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50th Anniversary Viewing
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The Ed Sullivan Show
Season 20, episode 10
Originally aired November 12, 1967
As represented in
The Best of the Ed Sullivan Show
The Turtles' performances come from a
Best of recorded Oct. 24 that included a mix of acts from three dates...most were from Feb. 20, 1966, so they're well past the point that I'll cover them here. One was an interesting bit of business from Aug. '68, so I'll be saving this recording for one more review.
Lead singer Howard Kaylan sports his post-Pepper 'stache for these. First we have a good, studio-ish performance of "Happy Together," a revisit of the old, established hit that's become their signature tune (Charted Feb. 11, 1967; #1 US the weeks of Mar. 25 through Apr. 8; #12 UK), which they already performed on the show when it was newer (May 14). I just noticed here that both guitarists are using guitars that look like Paul McCartney's iconic Hoffner violin-shaped bass.
"She's My Girl" is the fresh, new single that's in the process of climbing the charts 50 years ago this week, though it won't achieve the success of the prior song; and it's the source of the video that I posted the week of its chart debut. Since I only embedded it in text then, here it is again:
If this isn't the single audio being lip-synced to, I can't tell the difference upon casual listening. This isn't one of their classic hits, but I think it has a good pyschedelic-era vibe. When I was deciding whether to finish purchasing a Turtles collection from which I'd downloaded their bigger hits, this song weighed in favor of getting it.
The Harkness Ballet--This is the one odd act from the episode I recorded Nov. 10 that consisted mostly of material from Nov. 5, 1967, which I reviewed last week. Elizabeth Carroll and Helgi Tomasson perform "Canto Indio." Well...it's ballet. Not exactly in my wheelhouse, but they looked pretty good doing it.
Other acts from the original broadcast according to tv.com:
- Singers Johnny Mathis ("Sleigh Ride"--A little early, isn't it?; "Up-Up, and Away") and Lana Cantrell ("Yes Sir, That's My Baby"; "Love Is Stronger Far Than We")
- Comedians Joan Rivers, Shelley Berman, and Richard Hearne
- Victor Lundberg reciting "An Open Letter to My Teenage Son"
- Magicians the Gustafsons
- Audience bows: Johnny Weissmuller and Buster Crabbe
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Mission: Impossible
"Charity"
Originally aired November 12, 1967
Wiki said:
In order to recover millions of dollars (in the form of platinum bars) stolen from the needy by a married couple (Fritz Weaver, Hazel Court) and to put a stop their charity racket for good, the IMF team goes to the couple’s estate on the French/Italian border where a group of millionaires have been invited for the collection of $1 million supposedly to build a new hospital wing. The Wayne Manor set from the 1960s TV series Batman is featured in this episode and for the first time in the series. It will be featured again in the fourth season episode "The Numbers Game" (S04/E02).
The reel-to-reel tape in a welding shop or something said:
This recording will self-destruct in ten seconds. Good luck, Jim.
Well, I'm happy to see self-destruction back on the menu, but we've also reverted to Briggs-paced timing. Jim has already proven that he has the mojo to handle the faster tapes.
There's an early fake-out dilemma when it's revealed that Phelps went into the mission with a double cover. He and Rollin are trying to turn the residents of Stately Hagar Manor against each other.
The episode includes a couple of elements reminiscent of
Goldfinger: Melting down the platinum and casting it into auto body parts; and Barney working in the basement under a trick pool table where the platinum is hidden. We also get some novel spy-fi gimmickry in the form of an inflatable stack of platinum bars.
Once again blank backdrops are used behind the rear windows of the cars; apparently this show couldn't be bothered with rear projection. The IMF team tricks Mr. Hagar into getting caught unknowingly trying to smuggle the platinum across the border in his own car; I assume Mrs. Hagar just gets turned in directly, as Phelps drops his cover for her at the end.
