"Will Hutchins, who had a comically genteel starring role during the craze for television westerns in the 1950s, playing a sheriff who favored cherry soda..."

"... over whiskey on 'Sugarfoot,' died on April 21 in Manhasset, N.Y., on the North Shore of Long Island. He was 94.... Mr. Hutchins’s character, Tom Brewster, was the sugarfoot in question: an Eastern law student seeking his fortune as a sheriff who sidles up to the saloon bar to order a sarsaparilla (Wild West root beer) 'with a dash of cherry.' He abhors violence, tries to stop women from throwing themselves at him and lovingly gives up his share of drinking water for his horse. Mr. Hutchins played the role for comedy, following up a villain’s insult with a dramatic pause, only to critique the man for not being 'sociable.'... [H]e was likely to end a fight not with a killing but rather a comment like, 'All right now, how about that apology?'... [Hutchins said] the best advice he had received about comic performance was to act as if you were doing something no less severe than 'Hamlet.' "In order to make people laugh, you have to act seriously,' he said. 'Chaplin was just as sad as he was funny. Buster Keaton never smiled.'"

From "Will Hutchins, Gentle TV Cowboy Lawman in ‘Sugarfoot,’ Dies at 94/He starred in one of the westerns that dominated TV in the late 1950s. After losing traction in Hollywood, he became a traveling clown" (NYT).

Here's a snippet that shows the beginning of the second episode, "Reluctant Hero." I like how our law student character is reading what looks like a casebook as he rides his horse into town:

Watch the whole first episode — the pilot — here. Look for Dennis Hopper as Billy the Kid and Slim Pickens as Shorty.

And here's a clip from an episode of "Bronco" where Will Hutchins — as the Sugarfoot character — has a conversation with Theodore Roosevelt!

"I once felt that I would rather die than go blind. Now I feel the opposite. Daily life has a renewed delight and vigor."

"I am learning new things constantly. The most ordinary tasks, like going to the post office, have become terrifically interesting. In terms of everyday life, I feel that I am finally in there, more mindful and alert, more fully present. I have chosen curiosity over despair. When my disability was invisible, I irritated strangers constantly — they thought I was rude or dithering or both. People are impatient when they don’t know why you’re holding up the line. Now that I signal my disability with a white cane, I find that I have tapped a well of visible kindness.... Like a Buster Keaton film, my life is full of mishaps and averted disasters...."

Writes Edward Hirsch, who has been going blind for 20 years, in "I Am Going Blind, and I Now Find It Strangely Exhilarating" (NYT).

Beautiful! And I like that he brought up Buster Keaton. I've watched 3 short Buster Keaton movies in the last month — "Neighbors," "The Goat," and "Playhouse":

"Joseph Frank Keaton spent his youth in his parents’ knockabout vaudeville act; by the time he was eight, it basically consisted of his father, Joe, picking him up and throwing him..."

"... against the set wall. Joe would announce, 'It just breaks a father’s heart to be rough,' and he’d hurl Buster—already called this because of his stoicism—across the stage. 'Once, during a matinee performance... he innocently slammed the boy into scenery that had a brick wall directly behind it.' That 'innocently' is doing a lot of work, but all this brutality certainly conveyed a basic tenet of comedy: treating raw physical acts, like a kick in the pants, in a cerebral way is funny. 'I wait five seconds—count up to ten slow—grab the seat of my pants, holler bloody murder, and the audience is rolling in the aisles,' Keaton later recalled. 'It was The Slow Thinker. Audiences love The Slow Thinker.' A quick mind impersonating the Slow Thinker: that was key to his comic invention. The slowness was a sign of a cautious, calculating inner life. Detachment in the face of disorder remained his touchstone.... It was only when Joe started drinking too hard and got sloppy onstage that, in 1917, the fastidious Buster left him and went out on his own. It was the abuse of the art form that seemed to offend him."

From "What Made Buster Keaton’s Comedy So Modern?/Whereas Chaplin’s vision was essentially theatrical, Keaton’s was specific to the screen—he moved like the moving pictures" by Adam Gopnik (The New Yorker).

"The reality TV ordeal of a Russian who joined a Chinese boy band show by accident – and made it to the final despite urging fans to vote him off – has finally ended..."

