I thought I’d drop another Harry Dubin shot here. This one isn’t hard to date. Home Sweet Homicide came out in 1947. It’s also not hard to place the street where Harry is standing. I do wonder though who sold balloons on the street in a suit and fancy overcoat. Something tells me in this case Harry didn’t change clothes with the peddler.
I did get a little laugh when I looked up the movie my guide and saw that it co-starred Peggy Ann Garner. When I was researching The Box, my book about early TV, I interviewed a former DuMont director who told me that Garner did a lot of live TV in those days, and she had a bit of a reputation — but not for her acting chops — so much so that around the station she was known as Peggy Ann Gornisht.
Of course, her reputation was nothing compared to Judy Tyler‘s, who as Princess Summerfall Winterspring on Howdy Doody made the show curiously exciting for thousands of adolescents around the country. They certainly never saw a Native American woman depicted like that in their textbooks. Tyler made Daisy Mae look like Granny on The Beverly Hillbillies. Dominick Dunne delighted in telling me about her immense sexual appetite and then called me every name in the book for quoting him accurately. Somewhere I have that letter. The backstage folks on Howdy Doody were riotously funny. I could barely transcribe my tape of Dayton Allen because I couldn’t hear his voice over my shrieks of laughter. Allen was the one most responsible for the wild atmosphere behind the scenes. The rehearsals were so filthy that the staffers at NBC waited in line to get in so they could watch Flubadub humping Mr. Bluster.
Not everyone was so delightful though. Now I can tell the story about how I was told if I wanted to interview Buffalo Bob I shouldn’t try to do so after five because chances were he’d already be wasted by then. Me being me, I called him at six. He picked up the phone and said hello in such a bleary voice I swore I could smell the alcohol on his breath through the phone line. Remember Otis on Andy of Mayberry? That’s what he sounded like.
“Hello?”
[Silence]
“Bob Smith?”
“Yeah, who is this?”
“My name is Jeff Kisseloff. I’m writing a book about early television, and I’ve been interviewing the cast of Howdy Doody. I’d love to include you.”
“Who else did you interview?”
“Well, today I saw your old director, Howard Davis.”
“Howard Davis? Stay away from that faggy old asshole.”
“[Me, in a kid's voice] Gee, thanks, Buffalo Bob. Maybe I should talk to you another time.”
“Good idea”
Click.
I don’t know how I got from Harry to Buffalo Bob. That’s the fun of not having either an editor or a space limit. Here’s the picture. Click on the photo to supersize it, and for those who are new to this amazing series of photos, click here for the first post in the series to read how it came about. It’s a great story. Even Buffalo Bob would enjoy it. Then there was my interview with Captain Kangaroo. Another day. Here’s Harry:
