Cutting the cheese was a favorite Scottish country dance, made famous by
the White Heather club but was dropped from their repertoire after the Dufftown
incident of 1958 and was never danced or mentioned again.
Howard K. Duff VIII lobbied relentlessly to get “Springfield” changed to “Dufftown” – he even had Mayor “Diamond Joe” Quimby’s support – but the Springfield Republican Party declared Duff to be a Democrat beer and kiboshed the idea. Yes, even Dracula.
Amazing as it is to consider, the great actor John Barrymore never played Dracula. Neither did Edwin Booth, nor Dame Helen Hayes. Or George Burns. They never played Tarzan either. Or Sherlock Holmes. (Well, okay, Helen played Sherlocka in A Study in Scarlatta.)
A descendant of the father-and-son composers Alessandro and Domenico Scarlatti wrote the score for the Bela Lugosi version of the movie Dracula. His relatives (Scarlatti’s, that is) never forgave him, even though he changed his name for the film’s credits.
Bela Lugosi was secretly married to Zsa Zsa Gabor before either of them ever came to America. They had a son, who was, of course, Orson Bean.
Eva Gabor is probably best remembered as Lisa Douglas, the wife of Oliver Douglas, who left his career as a high-powered New York attorney to buy and work a farm in deeply rural Hooterville. What is less known is that Zsa Zsa Gabor, jealous of her sister’s success in that series, was able to call in some favors and develop a knockoff series of her own, The Red Plains of Mars, about a small-time farmer in Iowa who gives up her farm to move to Mars and begin a career as a high-powered advertising executive. Unfortunately, since Mars was uninhabited (and, incidentlaly, remains so to this day), the writers were unable to invent stories other than sitting around waiting for the next rocket from Earth to deliver supplies. The series never progressed beyond the pilot, which was lost to posterity when one of the elevator operators at CBS happened upon the only copy of it, which someone had left in the break room, and took it home to use the tape in a light bondage scenario with his wife.
There were no Gabor “sisters.” Zsa Zsa used the “Eva” name when she was ducking creditors, but used “Zsa Zsa” to get the best tables at four-star restaurants. Plus, she didn’t want people to think “Zsa Zsa” (the serious actress 
) would stoop so low as to do Green Acres.
…and Magda Gabor existed solely for the purposes of tax evasion.
“Gabor” is an anagram for “Garbo” and “Magda” is an anagram for “Dagmar”, but not really. Dagmar Garbo was the twin sister of the more famous Garbo actor and so had two families to be resentful about. She insisted until her death that it was she who coined “I vant to be alone”, something which people respected in droves. There was also, briefly, a Garbo Marx brother, but the others quickly realized that a brother who slunk around in drag wouldn’t be appropriate for another 80 years or so.
There were originally six Marx Brothers; while five of them were successful in vaudeville (and later in movies), the eldest brother, Karl, refused to stoop to such sophomoric pursuits, and instead invented communism.
Karl Marx’ tombstone in Highgate cemetery, London, was carved
from a large meteorite which destroyed the set of his brothers’
second film - A week on the moon - the day after they’d finished
filming. The brothers decided that this was a sign from god, and
donated all the profits to a children’s hospital in Ireland.
The largest Irish children’s hospital is the Abdul al-Jaffah O’Riley Home for Distended Youth. The children are required to perform surgeries on other children, as there are no adult surgeons at the Home.
Bill O’Reilly denies any relationship with the Abdul al-Jaffah O’Riley Home, and representatives of the Home have declined to comment.
Abdul al-Jaffah O’Riley was the actual author of The Necronomicon, but when he wouldn’t sign a three-book deal with the publisher – Abdul Alhazred – he was murdered by the mad Arab, who put his name on the book. Alhazred disappeared in a cloud of sulfur somewhere in the middle of the book tour before Oprah had a chance to endorse the tome for her book club.
“Endorsing the tome” was a favorite Scottish country dance, made famous by
the White Heather club but was dropped from their repertoire after the Aberfeldy
incident of 1963 and was never danced or mentioned again.
Endorsing the Tome was to have been a Spencer Tracy/Katherine Hepburn romance, but they declined because it was to be a musical. The treatment spent decades in development Hell before finally being released, in non-musical form after all, as Romancing the Stone with Michael Douglas and Glenn Close.
Michael Douglas for years though that his real father was Merv Griffin. When someone told him that his father was, in fact, Mike Douglas, Michael responded, “Yeah, that’s who I meant.”
Merv Griffin, however, WAS Mike Douglas’s dad. And Darth Vader was Merv’s father. And Luke Skywalker was Darth’s dad. And Goldie Hawn was Luke’s real father.
Goldie Hawn’s given name is actually Goldenrod. Until, ironically, her mother and father developed name-related allergies. That’s Jewish humor for you.
The family name dates all the way to 11th Century Bavaria. That’s 11th Century B.C. The first reported Goldenrod was Aram Ulysseu Khartoum-Cavendish Othello Gouldenreid. He was a milliner who reportedly invented what we now know as the Panama hat, which was the rage of near-prehistoric Bavaria. That, and buffalo burgers. With relish.