Category: Humor

10 Back-And-Forth Facts About Abbott and Costello

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Mark Mancini and Mental_Floss present 10 Back-And-Forth Facts About Abbott and Costello.  Here are three of my favorites…

1. LOU COSTELLO WAS ONCE AN AMATEUR BOXER.
As a young competitor, Louis Cristillo fought in 12 matches under the alias “Lou King.” With 11 victories and one draw, Cristillo’s boxing career was off to an impressive start—until his father abruptly forced him into an early retirement. A multi-sport athlete, Cristillo could also light up a basketball court, despite his below-average height of 5’ 5”. In fact, he was once reportedly crowned Paterson, New Jersey’s foul shot champion.

Athleticism would help Cristillo earn his first few Hollywood gigs. While struggling to become an actor during the late 1920s, he appeared as a stunt double in a handful of films, most notably The Trail of ’98 (1928). Unfortunately, Cristillo was seriously injured during that shoot and decided to move back east, where he planned on taking voice lessons. Since “talkies” were rising in popularity, this seemed like a smart move but Cristillo’s modest personal fortune only got him as far as St. Joseph, Missouri. It was there that he got his first taste of live theater and developed the bumbling persona he retained throughout his career. During this time, Cristillo chose yet another stage name: Lou Costello (a nod to silent film actress Helene Costello).

5. IN 1942, THEY RAISED $85 MILLION FOR AMERICA’S WAR EFFORT.
On their own dime, Abbott and Costello toured 78 cities in 34 days, with the proceeds funding Uncle Sam’s war bonds and stamps. En route, they were treated like national heroes—the good people of Lincoln even made them both honorary admirals in the fictitious Nebraska Navy.

6. COSTELLO HATED THE SCRIPT FOR ABBOTT AND COSTELLO MEET FRANKENSTEIN.
Between 1940 and 1956, Abbott and Costello made nearly 40 movies together. By 1948, sheer overexposure weakened their popularity with filmgoers, who began to tire of their antics. Then along came this blockbuster horror-comedy, which rejuvenated the duo’s cinematic career and launched several genre-mixing follow-ups, including Abbott and Costello Meet the Invisible Man (1951), Abbott snf Costello Meet Dr. Jekyll and Mr. Hyde(1953), and Abbott & Costello Meet the Mummy (1955).

However, Costello almost derailed Abbott and Costello Meet Frankenstein during pre-production. At one point, he barged into producer Robert Arthur’s office and claimed “My [five-year-old] daughter could write a better script than this. You’re not serious about making it, are you?” Arthur eventually calmed Costello by promising to hire the star’s favorite director, Charles Barton.

14 Moving Facts About “Planes, Trains and Automobiles”

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Roger Cormier and Mental_Floss present 14 Moving Facts About Planes, Trains and Automobiles.   Here are three of my favorites…

1. JOHN HUGHES ONCE HAD A HELLISH TRIP TRYING TO GET FROM NEW YORK CITY TO CHICAGO.
Before he became a screenwriter, Hughes used to work as a copywriter for the Leo Burnett advertising agency in Chicago. One day he had an 11 a.m. presentation scheduled in New York City on a Wednesday, and planned to return home on a 5 p.m. flight. Winter winds forced all flights to Chicago to be canceled that night, so he stayed in a hotel. A snowstorm in Chicago the next day continued the delays. The plane he eventually got on ended up being diverted to Denver. Then Phoenix. Hughes didn’t make it back until Monday. Experiencing such a hellish trip might explain how Hughes managed to write the first 60 pages of Planes, Trains and Automobiles in just six hours.

13. IN THE ORIGINAL ENDING, DEL FOLLOWED NEAL ALL THE WAY HOME.
Hughes decided during the editing process that instead, John Candy’s character would be “a noble person” and finally take the hint from Martin’s character, and let Neal return home alone, before Neal has a change of heart and finds Del again.

14. IN THE SCENE WHERE NEAL THINKS ABOUT DEL ON THE TRAIN, MARTIN DIDN’T KNOW THE CAMERA WAS ON.
In order to get the new ending he wanted, Hughes and editor Paul Hirsch went back to look for footage they previously didn’t think would be used. Hughes had kept the cameras rolling in between takes on the Chicago train, without his lead’s knowledge, while Martin was thinking about his next lines. Hughes thought Martin had a “beautiful expression” on his face in that unguarded moment.

