The Classic/Retro Pop Culture Thread

55 Years Ago This Week

Ima grab dat now!

Selections from Billboard's Hot 100 for the week:

Leaving the chart:

• "Cara, Mia," Jay & The Americans (13 weeks)
• "I Like It Like That," The Dave Clark Five (11 weeks)
• "I Want Candy," The Strangeloves (10 weeks)
• "Ride Your Pony," Lee Dorsey (9 weeks)
• "Sunshine, Lollipops and Rainbows," Lesley Gore (11 weeks)

Recent and new on the chart:

"Ride Away," Roy Orbison

(Aug. 21; #25 US)

"I Want to (Do Everything for You)," Joe Tex

(Aug. 28; #23 US; #1 R&B)

"Respect," Otis Redding

(#35 US; #4 R&B)

"Some Enchanted Evening," Jay & The Americans

(#13 US)

"Treat Her Right," Roy Head & The Traits

(#2 US; #2 R&B; #30 UK)

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Ah, and here I thought I was gonna be disappointing you.

But what if we are...?

You could just stand there soaking in the glory of being sternly lectured by him...or would you be going, "Hey! Look at me, not the teleprompter!"

I was gonna agree with that, and then I remembered this...welcome to the ParisPad:

From "Death Squad" (Mar. 15, 1970), the one where Jim has to call in the team from some country where Barney got in trouble with Pernell Roberts. He seems to be returning home from a performance as the phone in the foreground is ringing.

 

55.5th Anniversary Viewing

12 O'Clock High
"The Ticket"
Originally aired February 26, 1965

https://www.trekbbs.com/threads/the-classic-retro-pop-culture-thread.278375/page-67#post-12208868

The episode opens with Lt. Paul Stiger (Holliman) happily flying through heavy flak to the consternation of his more fearful co-pilot. At the Star & Bottle in Archbury, the other officers ignore and actively avoid him and talk behind his back about his disregard for his crew.

The Vital Target of the Week mentioned in the quoted post above is a dam, nestled in the mountains so it can't be bombed from altitude. Using a low-flying P-51 for the mission is Savage's idea. He picks Stiger based on his experience flying fighters as an American volunteer in the Royal Canadian Air Force, and the lieutenant is happy to take the assignment, telling Savage that he has nothing better to do and opining that the problem with the war is that "everybody's placing too much importance on living." But even Savage is put off by Stiger's lack of concern for his own life, which is fueled by coming from a poor rural background and having little to go back home to.

Stiger buys his sweepstakes ticket from a local girl he's seeing, Myra Bentley (Elen Willard). After the mission briefing, she comes to the base to inform him that he won...and his immediate reaction is conflicted. He's suddenly very popular with those guys who didn't want anything to do with him at the pub, who now encourage him to live it up, eager to come along for the ride. Over a heavy round of drinking, they start to put the idea in his head that he now has too much to live for, and Myra gets concerned at the hints of an impending dangerous mission.

Stiger requests permission to marry Myra before the mission, but Savage denies his request, flatly stating that "the fewer things that you have to worry about coming back to, the better your chances are of coming back." Savage monitors Stiger from a bomber during a test run in a mountainous area of England...the novel thing about this scene being that General Crowe is sitting in the co-pilot's seat. Savage observes another test run from the ground with binoculars. He then gets pissed when Stiger's late to a mission briefing because he's busy pissing away his money in a craps game...but the lieutenant proceeds to roll off every detail of the mission perfectly.

In a discussion with Myra, Paul frames his new attitude as being afraid of not surviving to settle down with her. The night before the mission, Savage hands Stiger permission to marry afterward. The lieutenant shows that he's starting to get cold feet when he asks for more time to practice. At that point Savage would rather fly the mission himself, but Crowe won't have it...though he will allow Savage to take some bombers to fly cover as decoys.

Stiger starts to freeze up on the mission, and Savage has to give him a tough-love pep talk over the target area. The lieutenant nervously makes his dive, bullseyes his target, and the dam comes down. The Epilog is Paul and Myra's wedding at the Star & Bottle. Citing Lincoln's famous quote about Grant's drinking, Savage buys a batch of sweepstakes tickets for the rest of his men.

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Won't argue with that.

 

50 Years Ago This Week

Selections from Billboard's Hot 100 for the week:

Leaving the chart:

• "Ball of Confusion (That's What the World Is Today)," The Temptations (15 weeks)
• "Big Yellow Taxi," Joni Mitchell (6 weeks)
• "Mama Told Me (Not to Come)," Three Dog Night (15 weeks)
• "O-o-h Child" / "Dear Prudence", The Five Stairsteps (16 weeks)

New on the chart:

"Look What They've Done to My Song, Ma," The New Seekers feat. Eve Graham

(#14 US; #4 AC; #39 UK)

"It's Only Make Believe," Glen Campbell

(#10 US; #2 AC; #3 Country; #4 UK)

"Somebody's Been Sleeping," 100 Proof (Aged in Soul)

(#8 US; #6 R&B)

"Indiana Wants Me," R. Dean Taylor

(#5 US; #2 UK)

"Gypsy Woman," Brian Hyland

(#3 US; #42 UK)

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Yeah.

Yeah, it's got a slightly catchy groove.

But...Otis wrote it! Yeah, Aretha's gonna redefine the song, but let's give Otis his moment of glory, as his original is perfectly enjoyable in its own right.

Jay & The Americans do...Rodgers & Hammerstein. It's alright.

Now this totally sounds like leftover '50s business to me. Like somebody didn't get the new decade memo...or they'd just thawed him out after seven years.

There was no indication it was anything but his. He's coming home and turning on the lights; there's no "Honey, I'm home"'; Jim is calling him long-distance there. Now did it used to be Rollin's pad? That's the question.

Mighta been a war drive thing or something.

Good question. Family back home?

 

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50th Anniversary Catch-Up Viewing

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Love, American Style
"Love and the Boss's Ex / Love and Mr. Nice Guy / Love and the Gangster"
Originally aired January 12, 1970

This was the fifteenth episode aired; the YouTube video is numbered the same for once.


