The Red Skelton Show

Red Skelton was still another major star who made the transition from movies to television with ease.

His shows certainly brought a laughter to the American households of years back.

He would begin the show with an opening monologue. Afterwards, we would have a variety of characters. Remember Gertrude and Heathcliff in the monologue? How can we ever forget San Fernando Red? I remember one episode where as a king Red introduced his queen by referring to her as your fatness.

Go know that Red would use his comedic talents to really hide from his tragic life. He lost a son to leukemia at age 11 or so. His wife, Georgia, died by suicide.

.......Playing Kaddiddlehopper, Col San Fernando, etc. the man was pretty wide ranging and a scream. I love watching him interact w/ Amanda Blake, or Don Knotts or whomever--he clearly was having a ball and I think he made it easier on his guests as well--so long as they Knew ahead of time it wasn't a disciplined, 19 take kind of production. Relax and be loose was clearly the name of the game there.

He reminds me of guys like Milton Berle, Benny Hill, maybe Jerry Lewis some too. Great timing, ancient gags that kept audiences in stitches for decades, sheer enjoyment about what he was doing. His sad little clown he played was good too--but in a touching manner.

Personally I think he's great, having just bought a two DVD set of his shows from '61 or so, it brings his stuff back in a fond way for me. I can remember seeing him on TV at the end of his run when he was winding up the series in 1971 or so.

Check this out if you are a fan or curious. He was a riot.

Red Skelton's TV show was a well-produced variety hour that had an impressively long run, largely due to the big-name guest stars who appeared opposite Red. Although I sometimes laugh at Skelton, I'm not hugely a fan of his work. Red Skelton was one of the most undisciplined performers in the history of showbiz (which is saying a lot!), and he was notorious for 'corpsing' his guest-stars: trying to make them break character and laugh. Supposedly, Skelton had a wide range of comedic characterisations, but most of them were just Red Skelton playing himself with minor changes in costume and situation. Freddie the Freeloader was Skelton playing himself as a hobo, San Fernando Red was Skelton playing himself as a con-man, Cauliflower McPugg (a real Al Capp name!) was Skelton playing himself as a boxer, George Appleby was Skelton playing himself as a henpecked husband, Willie Lump Lump was guess-who as a drunk, Sheriff Deadeye was guess-who as a cowboy, Forsooth was Skelton again as a mediaeval peasant, and so forth. I find Skelton's customary sign-off very annoying: 'Good night, and may God bless.' God bless what or whom? Why couldn't Skelton say 'God bless YOU', or 'God bless us, every one', or something that makes grammatical sense? His other famous catchphrase was 'I dood it', but in this case he doodn't.

The most original part of Red Skelton's show was the closing segment of most episodes. Called 'The Silent Spot', this featured Skelton in a wordless skit, utterly silent except for sound effects and the audience's laughter. TV TRIVIA: The guy who invented the laugh-track machine used audio recordings of Red Skelton's 'Silent Spot' segments as the source for his canned laughter: these contained no dialogue, so the inventor merely cut out the sound effects and had long audio samples of undiluted laughter. Skelton always performed his silent skits alone, sometimes abetted by stuntmen and mute bit players but without any co-star. The only time Skelton varied this formula was (fittingly enough) with guest star Harpo Marx in a World War One sketch, with Skelton as a doughboy and Harpo as a German officer sharing a dugout in No Man's Land.

The 24 September 1968 episode of Red Skelton's show had the unfortunate title 'He Who Steals My Robot Steals Trash'. This episode guest-starred Vincent Price and Boris Karloff in a prolonged spoof on horror movies. Skelton portrayed Clem Kadiddlehopper, who was (as usual) Red Skelton playing himself as a hillbilly. In the first half of the two-act skit, Vincent Price played a mad scientist in search of a brain for his robot. Guess whose brain he decides to use. Encountering farmboy Kaddidlehopper in a field (a very obvious indoor stage set), Price lures him to his lab. All the gags can be seen a mile off. When Clem's hillbilly father learns that Clem has been abducted by a mad scientist, he sadly mourns "I've lost Clem, I've lost Clem..." only to immediately become elated and rush offstage cackling "I've lost Clem! I've lost Clem!"

