Ed Sullivan Show review from Feb. 1964
Post: 17641 of 17653
From: claster@kaiwan.com (Bob Claster)
Newsgroups: rec.music.beatles
Subject: Re: Ed Sullivan's lineup
Date: 9 Jul 1994 16:56:19 -0700
Organization: kaiwan.com Internet Access (818) 756-0180
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Reply-To: claster@kaiwan.com
NNTP-Posting-Host: kaiwan.kaiwan.com
For your enjoyment, here's a little humor piece I wrote about that
Sullivan show. Everything is true, apart from the point of view.
Copyright (c) 1994 Bob Claster, all rights reserved.
"TUBE TALK: Last Night's Ed Sullivan Show"
New York Daily Journal and Star, Late Edition, 2/10/64
by Bob Claster
Everyone seems to be making such a fuss over this quartet that has
newly arrived from Liverpool, and I just want to say that it's a
gross injustice that the rest of the acts on last night's
entertaining edition of the always-amusing "Ed Sullivan Show" seem
to be going unnoticed.
To begin with, following the first batch of "tunes" from the four
shaggy heads, there was a marvelous performance by a magician named
Fred Kapps, whose ability to make salt continue to flow from his
hand surely must have taken at least as much time to perfect as that
Ringo person took to learn the drums. Then, the talented cast of the
Broadway musical, "Oliver," performed some melodious show-stopping
numbers that all but made one forget about the cacophony that began
the show. The lad playing the part of the Artful Dodger, one Davey
Jones, could be surrounded by three similarly able minstrels, and
the world would forget those Beatles soon enough, I promise you.
Then, Frank Gorshin arrived on the scene to amuse us with his
uncanny impressions, most noteworthy of which were those of
Broderick Crawford and Anthony Quinn. Sure, every impressionist
feels the need to include the obligatory Crawford bit, but Gorshin's
is every bit as funny as the original.
Next, the real talent from England hit the stage in the person of
Tessie O'Shea, reminding us that there actually is some real musical
ability coming from the British Isles. How she got so much music
out of such a small banjo, I'll never know. And last night she made
show business history by delivering the finest banjo rendition of
"The Tender Trap" this reporter has ever had the pleasure to hear.
Future banjoists needn't bother. And when she called to her host and
said "I love you, Eddie, I do, I do, I do!" and beckoned him to
receive a big, wet kiss, there wasn't a dry eye in the house.
But if comedy is your weakness, you were surely rendered helpless by
the witty vignette performed by Brill and McCall, in which Miss
McCall portrayed three hopeful (and hopeless!) starlets, auditioning
for a producer. I especially liked the one who kept saying she
wasn't nervous, but was clearly shaking from nervousness! The
resourcefulness of this duo is illustrated by their inclusion of the
following exchange: "My little girl is waiting outside. She used to
be one of the Beatles." "What happened to her?" "Somebody stepped on
her."
After another seemingly interminable appearance by the unkempt
upstarts during which they undoubtedly exhausted their limited
repertoire, the entertainment resumed with a brilliant novelty-
tumbling act called Wells and the Four Fays. Not only did they
begin with a dance number performed by a woman (probably one of the
Fays) with a large face painted on her abdomen and a huge hat
covering her head, thus giving the uncanny illusion of a person with
a huge head and a very small body, but they followed that with a
very amusing dance number which mimed a boxing match, all to very
lively music!
These many fine entertainers have been, in my opinion, unfairly
ignored, and to a man, they'll all be fondly remembered long after
this current insanity is but a faint unpleasant memory.
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Bob Claster claster@kaiwan.com
Coming to you from Sunny Los Angeleez
"You have no idea what a low opinion I have of myself,
and how little I deserve it." W.S. Gilbert, "Ruddigore"
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