Miss Jane

Toward the end of November 1946, television was demonstrated for the first time in South Florida, thanks to a joint effort by WGBS radio in Miami and the DuMont labs of New Jersey. WGBS put two of its promotion department staffers in charge of the six-day, eight-hour-a-day broadcast. One of them was a young lady who had returned to the station from war duty two months earlier named Nancy Kulp.

Yes, the same one who later played the ultra-efficient secretary and trouble-shooter Jane Hathaway on The Beverly Hillbillies.

Kulp seemed born to play the role, although publicity blurbs went out at the time the show debuted in 1962 that she had tested for Cousin Pearl but rejected because her Ozark accent wasn’t good enough. And the Hathaway role wasn’t the first regular part that Kulp had on TV. Here’s an unbylined story from the Hartford Courant of February 12, 1956.

Girl Comedian Years To Be Dramatic Star
Nancy Kulp, considered one of TV’s new comedy finds through appearances on the “Bob Cummings Show” over CBS TV, would rather be a serious actress. Despite all her efforts, however, everytime she goes dramatic all she gets are laughs.
Nancy found her niche early in the Cummings teleseries in the role of Pamela Livingston, girl bird-watcher, and has been written into the series many times since. In addition to acting, she also writes dramatics but hasn’t sold anything of note as yet.
Combining two careers dates back to Nancy’s college days at Florida State University from which she graduated in 1943. While there she developed, wrote and starred in a radio show, “Tassle McLaughlin, Woman,” a satire on soap operas. She left college with a journalism degree and joined the Waves for 2 ½ years. Hollywood got to know Nancy in 1951. She credits famed George Cukor, the director, for her first big chance in a picture, “Model and Marriage Broker,” in which she played a comedy role. Since then, besides films, she has been on such TV programs as “Video Theater,” “It’s a Great Life,” “Topper,” “Our Miss Brooks,” and “I Love Lucy.”
Nancy was born in Harrisburg, Pennsylvania, Aug. 28, 1921, and moved to Florida in 1933 with her parents. Even as a youngster she tried to be serious and won only laughs. This happened when she was just three years old.
“My mother and I were at a movie,” recalls Nancy. “The theater was dark and my mother suddenly missed me. A spot light was on the stage and there I was standing in the middle of it singing ‘Jesus Loves Me’ while the audience roared!”
Nancy vows that someday, and she hopes it will be soon, she’ll be up before the television cameras emoting like mad while tears come down the cheeks of the viewers at home. Making people cry will make her happy.

Before the war, Kulp had been with the Miami Beach Sun-Star and Kimberly-Clark Advertising, in addition to her radio work. Some time before February 1948, she had moved to WIOD, Miami. You can see more of how she got to Hollywood in the story to the right from the Lock Haven Express of February 4, 1952.

Now, a couple of clippings from after she made it big. First up is a syndicated column dated June 22, 1963, at the end of Hillbillies’ first season.

Frustrated Spinster Nancy Kulp Type-Cast
By HANK GRANT
Even before he'd cast the regular stars for his then-new Beverly Hillbillies series, creator-producer Paul Henning had decided that morose-looking, goggle-eyed Nancy Kulp would play the seedy-tweedy secretary, Jane Hathaway.
In fact, he created the role with Nancy in mind as a mere extension of her "birdwatching spinster" role on the old Bob Cummings Show, which Hemming had also produced.
Even before her rise to comedy recognition on the Bob Cummings Show, which provided her with five years of steady pay-checks, Nancy had already been type-cast as the perfect picture of a frustrated spinster.
One comedy star refused to use her again on his show, saying: "She stole every scene she was in with me. All she has to do is to purse her laps, roll her eyes Heaven-ward, and I'm dead — the laugh is hers!"
• • •
I FOUND Nancy much comelier than she appears on the screen, but when I complimented her on her beautiful, silky hair (it was a sincere comphment), she quickly asumed her familiar horsey-long face and we both laughed.
Encouraged by what was obviously a defense strategy against compliments, I asked Nancy this candid question: Is it possible that you play the frustrated spinster so well because the role parallels your real life?
• • •