16 Sure Facts About “Mrs. Doubtfire”

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Roger Cormier and Mental_Floss present 16 Sure Facts About Mrs. Doubtfire.  Here are three of my favorites…

3. THEY WENT THROUGH PHOTOGRAPHS OF OLD WOMEN.
Director Chris Columbus claimed that he and his fellow filmmakers looked through “hundreds and hundreds” of photographs until finding a 1940s-era English woman to base Mrs. Doubtfire’s look on.

7. CHUCK JONES SUPERVISED THE OPENING ANIMATION.
Jones was the iconic animator of Looney Tunes and Merrie Melodies cartoons for Warner Bros. The full five minutes of Pudgy Parakeet and Grunge the Cat was released as a DVD feature.

8. COLUMBUS USED MULTIPLE CAMERAS SIMULTANEOUSLY TO CAPTURE THE CAST WHEN WILLIAMS IMPROVISED.
The director mostly shot one or two takes of each scene as it was written in the script before shooting something Williams made up. Columbus said the resulting footage gave him the option of cutting a PG, PG-13, R, or NC-17 version of the movie. (He ended up going with the PG-13 version.)

25 Facts You Didn’t Know About “Grease”

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Hollywood.com presents 25 Facts You Didn’t Know About Grease.  Here are three of my favorites…

1. Elvis was initially offered a role in the film.
It is believed he would play the Guardian Angel role, but he did not accept.

3. In “Look at Me I’m Sandra Dee” they changed the reference and it has a freaky coincidence.
In the stage play, the song had a reference to Sal Mineo, who was murdered in 1976. For the movie, they changed the lyric to “Elvis, Elvis, let me be! Keep that pelvis far from me!” In reference to Elvis Presley, who died the same day the scene was filmed. The day was August 16, 1977.

10. Lucille Ball is the reason her daughter was not cast as Rizzo and the part went to Stockard Channing.
Lucie Arnaz was dropped from consideration after Lucille Ball called and said “I used to own that studio; my daughter’s not doing a screen test!” But actually, she owned the studio Desilu which was bought by Paramount.

15 Elevated Facts About “White Men Can’t Jump”

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Roger Cormier and Mental_Floss present 15 Elevated Facts About White Men Can’t Jump.  Here are three of my favorites…

2. DENZEL WASHINGTON WAS THE ORIGINAL CHOICE FOR SIDNEY.
Denzel Washington was dead set on playing Malcolm X next and turned them down. Shelton considered Cylk Cozart for the lead role, too. Ultimately, Cozart was cast in the role of Robert.

3. KEANU REEVES, CHARLIE SHEEN, AND DAVID DUCHOVNY WERE CONSIDERED FOR BILLY.

Part of the audition involved shooting hoops at a basketball court at a Culver City casting office. Reeves just didn’t cut it, and Woody Harrelson acknowledged that Reeves’ lack of talent in the sport helped change his career. “I probably would’ve just been Woody Boyd but for the fact that Keanu Reeves didn’t play great basketball,” Harrelson told the Daily Express. Sheen was offered the part after Reeves’ failed audition but passed. Duchovny said he auditioned and really wanted the role.

10. HARRELSON HUSTLED SNIPES OUT OF MONEY.
There was constant gambling on set. Cozart threatened to take all of Woody’s Cheers money and estimated he won $5000 off of him. Harrelson won money off of Snipes though when he successfully dunked. Snipes never realized that the crew lowered the rim before Harrelson’s attempt.

10 Not-So-Scary Facts About “Monsters, Inc.”

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Tara Aquino and Mental_Floss present 10 Not-So-Scary Facts About Monsters, Inc.  Here are three of my favorites…

5. PAUL DOCTER’S ORIGINAL PITCH WAS TO HAVE A GROWN MAN BE HAUNTED BY THE MONSTERS HE DREW AS A KID.
On Jeff Goldsmith’s Creative Writing podcast, director Pete Docter recounted his original pitch: “My idea was that what it was about was a 30-year-old man who is like an accountant or something, he hates his job, and one day he gets a book with some drawings in it that he did when he was a kid from his mom. He doesn’t think anything of it and he puts it on the shelf and that night, monsters show up. And nobody else can see them. He thinks he’s starting to go crazy, they follow him to his job, and on his dates … and it turns out these monsters are fears that he never dealt with as a kid … And each one of them represents a different kind of fear. As he conquers those fears, the guys who he slowly becomes kind of friends with, they disappear … It’s this bittersweet kind of ending where they go away, and so not much of that stayed.”

