The Smothers Brothers - Smothered (2002)

the good script nothing funny in this hey our boys were through censoring your show good afternoon and welcome to the u.s. comedy Arts Festival presentation of The Smothers Brothers Comedy reunion how are you Aspen how's the festival be going well let me ask a quick question how many remember watching The Smothers Brothers show my mom like my brother Besson she never liked me no this is not true mom gay you mom liked you best all right mom all right just be quiet one minute mom likes you best you lower your voice mom liked you too give me some facts with Smothers Brothers Comedy Hour ran from 1967 it went on in this very month of February 33 years ago until a very angry CBS yanked it and we all know how painful that is off the air in 1969 now during those years we had Sergeant Pepper in the White Album and the assassinations in Vietnam and presidents Johnson and Nixon these were turbulent times you mean we're not allowed to travel to Italy or not to Italy or France we shouldn't travel to Germany or no Spain that's right nothing abroad absolutely nothing abroad they don't want us American sister travel abroad not they our government is asking us as citizens decisions to refrain from traveling to foreign lands okay are you guys in Vietnam come on home The Smothers Brothers sacrificed their show because they wouldn't sacrifice their principles and for that all these years later all of us here especially at a comedy festival Oh them a huge debt of gratitude they're all going to come out together Tom's brothers dick smothers Bob Einstein Steve Martin and Mason Williams welcome them please fellas I think CBS probably had to cancel The Smothers Brothers show because it could not be seen as being pushed around by a single show I think they couldn't afford to do that television in the mid-60s was not like television of of this century it was pathetic in terms of not only how few choices there were but in what those networks were showing it was CBS NBC ABC and basically that's it it was all escapism this was Beverly Hillbillies and it was bewitched this was all of the fantastic shows that you can think of all the pretend shows as terms of an original American idea Smothers Brothers was first because it was a big secret until you got to show that you were this book no we were not political until we got the show after we got the show in the process of it took three years two years for us to be politicized in the whole world the United States getting politicized we just started seeing the war or something wrong and integration and a lot of things were happening and I thought we said a little less each show we could maybe be on for 10 years right and still get the same amount of information across how does that feel to be right you realize this is really about them yeah nobody expected Tom and dick when they went on the air to be controversial they were going to be Jack Benny and George Burns and and Bob Hope and all of the comics that had come before them the roots were in the traditional comedy they were both very clean-cut college looking kids they wore those Blazers and they looked you know very non-threatening they looked like the boys next door they couldn't hurt you they you want them to date your daughters and all that stuff and I think because of that they they were able to get away with a lot and thank God they were I remember Tommy came home one day and said hey we got an offer to do a variety show on CBS at 9:00 o'clock on Sunday which is called a kamikaze timeslot I said why that and he said well it's opposite bonanza and he said nine shows have gone down against Bonanza and I said I guess we're going to be the tenth nine o'clock Sunday night is the most important hour in all of television as far as circulation goes and therefore for the advertisers and for the network the lowest rated show on television at the time was the show that was opposite Bonanza the Garry Moore Show I had a series of constant failures against Bonanza and Garry Moore was one of them and we were anxious to get it off the air and a new show as quickly as possible oh I couldn't get a film show ready in less than 90 days so we had to take whatever we could get in a live format I learned that The Smothers Brothers was available I wasn't entirely sure what they could do but the gamble was one I had to take research had determined in their wisdom that these young men would appeal to the young audience and we needed to get a young audience to whack Bonanza over the head frankly most of us you know more conservative types thought this is a disaster we're going to go on and get killed but Tommy smothers blesses hard said look if we go on and get killed if we get knocked off everybody's going to say well so what they went up against the number one Joe nobody else's beaten bonanza we're not going to take any flack for it he said on the other hand if we're successful if we're if we beat Bonanza we're gonna be a tremendously exciting news story Magister does you want to do a variety show it'll be opposite Bonanza and stuff I said ah our careers over anyway I'll grab a have a season though baking shows aren't cleared ironclad kind of thirteen shows and I said yeah sure I didn't I'll go to Mexico and go fishing and so they way that's what yeah and I said blood I want control creative and I want creative control on the show CBS sicko sure I said what screaming I want control the writing and I want to be able to hire writers and irrelevant want to be not more relevant than the sitcom I want to and the other said sure whatever you want you got you got creative control and they didn't care they didn't expect it to succeed Brothers Comedy Hour Show number one take one now I'd like to help kick off the premiere of an exciting new comedy show which you're all going to enjoy for a long long time starring Tom and dick smothers now first of all they really are brothers they were born in New York City well way way back in the 1940s they were typical American kids average in every way one thing you have to remember about The Smothers Brothers was that they were a product of their time I mean they came of age in the Eisenhower era and some of their material and some of their attitudes were shaped in a much friendlier you know less threatening time the father was an Army officer they had been army brats it traveled around the country they had lived in a lot of different places they're going to San Jose State which is about as you know American at college as you could go to they came up in the folk clubs but they kind of idolized those old mains line you know mainstream performers it just happened that their consciousness had evolved beyond that and eventually that became part of the show hey fellas Tommy you Dickie would you please come out here well we dabble here let me let me take this oh okay thank you okay we dem we'd like you to settle something for us all right yeah which up old on myself yeah which of us do you think is the older you mean which of you two were the older yeah yeah which which is the oldest voices you tell the age of horses by women doesn't work with people's teeth well it might for me but not for him is he his teeth are only six months old you are who you hug I don't know who did that Sinatra sees you at a party he hugged you you're at his level and when you had George Burns and Jack Benny back then hug The Smothers Brothers by being on the show on us and Danny's all those people that gave us gave a credibility and the numbers start coming up so it's all together numbers were important because the numbers keep you on well we certainly were surprised and how fast had caught on and how well it did in such a short period of time what happened is that new young audiences were making a point of coming to The Smothers Brothers Comedy Hour it was appointment television before that phrase was invented everybody's probably surprised here we are back for the fourth show in a row wise ourselves I was wondering Tommy I didn't see you around very much what did you do all week well see what I've been sitting what I've what have I been doing mm-hmm well I've been I've been reading up on a theory on the correlation between clothes and politics the ambivalence of the show absolutely enabled it to survive because there was something there for everybody you know the counterculture was represented probably too much for most people's tastes but the mainstream was also well served by mainstream kind of guests and by Tom and Dick themselves who are clearly you know Americans I mean well it's just that you can tell who's running the country by how much clothes people wear who's running the country yeah but you can tell by how much clothes the people wear by then what do you mean like some people can afford more clothes on and other people less clothes on that's right exactly see some people that ordinary people are the lessons say uh-huh the lessons whoa who's running the country The Moron had no idea that would be successful never in my wildest dreams many months later I was acclaim for having such judgment such courage to have these wonderful young people there and I of course said well you just have to take those Gamble's sometime a lot of people who didn't do a lot of television showed up on the Smothers