WITHOUT batting an eye, she answered: "Unfortunately, that's true. I'm not a dyed-in-the-wool spinster; I was married once for a short time, but the only thing my husband and I had in common was a mutual love of laughs.
"Frustration has been a part of my life ever since I can remember. It runs in the family, too. Just when my father finally made a name for himself as one of the country's leading stock brokers, zoom! came the crash of '29!
"Even my great uncle, Samuel J. Tilden, suffered a frustration that was a lulu. He won the popular vote for President of the United States, but lost the office by one vote in the Electoral College!
• • •
"I'VE BEEN frustrated in practically everything I really wanted to do. Actually, I left Florida 12 years ago (where she'd headed publicity for two Miami radio stations) to come to Hollywood for a publicity career. Director George Cukor had me working as an actress before I'd been here two weeks.
"I hadn't even thought of becoming an actress, so I decided I'd be a serious one. Frustration, again.
"I'm quite happy, now, with good friends, a fine income and freedom to pursue any hobby I care to. But I'll continue to be frustrated till I either get some serious acting roles or a man who loves me seriously. So far, I've had neither!"
• • •
LIVING THE life of a bachelorette in Tarzana, in the San Fernando Valley, Nancy spends much of her free time looking for real estate bargains and antiques. She once had her own antique shop.
She's currently on vacation from Hillbillies but is acting in Jerry Lewis' movie "Who's Minding the Store." She's playing a white huntress.

This story is from the National Enterprise Association syndicate, June 5, 1965.

Nancy's Faith Renewed
By ERSKINE JOHNSON
Hollywood—After a change in time at the beginning of the TV season, the Beverly Hillbillies slumped to 33rd in the popularity ratings, then roared back by season's end into 8th place in the Top Ten.
The remarkable comeback of the show, always a target for critical barbs, assured Buddy Ebsen & Co. of a fourth year on home screens.
• • •
IT ALSO renewed Nancy Kulp's faith in audiences accepting a show at face value.
Nancy, who plays pompous secretary Jane Hathaway in the series, builds up a large head of steam whenever the series is rapped by critics, or ignored by TV people as not even being worthy of mention for Emmy consideration.
"It's absurd," snaps Nancy. "The show's existence is for only one reason—FUN. I think it's damn good fun, along with a lot of biting satire.
"I say, isn't there room for this? Can't our critics understand this? Can't they classify the show as strictly for fun? Our big audience accepts us on this merit alone and I suppose we should be grateful. But some people make me mad.
• • •

"I MET a man just the other day who said he didn't like the show. I asked him, 'Have you seen it?' His answer was 'No, of course not. I leave the room when my family tunes in.'
"Well, I sure told that fellow off. I asked him, 'Do you let critics do all your thinking? There was no answer, of course."
Nancy Kulp has had a strange career since arriving in Hollywood in 1951 to appear in movies and then TV. She was cast as a "broad Eve Arden type," but she also played heavies and roles calling for a Brooklyn accent.
She made her first big hit on TV as Pamela Livingstone, the bird watcher on The Bob Cummings Show. She credits this role with her zooming popularity as a comedienne.
• • •
"PAMELA WAS a real good character audiences liked," she says.
Before filming for the new season starts in July, Nancy is going on a 7000-mile, six-week tour of the U.S. in a station wagon. She will be sight-seeing and buying antiques, a hobby with her.
Since coming to Hollywood from Miami, where she studied journalism and worked in radio. Nancy was divorced.
What was her hubby's occupation?
Nancy sounds like bank secretary Jane Hathaway when she gives the question a double take.
"That's a marvelous question," she says, stringing out the words a la Jane. "You know, I don't recall that he ever had a job."

After Hillbillies, Kulp emulated Green Acres. She gave up city life and returned to the farm in Pennsylvania—and then witnessed what winter was like there, so back she went to California, becoming involved in several charity groups in Palm Springs. She died of cancer on February 3, 1991. You can read more about her earlier life by clicking on the clipping to the right.