6. THE FILM WAS THE FIRST TO INTRODUCE THE ONSCREEN REPRESENTATION OF FUR.
In order to animate each individual strand of hair on Sulley, which reportedly took 12 hours to fill a single frame, Pixar developed a new software program called Fizt. According to WIRED, the software was extremely advanced for its time, as it had the power to simulate each of the three million hairs that covered the lovable monster. “We made the simulator able to digest anything,” said Andy Witkin, one of the studio’s senior animation scientists.

7. JOHN GOODMAN AND BILLY CRYSTAL RECORDED THEIR LINES TOGETHER—A RARITY IN ANIMATION.
Typically, voice actors get into the booth at separate times to record their dialogue. But Billy Crystal pushed for the opportunity to work alongside his co-star, John Goodman. “I did the first two sessions alone and I didn’t like it,” Crystal told Dark Horizons. “It was lonely and it was frustrating.” Goodman was also a fan of the joint process; he told the BBC: “When Billy and I got together, the energy just went through the roof, so it was great.”

Give Thanks and Say, “You’re Welcome!”

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Today is Thanksgiving and many of us will come together with family and friends to pause and give thanks for what we have and perhaps what we’ve been spared.  Charles Dickens may have said it best…

  • “Reflect upon your present blessings, of which every man has many–not on your past misfortunes, of which all men have some.”

Of course not everyone gives thanks.  The Sexy Pilgrim doesn’t. Instead he says, “You’re welcome.”

I hope that you and yours have one of the best Thanksgiving Days ever. Count your blessings, eat too much turkey, ignore that family member who irritates you, make big plans, eat too much pie, doze in front of the tube, have a bit more turkey, and remember to watch a bit of the parade and some football!

16 Cutting-Edge Facts About “All in the Family”

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Kara Kovalchik and Mental_Floss present 16 Cutting-Edge Facts About All in the Family.  Here are three of my favorites…

2. ARCHIE BUNKER WAS ORIGINALLY ARCHIE JUSTICE.
Lear thought that the BBC show’s set-up—a middle-aged, blue collar conservative man who never hesitated to express his racist viewpoints, his doting wife, and his liberal daughter and son-in-law—could be mined for humor for American audiences. Justice for All, as the show was called in his original pilot script, starred Carroll O’Connor as Archie Justice and Jean Stapleton as his wife, Edith. Kelly Jean Peters and Tim McIntire rounded out the cast as Gloria and Richard (Meathead’s original name). ABC passed on the show, however; their main complaint being Archie and Edith’s lack of chemistry with the younger actors. Lear recast the roles with Candy Azzara and Chip Oliver, changed the name of the show to Those Were the Days and shot a new pilot, but ABC was still uninterested.

5. MICKEY ROONEY TURNED DOWN THE ROLE OF ARCHIE.
When Norman Lear pitched the series to Rooney, he only got as far as describing Archie as “a bigot who uses words like ‘spade’” before Mickey interrupted him. “Norm,” said the actor with a penchant for shortening names, “they’re going to kill you, shoot you dead in the streets.” Carroll O’Connor read for the role after Rooney’s refusal and had landed the part by the time he got to page three of the pilot script. But even he was dubious about the show and told Lear that CBS would cancel it after six weeks tops.

15. SAMMY DAVIS JR. CAUSED THE LONGEST LAUGH RECORDED ON THE SERIES.
O’Connor and Sammy Davis Jr. were good friends in real life, and All in the Family was Davis’ favorite TV show. So at his request, a guest spot was arranged for him in season two’s “Sammy’s Visit.” The kiss at the end was O’Connor’s idea, and the audience reaction was the loudest and longest laugh in the history of the series.

