Gilbert Gottfried's Amazing Colossal Podcast - Mini #230: Remembering Saturday Morning Cartoons with Mark McCray

Episode Date: August 22, 2019

This week: "Milton the Monster"! "A Man Called Flintstone"! The genius of Jack Urbont (and Hoyt Curtin)! Gilbert sings the "King Kong" theme! And the return of Jerry the Bellybutton Elf! Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

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moisture body wash buy it today at major retailers Here we go boys. One, two, three, four. Gilbert and Frank's Colossal Obsessions. Hi, this is Gilbert Gottfried and I'm here with my co-host Frank Santopadre and this is Gilbert and Frank's Amazing Colossal Obsessions. It is. Our guest this week is Mark McRae, who's coming out with his new book, The Best Saturdays of Our Lives. Can you tell us what this is about? Yes, and thanks for having me on the show. Of course, thanks for your incredible patience while we sat here with these two loons.

We just had Billy West in here as a segue for you. Awesome, I really like Billy West. He's a really great voiceover actor, definitely. Great talent. Yeah, so my book is The Best Saturdays of Our Lives, and it's a book that chronicles how Saturday morning programming became a competitive business. And I highlight the studios, the networks, the executives that worked in the industry at the time, as well as some of the programming strategy. And what's your journey, Mark? How did you wind up at Adult Swim? Because you come from programming.

That's correct. Yeah, so I worked on the kids' side of the business. I was part of the team that helped launch the Boomerang Network. And I was hired as a cartoon expert to create strategy for a lot of those old boomerang shows, you know, like the Bugs Bunnies and Scooby Doo. Yeah. I had a, before my book was a book, it was a newsletter. And it got the attention of Mike Lazo because I used to send a newsletter around to people in the industry. I know that name.

people in the industry. I know that name. And they felt that I would be a good fit in helping to form Boomerang's programming strategy. So I did that for a while. And then I also worked on the Cartoon Network side, helping to promote shows like the Powerpuff Girls and Dexter's Laboratory. We would come up with all type of crazy stunt ideas, the 10 best Powerpuff Girl adventures ever, or Dexter's mad scientist stunts, you know, to try to get the kids in the seats. So you were marketing those shows? Correct. Gil, did you do any of those shows?

Did you do voices for any of those? Dexter's Lab or Powerpuff Girls or any of that? None of those. Any of that Cartoon Network stuff? No, no, I did. Let's see. I've done so many cartoons. Well, he was Jerry the Belly Button Elf on Ren and Stimpy, Mark.

Oh, that's cool. I want to give you a heads up. I popped up as the dentist in about three episodes of Fairly Oddparents. Oh, yeah. Yeah. Fairly Oddparents. It's one of my favorite shows. He's been making the rounds.

And then I do this, well, that's for PBS Cyberchase. And you did Ninja Turtles. Oh, yeah. A few. As Krang the Subprime. Wow. Which version of Ninja Turtles? The one from the 80s or the later versions? This is a recent, yeah. Oh, the recent one. Wow. Which version of Ninja Turtles? The one from the 80s or the later versions?

This is a recent, yeah. Oh, the recent ones. Yeah. Yeah, he gets around, Mark. Yeah, that's cool. But you're like us. I mean, you're an obsessive kid about this stuff. I mean, the focus of the book, or at least the part that I locked in on, was the 60s stuff.

Oh, yeah. The 66, 67. You called it, what did you call it? I called it the Big Bang. The Big Bang. Yeah, I thought that was interesting. Yes. Go ahead.

You talk about this cartoon series that, as a kid, I would sit there with my jaw hanging open by how bad it was. And that was the Marvel Superheroes cartoon. Yeah, let's cover that. Yeah, so the Marvel Superheroes was done by a company called Grant Ray Lawrence. And it was a Canadian studio. And there wasn't a lot of money. They were only getting like $28,000 an episode to produce those cartoons.

And the going rate in 1966 was like $45,000 an episode. Wow. So not a lot. But they were charming. They were very charming. And recently, there was a Silver Age Facebook page, And recently, there is a Silver Age Facebook page and someone posted a poll about the Marvel superheroes versus some of the DC cartoons around the same era. And the poll wanted to know which shows do you prefer?

And the Marvel superheroes cartoons came out on top. So in spite of the limited animation, which was, you know, very limited, you know, the series did have, you know, very good voice work and great background music. And a lot of the stories were adapted very accurately from the comic books. I remember the animation there, there'd be a picture of the superhero, and they'd shake the picture. When there was an explosion.

Yeah. Yeah, one time we were watching an episode at Cartoon Network, and someone walked by and said, wow, it doesn't even look like an actual animated series. It doesn't even look like an actual animated series. It looks like an animatic that is storyboards that move with limited animation. But that was the method of Grant Ray Lawrence to make cartoons, I guess, the best that they could. On the cheap. Yeah.

Well, the theme songs were great. They stay with you all these years later. Oh, yeah. There's Jack Irvant, I think, is the guy, the composer.

Here's Bruce Banner turned into the Hulk. Yeah, they're great. Yeah. They really hold up. Yeah, the Iron Man song is one of my favorites. Yeah, you referenced it

in the book. There's a YouTube video. I'll send it to you. There's this guy. I don't know if he's still with us. And the video may be a decade old. I don't know if Ned knows. I see Ned in the background there.

A guy named Jack Urbont, U-R-B-O-N-T, is the composer of those themes. New York guy, like us. Wow. Like all of us. But still dining out. When Captain America swings his mighty shield. That's it. Throws, I think When Captain America swings his mighty shield. That's it. Throws, I think. Oh, throws his mighty shield. All I oppose

is shield my shield. That's it. That's it. Well, they trotted out this. Grant Ray Lawrence also did the Spider-Man series. Right. Also on the cheap, I might say. Right. But a much bigger budget because Actual animation. Right. So I guess bigger budget because actual animation.

Right. So I guess the difference between the Marvel superheroes and the Spider-Man production was one was syndicated and Spider-Man, you know, actually got a budget from, you know, the ABC network. And then in 66, as I described, the Big Bang, you had the New Adventures of Superman start. And all of a sudden, CBS is number one. And it was a big game changer. And so the person who was working at ABC, the programming executive, was a guy named Ed Vane. I can't find any information on him. Ed Vane, although I can't find any information on him. Lou Scheimer, who ran Filmation Productions, told me that that's who he remembered, the executive, the programming executive over at ABC.

But I just thought it was a genius move that he says, OK, if the CBS shows are beating me with DC, I'm going to go after Marvel shows. And I'm going to make sure that they have a decent budget. And what's really cool about all those 1967 shows is that, especially with Spider-Man, you actually got to see what these guys could do with an increased budget, even though it was still limited. They were terribly charming. I mean, with all these things, you go back and you look at them years later.

I mean, I had not seen those Spider-man cartoons in 25 years 30 years and i went back and i was shocked by how crude they were because i didn't remember them being crude when i was 10 or or nine but yeah but they retain a lot of their charm and that and those great jazz scores oh yeah that's uh ray ellis ray ellis um who uh i mention in my book as well. Yeah. He was a jazz musician. Can't talk. He was a jazz guy. And he worked with Lena Horne and a lot of the jazz greats. And he ended up, after doing the Spider-Man background music,

he ended up working at Filmation for many, many years. And he's a very versatile musician. Definitely. It's pretty hip music when you go back and you listen to that stuff. And Hoyt Curtin's work on Johnny Quest.

Oh, yeah. Yeah, Hoyt Curtin. I had the pleasure of talking to him. You did. When I first started working at Cartoon Network, I can't even remember

why we had a conversation. He called to get some type of information from me, and I tried to keep him on the phone as long as I could. He's a legend. Just to kind of ask questions and not try to come off as a fanboy, but try to make it seem like it was more business. Sure. Try to come off as a fanboy, but try to make it seem like it was more business. I remember they had two things that they played constantly on Saturday in between the cartoons. One was a rhyme that said, no school today, no school for me. It's Saturday morning on ABC.

