March/April 2023 No. 25 $10.

95
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EARLY
SUPERMAN
CARTOONS

MISSION: IMPOSSIBLE’S
GONNA LYNDA DAY GEORGE
PARTY
LIKE
IT’S

RAMBO
IN AN

WKRP in Cincinnati • Jerry Lewis & Bob Hope comic books • Commercial jingles & more!
1 82658 00488 0 Featuring Andy Mangels • Will Murray • Scott Saavedra • Scott Shaw! • Mark Voger • Michael Eury
Superman © DC Comics. Space: 1999 © ITC. All Rights Reserved.
 47

The Crazy Cool Culture

We Grew Up With
33

Issue #25 March/April 2023

55
3 Oddball World of Scott Shaw!
WKRP in Cincinnati
41
68
Retro Heroes
Rambo at Fifty with First Blood
13 23 author David Morrell
Columns and
Special Features
3
Interview Departments
Mission: Impossible’s
Lynda Day George 2
Retrotorial
13
Will Murray’s 20th Century 10
Panopticon Too Much TV Quiz
Max Fleischer’s Superman Instrumental TV theme
composers
23
Andy Mangels’ 40
Retro Saturday Morning RetroFad
Filmation Studios’ Superman Telephone Booth Stuffing

55 33 67
Voger’s Vault of
Celebrity Crushes
Vintage Varieties
Andy Gibb
Bob Hope and Jerry Lewis
comic books
76
Super Collector
68 41 Why I Love The Monkees
Scott Saavedra’s
Secret Sanctum
TV Commercial Jingles 78
RetroFanmail
47
Retro Sci-Fi 80
Space: 1999 ReJECTED
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RETRO INTERVIEW
Lynda
Her Missions Were Possible
BY ROBERT GREENBERGER
There is a serenity that surrounds Lynda Day George, the
77-year-old actress who is hopeful of a return to performing after
a long hiatus. Best known as Casey on Mission: Impossible, the
attractive actress has a long résumé of television and film credits,
but her beginnings were far more modest ones.
Born Linda Louise Day on December 11, 1944, she was raised in
San Marcos, Texas, by her mother Betty and father Claude, an Air
Force officer. Soon after her brother Richard was born, Claude was
transferred to Joplin, Missouri, bringing the family with him. At one
point, her mother remarried Del Whitehead, and in 1957 the entire
family relocated to Phoenix, Arizona. There, she found herself
amidst budding talents who would intersect with her later career.
Her mother, Betty Louise Avey Day-Whitehead, taught poise
and charm at a modeling school, which proved influential on
the young child. Initially, Lynda was thinking about becoming
a surgeon, but her good looks and mother’s influence had her
thinking in new directions. When she was 12, Lynda began entering
beauty contests, and was handing out flyers for the modeling
school where she also met Lynda Carter (yes, that Lynda Carter).
One day, as they handed out flyers, Wayne Newton and his brother
Jerry came across the street from a guitar store and introduced
Day
George
Your mission, RetroFan reader, should you choose to accept
it—and who wouldn’t??—is to enjoy this profile of the
fabulous Lynda Day George. (ABOVE) One of our favorites
of her roles is as Casey, from television’s coolest, smartest
espionage show, Mission: Impossible. Her castmates were
Peter Graves, Greg Morris, and Peter Lupus. © Paramount Pictures
Television.
themselves. Wayne eventually asked her to an eighth-grade dance.
She attended West High School, while Wayne and Jerry were across
town at North High School; they kept up their friendship and she
was present when Wayne debuted in Las Vegas, becoming an
iconic mainstay.
While in high school, she represented her school in the Maid
of Cotton competition, the first of many such accolades. From a
friend’s ranch in Montana, George wistfully looked back on those
days. She explained that her mother’s influence got her to model,
and it was not long after, at 15, that she was scouted to work for the
famous Eileen Ford Modeling Agency in New York City. A former
Ford model had opened her own agency in Phoenix and spotted
RETROFAN March/April 2023 3
 retro interview

PILOTS AND PARTNERSHIPS Among those roles, she did four episodes of The FBI, including one
Her track record suggests she was well regarded given the just after she and George married. They began frequently working
steadiness of her career along with her versatility, allowing her together on series, films, and even game shows. It helped that they
to excel in sitcoms and dramas. In The Complete Mission: Impossible shared an agent who knew they liked working with one another so
Dossier, director Gerald Mayer recounted an incident when he was they often got cast on the same episode of a series together.
helming an episode of The Fugitive. “At the last moment an actress She recalls seeing FBI
who was to play a very strong emotional part bowed out, and they star Efrem Zimbalist,
replaced her with Lynda Day, whom I’d never heard of. She was just Jr. frequently on the set
marvelous in a very dramatic part, absolutely terrific.” whether he was needed
Apparently, watching series star David Janssen was influential or not and despite not
on her, as he made a point to know the name of every member of sharing a lot of screen
the cast and crew, including personal details. He was also good time with him, they
had several fruitful
conversations.
Across the years, she
worked with some of
the greatest names in
Hollywood. Asked to
name which ones stood
out, she demurs, saying,
“Oh, you know, I was so
blessed to be working
with all these actors.

Lynda Day George in a pensive

moment from the 1969 pilot Fear
No Evil, eventally released as a
television movie-of-the-week.

friends with Christopher George, and she recalls seeing them
having many deep conversations.
She was popular enough to consistently be cast for pilots, only
one of which went to series. For Universal in 1969, she shot Fear No
Evil, a movie-of-the-week/pilot, opposite Louis Jourdan, who was
a psychiatrist with a healthy skepticism over the supernatural, but
whose cases often had him questioning that belief. It performed
well enough to commission a second telefilm, this one sans
Lynda, and it never went to series. She had tremendous respect
for Jourdan, who she saw as unique, very sophisticated in bearing.
“I was blown away” by working in television, which was rapidly
evolving from mere entertainment to stories with more dramatic
themes.
Many of her guest appearances were on Quinn Martin Produc-
tions, followed by many Aaron Spelling series. She notes how both
men had “strong visions for what could be done on television”
and she was happy to be working with both legendary producers.
(TOP) Lynda Day was part of the stellar cast of the 1970
movie Western, Chisum. (BOTTOM) A Chisum lobby card,
showing Day as Sue McSween with John Wayne as the
titular hero. © Warner Bros. All, courtesy of Heritage.
There would be a very long list of the best I worked with. There
were so many great productions.”
She said that being the visiting cast member was thrilling since
every show had its own vibe. “Everyone on the crew couldn’t have
made me feel more welcome,” she says.
In 1969, she thought a lucky break came when she was cast in
Chisum, a feature film mounted by John Wayne at Warner Bros.
Her part was a small one, but it brought a feature film salary and a
chance to be seen on the big screen. The movie, adapted by Andrew
J. Fenady from his short story “Chisum and the Lincoln County
Cattle War,” was directed by Andrew V. McLaglen. Shot in Durango,

