As a lifelong fan of
game shows, especially ones that involve celebrities, I sometimes find myself poking around YouTube or other places on the Internet for something of interest. (Fortunately for my middle-aged waistline, this often happens while on a treadmill at the gym!) As of late, I've been checking out the entertainingly tacky
The New Treasure Hunt from the 1970s, old installments of
Name That Tune and
The Joker's Wild and vintage
The Newlywed Game. But I also stumbled upon a parody featured on a now-obscure show that was briefly a mild hit during my youth -
Fridays. What led me to it was a satiric presentation of
Family Feud.
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The Saturday Night Live rip-off competitor Fridays debuted in April of 1980 and aired on, um, Friday late night ABC television. Rather closely following the format of its inspiration, there were faux newscasts, envelope-pushing sketches, trendy musical guests and celebrity parody, most often with a political bent.
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The Family Feud parody had Bruce Mahler offering up a rendition of Richard Dawson that that the 3-piece suit and the carnation down (along with some gestures), but not any sort of accurate voice.
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One of the families on this episode will be somewhat familiar...
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Meet Ted, Rose, Joan and Jackie!
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I thought they got Jackie O down pretty well, actually.
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Rose was portrayed by none other than one Michael Richards, later of Seinfeld...! He was in drag a fair amount on this show.
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He had a hysterical
staggeringly-unfunny character called Beverly Hills who would pop up
from time to time (in a look seemingly stolen later by Sylvia Miles for Evil Under the Sun, 1982!)
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You thought I was just being snarky, didn't ya? I mean... look at this!
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Anyhoo... The other family playing against The Kennedys was The Carters.
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Meet Roselyn, Miss Lillian, Billy and on the far left (I'm not making this up), Walter Mondale!
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Again, I think they did well with the (now) former First Lady.
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Dawson's custom of kissing every female contestant was included. Roselyn allowed a peck on the cheek...
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Jackie was having none of it...!
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Walter seemed down with it, though...! That was probably quite an image on TV for 1980. Now, believe it or not, all this Family Feud stuff was just a prelude for the thing this post is truly about. Once I watched this, I began to peruse a few other episodes and was scarcely prepared for what I found in one.
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From Dickie Dawson's kisses on FF, we turn to the legendary rock band Kiss. They were a guest on one installment. (Fridays featured all sorts of acts from Devo to Pat Benatar to Journey to Paul McCartney) Seen here are Gene Simmons, Ace Frehley, Paul Stanley and, on drums, spanking new member Eric Carr, who replaced the more famous Peter Criss.
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Carr's makeup scheme/character was The Fox. In one of those bizarre coincidences, I had JUST seen his official introduction to audiences while looking up Kids Are People, Too, a show I was checking out after seeing it's host on Whew! Carr remained with the band until shortly before his death at 41 from heart cancer in 1991.
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I'm not able to claim significant fandom for Kiss, though I did play the hell out of a 45 I owned of "I Was Made for Lovin' You" back in 1979. They often showed some chest, but for this gig, Paul Stanley wore no shirt at all for the second number! The biggest surprise for me, though, was the guest host of this episode, someone I just would never in a million years connect with Kiss (or any music group, really, except maybe The Beach Boys, who also did this show.)
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Yes, that's our Tab Hunter, seen here choking his chicken on national television.
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He played the ultra-WASPy villain in a sketch about two Orthodox Jewish secret agents. Having captured them, he puts them on a counter, Goldfinger (1964) style, with razor-sharp matzo spinning threateningly as it closes in on their crotches...
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In a striking coincidence, this same episode features a short film about UFOs and alien invasion that starred Aldo Ray. (The five-minute piece is so obscure that it doesn't come up at all on Ray's imdb.com page!) In 1955, Ray and Hunter had costarred in the then rather racy war romance Battle Cry, based on a Leon Uris novel.
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Ray, five years older than Hunter, had been through the career and personal meat-grinder, including having his Columbia Pictures contract dropped after chief Harry Cohn's death and grappling with a severe alcohol problem. Though he worked and worked, he could not overcome financial obligations (to three ex-wives) and the urge to drink, yet there were periods of sobriety. He died in 1991 of throat cancer at age 64.
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One bizarrely amusing sketch, which could only have happened in the '80s, was a take-off on Hollywood Squares called The Hollywood Cubes.
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The game was hosted by Larry David (yes that Larry David, who went on to help create Seinfeld.)
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Instead of the usual 9-person celebrity panel who were used as points on a tic-tac-toe board, this game was played on a gigantic Rubik's Cube (!) with 54 (!!) celebrities located on the thing.
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In a bizarre twist, considering how many celebs were already being impersonated (and the didn't attempt all 54 for obvious reasons), Tab was playing himself, the famous actor, rather than a regular contestant.
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Much like Squares, the contestant would call on a star and then either agree or disagree with the person's response to a question.
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If he was successful in agreeing or disagreeing with the celeb, he earned a turn at solving the Rubik's Cube by calling out the move and then performing it on a remote cube at his station. This act caused the large cube to rotate around, throwing all the people involved to and fro!! Ha ha! It was strange, but sort of clever considering how hot that puzzle was in its day.
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That's gonna do it for this hideously random post, but I leave you with some shots of Paul Stanley during the curtain call. (And I'm sorry Paul, but it's just not the same with that Linda Lavin hairdo in place of all the long, curly, rocker locks!)
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Straight as he is, his movement and behavior during this sequence was gayer than a picnic basket (and speaking of baskets, his was on display in those flimsy tights!)
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Should you wish to partake of this episode or any of the others which have seen the light of day (despite rumors that Michael Richards had it in his contract that they would never be released in any home video format), you can check it out at Tubi (free with ads) right here! Till next time!