"... after nearly three months. Vladislav Ivanov, a 27-year-old from Vladivostok, was kicked out of the Produce Camp 2021 on Saturday after viewers ignored his pleas to leave and backed him all the way to the final. Ivanov, who speaks Mandarin, joined the show as a Chinese translator. But he said he was invited to sign up as a contestant after the directors noticed his good looks.... He appeared to regret his decision almost immediately but could not leave without breaching his contract. His lack of enthusiasm played out in half-hearted singing, rapping and dancing alongside the other, more eager contestants. 'Becoming a member of a boy band is not my dream as I can’t sing and dance,' Ivanov said in Chinese on the show.... 'I hope the judges won’t support me. While the others want to get an A, I want to get an F as it stands for freedom.'... 'Don’t love me, you’ll get no results,' he said on one episode. But viewers took to his dour persona and kept him in the running for nearly three months....  Ivanov appears to have struck a genuine chord as an anti-hero for Chinese audiences. Fans, some earnest and some ironic, called him 'the most miserable wage slave,' and celebrated him as an icon of 'Sang culture,' a popular concept among Chinese millennials referring to a defeatist attitude toward everyday life. 'Don’t let him quit,' one viewer commented on a video of a dejected-looking Ivanov performing a Russian rap. 'Sisters, vote for him! Let him 996!' another fan commented, using the Chinese slang for the gruelling work schedule that afflicts many young staff, especially in digital startups."

The Guardian reports.

I feel challenged to attempt to understand the Chinese through this story. What? Are they excited by the idea of forced work — titillated by slavery? Did they like it because he was not Chinese? Because he was Russian? Was his unhappiness — his "dour persona" — fun for them? 

Did they somehow think it was an act — a comic persona — and enjoy playing along? Was it like the way Americans, watching "American Idol" would target contestant who wasn't too good and keep voting for him? Why did we do that? The prank was called "Vote for the Worst." I wrote about it in 2007, when Howard Stern was openly promoting ruining the show by voting for the worst contestant. I actually liked this person, a sweet young man, Sanjaya Malakar, and I think many viewers voted for him because they genuinely liked him.

"You Never Did That Before."

Here's Buster Keaton with Cliff Edwards playing one ukulele (in the 1930 movie "Doughboys"): 

And you might think this goes to show that you can't predict what will be the next Althouse post, but there is a flow here, and if you understood it well enough, you did have a chance at predicting that this charming duet would be the next thing. 

Yesterday, there was a post about a musical tribute to Joe Biden's accomplishments. It was comical — including the way it made some conservative men cringe — but I told you it gave me chills, and I ascertained that the chills were caused by the amazingly effective music from "The Little Mermaid," "Part of Your World."

That led me to play what I think is clearly the most beautiful song from a Disney animation, "When You Wish Upon a Star." But who is the singer? It's Cliff Edwards, AKA Ukelele Ike. I read about him at Wikipedia:

Edwards was born in Hannibal, Missouri [in 1895]. He left school at age 14 and soon moved to St. Louis, Missouri and Saint Charles, Missouri, where he entertained as a singer in saloons. As many places had pianos in bad shape or none at all, Edwards taught himself to play ʻukulele to serve as his own accompanist (choosing it because it was the cheapest instrument in the music shop). He was nicknamed "Ukulele Ike" by a club owner who could never remember his name.

He got his first break in 1918 at the Arsonia Cafe in Chicago, Illinois, where he performed a song called "Ja-Da", written by the club's pianist, Bob Carleton. Edwards and Carleton made it a hit on the vaudeville circuit. Vaudeville headliner Joe Frisco hired Edwards as part of his act, which was featured at the Palace in New York City—the most prestigious vaudeville theater—and later in the Ziegfeld Follies.

He recorded many of the pop and novelty hits of the day, including "California, Here I Come", "Hard Hearted Hannah", "Yes Sir, That's My Baby", and "I'll See You in My Dreams"... "Paddlin’ Madeleine Home" (1925), "I Can't Give You Anything but Love" (1928), and the classic "Singin' in the Rain" (1929), which he introduced....

He also recorded a few "off-color" novelty songs for under-the-counter sales, including "I'm a Bear in a Lady's Boudoir," "Take Out That Thing," and "Give It to Mary with Love"...

I couldn't find "Take Out That Thing." I tried! Wait — there's a different title: "Mr. Insurance Man" ("She said: Mr. Insurance Man, take out that thing for me... I crave some indemnity.... Oh, Mr. Insurance Man, let me take out that thing. Let me look at your policy.... Oh, Mr. Insurance Man, take out that thing for me. Let me see the numbers on that policy, just how much I'm gon' get").

In 1929, Cliff Edwards was playing at the Orpheum Theater in Los Angeles where he caught the attention of movie producer-director Irving Thalberg.... Edwards had a friendly working relationship with MGM's comedy star Buster Keaton, who featured Edwards in three of his films. Keaton, himself a former vaudevillian, enjoyed singing and harmonized with Edwards between takes. One of these casual jam sessions was captured on film, in Doughboys (1930), in which Buster and Cliff scat-sing their way through "You Never Did That Before"....

