Bob Rafelson: The Bad Guy

Happy Birthday!  Born in 1933 (Feb 21), he's the first half of RayBert and one of the B's in BBS.

Born in NYC to a Hat Manufacturer.

Interesting to note: Bob's uncle Sam, (Samson Raphaelson 3/30/1894-7/16/84) was a short story writer.  And playwright.  And Screenwriter. He wrote on "Shop Around the Corner" for Ernst Lubitsch and "Suspicion" for Hitchcock.  He also came up with a little story called, "The Jazz Singer".  He wrote the short story and play behind what would be the first talking movie in 1927.  A rabbi's kid wants to sing popular music, is renounced by his father and it all works out when he's a success.  Note the difference in spelling between Bob and Uncle Sam; it is simplified from "ph" to "f" and the "ae" becomes "e".  This Anglicizing shows that he had taken the lesson of "Jazz Singer" to heart.

Producer of the Monkees (with Mr. Bert Schneider) and collaborator with Nicholson and The Boys (uncredited) on "Head". Essentially, he took the money & prestige from the TV Show and used it to finance "Easy Rider" and the critical success of "5 Easy Pieces".        

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Even though it's his birthday, I will take this opportunity to insert a major question into this grand biography. Hollywood is a city of angles, and I believe that he entered and exited the entire TV Show project with the most cynicism and holds the most responsibility for any and all negative publicity and bad feelings arising from the narrative arc of our story.

In short, he is the Bad Guy of our story. The Bad Father, who eagerly seeded the PR and helped craft the contracts which only gave The Boys $400 a week and little to no profits from the residuals or merchandising.

Please correct me if I am wrong, but it seems that he deserted the project around the time of "Head", not fighting to capitalize on publicity or narrative accessibility.  Mel Brooks did a movie called "The Producers" which centered on crazy and evil producers getting a Broadway show to flop, to their financial benefit.  That's what RayBert did with "Head"; they wanted to kill the Monkee project and that movie was essentially received as a public funeral.  (Never mind that today it can be seen as a fascinating experimental film and a lynchpin in the Monkee narrative).

Rare Footage of Clarkesville Day:1966

I LOVE this rare FIRST PERFORMANCE footage for so many reasons.  It introduces itself in the first few moments as having been shot in La Jolla in 1966, before the premiere of the TV Show.  That was the day the town changed its name to Clarkesville, and the Boys realized just what they were getting themselves in for.  At least in terms of screaming fans.

FIRST of all, the film itself wasn't recorded with sound.  So someone decided to do something VERY creative with the music track.  Listen to it and try to figure out what song is playing and what they did!!*

Second: The film quality is TERRIBLE.  But actually, it is beautiful and completely suits the feeling.  This is what happens when the camera begin to experiment with drugs.  Black and white from the sixties, just as the world was changing.  This is not footage of "Leave it to Beaver".

Third: The spots near the end.  Danny Thomas introduces them.  He's a VERY famous vaudevillian.  From Lebanon.  Who had his own groundbreaking show in the 50's, called "Make Room for Daddy".  Father of "That Girl" Marlo Thomas. (Who was married to proto-talk show host Phil Donahue).  Mostly, for our purposes, Danny starred in a remake of "Jazz Singer".  As we have mentioned, Bert Rafelson's uncle, (Samson Raphaelson) wrote the original short story and play.



*Okay, Steppin Stone.  Played BACKWARDS! Too cool! Like "Strawberry Fields" by "those boys" (aka Beatles)  Here's the song, a clip that someone did with just music and lyrics.  Because they didn't HAVE videos back then.  Hey, the Beatles didn't even have a TV series!!

#22, At the Circus

Circus Episode!!

Opening contains 3 quick elements to set the scene:
1) The Monkeemobile on the road (i.e. we're not in the Pad this week, and they had to drive for an undetermined distance. There are trees, so at least we are out of the city)
2) Stock footage of circus & workers tending to elephants, etc. (Where is Bimbo for the rest of the episode, huh?)
3) Micky's line: "Man, I haven't been to the circus since I was a kid,"
What he didn't say:
"When my stage name was Micky Braddock and I played a kid named Corky on a show called "Circus Boy" and the set was a real live circus and . . . "
You'll notice how easily he juggles while walking on barrels, etc.

