RANDOM PIC OF THE WEEK
I found this pic on somebody’s Instagram account, and I had never seen it in color. Given the presence of the badge on Ollie’s lapel, and the severed phone line, I’m led to believe that this photo was taken right around the time “The Bullfighters” was made, as both of those aforementioned things figured into that film. But whether it does or not, it’s a GREAT shot of The Boys!
Though I wasn’t necessarily a fan of hers back in the 90s, the Alanis Morissette song “You Oughta Know” came up while I was driving around this week. Glen Ballard had just been inducted into the Songwriters Hall of Fame recently (along with Jeff Lynne) and he was the mastermind behind Alanis’ amazing album “Jagged Little Pill.” I listened to this song in rapt attention, and I realized it wasn’t so much a rock song, as an acting piece. The amount of vitriol and rage she exhibits in this song is some damn good acting! BUT BEWARE! This song contains some adult themes and languages.
Monday the 26th – MAKE HIM FLY! – My pal, Puppet Master and Voice Actor Drew Massey, met me for lunch at Paty’s to discuss creating a suspension device for Super Grover. I want to suspend him from one of the beams of my vaulted ceiling in my living room so it looks like he’s flying over the room (even though he won’t actually fly). He’ll just be suspended up high. We also talked about some other stuff going on and possible upcoming projects. After lunch I picked up my packages at my box and headed home to ice my back again. I rested a bit, and then did my nightly auditions. The good people at The Bob Baker Marionette Theater asked if I would update the narration I did for them a few years back for a show called “Hooray L.A.!” I told them I’d be glad to; and extremely excited to, in fact! I spent a good couple of hours working on the new material and I sent everything to the editor. Then I typed out Wally’s Week, and watched the rough edit of an animated film I’ll be working on Tuesday afternoon.
Tuesday the 27th – GOOD TO BE BACK; SONS OF THE DESERT! – First, I went by the Salami Studios in North Hollywood to do a few pick-up lines for an animated film I’m working on. I spent more time chatting with the producers and laughing than I actually spent in the studio doing the lines. Then I got 5 chicken tenders at Carl’s Jr. for a quickie lunch. It cost me $16!!! For FIVE chicken tenders! Unbelievable! Guess I won’t be going back there anytime soon! Wowza! I drove over to Alex In Wonderland’s studio to pick up the second pass of the helmet for Super Grover. The first helmet was beautiful, but it was a bit too short. This helmet will be taller and hopefully will look more “on-model.” I got the helmet and then headed home to feed Spook. I gathered up my fez, my checkbook, and my sense of fun and headed to a meeting for the Sons of the Desert. The “Sons” is a world-wide Laurel and Hardy fan club that was started back in the 60’s (in part by my old pal Chuck McCann). I remember reading about this club when I was a kid living in South Dakota, and I dreamed of someday being a member. I hadn’t been to a meeting since 2019, as the scamdemic lockdown had put an end to all the meetings for several years. The most recent meeting dates always seemed to land when I had something else going on. But this date was perfect and I couldn’t wait to get back to it! I got there early and helped load some things in for people. I whipped out my checkbook and paid my dues for another year, and got set for fun! I was soon joined by my seamstress Maggie and her boyfriend Jeff, and their friend Evan. I bought $10 worth of raffle tickets and chatted with some people. They had a lot of Laurel and Hardy stuff on the table for the raffle, but all the items I was interested in were items that I already had in my collection, with a few exceptions. My old pal Curt (a camera assistant) from “The Tonight Show” was there representing The Three Stooges. Curt is the great grandson of Larry Fine, and he was joined by the great grandson of Shemp (my favorite Stooge) and the grandson of Curly. The theme for the evening was “Fiesta,” as the Laurel and Hardy movie being shown that night was “The Bullfighters.” Oddly enough, “The Bullfighters” is the next film in my personal Laurel and Hardy Theatre rotation, and I’ll be watching it again this Saturday. But I’ve heard it’s a VERY good film! The opening film was a Porky Pig cartoon where he’s selling tamales at a bullfight. At the end, after he’s defeated the bull, he’s in the ring and people are throwing down all sorts of flowers, scarves, hats, sombreros, etc. – and somebody throws down a bowler hat. It lands on his head and just for a split-second Porky turns into Oliver Hardy! Hilarious! Bob Clampett was a genius! Then we watched a Three Stooges short about bullfighting that was fall-down funny! Then we had intermission, and everyone checked the numbers on their tickets for the raffle. It took a while, but eventually one of my ticket numbers was called! I picked up a Stan Laurel marionette! I had my eye on a set of these marionettes on eBay but had hesitated, for the lack of having somewhere to display them properly. But this was a sign I was meant to have them. The puppet was fairly badly stained, but the head and the controller were still in pretty good shape. I told Maggie that I was going to buy a set on eBay and possibly use the puppet I just won as a donor for spare parts. But then another one of my numbers was called. And another one. And another, and another! Some of the other members were jokingly yelling out, “Rigged! Rigged!” I told them with luck like this I was heading to Vegas! It was a great time. I got a pair of vintage Laurel and Hardy hangers that have their heads on them. So when you put a shirt on the hanger it looks like they’re wearing the shirt! I had never seen these before anywhere and I’m thinking they might be kind of rare. I also won some posters, a Spanish lobby card for “Way Out West,” and some L&H greeting cards! FUN! “The Bullfighters” was a VERY funny film, and it ended up being their last American-made film ever. They made one more film after this but it was a foreign release. It was a great evening, and it certainly felt good to be back! I was happy, happy, happy! Later at home I recorded my nightly auditions, and then made a salad and watched a few episodes of “The Lone Ranger” and “Have Gun – Will Travel.”