Brothers and the writers treated them with respect I was into the joy of the production of the show we groups like I appointed there's always those Mountain sirs always the ocean there was always Bob Hope and Jack Manning and Betty Davis and all those people and they came in and they said oh it's so wonderful to be on your show who is a weekly show so each week we started off on Monday with the run-through and then ended up on Friday by taping the show in front of a live audience tis a pity before the Sun sets you shall be taken in my private carriage through the countryside and driven to my summer palace where you shall be thrown into a dungeon till your flesh rots how does that sound you well up to the dungeon part not so bad but naquin I am prepared to die for France and you shall die with me I shall summon my god ha but nay it'll be of no avail before they hastened thither I shall have run you through your Queen part Tommy did not want an dick they didn't want so called sweetening he couldn't fake the laughs and faked the applause what the audience did was what we heard the show really started out as a pretty typical variety show the thing that began to break it away from that was really the fact that Tommy brought in a lot of his friends in particular Mason Williams and Mason and some of the other young writers on the show began to push the show in a much more radical direction you know I'd scribble down some idea and throw it in his shoe box and and when the show came up we just dug out this shoe box and started looking at all these little snippets of ideas and things was a creative control that I wanted to have some writers who were were sympathetic and empathetic with our sense I don't think Tommy had a briefcase full of notions that were going to shake up the network and the country when he came in I think he came in with that goofy character isn't his brother and it was charming and he could say impertinent things to him and everything was very bright and young and and with it I think it evolved into that our expectations midway in the first season started the change in line with our policy of taking a stand on the pressing issues of the day we now present another in our continuing series of editorials subject should the use of firearms be restricted remember it was about that tense show that he expressed to me that he was interested in shaking things up a little bit by virtue of saying things that that were a little bit inflammatory I asked you what is our most cherished right since pioneer days the right for every man woman and child to carry a gun this is not a statement of Gration but a band of meetings and even a child could understand if you're old enough to get arrested you're all enough to carry a gun a gun is a necessity who knows if you're walking down a street you'll spot a moose I feel these restrictions our plot miss Braddock turn to listing we at The Smothers Brothers program consider this personal tag got our own integrity personally I myself carry a gun should I be restricted from trying a gun do I look unstable we were writing comedy and we started to find that writing some politically based satirical comedy was getting laughs the audience was recognizing and that was really that was the thing that was I think enlightening stand up and be counted let's preserve our freedom to kill if you wish a copy of the preceding editorial send a self-addressed stamped envelope to editorial box 1763 Beverly Hills oh it was seasoned and spiced up with political satire social comment but that wasn't this the whole show at all it never was intended to be it was a show that was an hour variety show that had some social commenting see I think people remember the show as as being controversial and having that political view but the controversial part of it I think was the fact that I just want to include what was happening on the street as part of its spectrum of interests I think the degree of alienation in the country was accelerating by the minute and a lot of it was generational spurred by television a younger generation not accepting the kind of hierarchical view of things that the parents generation had I think that Smothers Brothers and the young people of writing for them really reflected that and the growing opposition to the war and a growing sense that you could not necessarily take the word of Washington as gospel I think what happened is they got the timeslot they got the show they got the audience they got the clout and then they became affected by The Times and became more radical you have Tom out there who is this kind of boyish looking and you know apple pie and mom looking kind of guy and we thought well he's you know he's really establishment but he's you know he's just you know like now a moderate that's slightly to the to the left what we didn't know is that he was way the heck oh look left Hollywood come in and sit with me and sit with the writers dick was great but his his focus wasn't in this aspect of it and I think it was a good thing I think of the two of them together would have been insane they're both good writers but tommy was really more profoundly involved with the creative aspects of the show homey name is McNamara I'm the leader of the panel although were few in number we're the greatest in the land ah there's Hennigan blending and planning and hanok and dari you already closed but Nelson oh for crying out loud what's the matter now didn't hear one Jewish name in the bath you sure start some controversy there yeah a giant great big bandwidth uh nobody Jewish in it no Italian no Chinese no Greek sense that's right because they're all Irish a little discrimination I'd say going on in Finnegan Flanagan Hanigan I didn't hear one pallucci one Rabinowitz key or one Hayakawa Iowa hi me hi cow WA Hayakawa yeah well I'll bet there's not one colored person in the band either that's right of course there isn't because it's an all Irish band and you're going to be hearing from the n-double AICP wait a minute you heard me who are they the National Association for the Advancement of Irish colored people all right Tommy you made your point my brother's absolutely right these songs were written 30 40 years ago they're very already master date they're out of date let's bring him up to date all right Dave cadet Nelson oh there's any convinient Flannigan Hannigan Donohue in the cone Malucci and Suzuki and macropolis and : oh there's every racing creed and Nationality in the land and they'll all March together MacNamaras integrated I would love to know about the process that went on there how did you pitch ideas how did you get your stuff on the air with well I always always believe that you could take the high road and stand up for your position you know I used to say to them you know CBS is like a high school you know you turn in your citement your assignments that are the scripts they get graded and whatnot and and I learned all this stuff in high school about America freedom of speech and all this I said I'm gonna hold you to that Mason Williams the head writer for the show for much of it was the soul of that program and really pushed more in terms of censorship and I think he in his way was always thinking about the medium I don't think the medium was thinking about itself as much as Mason was when you're a writer on a television show I think you come to the to that position and knowing about television you know there's a certain standard or you know in other words it's it's a public forum in that sense so you know there are things that are not going to be on and you're not going to swear and you're not going to do certain sorts of things I think that in our case we just started realizing that you don't have to accept then that limitation you only see it in hindsight it was it was a process it was spontaneous I look back at and I said yeah well just just kept kind of molding it and Mason I would take the scrip home next week scrip and we sometimes tortured joynton look at this script and we'd go take your disapproves of this anyway and we learn and we read this script going on at that's good Jimmy crack corn and I don't care Jimmy crack corn and I don't care JOHN CARTER I don't care wait a minute what's the matter I don't care what you mean you don't just don't care it I like that sign I just saw I don't just don't care you don't care about anything I don't care don't you care about it don't you care about the world you care about the world situation I don't care you don't care what it do what it what about civil rights I don't care what about that the the tax of the the height the high taxes I don't care what it won't tell me what do you think's the greatest single problem in the United States today apathy the first time there was any problem with censorship with the Smothers Brothers came nine episodes into the first season this was not a topical thing having anything to do with politics it was Tommy and Elaine playing censors who were watching something and we couldn't see it we could hear it and just see their reactions to it and it was a brilliant sketch cut in its entirety it was maybe that sensors couldn't laugh at themselves or they didn't want people to think about the network shows being censored so they just disallowed the sketch program practices in those