ERNIE KOVACS

Ian 00:59

Market domination.

Matthew 01:03

We apparently, our podcast is just big enough now to be getting emails from consultants offering to help us help our podcast achieve market domination. I get the... Yeah. It's obvious that our little podcast where I make my son watch movies from 60 years ago, it's definitely motivated by a lust for market domination.

Ian 01:28

Absolutely.

Matthew 01:29

So thank goodness these guys came along.

Ian 01:31

Oh, absolutely. And you know what? Weirdly enough, that, that... It works so well because talk about a, a creative person who influenced all of s- all of TV and movies- and dominated the market, but no one realizes he did it.

Matthew 01:49

Yeah, this is a, a kind of a different episode for us in some ways, because we're not talking really about a specific movie, let alone a specific TV series or book or, or album.

Ian 02:00

Yeah.

Matthew 02:01

We're talking about a guy for the first time, a person.

Ian 02:04

Yeah. We're talking about a single actor, and we're talking about his wide collection of weird short film experiments-

Matthew 02:14

Yes

Ian 02:15

that aired for years in blocks, but they were all chopped up, mixed around, movable. This is not th- this is not a single show. This is the pieces that made many a show.

Matthew 02:32

We're talking about Ernie Kovacs.

Ian 02:35

Oh my goodness.

Matthew 02:36

An amazing figure from early television, until his tragic death in 1962.

Ian 02:42

Yeah.

Matthew 02:43

And he was... We talk about digital natives. In some ways he feels like a... Well, I don't know. Does he feel like a TV native, or is he somebody who came to TV late enough to recognize how weird it is?

Ian 03:00

there are people for whom a certain medium of art just immediately resonates with them. And this man, Co- Ernie Kovacs had cellulose film in his veins. That makes him sound like a plant monster. No, no. I mean, there's something about the way his mind worked-

Matthew 03:22

Yes ...

Ian 03:22

that meant he understood the concept of the camera in a way that a lot of other creative people in time did not get yet.

Matthew 03:31

And he understood, I think You're absolutely right about that, and he also understood some things about television specifically and how it differed from film, which had been around for decades and decades, and what television offered both technologically and culturally that he could do weird and interesting things with.

Ian 03:53

Mm-hmm.

Matthew 03:56

Because he, uh, he was a, a, a comedian and he was an actor, and he's, has a, a pretty cool, fun supporting role in Bell, Book and Candle- Yes ... a movie that you and I are gonna have to come back to for the podcast sometime soon. Oh,

Ian 04:10

absolutely.

Matthew 04:12

But he's most known for these things that he did on television, and for that period from the early '50s to the early '60s, he was, like, on television somewhere almost all the time.

Ian 04:26

Mm-hmm. He was hosting game shows. He was hosting Tonight on NBC. He was host... He, he was making these short forms which would show up in, specials all over the, the airwaves. The timing just is hard to be able to place with some of these things.

Matthew 04:44

It is, because he bounced around a great deal, and he was doing morning shows. Like, there was a, a kids' entertainment education show called Ding Dong School, and he had a morning TV show that's followed Ding Dong School, but it was much more like a late night comedy show, like The Tonight Show or like a David Letterman. I think David Letterman's whole vibe and everything else owes a great deal to Ernie Kovacs. Oh, absolutely. Not taking anything away from Letterman, but Kovacs was a pioneer in the kind of things that he did. And the same is true for Johnny Carson in many ways, that, that Kovacs helped pave the way for that.

Ian 05:25

Absolutely. Although I will say, back when Craig Ferguson hosted The Late Late Show, if you're looking for something with a similar vibe, there's s- there's the same sort of- ... chaotic energy. Ernie Kovacs is a man for whom he is always s- like, there's always wild weirdness, and he seems to love the same kind of humor I do with just- pattern break.

Matthew 05:50

Yes.

Ian 05:50

It's, you know, A, B, three, wait. The, the idea that he could catch you off guard like that is absolutely core to this, and it results in this weird and wild surrealist interpretation of existence.

Matthew 06:09

And it's very disparate ways in which he, he used television, and he could adapt to different kinds of things. When he was hosting a morning show, and he's doing weird comedy sketches, but he's also introducing musical acts, and you see him intro- interacting with people on the set more, just, and it's... I don't know that it was live. I think some of that was live television. And he had this different vibe. And on the other hand, he's doing these things that could not be done live because they involved all this strange intercutting and editing, and really, as you were saying before, experimental film.

Mm-hmm. For all the w- the broad slapstick comedy that he loved, one thing he kept putting into his shows, especially when he had his own show on, at night later on, was we would have to describe them today as music videos, where he would take some piece of music, often a classic piece of music or a piece of jazz from the Great American Songbook, and he would take this instrumental and set visuals to it, like- Yeah

An, An office where all of the contents of the office move on their own, uh, through careful rigging of wires and things, but all done in time with the music, or this interesting, odd video essay just of an urban street scene going from night to day to night again. Over the smooth, cool jazz.

Ian 07:35

And yeah, he, he in, he talks about his love of music, and so much of all of his work has that rhythm and that musical sense to it. Even his short form skits get interspersed on, onto a background music track. So after a skit ends, it'll cut not to the next skit, but to a oscillating line, a visualizer-

Matthew 08:02

Yes ...

Ian 08:03

for the song you're listening to that's running as the through line between them all, giving you space to laugh and catch your breath before the next one hits you. music is a driving through, force through it all, and Ernie Kovacs' work has that sense of meter and rhythm and flow that you expect out of a song.

