Questions about anything

[minor muppetz]

Do television shows still do clip shows? I don't think I've ever seen any clip show episodes in the era of high definition television.

Though it seems more common now for shows to start with a recap of previous episodes, showing clips from many past episodes to show things that the next episode has to do with (I guess to refamiliarize people with things from the past and to inform late arrival viewers), not just to reflect what happened in the last episode. Shows with narration also tend to show clips when some past character or thing comes up. I wouldn't count these as clip shows.

 

[TimzUneeverse]

I want to make some art for ToughPigs. How do I do that??

 

[minor muppetz]

I want to make some art for ToughPigs. How do I do that??

I would suggest e-mailing Toughpigs first.

 

[TimzUneeverse]

How come Muppet Central went offline for a couple of hours?? I honestly don't understand.

 

[minor muppetz]

So in Back to the Future Part III, Marty and Doc are able to get into a drive-in movie theater during day hours so Marty can travel back in 1885 with unlikely risk of wrecking anything in the past.

So in 1955, could a person just go into a drive-in during daytime hours, when the place would be closed (and what business could they do there?)? Or did they break in for the sake of safe time travel?

 

[minor muppetz]

So what's with the scene from Austin Powers where Austin thinks Basil's mother is a man in disguise? We get a '60s scene where he can tell a man in drag is actually a man, so I guess Austin mistaking Basil's mother for a man in drag somehow reflects the difference between the 1960s and 1990s, but I can't quite figure out what it is.

Weren't there plenty of ugly women in the 1960s who Austin could have made the mistake of thinking it was a man in drag? Did women try harder to look feminine in the 1960s than the 1990s? I can't quite understand what this joke is getting at in regards to Austin Powers' mistake.

 

[minor muppetz]

Lately I have been wondering, if a movie is released in theaters with an animated short, is it better for the short to come with a movie that the studio has a lot of faith in, or one that the studio does not expect to be a big hit?

Recently I read a quote from Paul Terry, saying that in the golden age of theatrical animation, people enjoyed cartoons but would still pay to see the movie if it did not have a cartoon short at the beginning, citing that as why studios eventually did away with shorts. I thought shorts were a big selling point back when it was a regular thing (I think I've read that Columbia refused to let theaters screen their Three Stooges shorts unless they agreed to also show Columbia's b-movies).

In the late 1980s and 1990s, there was a time when movies would occasionally come with a short cartoon, it seems like it varied in whether the shorts were advertised in commercials for the films. At least with the Disney and WB films to come with shorts, it seems like many of them failed at the box office, though I am unsure if this was the case with them all. The first Roger Rabbit short came with Honey, I Shrunk the Kids, which was a big hit at the box office (in the top 5 for 1989) but which did a lot better than Disney had anticipated (was it more for the short or for the film's concept?). The other movies to open with Roger Rabbit shorts - Dick Tracy and A Far Away Place - did poorly at the box office (while I have not seen it, I am surprised Dick Tracy didn't do very well at the box office, seems like something that should have been a hit, but I guess I am not surprised by A Far Away Place, I wanted to see that for the Roger Rabbit short and don't think I really wanted to see the movie otherwise).

With the various Disney/WB films that came with a short and the short was advertised in the commercials, I feel like most of them weren't that appealing. The Neverending Story II was likely expected to be a hit (and I don't know if Box Office Bunny was in the promotions or not), The Prince and the Pauper (being a 30-minute short) was released with The Rescuers Down Under which I kind of feel should have been more successful (I actually saw those at the theaters twice, and I don't remember even knowing about Rescuers Down Under or Prince and the Pauper until I was taken to the theater to see them), Richie Rich is probably the one I most wanted to see for more than just the short (though I was suddenly really into the Road Runner, but Richie Rich also seemed like a genuinely cool movie to me - I was a fan of Macully Culkin and liked the concept of a movie about the world's richest kid, though otherwise I've barely seen anything involving the character), I'm not really sure how likely I would have wanted to see A Kid in King Arthur's Court if it didn't come with a new Mickey Mouse short or if I would have wanted to see The Great Panda Adventure without Carrotblanca (and I recall only seeing a TV ad for that once - otherwise, I kept seeing Carrotblanca advertised on bags of Doritos, and mistakenly thought that was a feature film), I also recall seeing a print ad (but never a television ad) saying that Superior Duck was in theaters with either Cats Don't Dance or Car Pool (did both come with a Warners short?), which made me want to see whichever movie more, yet it took a couple decades before I saw Cats Don't Dance and I still have not seen Car Pool.