RETROFAN March/April 2023 5

 retro interview
(LEFT) Promotional photo for the
short-lived, M:I-like The Silent Force
(1970–1971). (FRONT) Lynda Day
as Amelia Cole. (BACK, LEFT TO
RIGHT) Ed Nelson as Ward Fuller
and Percy Rodriguez as Jason Hart.
© CBS Studios, Inc.
Mexico, it had a large cast including Wayne,
Forrest Tucker (coming off F-Troop), Ben
Johnson, and Christopher George. Day was
reunited with her friend and this time their
romance heated up.
As 1970 dawned, Lynda Day divorced
Pantano, who she has little to say about, and on May 15, married
Christopher George. Their film opened to rave reviews just a month
later. Later, they petitioned the courts to have Nicky recognized as
his natural son.
Over the course of her career, she shot a total of nine pilots,
starting with the only one to go to series, The Silent Force. Others
of note included Cannon and The Barbary Coast. She laughs at the
notion she was either a good luck charm for studios or a curse given
her one-for-nine record.
Still, the half-season Silent Force proved providential on
several fronts. First, it was shot on the Paramount lot in 1970,
where Christopher was shooting his ABC series The Immortal. This
allowed them to travel together and visit whenever they weren’t
needed on set.
6 RETROFAN March/April 2023
(RIGHT) Lynda Day George as part
of the Mission: Impossible cast, on
the January 22–28, 1972 cover of TV
Guide. Mission: Impossible © Paramount Pictures
Television. TV Guide © TV Guide. (INSET) What a
handsome couple! Lynda Day George
and Christopher George.
The series was about three U.S.
Government agents who went undercover
to fight organized crime. Lynda was partnered with Percy Rodriguez
and Ed Nelson. If the premise sounds familiar, it should; it was clearly
patterned after the success of CBS’ juggernaut, Mission: Impossible.
Silent Force was created by Luther Davis, a prolific award-winning
playwright and screenwriter; this was his sole foray into television. An
Aaron Spelling production, it was critically panned and was cancelled
in January 1971, airing a mere 15 episodes. The half-hour drama could
never match the draw of NBC’s Rowan & Martin’s Laugh-In or CBS’s
Here’s Lucy. George is dismissive of it, given its short running time, and
feels, to her, it was filler prior to Monday Night Football.
Still, Lynda loved having a regular role at long last. She grew to
bond with her costars and really enjoyed getting to know the crew.
She didn’t have much to say about her character, Amelia Cole, who
wasn’t given much personality or background.
WILL MURRAY’S 20TH CENTURY PANOPTICON
Max Fleischer’s
Superman
BY WILL MURRAY
I still remember the first time I laid eyes on the Man of Steel. I was
very, very young. I don’t remember where I lived, but I remember
that the scenes came from the Adventures of Superman TV series
starring George Reeves. “The Clown Who Cried” was the name of
the episode.
I don’t know why I retained fragmentary memories of that
episode. It’s the only Superman experience I could remember
having before I purchased my first Superman comic book late in
Sibling animators Max Fleischer (LEFT) and Dave
Fleischer. Dave Fleischer photo courtesy of Popeye the Sailorpedia.
It’s a bird! It’s a plane! It’s… a cartoon series! Title and
sample images from the Fleischer Studios Superman
animated shorts from the Forties. Superman TM & © DC Comics.
Courtesy of Heritage.
1961. It was probably a rerun, since the original episode first aired
when I was approximately three years old.
After my comic-collecting career began, I caught Superman on
TV again. This wasn’t George Reeves in the flesh, but an even older,
animated incarnation.
One Saturday morning cartoon show—probably the local
Bozo the Clown—in the very early Sixties included in the line-up a
wartime episode of the Forties Max Fleischer Technicolor Superman
cartoons. Destruction, Inc. was the title. It involved the Man of Steel
battling saboteurs at the defense plant.
I don’t think we had a color TV set then, although we might
have. My family was the first in our neighborhood to purchase
one. But that episode was mesmerizing. I was especially enthralled
because this version of Superman had to work at being the Man of
Steel. He could shrug off bullets like his DC Comics descendent, all
right. But in one memorable scene where he’s buried in a massive
pile of steel girders, he had to struggle. It didn’t take him long to
shrug them off. But just those few moments of suspense really
grabbed me.
I don’t think I saw another episode until the Seventies, when the
larger comic-book conventions began showing them in 16-milli-
meter projection. They were as much a thrill then as they are now,
a half a century later.
RETROFAN March/April 2023 13
 Will Murray’s 20th Century Panopticon

Eventually, the Fleischer Superman cartoons were

released on video and then posted on YouTube, so (TOP) This pressbook
anyone could watch them, at any time. If you’ve never was presented to movie
seen one, they are an absolute joy. theaters in 1941 to help
So I thought for this column I would look into the promote the Fleischer
circumstances behind which Superman first appeared Studios’ new Superman
on the silver screen, way back in 1940. cartoon shorts. Superman TM
& © DC Comics. Courtesy of Heritage.
SLOWER (DEVELOPMENT) THAN A (LEFT) Move over, Jor-El
SPEEDING BULLET and Pa Kent! Superman’s
The Man of Steel took America by storm in 1938–1939. real fathers were his
A newspaper comic strip and radio program appeared co-creators, writer Jerry
before the character was much more than a year old. Siegel (STANDING) and
Hollywood noticed. artist Joe Shuster.
Republic Pictures envisioned producing a 15-chapter
Superman live-action serial in 1939, and acquired an
option to do so. But the project was slow to get off the ground. That was the story Harry Donenfeld told the press in 1940.
According to DC Comics publisher Harry Donenfeld, a Republic However, as Ray Pointer revealed in his book, The Art and Inventions
contract arrived on a Monday. Donenfeld was superstitious about of Max Fleischer, that was a publicity yarn. The truth was that
signing contracts on the first day of the business week. So he put it Fleischer Studios made the cartoon offer, not Paramount, which
aside. was only the distributor. Republic later unsuccessfully sued Donen-
The next day, a better offer came from Paramount Pictures, for feld for breach of contract.
a series of Superman animated cartoons. Donenfeld made that The Fleischer Studios’ plan called for a series of Superman
deal, leaving Republic to make do with Captain Marvel. cartoons, which would be released by Paramount. For a hero who
At the time, Donenfeld boasted, “Because I always thought could vault skyscrapers and outrace locomotives, animation made
Superman was too fantastic a character to be played by a real man, perfect sense. Fleischer was a self-contained operation located in
I jumped at the chance. We expect to gross about ten times as Miami, Florida, owned by two brothers, Max and Dave.
much money on the cartoons.” Max, the older brother, was the driving force. He had long
wanted to produce more realistic cartoons, and the science fiction

14 RETROFAN March/April 2023


premise of Superman especially appealed to him. Dave was more
comfortable with traditional cartoony subjects. Fearing the
technical complications of animating realistic characters, he was
against the project.
“I didn’t want to make Superman,” Dave Fleischer confessed.
“Paramount wanted it. They called me over and asked why I didn’t
want to make it. I told them because it was too expensive, they
wouldn’t make any money back on it. The average short cost nine
or $10,000, some ran up to 15: they varied. I couldn’t figure how to
make Superman look right without spending a lot of money. I told
them they’d have to spend $90,000 on each one… They spent the
$90,000. But they were great.”
Actually, the cost was $50,000 for the first episode, and $30,000
after that, but it was still tremendously expensive. When the deal
was announced in the summer of 1940, Paramount promised a
Christmas release. But they were overconfident. Technical issues
stalled the project, pushing the release deep into the following
year.
The first entry took seven months to produce—twice as long as
the usual cartoon short. Approximately 90 artists—most uncred-
ited and many of them women—produced an estimated 1,000,000
illustrations in order to bring the acclaimed character to life.
“Superman,” promised Dave Fleischer in 1941, “will be the first
animated short to tell a straight dramatic story, using humor only
Will Murray’s 20th Century Panopticon
where it would normally occur; the first cartoon short employing
quick emotional close-ups of the human head, and the first cartoon
short to utilize ‘quick cut-backs,’ which are flash shots of extreme
brevity used for their cumulative affect to show the reaction of
groups of people to a single decisive event.”
Superman pitted the Man of Steel against the depredations of a
mad scientist and his destructive Electrothanasia-ray. It premiered
in September 1941 and set the tone for most of what followed,
with only necessary variations in the formula. Typically, Lois Lane
would follow a news story into peril, which required Clark Kent
to dramatically doff his blue business suit for his trademark blue
tights, rescue Lois, and defeat the cartoon’s menace.
Superman’s cartoon debut was nominated for an Academy
Award, and is today considered one of the greatest examples of
theatrical animation ever produced.
FINESSED BY FLEISCHER
Much of the modern Superman mythos was pioneered in the
Fleischer Studio. In the comics, the Man of Steel could only leap
long distances, but the Fleischer animators realized this made him
look like a blue grasshopper, so they gave him the power of true
flight. The comics adopted this innovation in 1943. The trope of
Clark Kent ducking into a phone booth in order to change into the
Man of Steel originated with these cartoons.
Fleischer Studios’
interpretation of the Man of
Steel streamlined the hyper-
muscular comic-book version
rendered by Superman
co-creator Joe Shuster. Shown
here are a Superman color
model sheet and head model
sheet, plus a Lois Lane model
sheet. Superman TM &© DC Comics.
Courtesy of Heritage.
RETROFAN March/April 2023 15
ANDY MANGELS’ RETRO SATURDAY MORNING

Filmation’s
The New Adventures
of Superman
BY ANDY MANGELS

(RIGHT) Superman faces

off against “The Force
Phantom” in the first
The New Adventures of
Superman show. (INSET)
Clark Kent from a
Filmation model sheet
used to aid animators.
TM & © DC Comics.