days was a powerful major piece of a network and totally independent from the programming side so while programming encouraged the controversy loved the controversy wanted more controversy because it brought more viewers program practices wanted a perfectly straight clean toe the line kind of program I was always up if something was edited I was screaming you know and there's always someone to pick up the phone from the press to pick it up I always let everyone know when when the show was tampered with I think Tommy was brilliant using the press I'm not an expert about the press but he could always get an audience and he always seemed to have something to say that they would write about you become aware of programming practices your first day on the job because you get a memo from program practices about last week's script about what's you know what's wrong what's objectionable what has to be changed deleted what you have in your comedian is a point of view if you don't have a point of view you're not in the good to great category that is what distinguishes you so if you have a point of view and then you have a sensor saying you can see this and you can see that you can say that your question is why why are you the arbiter of what I think people can take and that Eddy just a natural response to that because I am about my point of view ladies and gentlemen a few shows back we did a sketch with d'Alene Mae it's a sketch that she wrote herself and the censors for various reasons of their own felt the sketch was a little too about you know I mean well they just didn't let us show it right yes the sketch was about censors yes just coincidental however since that time we've had some discussions about it and since it is really a well-written sketch and well they decided that we could show it to you after all I think it's very nice of them to let us do it yes right and I'd like to show it to you now it's a very funny sketch right here on page 4 and page 3 this page was especially well written I got a lot of laughs and haha Elaine we told you we'd get this sketch on right over here - laughs this last page oh that my honey my pulse beats well in my wrist whenever I'm near you this is only a excerpt this is it here is here's here's another father's they kept changing themselves and and we're smart enough to know what would hit and what worked and what didn't work and what they did the very experimentation seemed to attract people that it was different and was the first show to deal with social issues this was a particularly fascinating time in American history a time of great conflict a time of debate and controversy over the war in Vietnam civil rights social issues unprecedented kind of heat in the streets and it was during that time that Americans were most receptive to having their popular culture and their politics mixed I was working in San Francisco at a an improvisational satirical theatre called the committee I was doing a character in the committee that was a Berkeley radical at the time which is what The Smothers Brothers were interested in me doing Lee French was really a hippie of that period so the part that she played was very close to the real person she came out of the audience in the first show Tommy found her in the audience and just did an interview Dinah was hysterical I hitchhiked Gadar from San Francisco and I was just sort of hanging out you're on somebody light a ticket on me to come here and you know anything that's free you know but it's really I mean you know it's really far out I was just like sitting here in my seat digging you and everything and it was really really wild man the way you came down the audience you know you started to get everybody to sing and everything I mean it was a lot of love and everybody was very happy and everything I mean it was really beautiful I just started to blossom I thought I could be part of that blossoming we had lived the whole piece it was completely in the moment it was completely you know it was as pure as it can get I think when - - you know performers are connecting well turn-on is like if you know you press a certain button and you get kind of like a high frequency response in your whole piece made it on the air nobody at that point had a clue what I was talking about the generational references that were especially evident in Lea French's material that was an extension of the dope culture you know that part of the counterculture that dealt with soft drugs like marijuana and LSD and that lexicon hadn't percolated up word yet I'd like to greet all you ladies as I usually do hi when I did the Goldie Keefe share a little tea with Goldie I always did it sort of all in one and I would just share household hints and information with the audience at home as you remember the last time we got together I told you we'd be talking about how to get rid of those unsightly unwanted roaches in your home but you ladies were really on top of it you figured it out for yourself and I want to thank all of you for sending me all your old roaches the stuff I did was kind of designed with double entendre in mine so that if I was cleaning my house and we were gonna get rid of roaches well that made perfect sense to some mother sitting there and you know and then some kid going oh my god she said roaches on television they actually got things past the sensor in the vocabulary that anyone who was my age or older I was a teenager at the time understood you know had a feeling of now which television wasn't wasn't real big on now was her bigger on then you know as how he things used to be with mom and dad and the kids and breakfast and everybody wore a tie and a hat and I mean it was then they were very now at the time I thought well this is what all television should be about this is what we should be doing we should be commenting on the times I mean television is a medium of immediacy in line with our policy of taking a stand on the pressing issues of the day we now present another in our continuing series of editorials the subject are our draft laws unfair here again speaking for our program is mr. Patrick Paulson vice president one of the arguments against the dread we heard is unfair immoral discourages young men from studying ruins their careers and their lives picky picky picky I fell in love with Pat Paulsen early in our career he was a wonderful put on artists and we took him on some a couple of tours with us because he was writing some funny stuff now we don't claim the draft is perfect and we do have a constructive proposal for a workable alternative we proposed a draft lottery in which the names of all eligible males will be put into a hat and the men will be drafted according to their head sizes the tiny heads will go on to the military service and the fat heads will go into government that was doing these editorials and I remember Tommy and I were at an Italian restaurant on La Cienega I think I said something like you know I'd like to run an object for president instead of a person you know mason was this incredibly far-out thinker and he had decided he was gonna run the Mona Lisa or the Statue of Liberty for president but somewhere along the way he decided no no no I'm gonna run pet paulsen for president a great many of my friends and my associates and my fellow Americans have been urging me to run for office but what office I'm not at liberty to say at this time therefore I wish to state then with regard to the presidency of the United States I will not run if nominated and if I'm elected I will not serve we wanted to run Pat as a candidate to shed light on the political process in other words satire by doing a satirical political campaign you actually reveal to the general public what goes on in the real world politics mr. Paulson how do you stand on the question of welfare why hell I feel I just get a job a great many people were trying we were talking out of both sides of your mouth at the same time would you care to comment on this no I'm the Pat Paulsen for president campaign was one of the the most exciting and successful satirical things though the the show had he was also one of the primary colors in our as our characters he was the strongest defined color whenever in trouble put Pat Paulsen in the sketch boomin opened up however in spite of my repeated denials the grounds all of popular support grows every day I do not understand why this is happening the fact that I have a surefire plan of action to lower taxes solve our civil rights problems obliterate the national debt and put an end to the war in Vietnam obviously disqualifies me as a presidential politics now we're just typical American boys from a typical American town we believe in God and Senator Don and keep an old Castro down when it came our time to serve better dead red when we got to the draft board buddy this is what we said I'm only 18 I got a ruptured spleen and I always carry a purse somehow in the miscalculation history took place in the Johnson White House we had ended up being impaled with 500,000 men in Vietnam and it became anything more nor obvious that it didn't work I mean the new is a sort of military stalemate our superior military machine against their superior political dynamic we could kill them and they could keep coming so I think that that that began to