Uncle John’s Giant 10th Anniversary Bathroom Reader
Page 40
What’s the oldest veggie known to humans? Peas.
THE STAR: Lucy De Barbin, Dallas clothes designer who claimed to be Elvis’s lover and mother of his child
THE HEADLINE: Dallas Designer’s Daughter Royal Descendent?
WHAT HAPPENED: In 1987 De Barbin revealed her secret 24-year affair with Elvis in a book entitled Are You Lonesome Tonight?: The Untold True Story of Elvis Presley’s One True Love—and the Child He Never Knew. She said they kept their involvement a secret so it wouldn’t mess up his career. Later, she kept it quiet to protect Lisa Marie and the daughter she had with Elvis, Desir’ee. “I was so afraid of what was going to happen [if the secret got out],” she told a reporter. “I thought if one person found out, everybody would know.” She didn’t even tell Elvis they had a child, she said, although she hinted at it in a phone conversation just before the King’s death: “I just said things like, ‘I have a wonderful secret to tell you’ and ‘Her name is Desir’ee,’ things like that. And he said, ‘I hope what I’m thinking is true.’” De Barbin’s publisher, Random House, believed her. And several experts confirmed that a poem the King had reportedly written for De Barbin was in his handwriting. But neither the public nor the Presley estate bought the story.
AFTERMATH: De Barbin never produced blood samples to prove that her daughter was Elvis’s. Apparently, she offered no real evidence that they’d been lovers. The Presley estate claimed that because the book was not a success (it actually was), they didn’t need to bother suing De Barbin.
THE STAR: Matthias Jung, a German tourist in Dubrovnik, Croatia
THE HEADLINE: Brazen Tourist Has Dubrovnik All to Himself
WHAT HAPPENED: Dubrovnik, Croatia, was one of the world’s loveliest towns and a major tourist resort. But for seven months, from fall 1991 to spring 1992, the Serbs bombarded it with mortar shells. Tourism fell off, then disappeared. In August 1995, tourists warily started returning—only to be greeted with more shelling. They all fled…except one—Jung, a 32-year-old shopkeeper from Hanover. He wasn’t a thrill-seeker; he just wanted peace and quiet for his vacation.
AFTERMATH: After a while, things got so quiet that Jung admitted he was bored and went north.
What a commuter! Moles are able to tunnel through 300 feet of earth in a day.
“TONIGHT SHOW” PART VI: HE-E-ERE’S JOHNNY!
After 30 years on the tube, Johnny Carson became synonymous with “The Tonight Show” Here’s how he got the job.
RISING STAR
Johnny Carson had been working his way up the TV ladder for a decade. His first show was “Carson’s Cellar,” a comedy-variety program he created in 1951 for L.A.’s CBS affiliate. It only had a $25/week budget, so he couldn’t pay guests for appearances. Much of the time, he had to fake it.
One afternoon he had a member of the studio crew run quickly past the camera. “That was Red Skelton,” Carson joked. “Too bad he didn’t have time to stay and say a few words!” Skelton heard about the joke and was flattered. He made several appearances on the show…then hired Carson as a writer for his TV program.
OPENING DOORS
Carson left “Carson’s Cellar” in May 1954 to host a network game show called “Earn Your Vacation.” But he continued to write jokes for Skelton on the side. Then on August 18, 1954, while rehearsing a stunt for his show, Skelton threw himself into a prop door that was supposed to open on impact. It didn’t—Skelton was knocked cold with less than 90 minutes to go before airtime.
A few minutes later, Carson got a call from the show’s producers, who were searching frantically for a replacement host. Carson agreed to fill in…and so impressed CBS with his performance that the network gave him his own primetime show: “The Johnny Carson Show.”
It was Carson’s first big break…and his first big flop. Years later, Carson lamented: “They told me, ‘We’ve got to make the show important.’… How were they going to do that? With chorus girls. They were going to make me into Jackie Gleason! I’d come rushing on in a shower of balloons, with chorus girls yipping, ‘Here comes the star of the show, Johnny Carson!’… That was my first big lesson. If you don’t keep control, you’re going to bomb out, and there’s nobody to blame but yourself.”
The Merv Griffin Show’s director was Dick Carson, Johnny Carson’s brother.
