Kruger Industrial Smoothing ... we don't care and it shows.

Festivus for the rest of us



As not to embarrass yourself tonight at your Festivus family gathering, here are the four tenets of the holiday:



The Festivus Pole: During Festivus, an unadorned aluminum pole is displayed. The pole was chosen apparently in opposition to the commercialization of highly decorated Christmas trees, because it is "very low-maintenance," and also because the holiday's patron, Frank Costanza, "find[s] tinsel distracting."



Festivus Dinner: The Festivus dinner menu is flexible, but it should consist of filling, non-holiday comfort food (no turkey, duck, goose, or ham). The televised dinner featured what may have been meatloaf or spaghetti in a red sauce. (Presumably, an entree in a red sauce is more festive.) Kruger took a flask out from his jacket and took a swig; so one might interpret that drinking is optional.



The Airing of Grievances: At the Festivus dinner, each participant tells friends and family of all the instances where they disappointed him or her that year.



The Feats of Strength: The head of the family tests his or her strength against one participant of the head's choosing. Festivus is not considered over until the head of the family has been pinned to the ground. A participant is allowed to decline to attempt to pin the head of the family only if they have something better to do instead.

Don't forgot to keep your eye out for the Festivus Miracle. A Festivus Miracle is a frequent if unimpressive miracle. Carrying in all the groceries into the house for Festivus Dinner without tripping or dropping one of the bags could be considered a Festivus Miracle.

A Healthy and Happy Festivus to you and your family.


December 23, 1942 -
The Noel Coward-David Lean War time drama, In Which We Serve, premiered in the US on this date.



After about three weeks of shooting, Noël Coward realized that (a) David Lean knew a lot more about filmmaking than he did, and (b) he didn't care much for the long hours. So Coward effectively handed the directorial reins over to his partner at that point.


December 23, 1954 -
Walt Disney's live-action film, 20,000 Leagues Under the Sea, premiered on this date.



In 1969, Captain Nemo's pipe organ, which had been on display in Disneyland, was redressed and now resides in the ballroom of Disneyland's Haunted Mansion. A duplicate was constructed for the ballroom of Walt Disney World's Magic Kingdom Haunted Mansion, which opened in 1971, and over a decade later another duplicate was built for Tokyo Disneyland.



The climactic squid battle on the Nautilus was originally shot with a serene sunset and a calm sea. Director Richard Fleischer was troubled by the look of it because the cams and gears that operated the squid could easily be seen, making it look obviously fake. Walt Disney visited the set one day and Fleischer told him about the problem. Disney came up with the idea of having the squid battle take place during a fierce storm (another story is that it was actually screenwriter Earl Felton who came up with the idea). The scene was reshot that way and is considered by many to be the highlight of the film.


December 23, 1956 -
Alfred Hitchcock's classic quasi-docudrama, The Wrong Man, starring Henry Fonda, Anthony Quayle and Vera Miles, opened in Los Angeles, on this date.



This movie is one of Martin Scorsese's favorite Alfred Hitchcock movies, and was an influence on Scorese's Taxi Driver.


December 23, 1964 -
The Beach Boys made their first appearance on ABC-TV’s musical variety series Shindig!, on this date



The performance was tape on December 14th. Besides Little Saint Nick, the band went on to perform Dance, Dance, Dance, Monster Mash, Papa Oom Mow Mow, Johnny B. Goode,and We Three Kings of Orient Are. (Only hours before the show airs, Brian Wilson unfortunately suffered his first nervous breakdown on a flight from Los Angeles to Houston, in front of his horrified family.)


December 23, 1989 –
Phil Collins single Another Day In Paradise started a four week run at No. 1 on the US singles, on this date. Taken from his No. 1 album >…But Seriously, the song was written to bring attention to the problem of homelessness.



Collins told The New York Times how the song came together: “It was begun at the piano. I started playing and put it down on a tape so I wouldn’t forget it. Then I decided to see what would happen when I started singing. When I began, the words just came out, ‘She calls out to the man on the street.’ I didn’t set out to write a song about the homeless. Those were just the words I happened to sing. It was only then that I decided that was what the song would be about."


A surprize guest programmer - so scream really loud


Today in History:
December 23, 1690 -
Royal British astronomer John Flamsteed made the first sighting of Uranus by an astronomer on this date. Unfortunately, he didn't know what he was looking at, and classified it as a star: so yes, he didn't know Uranus from a star (I couldn't help myself.)

The 7th planet – Uranus – was 'officially' discovered on March 13, 1781, once again, completely by accident. British astronomer William Herschel was performing a survey of all the stars that were of magnitude 8 (too faint to see with the eye – or brighter.) He noticed an object that moved in front of the star background over time, clearly demonstrating it was closer to us than the distant stars. At first he thought he had found a comet, but later realized this object was a new planet in orbit around the Sun.


December 23, 1750 -
Benjamin Franklin was severely shocked while electrocuting a turkey on this date. Franklin believed electrocuting the turkey would make it more tender.

Lost in the annals of history is the crime the fowl committed.


December 23, 1823 -
The famous poem A Visit From St. Nicholas was first published on this date. It begins, Twas the night before Christmas, when all through the house / Not a creature was stirring, not even a mouse ....



Fourteen years after its first publication, an editor attributed the poem to a wealthy professor of classical literature named Clement Clarke Moore.



