Category — Entertainment

The idea for “The Price is Right” came to the late Bob Stewart “while standing in front of a store window in Manhattan in 1955,” reports Dennis Hevesi in the New York Times (5/7/12). His fellow window shoppers were guessing at how much the furniture in the window cost and the idea just “popped into his head.” At least that’s one version of the story. According to Stephen Miller in The Wall Street Journal (5/8/12), Bob “got the idea for ‘The Price is Right’ while watching a storekeeper in New York, who attracted a crowd by selling souvenirs through an auction instead of using set prices.”

Either way, the show became a hit when it aired in 1956 and “is still on the air for an hour each weekday on CBS,” notes Dennis. Contestants try to “guess the price of an item — a boat, a refrigerator, the cost of house cleaning for a year. The contestant who comes closest without exceeding the actual price won.” Bob got the idea for another hit game show, “To Tell The Truth,” after walking into a crowded elevator and wondering about the occupations of his fellow travelers. The resulting game involved “three people, all claiming to be the same person, trying to befuddle a panel of four celebrities.”

Bob’s other big hits included “Password” and “The $10,000 Pyramid,” originally starring Dick Clark. Bob explained that all his shows were essentially about communication. “Once you cause somebody at home to talk to the set aloud, even by himself or herself, then you’ve got a good game show, he once said. “You want them to say, ‘It’s number 2! It’s number 2! It’s number 2!’ before the moment of truth comes out.” Or, as he confided to the Washington Post in 1978: “By the time they find out that what they are watching is crap, they’ve already watched it.” Bob Stewart was 91 when he died last week in Los Angeles.

Susan Orlean spent "nearly a decade of her life" writing a book about Rin Tin Tin, reports the Economist (2/4/12). Susan decided to write the book, RinTin Tin: The Life and the Legend, after coming across a reference to the famous German Shepherd and being "startled by the strength of her reaction." She was instantly transported to her 1950s childhood and television memories of "The Adventures of Rin Tin Tin." Her father had recently died and her son had just been born and "she found herself stirred by the emotional permanence of Rin Tin Tin."

As a breed, German Shepherds "grew popular in the 1920s as soldiers returned from the front with stories of their loyalty and heroism in battle. Lee Duncan, a young American soldier stationed in France, could not believe his luck when he stumbled on a whimpering litter in an abandoned enemy kennel. An animal lover with a lonely soul, he saved the puppies and kept the two finest for himself, Rin Tin Tin and Nannette (named after two wartime good-luck charms)."

Driven more by a sense of the dog’s greatness than any material objective, Lee turned Rin Tin Tin into a silent-film star. Dogs and silent films were a good match — "unknowable but accessible, driven but egoless." Dogs were also becoming popular as pets at the time, evolving "from farm hands to hearth-warmers." When Rin Tin Tin died in 1932, "every national newspaper ran an obituary" and one radio announcer praised him as "a gentleman, a scholar, a hero, a cinema star … virtually everything we could wish to be."

Writer-director and comic-book geek Kevin Smith has bought himself a comic-book shop and is making a television show out of it, reports Dave Itzkoff in the New York Times (2/5/12). Kevin’s “filmmaking career took off with the 1994 release of Clerks,” which, like a later film, Mallrats, “mocked the anonymous and dehumanizing aspects of service-industry professionals.” Kevin says that Clerks cost just $27,575 to make, so when he was able to snag Comicology, a comic-book shop in Red Bank, NJ, for $30,000, he jumped on it.

Kevin figured that was only about $2,500 more than he had spent on Clerks and he could have his best comic-book-geek friend, Walt Flanagan run it. Ever since Clerks, “he began thinking of ways to pay back the friends who inspired his movies.” He re-named the store Jay and Silent Bob’s Secret Stash (after characters in his films), and turned it into a combination “mini-museum” of his film career, a hangout for regulars, “a place for staff members to record podcasts; and a site for poker games … it is also, occasionally, a place where business is transacted.”

Most recently, it has become the “subject of an AMC reality series, Comic Book Men, which, “at heart is a celebration of the deeply particular personalities involved when geeky merchandise changes hands.” As Kevin explains: “Both the purchaser and the seller are very interested in the item. If you go to a grocery store, whoever checks you out ain’t necessarily interested in the Cocoa Puffs.” Or as Walt Flanagan observes, “I don’t know if there’s many memories to be had of typing into a search engine, looking for this special book, as opposed to finding it in some hole-in-the-wall store you never were before.”

"The fastest-growing and wealthiest segment of the population has been ignored or forgotten by Hollywood’s broadcast and cable networks," reports Joe Flint in the Los Angeles Times (1/22/12). That segment would be "senior citizens," and John Erickson hopes to change their world with "a cable channel designed for the AARP-adjacent." John "made his fortune building large retirement communities," and got the idea for a seniors-specific television after building TV studios for residents and noticing how engaged they became in programming their own television station.