BUILDING TRUST
Carson’s next job was hosting a game show called “Do You Trust Your Wife?” The program was failing: the host, ventriloquist Edgar Bergen, had just been let go, and ABC was only renewing the contract month to month. Carson turned it around by dumping the husband-and-wife format and renaming it “Who Do You Trust?” so anyone could play.
Soon after, the show’s announcer left. Word spread that Carson was looking for a replacement, and Chuck Reeves, producer of Dick Clark’s “American Bandstand,” decided to help. He’d been at a party emceed by Clark’s next-door neighbor, a radio announcer named Ed McMahon. He liked McMahon’s style…so he got McMahon an audition on “Who Do You Trust?”
SECOND BANANA
McMahon went to New York and talked on camera with Carson for a couple of minutes. Then he went home. Weeks went by, and he heard nothing. So, convinced he hadn’t gotten the job, McMahon made plans to take a trip across the Atlantic.
As McMahon recalled in his autobiography, the day before he was scheduled to leave, he got a call from the show asking him to come back to New York. He cancelled the trip and went to meet with Carson’s producer, Art Stark. They talked for a few hours, but he still didn’t get a job offer. Finally, Stark asked McMahon if he was going to move to New York.
“I don’t think so,” McMahon replied.
“I thought maybe you’d want to.”
“Why?”
“Well, I thought it might be tough for you, doing the show.”
“What show?”
“Our show. You start Monday.”
“Next Monday?”
“For Chrissake, didn’t anybody tell you?”
And that’s how Ed became the world’s most famous second banana.
Check it out: On U.S. coins, all portraits (except Lincoln’s) face left.
CANNED LAUGHTER
As on Groucho Marx’s “You Bet Your Life,” the jokes in “Who Do You Trust?” were scripted in advance. It was the best-kept secret of the show: only Carson’s copy of the script contained the jokes. The television audience—and ABC’s censors—were kept completely in the dark, which made for racier ad-libbing. With Carson at the helm, “Who Do You Trust?” became one of the surprise hits of daytime television. Meanwhile, Carson kept his talk-show skills fresh by guest hosting for Garry Moore, Dinah Shore…and Jack Paar.
HEEERF’S JOHNNY!
Carson guest-hosted “The Tonight Show” as early as 1958, but doubted whether he could ever fill Paar’s shoes as permanent host. So when Paar announced in late 1961 that he was getting out, Carson wasn’t sure he wanted to give up a safe, successful network quiz show to take a chance on “The Tonight Show.” “How could I follow Jack Paar? I just wasn’t sure I could cut it,” he wrote years later.
In the end, of course, Carson decided to take the chance. He and McMahon signed on as the host and announcer of “The Tonight Show.” On October 1, 1962, Carson made his debut. The deck was stacked wildly in his favor that first night—he was introduced by Groucho Marx and had Mel Brooks, Tony Bennett, Joan Crawford, and Rudy Vallee as his guests.
Overall, the reviews were positive. “Mr. Carson’s style is his own,” Jack Gould wrote in The New York Times. “He has the proverbial engaging smile and the quick mind essential to sustaining and seasoning a marathon of banter.”
PAAR FOR THE COURSE
For some viewers, however, Carson was a big letdown. “America can now go back to bed,” Robert Kennedy joked to Jack Paar a few days later.
Even the NBC pages were skeptical. “After that first night,” says Kenneth Work, a history professor who was an NBC page in 1962, “the pages went down to the NBC coffee shop
and all of them were convinced Johnny wouldn’t make it. After working with Paar all those years, we were concerned he didn’t have the excitement and outspokenness Paar had. I didn’t think he’d last six months.”
More to come! See Part VII on page 386 after these messages.
According to florists, America’s favorite flower is the rose. Second place: the daisy.
UDDERLY SIMPLE
We all know these terms, but if someone were to ask you what they actually mean, would you be able to tell them? Here’s the difference between the different kinds of milk sold in most supermarkets.
Whole Milk. Milk as it comes from the cow. The USDA requires it to contain at least 3.25% fat and 8.25% other solids. It’s also about 88% water.
Low-Fat Milk. Milk with some fat (cream) removed. Depending on how it’s labeled, it can contain 0.5% to 2.5% fat by weight. By percentage of calories, it’s more. E.g., “1% milk” gets 24% of its calories from fat; “2% milk” gets 36% from fat. Vitamins A and D are found in the cream; when the cream is removed, the USDA requires dairies to “fortify” milk by putting the vitamins back in.
