Friday, December 15, 2023
I’ve been sitting on this news impatiently for months and am so glad to have the greenlight to leak it (with the aid of Noah Diamond’s premium artwork): May 2024 will see a bright, shiny…
SOURCE: Trav S.D. at 02:18PM1923 was a crucial year in the life of young John Henry Hammond II (1910-1987). That was the year the precocious young lad went on a family trip to London and saw the all-black show From Dix…
SOURCE: Trav S.D. at 08:54AMThursday, December 14, 2023
You heard it right, folks! This may be the only blog on the planet that has TWO posts about tv comedian Morey Amsterdam (the previous one is here) and we’ve even got a third one planned! W…
SOURCE: Trav S.D. at 01:42PMJust got the message in my in-box that this is the last week of shows at the Kraine Theatre, at least under the management it has known for the past however-many years. I’ve known the day …
SOURCE: Trav S.D. at 01:42PMOn this day in 1934 Hal Roach released his deeply twisted Christmas classic Babes in Toyland a.k.a. March of the Wooden Soldiers starring Laurel and Hardy et al. It’s the day of the year w…
SOURCE: Trav S.D. at 12:33PMDecember 14 was the original air date of the first remake of the holiday classic Miracle on 34th Street in 1955. Oddly, we learn that the release date of the original 1947 was in June, and w…
SOURCE: Trav S.D. at 10:18AMWednesday, December 13, 2023
Among those few who’ve even heard the name Larry Parks (1914-1975) there is a tendency to know just two or three things: that he made a big splashed playing Al Jolson in The Jolson Story …
SOURCE: Trav S.D. at 10:36AMJust got the unhappy news that Andre Braugher (b. 1962) has passed away at the young age of 61. News report are vague as to cause, mentioning only a “brief illness”. Typically we write a…
SOURCE: Trav S.D. at 12:54AMTuesday, December 12, 2023
I raved my my spiritual soul sister Kathy Biehl’s previous Eat, Drink and Be Wary here two and a half years ago. And as it happens, my own next book release won’t be until early ’24, s…
SOURCE: Trav S.D. at 11:48AMMultiple benchmarks go toward justifying today’s spotlight on the late Bob Barker (1923-2023). He was born 100 years ago ago today; he passed away back in August, just a couple of months s…
SOURCE: Trav S.D. at 09:42AMI’ve done posts on Young Frank and Old Frank, but not one yet on Middle Frank, which is arguably the peak of his art. To be accurate, Late-Middle Frank is probably the real peak. Early-Mid…
SOURCE: Trav S.D. at 08:36AMMonday, December 11, 2023
December 11 was the birthday of a distant relative of mine, Caleb Chase (1831-1908), who, with partner James Solomon Sanborn (1835-1903) formed the Chase and Sanborn Coffee Company in 1862. …
SOURCE: Trav S.D. at 01:03AMSunday, December 10, 2023
I don’t know how such things happen, but somehow I managed to do posts on Ray Henderson and Buddy De Sylva a decade ago, but their songwriting partner Lew Brown (Louis Brownstein, 1893-195…
SOURCE: Trav S.D. at 05:24AMSaturday, December 9, 2023
For tickets go here!
SOURCE: Trav S.D. at 05:32AMDecember 9 was the birthday of English actress and comedian Elsie Randolph (1904-1982). Wasn’t it lucky that just a couple of nights ago I was re-watching the early Alfred Hitchcock film R…
SOURCE: Trav S.D. at 03:32AMFriday, December 8, 2023
December 8 was the birthday of a Southern coffee broker by the name of Joel Owsley Cheek (1852-1935). Cheek’s chief claim to lasting fame is that in 1892 he convinced Nashville’s Maxwell…
SOURCE: Trav S.D. at 02:24AMThursday, December 7, 2023
On the off chance that you thought things were getting too treacly ’round here, here’s news of a show that really puts the “X” back in “X-mas”. Burlesque jack-of-all-trades Jonny…
SOURCE: Trav S.D. at 09:02AMWednesday, December 6, 2023
For whatever reason, we are ringing the Christmas bell hard this year. Some years it scarcely seems to exist; this year we have jumped in with both feet, having already posted on Oneofus’ …
SOURCE: Trav S.D. at 11:24AMTuesday, December 5, 2023
We first posted on “Little Richard” Penniman (1932-2020) back in 2012, and have had occasion to mention the long, tall shadow he cast on American music over 50 times on Travalanche. As a…
SOURCE: Trav S.D. at 10:12AMThe release date of the motion picture Serpico (1973) was 50 years ago today. We went back and re-watched this classic of my youth a few months ago, prompted by Isaac Butler’s excellent bo…
SOURCE: Trav S.D. at 09:12AMDon’t get confused! I don’t mean Blythe Danner or Tyne Daly, but just what I said, Blythe Daly (1901-1965), although I’ve seen many spelling permutations of same, including Blyth Daly,…
SOURCE: Trav S.D. at 08:06AMThis is not a review but just a notice that today is the release date for the new documentary A Towering Task: The Story of the Peace Corps. Full disclosure: I have a dog in this hunt! My so…
SOURCE: Trav S.D. at 08:06AMMonday, December 4, 2023
In spite of the fact that I have done posts of Max Baer, Sr., as well as The Beverly Hillbillies, Paul Henning, Buddy Ebsen, Irene Ryan, and Nancy Kulp I’m pretty certain I’d never have …
SOURCE: Trav S.D. at 09:12AMSunday, December 3, 2023
As promised a few days ago, I traveled out to Park Slope to see the first performance of the 25th Anniversary season of Dzieci Theatre’s Fool’s Mass last night. This is the second of a p…
SOURCE: Trav S.D. at 05:54PMToday would have been the 90th birthday of talk show host and actor Les Crane (Lesley Stein, 1933-2008). There is an Icarus-like quality to Crane’s brief fame. He was nationally prominent …
SOURCE: Trav S.D. at 11:24AMSaturday, December 2, 2023
Well, I’m still grinning from ear to ear. I was one of the lucky few hundred who were at last night’s invited dress for ONEOFUS’s latest holiday panto at the Abrons Arts Center, Sleepi…
SOURCE: Trav S.D. at 11:12AMFriday, December 1, 2023
Yes, it’s true, Sarah Silverman (b. 1970) has the same birthday as Woody Allen, Bette Midler, Richard Pryor, and Dick Shawn. Did she just decide to become a combination of all of them? She…
SOURCE: Trav S.D. at 10:18AMOur most devoted readers know that the mission of this blog and our books, talks, podcasts, etc has to do with much more than some kind of “salute to vintage pop culture”. That may well …
SOURCE: Trav S.D. at 08:06AMThursday, November 30, 2023
For Scotland’s National Day we celebrate a Glasgow venue that many claim is the oldest music hall in Great Britain, The Britannia Music Hall (also known in later years as The Panopticon…
SOURCE: Trav S.D. at 11:24AMNovember 30, 1912 was the date of the first Royal Variety Performance, also known as the Royal Command Performance. Attentive readers know that this writer is no fan of monarchy and pretty h…
SOURCE: Trav S.D. at 10:18AMJust the briefest of tributes to Australian swimming champ Beatrice Kerr (1887-1971), for she had the briefest of show biz careers. Kerr was only about 17 when she won several contests and b…
SOURCE: Trav S.D. at 09:06AM 
