prey for Cas Walker

The dream of almost everyone who has done a commercial voiceover is to become a cartoon character. I've always been a fan of the voices behind the drawings. When I was casting the radio dramas we did at KLOS, I would be sure to get some talented voice actors to work alongside the more well-known celebrities. Jess Harnell was in all of my productions. At other times we had Nancy Cartwright, Christine Cavanaugh and the legendary June Foray. Mark Hamill was in several of our productions. He is known for his on-camera performance in "Star Wars" but truly shines for his voiceover work as the Joker in "Batman: The Animated Series" and other roles.

The topic of voiceovers came to mind when my friend Sandy Weaver Carman left a comment on my blog entry about downloading a Mark Twain audiobook. DC radio fans will certainly remember Sandy as one of the best deejays to ever grace the market with her work at Q107 and WAVA. She recently launched her own voiceover business and a blog that will help push her name to the top of the search results.

Sandy's blog inspired me to add some newer samples on my own voiceover page. I recently did a couple of radio commercials using character voices. Although I have yet to become the voice of an animated cartoon character, publicist Zane Hagy asked me to create a voice for Ronnie Raccoon, the spokesplushy for Saving Little Hearts, a charity for kids with congenital heart defects.



One day last week, there was a slight advertising emergency at the radio station. A local used car dealer wanted someone to do a superhero voice for their new commercial. The others who had tried it weren't "whitebread" enough. Strangely, I was asked to give it a try. Because of the circumstances, there was a rush to get it done. On my way to the studio, I saw that the script called for three voices. I thought it might be funny if I did all of them myself. If it didn't sound right, they could still get somebody else to be the announcer or the woman in distress. Gene Wooten added some reverb and the perfect music. Bottom line: the client loved the spot and wants to do more. Former radio PD Gishelle Diva Gish called the request line on Sunday to tell me that she too thought the spot was good. Click here to take a listen for yourself. C'mon it's only 30 seconds!

surprise at the pearly gates

George Carlin seemed younger than 71. Maybe not in appearance but certainly in attitude. If someone asked you last week, could you have guessed that he was born in the 1930s? Yesterday morning I awoke to the startling news that Carlin had died. Although he was only a couple of years younger than my parents, he didn't behave like a member of their generation.

The 28-year-old Carlin was virtually unrecognizable in some footage from a 1965 episode of "The Merv Griffin Show." He was clean-cut and doing a more standard form of shtick reminiscent of Rodney Dangerfield. By the time he hosted the first "Saturday Night Live" in 1975, he had reinvented himself into the comedian we all knew. That could explain why he seemed younger than he was.

When asked for a reaction, Jay Leno told ABC News, "If there was ever a comedian who was a voice of their generation it was George Carlin." Leno's quote for USA Today was "He was a student of Lenny Bruce, and, like him, he spoke directly to his generation." Uh, Jay? Please see paragraphs one and two above.

I remember first listening to one of Carlin's comedy albums while visiting some second cousins in Baltimore. They let me use headphones so as not to disturb the grown-ups. And by grown-ups, I mean the people in the house who were closest to Carlin's age.

George Carlin was one of the many celebrities to appear on KLOS while I worked there. I think he was promoting a book at the time. Or maybe an HBO special. Or possibly both. Carlin was nothing short of prolific. I may not agree with all his beliefs, but I am glad to have met him. I think I may have had him sign a book. If I did, it would be packed away in in box in the basement.

Yesterday I flipped over to NPR as part of my resolution to listen to it more often. They were rerunning an interview with George Carlin from 2004. In the segment I heard, the interviewer asked George about his philosophy of life. In her question, she aptly described it as a mix of narcissism and mysticism. Then she asked about his heart attacks and his thoughts on death. He talked about how he would be sad to know that his life was ending whether he had a minute, a month or a year's notice that his time was up. I wonder what was going through the interviewer's mind as she asked the questions. Was she thinking ahead to the day the interview would eventually be replayed?

one down, nineteen to go

At the urging of my friend Tim, I tried listening to some NPR this week. Today I heard a show that was so good, I'm kicking myself for not knowing about it sooner. Fortunately all twenty past episodes of Radiolab are available online. They produce five episodes per season.

The episode that got me hooked was about the famous 1938 broadcast of "War of the Worlds." I downloaded the mp3 so I can hear the parts I missed while out of the car. People who posted comments on the show's blog loved it as much as I did.

