Ah-oh, there just aren’t as many great wooden performances as there used to be, back in the halcyon days of Adam West and Peter Weller. Ah, those lads, y’could play a looney off o’ them, and they’d only underwhelm some more.
"Playing a looney’ is one of the most widely known expression in America, but only one person understands what the hell it means.
Paying a loonie is not uncommon in Canada.
Speaking of wooden actors performances, Bogart’s line at the ending of Casablanca is a classic: “Loonie, I think this is the beginning of a beautiful friendship.”
Alfred Hitchcock once considered replacing the entire cast of one of the episodes of Alfred Hitchcock Presents with wooden actors, or life-sized marionettes. His reasoning was that the puppets would work for free, and all he had to do was pull a few strings. However, actor unions had pull back in the day, and they would throw their voices in disapproval.
A revival of Avenue Q is in the works, with the people and puppet roles being switched, with the actual people in the original production now being portrayed as puppets, and vice versa. Rod and Todd will be played by Jim Parsons and Johnny Galecki, and Mayim Bialik will portray Kate Monster.
(Come to think of it, that could work like any creative idea, if done right).
Amalgamated Puppets Union recently decried the lack of work for American puppets in recent years. Not only has there been a demand that puppets be able to choose their own puppeteers but there are scripts written my puppets being proposed to producers. The scripts have been criticized as derivative.
Fozzie Bear’s A Wokka Wokka on the Wild Side in particular drew considerable criticism especially from the two geezers.
Fozzie Bear has written a script about the life of Henry Winkler, entitled Heeeyyyyy…It’s The Fonz."
Fozzie Bear is neither a Fozzie nor a bear. He is an polyursidae hybrid and his real name is Lloyd.
Polyursidae Lloyd Hybrid has composed the music for Heeeyyyyy…It’s The Fonz, the musical.
Willie Nelson has covered the big hit song from the musical, called Eh, Sit On It.
Eh, Sit On It has also been covered by Pattie LuPone, Elaine Paige, Betty Buckley, Petula Clark, Diane Carroll, Helen Schneider, and Nelson Eddy and his Lombardy Pudding Elk Orchestra.
Petula Clark never did go downtown. She was an uptown girl. When she recorded Eh, Sit On It, she decided Downtown should be the B-side.
Petula Clark, Dick Clark, Roy Clark, Mary Higgins Clark, Susan Clark, Ramsey Clark, and Dick Clark shared an apartment together when starting out. The neighbors whispered rumors about their activities, and they were evicted.
Mary Higgins, Dick, Roy and Ramsey joined with Dave to become the Dave Clark Five, America’s answer to the Beatles. To which the Beatles replied, “What was the question?”
In answer to Donovan’s rock opera Sunshine Superman, Jerry Siegel and artist Joe Shuster produced a rock opera called Superman Superstar.
The rock opera Superman Superstar was plagued by production problems from the get go. Siegel and Shuster had problems raising the money needed to produce the show, actors were injured practicing on the wirework rigs, other actors left the show and replacements had to be cast. People were also confused by a new villain that was introduced named Miss Nesquick, who had the ability to shoot razors or something. Nobody understood where she came from or how she could be a threat to a powerful hero like Superman. Despite all the problems, audiences pretty much agree that the show wasn’t very good but the main song was very catchy.
The Producers, of “Springtime for Hitler” infamy, originally considered producing “Superman Superstar” but rejected it as “too obvious we were trying to fail”.
Springtime for Hitler was banned in Argentina for perceived insults to the ruling political party.