Wolf Blows Up Real Fast

Ex Disney writers Dick Kinney and Milt Schaffer keep up a steady stream of gags in Red Riding Hoodlum, a 1957 cartoon starring Knothead and Splinter.

In one scene, the wolf pushes a dynamite plunger, only to blow himself up. He’s the bad guy, you know. Badness has to be punished.



The second drawing above takes up one frame. It would have been nice if there could have been a series of funny drawings so a take would register better with the audience.

Les Kline and Bob Bentley are the only credited animators. June Foray, Dal McKennon, Grace Stafford and the original voice of Smokey Bear are heard on the cartoon (the last two uncredited). To be honest, the 1950s Smokey PSAs looked better than this.

Doggie Ballet

Chuck Jones and his animators could do “coy” really well by the 1950s. Here’s Mark Antony the dog trying to distract its owner by doing some ballet moves in Kiss Me Cat (1953).



Ken Harris, Ben Washam and Lloyd Vaughan are the credited animators in this cartoon.

Jack Benny and Laugh-In

Rowan and Martin’s Laugh-In was supposed to be hip and new in 1968, but there were still vestiges of old comedy hanging around. The show was doing George Jessel jokes. And NBC seems to have shoved some of its old-timers it still had under contract in front of the camera. Young viewers must have thought “What are THESE people doing here?”

One of NBC’s old vaudevillians who showed up on Laugh-In was Jack Benny. But he was a wise old vaudevillian. For years and years, Jack made sure nothing was ever done on his radio or TV shows that didn’t fit his character. And he applied the same thing to his big appearance on Laugh-In on February 2, 1970.

Laugh-In was known for quick cuts and fast one-liners. Benny was known for anything but. He could stare immobile at an audience for 15 seconds and the laughs would build and build. When it came to Laugh-In, the writers simply played the slow Benny off the fast format.

Here’s a promotional story from newspapers just before the show aired. There’s no byline, so it could be the product of NBC’s publicity department.

'Laugh-In' confuses old Benny
HOLLYWOOD — Jack Benny acted bewildered, but he was having the time of his life.
“This is the third day on the show,” he said during a break. “It’s the most fun I’ve ever had as a guest. They handled me very well. It was never tiring for a second.” The show? “Rowan and Martin’s Laugh-In,” to be colorcast over NBC-TV 8 to 9 p.m. Monday.
Jack, who had been approached several times to do the show, finally agreed.
ALWAYS BEWILDERED
“The only suggestion I made was that I should appear constantly bewildered as to what was going on,” said Jack. “I felt this was better than just doing jokes.” Jack’s sense of bewilderment was not far from his reaction to the series when it first came on the air.
“When I was asked what I thought of it, I said I didn’t have the slightest idea how this show would do,” Jack recalled. “I said it might be a flop or the biggest sensation of the season. I didn’t know which. Neither way would have surprised me. I reserved comment.”
Benny continued watching the show and became a great fan.
ENJOYS PACE

“I enjoy watching it,” he said. “I like all the short bits. There’s always something else, and if one bit isn’t so funny, another one comes along quickly. I also love the Lucy show. I try to watch both when I’m home.”
Jack never felt that the ‘Laugh-In’ pace would be hard to sustain.
“The fact that they were able to keep up the pace didn’t surprise me,” said Jack. “The more shows they did, the more it worked. They can keep it up so long as they have the people to write for. If years from now they have trouble casting the show, then something could happen to it.”
Benny is high on the present cast.
“I liked Rowan and Martin long before they did ‘Laugh-In’,” said Jack. “They are very good. I think everyone in the cast is very good, both fellows and girls. I really mean it.”
GOLDIE HAWN
He singled out Goldie Hawn for special comment. “As far as Goldie Hawn is concerned,” said Jack, “nothing can keep her from being a great star. She wouldn't be able to get out of the way of stardom! The reason she is great is because she doesn’t realize herself why. Like Gracie Allen, Goldie doesn’t have the slightest idea why she is so good. I saw her in ‘Cactus Flower.’ They couldn’t have found anybody better, or as good. Even though she'll make a lot of pictures, she ought to continue doing ‘Laugh-In,’ when she has time. You can get into a picture that isn’t so good, but she is always so good on this show, and it will continue to be good for her.”
“Perhaps the greatest tribute Benny could pay the show is that he cites it professionally as a good lesson in comedy timing.
“Everybody can learn something from somebody else,” he said. “I hope others have learned something from what I have done. You can learn pacing from ‘Laugh-In.’ I tell my writers this. If a scene is not funny all the way through, cut it until it is funny. Move it, keep it going.”
He made one final suggestion in agreeing to do “Laugh-In.”
“They didn’t want to use the water bit with me,” said Jack. “I said to do the show right I told them to sock-it-to-me!”