In the last few years, new evidence has come out that a Revolutionary War major named Henry Livingston Jr. may have been the actual author of The Night Before Christmas.



His family has letters describing his recitation of the poem before it was originally published, and literary scholars have found many similarities between his work and The Night Before Christmas. He was also three quarters Dutch, and many of the details in the poem, including names of the reindeer, have Dutch origins.


December 23, 1888 -
After an argument with fellow painter Paul Gauguin, Vincent van Gogh took a razor and removes a portion of his left ear. Their quarrel regarded the prostitutes in Arles who seemed to prefer Gauguin over Van Gogh; the painter delivered his ear a startled prostitute. She fainted.



Some women get very emotional when they receive that special gift.


December 23, 1938 -
The Coelacanth is one of the oldest living fish, and was thought to have gone extinct some 60 million years before Museum curator Marjorie Courtenay-Latimer discovered the fish among the catch of a local angler, Captain Hendrick Goosen who caught one off the coast of South Africa on this date.



Since that time, more than 200 Coelacanths have been caught. It is one of the textbook examples of a "living fossil."


December 23, 1947 -
The transistor was successfully demonstrated on at Bell Laboratories in Murray Hill, New Jersey, on this date.



Bell Labs is the research arm of American Telephone and Telegraph (AT&T). The three individuals credited with the invention of the transistor were William Shockley, John Bardeen, and Walter Brattain.


December 23, 1948 -
Japanese Premier Tojo and six others were hanged by the War Crimes Commission at Sugamo Prison, Tokyo, for the crime of starting an aggressive war on this date.



Now, that's not a necktie you want for Christmas.


December 23, 1954 -
The first successful kidney transplant between living patients were undertaken was performed by Dr. Joseph E. Murray at the Peter Bent Brigham Hospital in Boston on this date.



Murray and his assistants removed one of Robert Herrick's kidneys and grafted it into his twin brother, Richard, who was dying of kidney failure. Richard Herrick made a successful recovery and lived another eight years.


December 23, 1968 -
On the first day of the first flight ever by astronauts to orbit the Moon, Apollo 8 commander Frank Borman suffers from the first documented case of motion sickness. Previous astronauts had reported nothing -- partly because their ships were too small for them to move around a lot and get queasy, partly because they kept their mouths shut for fear they'd never fly again.

There is nothing worse than barfing into your own spacesuit.

Oh, wait a minute, yes there is - barfing into someone else's spacesuit.


December 23, 1972 –
Franco Harris of the Pittsburgh Steelers grabbed a deflected pass from quarterback Terry Bradshaw to score a touchdown, winning the game for the Steelers 13-7 over the Oakland Raiders, on this date.



The NFL’s Immaculate Reception, as it has become to be known, is one of the most famous plays in the history of American football.


December 23, 1986 -
Piloted by Dick Rutan and Jeana Yeager (no relation to Chuck Yeager), the Rutan Voyager became the first aircraft to fly around the world without stopping or refueling, landing at California's Edwards Air Force Base after a nine-day trip on this date.



They covered 24,986 miles, more than doubling the old distance record set by a Boeing B-52 bomber in 1962 — a world record that remains unchallenged today.


December 23, 1985 -
In a Lutheran school playground, James Vance and Raymond Belknap acted upon a drunken suicide pact forged while listening to Stained Class by Judas Priest. Belknap shot a 12 gauge shotgun under his chin, dying instantly, and Vance followed, but survived with a severely disfigured face. He later dies from painkillers on Thanksgiving three years later. Both kids' parents file suit against the band, but a judge ultimately rejects their subliminal message theory.



I believe anyone would kill themselves being forced to listen to Judas Priest, but that's just me.


December 23, 2009 -
The man who triggered a major alert by falsely claiming that his son was adrift in a helium balloon has been sentenced to ninety days in jail, and his wife to twenty, on this date. Richard Heene, and his wife Mayumi, said in October that their son had been carried off by the balloon.



The boy was eventually found hiding at home. Heene apologised to rescue workers and the community in the Colorado courtroom. The judge ordered four years of supervised probation for the couple and banned them from receiving any form of financial benefit from the case.

And so it goes

I guess I needed the extra sleep

(Sorry for being late again)

Ok bunkies, today is the fourth and last Sunday of the Advent season. The day is called the Fourth Sunday of Advent, sorry no fancy french or latin name.

The fourth candle is often called the Angel candle. It represents the messengers who announced the birth of the Messiah.

Go talk to the old ladies in the back of the church about your new found knowledge.


December 22, 1932 -
Universal Pictures released the horror film The Mummy, directed by Karl Freund and starring Boris Karloff on this date.



Boris Karloff was virtually unknown when he appeared as the creature in Frankenstein. He created such a sensation that when this was made, only a year later, Universal only had to advertise "KARLOFF . . . 'The Mummy'."


December 22, 1944 -
The Mummy's Curse, the follow-up film to The Mummy's Ghost was released by Universal Pictures on this date.



The famous sequence in which Princess Ananka (Virginia Christine) rises from the dead in the swamp is slightly undercranked - a process that speeds up the action - which gives an eerie, unreal quality to her movements. The trick is given away by the overly fast movements of the branches around her.


December 22, 1948 -
The film version of Maxwell Anderson's play (Joan of Lorraine,) Joan of Arc, starring Ingrid Bergman opened in Los Angeles on this date.



