On Air with Tom Chapin

"The World, and All That Is In It"

When I was an un-sullied lad, running business affairs for National Geographic TV, I had an assignment to set up our new production office at 1630 Broadway in Times Square.  I hopped many Eastern Shuttles, learned to eat sushi that winter, and scouted the grimy pre-Giuliani splendor of the 'hood.

We had launched National Geographic EXPLORER on Nickelodeon in 1985, then moved it to WTBS before a year was out.  At that juncture, we dropped hired-gun spokesmodel David Greenan and chose personable, charismatic Tom Chapin to host the 8-10pm Sunday night magazine-format show.  Tom would eventually be succeeded by Robert Urich, and later Bob Ballard.

Tom Chapin of Nat Geo Explorer

I got to meet Tom several times in the studio between 1986-1988, and he's a great guy.  Make a Wish!

You will be relieved to learn that letters written to National Geographic Society during the roaring '80's always received close and respectful attention, and wide circulation among the department heads.  Once early in Tom's tenure, for fun, I wrote a letter - in the voice of an earnest but cranky and befuddled National Geographic member - to Society President Gil Grosvenor complaining that "your immoral Tom Chapin" had been drunk on the air.

"My wife and I are Tee-Totalers!" I wrote.  "Disgraceful - by the end of the show, he Had The Glass Right There On The Desk Next To Him!  Never will we watch your degrading 'television show' ever again!"  I used a friend's home address in Hollywood, and posted the letter from L.A. while on a business trip.  Sure enough, a week later that letter came in the front door of the TV Division with stern instructions from the President that we review every minute of that program and "Get me an answer!"  We cleared it, and we told Gil "it must have been some crackpot...."

Clean-living Tom Chapin, deservedly, sailed through unblemished.

 * * * * *

Tom and Harry (whose hunger I satisfied) were brotherly collaborators.  From Circle newsletter:

Like most of Harry's songs, “Circle,” the one that became known as the “Chapin national anthem,” has a story behind it. When Tom Chapin was hired to host the weekly ABC Television children’s show "Make a Wish" in the Summer of 1971, the show consisted of two word topics in each episode like "fire" and "wind." They were looking for a songwriter to write a song for each word, helping to bring each word to life in a way that would be meaningful and appealing to kids.

Tom immediately recommended Harry for the job and the producers agreed. This was the year when Harry had gotten back into music and had created his first band with John Wallace, Ron Palmer, and Tim Scott. He was opening for his brothers’ band, "The Chapins," with Steve and Tom Chapin, and Phil Forbes and Doug Walker, who later became Harry's lead guitarist, every weekend at a club in Greenwich Village called The Village Gate. So writing songs for "Make A Wish," although very lucrative for him, was far down in the list of Harry's commitments.

One week the word was circle, and Harry still had not written the song—the night before the episode’s taping. "After the gigs at the Gate, we usually met, ate, and rehashed the evening at Maria's Diner in Brooklyn Heights," said Tom. "It was late Sunday night, and we were going to be shooting the episode for "Circle" early on Monday morning, and he promised me he'd have it done. So at 6:00 a.m. Harry called me and played the first verse and chorus over the phone while I took down words and scratched out the tune." Hours later Tom performed "Circle" for the first time on camera, walking around the Cinderella fountain in New York City's Central Park.

For a while it was only the first verse and chorus that existed. "Then our mother told Harry it was great song, and he ought to write some other verses. He did--and it became a signature Chapin song. All these years later, we still sing the song at concerts, weddings, funerals, and people all over the world love and sing that song."

Secretary of State Comity Club

The U.S. Senate Foreign Relations Committee, before which John Kerry appeared as a war protester in 1971, and of which he most recently has served as Chairman, today confirmed him in a comity vote as U.S. Secretary of State. 

The nomination will now go to the full Senate for another comity vote.

Electras wild-man bass player John Kerry (standing, left of drummer) - St. Paul's Academy, Concord NH, 1961

If you believe in diplomacy, then U.S. Secretary of State is a pretty influential role on the world stage.  I hope our next Secretary of State John Kerry, with whom I dined in style one evening, has as much success and influence as did Reagan Chief of Staff and G.H.W. Bush Secretary of State James Baker, with whom I attended church services, in his day (1989-1992).

With a reeeeeaaaal stretch, one could argue that Katherine Harris has been the most influential SOS in recent history - as the fifty State Secretaries of State each get to count the votes in their own state.  And after our history together, she's still my favorite among the three...

Mary Schapiro, My Favorite Commissioner

I normally don't call attention to a friendship with someone who's currently in a position of truly extraordinary importance, ... as my associations with some of the other notorious among the Celebrity tapestry could present them with - by what mathematicians call the associative property - a disastrous public liability!  But now that Mary Schapiro has resigned as Chairman of the SEC I can safely reveal that we are friends, and through the most political of Washington connections: the sleepovers, trick-or-treat nights, and classroom hi-jinks of our schoolgirl daughters.

