Bounce me, brother, with a solid four

Seventy years ago today, Bud Abbott & Lou Costello’s first starring feature Buck Privates (1941) was released to motion picture theaters…and to commemorate this auspicious occasion, I prepared a little essay on the film—which I encourage you to read at your leisure at Edward Copeland on Film…and More.  When I was a tad, the TV stations that showed…

Can you hear those Pioneers

PBS’ critically-acclaimed documentary series on one of my favorite subjects—namely the boob tube—is back for a second season; I missed the premiere of Pioneers of Television the week previous, which covered shows of a science-fiction nature, but was fortunate to remember to watch Wednesday night, when TV westerns was the topic.  (And to be honest, I probably wouldn’t…

The Great American Tragedy, the return of Sun Drop and the whirling satellite

So I’m on Facebook—aka “The Greatest Time Suck Known to Man”—the other day and my old high school chum and yearbook boss Jenni is talking about what I believe may be the ultimate comfort food recipe: bacon-wrapped meatloaf.  (I know; the first thing I thought of when I read this was a mental picture of my…

He looks like his heart will break

Because the Grim Reaper is a model employee who rarely takes a sick day or vacation, famous people continue to shuffle off this mortal coil…and this was definitely driven home to me yesterday when I learned via my CharredHer webpage that country music legend and Hall of Famer Charlie Louvin has left this world for…

Let a tune be your guide

Whenever I tune into Encore Westerns I do so mostly to watch the classic television oaters like Gunsmoke and Maverick—but I have to admit I’ve been enjoying another popular offering on the channel: namely, the B-westerns that singing cowboy star Gene Autry made for Republic and Columbia between 1935 and 1953.  These sagebrush sagas have the added benefit of…

I don’t like Mondays

In the Franz Kafka story The Metamorphosis, the protagonist—a traveling salesman named Gregor Samsa—wakes up one morning to find he’s been transformed into a gigantic insect (generally considered to be a cockroach, though it depends on the German translation).  I’ve been experiencing a series of similar misadventures here at Rancho Yesteryear lately, although my transmutation is more…

Max-imum impact

Last year when I was convalescing from my various medical maladies I was fortunate to have as a houseguest me sainted Irish mother, who’s a great deal of fun to be around while you’re watching a movie (she has sarcasm, and she’s not afraid to use it) and whose cooking is a hell of a…

“Madness! Madness!”

I know many of you are too polite to come right out and say this so it’s a good thing I have the power to read minds (also to cloud them, so that you can’t see me) because I keep hearing a chorus of “When is Mayberry Mondays coming back to the blog?” out in the blogosphere. …

CMBA Hitchcock Blogathon: The Pleasure Garden (1925)

Alfred Hitchcock was twenty-five years old when he received his first solo director’s credit for The Pleasure Garden in 1925.  When you stop to consider the incredible film career of the Master of Suspense, it’s difficult not to draw a parallel between him and another quarter-century wunderkind, Orson Welles, who made his cinematic debut with Citizen Kane (1941).  But where…

“I’m Ron @#$%ing Swanson!” and the Age of Ophiuchus

I learned back in November of last year from my Facebook chum and blogging compadre Jaime “Something Old, Nothing New” Weinman that NBC was going to institute a three-hour block of sitcoms on Thursday nights beginning this January 20th and this event cannot arrive here soon enough for me…because it means the return of Parks and Recreation to the…