According to some biographies of Ingrid Bergman, Howard Hughes saved her from possible injury during a visit to the set when she fell off her horse. He caught her, but rather awkwardly, with one hand firmly on her crotch.

Shades of the president elect ...


December 22 1958 -
The song by Dave Seville and The Chipmunks, The Chipmunk Song (Christmas Don’t Be Late), hit No. 1 on the Billboard charts, on this date, and stayed there for four weeks.  (Sorry about the ear worm.)



The song, written and performed by Ross Bagdasarian Sr. (a.k.a. David Seville) who varied the tape speeds to produce high-pitched chipmunk voices, went on to win three Grammy Awards.


December 22, 1959 -
Joseph L. Mankiewicz' film version of Tennesse Williams' strange one act play (about rape, incest, homosexuality, and cannibalism - I know that was probably a huge selling point,) Suddenly, Last Summer, premiered on this date.



In Catherine Holly's climactic monologue, Elizabeth Taylor (who had recently been widowed) used the emotions of her husband's death in order to create the acclaimed performance. However, she was only able to do one take as she could not stop crying after completing the first.


December 22, 1965 -
David Lean's Russian epic, Dr Zhivago, starring Omar Sharif, Julie Christie, Geraldine Chaplin, Tom Courtenay, Rod Steiger, Alec Guinness, Ralph Richardson, Siobhán McKenna, and Rita Tushingham, premiered in the US, on this date.



Critics tore the film apart upon release. Newsweek commented about "hack-job sets" and "pallid photography". Director David Lean was so deeply affected that he swore he would never make another movie. Thanks in part to MGM's marketing campaign and strong word of mouth, this became the second highest-grossing movie of 1965, behind The Sound of Music.


December 22, 1975 -
A beautiful study of love and madness (and the razor's edge between them), L'histoire d'Adele H, opened in the US on this date.



Initially planned as a grand-scale spectacular drama with Jeanne Moreau to play the lead, then Catherine Deneuve (then having an affair with François Truffaut) was considered for the role. The film took 7 years to be made, and finally Truffaut decided on Isabelle Adjani whom he noticed on a TV broadcast of the Comédie Française.


December 22, 1975 -
Archie Bunker's "little girl" Gloria gave birth to a son, Joseph Michael Stivic, on CBS's All in the Family, on this date.



The birth occurred in the second part of a two-part episode, The Baby, which begins with Edith and Archie (Jean Stapleton and Carroll O'Connor) beating Mike and Gloria (Rob Reiner and Sally Struthers) to the hospital — with Archie, who had been scheduled to appear in a skit at his lodge, arriving in black face.


December 22, 2000 -
Joel and Ethan Coen's purported adaptation of The Odyssey, O Brother, Where Art Thou?, starring George Clooney, John Turturro, Tim Blake Nelson, Chris Thomas King, John Goodman, Holly Hunter, and Charles Durning, premiered in the US on this date.



George Clooney, upon reading the script did not immediately understand his character and so sent the script to his uncle Jack, a tobacco farmer who lived in Kentucky, and asked him to read the entire script into a tape recorder. Unknown to Clooney, in his recording, Jack, a devout Baptist, omitted all instances of the words "damn" and "hell" from the Coens' script, which only became known to Clooney after the directors pointed this out to him in the middle of shooting. Jack had never been on a plane before flying in for the premiere.


Today's holiday special - Celebrate the music, not the man.


Today in History:
December 22, 1879 -
It's Stalin's birthday (again)! Hey, when you're a dictator, you get to celebrate your birthday on more than one day. Unfortunately, the proper way to celebrate - oppress, torture and murder millions of your fellow country men - is frowned upon.



So smack someone upside the head for no reason.


December 22, 1894 -
Claude Debussy's symphonic poem for orchestra Prélude à l'après-midi d'un faune (L. 86), known in English as Prelude to the Afternoon of a Faun, was first performed in Paris on this date.



It is considered a turning point in the history of Western art music. Please feel proud as punch for knowing that - offer yourself a Peppermint Patty.


December 22, 1937 -
The Lincoln Tunnel was originally proposed in the late 1920s and early 1930s as the Midtown Hudson Tunnel. The tubes of the Lincoln Tunnel were constructed in stages between 1934 and 1957. The center tube of the Lincoln Tunnel was opened to traffic today, charging 50¢ per passenger car.



Some of those cars are still trying to get through the tunnel.


December 22, 1940 -
Strange death of the day - Author Nathanael West and his wife, Eileen McKenney, died in an auto accident on this date.

Distraught over hearing of his friend's F. Scott Fitzgerald's death (who passed away a few days earlier of a massive heart attack,) he crashed his car after ignoring a stop sign.


December 22, 1955 -
The corpse of Evita Peron was stolen by anti-Peronistas on this date. For 26 years, her corpse makes a world-wind turn before it's returned for burial in Buenos Aires.

30 years later (to the day), Madonna's Like a Virgin single goes #1 for weeks.



Make of the coincidence what you will.


December 22, 1971 -
The renown international aid group Doctors Without Borders (Médecins Sans Frontières) was founded by Bernard Kouchner and a group of journalists in Paris on this date. One of their first missions after its formation in Paris was to Afghanistan in 1980.



Doctors Without Borders was awarded the Nobel Peace Prize in 1999, and within the past two years coordinated more than 30,000 personnel — mostly volunteer medical professionals — to treat the poor and war-ravaged population in 70 countries.