seep into the bloodstream of the society working his way oddly enough up from me I'm not down from the older generation but up from the young founding us right around us I mean you know we live in right in the middle of the most politically and socially exciting times ever you know in the 60s I mean it wasn't very difficult to find things to write about the Vietnam War was a huge issue it was tearing the nation apart The Smothers Brothers were on the side of get out but we were playing to an audience of mid Americans many many of whom had sons and family in the Army or Armed Forces so we had to walk a thin line we didn't want to you know demean the the action of real Patriots but at the same time we felt it was an unjust and immoral war and that America's participation and it was shameful ho chi minh she ain't no friend that's plain for all the scene I know so much got a fight over there but why does it have to be me so I wish you well Sarge give a peck I'm bound for Canada you know and if you ever get a war with that button or boy I'll be the first to go what didn't tell them mr. McNamara only 80 Nagata ruptures be and always carry a purse like a better plan my ass was get worse I'll ever think of my career ever sweetheart dear poor old invalid and that ain't no fool I'm going to school now we're gonna be best friends the first time we knew we were starting to have a problem was when we were hearing through various channels from the White House that the joke's on the Vietnam War while our boys were dying while fighting there what wasn't something you could make light of the CBS had a very complicated and not entirely appropriate relationship with Lyndon Johnson and the connecting link was Frank Stanton and in every way it would be something that good journalists should investigate instead it was a living endemic problem there and it got worse during the Vietnam War where Stanton was supposed to represent the interest of broadcasting but he was also Lyndon Johnson's man at CBS and Johnson would leverage him all the time when wasn't Johnson was in power Frank Stanton who was then president of CBS very often visited the White House there were very close friends he'd be there on a site evening to watch The Smothers Brothers president watch mothers brothers and it was not uncommon for me to get a telephone call that Sunday night or the following Monday morning asking me questions about who was watching over the show and what they were doing and was it a good taste I'm upset and angry and eager or peace I'll kill anybody who doesn't love us if you really want peace we could have today if all of our enemies would see things our way convince them with soldiers and a bombing increase we might wipe out mankind but it last will out peace so wait a gun for peace kill everyone for piece/pieces our goal that's what we're for we all happy but it won't be war Mike dan felt the pressure from the president and the group president and the corporate president and they have a whole world that they're living in they don't that The Smothers Brothers show was not the number one thing on their plates it was to them it was a little like a mosquito buzzing around stinging them in the ear it was not that big a thing to them Tommy ultimately made it that bigger thing because he never would let up this is the CBS official CBS censorship book Oh program practices continuity acceptances n CBS censorship voices official that's right isn't I got to read it well this book has a lot of things you this made me see the light people in America I've seen the light I have no I transgressed on the roads of talking and overdone many things and I've learned the light always to watch my mouth and to watch my mind as I travel because in America here this book tells you everything to keep this book is this what they know because they've lived Tommy and they stow censors know they really do listen America these are the guardians of your morals the guardians of pure adult grown-up thought these men are highly educated geniuses PhDs and sober judgment is their call the censors handbook right here will change my way that's for sure I just I must finish reading it because I they wrote it themselves and it why is it taking you so long to read such a skinny little book it was written in crayon every strip was some sort of a battle and Tommy enjoyed that very very much I mean he liked the truth and he liked to be met head-on because he wanted to do a good show it was Tommy that was the creative force Tommy that was trying to find ways to be provocative and be different anybody who had a voice in the counterculture was a candidate for a guest star shot on the show it wasn't like you know be a radical get on television it was a question of here's an act that would not normally be considered for a network television show so why don't we get them instead you know Steve Lawrence and edy gourmet or Wayne Newton Pete Seeger who had been blacklisted and kept off television for some time Tommy called me to say a hood pete seeger come on of course I said well I checked and yeah he can come on he's been on network television before yeah I know recently I could keep them off when the world discovered that it was a premiere episode in which each Seeger was going to be a guest star that's why understanding and we got something in the area of 30,000 letters saying out Gary you put this man on television it was in the fall the pake called me I found out from them later they had asked CBS could I be on their show and CBS said Penn well let's think about it and finally in the fall they said okay you can have him on and I think I had a few weeks notice and I flew out and purposely sang a bunch of soldiers arms and then I sang this new song I just written that year I'd seen a picture in the paper of American troops wading across the Mekong River and a lion came to me all of a sudden waist-deep in the big muddy the big fool who says to push on I didn't say in the song who was the big fool but you didn't have to think very much to realize it was probably Lyndon Johnson I wasn't surprised when it was scissored out of a tape but I have faith in my country and I felt sooner or later people would hear this song more widely and Tom and Dick very wisely took to the printed media and launched a campaign Hey CBS senses our best jokes and they censored see segars best song and it got around and sure enough I guess it was January they called me up to Pete CBS says you can sing it come on out it was back in 1942 I was a member of a good platoon we were on maneuvers in Louisiana one night by the light of the moon the captain told us to Florida River that's how it all begun we were knee-deep in the Big Muddy the big fools had to push on well the sergeant said sir are you sure this is the best way back to the base sergeant go on I've boarded this river about a mile above this place it'll be a little soggy but just keep slogging will soon be on dry ground we were waist-deep in the Big Muddy the big fool said to push off and he left it in so I had that knowledge that the program practices was just as confused about what was acceptable what wasn't and both of us were working you know at odds but it was it was a moving criteria and apply it any moral I'll leave that for yourself maybe you're still walking you're still talking you'd like to keep your health but every time I read the paper them old feelings come on we're wasting the Big Muddy mother's brothers coming out no - OH - show number one take one the war in Vietnam keeps on a ragin blacks and whites still haven't worked it out pollution guns and poverty surround us no wonder everybody's dropping out but we're still here oh yeah we're still here wait face the same old problem but we're still here let me try to stretch it out before us beeping sensors lurking in the wings see yes would like to give us notice and some of you don't like the things we say but we're still here she's still there in 1968 was the watershed year in American life the Tet Offensive makes a shambles of all the rationales of the Johnson administration it's very clear that the enemy is tough that it's resilient that we have not almost done away with it that they know how to fight that they're very brave and that the war can quite possibly go on endlessly in April 1968 Martin King is assassinated in Memphis and about two months later Injun Robert Kennedy on the night of winning the California primary is assassinated and the country is tearing apart the center does not seem to hold there is a new degree of radicalism among the young on the other side Nixon has quietly got come from back from political exile and is about to get the Republican nomination and the country is both is almost having a nervous breakdown and that is the setting of the middle of 1968 in the summer of 1968 I was producing Glen Campbell show is our summer replacement and had an opportunity to bring in some new riders Mason Williams had died today you got to come out to the ice house there's this guy named Steve Martin he's kind of funny the weird things he does kind of weird and off anything it was weird or different was uh I thought it was wonderful Tommy came to me and said I'm gonna hire so-and-so and so-and-so of this list who would you like to hire and I said Steve Martin I had no track