And that's when I found the clip I'm featuring in this post. 

Anyway, Edwards went on to play Jiminy Cricket in Disney's "Pinocchio" and the lead crow in "Dumbo." In the 40s, popular taste turned away from his style, toward "crooners" like Bing Crosby. But then there was TV, and he had his own show in the really early days of television — 1949. And he used to appear on "The Mickey Mouse Club," which I remember watching (in the 1950s), but I do not remember ever being this good:

Fantastic! There's some sad stuff in the Wikipedia article — alcoholism, late-life destitution. Read that if you like. But I highly recommend searching his name on Spotify (or wherever) and listening. Such a distinctive voice, many peppy, jazzy songs. If you ever — like me — went through a phase where you loved the Jim Kweskin Jug Band or Leon Redbone — not to mention Tiny Tim — you'll love it, I bet.

"I don't understand why the generic labeling of a time slot on a schedule means very much. People seem to be acting as though [Trump] just sat around watching Fox News."

"These seem to be the same people who don't like anything Trump does anyway, so you'd think they'd be happy that he's just idling. Does a schedule full of meetings prove you're a hard-worker, getting things done? I've gone to a lot of meetings where I felt my time was wasted and I was being kept from working. The people who schedule a lot of meetings maybe have a bureaucratic mindset and care about the superficiality of looking busy. I think an uncluttered schedule is helpful to a person with serious work that depends on the condition and quality of his mind."

I wrote... on a public Facebook post (put up by my son John) that linked to "Nearly 60 percent of Trump’s schedule is ‘Executive Time,’ report says" (CNBC). CBC relies on this AXIOS report, which has a response from White House press secretary Sarah Sanders:

"President Trump has a different leadership style than his predecessors and the results speak for themselves. While he spends much of his average day in scheduled meetings, events, and calls, there is time to allow for a more creative environment that has helped make him the most productive President in modern history."

A more creative environment.... That — not idling — is what should really set off the anti-Trumpsters.

Ah! I remember I have a tag for idleness. Now, I want to say, even if that executive time is idling, it should be respected. From a September 2017 post of mine:

2 of my favorite books are about idlers.

First — which I wrote about back in 2006, here and here — is "Essays in Idleness" by the 13th century Buddhist monk Kenko. He wrote:

What a strange, demented feeling it gives me when I realize I have spent whole days before this inkstone, with nothing better to do, jotting down at random whatever nonsensical thoughts have entered my head.

And I said...

How much do you value your free time? Do you use it to rest and recover or do you use it to do work that, because it's done in your own time -- in time you own -- is transformed into pleasure?

The second book is "An Apology for Idlers" by Robert Louis Stevenson. As I blogged a year ago, it begins:

BOSWELL: We grow weary when idle.

JOHNSON: That is, sir, because others being busy, we want company; but if we were idle, there would be no growing weary; we should all entertain one another. Just now, when everyone is bound, under pain of a decree in absence convicting them of lèse-respectability, to enter on some lucrative profession, and labour therein with something not far short of enthusiasm, a cry from the opposite party who are content when they have enough, and like to look on and enjoy in the meanwhile, savours a little of bravado and gasconade. And yet this should not be. Idleness so called, which does not consist in doing nothing, but in doing a great deal not recognized in the dogmatic formularies of the ruling class, has as good a right to state its position as industry itself....

Are you doing a great deal that is not recognized in the dogmatic formularies of the ruling class? 

Trump sure is!!

AND: Now I'm thinking at the schoolmarms who point and children and say, "You! Sit in your seat!" And I'm thinking about the jobs that require you to punch a time clock. Have you ever had to punch a times clock? Did you ever want to literally punch a time clock? Like Buster Keaton...



... punch it like you might punch a schoolboy for smiling.

ALSO: Everybody's talking about Marie Kondo and "The Life-Changing Magic of Tidying Up." They want help with decluttering and clearing their space of everything that's not doing them any good. If you don't want cluttered space — think about it — you don't want cluttered time.

PLUS: Commenter Hari links to the Wikipedia article, "Management by Walking Around" The term refers to "a style of business management which involves managers wandering around, in an unstructured manner." The "unplanned movement within a workplace" contrasts to "a plan where employees expect a visit from managers at more systematic, pre-approved or scheduled times."

And — brace yourself Trump-haters — "Historian Stephen B. Oates asserts that Abraham Lincoln invented the management style by informally inspecting the Union Army troops in the early part of the American Civil War."

"Well, now, there’s Buster Keaton. I thought he was visually thrilling, and very sophisticated: more about women than about men. He lets you read a lot into things."