Look, up in the sky! It’s a bird! It’s a plane! It’s Andy Mangels’ Retro abilities far beyond those of mortal men. Superman, who can leap tall
Saturday Morning, your constant guide to the shows that thrilled buildings in a single bound, race a speeding bullet to its target, bend steel
us from yesteryear, exciting our imaginations and capturing our in his bare hands, and who, disguised as Clark Kent, mild-mannered
memories. This issue, you get a double-dip into two parts of the reporter for a great Metropolitan newspaper, fights a never-ending battle
Man of Steel’s animated history: look elsewhere for the spotlight for truth and justice!
on the tremendous Fleischer theatrical shorts, but stay tuned for a Although uncredited initially to maintain secret-identity
look at TV’s exciting The New Adventures of Superman! mystique, Bud Collyer played both Clark Kent and Superman
(except for some final-year shows that featured Michael Fitz-
STRANGE VISITATIONS maurice), while Rolly Bester, Helen Choate, and Joan Alexander
Following his debut in Action Comics #1 (June 1938), the Kryptonian portrayed Lois Lane. The series introduced not only the concept
super-hero shone brighter than all other comic characters, and of kryptonite to the mythos, but also the characters of Daily Planet
media of the time soon followed. A Superman newspaper strip came editor Perry White (voiced by Julian Noa), copyboy Jimmy Olsen
first, in January 1939, and actor Ray Middleton portrayed Superman (voiced by Jackie Kelk and Jack Grimes), and Police Inspector Bill
at the 1939 New York World’s Fair. Beyond the printed page, the Henderson (voiced by Matt Crowley and Earl George). All of these
first adaptation of Superman was characters quickly transitioned into
a radio show titled The Adventures the comics as well.
of Superman. The syndicated show With no repeats aired, The
began on February 12, 1940 as a Adventures of Superman lasted
15-minute serialized story, airing for an amazing 2,088 original
from three to five times per week. episodes, finally ending its 11-year
The series was sponsored by run on March 1, 1951. By that time,
Kellogg’s Pep cereal.
Announcer and narrator Jackson
Beck gave the opening of the series, The Adventures of Superman
which thrilled young viewers: Up radio show voice actors: (LEFT
in the sky, look! It’s a bird! It’s a plane! TO RIGHT) announcer and
It’s Superman! Yes, it’s Superman— narrator Jackson Beck, Lois
strange visitor from the planet Krypton Lane Joan Alexander, and
who came to Earth with powers and Superman Bud Collyer.

RETROFAN March/April 2023 23

 andy mangels’ retro saturday morning

producer Robert Maxwell was already working on a new format for

Superman to conquer… television!
The new Adventures of Superman series was a syndicated
half-hour live-action show debuting around September 19, 1952
(actual airdates are contested due to the syndicated nature of the
program). As with the radio series, Kellogg’s sponsored the TV
show, which starred George Reeves as Clark Kent/Superman, Phyllis
Coates and Noel Neill as Lois Lane, Jack Larson as Jimmy Olsen,
John Hamilton as Perry White, and Robert Shayne as Inspector
Henderson. The series was originally filmed in black-and-white
for the first two seasons of 26 episodes each, but filming switched
to color for seasons three through six, which added an additional
13 episodes for each year. [Editor’s note: See
RetroFan #11—still available at www.twomorrows.
com—for our lavishly illustrated look back at
Adventures of Superman.] In all, 104 episodes were
produced, plus a short-form episode made for
the U.S. Treasury Department titled “Stamp Day
for Superman.”
Voiced by Bill Kennedy, the show’s opening
narration was a variation on the radio show:
Faster than a speeding bullet! More powerful than a
locomotive! Able to leap tall buildings at a single bound! Look! Up in the
sky! It’s a bird! It’s a plane! It’s Superman! Yes, it’s Superman… strange
visitor from another planet, who came to Earth with powers and abilities
far beyond those of mortal men! Superman... who can change the course
of mighty rivers, bend steel in his bare hands, and who, disguised as Clark
Kent, mild-mannered reporter for a great metropolitan newspaper, fights
a never-ending battle for truth, justice, and the American way!
The final episode of Adventures of Superman aired around April
28, 1958, although pilot episodes for both a Superboy and Superpup
spin-off series were shot later. The producers made plans to make
two more years of episodes, but the 1958 death of John Hamilton
threw one monkey wrench into the gears. Plans were completely
shut down after the unexpected and mysterious death of star
George Reeves on June 16, 1959. (TOP) Early Filmation studio location. (BOTTOM)
Because it was already in syndication, Adventures of Superman Filmation’s top brass circa the Sixties: (LEFT TO RIGHT)
basically never left the air for several decades after its cancellation. Norm Prescott, Hal Sutherland, and Lou Scheimer.
But in 1965, plans were put into place for a new media incarnation (INSET) Legendary Superman comics editor, Mort
for the Man of Steel… Weisinger.

AND WHO, DISGUISED AS AN ANIMATION

COMPANY…
In the early Sixties, having worked for animation houses including
Kling Studios, Walter Lantz, Ray Patton Productions, Warner Bros.,
and others, animator Lou Scheimer founded Filmation Associates
with fellow animator Hal Sutherland and disc-jockey-turned-pro-
ducer Norm Prescott. Filmation was a scrappy young company that
brokered outside animation jobs and commercials, but they really
needed some way to make their mark, or they would disappear.
“It was 1965, and after only a few years in business it looked
like Filmation Associates was going to have to close its doors,” said
Scheimer in my interviews with him for the 2012 TwoMorrows
book, Lou Scheimer: Creating the Filmation Generation. “The studio was
now down to two employees—myself and Hal—and a shutdown
was imminent. Norm was doing his best to try to raise money from
someone, somewhere, somehow… We had 24 empty desks and
some equipment gathering dust. We didn’t have a Moviola to sell,
or it would have probably been gone already.” Filmation’s offices
did have one other “person” in the office, but she didn’t say much;
at the front desk was a mannequin wearing glasses and a dress
from Lou’s wife. Visitors would sometimes talk to the “receptionist”
before realizing she wasn’t real. It was a sign of things to come…
“One day the phone rang, and Hal answered it,” Scheimer
continued. “A moment or so later his eyes got wide, and he said,
‘Louie, maybe you’d better talk to them!’… He had a peculiar look
on his face, ‘He says his name is Superman Weisinger calling from
DC. He’s looking for Prescott! … I got on the phone and said, ‘Hello,
Mr. Superman, are you calling from a phone booth?’ I figured it
was a prank call. The voice on the other end said, ‘Mort Weisinger
here. I’m the story editor on Superman, and I’d like to talk to Norm
Prescott.’ I said, ‘Well, Norm’s not here right now. Is there anything I
can do to help?’ He said, ‘No, I’ve got to talk to Prescott!’ I explained
to him that Prescott was in a hotel on Sunset Boulevard and was
going to leave for New York the next day and told him to call him
shortly. I hung up and quickly called Norm and said, ‘There’s some