They apparently are there to see a show, but find a small sign on the ground which says "closed". (Although it is not imposing and seems to be an afterthought of the Prop Department)
Peter suggests a word, "snik", Mike corrects him with the word "sneak" and conjugates it. ("I sneak, you sneak, he sneaks) The Peter character then makes a joke which is based on a literal reading (hearing?) of what Mike said. "Great, then we can all get in!" As if he might have been baiting him from the beginning by mispronouncing a word.

As an aside, this made me think of Jean Berko Gleason, famous Psycholinguist, who created the "Wug Test".  It demonstrates that anyone (especially small children) can learn and conjugate words they have never heard before.   (Thus the joke could have gone in the direction of "I snik, you snik, he sniks")  This essentially refutes the theory that children (and adults for that matter) learn solely through imitation. If this stuff really turns you on, investigate what Chomsky has to say about Universal Grammar. Kids are essentially born with the brain software to learn language, they just need to learn the data sets (vocabulary) and rules (grammar/syntax) to plug in. Fascinating stuff!!

Back to our story, they walk right in and begin playing with the "toys"/props of the circus, like kids.  It's a common example of a director turning on the camera and telling the actors to wander in, without giving them specific lines or actions. Mike has nothing specific here and just ends up wandering, looking at stuff. Peter turns a megaphone into a machine gun (made more effective by a sound effect) and cracks a whip (ditto exaggerated sound effect). Micky's juggling and it's a setup to Davy getting into position to deliver his line about how the circus gives you a feeling that "everyone likes one another". And then the irony of the knife act starts. Davy and Mike (especially) offer great fright faces before the theme hits.

Another stock shot of circus horses, but cut to the inside of the tent and everyone (except the guys feeding the horses) are at what looks like a union rally. The knife thrower complains about not being paid and a lack of audience. (He should mention that Peter is scratching his back) A guy in a Fonzie leather jacket ironically wants to blame it on those crazy kids and their "discotechques". (That spelling is a joke, folks).

Davy gives a rousing speech about circus life, hope, etc. There are several fantasy sequences involving comedic circus tropes (Mike as the lion, makes Micky jump through the hoop, in a reversal of power) And later, when idealism isn't enough, they all lie and convince the pretty girl that they are a circus act.  

Madagascar 3 anyone? That movie involves a gang of animals from the first 2 films in the series, and in order to get home, they need to pretend that they are an amazing acrobatic act. (Although they DO consider themselves performers, at the NY City Zoo). Most of the movie is spent on a variation of this Monkee episode, where the fake performers "become" exactly what they said they were, although through luck rather than actual talent. Continuing with the asides, this movie comes up with new words to the universal circus theme (Da da circus/da da afro). Chris Rock has claimed that he came up with that phrase in improv, even though the writers appropriated & crafted it into a major recurring theme & gag. But he didn't get writing credit for it. The line between performing talent and "writing" talent blurs again!

But borrowing/appropriating/stealing and paying "homage" is subtle and common. When the Peter character picks up the megaphone to introduce the fantasy sequence, he turns it directly towards the camera for an edit. When he pulls it away, he's in full ringmaster costume. Compare this to a montage scene in "Singin' in the Rain" (film, 1952) The more famous clip of a megaphone turned to the camera appears during "Should I reveal/Exactly how I feel?" with a Busby Berkeley twist. The movie itself is a "trunk" musical for the songs of Arthur Freed and Nacio Herb Brown, written by Betty Comden and Adolphe Green. The Jazz Singer is a major plot point. See it.

Micky begins singing the theme song to his old series, "Circus Boy". “It’s great, it’s terrific, it’s the best show on earth”. (This is him doing it in the series, with fellow cast members. "Calliope" is pronounced here as "cally-O-pee", vs the more acceptable (i.e.high-fallutin') "KAL-i-o-pee". Maybe it's a circus thing.) There seems to be a man winding a prop, which may or may not be representative of a calliope, maybe it's a hand cranked record player?

They appear as the French acrobats, the Mozzarella Brothers. How you Americans say it, "Help a lending hand?" Terrible accents and all. Even the fantasy costumes are outfits from the 4 Martians (who only added pantyhose on their heads) from a previous episode ("Find the Monkees")

Special attention is given to the practice/rehearsal/fantasy sequences of balancing on the high wire and on each other's shoulders, including a double-exposure effect used in an obvious, but surprising way. There is a lot of romp-type scenes, used without benefit of a song or directly relating to a realistic plot.