"You’re left with so much to decide. And then there was a woman in Santa Ana, an incredible woman, an artist. She was mysterious. She loved a lot of things that weren’t yet open to me. And then, gosh, a woman I met once when I was looking for an apartment who claimed that her husband had invented the tea bag. . . Well. And then my family. We’re very close to each other. My sister Dorrie looks like an Eskimo. And then Woody, of course."

So said Diane Keaton, in 1978, when The New Yorker's Penelope Gilliatt asked her to name 3 people who have influenced her the most in life.

Why am I reading that this morning? I was having a conversation about an old episode of "Friends" ("The One Where Monica and Richard Are Friends") and — because there's a scene in a video store — I got to thinking about a scene in a bookstore in "Annie Hall":



A scene in a bookstore (or a video store, if the show is set in the fleeting video-store era) can take advantage of the books (or movies) at hand to develop the characters. Looking for that bookstore scene, I was googling for "Annie Hall" and "cats" (because I remembered that Allen's character disapproves of her interest in a book about cats and insists on buying her the first of many books he would buy her with the word "death" in the title).

The old New Yorker article happened to contain the word "cats" (because Gilliatt describes Keaton's NYC apartment, replete with cats). Not what I was looking for, but I got interested in reading Gilliatt, whose articles I loved reading in the 70s. Imagine encountering a paragraph like this today:

The interpretation of bananas.

I don't know whom to believe here — "Frat Retreat Ends Early after Students ‘Frightened’ by a Banana Peel" — but whether Ryan Swanson is lying or not when he says he put a banana peel in a tree because he couldn't find a garbage can, this is one hell of an abject nonapology:

I want to sincerely apologize for the events that took place this past weekend. Although unintentional, there is no excuse for the pain that was caused to members of our community. I want to thank my friends in the NPHC for their candid and constructive conversations that we have continued to have. I have much to learn and look forward to doing such and encourage all members of our university community to do the same. We must all keep in mind how our actions affect those around us differently.

Swanson says he has "much to learn" and, really, don't we all have an infinite amount to learn? Anything you do might be misunderstood by someone else, perhaps by someone who deserves empathy and perhaps by someone with powerful allies who will ruin your life if you don't anticipate how they will interpret something you say or do or even how people who hate you will claim to have interpreted something that really didn't confuse them at all.

And what about all the students who go to college for an education and get taught that their emotional stirrings — their fears about what something might mean — warrant attention and respect? Their misinterpretations count as real in the world that other people — including the once-privileged frat boy — must anticipate and guard against. Does that feel good enough or will it get old and, ultimately, just as insulting as the kind of old-fashioned expressions of racism of which the banana peel in the tree might have been reminiscent?

By the way, "How Did Slipping on a Banana Peel Become a Comedy Staple?"

When the action was real — 100 years ago.

Beautiful, perfect...



... and funny/frightening in a way that can never be in today's CGI movies, where you don't need bother to ask yourself — a question asked at 3:27 — "What are the rules of this particular world?"

That made me think of this, from a review of the new movie"In the Heart of the Sea"

The pacing here is certainly forceful, as it is during the harrying and the slaughter of a sperm whale, and yet the force lacks clarity. This is partly because computer-generated waves never quite buffet us with the slap of the real thing, and also because, in the twenty years since [Ron] Howard made his finest film, “Apollo 13,” something has happened to the editing of action sequences. No longer, it seems, are we required to know who is doing what, and where, at any given point. What matters is that the frenzy of the occasion should be matched by the drubbing of the images, which must pelt us without pity or interruption. Just to crank up the turmoil, “In the Heart of the Sea” can be seen in 3-D, so that masts and braces keep poking you in the nose....

"Using wooden mallets cut from plywood, a crew of eight banged together the slotted frame of a WikiHouse without a single nail."

"It took the WikiHouse team of eight just two days to build its two houses, which were 12 feet wide, 26 feet long and nearly 10 feet high."

Builders use 3-D modeling software to design the houses and direct a robotic power tool called a CNC router to cut parts out of sheets of plywood. The free designs can be customized with computer-aided software.

Compare the 1920 "kit house," as encountered by Buster Keaton:

The 3 Stooges movie will have the perfect Larry.

Sean Penn! (Jim Carrey is Curly and Benicio Del Toro is Moe.) 

IN THE COMMENTS: Balfegor said:

Why would someone even think a 3 Stooges remake would be a good idea? It would be like remaking something by Buster Keaton, or Charlie Chaplin -- the pleasure isn't in the concept or the plot or witty dialogue, it's in who's doing it, and their skill at slapstick and physical comedy, no?

Well, now, wait. What about this? 

 

The original: