Tag: Nick Danger

More Of The Firesign Theater Now Makes Sense

In the late 60s, one of my favorite pastimes was listening to albums from the Firesign Theater. I’m not sure how to explain them… nor if it’s possible.

My Cousin Michael just told me he tried to play one of their albums for his wife, Melissa. She took to them the way most woman become Three Stooges fans. It was painful.

Sometimes their routines were peppered with what I thought was nonsense words. For instance, from “How Can You Be In Two Places At Once When You’re Not Anywhere At All?”

DC: It wasn’t always like that . . .

JOE: No. First they had to come from towns with strange names like . . .

EDDIE: Smegma!

Dc: Spasmodic!

EDDIE: Frog!

JOE: And the far-flung Isles of Langerhans.

I had not thought of the far-flung Isles of Langerhans for twenty years… maybe more. And then, it all came rushing back at me, like the hot kiss at the end of a wet fist.

Sorry – that’s their line, from Nick Danger.

From the New York Times:

Dr. Paul E. Lacy, a pathologist who was known as the father of islet cell transplants, an experimental treatment for Type 1 diabetes, died Tuesday in Zanesville, Ohio. He was 81.

The cause was pulmonary fibrosis, a chronic lung disease, said his son Paul E. Lacy Jr.

Dr. Lacy was among the first scientists to observe how beta cells, which reside in the islets of Langerhans in the pancreas, make insulin.

You’re kidding! I can’t believe they worked pathology into their albums. These guys were good.

The Maltese Falcon

Earlier this week, as I passed by TCM, there was a promo on for classic Humphrey Bogart movies being shown this weekend. I set the DVR. One, Casablanca, I had seen before. The other I had not. Tonight I watched The Maltese Falcon.

I am 54. For 54 years I’ve heard about this movie – what a classic it is. I am so unhappy to have watched and felt it fell short – very short.

The Maltese Falcon is a detective thriller. It is a perfect example of film noir. From Filmsite.org:

The primary moods of classic film noir are melancholy, alienation, bleakness, disillusionment, disenchantment, pessimism, ambiguity, moral corruption, evil, guilt and paranoia. Heroes (or anti-heroes), corrupt characters and villains include down-and-out, hard-boiled detectives or private eyes, cops, gangsters, government agents, crooks, war veterans, petty criminals, and murderers. These protagonists are often morally-ambiguous low lifes from the dark and gloomy underworld of violent crime and corruption. Distinctively, they are cynical, tarnished, obsessive (sexual or otherwise), brooding, menacing, sinister, sardonic, disillusioned, frightened and insecure loners (usually men), struggling to survive and ultimately losing.

Black and white in this case is more than the film stock. The movie itself was shot to produce stark scenes with little gray. I was surprised to see at least a few jump cuts (film editing errors) in the action scenes. Even at the theater they would have been obvious.

The story itself is very complex and in some ways implausible. I’ll look past that. It’s the dialog, not the story, that upset me the most. It is stilted – and not just because the movie is over 60 years old. The words were trite.

Bogey is fine. He was better in Casablanca, the African Queen and a bunch of others. There’s less to like about Mary Astor and Elisha Cook Jr. Sydney Greenstreet and Peter Lorre are the best parts of the movie.

I am so used to seeing these two ‘done’ by impressionists that I forgot what they were really like. Both men put real life into over-the-top characters. Joel Cairo (Lorre) and Kasper Gutman (Greenstreet) could have become comic strip characters had lesser actors played the roles.

About halfway in, I started looking for a way out. I fought the urge and watched until the end. It just wasn’t satisfying.

Back in the 60s, I used to listen to albums by the Firesign Theater, a comedy troupe. One of their albums featured an entire side called, “Nick Danger: Private Eye.” It wasn’t until tonight that I realized they were doing The Maltese Falcon!

I feel like a fool, having missed the joke for all these years.

There is one very memorable line, always associated with this movie. As Bogart is carrying the Falcon out of his office, a police detective asks what it is. “The stuff that dreams are made of.”

I wish I’d said that.