Skim Milk. All—or nearly all—of the fat is removed.
Evaporated Milk. Milk that has had 60% of its water removed. Sometimes it has a caramelized flavor, a result of the heating process used to remove the liquid.
Condensed Milk: Whole milk, mixed with as much as 40% to 45% sugar, then evaporated over heat.
Cream. When it’s taken from skim or low-fat milk, cream is made into four different products: regular cream (18% milk fat by weight—not calories); light whipping cream (30%-36% milk fat); heavy whipping cream (36% or more milk fat); and half-and-half: (half milk, half cream—10%-12% milk fat).
Buttermilk. When cream is agitated, or “churned,” the globules of fat separate out from the cream and clump together, forming butter. The globules are removed from the liquid, which is called “buttermilk.”
Acidophilus Milk: When milk is pasteurized to kill bad bacteria, a lot of beneficial bacteria is killed along with it. In acidophilus milk, the lactobacillus acidophilus bacteria, which aids digestion by regulating bacteria in the digestive system, is put back in after pasteurization.
Soy Milk: Made from whole soybeans, which are pureed, boiled, filtered, and sometimes sweetened.
Say “Bathroom Reader”: On average, a child who’s starting school knows about 6,000 words.
MYTH-SPOKEN
Everyone knows that Captain Kirk said, “Beam me up, Scotty” in every episode of “Star Trek” and that Bogart said, “Play it again, Sam” in Casablanca. But everyone’s wrong. Here are a few common misquotes.
Line: “Beam me up, Scotty.”
Supposedly Said By: Captain Kirk
Actually: That line was never spoken on “Star Trek.” Not once. What Kirk usually said was, “Beam us up, Mr. Scott,” or “Enterprise, beam us up.” According to Trekkies, he came pretty close just once. In the fourth episode, he said, “Scotty, beam me up.”
Line: “Don’t fire till you see the whites of their eyes.”
Supposedly Said By: Colonel William Prescott to American soldiers at the Battle of Bunker Hill, as they lay in wait for the British
Actually: Sounds like another American myth. There’s no record of Prescott ever saying it, but there are records of both Prince Charles of Prussia (in 1745) and Frederick the Great (in 1757) using the command.
Line: “You dirty rat.”
Supposedly Said By: James Cagney in one of his movies
Actually: Every Cagney impressionist says it, but Cagney never did. He made over 70 movies but never spoke this line in any of them.
Line: “Nice guys finish last.”
Supposedly Said By: Leo Durocher in 1946, when he was manager of the Brooklyn Dodgers
Actually: While being interviewed, he waved toward the Giants’ dugout and said, “The nice guys are all over there. In seventh place.” When the article came out, reporters had changed his statement to “The nice guys are all over there in last place.” As it was repeated, it was shortened to “Nice guys finish last.” Durocher protested that he’d never made the remark but couldn’t shake it. Finally he gave in, and eventually used it as the title of his autobiography.
Why is a newborn’s skin wrinkled? It’s too big for its body.
Line: “Gerry Ford is so dumb he can’t walk and chew gum at the same time.”
Supposedly Said By: President Lyndon Johnson
Actually: This remark was cleaned up for the public—what Johnson really said was, “Gerry Ford is so dumb he can’t fart and chew gum at the same time.”
Line: “How I wish I had not expressed my theory of evolution as I have done.”
Supposedly Said By: Charles Darwin, on his deathbed
Actually: The Christian evangelist, Jimmy Swaggart, announced in a speech in 1985 that Darwin had spoken the words as he lay dying, and asked that the Bible be read to him. But it was an old lie started shortly after Darwin’s death by a Christian fanatic who was speaking to seminary students. Darwin’s daughter and son both deny that their father ever had any change of heart about his scientific theory. According to his son, his last words were, “I am not the least afraid to die.”
Line: “I rob banks because that’s where the money is.”
Supposedly Said By: Infamous bank robber Willie Sutton
Actually: According to Sutton, it was a reporter who thought up this statement and printed it. “I can’t even remember when I first read it,” Sutton once remarked. “It just seemed to appear one day, and then it was everywhere.”
