwyn as one of the Goldwyn Girls. In Guys and Dolls, the Hot Box Girls are played by the Goldwyn Girls.

Gloria Lyons (Lucille Ball): “Love is something that gets you one room, two chins, and three kids.”

A brief clip from the film is seen in “Lucy and Desi: A Home Movie.”

“The Good Years” (January 12, 1962)

Produced by: Leland Heyward Directed by: Franklin L. Schaffner

Cast: Lucille Ball, Henry Fonda, Mort Sahl, Margaret Hamilton (Narrator)

Characters included Teddy Roosevelt, Sandow the Bodybuilder, the Wright Brothers, J.P. Morgan, Lizzy Borden   

TRIVIA

This CBS special was billed as 'Lucille Ball's return to television' after leaving Lucy Ricardo behind in April 1960. It would be several more months before the debut of “The Lucy Show” in Fall 1962.   

Based on a best-selling book by Walter Lord first published in 1960 about the years leading up to World War One, the special was a hodge-podge of sketches and musical numbers about the time period 1900 through 1920.

Mort Sahl: “Lucille Ball came into rehearsal. She had a later call and a lot of doubts about the script.”

The 90-minute special was a critical failure and has largely been forgotten. There are few photographs and video copies are held at the Museum of Broadcasting. 

“All About People” (1967)

Director: Saul Rubin

Narrators: Lucille Ball, Henry Fonda, Jack Benny, George Burns, Carol Channing, Eydie Gorme, Charleton Heston, Eartha Kitt, Burt Lancaster, Edward G. Robinson

TRIVIA

This was a 30-minute black and white documentary made by the United Jewish Welfare Fund about its history. 

After marrying Gary Morton (nee Morton Goldapper), Lucille Ball was active in Jewish charities. On December 9, 1961, Lucy had appeared on the “Twelve Star Salute to the Federation of Jewish Philanthropies.” 

Burns, Benny, and Gorme, all later made appearances on “Here's Lucy.” Edward G. Robinson did a cameo on “The Lucy Show.”  

Although Ball and Fonda are both involved in the project, they likely recorded their narration separately. 

Yours, Mine and Ours  (1968)

Producer: Robert F. Blumofe Director: Melville Shavelson Screenplay: Melville Shavelson and Mort Lachman, with story by Bob Carroll Jr. and Madelyn Davis (Lucy’s TV writers), based on the book Who Gets The Drumsticks? by Helen Eileen Beardsley

Cast: Lucille Ball (Helen North Beardsley), Henry Fonda (Frank Beardsley), Van Johnson (Darrel Harrison)

Nancy Howard (Nancy Beardsley) made three appearances on “Here's Lucy.” Tim Matheson (Mike Beardsley) made an appearance on a 1972 “Here's Lucy” playing Kim Carter’s boyfriend. 

Uncredited extras Leon Alton, Paul Bradley, Charles Cirillo, George Boyce, Paul King, Joseph LaCava, and Leoda Richards all made numerous background appearances on “The Lucy Show” and “Here's Lucy.”

Synopsis: A widower with ten children falls for a widow with eight, and they must decide about forming a huge, unconventional family.

TRIVIA

Jane Fonda claimed that her father was deeply in love with Lucy and that the two were "very close" during the filming of Yours, Mine and Ours but that Lucy wasn't in love with him.

After purchasing the rights to the book the film was based on, Lucille Ball became very close to the real Beardsleys and even treated the whole family to a vacation at Disneyland. 

In 1959, Lucille Ball and Desi Arnaz, still affiliated with MGM, were going to star as Frank and Helen Beardsley but the studio had trouble with the casting until the late 1960s. In addition, their marriage was then on the rocks, a situation which would have made working together on the optimistic comedy somewhat problematic.

Lucy's old friend John Wayne was initially considered to play Frank Beardsley. The role was cast with Fred MacMurray, but he was replaced by Henry Fonda.  

Frank (Henry Fonda): “I don't quite understand. Am I being stupid?” Helen (Lucille Ball): “No, you're being a man. Which is sometimes the same thing.”

Lucille Ball co-produced the film under her company, Desilu Productions. When the film became a surprise smash hit grossing over $17 million on a $2.5 million investment, she hadn't anticipated the film's huge box-office success and failed to provide a tax shelter for her personal profits, resulting in most of her earnings going toward taxes.

The success of the film led to Lucy being considered to play Mrs. Brady in “The Brady Bunch,” a TV sitcom with a similar story of a blended family. Lucy decided to do her own sitcom, “Here's Lucy,” instead.

In 1968, Van Johnson guest starred on “Here's Lucy” as both himself and an impostor look-alike in “Guess Who Owes Lucy $23.50” (HL S1;E11). The dialogue contained references to Yours, Mine and Ours and their co-star Henry Fonda.

Van Johnson Impostor: “I loved working with that kooky redhead.” Lucy Carter: “Personally, I thought she was much too young for Henry Fonda.”

Johnson was in the cast of Too Many Girls, the film which introduced Lucy to Desi in 1940. Johnson also guest-starred on “I Love Lucy” in “The Dancing Star” (S4;E27) in 1955.

Click Here for Part Two: 1975 to 1979!