December 22, 1977 -
File this under: Yes Virginia, there are Christmas miracles.
Thomas Helms, a 27-year-old artist from Hawaii, climbed to the edge of the observation deck on the eighty-sixth floor of the Empire State Building, and jumped, intending to kill himself on the streets 1000s of feet below.

But the winds blew him onto a narrow ledge on the 85th floor. Helms suffered no major injuries but was knocked unconscious for half-an-hour - adequate time for an emergency crew to bring him safely inside. He is only one of two people who have jumped from the observation deck of the Empire State Building, intending to commit suicide, and survived. The other being Elvita Adams, who survived her attempt in 1979.


December 22, 1984 -
Bernhard Goetz shot four teenage boys on the NYC subway after one of them asks him for money.



Again, this practice is frowned upon, so instead, smack someone upside the head.


December 22, 2001 -
Richard Reid attempted to blow up an American Airlines transatlantic flight by igniting a plastic explosive concealed in his shoe. Other passengers beat the living daylights out of him.



They knew - they smacked him upside the head.

And so it goes

A reminder that light follows even the darkest night

The Winter Solstice in Northern Hemisphere will be at 4:21 AM PM (EST), the shortest amount of daylight of the year and the longest night.

It's officially the first day of Winter and one of the oldest known holidays in human history.

Anthropologists believe that solstice celebrations go back at least 30,000 years, before humans even began farming on a large scale. The stone circles of Stonehenge were arranged to receive the first rays of midwinter sun.



It is therefore a good time to do things you wouldn't want the sun to hear about. The Pagans, for example, wisely celebrate their Yule holiday on the Winter Solstice.



Ancient peoples believed that because daylight was waning, it might go away forever, so they lit huge bonfires to tempt the sun to come back. The tradition of decorating our houses and our trees with lights at this time of year is passed down from those ancient bonfires.

In Ancient Rome, the winter solstice was celebrated with the festival of Saturnalia,



during which all business transactions and even war were suspended, and slaves were waited upon by their masters.

Hey, Get Naked, Paint Yourself Blue and Dance around the Fir Tree. It's party time!!!


December 21, 1914 -
The first feature-length silent film comedy, Tillie's Punctured Romance, starring Marie Dressler, Charlie Chaplin and Mabel Normand, was released on this date.



Milton Berle claimed to have played the bit part of the newsboy who gets slapped in the face and kicked by Charles Chaplin. He later confronted Chaplin about having played the role, but Chaplin (nor anyone else, it seems) could not recall for certain whether or not it was indeed Berle. Most researchers believe the role to have been played by Gordon Griffith, Keystone's house child actor. However, there are still others who claim that the boy does not resemble Griffith, and could therefore possibly be Berle. There really is no definitive way of obtaining an answer unless some sort of original studio records turn up, so in the meantime this can be considered speculation at best. Berle would have been six years old at the time, Griffith would have been seven. The newsboy appears to be somewhat older, so most likely is neither of them. Biography: Milton Berle: Mr. Television showed a clip with Chaplin and a young boy claiming that the youngster is Berle. The end credits of the UCLA restoration confirm that Berle was NOT in the film.


December 21, 1932 -
The movie musical Flying Down to Rio premiered on this date.



Originally conceived by RKO as a vehicle for Dolores del Rio, this film is most notable for its star-making pairing of Fred Astaire and Ginger Rogers. In supporting roles, the two relative unknowns smoked up the screen in a dance number called The Carioca. It generated such a positive response from critics and fans that they were eventually reunited in nine subsequent films.


December 21, 1937 -
The first feature-length color and sound cartoon, Walt Disney’s Snow White and the Seven Dwarfs, premiered on this date.



The animation took over two years and a then astronomical $1.5 million to create. Disney had to mortgage his house to pay for the film's production.


December 21, 1940 -
Another classic Porky Pig cartoon, The Timid Toreador, premiered on this date.



Bob Clampett was briefly sick during this time period, leaving two Porky Pig cartoons (The Timid Toreador and Porky's Snooze Reel) unfinished, Leon Schlesinger told Norman McCabe to complete the directorial duties—hence the co-director credit under their main titles.


December 21, 1959 -
The Orpheus legend set in Rio de Janeiro (with the fabulous music by Luiz Bonfa and Antonio Carlos Jobim,) Black Orpheus, premiered in the US on this date.



Although the film won the Palme d'Or at Cannes and the Oscar for Best Foreign Language Film, ironically it is not terribly well regarded in its native Brazil where some object to the depiction of their country as being a non-stop party.


December 21, 1963 -
The Doctor Who story arc The Daleks, the second story of Season One, first aired on the BBC on this date.



The episodes mark the first appearance of the Doctor’s mortal enemies, the Daleks, a race of genetically engineered mutants who abhor all other races.


December 21, 1969 -
Diana Ross and the Supremes make their final television appearance on The Ed Sullivan Show, on this date.



The song they sang, Someday We'll Be Together, would become the last of their 12 number one singles.

Don't forget to tune in to another episode of our holiday edition of The ACME Eagle Hand Soap Radio Hour today


Today in History -
The pilgrims landed on Plymouth Rock on December 21, 1620 or some other day, the pilgrims were too busy depriving themselves of luxuries like accurate calendars (Their stepping ashore onto a large rock that later became known as the Plymouth Rock probably is a myth.) Their boat was the Mayflower.

