Jackson Beck 1912-2004

Mark Evanier notes the passing of Jackson Beck, aged 92 years, five days. If we had voice credits listed in our Paramount Cartoons filmography, Jackson Beck's name would be all over them. He was with the studio roughly from the beginning until about 1961. The voices he performed included Bluto, Buzzy The Crow, King Leonardo, and of course the narrator of the "Superman" radio series, where he may have been the first to ever intone the words "It's a bird - it's a plane - it's Superman!" Up until about five years ago, you could still hear Jackson Beck on dozens of national television commercials, including Little Caesar's Pizza Pizza and Thompson's Water Seal. I believe the last commercials he ever did were for Infusium shampoo, and if anyone had trouble believing an 87-year-old could sell shampoo to teeny boppers, they probably had no soul to begin with.

Lighten Up On Ahnold

As misguided as Gov. Schwarzenegger's choice of words was, I don't think he should apologize to California democrats for calling them "girly men". Nor should the Dems be upset, IMHO.

News commentators have rightly noted that the phrase "girly man" was actually an invention of the old Hans and Franz sketches on "Saturday Night Live", in which Kevin Nealon and Dana Carvey vowed to "pump (clap) you up" while preening in front of riduculous looking cardboard cutouts of Arnold at his beefiest.

Schwarzenegger is just riffing on himself. Everyone else just needs to drop it and get on with their lives.

More Ad Disclaimers We Don't Need

Oh, in reference to the June post below talking about ad disclaimers... I was gonna talk about that tasteless commercial for Metamucil in which a park ranger is shown pouring a glass of the orange stuff into Old Faithful, thus allegedly keeping it nice and regular.

But then I found out this spot originally premiered in January 2003. And it's taken me this long to even see it?