Does that ring a bell, Mark? It does not. on ABC. Does that ring a bell, Mark? It does not. But it's interesting that you remembered that theme because I remembered one also, but it was a CBS theme and it went something like, oh my gosh, I got all these themes in my head. So there's one that was in primetime, and it was something like, the best ones right here. No. Oh, just like last year,

the best ones are right here on CBS. And the Saturday morning one went, I can't remember. This is the strange stuff that sticks in your head, Gilbert. Yeah. All these years later was that good but i was gonna say it's really cool that you know gilbert remembers that because you know it was all about themes and and uh jingles back in those days and and years later it's still in your head somehow oh yes the kind of crap we talk about on this show.

We're obsessed with the most minute details. These are some of the shows. The New Adventures of Superman on CBS, which you mentioned, which Fred Silverman of all people was behind. Was that the one with Bud Collier doing the voice from To Tell the

Truth? I remember those very well. Yeah, so the story is that CBS was number one in primetime and pretty much number one during the daytime where they aired mostly soap operas and game shows. And so they wouldn't let Fred Silverman really do anything, and they said, well, look, Saturday morning's in last place. Why don't you try to you know do something with that strategy and so they gave him saturday morning to work with and the first thing he did was like get all the black and white cartoons off of saturday

morning and uh brought in color cartoons and he you know realized that superhero uh programming was trending and i think a lot of that had to do with the Batman Adam West series that had premiered earlier that year in 1966. I just remembered another one. There's nothing to do today. There's nothing to do today. There's nothing to do today but have some fun. Which network? I forget. The one in his head.

Listen to this list, Gilbert. The Marvel superheroes, the new adventures of Superman, the mighty heroes. Do you remember the mighty heroes? No. With Diaper Man and Rope Man. Oh. What was it? Tornado Man? That was a Terry Toons show. Yeah, that was Terry Toons. Frankenstein Jr. and the Impossibles.

Does any of this ring a bell? No. I remember one early cartoon I remember was Herman the Monster. Oh, Milton the Monster. Milton the Monster. Milton the Monster. Yeah. Who was behind that? Was that not Rankin Bass?

Was it Rankin Bass? Oh, God. i can't recall and i and i watched the show but it's the milton monster show two drops of essence of terror three drops of sinister sauce when the stirring's done can i lick the spoon. Of course. You know, better hold my head. It's starting to tick. Better hold my mouth. I'm feeling sick. It wasn't the Patty Freeling, was it?

No, it wasn't the Patty Freeling. It was an independent I want to say it was someone like Sam Singer who did Courageous Cat. Okay. I just can't recall. And it Courageous Cat, too. And it was an imitation of Gomer Pyle.

That's right. The way Milton would talk. That's right. I watched that show as a kid, but I didn't remember that aspect of it. But I do remember one of the Saturday morning sing-alongs. And it kind of went like this.

Saturday morning on CBSalongs and it kind of went like this. Saturday morning on CBS and to me it just, you know, when I sing the song, yeah, I got a chill. It just brought back wonderful memories. Where are you from originally? The Bronx? From the Bronx, yeah. So you were watching the same channels we were watching, not only

the networks, obviously, but 9, 5 and 11. Correct. And a lot of stuff was syndicated in those days because i didn't see original runs on stuff like felix the cat or even courageous cat minute mouse you remember those gilbert yes yeah i'm pretty sure i saw those in syndication yeah or mcgoo or bat fink bat fink well the same company that did bat fink did um milton the monster okay and uh it's just the production company just escapes me right now yeah yeah yeah and and tell a little talk a little bit about the

japanese uh animation too because gilbert was into gigantor oh ned ned looked it up what was the company uh hal sager hal sager there you go yeah we should we should have known that thank you ned i used to like roger ramjet where roger ramjet and his eagles fighting for our freedom we fly with them through outer space not to join them but to feed them roger ramjet is a man hero of our nation. For more adventures, just make sure to stay tuned to this station. You know? Ring a bell, Mark? Yeah.

I actually used to own a Roger Ramjet t-shirt for the longest time. And when I was younger, I thought that Roger Ramjet was produced by Jay Ward because it had a similar look. And it would have

kind of a sarcastic comedy to it. Right, exactly. Like a Jay Ward cartoon. Like a Rocky and Bullwinkle. Now, Filmation was doing a lot of DC characters. You'd have the Batman Superman Hour, the New Adventures of Superman. By the way, Gilbert has been now, he's played, how do you say the character's name? Mr. Spickler.