In "Love and the Boss's Ex," Mr. Wood (Ray Walston, sporting a Mr. Mooney mustache) brings an employee, Alvin Doff (Pat Harrington) into his office to inform him that he's learned of how Doff has been seeing his ex-wife. Contrary to Doff's expectation that Wood plans to fire him for seeing her, Wood plans to fire Doff if he doesn't marry her, because he wants to end the alimony payments. To this end Wood puts up money for the ring plus a year's worth of alimony payments as a dowry; and Doff informs Wood that the ex, Valerie, has accepted his proposal. But Valerie later shows up in her ex-husband's office to inform him that Doff has taken the money and run off with the secretary that Wood had been wooing (Virginia Wood). Wood is now broke, but he and the ex start to reminisce and she invites him to come over...


In "Love and Mr. Nice Guy," Peter (Wally Cox) has been in what we now call the friend zone for two years with Erica (Alexandra Hay--both guest IMF agents, IIRC). He rushes to her apartment when she calls him in the middle of the night distraught and threatening to end it all, only for her to forget why he's there by the time he arrives. She admits that she uses him, but says that she finds talking to him helpful in sorting out her issues. When she tells him that her latest boyfriend, Kane Walker (Ray Danton), hit her in the face, Peter goes to his apartment in the same building to set him straight. Kane refuses to mix it up with Peter because he's a karate expert, but says that he only accidentally hit her when she came after him with a candle holder. Kane sits down with Peter and has a long talk about both of their situations with Erica...Kane informing Peter that Erica has a thing for mean guys, and that he's the meanest of them all, and loses interest in women who dig it. Peter offers that he should try going out with a woman who isn't interested in him at all, and Kane likens such a possibility to Peter's situation with Erica. Peter goes back down to Erica's apartment and decides to stand up to her, and in the process trips on the rug and accidentally hits her in the face himself. She has an epiphany that what she really needs is a man with Peter's qualities...and just as Peter thinks that he's gotten through, she proceeds to list off a number of other guys she knows with such qualities.


In "Love and the Gangster," the titular Mr. Stone (Nehemiah Persoff) has been driving away all of his daughter Angelica's (Marianna Hill) suitors with threats or worse, to her frustration. The one man he will allow to spend time with Erica is Dwayne Barone (Jerry Van Dyke), the new interior decorator whom he's hired to work on his office, on the assumption that Dwayne is...you know, an interior decorator. In fact, he so likes how having Dwayne around makes Angelica happy that he hires Dwayne to work on his entire house. Once Angelica gets over the shock of learning that Dwayne, who's an ex-Marine and combat veteran, isn't...you know...the two of them start having a secret romance right under her father's nose. But when he's done working on all of the rooms of the house, Dwayne decides that he has to ask Stone for his daughter's hand in marriage...which gives Stone and his henchmen, Rocky and Vince (Mike Mazurki and Lewis Charles), a good, hearty laugh. Once Dwayne has convinced Stone that he intends to go through with it and makes a move to leave, Rocky and Vince try to stop him...and Dwayne takes them both out in hand-to-hand, which causes Mr. Stone to start singing another tune. He reluctantly agrees to allow Dwayne to marry Angelica.

I found this one to be interestingly sign-o-the-timesy for the way that the story revolved around everyone assuming that Dwayne was gay without coming right out and saying it or using any of the familiar euphemisms. The closest they got to that was when Stone at one point referred to Dwayne as a type of flower.

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Hawaii Five-O
"Run, Johnny, Run"
Originally aired January 14, 1970

The episode opens with AWOL sailor John Mala (Nephi Hannemann) being spotted on the street and pursued by a pair of S.P.s, Walt Kramer (Walken) and Fred Waters (Beau Van den Ecker). Mala struggles with Waters in an empty stadium while the latter has a gun in his hand, a shot is heard, and Waters goes down. McGarrett, who'd helped Mala get in the Navy instead of going to jail for car theft, pays a visit to his mother (Myrtle Hilo), wanting to find him before the Navy does because the Navy has capital punishment. As Steve puts in a long night at the office, they literally do show him sleeping on the couch there! Mrs. Mala sends her younger son, Tommy, to fetch McGarrett and lead him to where John's hiding out. McGarrett brings him in and gets him a lawyer, but back at the office, he gets a call that Mala has escaped and is armed.

Kramer and five other sailors are arrested in John's neighborhood while looking for him. McGarrett goes to talk to their commander, Carl Anderson (Jack Ging), and meets Sue Waters (Marcy Brown), the wife of the sailor who was killed. Later he comes upon Anderson leading an S.P. squad in the area where Mala's believed to be hiding, which is part of a Naval reservation. McGarrett convinces Anderson to give him a chance to talk Mala out. John reveals himself and fires several rounds in McGarrett's general direction--like Superman, McGarrett calmly stands his ground while he's being fired at, but ducks when the gun is thrown. Then they get into a fistfight with lots of tumbling down the hillside, John's resolve is worn down, and he's taken into custody by the S.P.s.

Chin and Kono find the bullet that killed Waters, which is determined to be from the same type of gun that Waters had in his hand. But in addition to Waters's body having no powder marks, the trajectory of the bullet is all wrong for the bullet to have come from his own gun, and McGarrett figures out that it would have come from above. Meanwhile, we're privy to a scene in which Kramer seems a little too eager to be Sue's recovery guy. Having read up on Kramer's history, which includes Sue having formerly been his girl, McGarrett has Kramer take him to the scene of the crime and talks him through the scenario as he thinks it happened, which involved Kramer having fired at Waters and Mala while they were struggled, and then switching the clips between his and Waters's guns, so it looked like his hadn't been fired. When McGarrett produces the bullet, Kramer admits to having fired, but swears that he hadn't meant to hit Fred.

The episode ends with the exonerated John returning to his family, even though he's still wanted for being AWOL.

I may have just been suffering from a bad connection or something, but the audio was all out of sync for this episode. It was like watching a dubbed foreign film.

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Decent, but it's no iconic Coke commercial. It was, however, written by Melanie Safka.