They wore black and white clothes with big shiny buckles.



The crew of the ship did not have enough beer to get to Virginia and back to England so they dropped the Pilgrims at Plymouth Rock to preserve their beer stock.


December 21, 1879 -
Josif Djugashvili was born in the Gori District of Tiflis Province in Georgia, Imperial Russia, on this date.

(or December 18th or the 22nd. When you're an evil bastard dictator, you get to choose your own birthday).


December 21, 1898 -
Radium, which existed since the world was young, was minding it own business when French local busybodies and known chemists Pierre and Marie Curie isolated radium; one of the first radioactive elements to be discovered. They won a joint Nobel prize for their work, and Marie Curie went on to win another for her contributions to chemistry.



Marie Curie died of aplastic anemia as a result of overexposure to radium, which probably showed her not to play with radioactive elements.


December 21, 1940 -
F. Scott Fitzgerald, died of a heart attack at Sheilah Graham's apartment on this date. He was 44 and believed he had died a failure.



And yet, into the 21st century, millions of copies of his works have continued to be sold.


December 21, 1945 -
World War II General George Patton died in a car accident in Heidelberg, Germany on this date.



Patton was investigating the theft of Nazi gold by US Army men at the time. My grandfather was convinced that it was a conspiracy and he (Patton) was killed by the men he was investigating.

My grandfather was a small time numbers runner but that's another story ...


December 21, 1968 -
Apollo 8 was the second manned mission of the Apollo space program, in which Commander Frank Borman, Command Module Pilot James Lovell and Lunar Module Pilot William Anders became the first humans to leave Earth orbit and to orbit around the Moon.



The spacecraft entered into orbit around the moon on December 24th. They were the first men to ever view the Earth in its entirety, with them taking photos of our planet whilst on board the spacecraft and sending them back to television stations back home. They landed back on Earth on December 27th.

A year later Apollo 11 would be the first manned spacecraft to land on the Moon.


December 21, 1970 -
Paranoid, alcoholic President Richard Nixon met with prescription drug addict Elvis Presley at the White House to discuss The King's becoming a special drug enforcement agent



He presented Nixon with a pistol, and received a special DEA badge in return.


December 21, 2012 -
We're still here!



The Mayan "long count" calendar is based on great cycles of 5125 years; apparently, the world has not ended. But the calendar may just have been off by 9 years, or so.


Before you go - Acme would like to once again, bring you this Christmas classic, Dear Satan, from the folks at Anomaly London. It's popularity may have something to do with the fact that Sir Patrick Stewart narrated their video.



So kids, remember, two letters transposed and literally, Bob's yer uncle.


One more thing - It's only two days away - please begin writing

your list of family grievances, in earnest.

And so it goes

Who needs a tree when you've got an ugly Christmas sweater

The third Friday of December is National Ugly Christmas Sweater Day. The first Christmas-themed sweaters made an appearance in 1950, produced on a grand scale and quickly becoming popular, but it wasn‘t until the 1980s that the unique piece of clothing made a cultural impact, after appearing in different TV sitcoms.



Shockingly, nearly six million dollars are spent during the holiday season on ugly Christmas sweaters.


Tomorrow is the Winter's Solstice in the Northern Hemisphere.



The winter solstice is the "shortest" day of the year and marks the start of the winter period. This is because the tilt of the Earth’s axis is least aligned with the Sun, providing us with the least daylight of the year. After December 21, the nights will begin to get shorter as our planet rotates towards the Sun.


December 20, 1939 -
The Paramount Pictures animated version of Gulliver's Travels directed by Dave Fleischer, premiered in NYC on this date.



Even though the film was a box-office success, it never managed to recover its enormous cost, which went nearly $500,000 over budget due to the relocation of the Fleischer studios, transportation of film for processing and the cost of training new artists.


December 20, 1946 -
The Frank Capra film It's A Wonderful Life had a preview showing for charity at New York City's Globe Theatre, a day before its official premiere.



Due to a clerical error at NTA's copyright office, the copyright wasn't renewed when it expired in 1974. The film became public domain, meaning anyone who could obtain a print could broadcast it without paying royalties. Local stations aired it dozens of times between Thanksgiving and Christmas Day. In the 1990's, after a series of court battles, NTA's successor, Republic Pictures, re-acquired the rights to the film because they owned the source material (The Greatest Gift) and the film's score, which were still copyrighted.



It not that I dislike the film (I like it a great deal,) but the next time you get a chance to watch the film, notice what a truly strange little film it really is.


December 20, 1950 -
Henry Koster's adaptation of Mary Chase's Broadway play, Harvey, starring Jimmy Stewart premiered in NYC on this date.



Though Jimmy Stewart's character, Elwood P. Dowd, may certainly be referred to as an alcoholic, only at one time in the entire picture is he seen taking a drink. This is because the Hollywood Production Code at the time would not allow him to be shown getting drunk on film.


December 20, 1961 -
Columbia Pictures releases the science fiction film Mysterious Island, directed by Cy Endfield and featuring the stop-motion animation of Ray Harryhausen, on this date.



A real Brown crab was disemboweled, dismembered, cleaned and fitted with an internal armature for Ray Harryhausen's stop-motion animation of the giant crab. Additional live crabs were used for some of the "facial" close-ups, then later cooked for a crew dinner.