"What amazed me was the interest level of the residents in their own lives and how much attention they paid to this little television channel," he says. And so he developed RLTV (originally Retirement Living TV but now known as Re-define Life TV) and "bought a block of afternoon time on a few Comcast systems in the Northeast," as well as time on DirecTV along with some other distributors. He’s also recruited some familiar former network-television stars such as Joan Lunden (61) and Sam Donaldson (77) as well as Florence Hendersen (also 77!) to host shows.

Most of RLTV’s programming focused on healthcare, finance, politics and travel, although programming chief Elliot Jacobson hopes to launch a boomer version of American Idol soon, too. "It’s important for us to be advocates for the demographic we serve," he says. Senior power "can’t be ignored. According to the 2010 census, there are more than 99 million Americans older than 50. The over-50s are also one of the fastest growing groups on Facebook … And they have money. The AARP, citing information from the US Consumer Expenditure Survey, says adults over 50 spent $2.7 trillion on consumer goods in 2010."

A funny thing happened to Louis C.K. on his way to his latest comedy special, reports David Carr in the New York Times (12/19/11). Normally, Louis’s performances are carried on cable television. But this time, he decided to distribute his work himself, and turn a recent Beacon Theater show into a package of streams and downloads his fans could buy for five bucks via Paypal and watch whenever or however they wanted to. He didn’t impose any digital-rights restrictions, meaning that, once downloaded, "it was there for the pirating — and some went right to the torrent sites and did so."

But, by Louis’s count, about 200,000 fans have paid the five dollars so far. After expenses, he figures he has cleared a cool $750,000 to date. He also "owns the rights, and the long tail of buyers in perpetuity." Louis says he just did the obvious. "I went at this like a consumer, just looking at human impulses," he says. "I buy lots of things online and I had a focus group of one. I thought about it, and five bucks seemed almost free and I figured if I took out the hassle, most of the speed bumps, it would almost be like hitting a link and streaming it."

In a chat on Reddit, he addressed the piracy issue directly: "I think it is really interesting that I brought the price so close to stealing and made the movie so easy to get and made it so clear that it’s a human offering that it sparked a debate about pirating," he said. "To steal from someone and not feel bad, you either have to be a sociopath or view the act differently." In other words, Louis "changed the subject from whether it is OK to game a big corporation to whether it’s morally appropriate to simply take the work of an artist that other people have paid for." The result, says Louis, did not surprise him: "People have been paying for what I do for a long time now," he observes.

Carsten Holler, a scientist turned artist, is creating a museum experience that requires visitors to sign a legal waiver beforehand, reports Randy Kennedy in the New York Times (10/26/11). Visitors to Carsten Holler: Experience at the New Museum are treated to "a corkscrewing tubular metal slide for grownups," designed so that those taking the slide become part of the exhibit. "You will be able to see the madness in their faces for a split second and then — zup — they will be gone," says Carsten. "It’s a very odd thing with a slide; it’s quite an efficient way to go from place to place, but it is also like a barely controlled fall. It’s a very specific kind of madness to go down one."

The madness continues with "The Pinocchio Effect," which "tricks the mind into believing that the nose is growing: you hold your nose with your fingers and place a small vibrating device on one of your upper arms. Another piece, using a small video screen in front of each eye, mimics the effect of moving through a forest, except that at one point, the eyes go in different directions, around a tree." And then there are the "wraparound prism goggles," which "turn the world upside down and flips left and right, and effect that is more terrifying than it sounds." Carsten says the "first hour is really the worst, then it gets much better."

The point of all this is that “despite the certainties won by science over the past three or four hundred years, human beings still know relatively little about the world around them and have no good reason even to trust their senses.” This is art that stands “science on its head, yielding results for the sake of the test subject rather than that of the tester.” As Carsten puts it: “For every person who comes in, it will be like exposing a film to the light and seeing what image develops … I try to make the conditions for the development. But I, personally, have no idea what the image will be.” He says what he does “is certainly not science, but maybe it’s not art either; it’s something in between, a third thing.”

Larry Chickola "likes rides that simulate the sensation of flight," reports Ann Zimmerman in the Wall Street Journal (10/29/11). Larry is the chief corporate engineer for Six Flags, and "presides over one of the nation’s largest collections of roller coasters (120) and other stomach-churning rides (680)." Six Flags has "19 parks in the US, Canada and Mexico" and just celebrated the 50th anniversary of its park in Arlington, Texas, home of the Texas Giant, a "beloved but rickety wooden roller coaster."

For 20 years, the Giant’s fans "loved the clackety-clack sound its wheels made on the track, its rough-hewn look and how they were pulled out of their seats — ‘air time’ in coaster parlance — as the cars maneuvered numerous dips and curves." But Larry decided it was time for more than mere restoration. "The gauntlet was thrown," he says. "I didn’t want to just redo the ride, I wanted to design it for maximum thrill." Mid-level thrill just wouldn’t cut it. Larry wanted "something that wasn’t just fun, but spectacular."