Matthew 08:23

It does. It's a very, very important sense of rhythm. Sometimes his bits drag on too long, and that's just a sense of timing and what pacing was like in television. But, uh, but very often he's, he's nailing this kind of rhythm. He's ... He kind of brought to television the classic vaudeville idea of the blackout gag. Yes. Where it's a quick joke with a quick punchline, because he was on television. Often it was a visual punchline. But it was a get in, do it, get out, and immediately go to the break.

Not just a blackout in this case, as you were saying, it's a, um, a, a visualizer of this song that's running through it. And then on to the next gag. And, uh, Ernie Kovacs, in that way, he would've been very much at home on Vine.

Ian 09:13

Oh,

Matthew 09:14

absolutely. Or other short form video. Er- Ernie

Ian 09:17

Kovacs would've been a Vine star that survived on YouTube and made it to TikTok-

Matthew 09:23

Yeah

Ian 09:23

in the modern era. Ernie Kovacs's work is, um ... And see, that's the thing, I, I'm, I wanna reference bits and segments. There's, there's a recurring bit of, of this, uh, lady in a bathtub taking a bubble bath, and weird things like the camera panning out and finding her feet are sticking out the side of the bathtub, or a periscope popping up and looking around and going back down. a ding like an elevator and a line of office men walking up out of one half of the bathtub and going off to their, like the people clocking in for work. He, he, he grabs a theme and he runs with it in a way, but all of these feel like skits I could've seen online, just these ones are all strung together.

And right there it's, you know, a lot of things, Saturday Night Live, Monty Python.

Matthew 10:16

Mm-hmm.

Ian 10:16

I'm even gonna say, some of the humor in things like, Homestar Runner cartoons. feels like Ernie Kovacs

Matthew 10:24

I can see that line. And that especially when you go to the, the way that Kovacs created characters. We- Mm-hmm ... we've talked about the way he used television a little bit. We'll talk more about that and the way he used timing with these blackouts. But he also created weird characters and then stayed weirdly consistent with them. Yes. And that is definitely a through line to things like Homestar Runner.

Ian 10:49

Okay, I'm thinking of three characters in specific, and I wonder if you're thinking of the same three as me.

Matthew 10:53

Yeah.

Ian 10:54

First one is, is his strange poet laureate character of Percy Dovetonsils.

Matthew 11:02

Percy Dovetonsils. Percy Dovetonsils is a character where people who aren't really Ernie Kovacs fans gravitate to Percy Dovetonsils and, uh, and enjoy it 'cause he's such a distinct character.

Ian 11:13

He's a distinct character. He's this very floaty kind of guy who is there reading poetry like he's He, it's like a, like an AMC host on Quaaludes.

Matthew 11:29

Yes, and he's- To do this, Kovacs has his thick black hair slicked down in these strange little curls, and he wears glasses that have eyes painted on them with tiny- Yeah w- w- where he, with tiny holes where he can see through, but it gives him this half-asleep, dreamy, tranquil sort of look.

Ian 11:52

Oh, yeah.

Matthew 11:53

And Percy Dovetonsils is great because b- he's, he's weird, and, and let's, let's be honest, especially for TV in the 1950s, he's, he's kind of gay-coded.

Ian 12:04

Oh.

Matthew 12:06

And yet he is not. That's not the joke in some ways. He is, he's a character who seems very happy and comfortable in who he is and getting to share his poetry with people. He's a fascinating character. Oh,

Ian 12:20

yeah. This is well past coded. This character- This character seems like they've already been compiled, shipped- ... and the beta patch has come out. Th- th- Yeah this character is absolutely leaning into that stereotype, but in the most accepting way possible.

Matthew 12:35

Yeah.

Ian 12:35

Because you, the audience, are the one intruding on his completely fine space, and he's being polite back to you.

Matthew 12:41

He's very welcoming. He's very- Absolutely ... delighted to, to, to join us once again through the orthicon tube.

Ian 12:48

Exactly. Uh-

Matthew 12:49

And, uh, and share with us a poem.

Ian 12:52

And so a- anytime they've got... And most of that's just gonna be weird puns and wordplay stuff. It's the... Here's another bit that feels like more modern cinema to me. Ernie Kovacs left in the, the crew laughing at the jokes.

Matthew 13:08

Yes. It's the only thing that feels like he's got a studio audience, which he did for some of his early TV. But for, for the most part, in the, the Percy Dovetonsils era, it was, uh, it was mostly the crew cracking up.

Ian 13:22

There's a video by the video essayist Lindsay Ellis. This is from like seven years ago-

Matthew 13:30

Yeah. Lindsay Ellis ...

Ian 13:30

called "YouTube: Manufacturing Authenticity for Fun and Profit." That talks all about how being able to have the audience hear the crew is something modern shows, or at least modern within the last decade according to this, have put extra effort into adding just to make- the connection better. And here Ernie Kovacs is, just realizing that that is engaging so far earlier than everyone else figured it out. Yes. It's just one of those moments where it's like, "Oh, wait, that modern thing we love? That's us rediscovering something we used to know."

Matthew 14:13

And yeah, you're, you're absolutely right that Percy Dovetonsils is a great example of that.

Ian 14:18

Mm-hmm.

Matthew 14:20

And there was never a sense in, or in this kind of thing where it was character work, it was very often presented as we're on television, the characters are making television. They acknowledge that you're watching them on television. They'll talk about the technology that is used, as opposed to a play where you're supposed to just be immersed and forget that you're watching it on television.