The 2 musical sequences come off sweetly, if a bit odd. "Sometime in the Morning" as a sincere love song done in clown outfits. "She" as a formal performance, with the 4 Boys in (Beatle-like) suits, performing for the circus crowd. The song itself is actually a mean-spirited breakup song, as opposed to a cheerful uptempo number for a family crowd. As if the Music Supervisor (yes, I'm looking at YOU, Donnie Kirshner!) expects to throw any old song into an episode without any actual consideration for dramatic sensitivity. Yes, we are eager to see whatever you throw at us, but we'd like it more if you paid more attention to your curating job,

The acrobat/performer lie belies the motivation of having the circus people be the real heroes. Davy does an act where he clowns with the knife-throwers' name & reputation, until he is compelled to perform. Audiences being directly lied to here is not an issue which really gets addressed. Davy claims the audience didn't even miss the Mozzeralla Brothers, which is maybe more of a comment on the uselessness of Marketing more than the ultimate quality of the show. The main theme is for the performers to raise their game, which returns you to the main theme of the entire Monkees project. It doesn't matter how these 4 Boys got onstage, in front of a microphone or on camera. Just enjoy their exhuberant performances and the positive energy they give off.

That Guy Who Wrote "I'm a Believer"

It's Neil Diamond's birthday  (1/24/1941).

He is credited with writing 4 songs for the Monkees. And it is rumored he can kinda be heard singing backup on the one mentioned above.  Biggest selling single, 7 weeks at #1, 1966.

Honestly, I am/was/am a HUGE fan of ND. (off and on, I prefer him when he's not so popular.  And not dressed in sequins.)

In 1980, ND acted & sang in "The Jazz Singer" film.  Oddly enough, Bob Rafaelson's uncle (Sam) wrote the original short story and play back in the 1920's.  The property had been remade several times before (once starring Danny Thomas).  The original 1927 film (which Uncle Sam did not write!) is a landmark in film history.  And not just because Al Jolson was in it (although according to his legendary ego, that's all you need).

It was the FIRST SOUND MOVIE.  'Nuff said.

You may have seen a clip of him saying his famous line:"You ain't heard nothin' yet!".  And he sings to his mother.  (Of course)

The plot is about a Jewish Cantor who wants to make it in show business.  He has to leave behind his religious tradition and of course becomes a big star.  Laurence Olivier plays ND's father and does a great job as an old Jewish man.  Compare that performance to his role in "Marathon Man"  (as a former Nazi, masochistic dentist).

Oddly enough, the play is almost a template for most of the songwriters who came out of Tin Pan Alley, and then of the 50's and 60's generation, the Brill Building.  Neil Diamond and Carole King and Gerry Goffin and many others came from Brooklyn or the Lower East Side and worked their way up.  The 1980 movie shows the contrast in temperatures as another aspect of the two different worlds.  NYC is shown as cold and rainy and old fashioned.  Sunny LA is a place of easy success and easy morals.  A cautionary tale whose stereotype still holds up (superficially) today.   (As of this night in January, the wind chill in NYC, outside my window, is supposed to hit -1.  Personally, I would gladly sell out to LA. "If only they were buying"-a joke stolen from Peter Tork)

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Back to More Monkees Songs That ND Wrote:
"Little Bit Me, Little Bit You"  If you see this in person when Peter is doing it with Shoe Suede Blues, you MUST hold up 2 fingers when he sings, "Little Bit You, too".  It's a visual pun.  Also, Peter will sometimes sing "Three" or hold up 3 fingers when he sings "too".  Just to make sure you are paying attention.

"Lookout, Here Comes Tomorrow" (which I happen to love, because of its fun lyrical quality and rhythm. And my first name is Tamara)

"Love to Love" Not really released, included as bonus material (I have no idea how this goes)
NOT to be confused with the disco hit by Donna Summer, "Love to Love You Baby"
17 minute version here:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=V5AztWseIdU


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Not to get off topic (which I LOVE to LOVE to do), but here's a list of the Top 10 Hits:
http://www.billboard.biz/bbbiz/genre/rock-and-pop/the-monkees-top-10-billboard-hot-100-hits-1006318552.story

You can easily guess the first 5:
#1 I'm A
#2 Daydream
#3 Clarksville
#4 Little Bit
#5 PVS

But the next ones are kinda surprising:

#6 Valleri
#7 That was Then, This is Now (1986!!!)
#8 Words
#9 D.W. Washburn
#10 Steppin Stone

Leave it to Billboard!! I wonder if ND ended up with more money from the recordings than the 4 Boys.