You know he played that? Oh. He was the voice of that in the Tim Daly Superman you're with royalty here Mark wow that is awesome that is awesome it's funny you bring up

because I thought his pronunciation has changed so many times I thought it was Mitzelplix I know that was one I never attempted it. And there was a Superman story that was written about two years ago. And they had all the different pronunciations of that character's name just as a reference, you know. Yeah, so not too many people have voiced that character.

You must be like one of three or four. Did Michael J. Pollard do it? Oh, yeah. And I did it in some recent cartoons. You brought it back. Yeah, it might have been in those, whatchamacallit, those little figures. Legos. Legos.

I think it was some kind of Lego Superman or something. Oh, okay. Right. Yeah, there have been some Lego specials featuring the DC characters. I remember what a big deal it was. You'd watch Aquaman and Superman, and when they would occasionally go, you'd get an extra Justice League character. You'd suddenly see a cartoon and Adam was in it or The Flash. Such a treat. Oh, my gosh.

or The Flash. Such a treat. Oh my gosh. So, you know, that's one of the things that really stands out as far as my childhood goes. I turned on the television and I thought that I was watching

just a regular Superman cartoons and lo and behold, who shows up but the entire Justice League team. So that was my introduction to the DC universe, seeing those characters for the first those filmation shows with with ted knight doing a lot of those voices oh yeah and then and as the

narrator remember i yeah i remember too aquaman scourge of the seven seas yes and i remember too there was the dick tracy. Right. Oh, yeah. Those disappeared. And the voice of Dick Tracy was Everett Sloan. Everett Sloan from Citizen Kane. Yeah. Yeah. You're going way back. And Dick Tracy never did a thing in those commercials.

He would always get the call and he'd go, Okay, Chief, I'll be on it right away. And then they'd call up these made-up characters. Like jujitsu. Jujitsu, yeah. And hippo calorie. And they would constantly be doing celebrity imitations. Yeah. Which they got away with.

That was the thing back then. Why was Hanna-Barbera doing all their own superheroes? Filmation had a lock on those DC characters. Yeah, so, yeah, Filmation had a lock on the DC characters,

and according to Norm Prescott, there's an interview in my book, you know, Norm Prescott was one of the Filmation guys. He felt that Hanna-Barbera's business strategy was to not buy existing properties. I see. And to create something brand new.

Now, they did do the Fantastic Four in 1967. That's right. With that great Ted Nichols music. Right. And it's a great adaption of that comic book series. And I'm not sure if the network approached Hanna-Barbera to do it, or Hanna-Barbera was like, hey, we've got to do at least one Marvel series. I'm not exactly...

There's not a lot of information about how the Fantastic Four and Hanna-Barbera actually worked together, how that came about. Well, I liked what they created. I liked the Herculoids and Space Ghost. I thought they came up... And Birdman. And Birdman, which is all parodied years later. But I love that stuff.

Yeah, like Space Ghost. Dino Boy. Oh, and Dino Boy, right. Oh, and I remember there was the King Kong cartoon. I think that was Japanese. It may have been, but I remember there was the King Kong cartoon. I think that was Japanese. It may have been, but I remember the theme song. King Kong, you know the name of King Kong. You know the fame of King Kong.

Ten times as big as a man. Ringing any bells, Mark? Oh, I remember that show. And I sort of remember the theme song. I thought the theme song was, you know, as Gilbert just sung, very adult for a kid's show. It was a little dramatic. We will return to Gilbert Gottfried's

amazing colossal podcast after this. Baseball is finally back. Get in on Major League action and swing for the fences with BetMGM, the king of sportsbooks. Log in or sign up to play along as BetMGM brings the real-time action. Embrace a season's worth of swings with BetMGM,

your one-stop shop for all things baseball. BetMGM.com for T's and C's. 19 plus to wager. Ontario only. Gambling problem? Call Connex Ontario at 1-866-531-2600. BetMGM operates pursuant to an operating agreement with iGaming Ontario. Want visibly glowing skin in 14 days?