Every Halloween some radio stations would rerun the old Mercury Theatre show. I used to hear it as a kid in New York on WOR. In L.A. it was on KNX. While I was at KLOS, I produced and directed a version of "War of the Worlds" at the Museum of Television & Radio, as it was known back then. We paid some old guy for the rights and used the same script.

In our production, Paul Sorvino played the Orson Welles part. I cast Paul Moyer and Colleen Williams from KNBC and Leonard Maltin from "Entertainment Tonight" in the roles of the newscasters who "interrupt" the program. They were all great but it was William Shatner who stole the show. He played Carl Phillips, the reporter who (spoiler alert) gets burned up by the Martians. Shatner got a well-deserved standing ovation during our first commercial break.

to pry or not to pry

John Charles Carter died yesterday. The world knew him as Charlton Heston, the star of two of my favorite movies, "Planet of the Apes" and "The Ten Commandments." I had the pleasure of meeting him twice.

Mr. Heston visited KLOS a couple of times to promote his books. It is unusual for a movie star of his magnitude to do a radio interview. He came because the publishing business has a better appreciation for the power of radio than the movie industry. I was there when he came in to plug "To Be a Man: Letters to My Grandson." On another occasion we needed to bring the show to him. I can't remember exactly why. I made a few calls to his house and spoke with Mrs. Heston to make plans for the broadcast. On the appointed day, we took the Mark & Brian Mobile up Coldwater Canyon Drive to the Heston home. The entire interview was conducted in the driveway, near his grandson's sandbox.

The broadcast from Heston's driveway was similar to our on-air visits to the exteriors of the homes of Peter Falk and John Travolta. We didn't presume to set foot in their houses either.

who doesn't?

When they said the Osmonds would be on stage tonight, they really meant it. By the end of their concert, the stage was completely packed with Osmonds, performing and otherwise. They were the headline entertainment at the Children's Miracle Awards, part of the Children's Miracle Network Celebration going on this week at Walt Disney World.



My wife and I wanted to see the performance but we wanted to skip the black-tie dinner that preceded it for two reasons. First, we didn't bring any formal wear with us to Florida. Second, the entrée was filet mignon on a Lenten Friday. Instead we went to Epcot to get fish for dinner. And by fish, I mean sushi at Tokyo Dining.



After dinner we tried to hurry back to the Coronado Springs Resort. Because it took us a long time to find a bus going from the hotel to Epcot before dinner, we thought it might be faster to make our return trip via Monorail from Epcot to the Magic Kingdom and then by bus back to the hotel. It wasn't. We worried that we might miss the Osmonds. Instead that fortunate mistake put us in the right place at the right time to have our pictures taken with Donny Osmond, who was crossing the hallway outside the ballroom about half an hour before showtime.



We used our ticket to the formal dinner to slip in to the back of the ballroom where we found a lone empty table just waiting for us. The award ceremony was almost over. Before long, the Osmonds (including Alan) came on and sang shortened versions of their hits. To mark their 50th anniversary in show business, the four original Osmond Brothers sang an old barbershop song about an auction. Donny & Marie came on to sing a medley of their most famous songs including "Little Bit Country / Rock and Roll," "Soldier of Love," "Paper Roses" and "Puppy Love." Marie stepped aside to let her brothers sing a medley. The only song of theirs that I recognized was "One Bad Apple." They had an odd song about horses and some loud pyrotechnics that took the crowd by surprise.

For their finale, the performing Osmonds brought on their two oldest brothers who are deaf. Jimmy was given the task of explaining how the performing Osmond Brothers got their start as a way to raise money for the education of the two deaf brothers. The serious mood was broken by a series of Wayne's corny jokes (wear two pair of pants when golfing in case you get a hole-in-one). Marie got choked up and got the crowd feeling the same way as she talked about what it must be like to be born deaf into a musical family. Then Donny invited all the other Osmonds in the audience to join them as they sang "He Ain't Heavy, He's My Brother." The two eldest signed as the others sang.

