You mean the one where Jim Carey has his face painted green?
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I've just been reading about the cast of the 1970s British comedy series Dad's Army. The show was about retired older men serving as backup soldiers during WW2, it's quite funny but pretty old fashioned.
I was fascinated to learn that almost the entire cast were war veterans. It wasn't uncommon at the time because WW2 was the biggest war in history, but it's still really interesting. A couple of the actors were actually ww1 veterans and had served in BOTH wars.
It's like when I learned the same thing about the cast of Hogan's Heroes- A lot of the cast being WW2 veterans and many of those playing the Nazis were actually Jewish.
The Simpsons once criticised Hogan's Heroes for the bumbling and silly way it portrayed Nazis- I tend to think that Jewish men who fought against the Nazis in WW2 can portray them any way they please.
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Comic Talk and General Discussion *
Happy 2022! General Discussion Thread
Ozoneocean wrote:No, it was actually Chuck Jones's original animated special from the 60s that Dr. Seuss hated - he said he felt Chuck Jones strayed too far away from his Seussian art style and made the special look too much like his own animation style, which is why most subsequent Seuss animated specials went with Friz Freleng's studio instead, as they stayed more true to Seuss' art style.
You mean the one where Jim Carey has his face painted green?
Ozoneocean
I've just been reading about the cast of the 1970s British comedy series Dad's Army. The show was about retired older men serving as backup soldiers during WW2, it's quite funny but pretty old fashioned.
I was fascinated to learn that almost the entire cast were war veterans. It wasn't uncommon at the time because WW2 was the biggest war in history, but it's still really interesting. A couple of the actors were actually ww1 veterans and had served in BOTH wars.
It's like when I learned the same thing about the cast of Hogan's Heroes- A lot of the cast being WW2 veterans and many of those playing the Nazis were actually Jewish.
The Simpsons once criticised Hogan's Heroes for the bumbling and silly way it portrayed Nazis- I tend to think that Jewish men who fought against the Nazis in WW2 can portray them any way they please.
The German cast of Hogan's Heroes specifically Werner Kemperer insisted the Nazis never be shown to win. John Banner also requested that the Nazis be ridiculous. My supervisor is a huge fan of the show and we have a few Hogan's Heroes memes around including a portrait of our regional manager as Major Hochstetter.
J_Scarbrough wrote:
"WHAT IS THIS MAN DOING HEEEERRRRREEEEE!?!!
I do a pretty good Hochstetter and we totally break up every time.
If we ever make a mistake pffft- off to the Russian front.
I know noth-thing, absolutely noth-thing.
As you can probably tell from my icon, I wear one of those wool jeep caps like Kinch wore, though it was Radar O'Reilly who inspired me to wear one.
Speaking of which, HOGAN'S HEROES was a show I used to hate-watch, because I thought it was pretty stupid - especially in its earlier seasons, when it was incredibly broad, slapstick, and even cartoonish at times . . . but hate-watching it is how it grew on me, and I do very much enjoy it now (although, I do prefer the later, somewhat more "mature" seasons, as the show definitely got better with age.
Having said that, if I had a preference, I would still maintain that M*A*S*H was the superior of the two shows (until it got all preachy and depressing in its last few seasons), not just in terms a more sophisticated humor, but how it took the time to really flesh out the characters and allowed them to develop and evolve over time, which gave them many layers and depth, as oppposed to how the characters of HOGAN'S HEROES, for the most part, pretty much remained the same from the first to the last season (although, their performances seemed a lot more stilted in the last seasons, for some reason).
Interestingly, both shows had a lot of the same personnel behind the scenes: Laurence Marks, in particular, wrote extensively for HOGAN'S HEROES all six seasons, and was also a story editor on M*A*S*H in the earliest seasons. Gene Reynolds, who was the original co-creator/producer of M*A*S*H directed for both shows as well.
J_Scarbrough wrote:
Speaking of which, HOGAN'S HEROES was a show I used to hate-watch, because I thought it was pretty stupid - especially in its earlier seasons, when it was incredibly broad, slapstick, and even cartoonish at times . . . but hate-watching it is how it grew on me, and I do very much enjoy it now (although, I do prefer the later, somewhat more "mature" seasons, as the show definitely got better with age.
Hogan’s Heros followed my nightly Gilligan’s Island marathon in the mid-nineties, so the appearance of Colonel Klink usually signaled, “Time for bed, brush teeth, and turn off the television set.”
M*A*S*H was a more mature 1970s style show. US comedies in the 1970s were usually more sentimental and had more of a social commentary aspect, and as you know it was a pretty MASSIVE commentary on Vietnam, using the Korean war.
Hogan's Heroes was 1960s style- broad and silly.
You pretty much said that already, but I think it was more due to when they were from than just the shows themselves. The broader, silly style of Hogan's Heroes and 1960s US comedies in general fits better with international tastes.
I think that 1970s sentimentality could get a bit much sometimes and it was way more appealing specifically to Americans more than anyone else. Though I do appreciate the cleverness of M*A*S*H.
Tastes in the US started to turn BACK to broad comedies in the late 80s, though with a more cynical edge, so Hogans Heroes came back into fashion after a while and even fits in with modern tastes -because we can imagine the use of Nazis in it as being part of a harder edge, even though it wasn't at all.