24 RETROFAN March/April 2023

VOGER’S VAULT OF VINTAGE VARIETIES

SEND
IN THE
CLOWNS and J er ry L ewis
Bob Hope rse
the D C Un iv e
in
BY MARK VOGER
How does one become a comic-book hero? Offhand, I can
think of at least three ways: be born on Krypton; get bitten by
a radioactive spider; or become a funnyman in the movies.
At least, that’s how it was in the olden days.
When you’re a little squirt, you just accept things. Like, if you
were a kid in the Sixties who bought DC comic books at the corner
drugstore, you didn’t question your options: Superman, Batman,
Wonder Woman, The Flash, Green Lantern, The Adventures of Bob Hope,
The Adventures of Jerry Lewis…
Wait, what?
Can you imagine a child in the Sixties who’d want to
read a comic book about Bob Hope? The movie comedian’s
onscreen persona was the opposite of kid-friendly: a balding
flimflammer in a suit who broke the fourth wall referencing
show-biz pals—Hope’s constant name-dropping of Bing
Crosby could be a drinking game—and who, when in the presence of pretty ladies, It remains a mystery
acted all flustered. (Cant’cha just hear Hope doing his trademark guttural snarl?)  from the olden
Jerry Lewis, at least, did slapstick—always a hit with the kiddies—and his movie persona had a days of the medium
six-year-old mentality. But as the Sixties got their groove on, Lewis’ onscreen antics began to sour how DC Comics
(in lackluster films like Hook, Line & Sinker and Don’t Raise the Bridge, Lower the River). Meanwhile, his published books
comic-book counterpart was still making like the vital, Brylcreemed Jerry of the early days. Time “starring” movie
warp!  comedians Bob Hope
Still, we urchins bought, read, and dug the Hope and Lewis books. The creative teams’ secret (LEFT) and Jerry
sauce for holding our interest? Cram the books with lots of hip, or at least faux hip, supporting Lewis (RIGHT), that
characters. This distracted us from the woeful un-hipness of the titular comedians.  were bought and
What we pre-teen punks didn’t realize was that in the previous decade, Hope and Lewis read by children.
were “hired” by DC to help sustain the comics industry at a time when super-heroes were out of Both the Hope and
fashion—temporarily, it turned out. the Lewis books
I once broached the subject of the Hope and Lewis books being an odd cultural fit with writer exceeded 100 issues,
Arnold Drake, who scripted many issues of both titles for DC. The urbane, introspective Drake something that will
(1924–2007) told me something I’d never heard before—not in comics history books, the comics never happen again.
press, or anecdotally: that in the middle-Sixties, there had been a plan afoot, a slow-moving coup, © DC Comics.

RETROFAN March/April 2023 33

 Voger’s vault of vintage varieties

against Hope. (Cue needle-scratch on 33-RPM record.) DC was
plotting to remove Bob Hope from his own comic book.
Et tu, DC? But before we get into the “Bag Bob” conspiracy, as I’ll
call it, a bit of contextualization is in order.
BRINGING THE FUNNY
Screen comedians were depicted in comics from the early days of
both the “moving pictures” and the “funny papers.” It seems safe to
say that the first such instance was Charlie Chaplin’s Comic Capers, a
syndicated strip that debuted in 1915 from the Chicago-based
J. Keeley Syndicate. Chaplin was depicted as the “Little Tramp”
character—bowler, cane, Hitler mustache—from his Essanay films
of the era, such as The Champion, His New Job, and In the Park (all
from 1915).   Costello (1968–1971); and Dell/Gold Key’s six-issue revival of Laurel
But many early depictions of movie comedians in the comics
were largely unseen in America. Amalgamated Press of London
published Film Fun between 1920 and 1962. Chaplin, Harold Lloyd,
Buster Keaton, Laurel and Hardy, Abbott and Costello, and an
upstart comedy team called Martin and Lewis (more on them later)
were graphically depicted alongside British comedians virtually
unknown here.  LIGHTS, CAMERA, ACTION
From the Thirties through the Fifties, the so-called “Tijuana
bibles”—unauthorized pornographic comics illustrated by pros,
but not publicly sold—depicted W. C. Fields, Laurel and Hardy,
the Marx Brothers, Jimmy Durante, and Joe E. Brown
in compromising situations. (Trust me on this: It’s even
skeevier than it sounds.)
In 1945, Rural House brought Red Skelton to the comics in
their teen-genre title Patches, in issue #11. (A cartoon Skelton
is seen uttering his catchphrase “I dood it!” on the cover.)
In 1947, Fiction House featured Skelton in Movie Comics #4,
with their adaptation of “Merton of the Movies.” Film Fun ran
Skelton comics in its 1957 annual. (For the following, I leaned
heavily on Robert M. Overstreet’s Official Overstreet Comic
Book Price Guide, as any fellow comic-book freak should have
no trouble recognizing.)  four things about Hope: His
In the late Forties, St. John rolled the dice on comic books
featuring three comedy teams. In 1948, St. John launched
its Abbott and Costello series, which ran for 40 issues
through 1956, often with artwork by MAD caricaturist
Mort Drucker. (The publisher also depicted A&C in Giant
Comics Edition #16 in 1950.) St. John brought out its Laurel
and Hardy series in 1949, which ran for six issues through
1956, albeit with an erratic publishing schedule. That
same year, St. John’s Jubilee imprint kicked off its
six-issue series The Three Stooges, illustrated by Norman Maurer and
Joe Kubert.
We should also note appearances by movie comedians in K.K.
Publications’ long-running March of Comics (1946–1982). These
weren’t comic books per se, but commercially sponsored give-
aways. Characters depicted include Our Gang, Laurel and Hardy,
and the Stooges.
Owing to the TV popularity of the Our Gang shorts, Dell’s
long-running anthology title Four Color brought Spanky, Alfalfa,
and friends to the funnybooks with 12 issues of The Little Rascals
beginning with Four Color #674 in 1956. A TV resurgence was
also behind Dell/Gold Key’s later 55-issue revival of The Three
Stooges (1959–1966); Charlton’s 22-issue revival of Abbott and
and Hardy (1962–1967).
No one was safe. Woody Allen met the fictional rockers the
Maniaks in DC’s Showcase #71 (1967), illustrated by Mike Sekowsky.
For the life of me, I can’t determine whether this was an authorized
use of Allen’s name and likeness. Somehow, I doubt it.
 
If being a movie comedian is a way to become a comic-book hero,
how does one become a movie comedian? 
Bob Hope was born Leslie Townes
Hope in London in 1903, and lived to
be 100. Well, he was an inveterate
golfer, a ladies man (to put it
politely), and a proponent of the
health benefits of daily massage. 
Hope made his film debut in
the 1934 short Going Spanish, and
finished his career in a 1997 K-Mart
commercial that also featured
Martha Stewart and Big Bird. 
Anyone over 70 can tell you
theme song was “Thanks for

(LEFT) Charlie Chaplin’s Comic Capers (1915)

is likely the first instance of a movie
comedian depicted in the comics.
© J. Keeley Syndicate. (TOP) Cartoon versions of
Laurel and Hardy, Abbott and Costello,
Joe E. Brown, and British comedians
Arthur Lucan, Kitty McShane, and Frank
Randle frolic on the cover of Film Fun’s 1950
annual. © Amalgamated Press. (RIGHT) Bob drives the
jeep on the cover of True Comics #59 (1947). © Parents
Magazine Press

34 RETROFAN March/April 2023

 Voger’s vault of vintage varieties

(LEFT) The Little Rascals were another movie comedy team adapted to the comics. Shown is their debut in Four Color #674.
© Dell Publishing. (CENTER) Woody Allen meets the Maniaks in Showcase #71 (1967). Cover art by Mike Sekowsky and Mike
Esposito. (RIGHT) A photo cover reinforced the movie angle for The Adventures of Bob Hope #1 (1950). © DC Comics.