I don’t like putting up posts with a lot of video because the links always seem to die. But, below, you can see clips of Jack’s appearance, though there isn’t the one where he gets socked-it-to. One of Benny’s radio writers, Hugh Wedlock, Jr., wrote for Laugh-In, but was gone by this season. Still, I suspect Jack heard some of these jokes, or variations on them, when on the Orpheum circuit in 1920.

Saturday Morning Cartoons, 1940s Style

There were Saturday morning cartoons before there were Saturday morning cartoons.

“Saturday morning cartoons” has become an umbrella term to describe made-for-TV animated shows that may, or may not, have aired on network television on Saturdays. It was a concept that evolved by the mid-‘60s. Before that, networks would run some non-animated programming, such as the wonderful Shari Lewis on NBC, in addition to old theatricals. Some networks didn’t even bother signing on until 9 a.m. because Saturday morning wasn’t a lucrative time period. How things changed!

But before cartoons showed up on the small screen on Saturday mornings, they appeared on the big screen on Saturday mornings or afternoons. Theatres in the 1940s and ‘50s, looking for whatever business they could get, staged what were dubbed in some cases “Cartoon Carnivals.” They’d rent a pile of cartoons from the local exchange and run them. Some theatres would add non-animated comedy shorts to the mix as well—Three Stooges, Lew Lehr, etc.

They were huge successes; some theatres programmed them for year. In fact, MGM got on the bandwagon as in 1956 the studio put together “The M-G-M Carnival” including seven Tom and Jerry cartoons and several live-action shorts. It debuted at the Plaza in New York City, where 73% of admissions on the first week were adults (Variety, Sept. 12, 1956).

But back to the kiddie matinees. Here’s a story from April 1, 1948 from one of the papers in Pittsburgh. I failed to find an ad listing the various cartoons at the festival in question. It seems it was set up like a vaudeville programme—the first act was one that, if you missed it, you wouldn’t be missing the stars. In this case, it’s a 1947 Columbia cartoon starring the Fox and Crow. It reveals, among other things, that pre-Boomers were rude slobs. And they seem more interested in the junk food (as theatre owners were hoping) than the cartoons.

All-Cartoon Shows Growing in Popularity
By James W. Ross
Post-Gazette Staff Writer