This one has an Orbisonesque sound, but it was actually originally a chart-topper for Conway Twitty in 1958, before he went country.

I was able to get it on iTunes...pity I couldn't find a more professional clip for it.

It's definitely light on the beef and heavy on the cheese. Despite being a Hoosier, I don't really have any connection with this song.

It's got a good '70s soft rock sound, and is an interesting comeback for the guy primarily known for "Itsy Bitsy Teenie Weenie Yellow Polka-Dot Bikini". The song was written by Curtis Mayfield and originally recorded by the Impressions in 1961; the Hyland recording was produced by Del Shannon.

And giving that a listen helps me to appreciate the original a little better. It's like I say: if you can remember the '80s...why the hell would you wanna remember the '80s?

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Miscellaneous 50th Anniversary Business

For the Doors fans among us (Hi, RJ's Sis!), here are some clips on their Vevo from August 29, 1970, at the Isle of Wight Festival:




I like how Jim has a smoke during the instrumental section.

Jim has less than a year left at this point. Jimi Hendrix, who was also at the festival...less than three weeks.

 

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50th Anniversary Catch-Up Viewing

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Hawaii Five-O
"Killer Bee"
Originally aired January 21, 1970

The episode opens with George Loman (David Arkin) returning to the house to find Ted Frisette (Jeff Pomerantz) sleeping, an unconscious kid on the couch, and a bottle of chloroform nearby. When he wakes Ted up, he indicates that this isn't the first time this sort of thing has happened. Ted seems confused and out of it, but doesn't think that he did it. George gives Ted some medication, then drops the kid off on the side of a road on the other side of the island.

McGarrett goes to see the kid's family about the kidnapping. The Emorys are not well-to-do, and the ransom note--asking for an unprofessionally low sum--was sent to a Mrs. Watson (Doreen Lang), who doesn't know them. Back at George and Ted's pad, George comes back in the daytime with the paper, revealing that the note was sent to Ted's mother, which seems to connect with Ted's mommy issues that George had previously made a point of bringing up. From the way George is playing it, you can tell what's really going on. While Five-O is staking out the ransom drop, David (Harold Best) is found. That night, we see George quietly bring in another kid while Ted is out cold...then waking up Ted to tell him what he "found". The gaslighted Ted is distraught and still very confused; and George offers to take care of the situation again.

McGarrett and the Emorys are visiting David in the hospital when Steve gets a call about the next kidnapping. Watson gets the note again, and McGarrett seems to have figured out the pattern. Five-O digs up that Watson changed her name and her son, Ted Frisette, kidnapped a young boy as a juvenile, received therapy, and went on to join the Army. When McGarrett confronts her with the truth, it's clear that the high-strung Watson had her own issues and was a cold and uncaring mother. She believes that Ted is doing this to hurt her, which is also what George emphasized to Ted. Danny talks to Dr. Wong (Chapman Lam), who'd treated Ted when he came back from Vietnam, for insight about Ted's schizophrenia; the doctor introduces Danny to a psychiatric technician who's very familiar with Ted's case--George. While George has been affirming to Ted that he was a war buddy whose life Ted had saved, here he claims to have just been in 'Nam around the same time as Ted, and doesn't indicate any personal connection.

Watson isn't very cooperative with Five-O, but reluctantly shows them a locker full of Ted's medals and souvenirs (which she has no interest in and barely remembered). They find a picture of Ted with George, which indicates that they were in the same unit. Ted comes to his mother while she's visiting his father's grave, desperate for help, but she's completely unsympathetic and just tells him to turn himself in. Back at home, Ted talks in his sleep during a nightmare about Vietnam, in which he reacts to George having done something shocking. George, who's listening to Ted talking in his sleep, then stabs himself so that really fake, bright blood comes out, and wakes Ted up by fake-struggling to get the knife out of his hand. George drives home that Ted is hopelessly crazy, and Ted slips into a catatonic state.

Five-O looks into George's record and finds that he has a plethora of medals and commendations. Searching his apartment while he's out, they find that his typewriter matches the ransom notes. Putting together the pieces of what they've learned, McGarrett deduces that George is hiding something about a rear-guard action in Vietnam that he was thought he was the only survivor of, only for Ted to to have turned up alive; and that he got his job at the hospital after Ted was checked in there to keep an eye on him. Then they get the news that George has brought Ted to the hospital. McGarrett confronts George with the truth; George makes a dramatic break for it, but Steve tackles him on the hospital grounds, and George slips into a flashback to the battle for the hill in 'Nam, in which he see's McGarrett as his sergeant. As it plays out, we learn that George killed his entire unit, except for Ted.

The episode ends on a hopeful note of Ted beginning the road to recovery from his ordeal.

The title refers to an analogy that Dr. Wong engages in, likening Ted's condition to losing control of a car while being attacked by a bee.

George and Ted's surnames are given as Loomis and Frazer in the credits, though those don't match the names spoken in the episode.

I thought that our Fifth Five-O from Season 1, Lt. Kealoha/Leoloha, was back, but it appears that Doug Mossman is now playing different guest characters--apparently HPD investigators at this point. It's confusing because I have a crappy memory for faces, but Mossman has a very distinct one that I recognized immediately.

While McGarrett is forcing the truth out of George, he uses a slur to refer to the V.C.

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Dragnet 1970
"Burglary – Helpful Woman"
Originally aired January 22, 1970

It's gotten where I can tell when he's gonna say that by the delivery. Probably the same recording every time.

Tuesday, October 9 (last occurred in 1962): Friday and Gannon, working the day watch out of Burglary Auto Theft Division, are enlisting the news media's help for their latest investigation, which is actually something of a bunco scheme being perpetrated by a woman between 30 and 35, who gets into elderly people's houses under false pretenses, spends a little time there trying to help them out with things, scopes out where the valuables are, and covertly swipes them. They describe the M.O. to a radio personality named Dick Whittinghill, who's apparently the real McCoy playing himself. The detectives then visit the latest victims, the Andersons (Nydia Westman and Ralph Moody), who had their Social Security money taken. Mr. Anderson describes Friday and Gannon as "the younger generation"! (And Mrs. Anderson is very obviously sunburned, with tan lines around her eyes indicating sunglasses.) The detectives find three possible matches in the state records, and choose to look into Evelyn Gentry (Julie Bennett), who'd previously operated in Pasadena but the charges didn't stick. When they drive up there, the local detective who worked on her case advises them to show the victims pictures blown up to at least 8 x 10 size, as he'd lost his case because they tended to have bad eyesight.