I had a chance to chat separately with Donny and Marie during my remote broadcast on Star 102.1 this morning. It's been about four and a half years since I last saw Donny at a Morning Show Bootcamp convention and about ten years since I booked him as a guest on KLOS. Every time I see him, Donny remembers me from when he would visit the Don & Mike show at WAVA. We were one of the first stations to play "Soldier of Love." One memorable morning we had Donny ride through DC in a limo while standing in the sunroof opening and shouting to passersby "I'm Donny Osmond, don't you wish you were me?"

please, please, please don't go away

The TV in our living room stayed tuned to WATE all evening for "Lost" and the new show that followed. "Eli Stone" was pretty good and worth watching again next week. One of the stars is Natasha Henstridge, who first became famous in the movie "Species." I remember when she visited KLOS to promote "Species II." As I recall, she was pregnant at the time. A few months before I started my blog, I saw Natasha at the 2005 "American Idol" finale party. I would have liked to have had my picture taken with her but the opportunity didn't present itself. Instead I took a picture of Natasha posing with a fellow partygoer because she looked a bit like my Aunt Kitty McArdle. Not Natasha, the other lady. I've been hanging on to the picture all this time in case I ever had reason to write about either Natasha or Aunt Kitty even though she wasn't really a relative but a close family friend.



The 11 o'clock news on WATE had another story about the unusual advertising campaign for "Lost." My grandmother will probably be interested to know that Knoxville has one of only a very few Oceanic Air billboards. Maybe the placement of that billboard means Sawyer is one of the "Oceanic Six." I'll have to ask Grandma if she started watching "Lost" again. She had thought about giving up the show when it became too much about the Others.

Speaking of WATE, I will miss their noon newscast. Terry Morrow reports that the station will drop the broadcast after tomorrow. I was one of the people who watched it almost every day. Other stations owned by the same company have been canceling newscasts and making staff cutbacks. I was glad to see in Terry's report that Lori Tucker is staying put.

There's still one more show on WATE for me tonight. I will record "Jimmy Kimmel Live," as I always do and watch it later. Tonight he celebrates five years on the air. Happy anniversary Jimmy!

oodles of noodles

Unlike some viewers, I am not suffering from "TiVorexia" because of the writers strike. There are still plenty of shows for me to watch on my assorted DVRs. Here's my advice for those people with nothing to watch: lower your standards. I've started recording some movies on HBO, Cinemax and Starz now that they are broadcast in HD. I haven't watched them yet because I haven't run out of regular shows.

In addition to a backlog of shows like "Smallville" and "Reaper" recorded this fall, I can once again choose to watch every new "Jimmy Kimmel Live" show. The other night Jay Thomas was the guest. I will always be thankful to Jay for casting me as an extra on one episode of his sitcom, "Love & War." He started the segment by saying that he and Jimmy had never met before. It was a little surreal for me. I mean it's not everyday that you see co-workers from two different jobs having a conversation on national television about a third person you know. I worked with Jay at KPWR and with Jimmy at KROQ. Most of the segment centered on Jay's story about going "noodling" for catfish in Oklahoma with my friend Rodney Lee Conover. Rodney now works with Jay at Sirius and also worked at KPWR when I was there.

Jimmy got Jay to name all the cities where he had worked in radio. Knoxville was on the list. I either didn't know or had forgotten that Jay passed through here. I knew that Mark Thompson, a co-worker of mine from KLOS, had Knoxville on his résumé. I think Mark was on the air at WRJZ. Anybody know what station Jay Thomas was on? Sounds like a good question for Knoxville Radio History 101.

if ever he would leave us

The great Robert Goulet has died of pulmonary fibrosis. He was always one of my favorite radio guests. He never broke character but still seemed to understand the inherent campiness of his appearance on the morning shows I produced back then. At WAVA, Don & Mike would pre-promote the next appearance of "Goulet on the Zoo" more than most other guest bookings. Each year the largest and best Christmas card I received was postmarked in Las Vegas and bore a return address that said "ROGO & ROVE." The card always had a new photo of Robert and his wife Vera on the front.

During my time at KLOS, we would put on old-fashioned radio plays. At first it was just "A Christmas Carol." Later we expanded it to "The War of the Worlds" one Halloween and two episodes of "The Witch's Tale" the next year. Our most ambitious effort was probably the production of "The Wizard of Oz" we did one Easter. Dwight Yoakam was the first celebrity to sign up. He knew right away that he wanted to play the Cowardly Lion. Mark & Brian wanted to play the Tin Woodman and the Scarecrow but neither wanted to sing, especially since they would be compared to Dwight. I had the idea to get them a stunt double, somebody who was a consummate professional yet would get the joke. We didn't tell the audience about it in advance. The listeners were expecting to hear Brian sing "If I Only Had a Brain" and Mark sing "If I Only Had a Heart" but instead they heard the robust voice of Robert Goulet both times. You can see Mr. Goulet in the center of the cast photo below.