the Memories.” He entertained U.S. troops through six wars. He
hosted the Oscars 19 times. And he made seven “Road” pictures
with Bing Crosby and Dorothy Lamour.  the nightclub stage. They dissolved the union, not amicably, in 1956
Hope’s appeal is undeniably dated, so it takes a nostalgic person
(like myself) to get through movies like I’ll Take Sweden; Boy, Did I Get
a Wrong Number!; and How to Commit Marriage.
Jerry Lewis was born Jerome Levitch in 1926 in Newark, New
Jersey, and entered the show-biz field by pantomiming records.
(You can see Lewis recreate the bit to Count Basie’s bouncy jazz
instrumental “Cute” in his 1960 film Cinderfella.)  Lewis a comic genius that sometimes needed to be reeled in. That
He initially won fame as the dimwitted sidekick of suave singer
Dean Martin. The duo made their debut
in Atlantic City on July 25, 1946. (The exact
date is often noted because they broke up
ten years later, to the day.) Their first film
appearance was in My Friend Irma (1949)
starring Marie Wilson. For those ten years, Martin and Lewis were
kings of the entertainment world in broadcasting, movies, and on
(though Frank Sinatra brokered a live TV reunion 20 years later).
Lewis hosted marathons on behalf of the Muscular Dystrophy
Association from 1966 through 2010, and died at age 91.
Not everyone loved Lewis’ onscreen persona. Depending on
your viewpoint, the comedian portrayed a hilarious and endearing,
or unfunny and obnoxious, buffoon in dozens of films. Me? I’d call
rarely happened, and his films would suffer. But when he was
funny—boy, was this guy funny.
TROUBLE AT THE NEWSSTAND
When DC launched The Adventures of Bob
Hope and The Adventures of Dean Martin and
Jerry Lewis (as the Lewis book was titled for
its first 40 issues), the comics industry was
going through an anxious time. 
By the late Forties, super-hero characters
waned in popularity, as Western, war, crime,
horror, romance, teen, and “funny animal”
comic books dominated newsstands.
Increasingly, publishers turned to movies

(LEFT) Rascally Bob is smothered in

kisses in a panel from Bob Hope #26
(1954). © DC Comics. (RIGHT) Prior to their
DC run, Dean Martin and Jerry Lewis
appeared in Movie Love #12 (1951). © Famous
Funnies.

RETROFAN March/April 2023 35

SCOTT SAAVEDRA’S SECRET SANCTUM

Commercial
Jingles
BY SCOTT SAAVEDRA
Oh, I wish I were an Oscar Mayer wiener
That is what I’d truly like to be
’Cause if I were an Oscar Mayer wiener
Everyone would be in love with me.

Richard Trentlage is likely the first person to write a tune I couldn’t

get out of my head. Most people don’t know his name, but when
he died in 2016 at the age of 87, his obituary appeared in places as
diverse as the New York Times, National Public Radio, AdWeek, the
Hollywood Reporter, and Rolling Stone magazine. Trentlage wrote
commercial jingles professionally and the big one, the one most
of us Retronauts can still recall word for word, is “The Oscar Mayer
Wiener Song.”
Popular culture origin stories often have multiple versions in
the historical record, but the creation of this particular little ditty is Animated “The Oscar Mayer Wiener Song”
pretty consistent. The Wiener Song came about thanks to a jingle commercial, a first for the company, in 1965. © 2023 Kraft
contest organized by Oscar Mayer’s ad agency, J. Walter Thompson, Foods. All Rights Reserved.
and open only to advertising professionals. At the time Oscar Mayer
& Co. was a family-owned business and not yet national. It was the
final day of the contest when Trentlage heard about it and decided in an animated commercial. Once more, Trentlage’s son and
to take a shot. He wrote the jingle in an hour after coming up with daughter (with a cold again) recorded the song in a studio presum-
the “Oh, I wish…” line (based on a wistful statement from his son ably more advanced than the one in the family’s living room.
who wanted to be a “dirt-bike hot dog”). Recording his son and Former Oscar Mayer V.P. of Marketing Jerry Ringlien was quoted
daughter (she had a cold and it was felt that this would appeal to in Rolling Stone as admitting, “It was the commercial that carried
the moms) singing the tune took about 20 minutes. He composed Oscar Mayer to national distribution.” The Wiener Song was
the music on a ukulele and banjo. His wife played the standup bass. finally retired in 2010. Jerry Ringlien would himself create the “My
And then… it took a year before the public heard—and then was Bologna Has a First Name” campaign. The commercial with little
unable to forget—“The Oscar Mayer Wiener Song,” which debuted four-year-old Andy Lambros fishing and eating a bologna sandwich
appeared in 1974 and was also a hit for the company.

My bologna has a first name

It’s O-S-C-A-R
My bologna has a second name
It’s M-A-Y-E-R
Oh, I love to eat it every day
And if you ask me why I’ll say
’Cause Oscar Mayer has a way with B-O-L-O-G-N-A!!!!

Ringlien would admit that selling bologna was a lot harder than
selling hot dogs, but at least the tune pushed the brand name.

Adorable actor Andy Lambros fishin’ and eatin’ his

bologna sandwich (1974). © Kraft Foods. All Rights Reserved.

RETROFAN March/April 2023 41

RETRO SCI-FI

Space: 1999 BY SHAQUI LE VESCONTE

(ABOVE) The cover and cast introduction from the 1975 pressbook touting the release of Space: 1999.
© Incorporated Television Company (ITC). Courtesy of Heritage. (INSET) Sci-fi hardware was also a “star” of Space: 1999.
Noted model builder Martin Bower constructed this hand-painted miniature replica of the series’
transport vehicle, the Eagle. Space: 1999 © ITC. Courtesy of Heritage. Moon photo: NASA.

September thirteenth, nineteen ninety-nine. A massive nuclear they spearheaded a wave of marketing and merchandise the likes
explosion… cause—human error! The Moon is torn out of Earth orbit of which had never been achieved in the U.K. before.
and hurled into outer space—doomed to travel forever through hostile By the end of the Sixties, the Andersons had effectively
galaxies. And for the beings on Moonbase Alpha, one over-riding shot themselves in the foot by saturating the British television
purpose—survival. market with their series, with local channels opting out of latter
– Original Space: 1999 opening narration, from early productions Joe 90 and The Secret
Year Two scripts Service. They had made a
break into live-action
In hindsight, Space: 1999 seems like with the feature film
an exercise in how not to create a Doppelgänger (a.k.a.
series, let alone a science-fiction Journey to the Far
one. Star Trek was several years Side of the Sun) in
in its gestation, which Space: 1999 1968, which laid
was and still is compared to. the foundations
Gene Roddenberry’s vision was for doing so with
a future where space travel was a television series.
commonplace, on a realistically sized The result was UFO,
starship akin to modern navy vessels. first airing in the U.K. in
A large crew, headed by a smaller 1970, and following suit stateside
cast of regulars in command, gave rise in late 1972.
to numerous spin-offs set in that same The show was a ratings hit in New York, and
universe. interest in a second season was shown. Pre-production
The genesis of Space: 1999 goes back with its producers, art and documents were commissioned. With the original cast
husband-and-wife team Gerry and Sylvia Anderson. They were and crew disbanded with the closure of the Andersons’ Century
behind the popular Supermarionation puppet series such as 21 Productions the previous year, ITC’s American president Abe
Fireball XL5, Stingray, Thunderbirds [see RetroFan #4—ed.], and Mandell mooted updating the format to 1999. New characters
Captain Scarlet, which dominated the British airwaves through the would operate from an expanded “Moon City,” as those episodes of
Sixties. Each had an easy-to-understand format and, backed and UFO not set on Earth had been more popular with viewers. But fate
distributed by Lew Grade’s ITC (Incorporated Television Company), can be fickle, and as surprising as the high ratings had been, they

RETROFAN March/April 2023 47

 retro Sci-Fi

suddenly plummeted and American

backing was withdrawn, leaving the
Andersons with a massive outlay for
no purpose.
All was not lost, and the art
and format were used to pitch a
new show. UFO was about aliens
harvesting humans to sustain their
own dying race, and perhaps other
nefarious purposes. “UFO 1999”
proposed the aliens neutralizing the
Moon’s gravity and hurling it out of
orbit, taking Moon City’s fight into
deep space. For the new series, the
separation of Earth and Moon would
be retained but eliminating alien
involvement. The accidental deto-
nation of nuclear waste would be
responsible for this odyssey into the
unknown, and for the 311 occupants
of the renamed Moonbase Alpha.