The LAPD prints expert can tell that Gentry's their woman, though the match isn't strong enough to hold up in court. Then the detectives get a call from Mrs. Kissinger (Lillian Powell), a potential victim in progress who calls them about it, and set up an in-house stake-out...but it's not the same woman or M.O., and she appears to be a legitimate collector for a charity. The detectives then show Gentry's photo to several of the victims, who positively identify her; after which they get another call from a Mrs. McDermott (Ann Morgan Gullbert), the neighbor of a potential victim who wasn't home when Gentry called. McDermott gave Gentry a story to lure her back at a specific time, and positively identifies her from the photo. In a sting scenario very similar to an earlier bunco episode from which I took that screengrab of Friday holding his gun and badge, Gannon plays the wheelchair-bound prospective victim, Mr. Jennings, while Friday eavesdrops from the next room. Gentry offers to help "Jennings" with his pills and pilfers some money left out near the phone where she could find it. Friday doesn't show his gun or badge when he comes out to arrest her.

The onscreen text doesn't normally spell out the ordinal like that, but it did this time.

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Love, American Style
"Love and Those Poor Crusaders' Wives / Love and the Big Night / Love and the V.I.P. Restaurant"
Originally aired January 23, 1970

This was the sixteenth episode aired; the YouTube video is numbered 18.


In "Love and Those Poor Crusaders' Wives," just-married Steve and April (Monte Markham and Dorothy Provine) are checking out a dockside antique shop at their honeymoon spot, which has lots of medieval gear that seems like it belongs more in a museum. Trying on various bits of armor, Steve accidentally locks himself in a chastity belt. This proves to be a source of embarassment, so they try to hide it from the nosey hotel staff (Gino Conforti and Bryan O'Byrne), who proceed to gossip about it as the couple make strange requests in their attempts to get it off in the relative privacy of their room. The locksmith is out of town, so they ask for some oil; then they try a liberal amount of soap; then they ask for a hacksaw, but Steve doesn't want to have to pay $400 for the belt if they bust it. By this point, April starts speculating that there's a Freudian issue behind Steve's predicament. They call a doctor to give him a shot, thinking that relaxation might help him to slip out of it. The doctor refers them to the retired old locksmith (Percy Helton), who simply strikes an escape latch that would have been put in the belt by a bribed locksmith. Freed from the belt in time for their wedding night, Steve ends up out cold from sedatives that the doctor gave him.
Out cold from sedatives the doctor gave him.

Interestingly, everyone in the segment dances around naming the device, never actually describing it with the term "chastity belt".

The bed in the hotel room...is brass.


"Love and the Big Night" opens with Mark Travis (Tony Randall) seeing his secretary, Holly (Julie Newmar), to her apartment after the two of them had to put in a late night at the office. She seems to want him to stay for you-know-what, and he nervously chatters about his wife and tries to leave, but ends up splattering very liquidy mayonnaise all over his suit, so she cleans it, causing him to have to stay while clad in a towel. He starts getting into the idea of spending time with her and the two of them engage in some drinking; but when they leave the living room, a burglar quickly robs the place via the window, taking his clothes.

He borrows a shirt and pair of pants from her wardrobe, looking rather pimpish, sneaks into his home, and tries to ditch them, but the blouse ends up stuck in a tree outside the bedroom window. Then a policeman comes by in the middle of the night to return his suit. He initially tries to deny that it's his, but his wallet and her watch are with it; and Mark's Cheating neighbor Herb (Buddy Lester) finds out what happened. Mark then finds a note saying that his wife, Alice, is at her sister's and realizes that she was never home. Emboldened, he calls Holly and expresses interest in doing more with her. Then he gets suspicious about Alice's whereabouts, such that when she comes in, he starts questioning her. Alice (Ann Elder) seems evasive, and expresses interest in when he's going to be out of town for a convention. But Mark finds stained gloves verifying her story about getting a flat tire. He then asks Alice about coming with him to the convention, and in a roundabout way lets us know that he won't be trying anything behind her back again.

Mark and Alice's bed: brass.


In "Love and the V.I.P. Restaurant," George Miller (Shelley Berman) has lunch at what turns out to be a topless restaurant. His waiteress is seen from behind and holding a rather large menu in front of her, which she's happy to hand him when he asks to see it. George's wife, Sally, and her friend Carol (Kaye Ballard and Julie Bennett), who've been elected co-chairs of their ladies' club's Stop Filth and Nudity campaign, come to see him and he tries to hide from them; then to try to get them to leave; then to distract them from seeing any waitresses; but they finally see one, so he pretends not to notice that they're topless; and when that fails, claims that he's there doing research for the SFAN campaign. He ends up sticking his hand with a knife and Sally drags him out to see a doctor.

So they can do this, but apparently they can't say "chastity"? There's no brass bed in this one, but it takes place entirely in the restaurant.

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Only if he proceeds to get out of the situation.

Not that.

Heh.

He was grateful to Steve for giving him a second chance, but found that he couldn't cut it in the Navy, and that it was just another type of prison to him.

They didn't really make it clear earlier on, but who got him after he gave up hinged on the fact that he was hiding on a Naval reservation. Steve just went in to bring him out alive, whereas the armed patrol would have likely shot him.

He was in his clothes and without a blanket, perpetrating the illusion that it's not his usual routine.

Guess they didn't really check that closely at the time.

He definitely wanted Waters's wife, but he insisted that he didn't shoot Waters on purpose. He was certainly reckless to fire at them at all while they were struggling, so maybe his rivalry informed that action.

Mercifully, they certainly did.

I'd like to have used the post to get in some last Jimi business, but all I could find on his Vevo were later-produced videos that used footage from his festival performance, not full performance clips.

