May 3 – May 9 (2010) – Wally On The Web

Ever since I saw Michael Bolton sing his new hit “Murder My Heart”, a song he co-wrote with Lady Gaga, I’ve not been able to get it out of my head. It’s got a classic 80’s tortured love song feel, with Bolton’s impassioned vocals, and Lady Gaga’s gift for a good melodic hook. But as a special treat, the one I’m presenting here for you to listen to, is the version I recorded off of the TV when he did it on “The Tonight Show With Jay Leno.” I feel in a lot of ways this mix is superior to the studio version…warmer, rounder…more soulful. See what you think.

First, a few thoughts that should have been in LAST WEEK’S Wally’s Week, but because of a chaotic (but fun) week I had forgotten to include in last week’s entry. My parents were visiting me for about a week, and something my dad said really stuck with me. He said, “Leaving South Dakota was probably the best thing you ever did.” At the time it didn’t hit me, but after I thought about it for awhile I realized that in a way, this was his approval for how my life has turned out. And it’s always nice to get the direct approval of a parent after you’ve labored long and hard in the field to accomplish a goal. Thanks dad. Secondly, I experienced another career-high last week, and the impact is just now dawning on me. My boss Jay Leno did a fabulous job entertaining at the White House Correspondent’s Dinner in Washington D.C. the previous weekend. He even got a well-deserved standing ovation. During his presentation, he brought with him several clips from “The Tonight Show” that he played for the audience. One of them was a bit I had voiced (written by the VERY funny Rob Young) called Duct Tape. In fact, now that I think about it, this bit may have dated back to the prime time Leno show. My mom had mentioned she heard me in the presentation, so I searched for it on You Tube and sure enough! There it was! But as a bonus it cut back the President laughing after the bit was over. WOW! It’s not often a humble South Dakota boy can say he’s been heard by the President of the United States! Too cool! Now that I’ve got those out of the way, on to Wally’s Week!!

Monday the 3rd – IS IT MONDAY ALREADY? – Tops on my priority list was calling Jolly Time’s head office and ordering a few more cases of popcorn. They have this popcorn I really like called Blast ‘O’ Butter, and occasionally you can find it in the stores packaged in single serving sizes. The full bags I definitely WILL eat while watching TV, but I’ve found the single serving bags to be very satisfying. So, why pop a full bag when the single serving sizes are adequate. The problem is, I can no longer find them in most stores. So…OFF TO THE INTERNET! I had ordered a couple of cases a few months ago, but I’m running low. So I got my order placed and I’m expecting my popcorn soon. I also called some guys at an air conditioning place last summer to inquire about replacing my A/C in my house. But I decided to wait until it cooled off so it wouldn’t be such an inconvenience to not have A/C for a couple of days while they worked. I spoke with a guy named Brian there about popping out to the house to re-evaluate the situation. It’s going to be a huge expense, but well worth it. The last four summers, my A/C has failed during the hottest weeks in L.A.! And last year it happened during Comic Con week! Well, it WON’T happen this year because I’m getting a brand-new, energy efficient unit! It’ll be very worth it! I also called my bank and ordered more checks, and dropped my camcorder off to the repair shop. It’s viewscreen was looking weird, and it was having trouble loading tapes. Shortly after noon I went to Voicecasters to audition for a TV commercial, then I swung by my buddy’s studio to drop off a VHS tape. I was doing a research project and I couldn’t get good screenshots off of the video, so I had him dub it to a DVD so I could pop it in the computer and get shots. Then I headed over to “The Tonight Show” to do my usual announcer gig. Afterwards I went to my tailor’s and picked up a tuxedo shirt that I was having altered. It came with button cuffs, but I wanted the cuffs altered so I could wear cuff links with it. MUCH classier!

Tuesday the 4th – GARFIIIIEEEEELLLLLD! – Another fun day of “Garfield” mania at Buzzy’s Recording in Hollywood. In addition to the usuals, Frank Welker and Gregg Berger, we were joined by Jason Marsden and Laraine Newman. I really do hope this cartoon lasts forever. WHAT FUN! When I got done I swung by the pharmacy to pick up a prescription and then stopped by my mailbox. I got a bunch of check in, so I went home, scanned them into my computer and readied my deposit for later. Then I went to “TTS”, and when we were wrapped I headed to the bank to make my deposit. I stopped along the way to a few stores and bought some new stuff. That evening I napped. I was beat!