A NETWORK LAUNCH DERAILED

Space: 1999 was introduced to the press in the summer of 1973.
Grade gave the go-head with a budget of $6.5 million—$275,000
per episode—making it the most expensive television series at the
time. A verbal agreement was given by CBS to purchase the series
if the stars were American, in what would be the Andersons’ first
network sale since Fireball XL5.
Another husband-and-wife team, Martin Landau and Barbara
Bain, were cast as Commander John Koenig and Doctor Helena
Russell. Stars of the early seasons of Mission: Impossible, they were
faces known to the all-important American market. British-Cana-
dian actor Barry Morse, equally famous from his role as Lt. Gerard
in The Fugitive and more recently in ITC’s The Adventurer, took the
role of Professor Victor Bergman.
Filling out the cast were Australian Nick Tate as pilot Captain
Alan Carter, Prentis Hancock as Koenig’s second-in-command
Controller Paul Morrow, and Burmese-born actress Zienia Familiar faces: (TOP LEFT) Martin Landau and (TOP
Merton as data analyst Sandra Benes. Anton Phillips was Doctor RIGHT) Barbara Bain in publicity photos from TV’s
Russell’s deputy medical officer Bob Mathias, with Clifton Jones Mission: Impossible. © Paramount Pictures Television. Courtesy of Heritage.
as computer expert David Kano, replacing Lon Satton’s Ben Ouma (ABOVE) Screen capture of Barry Morse from TV’s The
after the opening episode. Fugitive. © Quinn Martin Productions/United Artists Television.
It was planned that Space: 1999 would air for the 1974–1975
season, but fate dealt a blow. The threatened closure of MGM its debut in the U.S.A., over 150 such stations had bought the series,
Elstree Studios meant the entire production was illicitly moved to with 90% of them being network affiliates. A brand new high-
those at Pinewood, resulting in union blacklisting. England was in budget show gave them the opportunity to pre-empt the usual
the midst of economic turmoil, with strikes and power cuts which network offerings.
slowed down filming. CBS had purchased the Planet of the Apes But what of the series itself?
television series for the 1974–1975 season instead, and cancelled When in a situation of retro-fitting a format to suit invariables
its order for Space: 1999, now well into production. Neither of the imposed on you—that the Moon had to be separated from
other two networks wanted a series they had had no input to. Like Earth was the main immutable factor—there were going to be
the Moon in Space: 1999, the production was adrift in the mercurial compromises to scientific accuracy. One major flaw was the Moon
television sales market. being perceived as a solid whole which could be blasted out of orbit.
International sales, helped by ITC’s marketing, were healthy Critics commented that an explosion big enough to shift the Moon
enough, but America still counted for a major percentage of it. would more likely fragmentize it.
Grade and Mandell started a drive to sell Space: 1999 to the States’ In the year 1999, at least in the establishing episode “Breakaway,”
many local stations for the 1975–1976 season. By the time it made mankind had probably only got as far as Mars. Subsequent

48 RETROFAN March/April 2023

THE ODDBALL WORLD OF SCOTT SHAW!

The Story of
Turkeys, Band-Aids,
and Executroids

WKRP in Cincinnati
BY SCOTT SHAW!
WKRP in Cincinnati was promoted as “America’s
Favorite Radio Station”… and in many ways, it was and
still is. It’s certainly my favorite primetime sitcom,
primarily because of one of its breakout characters.
Every once in a while, a new character pops up in
a television series that makes you think, “I’ve known
people exactly like this character, but it’s the first time
I’ve seen her/him in entertainment.” And that’s how
some of TV’s most unique and oddly appealing charac-
ters—such as Leave It to Beaver’s insincere wiseass Eddie
Haskell, The Many Loves of Dobie Gillis’ devotedly unem-
ployed beatnik Maynard G. Krebs, The Andy Griffith
Show’s incompetent authoritarian Deputy Barney Fife,
Taxi’s spaced-out burnout Reverend Jim Ignatowski,
Happy Days’ tough-little-guy-with-a-lot-of-heart Arthur
“Fonzie” Fonzarelli, The A-Team’s outrageous adventurer
B. A. Baracus, and The Big Bang Theory’s obsessive
self-absorbed genius Sheldon Cooper—have all
become timeless icons of the tube. Here’s another...
I’ve often thought of myself as “the Dr. Johnny
Fever of cartoonists” (and not just because we’re both
survivors of Sixties/Seventies counterculture). He
was the seasoned (by time, place, and substances)
morning deejay of multiple air-names on WKRP in Cincinnati, as well The cast of WKRP in Cincinnati—“America’s Favorite
as the character who attracted me—and many viewers—to the Radio Station.” (FRONT ROW) Loni Anderson as Jennifer
series. Johnny Caravella/Johnny Duke/Johnny Style/Johnny Cool/ Marlowe, Howard Hesseman as Dr. Johnny Fever, and
Johnny Sunshine/Heavy Early/Rip Tide/Dr. Johnny Fever worked Jan Smithers as Bailey Quarters. (CENTER ROW) Frank
for all types of radio stations around the country… for a lo-o-ong Bonner as Herb Tartek and Gary Sandy as Andy Travis.
time. I worked for all types of comic-book publishers around the (BACK ROW) Richard Sanders as Les Nessman, Gordon
country and animation studios around Hollywood… for a lo-o-ong Jump as Arthur Carlson, and Tim Reid as Venus Flytrap.
time. Also, deejays and cartoonists have similar professions: We WKRP in Cincinnati © MTM Enterprises.
sit in a room by ourselves, making something entertaining out of
almost nothing. I also understand how a career that makes you
resilient, crafty, and thick-skinned is hard to leave. Why? Because number of classic TV series that followed. But let’s look at the land-
we cartoonists love our job—and we’re mostly suckers to let the scape of network-aired, primetime, live-action situation comedies
money-people know how to control us. But I digress… that preceded WKRP in Cincinnati.
In the mid-to-late Sixties, standard TV sitcoms primarily
SITCOMS GET ‘WITH IT’ featured hillbillies and rural communities (The Beverly Hillbillies,
A number of similarly unique characters were core cast members Green Acres), fantasy (The Addams Family, Bewitched, I Dream of
of WKRP in Cincinnati, a sitcom that subtly changed sitcoms Jeannie, Get Smart, etc.), and domestic family shows that had
forever. Among those were two standouts, Howard Hesseman’s flogged the same old plots for years. Their ratings were based on
seasoned-and-stoned deejay Dr. Johnny Fever, and Loni Anderson’s the total number of people who were watching a specific show. In
stunning-and-smart receptionist Jennifer Marlowe. the late Sixties and early Seventies, the ratings system changed,
But they weren’t the only ones—the show’s cast represented evaluating shows by using demographics. Ratings were broken
a number of characters with that “I’ve known people exactly like down into age, gender, and social groupings, so that advertisers
this character” vibe. Although the creatively progressive mindset could learn what sort of people were watching what sort of shows.
of WKRP in Cincinnati wasn’t obvious, it had a huge influence on a Bob Wood, who became the president of CBS in 1970, advocated

RETROFAN March/April 2023 55

 The oddball world of scott shaw!