 

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50th Anniversary Catch-Up Viewing

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Hawaii Five-O
"The One with the Gun"
Originally aired January 28, 1970

So now they're anticipating the title scheme of Friends. They could have tried "Love and the Vigilante".

Jackie Gleas--er, Peter Corman (Steve Logan)--starts complaining about his suspicious streak of bad luck and exits the poker game. While leaving, he sees a van nearby and opens the side to find that it's manned and full of surveillance equipment. He goes to confront the other players and shots are heard. A young couple on the nearby beach enter the house to find him. McGarrett rushes to the scene alongside the ambulance. Corman's manages to make it to the hospital alive against the odds. Steve's trying to talk to him when his distraught wife, Maggie (Julie Gregg) arrives. Peter responds to her, telling her to tell Lorenzo "left-handed"...then he dies while she's in the room. Maggie tells Steve that Lorenzo is Peter's brother, who's arriving that day.

Steve and Maggie meet Lorenzo (John Colicos) at the airport. When they're alone, Maggie shares Peter's message with his brother. Back at the scene of the crime, Danno finds a concealed closed-circuit camera, tipping Five-O off to the crooked poker game scheme. They proceed to catch Shogi (Tom Fujiwara), a P.I. who manned the truck, heard the shots, and drove off. He claims that he'd been hired by Peter, so he gets booked.

The team works out how things went down in the game on the Giant Daylit Lucite Diagram of the Poker Table--each player having conveniently left behind some distinctive physical evidence, like gun wrappers or eyeglass wipes. Shogi is let go, following which Lorenzo confronts him in his office and pays him for a name. When Corman leaves, Shogi calls one of the players, claiming to have been forced to talk at gunpoint, and saying that he gave Corman another player's name. The player that Lorenzo goes to is a tourist who's leaving for the mainland, and is right-handed, so he's let go after sharing the name of the company rep who tipped him off about the game. Elsewhere, Danno gets the same man's name from a bar girl whose name and number he had written in a matchbook. Corman talks to that player and fake-poisons his drink to get two more names.

McGarrett learns of Lorenzo's activities and that he's a former mob enforcer. One of the players whose name Lorenzo was given, Del Enright (Arthur Franz), goes to see the other, Sam Quong (Jack Soo), claiming that he's figured that Quong must have been the killer and wanting a payoff to make up for his losses at the game. After Enright leaves, he's confronted by Corman at gunpoint, and Lorenzo is about to test his handedness when he's shot dead--and left-handedly--by Quong, who also wings Corman. As Corman was seen fleeing the scene of the shooting, McGarrett puts out an APB on him.

Lorenzo calls Maggie to try to get a message to McGarrett about who killed Enright. She shares what she knows...that the killer wasn't Enright and was left-handed. The wounded Lorenzo goes to Quong's place with gun in his good hand, and sees that Quong is left-handed. Quong manages to get his own gun on Corman and tells how he plans to shoot Lorenzo and claim self-defense...but Steve and Danny burst in and shoot him. He falls on his living room floor...but the thing that gave him away to Corman was fixing him a drink. As for Corman...

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Dragnet 1970
"Homicide – Who Killed Who?"
Originally aired January 29, 1970

Tuesday, October 28 (1969): Friday and Gannon, working the day watch out of Robbery Homicide Division, Homicide section, investigate a shooting at a rooming house, with three victims and no suspects. The building manager, shot twice in the abdomen upstairs from the other two shootings, is still alive and tries to say something while being carried out: "oft one". He later dies at the hospital. The other two victims are in a common room on the ground floor. Nobody has left the house, so the detectives initiate a thorough examination of the house, with a surprising amount of voiceover exposition for such an investigation this late in the series. Coordinating the investigation from a room in the house that's determined to have no evidence in it, they find a variety of clues spanning more than one floor. Focusing on what the building manager was trying to say, Friday and Gannon take too long going through letters of the alphabet to come to the obvious "loft one"--referring to a converted attic room where they find another body, lying in a bed. Friday gives a press conference from the coordination room. When Friday wants to keep some details out of the paper, Paul Woods (Herb Vigran) makes accusations about the first amendment, so Friday lectures him about needing to work together to enable the sixth.

Uniformed officers bring in Pedro Martinez (Marco Lopez, uncredited and with no lines), who was witnessed running from the building at the time of the shooting. He says (as awkwardly related second-hand by the officers) that he saw the two men downstairs shot, struggled with the gunman while he was coming up the stairs, and the gun went off, wounding the gunman. His description of the gunman matches the man in the loft room, Paul Andrews, so the detectives reexamine his room, finding the red shirt that he'd removed, which has a bullet hole in it. It turns out that the initial two shootings downstairs were the result of a dispute over TV use. Andrews struggled with Martinez on the way to his room, then shot the manager, before proceeding to his room and removing his clothes. In an offbeat closing note, a delivery man arrives with a TV that Andrews had ordered the day before.

Friday should blame the whole incident on radio--it leads to stronger stuff.

The interesting thing I noticed about the credits list for this one as the episode went along was that all of the credited actors were playing officers and reporters, indicating that they wouldn't catch a suspect with lines. Questioning of a group of other tenants assembled in the common room, who were a burly, ex-con-ish looking bunch, was conspicuously absent.

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Love, American Style
"Love and the Nervous Executive / Love and the Hitchhiker / Love and the Great Catch"
Originally aired January 30, 1970

This was the seventeenth episode aired; the YouTube video is numbered 19.


In "Love and the Nervous Executive," Grisdale (Paul Lynde) has been recently promoted upstairs at his firm. He's particularly enthusiastic to have his own secretary, whom he assume will increase his productivity dramatically...until he meets her--platinum blonde Angela Pruett (Carol Wayne)--and she immediately proves to be a distraction. He calls personnel to complain, assuming she must not be good at her job, but is persuaded to give her a try, so he puts her to the test. Her skills prove to be exemplary, but he continues to suffer clumsy mishaps in her presence, and botches an important account...such that his boss, Mr. Dunlap (Herbert Voland), starts to have second thoughts about his ability to perform the job. Grisdale decides that he has to let Angela go, but when he tells her, he finds out that she's lost multiple jobs for the same reason. Thus he's guilted into keeping her, though he turns down her proposed solution to the issue, which, practically speaking, might have helped. Then she slips on her horn-rimmed reading glasses, which he finds make her look less appealing to him. Cut to a couple of weeks later, by which point Grisdale has gotten his professional mojo back and is back in Dunlap's good graces...and Angela is sporting a dowdy appearance while on the job, wearing more conservative clothes and putting her hair up in addition to keeping the glasses on.