This meant replacing the wood track with "a new steel-rail fabrication technique … Wood would be used as the ride’s scaffolding to retain the old-timey look." The result is "the world’s steepest drop on a wooden coaster; the six-car trains slowly crest a 153-foot summit, then plummet almost straight down, maxing out at 65 miles per hour. Seconds later, riders are whooshed into a 95-degree snap turn — one of three — and careen through three tunnels filled with fog and LED lighting … (video) In all, reinventing the Texas Giant would take $10 million and 18 months."

Eric Carle‘s latest book, The Artist Who Painted a Blue Horse, is "a celebration of unbridled creativity in 49 words," reports Joanne Kaufman in the Wall Street Journal (10/4/11). The book is about a boy who uses a horse as his palette. "I always say if you’re writing an adult book you start with a 20-word idea and build up to 200,000 words," says Eric, who is 82. "When you do a children’s book, you start out with an idea that’s 200,000 words and you reduce it to 25." Eric is best known for The Very Hungry Caterpillar and his trademark illustrations — "gorgeous collages of hand-painted tissue papers."

It’s a technique Eric first used while serving as an "art director for a pharmaceutical advertising agency." His challenge was to come up with a new style for each client, and, when he ran out of ideas, he recalled making collages while in high school. So, he made a collage of "a lobster for a campaign to promote an allergy medication." This was noticed by Bill Martin, a children’s book author, who tapped Eric to illustrate Brown Bear, Brown Bear What Do You See? in 1967. The book became a best-seller and it gave Eric the idea that maybe he could write, as well as illustrate, his own books. "It changed my life," says Eric.

His first idea was to write about a worm called Willi, but his editor, Ann Beneduce, thought he needed a more sympathetic protagonist and suggested a caterpillar. The Very Hungry Caterpillar was published in 1969 and now "has 30 million copies in print in 50 languages." Ann, who is still his editor, met his latest book idea similar skepticism. She thought Eric’s illustration of a blue horse, inspired by "the early 20th-century artist Franz Marc (image), looked "a little too adult." But Ann says that once Eric "added the figure of a child as the artist, the point became clear." She now thinks that this book — his 70th — "is the freest burst of Eric’s artistry."

Dane Boedigheimer has this fruity idea that he can bypass Hollywood on the way to the television screen, reports Brooks Barnes in the New York Times (10/3/11). Dane is the seed of the YouTube sensation otherwise known as the Annoying Orange, a series of short animations that have peeled off "more than 800 million views on YouTube" over the past two years. He’s already planted this pop-culture success in licensed merchandise that will go on sale at Toys R Us, Radio Shack and JC Penney this Christmas. Dane would also like to see the fruits of his labor on television, but Hollywood isn’t biting.

"The reaction is always, ‘I see why it resonates in a bite-sized way on the web, but how is this a full-blown TV show?’" says Dan Weinstein of the Collective, the management company for the Annoying Orange. Some say it’s hard to translate "short, unpolished bursts … into the kind of longer-form content that flows through Hollywood’s traditional piping." Others say Hollywood wastes too much time and money and generally squeezes the juice out of good ideas: "The entertainment industry’s senior ranks are still populated with people who, deep down, believe that the audience does not tell them what it wants; they tell the audience."

Usually, Hollywood takes about two years and a million dollars to create a pilot. So, Dane and the Collective, are making their own damn pilot, at a cost of "a few hundred thousand dollars" and then shopping it to the networks themselves. The target audience is kids 6-12. The shows are full of puns and sophomoric humor and "typically showcase a guest food getting chopped to bits." Dane says he hopes the pilot will prove that the Annoying Orange can keep its "attitude and charm" while going for a bigger audience. "People respond because it’s simple and silly," he says. "That, and people like to see talking food get hacked in half. Everybody needs a good kersplat once in a while."

Illusionist David Copperfield is willing to spend millions for a unique antique Gypsy fortuneteller machine, reports John S. Adams in USA Today (9/23/11). The machine, made by the Mills Novelty Company more than 100 years ago, currently is owned by the State of Montana. It is believed to be "one of the first amusement machines to use a recorded human voice to dispense a player’s fortune … Montana inherited the Gypsy in 1998 when it paid $6.5 million to buy nearly 250 buildings and their contents" which included "a massive collection of antique games, music machines and other oddities."

David Copperfield is also "an avid collector of turn-of-the-century penny arcade machines," and has restored other Gypsy fortuneteller machines. But he says this one is special. "There are other verbal fortunetellers that exist, but a Mills verbal like that, that’s the only one," he says. However, the Montana Heritage Commission, "which oversees a vast collection of rare antiques," says that state law prohibits it from selling "items from its collection without first completing an intensive public process." And so David says he’d be content simply to help restore this rare Gypsy to her former glory.

Montana has actually been working on doing just that for some time, although it’s not easy to find parts: "The original Edison wax cylinder phonograph records that gave the Gypsy her voice were in poor shape and couldn’t be played," for example. Her voice has been restored, however, via digital scans of the cylinders. And David is okay with not owning the Gypsy machine as long as it’s restored. "I think it deserves to be wherever it is as long as it’s going to be preserved and kept properly and that people who would understand it would be able to see it," he says.