ROY ROGERS and Gene Autrey [sic] be burnin' up the plains and scatterin' the rustlers out yonder, stranger, but around these parts they'd better tighten up their cinches and get set for some real hard ridin'.
This is cartoon territory.
And this is the day of the “All-Cartoon Show.”
“17-Count ‘Em-17 Genuine Cartoons—Not a Live Actor in the Bunch”—and the kids are eating them up.
Started here about two years ago, the all-cartoon shows have been steadily growing in popularity with children of all ages, and reached a peak Easter Monday when one major chain alone scheduled them for 13 different neighborhood movies.
THEY'RE only held about four or five a year, usually at holidays, and theaters and management couldn't take it if the kids wanted them oftener.
At the Whitehall Theater, Brownsville road, the youngsters started to line up at 8:30, even though the show was set to start at 10:30.
The price was a flat two bits, and many a tyke had a fistful of change. The trick is to get one guy to buy a batch of tickets so everyone doesn't have to stand in line. One boy just about threw the harassed cashier by dumping out a fistful of 25 pennies.
BUSINESS is at its best at the popcorn counter. If a regular movie calls for one box, a cartoon show seems to indicate two or more. Plus candy. Plus innumerable drinks of water both before and during the show.
When about half of the 1,200 youngsters were seated, a young usher hurried up to the manager. "There's a couple of kids here with water guns. What do I do?" "Find them and take the guns away," the manager called back as he ran to the door to untangle the snarled line.
One girl, about 16, walked down the aisle looking for a seat. A small boy, who could have been her kid brother, wagged his finger at her and sing-songed "I'm gonna tell your boy friend. Coming to see a cartoon show with a bunch of little kids!"
WHEN the first of the 17 cartoons on the screen, a shout rose from the audience, 'then a hush to end all hushes settled in. The first cartoon, by the way, was titled, "Tooth or Consequence."
There was "Mighty Mouse" and "Tom and Jerry" and "Popeye" and "Mighty Mouse" again, and more and more up to 17.
Bigger boys lolled beyond the first row of seats, on a floor carpeted with spilled popcorn.
The little guys and girls, some of them on their mother's laps, craned to see what everyone else was laughing at. Titles were read aloud, quietly and in unison, apparently in an agreement to supply the small fry with the information.
STRANGELY enough, most are glad the end of 17 cartoons, although they usually count just to make sure they're getting a full measure.
At the Whitehall, and in several other movies, there was an added inducement to leaving "Free to everyone attending—a five-cent candy bar."

Cartoon carnivals, of sorts, still exist today. There have been animation festivals though, while not necessarily pretentious, are for people who want to examine Cartoon As Film-with-a-capital-F and not as entertainment. Jerry Beck posts about occasional animation roundups at theatres around the Los Angeles area that are fun events for fans. Popcorn available, we suspect. And on the other side of the U.S., Tom Stathes gets out his canisters of old reels and puts together a showing at a small venue for groups of diehards and friends. Want to see a Van Beuren, or a silent Farmer Alfalfa (with live musical accompaniment) or some creepy stop-motion film from 80 or so years ago? That’s where you go.

Maybe there are more of these kinds of showings elsewhere but I rarely hear of any. Too bad. Having first seen Tex Avery’s Magical Maestro on the big screen, I can say that watching cartoons at home is always entertaining, but there’s nothing like rows full of people in theatre seats laughing at a pair of rabbits suddenly joining Poochini in a Hawaiian dance.

The Other Place

I’ll show those pigs that I’m not stuck.
If I can’t blow it down, I’ll blow it up.

The Big Bad Wolf in The Three Little Bops meets his demise in a typical Warren Foster joke. He moves further and further away so his fuse won’t get blown out but he ends up so far away, he blows himself up (to the sound of a saxophone which none of the pigs/bops are playing).



Well, the Big Bad Wolf was really gone
And with him went his corny horn.
Went out of this world without a trace.
Didn’t go to Heaven, was the other place.

Director Friz Freleng has the camera pan around the background.



Freleng makes makes a cut and pans down, then dissolves to the camera moving down some more and resting on animation of the wolf playing the trumpet softly.



Gerry Chiniquy and Bob Matz are the credited animators, with Irv Wyner providing stylised backgrounds.

Jippo Kills

Jippo endows its imbibers with different reactions in the warped Fleischer cartoon Betty Boop M.D. (1932). An invalid drinks some, starts scat singing and dancing, then dies. He makes his own grave, then his grave plants a scat singing flower.



Willard Bowsky and Tom Goodson are the credited animators.

Flynn No Failure

He was 30 years old, and considered himself a failure.

He had run for political office in Ohio and lost. He came west, was a graduate student speech at USC and planned to go into teaching, according to a 1953 Los Angeles Times story. Instead, at age 30 in 1955, he was the host of KTTV’s Whatsa Name, where four fashion models attempted to identify relatives of famous people.

It wasn’t quite the career path he was hoping for.

But things picked up and he got his big break in 1962, a TV role that made him famous to millions. He became “Old Leadbottom.”

That’s when Joe Flynn was enlisted for McHale’s Navy.