Ian 14:43

next character of his I can think of is Eugene.

Matthew 14:51

Yes. That was a kind of a standalone thing, wasn't it?

Ian 14:55

It was. It's a half-hour, of a character who is completely silent And yet there's all sorts of sound effects and such to give it audio. And he's walking around this liminal space stage and set doing things like the classic, you know, drawing a chalk door onto the, uh, onto the wall trick, but he's doing it with tape on the camera screen. And so he's, like, literally putting a door in the fourth wall to walk to you. You ever want, you ever wanted to see Mr. Bean versus the Backrooms? It's Eugene.

Matthew 15:35

Yes. Yes. Great description.

Ian 15:39

Thank you. But it's, it's wildly engaging, and it's so interesting that he c- he's, he's grabbing from, various classic actors from even before his time.

Matthew 15:51

There's definitely some Buster Keaton in there.

Ian 15:53

Mm. Yes.

Matthew 15:54

Uh, some of that very emotive ... Well, Buster Keaton is famous for being stone-faced, but also some of the more emotive, um, silent actors, because this is essentially- Charlie Chaplin? silent. Yeah, there's a bit of ch- uh, Chaplin's, uh, Tramp there.

Ian 16:09

Yeah. There's some of that in there. And, and it's all paired with this cutting, to be able to make rooms shift and change in ways they shouldn't. Classic vaudeville, but being presented to the camera. It's a fine example of Ernie Kovacs being a guy who realized, "Oh, wait a minute. On the stage, I, we can deal with the actors, we can deal with the sets, we can deal with the lighting, and finally, the camera means that I can control the most annoying part of any stage performance, the audience." And he can put the audience where he wants them and show them only what he wants to show them.

Matthew 16:48

Right.

Ian 16:48

And that is so strong, because it lets him craft the world more completely.

Matthew 16:56

And that lets him in Eugene, which was one of the specials that he did for Dutch Masters Cigars, so we also get odd little Dutch Masters commercials inter- interspersed.

Ian 17:07

Oh, yeah.

Matthew 17:07

But again, with no dialogue, though. They kept the whole half, the entire half hour was kept with no dialogue. But- Mm ... it also lets him do one of his really famous bits, uh, to, to me at least, which is his gravity control thing.

Ian 17:22

Yes.

Matthew 17:22

Where he sets it up and Eugene is sitting at where, is sitting at a big table, unpacking his lunchbox. And- gravity is not right, so things, even though everything looks normal and level, things keep rolling off one side of the table. He tries to pour some milk out of his thermos and it pours at a weird angle. And eventually he makes a little plumb bob out of a piece of thread and an olive and shows us that gravity is weird, and yet it looks normal because it's a fairly simple trick of you tilt the table, you tilt the set, you tilt the camera, and suddenly gravity isn't where you think it is.

As you say, when you're watching it on television- Mm-hmm ... you can control what the audience sees and, and from what angle. And it's so weirdly effective and fun. Even once you get what's going on, it's fun to watch him play out this thing he came up with to do on television.

Ian 18:16

Oh, yeah. they are classics for a reason.

Matthew 18:21

Yep.

Ian 18:22

And Ernie Kovacs, the more I looked in, he is your fame- your, your favorite video artist's favorite video artist.

Matthew 18:31

Hmm.

Ian 18:32

Yeah. Which is usually a concept usually reserved for, like, bands. It's like, oh, your band's f- ... your favorite band's favorite band kind of attitude. if you like someone's video stylings, double-check. They are either inspired by or directly inspired by Ernie Kovacs. Like, it all kind of filters back to him in some ways because of that The third one I never know how to feel.

Matthew 18:54

Yeah.

Ian 18:55

And that's the Nairobi Trio.

Matthew 18:58

Yeah. I think it's important to acknowledge the fact, first of all, before we get to them in detail, it's important to acknowledge that this is 1950s television.

Ian 19:08

Mm-hmm.

Matthew 19:08

With all of the, the racial stereotyping and jokes that we would just c- or, or consider offensive or at least cringe-worthy today. They were part and parcel of TV comedy then. And I think there was a lot of, of, uh, a lot of ignorance, a lot of other things behind that, m- more s- in, depending on the person you're dealing with, more so than any kind of malevolence. But you are gonna see that in the Ernie Kovacs stuff. Stereotypes of Native Americans, stereotypes of, um- European ethnicities.

Like, uh, he's got one character who's, uh, uh, Von Sauerbraten, the, the German, uh, radio DJ. Which is mainly- Yeah ... an excuse for him to prattle on in faux German while wearing lederhosen or a, a, an Austrian hat. But the Nairobi Trio Is a musical act comprised of three people in gorilla masks and overcoats and bowler hats.

Ian 20:15

Yeah.

Matthew 20:19

And yet I, I, it's hard to even talk about this. I don't think it was intended in any way to suggest, oh, people from the African nation of Kenya are equivalent to gorillas or vice versa. I think it was more that we wanna do something with gorillas. Where do gorillas come from? They come from Africa. How do you make a gorilla funnier? You put a hat on it.

Ian 20:44

Yeah.

Matthew 20:45

I don't think it was a comment about people, it was a comment about, it was a, a, a using gorillas in a weird musical comedy thing.

Ian 20:54

I, yeah. I think, the naming has its problems and the depictions has its problems.

Matthew 21:00

Yeah. Yes.

Ian 21:00

And I, I don't think it was intentional.