record no nothing I wasn't in the Union he also had no office no office but I found out later I was making $300 a week and I found out later that Mason was paying me out of his own pocket I had come to Los Angeles with an improvisational comedy revue called the committee and we were playing in a theater up on the Sunset Strip doing six nights a week of improvisational comedy we'd go see these people because we were looking for a different point of view not just our own but when with a little more edgy a little brighter a little smarter we're gonna and Tom Ament to see the committee and he decided to hire Carl Gottlieb and myself from that company then ultimately we were you know kept on for the fall season the army guy says well I'll tell you I was 21 at the time and it was my first writing job and I think I was at that time probably the youngest writer you know on a network television show Rob Reiner was man an in-your-face revolutionary and he was always saying oh you're not doing enough you know you're not really carrying the banner forward in his as aggressively as you could he was going God you cop out don't you man you're letting these capitalist pigs change your muck this I mean it's really and I'm going wait a second now I'm the guy in the soup who wrote the heaviest rhetorical piece is gonna get all the letters the material for the show came out of the daily newspapers we just have to like look out the window or walk down to the farmers market for a newspaper and come back and there was the material for the show my old man's a negro what do you think about that wait a minute I'm praying you're incorrect my old man's Aniki is not a Negro you are no chance I'm not a taxes then you know some people who are I know you and I know me and I know you're my brother so that makes it impossible absolutely and genetically impossible for your old man to be a negro you know why because my old man is not a negro no wonder mom always liked you best anybody who was espousing we're all one we're all equal we're all one world do unto others was getting hammered I mean we had in a space of five years in this country between 63 and 68 five leaders were assassinated who all essentially embodied the same philosophy I mean between Medgar Evers John and and Bobby Kennedy Malcolm X and Martin Luther King we had five people who are our leaders great leaders who were espousing a brotherhood and an equality and you know we're all one and family of man and they were all assassinated and so it was no surprise that anybody was espousing that on television would be essentially you know artistically assassinated it seemed to me that program practices had a mission and they were ought to try to sanitize that show it took a little bit of the fun out of what we were doing because we know we knew they were looking over our shoulders well I was trying to define their rules because I didn't feel there was any rules as far as that we were breaking according to anything I had read and from the FCC and the licensing committees put the request of what you want taken out of our show that you find offensive or that is supposed to be censor doesn't fit form of program practices put it in writing I want these things in writing something about I had this feeling that there's something legally is going to happen down here and I want it in writing the most dangerous thing to do with censors is to do their work for them to be sitting alone in the room during the creative process and say to yourself oh let's not do that we'll never get it in my name it's Jim freedom who are you I am the hot dog at the baseball I'm the funny papers on Sunday morning I'm the lump in your throat on the fourth of July and lots more it's like what well I'm the partner the clerk in the store the bricklayer the cowboy I'm the girl next door a lot of things Jim well I'm mom I'm apple pie I'm your dog and lots more Jim freedom and that that's what you're fighting for gee Sarge I understand now I'm not afraid anymore I can kill but I still can't vote when things were at their peak maybe for about a year I was devoting up to maybe a third of my time and I was involved because Tommy didn't want to talk to any deputies and it was doubly difficult for me because I happen to think that most of what he was trying to do was wonderful it wasn't that we could write that script and walk away from it and just produce it and he'd get it done it was a constant fight and it was constant sometimes we would present a show in CBS would take it and edit it other times they would say after the shows then he said that's we can't accept that and so we would go down and to make an artistic edit to make it smoother when CBS kept getting in the way and saying we were controversial I my thought was the stuff we created was not meant to be and had they not mentioned it I wouldn't have known it was Conover so neither would the public they reacted and created something that wasn't really intended to be relevant yes did you have good taste yes to to have little messages yes to be entertaining number one yes look you're not green you're red so you can't be April yet oh then what am I then you know now that you mention it I'm not sure but since your red and you look sort of dumb I'd say you were a lobster yeah well I gotta go warts oh oh we're gonna get up a big chunky wart listen you two now what what is your problem she says it's because I'm red I'm not a frog she said well he is not a frog because frogs are green but that's not entirely true well now you know what happens when you let one red frog in if you have something important something very important to say on American television you know we don't we a lot of times we can't we don't have opportunities saying anything important because it's American television every time you say second and try to say something important well would even say it or not keep trying to say I've gotten a lot of calls to appear on The Smothers Brothers show and fortunately for me this particular call in 1968 was one that I could accept and it turned out to be a call of all calls the writers and lion and Mason I believe it what they worked on taking these putting a group of songs together working with Harry and using footage from the the Democratic convention in Chicago 68 with all of violence and protests took place and putting them against each other when they talked about using the song which had its roots in the Caribbean and was about a festival and a carnival and all of that men as the conversation evolved they thought that would be a wonderful environment it was to show the carnival-like atmosphere of American politics especially within the political parties or their conventions were like and in particular the Democratic convention and what had happened in Chicago all the contradictions and all the conflicts of the Democrats are there when they hold their convention in Chicago because the war has divided the Democrats number of sort of radical alienated young guy would go in and start having a counter convention Mayor Daley's he says his cops out industry and you get something of a bloodbath for this event to be erupt into this violence and for the megalomania of Richard Daley to have become so evident and for all this arrogance to have been captured on camera was was was in a way quite startling and we saw it all of that the opportunity is artists to make commentary feedings dawn and the country is not our economy by an American by canal we've gone to CBS and pull the footage they warned us the they said don't put into violence in 1001 and violence in there we kind of bent over backwards reluctantly not to to put too much of it in does your country follow my country Gandhi Huggies reviewed what we had done with some sense of delight and we thought that we did a rather nice thing much to our amazement we found that a lot of people didn't think so jump in and ice your body but when they pulled it out I was furious it was a great piece of of commentary and entertainment sorry that work you did that stuff we did that great skit we did it's not on if you're Tommy I think you carry that to the next week and you start looking for battles it was hard for him I mean here he was going out with this kind of cheery simple-minded character in front of the audience every week to entertain the public but at the same time we all know who he was he was a very serious-minded guy who cared very deeply about what was going on in the country and wanted to use his television show as a forum to let people know you the harder you push the more they're going to push back and they're bigger than you are and you really can't win over the long haul and I tried to explain that to Tommy it you really can't win over the long haul and you got to loosen up and and give them a little bit more than you're giving them but he was just not able to do that because he was on such a roll and everybody I think in his group was going yeah go get him by the way I'm very volatile you can't tell this but I don't my brother mention it I I do I can I can be a screamer no I don't like that side of me but it's part of my personality and I I feel cross I can I can let it out and some of these memos I was letting it out and someone I was tweaking them and sometimes I Doug I get tweeks back there was a