Wednesday the 5th – UNDER WHERE?! – For several years in a row now, I’ve been the spokesvoice for Canada’s “Underwear Affair,” a fundraising effort that fights cancer. Check them out here…https://www.uncoverthecure.org/index.html?cvridirect=true
It’s always a lot of fun to be involved every year. I went over to Elm Silverlake Studio in the morning to record another batch of radio commercials for them. Then I went to Jerry’s Famous Deli in Studio City to have lunch with my pals Richard Halpern and Sara. Richard’s one of the best (if not THE best) Austin Powers impersonators in the biz, and as I was doing some housecleaning last week I came upon some props I had when I was doing Austin. And I wanted to pass them along to him. When lunch was over I stopped by my buddy’s studio and picked up my DVD copies of my VHS tape. Then I went to “TTS” and (as usual) had a blast. Between that job and “Garfield”, I can’t decide which job I’d rather have last forever more. (Did that make sense?) Anyway, after the show I got ready for evening church. I would be meeting my old pal A.J. at the meditational service. We hadn’t spoken for years because we had lost touch, but last week he called me out of the blue. He said he had been meditating and he thought I would think he was crazy. But when I told him I had been meditating as well, he said he wanted to come check out how our church did it. So after church he and his son Aaron took me to eat at Little Toni’s. We had some good Italian food. That night, I worked on a presentation that I would be giving a buddy of mine the next day. It was a package of DVDs and a cover letter for an agent who would be considering “Livin’ On a Prayer” and “Uncle Davver’s Really Scary Movie Show!” Fingers crossed!

Thursday the 6th – BIRTHDAY DAY 1! – Well, even though this was my official birthday, most of the fun stuff wasn’t going to happen until the weekend, and in several parts. I got up to meet with my friend Greg Glass of BCII TV. I do a fair amount of voice work for his company, so as a favor they were hooking me up with one of the hottest new car customizers in Hollywood. We were going to meet up with him to talk about…getting my Starsky Gran Torino made! The time had come! I couldn’t wait any longer. And Greg’s contact seemed like a good start. In fact, he had already found the “donor car” that morning on the internet. It was the right year (1976) and was in pretty good shape. After touring me around his amazing facility, we agreed that he would go check out this car and see about its worthiness. He would report back on his findings and we would decide how to proceed from there. Just think, by this fall, I could be cruising around Hollywood in a Starsky & Hutch Gran Torino replica! I’ve wanted one of these since I was 15! So, this was a good birthday present to myself! We had a quick lunch, and then I went on my way. I had to be at McCoy Productions to do an audition at 3, and then it was off to “TTS!” Afterwards I stopped at It’s a Wrap in Burbank. My pal Scott reminded me that It’s a Wrap had marked down all of their dresses from ‘Deal or No Deal’…TO JUST 10 BUCKS! So I picked up about 8 of them to have around the house for those spontaneous times when I want to go out, but my female companion didn’t bring anything nice to wear. Fear not! I now have a well-stocked closet of snazzy dresses from the set of ‘Deal or No Deal’! I couldn’t wait to show my friend Patrice all the great stuff I got. I headed home, walked Sassie, and headed over to Chin Chin to meet her for dinner. All of the dresses I bought were size 2, which would fit Patrice perfectly, as well as my friend Sara. We finished dinner and then went over to a place called Chill for frozen yogurt. It was a great birthday!

Friday the 7th – BIRTHDAY DAY 2! – As another gift to myself, I had the carpet guys come to the house and clean all the carpets in Planet Wallywood. It was long overdue, but now they look fabulous! It was a great time to do it as well, as this week was a little slower than usual, so I had lots of time to deal with it. But I got an e-mail that morning that “TTS” wanted to tape 15 minutes earlier than usual! Which meant my normal call-time of 3:30 was now 3:15. I told the carpet guys they had to be finished in a certain time, and they guaranteed me they would be. They were, but just barely. I sped over to NBC and reported in for work. The taping was great and had Don Cheadle chipping golf balls off the roof of NBC into a cup in an adjacent park. Hilarious! And Don’s a fabulous golfer! In fact, Jay donated $5,000 to Don’s charity Ante Up for Africa for doing such a great job! Here’s more… https://anteupforafrica.org/ After the taping I went home to grab a nap. That night I had four tickets (6th row CENTER!) for “Iron Man 2” at the Dome in Hollywood. Patrice came over, as did Sara and Georgette, and we got ready to go. Patrice tried on all of the “DOND” dresses, and it looked like they had been made for her! Sara tried on a few as well and they looked fabulous! Patrice wanted to wear one of them to the movie, but I thought it would be too cold in the theater for her. We stopped at Jack In the Box for some drive-thru food, ate it in the parking structure of the theater, and then went in, got our snacks and found our seats. The movie was awesome and I can’t wait to see it again! So…that was Birthday Day 2! FUN!

