Vital Viewing (As Primitive as Can Be Edition)

 

Actor Bob Denver was born on this day in 1935 (he died in 2005.) Though it's not his original claim to fame, Denver is by now best-known for the 1960s situation comedy Gilligan's Island.

If you've never seen the show--which at one time would have and may still put you in a distinct minority--it's about seven people shipwrecked on an uncharted South Pacific island, each person a "type": a sea captain, i.e., skipper, a millionaire (perhaps a billionaire in today's money), his society matron wife, a movie star, a science professor, a girl-next-door type, and a fuck-up. What I find particularly interesting is how six of these seven castaways clung to their individual stereotypes despite three years spent in an island setting that made such stereotypes increasingly irrelevant, if not completely ridiculous. The sea captain no longer has a ship but still sees himself in charge; the movie star has no red carpet to walk on but still dresses as if there's paparazzi snapping photos; the millionaire flaunts his money though there's no stores on the island and the coconuts and bananas are free for the taking; the society matron looks as though she's all set to attend some charity benefit luncheon though as a shipwreck survivor marooned on an island she could probably use some charity herself; the girl-next-door type has to share her hut with the movie star, technically making the latter a girl next door, too, thus rendering the whole concept superfluous; while the science professor, though he lacks a college campus, lecture hall, and laboratory, comes closest to equaling, at times even exceeding, his former life on the mainland as he basically runs the island behind the sea captain's back and solves all sorts of problems that crop up except for the number one problem of how to get off the island, as all his book learning turns out to be no match for...

 ...the fuck-up, i.e., Gilligan. Perhaps I'm being a bit harsh. After all, even though he has his own distinct personality, Gilligan is the one castaway lacking in any pretense. He clings to nothing, guilelessly taking each day as it comes, with little concern that he may be deviating from some self-assigned role. He's a free spirit as well as a fuck-up. He may even be a fuck-up because he's a free spirit. Or vice-versa. Neither trait gets you all that far in civilized society so it may be the island is the best place for him. Perhaps all those "mistakes" that lay waste to the Professor's carefully laid plans and dooms the castaways to yet another half hour without phones, lights, or motor cars as if they were tropical Amish, is just some unconscious sabotage on Gilligan's part. Whether the aforementioned Denver, who so memorably brought Gilligan to slapstick life would agree with that, I don't know, but he shares some thoughts on his character and the show in general with Rosie O'Donnell in this clip from 1997:

Bob and Rosie talked about the two versions of Gilligan's opening credits. We'll show you both, first the black-and-white segregated version, in which there's no Professor and Mary-Ann, both having been relegated to the back of the bus closing credits, and the multi-hued desegregated version, in which the two have finally attained their equal rights:

I definitely prefer the second opening. It's much more egalitarian.

Oh, that island wasn't egalitarian at all!

Following in the footsteps of such classic fat guy-skinny guy duos as seen above, we now present to you the comedy team of...

...Denver and Hale!

I like the fact that someone set the above video to polka music. It makes that island seem like Cleveland.

...because the only people for me are the mad ones, the ones who are mad to live, mad to talk, mad to be saved, desirous of everything at the same time, the ones who never yawn or say a commonplace thing, but burn, burn, burn like fabulous yellow roman candles exploding like spiders across the stars and in the middle you see the blue centerlight pop and
everybody goes "Awww!”

--Jack Kerouac

Mr. Kerouac may not have had Maynard G. Krebs in mind when he wrote that sentence, but I'm sure Max Shulman, creator of the TV series (and author of the book in which it was based) The Many Loves of Dobie Gillis no doubt had Kerouac in mind when he dreamed up Krebs, television's first bohemian, and Dobie's best friend. Why they should be best friends is a bit puzzling. I remember the high school I went to as being rather clique-ridden: jocks hung around with jocks, cheerleaders hung around with cheerleaders, nerds hung around with nerds, stoners hung around with stoners, and so on. Had there been beatniks in my school--it was about fifteen years too late for any to attend--I'm sure they would have hung around other beatniks and not whatever clique Dobie belonged to (the lovestruck kids who mope around Rodan sculptures clique, maybe? Except he seemed to be the only member.) I guess there's just an unwritten law of comedy that states that laughs are best mined from two best friends with nothing in common. Dobie and Maynard merely paved the way for Oscar and Felix. Anyway, if you haven't figured it out by now, Maynard was played by Denver, shooting him to fame about five years before achieving even greater fame as Gilligan:    

Somehow, the Establishment always gets the upper hand.

Smart Art (Adolescent Pontifications Edition)

 

1934-2022

What makes my Thinker think is that he thinks not only with his brain, with his knitted brow, his distended nostrils and compressed lips, but with every muscle of his arms, back, and legs, with his clenched fist and gripping toes.

--Auguste Rodin

(No, Rodin wasn't Dwayne Hickman's agent, but the latter sure looked good in front of a paper mache replica of the original Thinker for four seasons on The Many Loves of Dobie Gillis--Kirk)