Matthew 21:05

And, and I am totally prepared to be wrong about that. Anybody tells me they are offended by this, my answer is, "Yes, you're right." Not gonna argue- Mm ... with that one bit. But I don't, I never get the feeling that there's anything mean-spirited or even particularly ignorant about what they were trying to do.

Ian 21:24

Mm.

Matthew 21:25

Although the naming wasn't great.

Ian 21:27

And I will then say it helps the fact that the skits themselves that feature the trio are not pointing that out.

Matthew 21:40

Absolutely not.

Ian 21:40

Once the characters are in these costumes, which we're acknowledging as a problem alongside the name, the skit then goes on not being about that. The skits of these groups are just, they are musical Three Stooges.

Matthew 21:56

Yes. It's, uh, it's the classic three-person, uh, formula of the Three Stooges or, or Harpo, Chico, and, and, uh, Zeppo. Mm-hmm. Or, or any, you see this in so much comedy, and yet they do this silently, which is fascinating.

Ian 22:13

Yeah. They, they're, they do it silently, and the, the, the group was played by Ernie, his wife, and a third person- who ranged from apparently, uh, Jack Lemmon, friend of the family- ... to Frank Sinatra.

Matthew 22:29

Frank Sinatra was in there? Wow.

Ian 22:30

There's implied, it's implied that he had performed the character at least once in the past.

Matthew 22:34

That's kind of fun because it means, uh, something about the trio in that they're gorilla masks and overcoats. Anybody can be in there.

Ian 22:41

Right.

Matthew 22:42

And his, you mentioned his wife. It's worth noting that she appears in a number of these. That's Edie Adams- Yes ... who is a re- incredibly accomplished performer in her own right. A- Mm ... Broadway performer. I think she originated the role of Daisy Mae in the Li'l Abner musical. But that's fun. I didn't realize that they swapped people in and out. Because it was so popular, they did variations on it over and over.

Ian 23:04

Mm-hmm. And Ernie Kovacs himself was known for- smoking cigars, which is part of why he had an ad for a cigar company. So they were playing with the fact that you could tell this is people in rubber masks, because there's this, this gorilla mask with a ru- with a cigar sticking through the mouth. And every time he would take a puff in, the entire mask would pull in around his face. It, it, it has a weird, like... I guess, once again, I'm pulling to more r- modern media. I feel like Ernie Kovacs was making a comedy comment on animatronic bands- ... like you'd find at a Chuck E. Cheese's before Five Nights at Freddy's even showed up and made those into a horror campaign.

Matthew 23:49

Yeah. Talk about things you could program with animatronics. And to try to describe this, it's the three gorillas in, in coats and hats. One of them is at a little piano, uh, on, on the, the right side. On the left side, one of them is standing up with a pair of, uh, of mallets, drumsticks. And one is sitting down between them with a conductor's, uh, baton. And this is all to the, the music, uh, Solfeggio by Robert Maxwell, which is a very almost music boxy but very, very rhythmic, clear pattern of a, of a song And the only one who's actually playing music throughout is the one on the, the piano. The one in the middle is just making this very simple rhythmic L-shaped gesture with the, the conductor's baton.

And the one with the mallets is just waiting for the part where there's a little drum fill in the music, because he's going to slowly turn and hit the guy in the middle on the head with the

Ian 24:59

mallets. Yes.

Matthew 25:00

That's it. That's all there is to this. But of course, the guy who's getting hit on the head gets more and more angry.

Ian 25:09

And, and it grows from there as, as the two with the mallets and the batons start kind of fighting each other- ... without losing track of the music best they can. Yes. And the piano player is just trying to figure out what's happening with his buddies over there.

Matthew 25:27

And there's, there's a bit of, of especially the early, Nairobi Trio bits, which are a great example of the Kuleshov effect, which is this idea from, uh, uh, Lev Kuleshov, Russian filmmaker, you can have someb- you can show a person with a completely neutral expression, and you juxtapose that with a picture of a bowl of stew. Mm-hmm. And depending on how long you hold the shots, people will watch that movie and they will conclude, "Oh, he's hungry." You juxtapose it with a, a, a shot of a beautiful woman, and depending on how long you hold each shot, it's, "Oh, he is experiencing desire or fear," whatever you juxtapose it with. Even though he's got a completely neutral expression that hasn't changed, only editing has changed.

Here, we're getting... We, we see this stuff happening, then we see a close-up of a gorilla mask. In the first few shots, there's not even any motion for the gorilla mask. It's just a close-up of a gorilla mask. And yet it's becomes clear because you just saw him get hit on the head, "Oh, he's annoyed."

Ian 26:35

Yeah.

Matthew 26:35

He's not moving. Later on, he moves. He rhythmically, with the music, turns to glare at the guy with the mallets. He starts hyperventilating so the mask gets sucked into the, the performer.

Ian 26:50

Exactly.

Matthew 26:50

But those first shots, it's, there's nothing going on, and yet we relate to this m- gorilla mask. We know he's angry. We know why he's angry. We're on, kind of on his side, and yet he seems somehow bossy, so we're not entirely on his side. It's fascinating how much complexity he gets from this simple idea and this simple set of masks.

Ian 27:12

Absolutely. Ernie Kovacs grabs the Kuleshov effect- ... and wields it like a hammer towards the audience in so much of his stuff, but he is using it so strongly- especially when he has props and costuming like that. I will say some of the things Ernie Kovacs did were wildly complex and some were so simple, and yet every single one of them has the same kind of love.

Matthew 27:41

Yeah.