Saturday the 8th – HAPPY BIRTHDAY BONNIE! and BIRTHDAY DAY 3! – It’s one of my sister’s birthday’s today. She was born exactly 10 years and 2 days after me. Wild! But it was also the third day of my birthday celebration. My contractor and pal Terry came over in the afternoon and we worked all day on the house. One of the rods in my closet decided to give up its support and came off the wall. Terry said I had too many clothes and fortified the entire closet with more braces and supports. Now it shouldn’t be a problem. But I had to take every piece of clothing on the rack out of the closet so he could work. While he did that I set about cleaning my deck. I had some old patio furniture that had worn out it’s usefulness and had started to rot. So I put those in his truck to be disposed of. Then I cleaned off all the leaves and twigs. I got about 4 bags full of stuff! Then I hosed it all down and made it nice and pretty. Then I started cleaning the kitchen, since I was having a shindig later that night. Terry had finished the closet and I ran to get us some lunch at Taco Bell. When I got back Terry started putting up the shelves in my kitchen. I needed to clear some space for a new display I’m doing in the kitchen, and this was the best solution. But while he was working on that I was upstairs putting all my clothes back on the newly fortified rack. Scott and Vickie Sebring came over early, since they had been in the area doing an appearance, and rested up. Terry finished up, cleaned the area, and headed home. I still had some stuff to do upstairs to get ready for the shindig. Then Scott, Vickie and I went to the grocery store to get some supplies. When we returned, several guests had already arrived and were waiting. The special treat that night, was that my friend Yvonne Craig (the actress who played Batgirl) was coming over with her sister to join us in watching her “Star Trek” episode on Blu Ray. She hadn’t seen the episode since the 60’s, and I told her she wouldn’t believe the great quality on Blu Ray. About twice the normal crowd showed up, as it was not only my birthday, but my friend Zandra’s as well. They brought a delicious cake, made by Zandra’s daughter Andria, and we all had a great time watching clips of other stuff on Blu Ray before we watched the “Star Trek” episode. Yvonne said that the first time she saw it on TV she was actually BLUE, and not green like she was supposed to be. It was fun getting her stories and recollections about filming the episode “Whom Gods Destroy.” She also mentioned working on “In Like Flint” and was telling a story about that. I realized that I had that film in my collection and surprised her by putting on a clip from it! It was a great night and my pal Nate even brought over his KITT car for the guests to see. At the peak, we had about 20-25 people here! What a great end to a birthday trifecta!

Sunday the 9th – HAPPY MOTHER’S DAY TO ALL YOU MOTHERS OUT THERE! – I was exhausted so I slept in until 2. Then I called my mom for Mother’s Day and did some stuff around the house until it was time for evening church. After church I couldn’t raise anybody to have dinner with, so I took another nap. I ended up sleeping until 10:30 that night!! WOW! I had missed out on dining with my friend Bruce, as well as my pal Sara. Of course by the time I awakened, everybody I knew was just going to bed. It’s sometimes tough to be a nightbird like me. So I wrote Wally’s Week, did some auditions to e-mail into my agent, and got some food to go at Denny’s. A great night!

And how was YOUR week??!!

Here’s Manny, Moe and Jack…three male ducks who decided to hang out in my pool one day. The usual female has been missing, and I think she’s sitting on a nest somewhere.

Another part of the Planet Wallywood Wildlife Preserve, is the crazy squirrel population. Here a diner partakes of some of the finest unsalted peanuts anywhere in the neighborhood.

Though my cat Spooky seems to enjoy watching Kitty TV (watching the ducks, birds and squirrels through my screen door) he does get bored with it quickly. Here is Spook starting to look for the remote to change the channel…

During the taping of the segment I did for Canadian TV, Sara and Georgette donned my Batgirl and Catwoman costumes respectively.

Here’s my friends Edi and her son Josh at the recent autograph show.

MY HERO! It’s the greatest living voice-actor Frank Welker and I after a “Garfield” gig. You know, if you really break it down, Frank’s been in more movies and TV shows than any other actor in history! Notice all the great signatures on the wall behind us. How many can you spot?

At the recent Wizard World convention in Anaheim, I got a photo op with three of “Star Trek: The Next Generation’s” finest actors…Brent Spiner, Michael Dorn & LeVar Burton. When a fan came up to Brent and said, “Hi Data.” Brent responded by saying, “Hi. Is there a fictitious name I can call you by?” It was hilarious!