Tuesday, August 12, 2014

 

Remembering Robin Williams


Today, the world lost a unique talent, Robin Williams. Robin has been entertaining us for 5 decades. In the 70s, we first met Robin when he played the role of space visitor Mork, from Ork. Mork landed in Boulder Colorado on a mission to observe human life and report back to leader Orson. Each week, he was involved in hilarious high jinx, but always saw something in the human race that showed how worthwhile we were.

In the 80s and beyond, Robin starred in many popular movies including Good Morning Vietnam, Mrs. Doubtfire, The World According to Garp, Patch Adams, Awakenings, The Dead Poet Society and many more. Robin performed stand up comedy at break neck speed, improvising often and going off on extended joke sprees at the slightest trigger. He appeared often on late night shows leaving the host and audience gasping for air after laughing heartily.

Recently Robin Williams was a performer on American Idol Gives Back, a charity show with the American Idol judges. He played the role of the winner of Russian Idol, and did several minutes of jokes and improv. Today we present two representative videos from the long laugh filled career of Robin Williams. The first video is the pilot episode of Mork and Mindy, starring Robin Williams and Pam Dawber, with guest stars Henry Winkler as The Fonz and Penny Marshall as Laverne De Fasio. The second video is of Robin Williams on American Idol. Watch, laugh, and celebrate the life of Robin Williams.

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Wednesday, May 30, 2012

 

You Need Us!


Many of you know that I am a huge fan of 1960s pop culture, especially 60s Music.

In the mid 60s, when the War in Viet Nam was raging and its body count was featured on the TV News every night, there was a need for mindless comedies to take people's minds off the more serious issues of the day.  One such TV show was Gilligan's Island.

Gilligan, the Skipper, the Howells, the Professor, Ginger and Mary Ann were stranded on a remote deserted island.  Sometimes they had visitors from the outside world but incredibly they were never able to get off the island.  In one episode, Rock band The Mosquitos ended up on the island.  This was an episode titled "Don't Bug the Mosquitoes" - Season 2, Episode 12 - and was originally on the air on December 09, 1965.

It seems that the girls wanted to form their own singing group.  So Mrs, Howell, Ginger and Mary Ann created a group called The Honey Bees and sang a song called, "You Need Us".  They performed the song for the guys, and you can see that performance below.

This song, You Need Us, has always been one of my favorite TV show songs from the 60s, right up there with The Alvin Twist and The Bedrock Twitch.  If you want to listen to an MP3 of You Need Us, by The Honeybees, from Gilligan's Island, click here.

I recently came across a simply delightful lipsync cover of You Need Us, performed by a family who shot this video in two takes and posted it to YouTube.  The mother plays Mrs. Howell and her two daughters play Ginger and Mary Ann.  They are all adorable as they lipsync and do The Honey Bees dance moves.  We are Featuring this video this week on our YouTube Top 100 Weekly Chart. Check it out!



Now, here is the original performance of You Need Us sung by The Honeybees - Lovey Howell, Ginger and Mary Ann. This was originally on TV back in 1965 and reflects the kind of Garage Rock music that was popular at the time. The Beatles were huge and every teen in the world dreamed of being in a band that would make the girls scream and chase after them, like they did to The Beatles. It was quite an interesting time for music!



If YOU decide to do a cover of this groovy 60s tune, email me a link to your video and I'll feature it here too!

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