that his network needed to reach the

more upscale, purchase-oriented group
to attract potential advertisers by airing
more sophisticated material. [Editor’s
note: See RetroFan #15 for columnist Scott
Saavedra’s look back at this “Rural Sitcom
Purge.”] The early Seventies brought on
a wave of the new style of comedies, trig-
gered by MTM Enterprises’ The Mary Tyler
Moore Show (1970) and Norman Lear’s All in
the Family (1971), which both aired on CBS.
Although Lear’s show got higher ratings
and more attention due to its controver-
sial themes, MTM’s storylines were much
more subtle with its progressive messaging and therefore, more
palatable to a wider range of viewers. [You did catch our interview
with Norman Lear in RetroFan #22, didn’t you? —ye buttinski ed.]
But after a few years, the era of “social issue comedies” seemed
to wane, with lightweight sitcoms such
as Gary Marshall’s Happy Days, Laverne
& Shirley, and Mork & Mindy, all with the
occasional moral for the young, but rarely
with a social issue. Even Norman Lear’s
output changed, with similar series like
Diff’rent Strokes and The Facts of Life. MTM (INSET) What’s in a name? Dr. Johnny Fever’s coffee
launched more dramas such as Lou Grant, mug. Courtesy of Scott Shaw! (LEFT) WKRP creator Hugh
The White Shadow, Hill Street Blues, and St. Wilson. Legacy.com. (RIGHT) WKRP in Cincinnati’s
Elsewhere, series where “issue” storylines breakout characters, Dr. Johnny Fever (Hesseman)
were a standard theme. and Jennifer Marlowe (Anderson), in a behind-
Then a TV series came along that was really different, thanks to the-scenes photo from the personal collection of Loni
an office copier salesman. Hugh Wilson (August 21, 1943–January Anderson. © MTM Enterprises. Courtesy of Heritage.
14, 2018) was born in Miami, Florida. He graduated from the
University of Florida in 1964 with a degree in journalism. After
working as an office copier salesman, Wilson was a staff writer for a attitude about their profession provided lots of legitimate valuable
cork company’s trade magazine. There, he met Jay Tarses and Tom input for what would become Wilson’s first and best-known
Patchett, who both would one day be major forces in TV situation television series.
comedies. They all moonlighted as stand-up comics in Miami, Interested in the show’s potential, a week later, Tinker took
but Tarses and Patchett decided to move to Los Angeles to enter Wilson to meet with Andrew Siegel, CBS’ Vice President for
Hollywood’s entertainment industry. Wilson relocated to Atlanta, Comedy Development. Impressed by the concept, Siegel gave the
Georgia, to enter the world of advertising in 1966 as a copywriter okay for Wilson to write a pilot script for the still-nameless project.
for the Burton-Campbell Agency. By 1970, he was the company’s Before developing the pilot’s cast of characters, Wilson returned
creative director and in 1973, he became its president. But Wilson to Atlanta to hang out at WQXI for a day with his pal Clark Brown.
retained his interest in creating entertainment, keeping in touch This was very fruitful for Hugh, whose concept began to jell. One
with Tarses and Patchett. In 1975, Jay and Tom set up an interview aspect that paid off was that Clark dressed in loud polyester clothes
between their old friend Hugh and Grant Tinker, the then-current that were typical of many salesmen in those days. That provided a
head of MTM Enterprises. It led to Hugh Wilson writing for The unique visual label that inspired the fashion sense of WKRP’s Exec-
Bob Newhart Show, and all three of them, along with Gary David utive Sales Manager Herbert R. Tarlek. One of WQXI’s deejays was
Goldberg, writing for The Tony Randall Show. a sleepy guy who’d seen it all and done it all, sometimes even while
sober, named “Skinny” Bobby Parker. Hugh has claimed that he was
RADIO DAZE the inspiration for Dr. Johnny Fever, but Howard Hesseman never
In 1977, Tinker asked Wilson and Goldberg to each pitch show agreed with that. According to actor Gordon Jump, WKRP’s Arthur
concepts for the upcoming fall season. Wilson delved into his past Carlson, Jr. was also based on an employee of WQXI, a radio execu-
and pitched a workplace sitcom set at a radio station based on tive who concocted the all-too-real “turkey drop” while working at
stories from his friend at Atlanta’s WQXI. (Goldberg’s was rejected, a Texas station. He not only inspired the creation of Mr. Carlson, his
but he went on to create such shows as Family Ties and Spin City.) disastrous stunt also became the basis for WKRP in Cincinnati’s best-
Clark Brown was the advertising salesman for WQXI who spent a known episode, considered one of the funniest tales in the history
lot of time at Harrison’s, a watering hole for the locals in advertising of televised comedy. Wilson also drew from personal sources while
and media. There, Hugh Wilson met a number of people who filling out the cast of his evolving concept. Andy Travis, WKRP’s new
worked for WQXI and other Atlanta stations. Their stories and station manager, was based on Hugh’s cousin, who was a Colorado

56 RETROFAN March/April 2023

 The oddball world of scott shaw!

f Tim Reid was born on December 19, 1944 in Norfolk, Virginia, (LEFT) A young Jan
and was raised in Chesapeake, Baltimore, and Nashville. While Smithers represented the
in high school, he was on the track team, the student council, American teenager on
and the yearbook, which he edited. Tim attended Norfolk State the March 21, 1966 cover
College and received a Bachelor of Business Administration de- of Newsweek. © Newsweek.
gree in 1968. It led to him getting hired by the Dupont Corpora- (RIGHT) A Smithers
tion, where he worked for three years. That same year, while at a publicity photo during her
Junior Chamber of Commerce meeting, he befriended Tom Dre- WKRP stardom.
esen. While working togeth-
er on their humorous an-
ti-drug program created for
local grade schools, they de-
cided to form the first bira-
cial comedy team, “Tim and
Tom.” Within six months,
Tim and Tom started getting
gigs on TV shows hosted by
Merv Griffin, David Frost,
and others. Eventually, while
Tom remained in stand-
up comedy, Tim struck out for Hollywood, soon appearing on
Rhoda, Lou Grant, Maude, Fernwood 2-Night, What’s Happening!!,
and a recurring role on The Richard Pryor Show. When he audi-
tioned for the role of WKRP’s hip and colorful Venus Flytrap, he
wasn’t the only one who showed up, but he may have been the
only actor who wasn’t eager to portray “another stereotypical
black character.” In fact, he told Hugh Wilson exactly that, who
appreciated and valued Tim’s honest input. “I wanted to have a
black DJ, and he hardly appears in the pilot, he just comes in at
the end… I use him really as a stage device to scare the hell out of
[Momma] Carlson,” said Hugh. “Then Timmy and I sat down and
really talked the thing over, and he decided that he would rather
play away from the street black. I immediately agreed with him
on that. So his character—he shows up in a wild outfit—began
to change quite rapidly.”

f Jan Smithers, born on July 3, 1949, and grew up in Woodland
Hills in Los Angeles’ San Fernando Valley, not far from the movie
and television studios a few miles east. While attending William
Howard Taft High School, she was photographed for the cover
of the March 2, 1966 issue of Newsweek magazine; its theme was
“The Teenagers: A Newsweek Survey of What They’re Really Like.”
As Jan remembered, “One had long hair and cameras around
his neck. They walked right up to me and said, ‘We’re doing an
article on teens across the country, and we’re looking for a girl
from California. We’re wondering if you’d be interested in doing
the article.” One of the photographers, Julian Wasser, recalled
seeing young Ms. Smithers for the first time. “How can I forget?
I was walking on the beach
looking for someone and
there was this incredibly
beautiful girl. She was no-
body then, just a high school
kid. She thought [the article]
was a big fake. She was a
typical California raving
beauty who didn’t know
it.” Two weeks before the
Newsweek issue hit the racks,
her parents got divorced. Racing home to show the magazine to
her mom, Jan had a traffic accident that sent her to the hospital
with a broken jaw. Then, not long after its publication, both her
brother and her mother died unexpectedly, understandably
leaving Jan feeling adrift and alone. To counter those feelings,
she decided to accept some of the TV commercials she’d been
offered as a result of the recent Newsweek cover. She also began
studying at the California Institute of the Arts. At 19, Jan chose
to become a professional actor. She achieved small roles in the
films Where the Lilies Bloom, When the North Wind Blows, and Our
Winning Season, as well as in the Love Story and Starsky and Hutch
TV series. When Jan auditioned for the part of WKRP’s shy and
smart advertisement scheduler Bailey Quarters, she matched
many of the aspects of Hugh Wilson’s wife, the original inspira-
tion of the character, who he felt was “very shy, but very smart—
the sort of person people tend to dismiss as a jerk until they find
out she’s got so much to offer.” Touched by her personality, he
immediately gave Jan the role. “Other actresses read better for
the part, but they were playing shy. Jan was shy.”
f Richard Sanders was born on August 23, 1940 in Harrisburg,
Pennsylvania, and grew up in Leavenworth, Kansas, where he
dreamed about becoming an actor. Richard was always the class