Supply/Demand: D.C. Cupcake Wars

Mary and I were soccer side-liners for years and years as our girls were growing up.  We did our part in the school pageants, fundraisers and field days, and the girls got hula lessons at Mary's house one wild afternoon.  The year that I was a "classroom parent" (don't ever sign up for more than one tour of such duty, please!), we arranged for Ms. Mackie's 5th grade class to venture forth on a field trip from DC to NY, where Mary hosted them at her FINRA offices and arranged a bell-ringing at the stock exchange.  

Here's what Mary looks like when she's about to serve you a designer cupcake.  Or, in my case, two:

She's done a fantastic job getting the SEC back on solid footing.  I did have occasion to visit the SEC on business twice during Mary's tenure (although one of those times she had to duck out for an emergency summons to speak with friends in Congress), and I came away with greater respect for the work and mission of the institution, and of course reinforcement of the deep good feelings I already had toward my friend.  I'm due back there next month and I'll really miss her!

Power Play: look for six at the Sands Casino's high-stakes Texas Hold 'em table: Christina Romer, Paul Volcker, Dan Mudd, Tura Satana, Mary and me . . . !

Surf's Up: on the Flight Deck with Brian Wilson

The one and only, the great Brian Wilson.

In 1994, I was being recruited for a CEO job with Luna Imaging, an L.A.-based start-up with Getty funding.  Before my visit to meet the entrepreneur, when I would stay at Shutters on the Beach and get the pitch, I first snuck out to the coast for a screening meeting during a half-day stop-over in LAX with Gary Hromadko, the VC backing the venture.

We met in the American Airlines Ambassador Lounge and sat in the big lounge chairs.  There, sunk comfortably into a huge chair ten feet away with a confidante?  Brian Wilson!

Although I'd resisted my band-mate Dave's proselytizing in college about the Beach Boys, I eventually could admit I admired Brian - much more for his ballads than for the Beach Boy surf rave-ups.  Especially because he was secure enough, whole enough (or crazy enough?) to write and sing with great emotional vulnerability about fear, and alone-ness, and crying, and doubt, and hurt - in songs like "In My Room,"  "Girl Don't Tell Me,"  "Caroline, No" and " 'Til I Die."

Brian Wilson at the Bridge - on Sunset

Flash forward to 1994 and by this point in my life, I was a confirmed fan, but had not yet developed a complete appreciation for Brian's production genius that would be fulfilled when I came late to Pet Sounds, and - finally - when SMiLE finally had its 38-years-late release.  Still I felt I had a kindred spirit in that he was the only other person I knew of who admired and openly praised the Four Freshmen - to others they were Squaresville, 'though not to me, and Brian has always honored them as his harmonic inspiration.

Perfect Pitch

Gary and I spent a little over two hours talking.  Sometime before we wrapped up, Brian and his friend stood up, shook hands and parted.  As he walked away from us, I thought of the anonymous silhouettes, receding against the day-glo horizon, in the classic key-art poster from the Bruce Brown film "Endless Summer."

I was too awe-struck, and too much captive of the interview moment, to get up and introduce myself.  But I felt the warmth of his sun* ... and knew I'd now truly been in California!

Precision Genius

 . . . "Lately, I'd been depressed and preoccupied with death...Looking out toward the ocean, my mind, as it did almost every hour of every day, worked to explain the inconsistencies that dominated my life; the pain, torment, and confusion and the beautiful music I was able to make. Was there an answer? Did I have no control? Had I ever? Feeling shipwrecked on an existential island, I lost myself in the balance of darkness that stretched beyond the breaking waves to the other side of the earth. The ocean was so incredibly vast, the universe was so large, and suddenly I saw myself in proportion to that, a little pebble of sand, a jellyfish floating on top of the water; traveling with the current I felt dwarfed, temporary. The next day I began writing "'Til I Die", perhaps the most personal song I ever wrote for The Beach Boys...In doing so, I wanted to re-create the swell of emotions that I'd felt at the beach the previous night."

'Til I Die - Surf's Up, 1971

* Something interesting here.

Julius Lester - Cupid and an Early Valentine

"We are only human. We make mistakes. We oft times do not know what we are 
doing, or why. We hurt each other out of the depths of hurts whose pain we have 
not felt. This is what it means to be human - to love each other in our 
mistakes, our hurting each other, and in the darkness that is always present."

Journal,  1978 

Remarkable Julius Lester

In Amherst, MA we have a marvelous, unique and incredibly creative man, a  man who has sought to understand human struggle - political, social, private and emotional - and documented it with force, feeling, and amazing tenderness.  He is Julius Lester.

New School professor, distinguished UMass faculty icon; folksinger, board member 1965 Newport Folk Festival; photo documentarian of the US civil rights movement (here's a great interview), Viet Nam war, and Castro/Cuba.  Pioneer in Afro-American Studies, Judaic and Near Eastern Studies.  But I admire Julius most for three things:

    
1. He wrote "Look Out, Whitey!  Black Power's Gon' Get Your Mama!" about his days (through early '68, though he must have turned the manuscript in just before April 4), as a field coordinator on the ramparts at the SNCC,
2. He wrote "Cupid," and when I heard his heart-melting reading at the Jones Library he left tears on many of our faces,
3. He occasionally reads, sings, or lay-leads at services in our lively local synagogue, the Jewish Community of Amherst.