20 Fun Facts About “I Love Lucy”

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Kara Kovalchik and Mental_Floss present 20 Fun Facts About I Love Lucy.  Here are three of my favorites…

1. CBS DIDN’T THINK AMERICANS WOULD BUY THAT LUCY WAS MARRIED TO A “FOREIGN” MAN.
When CBS approached Lucille Ball with the offer of turning her popular radio show My Favorite Husband into a television show, she was agreeable with one condition: that her real-life husband, Desi Arnaz, would be cast in the role of her spouse (played on the radio by Richard Denning). The network balked—there was no way that American viewers would accept average housewife Liz Cooper (her character’s name on the radio series) being married to a “foreign” man with an indecipherable accent. Never mind the fact that Lucy and Desi had been married more than a decade; such a “mixed” marriage was unbelievable.

3. THE SHOW BROKE GROUND IN SEVERAL WAYS, SIMPLY BECAUSE THE ARNAZES WOULDN’T MOVE TO NEW YORK.
Lucille and Desi wanted to work in Los Angeles, near their home and their new baby daughter Lucie. But in 1951 the majority of television shows were broadcast from New York, and that’s where sponsor Philip Morris wanted their show to originate as well. In those days the U.S. wasn’t wired for television from coast-to-coast; shows broadcast live could only be transmitted so far. As a result, such shows were preserved on kinescopes (a movie camera aimed at a TV monitor that recorded the show in negligible quality) and shipped to distant stations.

Philip Morris objected to I Love Lucy being performed in California and the kinescopes sent to New York; their biggest cigarette market was up and down the east coast and they wanted the best TV picture quality for that area. Desi Arnaz suggested that the show be filmed with three cameras, like a stage play, which would provide the same quality picture for every market. But multi-cameras had never been used on a situation comedy before, and there were many obstacles involved, not the least of which was accommodating a live studio audience (Desi knew that Lucille worked best when she got immediate audience feedback).

Desi hired legendary cinematographer Karl Freund to help solve the dilemma, and along with writer-producer Jess Oppenheimer and director Marc Daniels, they built a set, and the necessary filming equipment was strategically placed. CBS balked at the additional expense involved in this undertaking, so Arnaz struck a deal: he and Lucille would take a large cut in their salaries and their company, Desilu Productions, would retain ownership of the films in exchange. The enduring high quality of the 35 millimeter film was part of the reason that I Love Lucy became so popular in rerun syndication, and Desilu’s 100 percent ownership of the series made Lucille and Desi the first millionaire TV stars.

9. DESI ARNAZ HAD LIFTS IN HIS SHOES (AND HIS LOVESEAT).
Arnaz listed his height as 5’11” in most official biographies, but those who worked with him knew that in reality he was 5’9” and wore four-inch lifts in his shoes. Lucille Ball stood 5’7” in her stocking feet, and when she wore heels she seemed to tower over her husband. Desi Arnaz Jr. would later explain to an interviewer that his father “was a Cuban with a Latin male’s pride,” which is why it was important to him to be taller than his wife. A dual-purpose, subtle additional cushion (undetectable by the viewing audience) was added to the Ricardo’s loveseat so that Ricky would be taller than Lucy while seated, and would also give him the extra boost needed to gracefully rise from a sitting position up onto his elevator shoes.

11 Magical Facts About “I Dream of Jeannie”

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Sarene Leeds and Mental_Floss present 11 Magical Facts About I Dream of Jeannie.  Here are three of my favorites…

1. BARBARA EDEN DIDN’T LIKE THAT JEANNIE AND TONY NELSON GOT MARRIED.
The palpable sexual tension between Hagman’s astronaut character and the mischievous genie who lived under the same roof for the first four seasons of the series was what kept the series exciting—the objectification of Eden’s character notwithstanding. Here was a midriff-baring beauty, willing and able to fulfill her master’s every wish and command, and he still managed to keep her out of his bedroom for most of Jeannie’s run. By 1969, the sexual revolution was well under way, and it was time for Tony and Jeannie to get together. Except, as we all know, that kind of creative decision usually sounds the death knell for a TV show, and I Dream of Jeannie was no different. The characters tied the knot during the 1969-1970 season, which ended up being the series’ last.

In an interview with the Today show’s Willie Geist earlier this year (video above), Eden made no bones about her feelings regarding the Nelson marriage: “It ruined the show,” she said. “Because [Jeannie] wasn’t human … She thought she was, and [Tony] knew she wasn’t … I think it broke credibility.”