Christopher 2010 said:
I kind of feel sorry for them, going up against a crack spy team that’s overthrown governments and saved the world from weapons of mass destruction time and time again.
Now that you mention it....In the end, the operation was a bit more question-raising than
a-ha!, but the details kept me guessing well enough to make the episode go by smoothly and swiftly, even if it didn't come together all that well in the end.
Hazel Court played a recurring ladyfriend of Savage's in four Season 1 episodes of
12 O'Clock High; she received a special guest billing in the opening credits of those episodes. Fritz Weaver guested in a memorable
12 O'Clock High as a downed German pilot who held Savage at gunpoint in Glynis Johns's English manor house.
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The Rat Patrol
"The Kingdom Come Raid"
Originally aired November 13, 1967
H&I said:
While supervising the transport of new anti-aircraft shell fuses, Hitchcock is wounded by a deserter when the convoy is attacked by a German recon unit.
They always seem to use sets for night scenes in the desert. Here, it's a major scene of infiltrating the German camp.
Matt Clark guests as as the miserable wretch who not only shoots Hitch, but after the rescue sets the fuses on the bombs in the truck carrying Hitch to cover it up. This comes in handy, though, when the Germans recapture the truck.
Dietrich is not in this episode.
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Batman
"Surf's Up! Joker's Under!"
Originally aired November 16, 1967
H&I said:
The Joker kidnaps a surfing champion in hopes of transferring his ability into his own body.
Well, I've always loved the pure camp of Batman and the Joker engaging in a surf contest wearing baggies over their normal outfits. This could have easily been a two-parter...as-is, it feels a little rushed.
You can hear Billy May in the sound of Johnny Green & the Greenmen, but apparently they were a real band at the time, though they don't seem to have had any charting singles...and they seem to have mainly milked their association with
Batman in the years since.
I have to wonder where Dick and Barbara had their costumes stashed when they changed for the climactic Batfight.
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Ironside
"The Monster of Comus Towers"
Originally aired November 16, 1967
Wiki said:
A human fly is suspected of killing a guard at an art gallery.
Guesting Warren Stevens (well, he's in everything) and Michael Forest. I knew that the culprit was Forest's character, Edmond, from the way he was conspicuously on the scene and found unconscious next to the murdered guard, when we never saw how he got there. It seemed obvious that he'd stayed on the scene of his own crime and faked being attacked himself. But there was an accomplice, and the episode muddied things with a large, difficult-to-keep-straight array of suspects.
Ironside [upon finding a candy wrapper on the scene]: Vital evidence.
Edmond: You're joking.
Ironside: I haven't joked since 1958.
Later...
Lt. Fitch: And you told me it was vital evidence.
Ironside: I was kidding at the time.
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Tarzan
"The Pride of a Lioness"
Originally aired November 17, 1967
H&I said:
A young doctor faces two adversaries in trying to keep his late father's jungle clinic open: a native witch doctor and his own mother.
Guesting Jack Lord's future booking agent, James MacArthur, as the son of the murdered doctor, who's also a doctor, and who sees a need to continue his father's work. Doc Danno's mother tries to have him deported, but winds up staying to help him after she finds out how much it all means.
Ah, now
here's a guest of note...
Geoffrey Holder plays the witch doctor, Zwengi...who has a Mini-Me and (of course) likes to laugh a lot.
Also guesting Davis Roberts (Dr. Ozaba, "The Empath") as the tribe's chief, Kanzuma; and an elephant named Rocky who busts Tarzan out of jail.
Overall, a decent little episode; it feels like the show more on its game than not.
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Star Trek
"Journey to Babel"
Originally aired November 17, 1967
Stardate 3842.3
MeTV said:
Spock meets his estranged father when the Enterprise escorts a group of ambassadors to a conference on the planet Babel.
See my post here.
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The Prisoner
"Dance of the Dead"
Originally aired November 17, 1967 (UK)
Wiki said:
Number Six tries to save an old friend who is headed for destruction at the hands of the Village.