RETROFAN March/April 2023 59

 RETRO HEROES

David Morrell’s
Rambo
at 50
BY DON VAUGHAN

(LEFT) Author David

“His name was Rambo, and he was just some nothing Morrell introduced the
kid for all anybody knew, standing by the pump of a gas world to Vietnam vet/
station at the outskirts of Madison, Kentucky.” ultimate survivalist John
So begins First Blood, David Morrell’s 1972 debut Rambo in this 1972 novel,
novel. Morrell’s story of troubled Vietnam veteran First Blood. © David Morrell.
John Rambo and his bloody, violent battle with hippie- Courtesy of Heritage. (BELOW)
hating police chief (and Korean War vet) Wilfred Teasle David Morrell. © Jennifer
would go on to become one of the most influential Esperanza.
novels of the latter 20th Century, literally reinventing
the action story and introducing a character destined
to become as recognizable as Tarzan, Superman, or forth between Rambo and the
Sherlock Holmes. police chief. Their alternating
It didn’t take long for popular culture to make viewpoints represent the way
Rambo an iconic figure. Since his introduction, Rambo has the country was alternating back and forth, the contrast of the two
appeared in an eclectic array of forms, media, and formats, points of view.”
including motion pictures, novelizations, action figures, toys, comic Morrell attended Penn State to study with Hemingway scholar
books, an animated television series, trading cards, and much, Philip Young, and wrote his Master’s thesis on Hemingway’s style.
much more. Five decades out, Rambo remains as popular as ever. “What I noticed was the way Hemingway wrote about action as if
no one had ever written about it before,” Morrell continued. “My
THE BIRTH OF RAMBO goal in writing First Blood was two-fold. One was to dramatize the
Morrell was a graduate student at Penn State from 1966 to 1970 as polar opposites that were dividing the country in the late Sixties,
the Vietnam War escalated. The events of that period and also to write an action book
struck the Canadian transplant, causing him to fear that that didn’t feel like a genre book.
the United States was headed for a civil war. To try to write it so it felt like a
“What I thought I would do was bring the Vietnam real novel and not something
War to the United States and show the polar opposites out of the pulp pages. My agent
that were happening in the country with all the and I felt that because I was
riots and the police reaction, someone representing writing action in a different way,
the establishment and someone representing the we might have some resistance
disaffected,” Morrell explained to this writer in a 2015 from publishers who might think
interview for Videoscope Magazine. “In this case, it would it was too realistic. But the novel
be someone who had been in the war and came back was sold to a publisher within
hating what it had done to him. So that was basically six weeks of being submitted to
the concept of the novel. It took me three years to various places.”
write the book because I was still learning how to The story of how First Blood
write a novel, and because it took me a little while to became a motion picture is a long
figure out that the chapters would bounce back and tale of false starts, sudden stops,

68 RETROFAN March/April 2023

 RETRO HEROES
(ABOVE) Sylvester Stallone’s Rocky box-office muscle
attracted moviegoers’ attention when Rambo raided
Hollywood in 1982’s Ted Kotcheff–directed hit, First
Blood. (BELOW) This survival knife, along with its
sheath, used by Stallone as Rambo in First Blood, netted
$92,250 at a July 28, 2013 Heritage auction. Rambo’s
brown canvas First Blood poncho fetched $60,000 at a
December 18, 2015 Heritage auction. First Blood © Anabasis
Investments, N.V. Movie poster and props courtesy of Heritage.
70 RETROFAN March/April 2023
IF YOU ENJOYED THIS PREVIEW,
and a lot of frustration. According CLICK to Morrell,
THE LINK Hollywood
TO ORDER expressed
THIS
interest before the novel was even released, with
ISSUE IN PRINT OR DIGITAL FORMAT! director Stanley
Kramer snagging the first option. Or so it was announced. “We
waited and waited, but the contract never showed up, and it turned
out he was lying to us,” Morrell revealed. “There were even print ads
that talked about Stanley Kramer making the movie, or that it had
been optioned to him at least, and the publisher was very upset.”
The book went through a lot of hands over the ensuing years,
including Lawrence Turman, one of the producers for The Graduate.
Turman and director Richard Brooks went to Columbia Pictures,
which purchased the book outright. Brooks worked on the script
for a year, Morrell reported, only to have Columbia sell the book to
Warner Bros.
“There was talk of Paul Newman playing the police chief with
Martin Ritt directing, because they hadRETROFAN worked together #25 many
Meet Mission: Impossible’s LYNDA DAY GEORGE in an ex-
times and Ritt had just finished a Southern picture called
clusive interview! Celebrate Rambo’s 50th birthday Sounder,”
with his
Morrell explained. “That didcreator,
not work out. Then Steve McQueen
novelist DAVID MORRELL! Plus: TV faves WKRP IN
CINCINNATI and SPACE: 1999, Fleisher’s and Filmation’s
was signed to play Rambo with Sidney
SUPERMAN Pollack
cartoons, directing.
commercial I talked
jingles, JERRY LEWIS and
BOB HOPE comic books, and more fun, fab features! Edited by
with Sidney years later and he told
MICHAEL EURY.me how they were all very
excited until someone realized that(84-page the picture
FULL-COLOR was going$10.95
magazine) to be
(Digital Edition) $4.99
made in 1975. Steve McQueen was in his 40s and there were no
https://twomorrows.com/index.php?main_page=product_info&cPath=98_152&products_id=1678
40-year-old Vietnam veterans in 1975. It was a young person’s war.
So they realized the picture couldn’t be made believably and they
stopped production.”
All told, 26 scripts were produced for First Blood. The film finally
became a reality with the involvement of Carolco, a production
company owned by film distributors Mario Kassar and Andrew
Vajna. “They’d struck up a relationship with director Ted Kotcheff,”
Morrell told Videoscope. “They said, we want you to make a movie
for us, you can do whatever you want. And he said, I worked for a
while on a movie called First Blood when I was at Warner Bros. and
I’d like to make that movie.”
William Sackheim and Michael Kozoll pounded out yet another
script, and the search was on for an actor with international appeal.
Someone recommended Sylvester Stallone, who had a hit with
Rocky, but whose subsequent films weren’t as successful. “So there
was a certain risk,” Morrell said. Stallone ran the script through his
own typewriter, added some elements such as Rambo’s survival
knife, and the film moved forward with a $17 million budget,
funded by one of Kassar’s wealthy relatives.
The 97-minute film is a fairly faithful adaptation of Morrell’s
novel, with one very important exception—Rambo survives at the
end. In the novel, both Rambo and Teasle die as a result of their
mutual violence, and in Sackheim and Kozoll’s initial shooting
script, Rambo takes his own life with Col. Trautman’s gun.
Test audiences hated that ending, so it was quickly reshot
with Rambo going to prison instead. “They had no intention
of making a sequel,” according to Morrell. “And then the
movie scored so well with Rambo alive. So for [the producers],
it was a blessing.”
Rambo: First Blood Part II, a Vietnam rescue mission, and Rambo
III, set in Soviet-occupied Afghanistan, followed three years
apart, with Morrell agreeing to write the novelizations. James
Cameron had written a script for Rambo: First Blood Part II (much
of which was rewritten by Stallone), and Morrell incorporated
numerous elements from Cameron’s contribution. “The
shooting script was just 80 pages, and it was literally, ‘Rambo
shoots this guy. Rambo shoots that guy,’” Morrell revealed. “I
asked what else they had, and they said, well, we have this James