level of playfulness in here but there was it was pretty deadly serious about what we were trying to get through as much as we could that was important I used to tell Tommy you know you're gonna regret the fact that you're not paying attention to your performance a little more you need to make sure that you're not shortchanging what it is you end up doing on the show it was ruining my life that's what I was doing because I was spending so much time trying to get Tommy to lay off a little bit and I was getting beat up from New York all the time by those guys so I was just kind of really miserable with the whole thing I had a system in my office I could just push a button and tune in any studio in the building so I could just watch The Smothers Brothers while they were rehearsing and I often did that because my deputy who was present in the studio would often called me up says you better look at this so I would lean over and press the button and lean back on my chair and stop whatever I was doing and and look at it and more often than not that it was some kind of a problem then that had to be addressed today's sermon deals with the exciting personality of Moses who had a wonderful rapport with God whom I'm sure you'll all remember from last week's sermon my sermons were edgy only insofar as no one was doing anything on the Bible at all and this mother's brothers knew that and they didn't care they wanted it out there because they thought it was just on something new something that no one had seen before they were always looking for what their difference was Moses was wandering in the wilderness when he saw a bush that was burning yet it would not consume itself a voice came out of the heavens Moses take off your shoes from off of your feet God said in his redundant way it's one thing for david steinberg to be able to do that in clubs but to put it on national television over the airwaves to millions and millions of people take took a tremendous amount of guts and quite frankly a lot of guts for the network to allow it to be on well Moses took his shoes off approached the burning bush burnt his feet ha ha third one today three weeks after it was on the air Tommy and Dick said we've got the most negative mail I think ever so I knew that there was trouble about this and he he to Tommy and to dick it was you know we're having you back on and I'm sure CBO said to them you can't have Steinberg back on again or if he does come on don't have him do the sermon the network's didn't want bad letters they didn't want good letters they didn't want any letters individual station has the right and they should have the right to carry only the episodes or programs that they want to be viewed in their community each of the networks owned as they still do some of the most profitable television stations in the United States primarily those in the very largest markets the affiliates by contrast were stations not owned by the networks but affiliated by contract with the network's the affiliates then had the power to accept or reject some programs we reached a decision that we would show the tape to be aired the following Sunday to the affiliates on a Wednesday or Thursday at five o'clock and they can make that decision I am an authority on the transcontinental airline schedules and who was bringing it sometimes you don't think we were going to let some ordinary mail courier or special delivery set up for that tape carried and ones precious attache case like it was a armistice document networks are built on advertiser support support from the affiliates on government approval and they're not going to stand for someone jeopardizing any of those areas for them and The Smothers Brothers Comedy are had become a thorn in the side of the network if they've been a number one show still I think they would have found a way to tolerate it but we'd slipped we'd slipped in the ratings at that point in time we were vulnerable later on when hunks of material be excised from the show censored from the show it was time to fill I took those times to talk to the audience that's when I had lost my balance as a comedian and I was it was hard for me to be funny letters that are and there's sometimes there's some tape sir I look at I cringe then so desperately sincere and we get a lot of complimentary letters but we get a lot of derogatory letters saying that we are communists um pinkos and those are the good letters on American and they don't forget their success came from being fun well you can't have a lot of fun if you take up a lot of causes you and constantly are in the headlines of the papers that they write are they wrong one of the classic stories is how Joan Baez appeared on the show and she dedicated the song to her then husband David Harris who was a war resistor and a draft protester who had been jailed for his failure to register for the draft if you were tapping in to Joan Baez and she was talking about her then-husband David Harris who was a very articulate early auntie or activist you were giving legitimacy to the peace movement which I think would have made powerful people in Washington nervous I don't think they wanted to grant it that kind of legitimacy tommy would say do what is you and I felt very strongly that at that time my ex was in prison and I was pregnant and I wanted people to know why otherwise I would have felt I would have felt incomplete so Joan she's strumming the introduction for her song says to the camera this song is for my husband David a prisoner prisoner of conscience is sort of a California hillbilly so the song songs on the record or all country-and-western and it's a kind of a gift to david because he's going to be going to prison probably in june and you'll be there for three years the reason he's going is that he refused to have anything to do with the draft or Selective Service or whatever you want to call it militarism in general the point is if you do that and you do it upfront there over ground then you're going to get busted we presented this show to CBS and they made an edit when the show went on the air there was this absurd edit in the midst of her so what you saw was the kind of a gift to David because he's going to be going to prison this song is called the green green grass of home I was explaining this to somebody I know and I said I was so difficult in those days he said no you were clear well I was absolutely clear what I needed to do I think that I knew what the consequences might be and they weren't consequences for me and it was most extraordinary in those days and probably even more so now but but for somebody to put themselves on the line somebody who has that much you know to lose basically the censorship issue became obsessive because it became like somebody who just had to win and it didn't become any more about the material or the humor or the issues it became about minding we've done good things on this show we have done some great things but you haven't seen them because of the sensor the sensor sits somewhere between the scenes to be seen in the television sets with a scissor purpose poised watching the human stuff that will sizzle through the magic wires and light up like welding shops the ho-hum rooms of America and with the kindergarten Arts and Crafts concept of moral responsibility sniffs out the rough talk the unpopular opinion or anything with tea and renders a pattern of ideas full of holes a doily for your mind they picked up the show for the fourth season and I said if you don't want to pick the episode don't pick it up please let it go we'll go somewhere else this is too much for you guys so Tommy went and met with mr. wood and I there was nobody there to act as a buffer by those days my partner Ken Fritz and I had both been eliminated from the mix and tommy was now running the show and I think that wrecked confrontation between the artist and the president of network caused the ultimate demise of the show I remember kind of yelling in the face getting kind of redness I look back and I'm kind of embarrassed about I could have talked to him in a different different tone of voice but the time that was our voice was passion and anger and and that creeped in during the end of the show last year better young man david steinberg on the show who did he sermonette and we had a great deal of problems from that telecast and it was all intended and fun but we have mr. Steinberg back with us again we Tommy said you know one do another one of those sermons and I you know I didn't think I didn't god I said sure why not he shot a lot of stuff the censors hadn't approved you got to understand that you they say you can't do that in a million years he's shot it anyway I'm Toby new he's gonna have to fight someone and and Tommy had a lot of fight in him and I think he liked the idea of pushing the censors and pushing the network so in a way a clash was been evident Tommy loved to upset the suits he felt comfortable in a fight Old Testament concept the Old Testament scholars say that Jonah was in fact swallowed by a whale the Gentiles the New Testament scholars they say hold it Jews no Jonah wasn't Jonah they literally grabbed the Jews by the Old Testament see see Jonah could not have been swallowed by a whale the New Testament scholars say because whales have tiny gullets and