Line: “Play it again, Sam.”
Supposedly Said By: Humphrey Bogart, in the classic film Casablanca
Actually: This may be the most famous movie line ever, but it wasn’t in the movie. Ingrid Bergman said, “Play it, Sam. Play ‘As Time Goes By.’” And Bogart said “If she can stand it, I can. Play it!” But the only person who ever used “Play it again, Sam” was Woody Allen—who jokingly called his theatrical homage to Bogart Play It Again, Sam because he knew it was a misquote.
Line: “Elementary, my dear Watson.”
Supposedly Said By: Sherlock Holmes, in Arthur Conan Doyle’s books
Actually: Holmes never said it in any of the stories. It was a movie standard, however, beginning in 1929 with The Return of Sherlock Holmes.
Brain waves have been used to run an electric train.
BOND(S)… JAMES BONDS
Every 007 fan has their own opinion of which actor—Sean Connery, George Lazenby, Roger Moore, Timothy Dalton, or Pierce Brosnan—made the best James Bond. …but do you know how each actor landed the role? Here are their stories.
SEAN CONNERY (See page 211 for the whole story.)
The role of James Bond turned Connery from a nobody into an international sex symbol in less than five years…but as Connery’s fame grew with each Bond film, so did his frustration with the part. He worried about being typecast, he hated reporters, and he was annoyed by the crowds of fans that followed him wherever he went. And since his image was inextricably linked with the Bond character, he was angry that Cubby Broccoli and Harry Saltzman wouldn’t make him a full partner in the 007 films and merchandising deals. He left the series in 1967 after making You Only Live Twice, his sixth Bond film.
GEORGE LAZENBY
In 1967 a friend asked George Lazenby, a part-time actor, to substitute for him on a blind date when his girlfriend suddenly came back to town.
The blind date “was supposed to be some up-and-coming agent, which was why he wanted to go out with her,” Lazenby recounted years later, “but I didn’t care. I was running a health studio in Belgium.” Some months later, the agent remembered Lazenby and contacted him when the search for Connery’s replacement in On Her Majesty’s Secret Service got underway. “I got the part,” Lazenby remembers, “and my friend’s career fizzled.”
So did Lazenby’s: After fighting with the producers, the director, and co-star Diana Rigg during the ma
king of On Her Majesty’s Secret Service, he either quit or was fired, depending on who you ask.
When it premiered in 1969, On Her Majesty’s Secret Service was panned by the critics and was a box-office disappointment; today it is considered one of the best of the Bond films.
Statisticians say: It takes seven shuffles to thoroughly mix a 52-card deck.
SEAN CONNERY (II)
Panicked by the drubbing On Her Majesty’s Secret Service took at the box office, Broccoli and Saltzman paid a reluctant Sean Connery $1,25 million plus a huge share of the profits to return to the series in the 1971 film Diamonds Are Forever.
Connery needed the boost—most of his post-Bond films were box-office flops—but he quit the series again after just one film, turning down a reported $5 million for Live and Let Die. The role went instead to his old friend Roger Moore. (Burt Reynolds was also considered, but Broccoli insisted on an Englishman.)
Connery returned for a seventh and last time in the 1983 film Never Say Never Again.
ROGER MOORE
Moore was one of Ian Fleming’s original choices for the Bond rote, and he finally got his shot in Live and Let Die. Unlike Lazenby, Moore succeeded—largely by complementing, not imitating, Connery’s interpretation of the role. As Raymond Benson writes in The James Bond Bedside Companion,
From Live and Let Die on, the scriptwriters tailored the screenplays to fit Roger Moore’s personality. As a result, James Bond lost much of the machismo image which was so prominent in the sixties. It seems Bond never gets hurt in any of the subsequent films—the Roger Moore Bond uses his wits rather than fists to escape dangerous situations.
Moore’s departure from Connery’s Bond was so dramatic that it inspired a Beatles-vs.-Rolling Stones-type rivalry among 007 fans over who was the best Bond. “People who saw their first Bond with Sean never took to Roger,” says 007 marketing executive Charles Juroe, “and people who saw their first Bond with Roger never took to Sean. Roger’s movies grossed more than Sean’s.” Moore made a total of seven Bond films between 1973 and 1985, tying Sean Connery. His last was A View to a Kill.