Wednesday the 28th – HELMET TWEAK! – Late in the day I headed to Voice Trax West to do a one-hour session for a video game. Then I drove back to Alex In Wonderland’s studio to see if she could tweak the Super Grover helmet just a bit. I brought the puppet along too so she could see more of what I was going for with the look. The helmet, while definitely taller, had some tapering in on the sides that I didn’t like. The overall helmet needed to be a bit “dome-ier.” She kept the puppet and the helmet and said she’d tweak it and have it ready for me soon. Sometimes I hate being a stickler for detail, but yeah…I’m a stickler for detail. I met Sara for dinner at Paty’s and then headed back home. My back had been feeling a bit better, but I’ve been keeping ice on it a lot. Later I did my nightly auditions, made some spaghetti, and watched a few episodes of “The Lone Ranger” and “Have Gun – Will Travel.”
Thursday the 29th – BOOKED THROUGH OCTOBER! – Most of the day was spent doing work around the house and checking up on messages. The producers of the new “Bleach: The Thousand Year Blood War” checked my availability for the new recording sessions…ALL THE WAY THROUGH OCTOBER! Apparently my character Renji has a LOT to do in the upcoming story arc. VERY exciting! So we set dates for recording sessions all through the months of July, August, September and October. Hard to believe October will be here before you know it! Heck, the year 2023 is half over as of July 1st! My lovely and talented friend Angi came over and we sped off in the Mustang for dinner at Barone’s. The owner Tommy is a buddy, so he took great pride in showing me his dream car..a very rare Jaguar! In fact, it’s not only one of only 50 that were made, it’s also the #1 car!! It’s gorgeous! He searched for it for two years and finally got it. I love stories like that! I headed back home to relax for a bit with Spook, and then I did my nightly auditions. I worked around the house (carefully) for a bit, and then made a salad and watched a few more episodes of “The Lone Ranger” and “Have Gun – Will Travel!” I can’t tell you how much I’ve been digging the latter show. It’s truly amazing, with terrific guest stars!
Friday the 30th – PUPPET ROOM PREP! – It’s hard to believe that 2023 is officially half over! Unbelievable! I rested my back most of the day. I’m seeing improvement, but very slowly. When you pull a muscle in your back it heals very slowly, because it’s unrealistic to believe you can stay immobile for as long as it takes to fully heal. I had some errands that I could have done, but I sloughed them off for another day. I did some auditions later that evening, and then decided to try going for a late-night walk through my complex. It felt good to be out again, but I sat down to rest my back for a short period in the middle of the walk. It seemed to help quite a bit. I’m going to look into getting one of those compression wraps that go around the body for exercise. I think that’ll help speed the healing process, and allow me to keep exercising at the same time. I took my blood pressure when I got back inside and got some VERY good readings! Things are going well with that. Between the alteration of my diet, the exercising I’ve been doing, and the medication – I’m doing very well. Plus, when I was having high readings toward the end of 2022, I was VERY stressed about the Roxy situation. Now that the situation is over, I think that has helped my blood pressure considerably too. The other night I went ahead and ordered a set of vintage Laurel and Hardy marionettes on eBay. I’ve been watching them for quite a while. But winning a Stan Laurel marionette the other night gave me the push I needed. On top of my armoire in The Puppet Room I DO have enough extra space for these puppets. But I had to move a few things around to make some extra room. I worked in the Puppet Room (very carefully), but in the process of doing some work my arm drew across some LED strip lighting I had mounted on the back of the armoire and it snapped apart! The plastic/rubber stuff they use to make those gets very brittle. I tried to reconnect it, but to no avail. I unmounted the strip lighting and compared each piece to see which was the longer of the two pieces. Then I took the longest piece, and remounted that one. When the actual marionettes arrive and I do the necessary restoration on them, I’ll do some more detailed work to fit them into the display properly. The whole project was very hard work, but when it’s finished, it will look amazing! I did some other work around the house, and then made some soup and a sandwich. They’re expecting a bit of a heatwave this weekend, so I’m anxious to enjoy some great summer weather!