This episode gives us another female Number Two, this time without deceptive opening credits keeping her a surprise. She offers this bit of series premise insight...
Number Two said:
I don't want him broken. He must be won over.
This episode was fourth in production order, and has a number of elements that make it seem like it's meant to take place very soon after the first episode:
- Six saying, "I'm new here!"
- Number Two explaining how they're "democratic...in some ways" well after the election episode aired...but that episode is also second in production order, so it comes first either way.
- Other dialogue in the episode seems a bit more expository than in previously aired episodes, as if the viewer still has to be filled in on things...including explaining the legal system.
- Dutton has been there a couple of months; Six is the more recent arrival.
- The map of the village that Six puts on the corpse leaves its location vague, suggesting that last week's episode hasn't happened yet.
- We get our first indication of an attempt to cover up Six's disappearance in the outside world.
It's rather conspicuous how Dutton gets to be addressed by his full name when the show has invested us in the conceit that Six is only addressed by his number.
The Village population in this episode seems much more sheepishly controlled and less spontaneous than usual.
The Town Crier said:
There will be music, dancing, happiness, all at the carnival...by order!
Interesting to hear the Gettysburg Address quoted in the Village. Considering this is a British show, could that be meant as a commentary on America?
I'm not sure I get the significance of the machine in the room at the end.
Good lord, it took me a moment to place out of context, but the bit of music that gets played three times in this episode--twice when the maid is in Number Two's pad and again in the trial scene as the judges enter--is that of Josette's sinister music box in
Dark Shadows! That would be the version that was used in the episodes that I just watched...I recall
@TREK_GOD_1 having indicated that it was replaced at some point, and all of the examples I could find online were of a different theme, presumably the replacement.
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The Avengers
"Mission...Highly Improbable"
Originally aired November 18, 1967 (UK)
Wiki said:
In a spoof of the television series Mission: Impossible, a new ray machine which makes everything smaller miniaturises Steed!
People who write episode descriptions for Wiki tend to be too quick to declare an episode a spoof based only on a jokey title. There's nothing else in this episode that seems to be spoofing on M:I, unless I missed their shrinking ray episode. The title is spoken once by the bad guy.
The military vehicle is oddly large-scale for purposes of the bad guy smuggling it out in his overcoat...compare and contrast to the shrunken Rolls, which was closer to Matchbox scale. No doubt this was to accommodate the scale of the shrunken Steed, who was inside the vehicle when it was subjected to the ray. The scale of Steed interacting with objects such as the key and fountain pen also seems off. Shrunken Steed near an ashtray reminds me of the Exciting Adventure of Paul of the Floor.
Peel is tied to a chair in an oddly loose manner to accommodate Steed on the desk cutting her free...she has so much freedom of movement that it hardly seems like she'd need his help.
Thus ends this UK season of the show. Peel will be back for one episode to pass the torch to Tara King. The next season didn't air in the UK until the Fall of 1968, but going by the non-British airdates on IMDb (which match the day of the week that the show aired in the US), it seems that several episodes from that season aired substantially earlier on this side of the pond...in the Spring of '68. Given that, I think I'll try watching that season according to the (apparent) US dates (which also match up with the order that Cozi aired them). This has the added bonus of putting several of the episodes during the summer hiatus in the US.
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Get Smart
"When Good Fellows Get Together"
Originally Aired November 18, 1967
Wiki said:
KAOS creates the super-robot Groppo to destroy CONTROL's robot Hymie. Max must help Hymie defend himself, but Hymie may be too "nice" to be willing to use violence.
This would be my first Hymie episode, though it looks like this is the fourth of six appearances. The Chief is absent with Max using his desk again; 99 is absent this time as well.
Max said:
We have to make him better, stronger, faster...
How much did Hymie cost, by the way...?
We get a hint of Civil Rights commentary in Hymie talking about "his kind" not being welcomed in some places.
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