"Love and the Hitchhiker" opens with Earl (Bob Denver!) bringing Tippy (Joey Heatherton), a groovy hitchhiker he picked up, back to his pad. He promptly gets rid of his roomie, Tom (Howard Storm), escorting him out the door in his pajamas. Earl's efforts to make the moves on Tippy are stymied by her being a vegetarian and health food nut who doesn't drink wine or tap water; finds his job in tool & dye to be a drag; and declares that his fur rug brings her down. She wants to teach him about love, but it's not what he expects, as she shows him how to meditate. Tom comes back to find Earl solidly in a trance and Tippy ready to leave, so he offers to give her a lift, still in his PJs.


In "Love and the Great Catch," Harry Brinks (George Lindsey) comes home to be enthusiastically informed by his wife, Phyllis (Nanette Fabray), and sister-in-law, Jean (Pat Carroll), that he's gotten a call from Adam West (as himself--Gilligan and Batman in the same episode!). Harry arranges to have Adam come over to look at some stamps in his collection. Adam's coming that night, but Harry tells Jean it'll be a different day to get rid of her. When she's gone it turns out that Harry, who'd previously been playing it cool, is himself star-struck to host the "movie star".

Cut to Adam looking through Harry's stamp book while the couple take turns posing with him while the other takes pictures. Jean comes by, having been tipped off by Phyllis, who's hoping to hook her sister up with Adam. Harry gets upset that Jean monopolizes Adam's attention, and the two of them actually start to hit it off. Then Harry's sister, Barbara (Mary Wilcox), drops by, having been tipped off by Harry, who's hoping that Adam can help her launch a career as an actress. She basically auditions for him (singing terribly). Jean and Barbara proceed to get catty with one another. Adam takes Harry aside and asks about taking Barbara to Palm Springs for a golf tournament, because he really digs her. Then Harry plays up her relative youth, the same as Jean had previously been doing, and tries to rush Barbara out. When the tournament comes up, Harry proposes that Adam take Jean, everyone else wants to come along, and Adam makes excuses to leave without having had dinner. After he leaves, the in-laws get in an argument about who was invited and who wasn't.

I can understand why West would have been wanting to play down his recent, most iconic role at this point in his career, but it was a bit odd how they repeatedly sold him up as a movie star, when historically we've come to more strongly associate him with his TV work.

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I think it was described as a routine, so Ted knew he'd find her there.

Whose motive was to flee? Ted was traumatized and got psychiatric treatment that George had a hand in. George was trying to bury the truth.

No, Steve said it, trying to get the truth out of George. "What did you do to earn those medals, George? Carry a buddy to safety? Tell me. Did you make some sweep of some ****-infested hill?"

They were hunting down an armed man who was believed to have killed one of their own; and John did pull a gun and fire at Steve...imagine if he'd done the same with the armed patrol of sailors.

 

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50th Anniversary Catch-Up Viewing

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Hawaii Five-O
"Cry, Lie"
Originally aired February 4, 1970

Doug Mossman is involved in the opening bust, credited here as an HPD sergeant. The subject of the bust, Amuru (Derek Mau), claims in front of the HPD officers and Danny that he's been paying protection to Five-O via Chin...an accusation that McGarrett and the Governor take very seriously. We promptly learn that it's a "project" conceived by crooked lawyer Eddie Calhao (Sheen and a big '70s 'stache), with the goal of indicting McGarrett.

There's a nicely played moment when Steve has to bring Chin into his office for questioning. Chin agrees to a polygraph test, though this doesn't exonerate him. It turns out that Chin's got a home, and a family--a wife and eight kids of varied ages. (I counted six in the scene, but Kono later says eight.) The alleged pick-up man for the payments is caught, and in another layer of set-up be describes Kelly as the man he was delivering the money to and identifies him in a line-up. Chin was fishing at the time, but can't prove it. As the investigation gets hotter, the Governor wants Steve to turn it over to someone else, but Steve insists on staying on.

A reporter, Dave Garland (Ed Sheehan), gets an anonymous phone tip about a bank account. The $1,200 in the account matches the amount of the alleged payments, and the bank manager, Austin Summers (George Petrie), describes the depositor as looking like Chin. McGarrett questions Summers in his office on tape, and the Five-O team digs deep into the details. The suit Chin's described as wearing is one that he actually owns, but it's too heavy for the temperature on the day specified. McGarrett tests Summers on how much he remembers about other clients whom he's seen more recently, and he can't provide the same types of details, which makes him nervous. Summers goes back to Calhao and wants out. When he leaves, Calhao gives an order to "bury" him. Danno was tailing Summmers, so McGarrett has the lawayer checked out.

When Chin can't come up with alibis for any of the dates of the alleged transactions, Steve has to suspend him. Chin then gets a late anonymous call at home and rather amateurishly goes to a rendezvous point. While he's waiting there, a hood kills Summers at home with a shotgun. The next day, the Governor formally takes Steve off the case. Off the books, the Five-O team leans on an underworld figure named Brohme (Larry Ronson), whom Calhao is working for, via Brohme's operation, because they've figured that this scheme doesn't fit his MO and must be Calhao's idea. Meanwhile, McGarrett confronts Calhao, planting the seed that Brohme may turn on him. Calhao returns to his office to find that it's been ransacked, then is pursued and shot at outside. Police cars arrive and he runs to them, begging McGarrett for protection from Brohme. After he's taken away by a squad car, we find that the gunmen after Calhao were, as expected, Danny and Kono in trench coats. Steve's a little too quick to call Chin and tell him he has his job back to give us a happy ending.