Ian 27:43

There's something about the fact that he's got the entire bit with the used car salesman. Which is this tiny, tiny skit of him doing the classic, you know, ta- hit the top of the roof of the car. Yeah. And he falls through the s- through the floor. And apparently that was a multi-thousand dollar, like, set that they built that they got this one clip out of.

Matthew 28:06

Yeah.

Ian 28:08

And there's just such love in it, and at the same time it's like they are pulling humor out of a couple of gorilla masks and some- ... timpani mallets in the same sort of way. And I'm like, the, the disparity of complexity, and it is, is never, is never noticed because the amount of effort and care is always the same.

Matthew 28:33

And especially later on as he got more well-known, more sought after, was given a little more control, he was ... He became known for going way past budgets, going way past times, making the, the, the network pay huge overtime to crew members. There was a talk about, the camera guys were driving around in Cadillacs because of all the overtime that Ernie Kovacs made them earn. Oof.

Ian 29:00

Yeah.

Matthew 29:01

And, and yet it was because he had all of these ideas, and yet they... So many of them come down to ideas. There are times watching this collection, and we'll talk more about the collection that we watched specifically later on. But watching this collection, I was taken by the lack of technical precision in a lot of these things.

Ian 29:25

Yeah.

Matthew 29:26

To some extent it may have been a function of the, the poor recordings we had at the time. Some of these are kinescopes, some of these are primitive. I think some of them are early videotape. But, um- Sometimes it seemed as if he had the idea, he wanted to get the idea out onto television, and he was in a hurry to do so. Though so things aren't as precise. You can see the seams, you can see things not lining up right. Some of the musical things where he's got a f- an eight-minute musical illustration with stop, but not stop-motion, with careful rigging and such like we talked about. The synchronization is not very good at all.

Ian 30:11

It's not.

Matthew 30:12

And yet the fact that you can see the homemade... It's made, paid for thousands and thousands of dollars at a T- TV network, but there's something homemade about it that still makes it charming. Because you can see the idea that he had and what, how he wanted to get, get it onto TV. And if he had infinite time and infinite money, it c- might've been more precise. But it was more important to him to get that out and done and on to the next of the million ideas he had.

Ian 30:39

It's something of an inspiration as this l- example of living the concept of, you know, perfect is the enemy of done.

Matthew 30:48

Yeah.

Ian 30:49

That, you know, idea of not being a perfectionist in order to be able to keep moving. And it's something I have to work on, so it's like it, I appreciate the fact that he shows the rough edges because it proves that the rough edges don't take away from the quality.

Matthew 31:02

And even the ideas. I read a quote from him saying that so many of h- his ideas came from the fact that it's 2:30 and there's a production meeting at 3:00. So you better have ideas.

Ian 31:13

Oh, absolutely. I love that.

Matthew 31:15

Another of his characters that it, it, it's not somebody who shows up repeatedly like Percy or like, uh, the Nairobi Trio, but I really like is, uh, Chef Molnar Because one thing, uh, Kovacs talked about a lot is his Hungarian heritage, and he just described himself as this old sleepy-eyed Hungarian. but Chef Molnar kind of, I get the impression this was his chance to pretend to be the old Hungarian guys that were always around when he grew up, 'cause he's a- Oh,

Ian 31:49

absolutely

Matthew 31:50

a Hungarian chef who is... He shows, a similar character shows up in some other things, like where he's trying to pretend to be a chef by making a recipe as he listens to it on a record. But the main Chef Molnar thing was- Oh, goodness, that one ... he's like a TV chef, and I think it was all improv, but it's Ernie Kovacs showing you how to make this chicken dish where and it's, it doesn't bear detailed explanation, but it's just so strangely detailed and so frenetic, and yet almo- also this weird confidence on the part of this chef.

Ian 32:30

Yeah.

Matthew 32:30

And how you're making this, this strange stuffing for the chicken and a- adding tons of liquor for the sauce, and you turn the oven onto Fahrenheit. Doesn't matter what number, just make sure it's Fahrenheit.

Ian 32:44

Yes.

Matthew 32:46

There's something I find endearing about Chef Molnar.

Ian 32:48

Oh, I, it makes... Yeah. It makes sense. There's- every single time the, the, I, 'cause I remember the endings of that one and I'm cracking up. And I'm not sure if I want to give it to our audience or if that's a one that I'm saying they should go find and see. Because e- even if it char- even if the character is there for only a little bit, it, he, Ernie's able to play him, whoever this is, with such energy that you will get invested and get wrapped up in whatever's happening.

I usually don't get to show my, the old stuff, the older stuff we watch to my lovely wife Jen, because as she says, she's not a big fan of old media. I'm a little confused by that sometimes, but then I was raised by this guy over here. And so old media's something I've grown up with. Um, but I did show her a bit of the Ernie Kovacs stuff, and she was very bewildered- and yet engaged the entire time.

Matthew 33:52

Well, that's cool.

Ian 33:53

It was like just sitting there watching it, like every once in a while glancing over at me with a bit of a, "Oh, that explains your humor." But still, even all of these skits and such pull you in. Even if it's not your thing, they can pull you in because of the, the sheer energy being presented, I find.

Matthew 34:16

And there's that tension between the immediate weirdness and what's happening, what's going to happen next.

Ian 34:22

Mm-hmm. And there's so much repetition on a theme too. You'll-- If you see a character in a skit, there's a fine chance you'll see them again, and what will happen will be different

Matthew 34:34

And he did, especially for his later shows, he did have a, a little repertory company, a little, little cast who would, would show up and do really, really good comedic character work as all these supporting roles.