cannot swallow hold prophets therefore they offer their own theory that Jonah was in fact swallowed by a gigantic guppy and to this day the New Testament doesn't sell I resisted completely the concept of taking out the steinberg sermonette we'd had one in already it could not have been a win-win situation the way it was going because it got to the point where both sides had drawn a line in the sand and that was it it was a Tuesday morning I called Perry and the West Coast and said now Perry I want that tape in here Wednesday noon and who how are we getting it and Perry said to me Tommy is in San Francisco the show has been made but he is in San Francisco and he's got the tape I said fine just make sure I have it tomorrow we didn't get it on Wednesday and I got very worried was one of those things that you see it coming and you say what a shame what a shame that we can't do something to stop this collision Thursday came and I still didn't have the tape and Bob wood was president of the network at the time called me and said by Apple who was the attorney for CBS wants us thinks we should have a meeting I know what it was about I mean secret about it because everybody in the world had called me by then at 3 o'clock we all attended that meeting or four or five of us in the room and Bob would said to me Mike do you have the tape of Sunday's show and I said no and Apple the attorney said we got him that was his words we got them and I looked around and I said what have you got he said well we can cancel now I knew that that was the end of his mother's brothers next thing I'm back in New York and I looked on the front page of New York Times I saw the name Steinberg and I always was wondering who what's this other Steinberg bad at economist associates on the front page of the New York Times and it was me and it was about me having thrown The Smothers Brothers off the air one day he was in the papers that the show had been cancelled ostensibly over some failure to meet delivery requirements but clearly it was over a failure to agree on material that should be on television CBS announced today that The Smothers Brothers Comedy Hour will not return to the CBS television network next season CBS television network president Robert Wood said he regrets canceling a program with such wide appeal he said that The Smothers Brothers consistently failed under contractual obligations to deliver their program tapes in time for review by the CBS program practices Department and for preview by affiliated stations Wood said it became evident that the brothers quote were unwilling to accept the criteria of taste established by CBS CBS News efforts to reach the brothers for comment have been unsuccessful for fire it was shocked I never played hardball before I didn't know what that game was about if I was pretty naive and I still AM you still know how those games are played in America I think it's more moving over next Laurie I had my my job and my family and I had the time that was Dickey's for fun and and growth and learning new things to do the job was just part of it the job was everything for Tom and there was a sense that now they'll work this out and then when they didn't work it out and the following season came and there was no Smothers Brothers you know the tents had actually been moved and there was no place to stage a revival and they just sort of had to go to the courts you I was still at CBS and the trial occurred and put my suit on and went down everyday to the courthouse and sat there and they call me an open-call particularly what I was asked but I remember looking at Tommy and Dickie sitting there in the court thinking how strange that has come to this I didn't know whether to smile or to look away it was a very peculiar feeling and it took about four years ago to trial he had no form until we went to trial and had that eight weeks of trial in federal court it was just his word against their word the best bet for The Smothers Brothers to win their case was with breach of contract in order to win on a first amendment theory you would have to prove the government pressured CBS to take the show off the air and we haven't seen that smoking gun it's important to make the point that the only people who really have de facto First Amendment rights are the people who own the media so no newspaper editor no entertainer has any First Amendment rights except those that the owner wishes to bestow upon them and honor as a matter of grace but not as a matter of right so in that sense there there was no censorship issue here all the real issues were deleted in the name of winning I was told by intellectuals and smart people this is this case and it goes the court you have to win and if you conclude First Amendment any trust particularly those you have a chance to lose and it's more important that you come out a winner in this court case and if it's this breach of contract win that I felt that it was David versus Goliath Red Riding Hood versus the big bad wolf I have to say that all the jurors were very respectful of the instructions that were given by the judge kept an open mind and yet I think in the back of our heads it was always cut and dry and yet we did what we were supposed to do and follow the instructions into the deliberation process I think my position strengthened their case considerably I had to quote apples remark we got him as a indication that we were looking for a way out to get rid of them if I'd been him remember the CBS family then I could hardly have testified I would have had to resign we found in favor of Tom and dick smothers it was felt that they did everything they were supposed to do they met other obligations as per their contract and CBS just was trying to play art when the trial was over we left the courtroom and walked out to our car which was about two blocks away we were followed about ten paces behind by the to CBS attorneys never saying a word they just continued to follow us and finally we stopped and turned around as to motion what do you want and they finally said well are you going to talk to us or not and we just turned around and continued to walk our way we were nominated for an Emmy Award for the best written comedy variety musical show and television and we all went to the Emmy expecting to see laughs and get it yet another year laughing at one the two years previous so we get to the show were cancelled now we're off the air and yet when they announce the winner it's us in Hollywood the winners are the writers of The Smothers Brothers it was a fabulous revenge that the television Academy gave us the Emmy in light of all the controversy over the cancellation of the show no matter what happened there we were given Emmy to show for our efforts that's in the record books that's for all time and thrill to Adam but you know they were nice enough 20 years later to invite us back and we did a bunch of shows for him when we came back to do the reunion show CBS came to us and said well we'd like for you guys to be controversial and to you know be on the cutting edge and we said no thanks is my present only in my past it was Dwight Clark always going to just be asked about the catch that beat Dallas this man still got to live a long life and yes that's a highlight that we will never touch again and our entire lives if you don't like what we say you have the ultimate censorship and that is to turn us off or to turn any program off but the right to for us not to allow even to give our viewpoints to other people who are interested in hearing it is contrary I think to the principle of of our country in to the principle that makes the world go round they want their dissidents out there it gives an illusion and there is a there is the protesters there's a sense of freedom and et cetera they didn't want the protestor to have primetime show particularly it seemed normal it didn't seem like we were doing something extraordinary in retrospect looking back on it you know it was extraordinary I think when you're on the cutting edge do not expect to be Garland know that it is a mind field to get there early you know 20 years later all kinds of people combined do the kind of thing you didn't everybody think oh that's terrific when you're sort of the first and you arrive precipitously at a conflicted venue a venue under challenge you're going to draw a lot of heat and then you're going to be called controversial I think you pay a price when you take on the establishment we all do and I certainly have and I know they have and others have and I think the price is worth it because it constantly has some kind of Paul Revere like a claim to the American to American citizens you know all is not well and you should know that all is not well you can't tell a comedian anyone particularly comedian don't say that word don't say this thing don't do that piece a comedian is contrary by nature the more they said don't do it the more it seemed it must be important I miss not being that person now because I would love to still be there I'm still angry so I have not sold out my point of view I just have a trouble expressing it in a creative form that was just sitting there right there - for the taking it's a great place to be and it was easy to say it because of people around me wanna see it country wanted to hear you