Flynn eventually became so well known that he became a “type.” Producer Mark Evanier once related how Joe Barbera wanted to hire Flynn to, basically, repeat his McHale’s Navy characterisation on a cartoon series but then hired John Stephenson instead because Stephenson sounded more like Flynn than Flynn did.

United Press International’s Hollywood reporter, Vernon Scott, talked to Flynn while the series was still on. His first column was published on May 29, 1963, and in it Flynn seems to place a great amount of importance on being important. I admit I’m confused about what Scott means when he says “He holds little brief for Bishop, however.” I presume Flynn and the dour Bishop didn’t get along.

Love to Hate Joe's Role
By VERNON SCOTT
HOLLYWOOD (UPI)—Persistence and a photogenic snarl have finally paid off for character actor Joe Flynn, who claims he's had a hundred false starts at achieving stardom.
For the uninitiated, Flynn (definitely no relation to Errol) plays the sulphurous Capt. Wallace Binghamton in video's "McHale's Navy"—a character you love to hate.
But to Flynn the dyspeptic despot of a miserable PT-boat base is an archangel.
Were it not for Binghamton, Flynn would still be lost in the horse latitudes of show biz searching for a claim to fame.
FOR MORE than 15 years the bespectacled performer has wandered around seeking fortune and a modicum of fame. He has appeared in 50 movies and 350 television shows, including regular stints with George Gobel, Bob Newhart and Joey Bishop. He holds little brief for Bishop, however.
"It's a terrible thing to wake up one morning and find yourself 30 years old and a failure," Flynn said.
He was dispatching lunch in the Universal City commissary. Dressed in his Navy captain's uniform he looked every inch an actor. A former Army sergeant, even Flynn admits he couldn't pass for an old sea dog in real life.
"Guys I had gone to school with were doctors, lawyers and successful politicians," he continued in an obvious attempt to garner pity, "but I was still on the fringes of show business.
"I took every part offered me, from one-line bits to support roles in movies.

"EACH TIME I'd complete something worthwhile I was assured by the producer, my agent and friends that I was on my way. 'Just wait until this comes out,' they'd say.
"Well, I'd wait and out would come a bomb."
It was something of a surprise, then when "McHale's Navy" became ABC-TV's big hit of the year. People recognize Flynn on the street now, and he's hearing from old friends--doctors, lawyers and successful politicians, for example.
"It's a thrilling thing to be recognized and to have strangers address you by name," said Flynn. "And I get a big kick out of playing Binghamton. He's a cowardly naval officer. But having been a cowardly sergeant I was well prepared to play the role.
"The world is full of Binghamtons. And we all have at least one of them in our lives that we like to see get his lumps.
"AT THE SAME time he does get some sympathy because, like most of us, he wants to be something he isn't. At least he tries, and you have to give him credit for that."
Because Flynn was stomping around the boondocks of show biz for so long even small touches of status elevate his morale. A few weeks ago he arrived on the set to discover that a canvas chair had been added to the stage one with his name (Joe Flynn) stenciled on the back. He almost came down with the vapors.
"Nobody will ever know how much that meant to me," he concluded. "I was so proud of it I didn't sit in the chair all day. I didn't want to sit down and cover up my name." The name is Flynn, F-L-Y-N-N - like in Errol.

Now that Flynn was a success, he seems to have settled into a comfortable, drab life. Scott pulls a punch here. Flynn didn’t like Ernie Borgnine but nowhere in the story does he or Scott explain why. Maybe Flynn was a fan of Ethel Merman, I don’t know.

This story appeared on June 6, 1964.