Saturday the 1st – PUZZLE ME THIS! – When I stopped at my box to get my packages, I saw that I had gotten in my Riddler Puzzle Box, a new toy from Macfarlane Toys. I couldn’t wait to get to it to see how it worked! I also got some great vintage artwork of an ad for Funny Face drink mix! The ad was clipped from a newspaper from 1965, so while it’s charming and amazing, it IS printed on newspaper. On the reverse side is a full-color comic strip that bleeds through to the ad quite badly. I’m going to see if my graphics genius friend Scott Sebring can fix it up so I can print it and mount it in my kitchen, just a few feet away from my Funny Face collection. I gassed up the Mustang and then headed to my auxiliary garage to swap cars. I wanted to get my Rav out and drive that around for a while. But the Rav was FILTHY, so I need to get it washed soon. I went over to Ikea to look around for some ideas. If you don’t know, Ikea is a Swedish-based home furnishings store that’s MASSIVE! It takes a good couple of hours just to get through the store. But I kept my eye peeled for interesting things. I looked at a chair for my living room, but it was in a dark chocolate brown leather-type material and it just didn’t “send” me. But I did pick up some great things along the way. I got a few new lighting options for the Tranquility Zone, some specialty LED bulbs for my vanity area, rechargeable batteries, a new dinner tray for my “in-bed TV viewing,” and a few other nick- nacks. Ikea is famous for having a restaurant in their stores, and the restaurant is most famous for selling Swedish meatballs. However, I wasn’t able to glimpse the chef in the back who makes the food and is known to say “Ishky Beershky Bork Bork Bork” a lot. I sat down for a Swedish meatball lunch, complete with peas and mashed potatoes. YUM! I got back home to shower (I needed it after walking around the massive Ikea store all day!) and my pals Mark and James came over so we could have dinner later at the Smoke House. We had a terrific dinner and got caught up on all the news. Later we all went to Planet Wallywood and we got the Riddler Puzzle Box out and started messing with it. But I got stuck on a particular part and couldn’t figure it out. So (like the REAL Riddler would do) I cheated. I looked up a tutorial video on YouTube for the right moves. When that still didn’t work, I got out a little screwdriver and removed the main plate to get a glimpse of the inner workings! Finally I got all the drawers open and I could assemble the metal Batarang pieces to complete the puzzle. FUN! Later I did work throughout the house and put together some of the new lighting things I bought at Ikea. I installed all the new LED bulbs in my vanity area, changed the sheets on my bed, and got ready to make my traditional “Laurel & Hardy Theatre” meal of a Chef Boyardee pizza, a banana Twinkie, popcorn, and Diet Pepsi in my Stan Laurel mug. As I mentioned before, the movie that was next in rotation was “The Bullfighters,” the very same movie I saw last Tuesday night at the Sons of the Desert meeting. But I didn’t mind an encore viewing. In fact, it was great – considering that I missed a few pieces of dialogue at the meeting because everyone was laughing so hard.
Sunday the 2nd – HELMET HELL! – Alex texted me to let me know I could come to her studio to pick up Grover and have a look at the helmet upgrades. I’m sure she’s darn sick of working on these Super Grover helmets, but the slivers she put into the helmet helped fill it out considerably and it looked great. All she needs to do now is to glue the slivers in, latex over it, and paint it. Then it’ll be good to go! It was a very mellow day and the weather was gorgeous! I got back home to do some work around the house, and started futzing around with a scan of the Funny Face artwork I bought on eBay. I think the key is to manipulate the contrast enough on the file so that the bleed through is minimized. But I’ll see what Scott can do with it first. I made a salad and watched a few episodes of “The Lone Ranger.” Since it was the 4th of July weekend, the H&I channel wasn’t running “Have Gun – Will Travel,” but instead they were doing a “Twilight Zone” marathon. I like “Twilight Zone,” (but I’m more of an “Outer Limits” guy myself) so I did watch an episode or two of those before bed.
And how was YOUR week??!!
PIX FROM THE WEEK
My buddy Bob and I at the Sons of the Desert meeting
I was amazed to be able to meet Ralph Platz, who performed in “The Bullfighters” in a scene with Stan Laurel! He’s now 88, but here he is as he appeared in the film as a young boy.
Lots of fun at the SOTD meeting with Maggie, Jeff and Evan!
At the Smoke House we ran into my pal Cynthia Rothrock, Martial Arts expert and actress!
My buddy James and I LOVE the Smoke House! Heaven on Earth!
Here’s a look at the new Riddler Puzzle Box! I can’t wait to sign these things at upcoming conventions!
My pal Officer Mark got some great shots of the recently cleaned and restructured action figure cabinet in my living room.
Speaking of Heaven on Earth, this new cereal is amazing! Back in the early 80’s, my ex-wife and I used to love buying Cap’n Crunch with Crunchberries, extracting all of the Crunchberries, and eating just those as a treat. Quaker finally got the idea and now there’s this amazing cereal. I’ve never been a fan of the blue or green Crunchberries, but the red ones turn the milk a yummy strawberry – just like strawberry Nestle’s Quik! I’m going to buy every box of this stuff I can find before it’s all gone!