Ian 34:48

Mm-hmm.

Matthew 34:50

And some of the video essays and musical things showed that they had range too. They weren't just comedians.

Ian 34:58

Yeah.

Matthew 34:59

We could see some, even, even in these dialogue-free musical things, they had a lot of, of dramatic expression available.

Ian 35:06

Comedy was the go-to, but the love of media was not only to comedy

Matthew 35:13

Well, we could talk a lot more about Ernie Kovacs, and it would come down to going through more and more of his specific bits and specific characters, and which would be a lot of fun. But I think instead we're gonna turn soon to our final questions because we've, I think we've got a lot to say about that and around that.

Ian 35:31

Oh, yeah.

Matthew 35:32

But in the meantime, if you're listening, to the IMMP, which I suspect you are- ... and you're enjoying the podcast, uh, well first of all, thank you very much for, for listening. And if you're interested in more, please go to immproject.com because that's where you will find all of our back episodes, two- over 200 now, plus bonuses, and also where you will find ways to support the show. On our Patreon you can both support us and get even more bonus audio content. At our shop you can get things like coffee mugs and T-shirts and other fun stuff, not just for the podcast but also related to some of the things we've talked about over the years, like, "The Prisoner" and "Space 1999".

Ian 36:13

Yes.

Matthew 36:14

And also on our website, immproject.com, that's where you will find ways to contact us on our contact page. We would absolutely love to hear from you on our Discord, on Blue Sky or Mastodon, or you can send us email, you can send us honest to goodness mail through the US Postal Service at our PO box. So yeah, let us know, have you seen Ernie Kovacs? What do you think of him? What do you think about things that he has influenced over the years?

Any other old TV or movies that you think we should cover on the podcast? We love to get ideas on that too.

Ian 36:45

Mm-hmm.

Matthew 36:47

And Ian, where can people find you?

Ian 36:49

I can be found online as ItemCrafting, be that ItemCrafting on Blue Sky or ItemCraftingLive on Twitch. I, uh, try to stream most every Thursday, and I'll be, uh, making things, playing games, and maybe I'll have the inspiration of Er- of, uh, Mr. Kovacs here- ... filming some short film stuff too.

Matthew 37:10

Well, that sounds cool.

Ian 37:12

Oh, yeah. And Dad, where can people find you?

Matthew 37:14

Well, yeah, best place to go is, bymatthewporter.com, and that's where you will find links to whatever I'm doing online, which includes this podcast, it includes my YouTube channel where I re- review, mostly I review movies and movie theaters. But also at bymatthewporter.com you will find, my blog, you will find a way to subscribe to my low traffic, zero spam newsletter, and you'll find information about my book, "Questions for the Dead", which is now available for order at your local bookstore or any of your, uh, favorite online booksellers, both in e-book and in paperback.

It's, uh, a story of a, a Denver private investigator with a strange and useful collection of friends with special abilities.

Ian 38:00

Oh, absolutely.

Matthew 38:02

All right. Well, our final- Well ... questions for TV, it's usually binge or no binge, and yet we're not talking about a specific TV series, are we?

Ian 38:13

No.

Matthew 38:15

And I think we need to back up a little bit and talk about how we watched this and how we originally came to this.

Ian 38:21

I think so.

Matthew 38:22

My dad was an Ernie Kovacs fan. I'm sure my dad watched Ernie Kovacs on TV when he was first broadcasting. And in the late 1970s, around 1977, PBS, over the course of a summer I think it was, had this nine or 10 episode series of half-hour segments of the best of Ernie Kovacs. They had some introductory, uh, voiceover by Jack Lemmon, and then just showed Ernie Kovacs bits. Occasionally, a complete half hour of one of his shows. More often, things intercut from various sources. Hmm. And that was my first exposure to Ernie Kovacs, was this Best of Ernie Kovacs series on PBS. And later on- Wow ... I was able to find a DVD, a two DVD collection, uh, of this series, specifically The Best of Ernie Kovacs from PBS in the late '70s, and that's where, where I first showed it to you.

And it was interesting to be able to see that again. It was interesting to be able to, to show it to you in the same form that I saw it in. But this Best of Ernie Kovacs two DVD set is not the best way to see Ernie Kovacs, I think.

Ian 39:33

I don't think so.

Matthew 39:34

It's not curated very well. It's kind of haphazard. It's repetitive. You'll see the same... You'll see a bit, and then you'll see the same exact bit repeated two episodes later. And it's not as if there isn't enough Ernie Kovacs stuff to pull from that they had to do that. Yeah. I really think it was, it was kind of lazily done when it was put together. And the DVD transfer is okay. It's fine. There's no... not really good as far as chaptering or, or, um, making it accessible. It's better than nothing, and it, it, it does remind me of the way I first saw Kovacs, which was this kind of blender of his stuff. But it's not a well put together set representing his work.

Ian 40:18

No. But I will say nowadays, it's a lot of ways to find his stuff, and... , the Ernie Kovacs estate, they have newer collections printed that I understand to be really good.

Matthew 40:36

Yeah,

Ian 40:36

they've- Uh, they've got DVD sets of all their stuff, of all his stuff. They're releasing, just a few years ago, updated, refreshed versions of his work. So his stuff is being preserved for that.

Matthew 40:51

And that can be found at erniekovacs.com, and I gather that they've got this new, The Ernie Kovacs Collection-

Ian 41:00

Yeah ...