With new Olay Indulgent Moisture Body Wash, you can lather and glow. The 24-hour moisturizing body wash is infused with vitamin B3 complex and has notes of rose and cherry creme for a rich indulgent experience. Treat your senses with Nuole Indulgent Moisture Body Wash. Buy it today at major retailers why did this is an interesting turning point in your book why did they start getting away from superhero shows there was some there was some nervousness or some anxiety about violence and fisticuffs and saturday morning oh yes and so, first of all, the Vietnam War was going on.

And the Vietnam War, images from that war were being shown on the 6 o'clock news every night. Sure. And a lot of parents' groups were really concerned about the violence that was taking place

on superhero shows. And so, you also have to understand, in 1967, I mean, there was a, you know, thanks to Superman being this huge hit, the following year was the first year that Saturday morning actually reacted to a trend. And that trend was superheroes. And so you had more superheroes on the air

than you ever had in the entire history of television. And a lot of those programs were violent. Sometimes the villains would get left for dead or things would happen and you're not sure what happened to the villain. And so a lot of it was going on. And what I found interesting about Fred Silverman was that while NBC and ABC were pulling back their superhero programs, Fred Silverman found out that NBC and ABC were pulling back their superhero programs, Fred Silverman found out that the animated rights to Batman were available

and decided to green light the Batman Superman hour. Parents, groups, and pressure be damned. He just went and did it because Superman had been his number one show for two years previously. And he was going to find a way to keep that show going in spite of... Great memories of those shows. But it sort of ushers in the overreaction to violence

or the negative reaction to violence on Saturday morning sort of ushers in this era of music-oriented cartoons. So suddenly here comes the Archies and Josie and the Pussycats and there's an Osmonds cartoon. And there's a Jackson 5 cartoon. Do you remember all this? Oh, absolutely.

And then Sid and Marty had the Bogaloos. Right. Yeah. And the Josie and the Pussycats, that was definitely fuel for her masturbation for a little boy back then. This is a G-rated episode, Gilbert. And the Catanooga Cats. Oh, the Catanooga Cats. Yeah, all that

doing their thing. All that stuff. We had Ron Dante, by the way, here on the podcast. Oh, that's awesome. I'm a huge fan. Me too.

We are too. And even the Fat Albert and the Cosby Kids sang. They had a band. Yes, sang. They had a band. Yes, yes. They had a band. Everybody had to sing. They played with instruments

from like a junkyard. Yeah, they were a junkyard band. Right. Yeah, yeah. So that was a trend. That was a trend. This is like 68

because by that time also the Batman live action series is breathing its last. Right, it's breathing its last and that's how CBS and Fred Silverman were able to get the animated rights to Batman, to create the Batman Superman Hour. And because the Archies unexpectedly tracked so well ratings-wise,

obviously the networks decided, hey, we don't need superhero shows anymore. We can just go with teenagers and music now. Right, right. Obviously, the networks decided, hey, we don't need superhero shows anymore. We can just go with teenagers and music now. Right, right. And, I mean, these are the days when you would see the little 45 on the back of the cereal box. I mean, I remember Sugar Sugar with the Archies being on the back of a, I guess it was Alphabits. I want to say it was Alphabits or Honeycomb or something.

I remember that. And I think if you Google it, you can still see it. You could also say it was Alphabits or Honeycomb or something. I remember that. And I think if you Google it, you can still see it. You could also get it. It's not a cross-promotion. You could also get those records on the page of a magazine. That's true, too, in those days. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah, my...

So that's a long-gone memory. Right. My parents, for whatever reason, wouldn't buy any of the cereals that had the records, unfortunately. I'm not exactly sure. I mean, if it if it was on the back of a cereal that we didn't necessarily eat on a regular basis. I just think that, you know, my mom just didn't want to spend extra for whatever that cereal was because there have been times when she has tried out different cereals uh you know and either i liked it or i didn't or my brother didn't like it and she's like never again you had it today it would be worth money oh yeah i know oh i wish on the subject of hb let's talk a little bit about the flintstones because you you mentioned

them in your book which i don't remember the Flintstones on Saturday mornings I remember the Flintstones in prime time yes right yes yeah Flintstones were in prime time but once the show ended it it sort of graduated to Saturday morning and uh so it would be rerun on NBC during uh the Saturday morning years. And then, you know, the ratings must have been pretty good because next thing you know in 1971, they are greenlighting the Pebbles and Bam Bam show.