Joe Flynn Smokes Pipe in Secret Because of Sponsor
By VERNON SCOTT
UPI Hollywood Correspondent
HOLLYWOOD (UPI) — Joe Flynn, the vile-tempered Capt Binghamton of “McHale's Navy,” is a placid soul off-screen who dabbles in politics and loafs as much as possible.
He’s a secret pipe-smoker because the show is sponsored by a cigaret company.
Another thing, he’s not particularly fond of his co-star, Ernest Borgnine. When he shouts at Commander McHale in a scene he is venting his own wrath at Borgnine.
If nothing else, that proves Flynn is courageous. Even he admits that big Ernie could dismember him with a single shot to the incisors.
Away from the set Flynn leads the good life. He likes nothing better than to settle down in a comfortable chair with a highball.
The easy chair most likely will be an Italian provincial number in his contemporary home in Benedict Canyon, a genteel section of Beverly Hills. He and his wife Shirley (married eight years) have lived in the four-bedroom, three-bath house for the past three years. They have two sons, Tony, 5, and Kenneth Conrad (K.C.), 4.
The senior Flynns collect paintings—28 in all—ranging from modern impressionists to abstracts. Flynn enjoys just looking at them. Around the house he is totally useless.

“I’m not a handyman,” he says drily, “but I have a great knack for going to the yellow pages (of the telephone book).”
Every work day the actor is up at 5:30 in the morning and seldom returns before 6:30 p.m. He’s home for dinner every night.
“I’m on the Three-S diet,” he boasts, “Steak, Salad and Scotch. We exist almost exclusively on beef—steaks, roasts, hamburger, meatloaf and stew—Shirley cooks them all well.”
Joe drives a 1962 sedan while Shirley pilots the children around in a sports compact.
If Flynn appears to be more affluent than his television salary might indicate, it is only fair to state that he also owns two parking lots in the heart of Beverly Hills. The Comstock Lode produced less gold.
Capitalist Flynn has refused to buy a pet for his youngsters. For himself, however, he has a year-old cocker spaniel named Guy.
Flynn is remarkably proud of the fact that he is a lounge lizard, a total stranger to exercise. He does not play golf, swim or play tennis. Just watching such exertions gives him the bends, at least at the elbows.
His friends are mostly performers—George Gobel, Bob Newhart, Robert Vaughn and Tim Conway, who plays the hare-brained Navy ensign on “McHale's Navy.”
The Flynns rarely entertain and rarely dine out. A big night in the family consists of a visit with friends. Joe prefers to relax with a good biography or history book and hit the hay early.
A gardener relieves Flynn of hacking around the shrubs and flowers, the thought of which appalls him. A steady housekeeper makes life easier for Shirley.
Frequently Flynn devotes his weekends to the U.S. Navy, traveling around in his Captain’s uniform for benefits, telethons and a variety of Navy functions. Sometimes he is paid. Sometimes not.
He takes along his stand-in and secretary, Jimmy Jones, who does the driving and handles his fan mail.
When not in uniform Flynn lazes around in sweaters and slacks.
He is much in demand as master of ceremonies for Democratic Party functions. He is an ardent Democrat and longtime friend of Jesse Unruh, California’s “big daddy" of Democratic politics.
This summer Flynn and his pretty wife are vacationing in Europe, safe in the knowledge that he won't have to wear his Navy uniform for two whole months.

McHale’s Navy left the air in 1966. Flynn’s personal friendship and on-camera chemistry with Conway led to the two starring in a sitcom called The Tim Conway Show in 1970. It was one of Conway’s numerous failures. At least it got to air. In 1972, Flynn shot a comedy pilot with Soupy Sales called The Bear and I that went nowhere. In early 1967, Flynn and Jack Weston filmed a Dragnet parody called Ready and Willing. It got an airing seven years later as part of NBC Monday Night at the Movies.

But Flynn found steady employment in Disney family comedies until his untimely death in his swimming pool at age 49 in 1974.

The Colour of Danger

Here’s another reason why Don Patterson should have kept his director’s job at Walter Lantz.

There’s a good colour change effect at the start of Termites From Mars (1953). As the Martian danger approaches in various gag situation, the sky turns darker and more ominous, becoming various shades of magenta.



Later Lantz cartoons wouldn’t have bothered with all this. They would have gone for the gag (ship becomes a sub, plane hides in a volcano, skyscrapers turn into huge gun barrels) and that’s it.

There’s no story credit on this short. La Verne Harding, Ray Abrams and Paul J. Smith are the animators.