Matthew 41:00

which I expect is a much better DVD transfer and DVD curation of his stuff. I'm gonna be interested in getting that collection at some point. Maybe we'll revisit that at some point in the future, but I suspect it's better than the PBS Best of Ernie Kovacs that I knew.

Ian 41:16

Yeah. We love the fact that the PBS one existed, but the fact that there is newer work than what we were watching in terms of preservation is wonderful.

Matthew 41:25

Mm-hmm.

Ian 41:26

I am also happy, though, to say that if you want to be able to just get some examples of his work, there's plenty of it available online. Plenty of his work has been uploaded to YouTube and to the Internet Archive, and so you can see a lot of his, of his pieces and get an idea for the style we're talking about just from there

Matthew 41:52

so if you go on YouTube and you, you look up Ernie Kovacs, you look up the Nairobi Trio or some of his characters, you'll find at least examples of these to get a taste of what we're talking about, which is important, I think, because we could talk forever and not really let you know how, what it is like to watch some of these things.

Ian 42:11

Oh, yeah. It... And, and we haven't even scrapped... There, there's a chance that we could come back to him on multiple things. We didn't even talk about the fact that he hosted, the show Take a Good Look.

Matthew 42:23

Yes.

Ian 42:24

Which was an entire, game show that existed.

Matthew 42:29

And that's interesting because in his other shows, there are many segments that are, parodies of game shows.

Ian 42:36

Mm-hmm.

Matthew 42:37

Like the, the Whom Dun It, where someone selected from the studio audience is, mortally wounded by a secret guest, and the panelists have to ask questions that'll help them figure out who shot this guy.

Ian 42:52

What the heck? Exactly.

Matthew 42:54

There's a lot of violence in this. There's also- Yeah ... a lot of misogyny. We talked about some of the, of the, the cultural racism we see in here. Uh- Yeah ... but again, it's, it's dated in a strange way, and yet he also, he introduces a lot of his, his later shows with, he's talking to you from the control room as he's directing the final edit of the show, and talking about, "Well, this is commentary on sex and violence on television."

Yeah. And then he does jokes about sex and violence on television, so take

Ian 43:24

that for what it's worth. And right there, and, and right there, honestly, I think you've, uh, named the sh- named a show that is very important. Because if you want a... Our next question on this, well, we haven't even answered our first question. We're gonna go back a bit.

Matthew 43:39

We haven't.

Ian 43:40

Okay.

Matthew 43:41

I want-

Ian 43:41

Should you watch Ernie Kovacs?

Matthew 43:43

Well, I also want to mention another way that I first- ... got to see some of Ernie Kovacs' stuff, because I talked about that 1977-ish PBS, uh, best of. Yes. But then some years later, Mrs. Darling Wife and I, back when she was Miss Darling Girlfriend, and we were, were dating. Oh. We would go into the city for, to see museums and things in the city. I grew up in New York. We're talking about New York City.

We would go to what at the time was called the Museum of Broadcasting. I believe now it's moved and it's the Museum of Radio and Television, but it was the Museum of Broadcasting. First of all, they had a tremendous library of videotapes before this kind of thing was available physically to regular consumers, let alone streaming. But they also would have special series and retrospectives, and we happened to be there when they were doing a retrospective on Ernie Kovacs. So we got to sit in the screening room and see really good transfers of some of his earliest stuff, which shows ha- his, his beginnings on local television with these morning shows and things.

And there's a phrase that will still be used in this house from time to time, which is, "Hold it. Don't nobody move." Followed a little while later by, "Resume." Because the way he would do the commercial breaks is they'd be in the middle of things. This might've been from Kovacs on the Corner, which was one of his shows. They would, they would be doing something and it would be time for the commercial break, so the call would go out, "Hold it. Don't nobody move." And everybody would freeze, and then there'd be the commercial. And then when the commercials are done, somebody would say, "Resume," and things would pick up where they left off.

Ian 45:24

That's pretty brilliant.

Matthew 45:26

Again, it was, it was acknowledging the structure and the limitations of television, not trying to ignore it for the sake of narrative.

Ian 45:33

Mm-hmm.

Matthew 45:35

So that was another fun way to get a taste of what was far beyond what we saw in the PBS show.

Ian 45:41

That makes sense.

Matthew 45:42

And maybe there's some of that on that Ernie Kovacs collection DVD set, so we'll have to check that out.

Ian 45:46

We'll have to check that out.

Matthew 45:47

But, uh-

Ian 45:48

So, yeah. Yeah. This is... It's not a TV show, so it's not a binge or no binge. It's not a movie, so it's not purely a screen or no screen. And I think this is a watch or don't watch.

Matthew 45:59

Uh-huh, yeah. I am gonna s- I'm gonna call this an add it to your diet.

Ian 46:04

Yeah.

Matthew 46:04

Add this to your media diet. Maybe the occasional binge-watch an hour or two of Ernie Kovacs, but try it out and watch some of his stuff periodically because I think it's a refreshing look into where all the media that we, uh, we engage in today came from. Yes. And how some of the things we think are so incredibly post-millennial and, and like we were saying before about short-form video and the like, and how it's, it's new but it's not as new as we thought it was, and people were doing comparably strange and interesting things, far more so in many ways, um, 60, 70 years ago.

Ian 46:42

Absolutely. If you are a person who likes to make things, if you're a creative person listening to, to our show, go watch a bit of Ernie Kovacs. I think there is something inspiring it s- uh, inspiring in seeing a person just love the medium they're working in and play with it so much that will inspire others to think that same creative way about whatever medium they do their own art within. Self-expression begets self-expression, and Ernie Kovacs- ... was expressing all sorts of stuff.