Right. And there was the Flintstones feature. Right. The man called Flintstone. Oh, that's right. Cashing in on the whole secret agent craze. Yeah. Right, right. Yeah, yeah.

And Ted Nichols, who I interview in my book, he retained some of the musical rights for that movie. And he said one day he got a check for like six bucks or something like that. You know, but while the whole time he was working at Hanna-Barbera, which was about 10 years, he said that, you know, he didn't have rights to a lot of the music that he composed, unfortunately. But somehow, you know, with this feature film featuring the Flintstones, he managed to, you know, retain the rights for it. Those theme songs, you know, and we talk about this show,

we lament the loss of commercial jingles and TV theme songs. We had the director, James Burrows, here the other day. We're talking about how you don't hear a sitcom theme like Taxi or Cheers because they want to get that extra 26 seconds to give it away to a commercial.

And now, when they... They want to get that extra 26 seconds to give it away to a commercial. And now, when they... They want to sell it. When one show ends, you see at the bottom of the screen, the credits going really quick, and on top of the screen, the other show's beginning. Right, that's right.

Because they realize people have a very limited attention span. But you go back and listen to those, and I should know the composers of both the Jetsons theme and the Flintstones theme, but they're as great as ever. Right. Yeah. So, you know, I agree with you. And part of the success of those shows. Right. So, you know, in the old days of television, the open actually was the thing that would sell the viewer to watch.

Imagine that. To bring you in to the series. And nowadays, as you pointed out, sometimes there is no open, and they want to get you to that content as quickly as possible. And maybe that's because there's streaming competition and cable and satellite. I love, too, that the Flintstones and the Jetsons, they also fall into that category of theme songs that set up the

show. Here's George Jetson, Jane, his wife. I mean, it couldn't be any more explanatory. And even the Flintstones theme tells you everything you need to know about the series. The ultimate in that was always Gilligan's Island. Well, Sherwood Schwartz, he cashed in on those.

Well, there were the two theme songs. There was from season one that didn't list all the cast members instead and the rest. And the rest. And then somebody's agent got involved. Let's also talk a little bit about Sid and Marty, who we also had here on the podcast. Oh, really? Have you met those guys? I met them at Comic-Con in 2012.

They showed a pilot for Land of the Lost. We loved them. And one of their executives named Joe King actually, when I first started doing the best Saturdays of our lives, newsletter started to mentor me and, you know, we'd have regular phone calls and he would explain how syndication works and, you know, how people were in the industry.

So when I saw, when I met those guys in 2012, I wanted to know, I said, well, how was Joe King doing? And Sid told me that he had passed away like the year before, unfortunately. So it would have been wonderful to be able to let Joe know, like, look, I made it.

I'm in the industry now. Thanks for your help and support. But it was sweet that he wrote you back in the first place. Sid and Marty will be around forever, by the way. Oh, I agree. Sid's a gym rat. He works out a couple of days a week. And Marty's anger is keeping him alive.

Yes. They're like the sunshine. They really are. They really are. You always, this is interesting too from the book, a theory you have that you always saw a little bit of the Wizard of Oz in Puffin stuff. Yeah, I don't know what it was. It just really reminded me of the Wizard of Oz a lot.

You have this character that gets swept into this new world. It's not a tornado, but, I mean, it was a storm that sort of brought little Jimmy into H.R. Puff and Stuff's world. And, you know, there's a wicked witch, just like in The Wizard of Oz, and there's all these characters. Steal from the best. Right. Or borrow. And I didn't know this until I read

your book, that NBC was dealing with them on the cheap, too. They were clutching the purse strings. On those Croft shows. Yes. So So NBC was having some ratings issues because unlike ABC and CBS, ABC and CBS had a tendency to follow whatever the newest programming trends were. whatever the newest programming trends were. NBC was trying to create a new programming trend, and they were putting a lot of their eggs in one basket.

And so a lot of times, while kids were happy watching Scooby-Doo on CBS and watching a wonderful show over on ABC, a lot of the shows on NBC weren't really getting a lot of traction. And the way that the business models were set up back in those days, the advertising pays the bills. And if you have really great ratings, you can charge a higher advertising rate. And if you have low ratings, well, the rate won't be as high. And I think NBC sort of in those early days in at least the early 70s, suffered from having low ratings and not being able to give a full renewal of episodes for a show like H.R. Puffin's stuff that did really great ratings. And there's something.

