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Although it originally aired "only" a little more than two thin decades ago, Leave It To Beaver takes us waaay back to a Motorcraft-tested world where ideals were cheap and they didn't even put nipples on the manikins. It was the pivotal drop in the post-hypnotic suggestion box of parents everywhere who wanted to grow adorable little semiaquatic rodents of their very own.
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EVERYBODY NEEDS BEAVER!
Creemedia
THE WORLD ACCORDING TO BEAVER
by Irwyn Applebaum
(Bantam)
by
Rick Johnson
Although it originally aired "only" a little more than two thin decades ago, Leave It To Beaver takes us waaay back to a Motorcraft-tested world where ideals were cheap and they didn't even put nipples on the manikins. It was the pivotal drop in the post-hypnotic suggestion box of parents everywhere who wanted to grow adorable little semiaquatic rodents of their very own. And to us kids, it was.. well, the neatest!
Ever since the show's network demise in 1963 and subsequent ascendence into rerun perpetuity, Beav fans around the world have been waiting for the definitive book on the trax 'n' fax behind a program whose staying power is stronger even than the leading spermicide. It's about time-every TV sitcom from the Dick Van Dyke Show to Love Of Puke has its own book, and it took just about forever for a decent job on LITB.
The World According To Beaver is just that—a decent effort. Fans of the show should enjoy it at least as much as a complete set of tiller attachments, although the hardcore will encounter a few problems.
LITB featured a cast of characters that will persevere like set-in mustard stains. Jerry Mathers’s portrayal of the Beav made him the most believable kid in sitcom history, the kinda guy who could make you believe that squooshing stuff in your dad’s vice was a pleasure akin to seeing Richard Benjamin devoured by mealworms.
Tony Dow as Wally, Beaver’s dense older brother, turned some incredibly lousy acting into a seemingly actual teenager with normal lug rattle. Ward Cleaver, played by Methodist lay preacher Hugh Beaumont, was truly the sort of guy who “says it with seatcovers”; his wife, June (Barbara Billingsley), as warm and comforting as a visit from the sleep bunnies.
Then there was Ken Osmond as Eddie Haskell. Eddie “Good evening, Mrs. Cleaver, Mr. Cleaver” Haskell. Eddie “Nothing’s a dirty trick if it’s funny enough” Haskell. Eddie “If you start treating your parents too good, the next thing you know, they’ll start pushing you around” Haskell. As noted philosopher and occasional baseball announcer Harry Caray once said, “If there really is a law of averages, this guy is doomed.”
Applebaum’s opus contains plenty of amazing fax. The biggie is that Beaver got his nickname from Wally, who—unable to pronounce Theodore in his prathood—kept calling his younger sibling “Tweeter.” For some reason, Ward and June thought “Beaver” sounded somehow nicer. You’d hate to think what they’d come up with if Wally’d called him “Wiener,” or “Twatface.”
Some more amazing fax: The Cleaver’s state-of-the-art kitchen has both a cookie jar and a cookie drawer. Their hometown of Mayfield is located nowhere, being situated near both Cincinnati and “The Ocean.” The painting hanging near the entry is Gainsborough’s “Blue Boy.” And most amazing of all, the show never went Top 20 in the national ratings.
Complaint Dept.: For this kind of undertaking, the photos are remarkably bad, featuring numerous poorly-cropped, indistinguishable people-shaped blobs resembling kinescopes viewed through two-way wood. Cutesie sections like “You Know You’re A Kid When...” (“Your pockets contain dried worms.”) and “My Diary,” one of several pages featuring pretend child-scrawlings as readable as those interstellar go-cart strips in the mountains of Peru, should stay in Sunday supplements, where they belong. Not to mention (he mentioned) the overkill of lessthan-notable quotes from the script.
Where this TV geez has trouble is in the Episode Guide, the information I most wanted from this book. I mean, Shuck E. Darns guys, are they presented in chronological or any kind of order? Are the headlines the actual titles of episodes? Did the original shows even have titles? Do any of the guest stars have names?
Aw, heck—quibbling about the ton of info that is in the book is about as useful a concept as our editorial assistant’s (whoever it is today) measurements of food bogue-ness. Just take it from the Beav, the hero of junk writers everywhere (especially here): “I didn’t write it dumb—it just came out dumb!”