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Dragnet 1970
"Burglary – The Son"
Originally aired February 5, 1970

Now that was just plain weak.

Monday, January 12 (1970): Friday and Gannon, working the day watch out of Burglary Auto Theft Division, are investigating a series of fifteen small residential burglaries when they get a call from one of the victims, Dorothy Haven (Dorothy Morris), giving them additional info about the items stolen. When the detectives visit her home, Mrs. Haven is at a loss as to how the burglar got in, though Gannon demonstrates how easy it is to get into the back door with a plastic card. She also thinks that the burglar knew right where to look for the easiest valuables to steal. Her update concerns a jewelry box, which she didn't report the night before because she used it to hide money for her young adult children, which she didn't want her husband to know about.

Days later the detectives get a tip from a pawn shop regarding a shotgun that had been stolen from the Haven home. The person pawning it is ID'ed as Albert Maddox, a known user. The detectives enlist the help of a narcotics detective familiar with the suspect, Sgt. Odom (Lew Brown), who leads them to the "shooting gallery" of a known associate. While there, the detectives get lucky when Maddox (John Gilgreen) comes knocking on the door. But the pawnbroker (Howard Culver again) indicates that the young man who pawned the gun looked completely different. The detectives believe that Maddox may know who would have been using his temporary driver's license, however. They let Maddox go, but have another pair of detectives tail him.

Friday and Gannon go to a motel room that Maddox had been seen entering. There they find the stolen items spready about the room and an occupant who does match the pawnbroker's description (Robert Heinz), and admits to being the burglar. He says that it was his first job, that he only burglarized the Haven house to get money for a fix, and that he's not responsible for the other burglaries. As he's also being evasive about his identity, Friday deduces that he may be the son mentioned by Mrs. Haven. He has the Havens brought in, ostensibly to identify the stolen items, and they're shocked to find that the burglar is indeed their son, Ross. Cue the violins while the Havenses react and Mr. Haven (Robert Brubaker) loudly disowns his son. Friday sits them down and convinces them that as an addict, Ross needs their help, not their scorn...and accompanied by more violins and some horns, Mr. Haven promptly re-owns his son, and Ross just as promptly volunteers to seek help.

So that's another episode title that kinda spoils a major twist in the case, if you went in knowing it.

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Love, American Style
"Love and the Banned Book / Love and the First-Nighters / Love and the King"
Originally aired February 6, 1970

This was the eighteenth episode aired; the YouTube video is numbered 20.

In "Love and the Banned Book," Sgt. Stanley Dunbar (Burt Reynolds) has returned home from overseas to learn that while he was gone, his wife, Penny (Elizabeth Ashley), has written a bestselling novel called All My Loves, which he considers to be obscene. When he also expresses his suspicions that the men in the novel are based on men she's known, she reveals that all of them were based on aspects of him. He challenges her by citing passages from the book, and based on one of the characters, goes so far as to accuse her of having had an affair with Richard Burton! Refusing to be placated, he further gets suspicious of a caller who had the wrong number. She finally talks him down, but then gets suspicious herself, based on circumstantial evidence, that while Stanley was in Monaco he had an affair with Grace Kelley! Finally they each convince the other the he/she is the only girl/man in the world for him/her.


In "Love and the First-Nighters," underaged sweethearts Johnny and Amy (Kurt Russell and Debbie Watson) check into an otherwise modest motel room with a brass bed. They're posing as a married couple, though but can't keep their stories straight with the motel owner (Jackie Coogan). Once they're alone, they start getting nervous about the owner calling the cops, or their parents figuring out that they're together, and chatter to convince themselves that what they're doing makes sense, because they have to find out if they're compatible. Then they spot a couple of friends--one of them being the guy who tipped Johnny off about the motel--checking into the room next door, and hear the sounds of a fight, so Johnny eavesdrops with a glass. It turns out that the girl is pregnant, her older brother and then both sets of parents arrive, and the couple reveals that they're secretly married. When all of this has settled down, Johnny uses a couple of sneezes from Amy as an excuse to get her home quickly, and she seems pleased by his chivalrous behavior.

When they're comparing notes about the ways in which they're already compatible, they list the Beatles as something that they have in common.


"Love and the King" starts with Bob Curtis (Herb Edelman) as a straight-laced, overworked executive. Then an old Army buddy, Charlie Burrows (Ron Masak), drops by his office to try to get some action going, recalling how Bob used to be known as "the King" for his swinging ways. But Bob's no longer interested in any of that, because he's hitched to Kathie Browne! Nonetheless, Charlie drops by his place that night--Bob's wife, Ann, being away visiting her sick mother--with a knockout for each of them, having lured the ladies with a story of either him or Bob being a movie producer. But Bob's boss, Mr. Jenks (Herb Vigran), also drops by, to drop off some work that Bob had promised to do that night. Bob unsuccessfully tries to hide his visitors and the signs of their presence, but eventually Mr. Jenks meets them. Bob's afraid that this is going to cost him his job, but when he goes in the next day, the secretaries fawn over him and Jenks treats him as a VIP, impressed with his prowess.

Mr. Jenks: After six, you're the Green Hornet.​

There's a catch, though...Jenks wants Bob to throw another such private party for an important client, Brad Crandall (John Myhers), in order to persuade him to sign a contract. Bob desperately tries to get ahold of Charlie; then resorts to trying to call old girlfriends; but finally gets a call from one of Charlie's girls, Suzy (Timothy Blake), who'd left her shoes at the Curtis residence (people finding the shoes being a running gag throughout the segment). Suzy arranges for a gorgeous redhead to go to Charlie's to entertain Crandall. But before she arrives, Ann comes home, and not having been apprised of the expected hair color, Crandall assumes that she's his date. As Ann plays along, he gradually drops details of what he knows of Bob's activities the previous night, causing her to take her husband aside multiple times as she learns more and more, with Bob assuring her each time that it's not what it seems. Then the doorbell rings, but it's Crandall's wife, Maude (Bobo Lewis)! Under pressure for an alibi, Crandall signs the contract. After the Crandalls leave, the redhead finally arrives, and Ann turns her away but asks her to return Suzy's shoes.