You could see it on the internet. And it seems like a bad taste joke put together. But the Flintstones once did a cigarette commercial. Oh, yeah, you've seen that. Yeah. Yes, it's infamous. Scary. Different times.

Yeah, Fred and Barney lighting up a cigarette and having a smoke. It's so scary. We get a kick out of, Mark, we get a kick out of how derivative those HB shows were of primetime characters. That Huckleberry Hound was Andy Griffith. And that the Flintstones was the Honeymooners. The Honeymooners. And Yogi Bear was what? Art Carney.

Oh, yeah. Art Carney is what I've always said. Right, right. And I think somebody sued, I'm trying to remember who it was, Burt Lahr sued them for snagglepuss or something. You could look this up.

Okay. That's a good Billy West question. And now, for years, Bela Lugosi Jr. is a lawyer who fights Did you know this? for these people. No, I did not. He fights for these likeness rights. Because before that, you could do anybody's voice. I mean, I remember for years they had Columbo yogurt and a guy imitating Peter Falk.

Right. Yeah. So if you wanted to start a cartoon show now and you just wanted to have somebody go, hey, boo-boo, and just do our carny, you've got to go through some legal wrangling if you want to do it. Right. Yeah. I guess, you know, back in the day, it was just, it was a lot more liberties. The Wild West.

Yeah. Yeah. Tell us this, too. This is fascinating. Why did DC Comics hate the Super Friends? Oh, my gosh. Well, okay. Because I hated them.

Yeah. Okay, so here's the story, right? So, again, the superheroes sort of left the air after the 1968-69 season, and there really wasn't a lot of superhero shows on, but kids still wanted to see superheroes, and studios still wanted to make superhero shows. And I think that, so the story is that Superman and Wonder Woman make guest appearances

on the Brady Kids series. That's right. And every time those episodes aired, it had huge ratings. And so ABC got the idea, well, obviously people want to see superhero shows, so let's bring back a superhero show. And they brought in the Super Friends. And what I thought was cool about it is the first time that you see Superman, Batman, Wonder Woman, Aquaman, and Robin together on the screen at the same time. So I was really happy and hyped over it. But there was no real action.

No. There was a lot of talking. And there was a monkey. And, oh, the monkey came later. A monkey. They had a dog first. Wonder Dog was in the first season. Wonder Dog.

And then there was Gleek. And then there was Gleek who came. Gleek jumped the shark, man. Right. Oh, my God. I remember like the Scooby-Doo cartoons, they would have celebrity guest stars. Always. Paul Lynde. Yes.

Yeah. And it was always so clumsy because they go, oh, this is the house of Sonny and Cher. I think Sonny and Cher were on Scooby-Doo. Yeah, and they wouldn't really do anything. They'd go, oh, hi, are you looking for the ghosts? Yeah, we are. And that would be it. I have a theory behind that as well.

So a lot of the guest stars on the new Scooby-Doo movies, they had some type of contract or association with CBS. So Sonny and Cher had their primetime series. Sandy Duncan had a contract with CBS. And there were others. And I think they just tied those contracts in with, hey, you guys want to do some voices or we're going to make you do voices. I'm not exactly sure how it got negotiated but and they suddenly had to show up on the scooby-doo show uh why i have one last fun question unless you you know anything about the beatles cartoon and you can tell us why no none of them actually sounded like the beatles which gilbert's obsessed with yes well um here's what i know about the beat. You mentioned Paul Freese as doing the voices.

John Lennon, I think. I wasn't a huge fan of that cartoon series. But what I do know is that in 1966, it was the number one Saturday morning show overall. The cash it in. Yeah. And, you know, it createdall? Ah. The cash it in. Yeah. And, you know, it created, you know, what every network wants, a halo effect.

And so kids stood around to watch the rest of the schedule. And that number one status was actually upset, was, you know, the big upset happened with Superman. The New Adventures of Superman came in, and all of a sudden, Superman is the number one show, and Superman is creating a halo effect with a space ghost and a Lone Ranger cartoon. It's trends. The Beatles sort of found its way on its way out.