December 20, 1963 -
Jean-Luc Godard's first big bugdet film, Contempt, starring Brigitte Bardot, Michel Piccoli, Jack Palance, Fritz Lang, and Giorgia Moll, opened in Paris on this date.



Filming was frequently interrupted by chasing off members of the paparazzi who were desperate to take photos of Brigitte Bardot, then one of the biggest stars in the world. Producer Joseph E. Levine insisted on the Brigitte Bardot nude scene that opens the film, realizing that it was the only way he could sell a film that he hated.


December 20, 1967 -
Mike Nichols' seminal 60s film, The Graduate, starring Dustin Hoffman and Anne Bancroft, premiered on this date.



During rehearsals of Dustin Hoffman's and Anne Bancroft's first encounter in the hotel room, Bancroft did not know that Hoffman was going to grab her breast. Hoffman decided to do it because it reminded him of schoolboys trying to nonchalantly grab girls' breasts in the hall by pretending to put their jackets on. When Hoffman did it, Director Mike Nichols began laughing loudly. Hoffman began to laugh as well, so rather than stop the scene, he turned away and walked to the wall. Hoffman banged his head on the wall, trying to stop laughing, and Nichols thought it was so funny, it stayed in the finished film.


December 20, 1969 -
Peter, Paul & Mary's cover of the John Denver song, Leaving on a Jet Plane, reached #1 on the Billboard Charts, on this date. The song turned out to be Peter, Paul and Mary's biggest (and final) hit.



This was written by a very young John Denver, who was then a member of the Chad Mitchell Trio before beginning his solo career in the 1970s. Denver wrote this in 1967 during a layover at Washington airport, "Not so much from feeling that way for someone, but from the longing of having someone to love."


December 20, 1971 -
Hal Ashby's very dark comedy, Harold and Maude, starring Ruth Gordon and Burt Cort, premiered on this date. The film was not a commercial success when it opened but is now seen as one of the most influential films of the 1970s.



In all shots of Ruth Gordon (Maude) driving the hearse it is being towed because she never learned how to drive a car.


December 20, 1971 -
The Rolling Stones' first anthology album Hot Rocks 1964-1971 was released on this date. The album remains one of their all-time best sellers.



While the emphasis is on the hits, Hot Rocks also includes several iconic album tracks such as Play With Fire, Under My Thumb, and Gimme Shelter.


December 20, 1974 -
Arguably the greatest sequel ever made, Godfather II, directed by Francis Ford Coppola and starring Al Pacino, Robert Duvall, Diane Keaton, and Robert De Niro, premiered in the US on this date.



Francis Ford Coppola had a horrible time directing The Godfather and asked to pick a different director for the sequel, while taking the title of producer for himself. He chose Martin Scorsese, who the film executives rejected. Thus, Coppola agreed to direct the film, with a few conditions: the sequel be interconnected with the first film with the intention of later showing them together; that he be allowed to direct his own script of The Conversation; that he be allowed to direct a production for the San Francisco Opera; and that he be allowed to write the screenplay for The Great Gatsby, all prior to production of the sequel for a Christmas 1974 release.


December 20, 1979 -
Bob Fosse’s semi-autobiographical film All that Jazz, starring Roy Scheider, Ann Reinking, Jessica Lange and Ben Vereen, opened in the US on this date.



Bob Fosse considered playing the lead role himself. Producer David H. Melnick pointed out that Fosse, who had a history of heart problems, wouldn't survive the shoot.


December 20, 1986 –
The Bangles' hit Walk Like An Egyptian went to the No. 1 spot on the Billboard charts on this date.



The songwriter Liam Sternberg wrote this. He got the idea when he was on a ferry boat and saw people struggling to keep their balance. The way they held out their arms and jerked around made it look like they were doing Egyptian movements, and if the boat moved suddenly, they would all topple over.


December 20, 2002 -
Martin Scorsese take on the notorious Five Points district of Lower Manhattan during the mid 19th century, Gangs of New York, starring Leonardo DiCaprio, Daniel Day-Lewis and Cameron Diaz, was released on this date.



Daniel Day-Lewis became so uncomfortable with the greasy hairstyle he wore as Bill the Butcher that he shaved his head immediately after filming completed.

George is a good guy. Give him a break, God..


Today in History
December 20, 1803 -
France finalized the Louisiana Purchase and transferred authority over the region to the United States, as a Christmas gift for Thomas Jefferson on this date.



The wisdom of this purchase was not fully appreciated at first but after Mardi Gras, it was warmly embraced.

(It was not for nothing that Thomas Jefferson collected beads.)


December 20, 1879 -
Thomas Edison privately demonstrated light bulb to a rapt audience on this date at Menlo Park, N.J. (He apparently showed off his light bulb so frequently that there is no general concensus on when he actually first show it to unsuspecting folks.)



Unfortunately, it took 27 of his assistants to lift the entire shed and turn it around to screw in the bulb and many believe the light would never take off.


December 20, 1892 -
According to Jules Verne, on October 2nd, Phileas Fogg stepped out of the Explorers Club in London, England and decides to take a little trip.



Due to the incompetence and laziness of most of the transit workers around the world, he finally completed his trip on this date.


Adolf Hitler was released from prison on December 20, 1924, after serving less than a year against a five-year treason sentence. Hitler became a prolific author while in prison, where he penned the infamous political autobiography Mein Kampf. (How I Intend to Enslave or Kill Millions of People Immediately Upon My Release.)