Channel: MyyyClips2

Views: 495,552

Rating: 4.7603283 out of 5

Keywords: Pat Paulsen, steve martin, Rob Reiner, Bob Einstein, Super Dave Osborne, Leigh French, Mason Williams, Joan Baez, Pete Seeger, david steinberg, bill maher

Id: xnnmcP6FkWk

Length: 88min 22sec (5302 seconds)

Published: Sat Feb 20 2016

Reddit Comments

[u/martiniolives2]

We "cool kids" used to watch the show religiously. They looked square but the Smothers Brothers were incredibly hip and pushed quite a lot of boundaries. You gotta remember, this was during the Vietnam War and they were clearly anti-war as well as anti-segregation. CBS and a lot of its affiliates either censored segments or just didn't carry episodes they found objectionable.

Tom and Dick also had many of the best bands of the day on the show (including the infamous Who performance when the explosion in Moon's bass drum nearly blew out Townshend's hearing).

[u/mygodhasabiggerdick]

Dude.... Steve Martin before he went white AND Super Dave Osbourne? Wow. Awesome!

​

[u/Unbefuckinlievable]

When I was about 6, I met Dick Smothers at a Jiffy Lube in south Florida. I was there with my mom, waiting for the oil in her Beetle to get changed. I didn’t realize until afterward, but my mom was totally star struck. He sat and talked to me for 20 or so minutes about all kinds of stuff like what kind of books did I like to read and what kind of music did I listen to. At the time it was Motley Crüe because my older sister was super into them, and he thought that was hilarious. Afterward, when we left, my mom said, “Do you know who that was?!” Of course I didn’t. “That was Dickie Smothers!!”

Now that I’m older and I know who he is, I think that’s probably one of the coolest conversations ever.

Edited to add a second mom quote.

[u/lakhotason]

Mason Williams also had a hit record "Classical Gas" in 1968. It won three Grammys. Give it a listen sometime.

[u/DrColdReality]

Bob Einstein, one of the show's writers (he's the guy who says "good script" at the start of the vid), who also played the deadpan Officer Judy on the show, died just a couple weeks ago.

[u/Sputnik9999]

Dick Smothers has a son, Dick Jr. Dick (Jr) Smothers is a porn star. His dad hated the fact that Jr used the family name in his professional career.

[u/Swiggy1957]

An excellent documentary. I've seen it before when looking up old Smother Brothers routines. (Large collection, or was, on YouTube)

I grew up in that era. I learned to start paying attention to the events around me. To this day, there are many that still believe that the show was subversive. No, it wasn't subversive: it was set to be by the comedy style of that time: Observational Humor. That we got a chance to observe our society's warts allowed us to look within ourselves and see what was going on.

One of their last episodes I recall was when Libarace appeared. Bob Einstein appeared to give him a speeding ticket for playing a song too fast. One sketch had David Frye doing impressions of the presidential candidates set in the middle ages. The next ruler was to be determined by whosoever pulls the sword from the stone. (King Arthur parody) Mind you, This was 50 years ago and I still remember it. I finally found it on YouTube.

[u/Longshot_45]

Thank God they couldn't censor the yoyo man.

[u/ThisLookInfectedToYa]

Tommy's appearance in "The Greenroom with Paul Provenza" was great, uncensored comedy

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=5Gcdghx87gM