But something about the series, I just couldn't get into when I was a kid. Me neither. It weirded me out, and I knew that they weren't the Beatles' voices, and they didn't bother to try to sound like the Beatles. And you knew it was like, hey, the Beatles are big. We can make a buck this way. Yeah.

Oh, absolutely. Now, Ned is sitting behind you, and Ned said to me, Ned, if I have this right, I was supposed to ask the Lou Scheimer story. Is that right? Yeah, the Lou Scheimer story. Okay. Is he laughing or nodding? Do I have it right?

He's laughing and nodding. Lou Scheimer, for the uninitiated, ran Filmation. He ran Filmation. Again, someone else who was a mentor to me in the business. I first met Lou back in 1989. I tried to get a job with his company. He didn't have any openings, but we remained friends. And he told me, you know, that I knew a lot about the kids industry. And he said, well, you should try to find a way to get your name out there. And he said, well, you should try to find a way to get your name out there. And so after my meeting with him, I decided to launch the Best Saturdays of Our Lives newsletter. And, you know, I was thinking, well, instead of just focusing on one person, why not just focus on the whole industry? And so I started sending the newsletter out to everyone who touched kids content. and that included all the broadcast networks,

DC and Marvel Comics. But it was Lou that actually inspired me and gave me the idea to find a way to get my name out there. And we remained friends until his passing. When did he pass? Ooh. It was Prescott and Shimer, right?

Yeah, I'm not exactly sure the year passed but it was Prescott Shimer and Hal Sutherland they were the three principals yeah and there's conversations with all three of them in my book that's great and Hal Sutherland was he was so funny I had one phone conversation with him and you know they were always talking about the competition between Filmation and Hanna-Barbera. And he would always say, yes, Hanna-Barbera had deep pockets, deep pockets. And he would just repeat that over and over again. And I thought it was so funny. And Hal Sutherland actually has a half brother that spent a lot of years working over at Hanna-Barbera, Tony Benedict. Have you ever heard that name?

No, I haven't. Yeah, well, Tony was one of the original guys that, I guess when Hanna-Barbera started their television production, Tony was there. And I think he left Hanna-Barbera about 1966, 67. And we're friends on Facebook, and he had published a letter from Hal Sutherland. And I sent him a message.

I said, oh yeah, I said, I have talked to Hal on the phone and he's mentioned in my book. And that's when Tony revealed that they were half brothers. That's cool. Yeah, and after he told me that, I was just curious about what was

Thanksgiving like? With them working for rival companies. You know the actress Beverly D'Angelo from the vacation movies? Did you know she was an animation artist at Hanna-Barbera? No way. When she was like 19 or 20 years old? It's true.

You can learn about that on this very podcast. Okay, yeah, I need to check that out. And was there anything more desperate than when Fred Flintstone made friends with... The Great Gazoo. Yeah, yeah. Harvey Korman. That was desperation.

We have nothing. Well, there's debates about when the Flintstones jumped the shark. Some people say they jumped the shark with Kazoo. Some folks say they jumped the shark when Pebbles and Bam Bam showed up. Oh, both of them are pretty horrible. Alright, last question

before we plug the book and let you out of here, Mark. Because you're an expert, what do you think Sid and Marty were on? We have our own theories. Hey, they listened to your podcast, right? They were on it. No, we doubt very much that they're listening.

Okay. I think those guys were smoking a lot of weed. I had to guess. There you go. From the expert's mouth. So this has been Gilbert and Frank's amazing, colossal obsessions. And the book is The Best Saturdays of Our Lives, Mark McRae. Mark, you're one of us.

You're crazy. You're obsessed with the same minutia. God help you. You're a perfect guest for this show, so we thank you and one of us. You're crazy. You're obsessed with the same minutia. God help you. You're a perfect guest for this show, so we thank you and we thank Ned. Thank you. Thanks for having me as a guest, and I have to thank Ned, too, for connecting me with you guys. It's just been an awesome time talking about Saturday morning. I'm glad.

The great Ned Hastings and Casper Kelly. We thank you guys, and we'll get the word out about the book. All right. Awesome. Thank you. Take care, guys. All right. You too.

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