...it's not dark yet, but it's gettin' there...
I really can't stand The Beatles. So this next video was already at a disadvantage from my point of view. It's from the October 17, 1967, episode of The Hollywood Palace (see below for a description of that show).
In this number, Sgt. Pepper's Lonely Hearts Club Band consists of Petula Clark on triangle, Lynn Redgrave on cymbals, and Noel Harrison on bass drum.
Noel Harrison is the son of legendary stage actor Rex Harrison. You probably know his father as professor Henry Higgins from the film My Fair Lady. Anyway, Noel Harrison did a lot of tv work, but he also sang "The Windmills of Your Mind" in one of my favorite Steve McQueen movies ever, The Thomas Crown Affair.
I found all this out, by the way, through skilled cross-referencing of IMDb and Wikipedia.
Anyways, the following video is most notable for the way they butcher Sgt. Pepper, which is a song that under the best of circumstances will cause me to change the radio station whenever it comes on. But do watch the intro, because I have more trivia to tell you about that.
Did you recognize the guy at the beginning? Yes, that was the one and only George Sanders. I will always remember him best for his portrayal of Addison DeWitt, the duplicitious Broadway gossip columnist in All About Eve. But he also stood out in Hitchcock's Foreign Correspondent and Rebecca, and as Lord Wotton in The Picture of Dorian Gray. George Sanders epitomized the sarcastically droll over-educated Englishman.
You might also know that George Sanders married two of the Gabor sisters. He famously commited suicide in 1972 near Barcelona, because he was simply bored. I don't doubt it, if he was taking jobs like the one in that video above.
Good God, that was painful.
Posted by: Stew on Nov. 15, 2006Petula-Fest was awesome. Even this was awesome in its double-plus unawesome way.
Posted by: Victor on Nov. 15, 2006I'm glad I agree with you politically, because we're sure not on the same page musically. Don't like the Beatles? Puh-lease.
Posted by: DHammett on Nov. 15, 2006you might be cray-cray over petula!
Posted by: Scof on Nov. 16, 2006You people do know that beetles are cockroaches right? Eh, they had a few nice songs, but most of beetlemania was fueled by female hysteria, just like our common culture. Sgt Peppers = root canal.
Posted by: Casca on Nov. 16, 2006You hate the Beatles, too? Awesome!
Posted by: Matt on Nov. 16, 2006What's up with all you knuckle-draggers that don't like the greatest band of all-time? I have Revolver playing in my car CD right now - easily one of the greatest albums ever made. McCartney's arrangement of "Elenor Rigby" alone makes the album a classic. No other band has had a bigger impact on popular music. That's just a fact.
Posted by: blu on Nov. 16, 2006i'll name 3:
sex pistols
ramones
public enemy
I do love the Ramones. Public Enemy not so much. (Will anybody be listening to Public Enemy in 30 years?) And the Sex Pistols flat-out sucked. Not even very good musicians. But all very important I'll grant you. I still think critical opinion is overwhelmingly on my side especially from the perspective of musical arrangement and impact on bands that followed. Look at chord progressions and musical arrangements prior to and after The Beatles.
I'll just have to chalk up your errors to youth and inexperience ;-)
dude, aren't you like my age?
Posted by: annika on Nov. 16, 2006I think I see the problem here. Blu thinks pop music is actual, you know, music. Prolly digs Michael Jackson, too.
The Beatles made great elevator music. 'Nuff said.
Posted by: Happy to be a knuckle-dragger on Nov. 16, 2006This is so awesome...I thought I was the only person who doesn't like the Beatles!
Posted by: Sarah on Nov. 20, 2006