I still hear Robert Goulet's voice every night singing the theme song to "Jimmy Kimmel Live." My deepest sympathy goes to Vera and the rest of his family.

eighth wonder of the world

Rather than sit in weekend traffic through Sevierville and Pigeon Forge, I opted to take a more scenic route from Morristown to Gatlinburg today. I drove south on I-81 to I-40 and headed east, where I picked up U.S. Route 321 in Cocke County. I was only passing through and did not see anything unusual. It was probably a greater distance than if I had taken exit 407 but I got to keep moving and see a less developed side of the Smokies. Along the way, I enjoyed some hyper-local radio. One AM station had some great cheesy jingles and frequent weather reports between their moldy oldies. A local FM station was in the middle of a four-hour remote from a client. Both reminded me a little of my favorite station, WLNG in Sag Harbor, New York.

My wife and I had been invited to a wedding and reception in Gatlinburg. The wedding was at St. Mary Catholic Church and the reception was at Lineberger's Seafood Company. The bride is a fourth grade teacher. During the reception, she read aloud from some essays her students had written on the topic "How to Be a Good Husband." One young girl wrote, "if your wife ever wants anything, buy it for her."

As I looked out from the restaurant balcony at the crowded sidewalks and shops below, I was reminded of a recent Metro Pulse article by an intern making her first trip to Pigeon Forge. A new tourist attraction is being built next door to the restaurant. It's the third location of the Hollywood Wax Museum. They also have one in Branson and one in Hollywood. I went into the museum in Hollywood when my friend Pam Baker and I were scouting possible locations for Mark & Brian's star on the Hollywood Walk of Fame. As it turned out, their star was placed right by the museum. The new Gatlinburg wax museum has a gigantic likeness of King Kong to grab the attention of visitors. During the wedding reception, I tried to surreptitiously take a photo of the bride and groom with King Kong in the background. Ultimately it was just easier to ask them to pose for the blog.

putting the MT in CMT

"Have you seen the new Alison Kraus music video?" asked my friend Mary. Truthfully, I hadn't seen any Alison Kraus videos, new or old. Because I knew Mary to be a fan of the rock music when she and I worked together at KLOS and at the Comedy World Radio Network, she felt that she had to explain. Mary said it was her husband, not she, who was watching CMT when the video came on.

Tonight I flipped over to PBS hoping to catch one of my favorite bands, Buckwheat Zydeco on the tribute to Paul Simon. Several famous artists did cover versions of Paul Simon songs. As fate would have it, I missed Buckwheat but saw Alison Kraus. The show repeats tomorrow afternoon. I'll have more to say about cover songs tomorrow too.

Regardless of who is responsible, Mary and her husband noticed that Mark Thompson (of Mark & Brian fame) is in the Alison Kraus video playing the part of a sound engineer. The action takes place in a recording studio as Alison and John Waite sing a duet version of his 1984 hit "Missing You." Mark has been doing a lot of acting and screen writing lately. Mary will get to display some of her fancy flute playing on the soundtrack to Mark's next film, "Two: Thirteen."

paley in comparison

One of my favorite places has a new name. The Museum of Television & Radio is now known as the Paley Center for Media. The museum and I go way back. I used to go there when I was in high school and the museum was still known as the Museum of Broadcasting. At some point they decided that the word "broadcasting" wasn't broad enough for the scope of their collection. They had started to include shows that were made for cable and hadn't been broadcast over the air.

When I worked at KROQ, I arranged for the morning show to broadcast from the museum in New York while we were there to cover the MTV Video Music Awards. When I worked at KLOS, I arranged for the morning show to broadcast from the museum in Beverly Hills so that we could put on old time radio plays in their John H. Mitchell Theater.

I once sent an email to "The View" to complain about the way Barbara Walters always referred to the museum. I think she called it the Museum of Television & Broadcasting. My complaint was that she omitted radio. Now she can just call it the Pawey Centaw.

a comedy tragedy

Sometimes a death can bring people together. At every funeral I've been to, somebody says that it's great to see you again but that they're sorry it has to be under these circumstances. Somebody else will say that the only time we ever get together anymore is at funerals and weddings. I hadn't talked with my friend Charlie Reinke in a long time. The sad news of Richard Jeni's death prompted me to call Charlie today.

Charlie is a comedy writer in Burbank. We met because our daughters went to grammar school together. As our families became good friends, our wives would often make plans for the four of us. Charlie and I would occasionally go to TV show tapings using tickets that either he or I had gotten through a business contact. I've mentioned before that Charlie's wife, Anja, is running for city council.