He also outlined a series of children’s books which have sadly been lost to history as a result of his having chosen upon his release to pursue a path of demonic world conquest instead of pedagogical literature. One can only wonder what sort of success Hitler would have experienced with titles such as:

The Little Engine That Was Betrayed by Jewish Usurers,

Where the Wild Things Are and How to Eliminate Them,

Every Little Aryan Child’s Bedtime Book of Insidious Evil and Global Domination.

December 20, 1938 -
Vladimir Zworykin receives a patent for the Iconoscope (U.S. patent No. 2,141,059), an early television camera tube, 15 years after filing his application.

The tube is part of the first electronic television system.


December 20, 1941 -
The Flying Tigers, American pilots in China, entered combat against the Japanese over Kunming on this date.



The group, formed 12 days after Pearl Harbor, was a great morale booster, as it posted numerous tactical victories when the news in the U.S. was filled with little more than stories of defeat at the hands of the Japanese forces.


December 20, 1957 -
A trigger warning - you are about to see Elvis in his skivvies.

Elvis receives orders from the draft board to serve in the United States Army, which to his credit he does without complaint.


December 20, 1997 -
Sotheby's auctioned off the loincloth worn by Kirk Douglas in the 1960 film Spartacus for $2,990 on this date.

You can't get those at Robert Hall, aisle five.


December 20, 2007 -
Elizabeth II turned 81 years and 243 days old on this date and surpassed Queen Victoria as the oldest UK monarch.

Buckingham palace had the time calculated down to the hour, though no major celebrations were held to mark the occasion. About five years ago, the Queen became the longest reigning sovereign and Prince Charles had to continue to bide his time for another 15 years.

And so it goes

Did you know - Tinsel was once banned.

Shiny, colorful tinsel is undoubtedly one of the quintessential Christmas decorations, but it wasn't always this way. Tinsel arrived on the scene in Germany in the 1600s, where it was made from real silver.



Fast forward a few hundred years and the decoration became banned in the United States because it contained lead. Today's tinsel is made from safer materials like plastic and aluminum, so you can string it up without concern.


December 19, 1961 -
Released in time for the holidays, the star-studded Stanley Kramer film, Judgment At Nuremberg, opened in New York City on this date.



Montgomery Clift had a habit of cutting his hair very short when he was between films and would not work until it had grown back. In fact, his scene in this film was shot right after getting one of those haircuts. He also had so much trouble remembering his lines, the scene had to be re-shot many times. Director Stanley Kramer finally gave up and told Clift to ad lib his lines, saying that this would help to convey the confusion in his character's mind while he was being questioned on the witness stand. "Monty seemed to calm down after this," Kramer later recalled. "He wasn't always close to the script, but whatever he said fitted in perfectly, and he came through with as good a performance as I had hoped."


December 19, 1971 -
The pilot for the hit family series The Waltons, The Homecoming: A Christmas Story premiered on CBS-TV on this date



Earl Hamner's two children Scott and Carrie are in the film as two of the children listening to the missionary lady. Carrie is the short-dark-haired girl in a home-made hat and Scott is the boy with paler hair, also wearing a hat.


December 19, 1971 -
A Clockwork Orange premiered on this date, originally with an X rating. Censors objected more to the sex scenes than the violence.



Alex performing Singing in the Rain as he attacks the writer and his wife was not scripted. Stanley Kubrick spent four days experimenting with this scene, finding it too conventional. Eventually he approached Malcolm McDowell and asked him if he could dance. They tried the scene again, this time with McDowell dancing and singing the only song he could remember. Kubrick was so amused that he swiftly bought the rights to Singing in the Rain for $10,000.


December 19, 1979 -
Robert Benson's family drama Kramer vs. Kramer starring Dustin Hoffman, Meryl Streep, Jane Alexander, and Justin Henry premiered in the US on this date.



The stenographer in the courtroom scenes was a real one. In between takes, Dustin Hoffman would chat with her and he asked her if she worked on many divorce cases. She replied that she used to, but was burnt out by the experience, as she found them to be too emotionally painful. Instead she had moved to homicide cases, which she said were much easier to handle.


December 19, 1987 -
The Pet Shop Boys had their third UK No.1 single with their version of Always On My Mind, on this date.



The duo had performed a version of Always on My Mind on Love Me Tender, an TV special commemorating the tenth anniversary of Elvis Presley's death, their performance was so well-received that the group decided to record the song and release it as a single.


December 19, 1997 -
The movie, Titanic was released in theaters on this date. This movie would become the most financially successful movie in U.S. history, grossing approximately $1.8 billion worldwide (until the release of Avatar in 2009, which grossed an astounding $2.075 billion. Avatar was conveniently directed by Mr. Cameron as well.)



James Cameron went on 12 dives to the real Titanic himself, and found it an overwhelming emotional experience to actually see the sunken ship. During his first trip, he was so goal-oriented that he managed to film the shots he wanted, but as soon as he was back on the surface, he broke down in tears after finally realizing the magnitude of the historic tragedy that he had just witnessed. He ended up spending more time with the ship than its living passengers did.


December 19, 2001 -
New Line Cinema released The Lord of the Rings: The Fellowship of the Ring (based on the epic 1954 novel by J.R.R. Tolkien,) directed by Peter Jackson and starring a very large number of people, premiered in the U.S. on this date.