2. THE FAMILIAR-SOUNDING JEANNIE THEME SONG DIDN’T EXIST UNTIL THE SECOND SEASON.
You know the tune: Matthew Broderick did an unforgettable 12-second dance to it in Ferris Bueller’s Day Off. But the bouncy riff that will always be synonymous with I Dream of Jeannie didn’t first appear until the series’ second season, when a new, in-color animated opening sequence was introduced. The first season, which was filmed in black and white, tried a couple of different openers: First there was the expository one that brought the audience up to speed on how Jeannie and Tony met; eventually, the exposition was dropped for this jazzy, albeit abbreviated, animated sequence.

8. I DREAM OF JEANNIE HAD A FUN LITTLE CONNECTION WITH FELLOW NBC SITCOM THE MONKEES.
While The Monkees only lasted two seasons, it had a sweet brother-sister-type relationship with I Dream of Jeannie while it was on the air, as they were both on NBC and shared the same music supervisor, Don Kirshner. About midway through the fall 1966, in The Monkees episode “The Spy Who Came in From the Cool,” Davy Jones rubs a small table lamp (see above video, 14:10). In true Jeannie fashion, a beautiful harem-costumed genie (not Barbara Eden) emerges from a puff of smoke and assures her “master” that she will help him. A bemused Jones remarks, “Imagine that—wrong show!”

The following year, in the Jeannie episode “Jeannie, the Hip Hippie” (see above), Jeannie puts together a rock band featuring Tommy Boyce and Bobby Hart, who penned some of The Monkees’ most famous songs. At one point, an instrumental version of one of the duo’s biggest hits for the band, “Last Train to Clarksville,” can be heard. Plus, Hart is holding a copy of The Monkees’ first album in one scene.

12 Fiendishly Fun Facts About “The Munsters”

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Kara Kovalchik and Mental_Floss present 12 Fiendishly Fun Facts About The Munsters.  Here are three of my favorites…

2. THE CHOICE OF MONSTER CHARACTERS WAS STRICTLY INTENTIONAL (AND ROYALTY-FREE).
Universal Studios owned Universal Television, which owned The Munsters. Universal Studios also owned the copyrights to most of the classic monsters, including Dracula, the Wolf Man, and Frankenstein’s monster. The studio had been running their old classic horror films on television since the 1950s and found that there was still an impressive audience for these decades-old monster movies. When Connelly and Mosher pitched their series idea, CBS executives knew that they had one advantage that ABC lacked with The Addams Family: the ability to use the Universal monster characters. The Munsters regularly topped The Addams Family in the ratings, mainly because of the instant identifiability of (and built-in fan base for) Dracula, Frankenstein’s bride, et al.

10. HERMAN’S COSTUME WAS A PERSONAL TORTURE CHAMBER FOR FRED GWYNNE.
Even though Gwynne would eventually reminisce that Herman was one of his favorite characters, the time he spent on The Munsters set was often fairly miserable, thanks to the various devices necessary to transform him into the lovable Frankenstein monster. On his feet he wore asphalt paver’s boots with four-inch soles, and his thighs, arms, and torso were covered in 40 pounds of foam rubber padding. He contended with back pain daily caused by the weight of the suit and inflexibility of the shoes. His head was fitted with a foam latex piece to flatten the top of his head and then he had to endure two hours in the makeup chair. He perspired freely under the heavy costume and hot studio lights and lost 10 pounds in one month despite consuming gallons of lemonade between takes. The producers eventually rented a compressed air tank and would poke the nozzle inside Gwynne’s collar to blow cool air on him.

11. THE COSTUME HAD ONE BENEFIT: IT EXCUSED GWYNNE FROM PERSONAL APPEARANCES.
As The Munsters gained popularity, its stars received more and more requests to appear at various functions. The producers, of course, sent the actors out as often as possible since such appearances not only promoted the show, they also propelled the sales of the variousMunsters merchandise that saturated the market at the time. Only Fred Gwynne was able to relax on his days off (for the most part), since the time and expense required to get him into character outweighed the publicity value of cutting ribbons at supermarket openings. One of the rare times he played Herman in public was alongside Al Lewis in the 1964 Macy’s Thanksgiving Day Parade. Gwynne confessed to TV Guide that he’d been taking slugs from a bottle of whiskey the entire time, because he “had to get bombed so I could say ‘hello’ to the little kiddies for 40 blocks.”