But M*A*S*H is part of a style that's over now so it seems more unique and special in its own way rather than part of the general mass of comedy.
J_Scarbrough wrote:Specifically designed to be worn under a steel pot to warm the head and ears and shade the eyes a little.
As you can probably tell from my icon, I wear one of those wool jeep caps like Kinch wore, though it was Radar O'Reilly who inspired me to wear one.
Lots of WW2 pictures especially in the Battle of the Bulge, where you can see the brim poking out from under the helmet.
Gets awfully cold under that helmet with the wind blowing around your ears because of that high and tight haircut the first sergeant insists on. I typically wore an SAS balaclava. Which I still have and wear throughout the winter to this day.
That was always something from M*A*S*H. The old army senior NCO. Sherman Potter fit the archetype though and had been an enlisted man so it made up for it in part. There should have been an E-8 and a couple of E-7 walking around but I guess they had better things to do, like actually get things done so the unit will still be able to run the next morning.
To be fair, yes, most sitcoms of the 60s were definitely kooky and silly, but that was mainly because the 60s were such a tumultuous and turbulent decade, that primetime TV was a form of escapism from what was happening in the world around everybody. Shows were either fantasy-based like THE ADDAMS FAMILY, THE MUNSTERS, BEWITCHED, I DREAM OF JEANNIE, or they were just so completely campy and wacky like THE BEVERLY HILLBILLIES, PETTICOAT JUNCTION, GREEN ACRES, and the like. HOGAN'S HEROES was a unique case, in that it was set during a war, and as they say on M*A*S*H all the time, war is hell . . . on paper, it almost sounds like an insensitive notion to build a sitcom around a POW camp in Nazi Germany, and there were some who took offense to such a notion - the pilot of HOGAN'S HEROES included a Russian POW as part of Hogan's band, but when the pilot went to series, the actor refused to sign on, because he felt the Nazis were depicted too lightly, which is how Carter ended up becoming a regular part of Hogan's band, despite being only a guest character passing through in the pilot. But otherwise, yeah, Werner Klemperer made it a condition of his that he would only play Klink if Klink always lost and was made the fool, and even John Banner once remarked, "Who better to play the Nazis then we Jews?" Robert Clary was even a Holocaust survivor; he spent time in concentration camps, where he was among the only ones in his family who survived (and he was one of fourteen children).
Oddly enough I met Howard Caine (Major Hochstetter) and played music with him and his son when I was younger. He was old and didn't like kids much, but I remember him being funny. He played Arkansas Traveler, which is a funny song. He didn't mind me being there because I did not talk much and could play a little bit.
He even did his line "Who is this man!" and talked about Hogan's Heroes a little bit.
Howard Caine came from my state.
I got to meet Jamie Farr at the Fanboy Expo this past summer (Loretta Swit and Jeff Maxwell were supposed to be there as well, but Jeff fell ill, and Loretta's flight had been canceled); unfortunately, I didn't get to spend a lot of time talking with him, but it was such an honor to get to meet Klinger!
I know I look like Radar (and I'm even considered the real-life Radar), but again, for the record, I wear the cap and glasses all the time.
sleeping_gorilla wrote:That's amazing!!! I just had a little google of him to refresh my memory. I didn't know he played 3 different officers in the show XD
Oddly enough I met Howard Caine (Major Hochstetter) and played music with him
J_Scarbrough wrote:That's so cool man! ^_^
I got to meet Jamie Farr
The only 60s TV Icon I met was Barbara Eden. She still looked great and was so tall! Haha!
She had to bend her knees to be level in the pic with me (though she may have been in heels, I didn't notice). I was dressed in the white 18th century suit I made.
As soon as she saw me she said I looked beautiful, which coming from Barbara Eden is a huge compliment ^_^
I loved M*A*S*H back in the day, it was a perfect fit for the time and now seems like a curious time capsule from a lost world. I wish I still had my approximate army green M*A*S*H Tshirt with the logo and printed on dog tags.
Dad's Army feels equally of it's time but has an interesting blend of farce and pathos and my Dad who lived through WW2, insisted it was a pretty accurate representation of the Home Guard as he remembered them.
He also introduced me to the Phil Silvers Show, a military set comedy which for my money never gets old.
I would love to meet Barbara Eden!
When I used to be on Twitter, the one tweet of mine that ended up getting the most attention was about Barbara Eden: I noticed she was trending, and I got scared as to what the reason might have been (I mean, why else do older celebrities trend on Twitter?), but there didn't seem to be any specific reason why. Anyway, I tweeted about this, and even used a gif of Tom (from Tom and Jerry) wiping his forehead in relief. In addition to all of the attention that tweet of mine got, she not only saw it, but liked it, retweeted, and even responded that she had no idea why she was trending either, but assured me that she was indeed well, and appreciated the love.
It has been a while since I popped in here. I'm slowly learning how to use Linux (the distro I chose was Ubuntu Studio), and despite some hiccups I'm getting more of the epic-length Mr. Petersik song done. The link to the latest part is below.
Mr. Petersik Part 6 - Rough Mix 4
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