The second act takes place in Price's lab. It turns out he's the junior partner in a father-and-son team of mad scientists. And now here comes his father, to huge applause from the studio audience: Boris Karloff! The skit itself is unfunny, although it's pleasant to see Karloff gamely guying his own image.

After the commercial break, Karloff and Price take a bow as themselves and perform a jolly little song about their screen careers, in which Price sings the line 'I was the Fly'. It's a bit disorienting to hear him sing this; Vincent Price did indeed star in 'The Fly' but he did NOT play the title role, and he often encountered film fans who thought he HAD played that role.

I'm a fan of Karloff, but at this point (only a few months before his death) that great actor's health was so bad that his appearance is very distressing. Throughout this episode, Karloff spends his entire screen time sitting down, clearly too weak to stand. In the lab sketch, he makes his entrance (and it IS quite an entrance!) aboard a motorised chair that looks like something Blofeld might favour. The chair is extremely bulky, suggesting that Karloff's oxygen tank is stowed aboard. By this time, the lung complaint that would eventually end Karloff's life was so severe that an oxygen cylinder was always close at hand.

During the third-act musical number, Karloff and Price are both seated on a platform that mechanically trundles through the proscenium curtain. Again, it's an effective entrance, and Price's presence aboard the platform makes it less obvious that Karloff is too weak to stand.

I've seen Vincent Price on a much earlier episode of Skelton's show, from the 1950s. His hammy personality worked well with Skelton's humour. Karloff too had made at least one 1950s appearance (famously referenced in a 'Honeymooners' episode) on Skelton's show. If only Karloff and Price had appeared together opposite Skelton circa 1957, when Karloff was still comparatively healthy, that might have been a comedy skit to cherish. As it is, though, Karloff's (inappropriately) cadaverous appearance makes this guest shot a very depressing one indeed. And, given its spookfest atmosphere, I wonder why this pre-recorded episode was aired in September, rather than delaying it another month and showing it at Hallowe'en.

Red Skelton was watched weekly even before I was born. As I watched the shows, it was if he was part of our family. My father would laugh and giggle along with the rest of us. What made the show funny was not only the rehearsed script, but the ad lib comments. He included us as if we were right there with him. While some considered him as unprofessional by causing others to crack up on stage, we the audience found it funny to see the serious characters laughing and smiling on screen. I am sure the performers came on the program to enjoy a bit of lighthearted performing. If the program had been a professional polished perfect performance, I don't think the program would have lasted as long. It was funny, entertaining, and at times, very poignant. I think one of my most memorable performances was Freddy the freeloader with the Raggedy Ann doll that changed to a 'live' partner. It taught me that all people crave someone. It touched my heart then and every time I think of it. It was a Yuletide performance and it is in my memory as a child. Red Skelton wasn't only a performer, but a human being to share his humor and wit. It is one of the programs such as Leave it to Beaver, Father knows Best, and others to build a set of standards that make me a better man today! The statement God Bless was a statement at the end to wish everyone in every aspect of life to have their life improved.

It was wonderful to have a youth where our family would get together weekly to watch the miracle performer of all time Red Skelton. Red had world class scripts or could be an ad-lib genius and improvise to perfection. The characters he created are beloved for the ages, Clem Kadiddlehopper, San Fernando Red, Freddie the Freeloader, Cauliflower McPugg, tippler Willie Lump-Lump, Sheriff Deadeye, Lord Beaverhead, and George Appleby. He had the cream of the crop of entertainers including, John Wayne, Milton Berle, Martha Raye, Tim Conway, Phyllis Diller, Mickey Rooney, Nipsey Russell, George Gobel, Robert Goulet, Merv Griffin,Vincent Price, Lou Rawls and Liberace. The wonder was our family felt like we were part of his family. The whole world was a better place when Red Skelton was in it.