MEDIA COOL

MEDIA COOL

This Month’s Media Cool was written by Jeffrey Morgan, John Mendelssohn, Richard C. Walls and Bill Holdship

PEE-WEE’S PLAYHOUSE (CBS)

Billy Altman turned me onto this show the last time I was in New York, and I owe him a dinner for the tip. Quite simply, it’s the best live action children’s show I’ve seen in at least 20 years. Even if you don’t like PeeWee Herman all that much (hey, my hand’s half up), you have to admire his genius when you’re confronted by it in a universe of his own design. Lots of clay animation by the guys who did the “Road To Nowhere” and “Sledgehammer” videos, as well as secret words, neighborhood visitors, and talking furniture. And like any good children’s host, Pee-Wee has his own robot sidekick—but wouldn’t you know it? It’s not just a robot, it’s a walking ghetto blaster/home Hi-Fi unit. Besides, when he shows a cartoon, he digs up a jem from the mid-’30s and not some limited animation piece of schlock from today’s dustbin. What can I say? He’s the Captain Kangaroo of the ’80s. Who’da thunk it? It’s enough to make you wanna go out and get some kids! J.M.

THE A-TEAM (NBC)

So what do you do when your show starts slipping into the Neilson toilet? Well, you might write-off your last season as a dream sequence...or you might change a few haircuts, cars, and clothes—but if you’re Steve Cannell, you call everyone’s bluff and really up the ante as if there were no tomorrow. So effective the start of the ’86-’87 season, our boys are no longer wanted for robbing the Bank of Hanoi, they’re court marshalled for Murder One and shot in front of a firing squad. Of course, they escape—but it’s no joke: they’re on the lam from a murder charge and under the thumb of Robert Vaughan, playing another Ross Webster-like role (i.e., The Man From S.C.U.M.) as the newest cast member. OK, so Bob missed out on the merchandising perks, but he gets old pal David McCallum as a special guest star in a show complete with U.N.C.L.E.-style color-blur scene changes and outof-focus fade-outs. J.M.

THE COMPLETE NIGHT OF THE LIVING DEAD FILMBOOK

by John Russo (Harmony Books)

Admit it, you tuned in the colorized showing of N.O.L.D. out of curiosity, right? And it sucked, didn’t it? All those chalky pastels, and every time a shadow fell on the hero’s sweater, it radiated like a Chernobyl spud farmer—it’s not that colorization is an inherently immoral idea, it’s just that it’s one more item, in this age of Reagan de-regulation, that’s been dumped on the market years before it’s been perfected. Meanwhile, as greed makes all our lives a little shabbier, you can cop this only moderately overpriced trade paperback and learn everything you’ve ever wanted to know about one of the greatest horror films ever made (up there with Horror Of Dracula and Bride Of Frankenstein, by gum). Such burning questions as “Was them guts real?” and “How much was improvised?” and “How do you say the film title in German?” are all answered here and lots, lots, more; plus plenty of behind the scenes photos. Down-right inspirational.R.C.W.

SON OF GOLDEN TURKEY AWARDS by Henry & Michael Medved (Villard Books)

You’d think that they would have milked this concept dry by now, but no, the intrepid Bros, actually manage to squeeze a few more yuks out of it (though the funniest part of the book is in the intro, where the ’Veds say they don’t do these books for money, but from an urge to share with us their love of bad cinema. Oh sure, and I don’t write these capsule reviews for the bucks, but because I think they might help bring World Peace). It is fun to browse, though, and the “Who’s Who In Bad Movies” section is informative—and a sad reminder that the comprehensive, serious book on cinema de crud has yet to be written (though Hoberman and Rosenbaum’s Midnight Movies is highly recommended). R.C.W.

THE BOB (N.Y. Fanzine)

Cynical about the future of rock? Chances are you’ll be less so after reading The Bob, a wellwritten fanzine that celebrates extremely young, extremely obscure bands from all over the country with infectious enthusiasm. Who wouldn’t break into a big grin on reading, say, “The last time I saw [Electric Love Muffin, they] had a guest bass player filling in for Brian, who was attending his senior prom”? As though further inducement were necessary, one recent issue even included a flexi-disc of R.E.M. performing the Velvets’ “Femme Fatale,” rather limply. (151 First Ave., Ste. F, New York, NY 10003). J.M.

ELVIS MUSICAL POP UP BOOK (Bonanza Pop Up/ Crown Publishers)

This is really neat! An honestto-goodness toy for adult Elvis fans. The book only features six “pop up” scenes (the “Million Dollar Quartet”; Jailhouse Rock; army induction; the ’60s at Graceland, and the Las Vegas comeback), but there are all sorts of little panels that open (featuring Colonel Tom counting his money, among other things) that aid in telling the whole tale. I just wish it played something other than “Love Me Tender.” B.H.