I called Charlie to talk about Richard Jeni. We had taken our wives to see Richard perform at the Ice House and had gone backstage to say hi. Charlie and I were in the audience for a taping of Richard's UPN sitcom, "Platypus Man." Charlie told me tonight how Richard would sometimes make a guest appearance in the comedy writing class that Charlie took when he was getting started in the business. Two of the first three jokes he sold were to a TV show called "Caroline's Comedy Hour" and were delivered by Richard Jeni.

I am a fan of Richard's comedy. I've watched his HBO specials and I booked him to appear on KLOS several times. The program director once asked me to find a comedian to entertain between sets at a classic rock concert the station was hosting at the Glen Helen Pavilion in San Bernardino. I arranged for Richard Jeni to do it but it didn't go well. The road crew for the next band refused to stop soundchecking the drums during Jeni's performance. As Richard valiantly tried to get laughs, you could hear the roadie slowly pounding on each drum in the kit and monotonously saying "one, one, one" then "two, two, two" and so on into a microphone.

Charlie hopes to go to memorial service for Richard. He suggested that I check a blog entry from the wife of comedy writer T. Sean Shannon on her MySpace page. On "The View" this morning, the women mentioned a blog posting about Richard written by Elayne Boosler. It will be the last thing I read before bed tonight.

on deadline

The editors at USA Today chose today's paper to list the notable figures who died in 2006. Why couldn't they wait for the year to end? I seem to recall that they've done this before. This year it backfired on them more so than usual. The death of former president Gerald Ford was reported late last night, after USA Today had gone to press. Not only is his passing missing from the list of 2006 deaths, he's not mentioned anywhere in the paper.

There are some other celebrities who've died on the day after Christmas. One of the first celebrity deaths that I remember from childhood was the passing of former president Harry Truman. Jack Benny, Jason Robards and Reggie White also died on December 26th.

While reading the list of entertainers who died in 2006, I was reminded of my blog entry from February 6th. I wrote about the deaths of Al Lewis and Fayard Nicholas, both of whom I had the opportunity to meet. I've met two other stars who died this year. I booked Jack Palance to appear on the Mark & Brian show once or twice while I worked there. I would have met Steve Irwin too but I was on jury duty the day he visited KLOS. Because Steve was not yet well known in America, I had to persuade Mark & Brian to say yes when the booking was offered to us.

My other "brush with greatness" (or could I say "brush with late-ness"?) happened back when I worked in the box office at Wolf Trap Farm Park for the Performing Arts. My boss asked two or three of us to accompany him to a late night performance at the Madeira School (yes, that Madeira School). We were to sell tickets to a Wolf Trap sponsored performance of some opera. The conductor was the larger-than-life Sarah Caldwell. I won't speak ill of the dead, so I'll just say that she was a little different. Okay, okay... She could have used a shower and she could have been nicer to the people working the event. How's that?

rock that town

How far would you drive to see one of your favorite bands in concert? An hour? Maybe two? How about three hours? My family and I drove that far when I was given some tickets to see Rockapella perform at Georgia Tech. Atlanta is about 3 hours south of Knoxville while Nashville is about three hours west of here. Concert tours are much more likely to be routed through one of those bigger markets than through KnoxVegas.

Check out the web version of an email sent to "radio professionals" today. It says that Brian Setzer has a new CD and it lets you hear the track "Everybody's Up To Somethin'." Best of all, it says that Brian is bringing the whole orchestra to the Ryman Auditorium in Nashville for a Christmas concert on December 7. I would love to get some tickets if I can figure out how to get enough sleep and still make it to work the next morning. I need to try because Brian told a Minneapolis newspaper that he will probably retire the BSO after this year's holiday tour.

Mr. Setzer is responsible for some of my favorite radio memories. One morning we packed the whole Brian Setzer Orchestra into the studio, offices and hallways at KROQ for a live performance. I still remember the thrill I got a couple of years later when I first heard the Orchestra's version of "Rock This Town" while they were in the KLOS studio. I am reminded of the feeling every time I listen to that track on my mp3 player/phone. One year when the NAB convention was in Los Angeles, I went to some downtown hotel to hear Brian play in a suite on the top floor. The lobby was swarming with a hundred or so radio guys when Setzer arrived and headed for the elevator bank. He made me feel like a million bucks when he spotted me in the crowd and shouted, "hey Frank!"