During filming, most of the members of the Fellowship took up surfing in New Zealand in their spare time. Amongst them was Viggo Mortensen, who wiped out terribly one day and bruised one whole side of his face. The next day, make-up artists tried to mask the bruising and swelling, but were unsuccessful. Instead, Peter Jackson opted to film Mortensen from one side for the entire scene. In the Mines of Moria, when they find the tomb, Aragorn is only seen from one side in the whole scene.


December 19, 2014 -
After 2,058 episodes, Craig Ferguson ended his time as the host of The Late Late Show on CBS TV, on this date.



In the cold open, Ferguson performed Dead Man Fall's song Bang Your Drum accompanied by Kevin Bacon, Kyra Sedgwick (plus dog Lily), Jack Black, Kristen Bell, Pierce Brosnan, Steve Carell, Don Cheadle, Kristin Chenoweth, Marion Cotillard, Tenacious D, Jeff Daniels, Ted Danson, Kat Dennings, Julia Louis-Dreyfus, Tony Hale, Carl Edwards, Cedric the Entertainer, Jon Hamm, Sean Hayes, Samuel L. Jackson, Rashida Jones, Toby Keith, Jimmy Kimmel, Mila Kunis, Lisa Kudrow, Jane Lynch, Justin Long, James Marsden, Matthew McConaughey, Mary McCormack, Joel McHale, Tim Meadows, Metallica, Kunal Nayyar, Geoff Peterson, Regis Philbin, Ray Romano, Bob Saget, William Shatner, Michael Sheen, Quentin Tarantino, Josh Robert Thompson, Archbishop Desmond Tutu, Henry Winkler, Shailene Woodley, "Weird Al" Yankovic, Larry King, Angela Kinsey, Betty White, Thomas Lennon, Secretariat, and Ferguson's bunny and alligator puppets.


Rocking out the holidays - ladies first


Today in History:
December 19, 1154 -
Henry was 18 when we met and I was queen of France ... We shattered the commandments on the spot.

Henry Plantagenet of the Angevin dynasty was crowned Henry II, King of England with Eleanor of Aquitaine as queen, on this date.


December 19, 1733 -
Benjamin Franklin, writing under the pseudonym of Poor Richard, published Poor Richard's Almanack on this date.



The book, filled with proverbs and parables, was published continuously for 25 years and became one of the most popular publications in colonial America, selling an average of 10,000 copies a year.


December 19, 1777 -
These are the times that try men's souls.



General George Washington led his ragtag army of about 11,000 men to Valley Forge, Pa., to camp for the winter on this date.


December 19, 1903 -
On this date, the Williamsburg Bridge was opened in New York City. It was America's first major suspension bridge using steel towers instead of the customary masonry towers.



It was built to alleviate traffic on the Brooklyn Bridge and to provide a link between Manhattan and the Williamsburg section of Brooklyn. Taking over seven years to complete, the 1,600 foot Williamsburg Bridge was the world's longest suspension bridge until the 1920s.


December 19, 1922 -
In a Sheffield, England, courtroom, accused bigamist Theresa Vaughn admitted under oath that in the past five years she had acquired 61 husbands in 50 cities throughout England, Germany and South Africa, averaging a marriage a month.



And you think you've been busy.


December 19, 1928 -
The first autogyro flight in the U.S., piloted by H.F. Pitcairn, was made on this date.

The autogyro would later lead to the development of the helicopter.


December 19, 1941 -
Twelve days after Pearl Harbor, Franklin D. Roosevelt under authority of Congress, created the Office of Censorship. The bureau had discretion over communications with foreign countries. Participation by domestic publishers was "voluntary."

From December 1941 to August 1945, every letter that crossed international or U.S. territorial borders was subject to being opened and reviewed for details.


December 19, 1972 -
Apollo 17 completed their mission and splashed down in the Pacific on this date.



With this return to earth, the Apollo program of manned lunar landings ended.


December 19, 1974 -
Nelson A. Rockefeller was sworn in as the 41st vice president of the United States after a House vote. Rockefeller was the second person appointed Vice President under the 25th Amendment – the first being Gerald Ford (the man for whom he was serving as Vice President.)



After the proceedings, Rockefeller celebrates by vigorously copulating with three of his assistants in the Warren G. Harding memorial cloakroom.


December 19, 1998 -
Oh, the irony - President Bill Clinton was formally impeached by the House of Representatives for lying under oath and obstruction of justice in the investigation of his affair with White House intern Monica Lewinsky.



Clinton was not required to leave office despite being impeached by the House, since the Senate acquitted him of both charges.


Before you go - More holiday trivia: Japanese people traditionally eat at KFC for Christmas dinner.



Although the percentage of christian people in Japan is less than 2%, every Christmas, kids and grown-ups head to the closest KFC to enjoy some fried chicken – the closest food to turkey that you can get in Japan. It’s all thanks to a successful “Kentucky for Christmas!” marketing campaign in 1947. First aimed at foreigners, KFC offered a “Christmas dinner” that contained chicken and wine – a meal that remotely resembled the food expats and tourists had at home. After a huge success, Kentucky Fried Chicken started promoting this offer every year, until the fast food chain became strongly associated with the holiday season.


Psst - did you get your unadorned aluminum pole yet? Supplies are limited.

And so it goes