Matthew 47:19

And if you are, if you're creating things and you see some of his stuff, it might be encouraging to see how rough some of it is. We were talking before about how- Mm-hmm ... he was not letting perfectionism get in the way, partly because he couldn't. It had to go on the air at a certain time each week. But recognizing he had the ideas and he had the drive to execute it, and he got something out there. So next time you're wondering if your, your music sync isn't perfect or if your color grading isn't right, or am I using the right camera for my YouTube Short?

It doesn't matter. Are you conveying what you want to convey?

Ian 47:53

Yeah. I, I'm honestly taking so much inspiration re-looking at Ernie Kovacs's stuff. Part of why I'm saying this is that it's getting me to, like, put more out there and, and not let perfect be the enemy of good.

Matthew 48:06

Yeah. Which is important because the surest way to make your stuff better is just to do it, not to- Exactly fret over each piece. So yeah, we're, we're-- It's sort of a binge, sort of an add it to your media diet. Watch it- Yeah ... in whatever doses make sense to you. But we definitely recommend acknowledging and, and paying some attention to Ernie Kovacs. I don't know that our s- usual second question makes any sense whatsoever. I don't even know if we can ask it It really

Ian 48:32

doesn't

Matthew 48:32

Our usual question is revive, reboot, or rest in peace

Ian 48:38

The, the man's work has influenced so much, and I think that's the important part.

Matthew 48:43

Yeah.

Ian 48:43

When we, we ask that second question, it is about the concepts of this story, the, the work we're looking at and how it can be moved into the modern era. And the answer is it has inspired many creatives and it will continue to be a, an example of brilliant work in that. So I think it is already doing that regardless of what we say.

Matthew 49:09

So yeah, short of necromancy, there is no way to do, uh, a revival because you can't have Ernie Kovacs without Ernie Kovacs. so there's no way to reboot it. There's no way to revive it. It's gotta be a rest in peace, That said, I d- I also want to acknowledge another thing, which is a 1984 TV movie. It's w- on the Blank Check podcast, they'll occasionally make reference to a film that doesn't exist.

Ian 49:39

Okay.

Matthew 49:39

Yes, it was made. I have heard of it, maybe I've even seen it, but it has absolutely no impact culturally or... And you ask a dozen people, and none of them are gonna n- know it exists. This 1984 TV movie called Ernie Kovacs: Between the Laughter, starring Jeff Goldblum as Ernie Kovacs.

Ian 50:01

What?

Matthew 50:01

A TV biopic about Ernie Kovacs starring Jeff Goldblum.

Ian 50:09

How did I not know of this before now? That sounds brilliant.

Matthew 50:13

And, you know, technically I did see it when it aired. I was probably one of four people who watched it when it aired, and it's inbounds, 19-- the, the, the magical year of 1984. Maybe this is something we need to come back to for the podcast.

Ian 50:29

Dear listening audience, if our podcast suddenly stops production, that is because my father has refused to put it onto the docket for us to watch- ... and I have resulted in violence. Please, Dad, we've gotta watch this. I have, uh, in 200 episodes, I do not think I have ever begged for you- ... to put something on the watch list, and I'm doing so now. This is a- All

Matthew 50:55

right ...

Ian 50:56

this is a first for the series.

Matthew 50:58

That is on the list. Oh, my goodness. No question. Thank you. So even then, he was being acknowledged, even though so few people, I think, had seen him at that point. He was being acknowledged as important to television. I get the impression that this movie with Jeff Goldblum was a labor of love for certain people, regardless of how many people watching TV in the '80s really knew who Ernie Kovacs was.

Really knew-

Ian 51:21

Thinking of his filmography, I'm betting it's a labor of love for Jeff Goldblum.

Matthew 51:25

Yeah.

Ian 51:25

The guy seems like one of the actors who'd be inspired.

Matthew 51:28

I would think so.

Ian 51:31

Oh, wow.

Matthew 51:33

So there we have it. This is a more open-ended kind of episode than we often have because we are gonna be looking into some other sources of Ernie Kovacs' stuff, and we're gonna be looking at this biopic as well, of course.

Ian 51:47

Oh, absolutely.

Matthew 51:48

But it was fun to, to introduce you to something that was... Once, my father introduced me to it, and he, he was a big Ernie Kovacs fan. He was kind of Ernie Kovacs-like in some ways, my dad.

Ian 52:01

I never got to meet him. And- He, yeah.

Matthew 52:03

Yeah, you were, you were in, in low single digits when he passed away-

Ian 52:07

Yeah ...

Matthew 52:08

age-wise. But he, um, but he, and he was a huge fan of Kovacs' stuff. And even he recognized that compared to what he remembered , from 20 years earlier, that the, the PBS Best Of wasn't a great compilation or a great curation.

Ian 52:25

Yeah.

Matthew 52:25

But he enjoyed showing that to me in 1977. We just did a podcast. You've been family,

Ian 52:31

you've been following a family tradition- ... showing it to me when I, and you did, 'cause you showed me that when I was in, like, middle school, I think.

Matthew 52:37

Yeah, yeah. It was quite a while ago.

Ian 52:41

My goodness

Matthew 52:42

So we may be back in the future with more... Well, we will be back in the future with more related to Ernie Kovacs one way or another.

Ian 52:47

Absolutely.

Matthew 52:48

But we will definitely be back in two weeks with more tales of other media from the 20th century.

Ian 52:55

In the meantime, go find something new to watch