But then by the late-1990s, it seemed non-existent for commercials for movies to advertise the shorts they came with. I think most of the '90s movies to contain shorts did poorly, so not sure if that's what it was, or if they decided it'd be better to surprise movie goers. Though the first three Nickelodeon movies had a short at the start, I feel like I just vaguely knew about Harriet the Spy coming with a Hey Arnold sneak preview or The Rugrats Movie coming with a CatDog short, but I was aware of all the shorts before seeing them. And of course the three Pokemon movies advertised the shorts that came with them (and is it odd to anybody else that they produced Pokemon shorts and had those come with the Pokemon films? Would it have been just as odd if Carrotblanca was released with Space Jam or Runaway Brain came with A Goofy Movie? Or if Looney Tunes: Back in Action came with one of the Larry Doyle Looney Tunes shorts like originally planned?). Most recently, advertisements for Cocoa also included promotion/acknolwedgement of Olaf's Frozen Adventure. But I guess if a movie is to be released with a half-hour short (or a 20-minute short, like the Pokemon shorts), it's best to advertise those.

Of course nearly every Pixar movie was released with a short (it looks like the last few have not), I don't think any of those were advertised on television, but it was such a tradition that after a certain point the public most likely expected to see a short in the theaters with each Pixar film.

 

[minor muppetz]

Recently I saw The Pee-wee Herman Show (the original, not the Broadway revival) for the first time, and noticed the credited said "written by the cast" (and then it adds one name I forget, I guess a writer who wasn't a performer).

I'm guessing the cast mainly wrote their own segments (with Paul Reubens writing a lot, and perhaps that credited writer writing a lot as well), but I also know that The Groundlings was largely an improvisational group, did each cast member write their segments or did they primarily just improvise, with a basic script or outline to work from? Do people get credited as writers when they just improvise? I would think all credited writers actually contribute to writing something in the script, as opposed to actors just making up something on the spot. The Muppets have been known to improvise at times, but very few Muppet performers besides Jim Henson have gotten writers credit. I know the Marx Brothers improvised a lot, but it's rare that any of them got writers credit in their films (Harpo Marx did get a writers credit for Love Happy).

And now I am remembering that I saw some video online where Paul Reubens talks about his appearances in the Cheech and Chong films. He said that they largely cast members of The Groundlings in supporting roles because they were skilled at improv, Cheech and Chong bragging that they could do a movie without a script. But I thought Cheech Marin and Tommy Chong got writers credit (they could have just written a basic outline, and maybe they worked their routines into the films and felt those qualified as writing the films). Reubens said that he and the other members of The Groundlings wrote their parts (so did they actually write or just improvise?), adding that it was with no writers credit or extra pay. I should find this video, because I have not seen this info anywhere else (not on the wikipedia or TV Tropes pages for the Cheech and Chong movies, etc.).

Only one performance of The Pee-wee Herman Show was taped and made available. Anybody know if they did the same show every night or if they actually did different things each night and we just saw one performance (as that was taped)? I almost wish that had become an actual prime time or cable series. Anybody know whether any of the actors/characters who did not make it to Pee-wee's Playhouse were considered for that show? Mailman Mike is a funny character, and he did return for the Broadway revival (played by the same actor), I wonder if he was considered for the show at some point. I feel he might have ended up being one of those "season one characters". I almost feel like every character who didn't make it to the Saturday morning series wouldn't have made it past the first season, which seemed a bit more like an adult parody of kids shows that somehow made it to Saturday mornings, most of the characters and elements that didn't make it past the first season seem more fitting for an adult parody of children's programming. I don't think I've seen an official explanation for why any of the "first season characters" didn't appear in the second season, it could be just as likely the move of production from New York City to LA (Phil Hartman joined SNL when this series began and I figure he chose to stay on SNL, though I've also heard he and Paul Reubens stopped being friends due to Reubens only wanting friendships he could control).