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I don't really put much thought into why he's assigned to some of these cases at this point. But in one of the early episodes the Governor did express a specific interest in having him handle cases involving tourists.

Would you believe his next-to-last gasp?

I was surprised they didn't find an excuse to put him in yellowface...he'd be more convincing than some of the actors they've done that with.

It was a lot of characters to keep tracks of, and I didn't bother identifying a couple of the players.

It was accessed via a pull-down attic hatch, FWIW.

I thought it was a pretty cute segment as it was.

Would you settle for Batman meeting Scooby-Doo?

Are you saying that this role isn't Adam West canon?

There might have been an explanation in there somewhere, but being an awful mother doesn't mean that she didn't have feelings for her husband.

George pretty much snapped under pressure in the battle.

I have to think that the term probably wasn't as objectionable to white middle America at the time, when we were embroiled in the war, though you still wouldn't have heard it at a more family-friendly hour.

 

50th Anniversary Album Spotlight

Close to You
Carpenters
Released August 19, 1970
Chart debut: September 19, 1970
Chart peak: #2, December 5, 1970
#175 on Rolling Stone's 500 Greatest Albums of All Time

The album opens with the duo's second big single, "We've Only Just Begun" (charts Sept. 12, 1970; #2 US; #1 AC; #28 UK; #405 on Rolling Stone's 500 Greatest Songs of All Time):

Next up is "Love Is Surrender," which has a pleasant, Sergio Mendes-ish sound.

This segues directly into the next track, the warmer "Maybe It's You":

"Reason to Believe" has a particularly familiar sound about it, perhaps owing to later Rod Stewart versions:

The duo's first charting single was a cover of "Ticket to Ride" (charted Feb. 14, 1970; #54 US, #19 AC)...they return to that formula with another cover not just of the Beatles, but from the same album--"Help," just in time for 5th anniversary retro. I've warmed up a lot to Beatles covers, but I can't say I'm crazy about this one. Karen's rich voice would have been better suited to a slower, more intimate arrangement of the song. Here she sounds like a slightly shrill fan singing on a novelty record.

The first side closes with the album's title track and the duo's recent breakout hit...Bacharach and David composition "(They Long to Be) Close to You" (charted June 26, 1970; #1 US the weeks of July 25 through Aug. 15, 1970; #1 AC; #6 UK):


To open the second side, the Carpenters cover a song that was previously covered by the Beatles--and originally a Top 10 hit for the Shirelles in 1961-62--Bacharach, David, and Williams composition "Baby It's You". Karen's much more in her zone here than with the "Help" cover.

After that, it's back to Bacharach and David with "I'll Never Fall in Love Again," recently a Top 10 hit for Dionne Warwick:


"Crescent Noon" is another Bettis and Carpenter original, which Wiki tells me was "originally performed by Karen and Richard in the California State University, Long Beach choir in 1969." It has a particularly rich, melancholy sound.

Bettis and Carpenter original "Mr. Guder" has an interesting story behind it that makes the song more personal, if a bit petty...

This segues into the penultimate song on the album--another Nichols and Williams composition, "I Kept On Loving You," featuring Richard on vocals.

The album closes with Bettis and Carpenter original "Another Song," which...

Overall, this was a pleasant listen and more in my wheelhouse than Black Sabbath...but outside of the two major singles, nothing really jumped out at me as "gotta have this album" material. I gather that it earns its spot on the RS list largely for being an examplar of the softer, more mellow sound that will be the default setting for the early '70s pop charts.

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Or he could go knock a few back at Danno's place...seen in the next episode!

Not-quite-stately Kelly Manor:


The Dancave:


Will we see Kono's place before Steve's? Or does Steve usually sleep in a pouch on Kono's back?

Well, that's around $8,000 in today's dollars, FWIW. It was a series of ongoing kickback payments of $200 each. And IIRC, they were weekly.

It's not about going rogue, it's about cluelessly playing into the hands of the guys who where already setting him up. He was already suffering alibi problems, and what does he do? Lets an anonymous caller send him to a fake rendezvous point so he won't have an alibi again!

Yeah, that was a little OTT.

Dude, that is like so 1971.

Yeah, I thought so too.

No, but he was a stinger.

He turned it down when she offered it as a solution to his inability to work around her.

Don't think she was the type. She was very high-strung and acted like she had a stick up her ass. I took her as living in a very ordered, proper world that had no place for the chaos of children.

I wasn't reading it quite that way, but he definitely was trying to evoke a reaction.

 

55 Years Ago This Week

Selections from Billboard's Hot 100 for the week:

Leaving the chart:

• "All I Really Want to Do," The Byrds (10 weeks)
• "Don't Just Stand There," Patty Duke (11 weeks)
• "I'm Henry VIII, I Am," Herman's Hermits (10 weeks)
• "Take Me Back," Little Anthony & The Imperials (11 weeks)
• "What's New Pussycat?," Tom Jones (12 weeks)
• "You'd Better Come Home," Petula Clark (9 weeks)

New on the chart:

"There but for Fortune," Joan Baez

(#50 US; #16 AC; #8 UK)

"Make Me Your Baby," Barbara Lewis

(#11 US; #9 R&B)

"Keep On Dancing," The Gentrys

(#4 US)

"A Lover's Concerto," The Toys

(#2 US; #4 R&B; #5 UK)

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Yep.

Sounds about right. He was somebody you'd see doing the rounds in that period.

I thought everybody knew that. Let's see if I can dig it up...

Ostensibly, they were protection payments. Bribes. Kickbacks. Five-O was supposed to look the other way. The drug dealer was complaining that he was getting busted despite having made the payments. Of course, it was all a story...though I'm not sure offhand if the dealer himself was in on the plan, as there was a go-between picking up the payments.

Or if I'd paid more attention during that scene...

ETA: Ah, here we go...

Ted: I suppose you'd care more about me if I was dead, huh? You never cared about Papa when he was alive, but now you come here every Wednesday. You wouldn't even miss it if it was raining! I suppose...I suppose it's because...he can't ask you for anything anymore.​