When in Amherst, come to the back room at A. J. Hastings Newsdealer's, and search among the greeting cards for his hand-printed and signed masterpieces, including this one below ("Black American Gothic") which I presented to my wife one year on Valentine's Day.  Then walk across the street to Amherst Books and purchase a copy of "Cupid," as I did for my eldest daughter as a Valentine's Day gift when she was coming of age.

Black American Gothic  (1966)  -  (c) Julius Lester

I was lucky enough to speak with Julius recently when his photographs were on display at the JCA. Introduced myself as a reader and as the son of an old English department colleague.  We shared a few words, and I met his lovely wife.  I took a chance and complemented her that she was no doubt the blessing in his life who enables him to write so warmly about human love and vulnerability.  Then I [coarsely] quoted him this passage from "Cupid," and thanked him for the dialog his book had opened between me and my then 13 year old daughter:

"There come moments in each of our journeys when we can no longer continue our lives as they are.  But neither can we see what we will become.  We either go forward, with no idea of where we are going or what we are doing, or we remain as we are - and begin to die, though we do not realize that is the choice we have made.  This is why love is such a fearful undertaking...."

Cupid: A Tale of Love & Desire, 2007
 

Shabbat Shalom

A man who understands struggle and love, and can enlighten us on each, is someone who understands much of what life is about.


Gratefully Yours.

Fellow Breast Man Roger Ebert

Poolside: an Urgent call . . .

Roger Ebert is one of the best ever - perhaps the finest -  movie/film critics in the world over the past 50 years (Take that, Paulene Kael!).  He and partner Gene Siskel (R.I.P.) created the "thumbs up/down" rating shorthand and had true chemistry as a reviewing team. 

Roger is a fanatic, on par with Peter Bogdonovich; he's also always honest and thoughtful - and I think quite fair - in his reviewing.  I appreciated this review of Roger's.  I still disagree with RE about Ryan's Daughter, though....

Thumbs Up !

Usually treated as an amusing footnote to his bio, the young Ebert of 1970 dabbled in debauchery with my hero Russ Meyer as screenplay collaborator on Beyond the Valley of the Dolls.

Ebert Surrounded - the Gang's All Here

In the spring of 2005 I finally got to meet Roger when he was honored with a CINE Lifetime Achievement Award on M street NW in Washington DC.  A friend had invited me to the event at National Geographic TV, and after seeing the Raymonds (Patient Zero progenitors with their high-quality PBS innovation "American Family" that indirectly begat today's 'reality' sewage) honored, I caught up with Roger.

First stop (establishing shot): Men's Room.

"Porter Hall," I introduced myself.  Ebert brightened, quizzically. "We have a good, mutual friend - RM" I continued.  "How do you know Russ?" asked Roger, and we were off.

Initial exposition and plot-set-up.  Backstory.  All that rot.  Choice private anecdotes for validation (see below).  Confirmation.  Camaraderie.  Continuity.  Drama, pathos and everything else, in ten minutes chat and a stroll from the Sumner School building down to the street, round the corner and a sidewalk parting at the cab on 17th street, NW.

Ebert instantly connected the dots - he had heard Russ talk of his Washington 'insider' buddy, referring always to a "Porter Hall," whose original namesake is a shady character whom Ebert/Meyer contrived in the BVD script, played to a villainous T by Duncan McLeod.  Well, that insider is yours truly.

Two Gentlemen without Equal

Roger and I lamented RM's passing the previous September.  By his words about Rus,s it was instantly, abundantly and cantilevered-ly clear that Roger had been as genuine and devoted a friend as any man could ever have.

Now, Russ was without doubt the best raconteur I ever met, with a genius for tale-telling, a vocabulary that he could have copyrighted, and a bottomless well of incredible stories ("Hemingway rousted us out of our fartsacks and paid our way into the best whorehouse in Paris"... "I screwed Uschi all that summer on the carpet of my office at Fox!"... "Ebert got blown by the pool!" ... etc.).

On and On . . .

The bond between Roger and Russ was borne out by the hours of tales RM had spun with me about his exploits with the youthful Ebert, which are more fully chronicled and liberally sprinkled throughout RM's 19-lb., three-volume "Breast of Russ Meyer."  And RM loved to recount these hi-jinks when we were out on the town.  Once, over huge portions of liver and onions at the Daily Grill in Palm Desert, Russ referred to Ebert (with obvious gleeful affection) a "that Moravian bastard!"  Russ was a demanding friend - he had no distractions in his own life other than self-selected obsessions, and he offered little and grudging latitude to those of us whose attention he craved; yet, although he no doubt vied competitively with her for RE's attention, RM always spoke with highest regard for RE's wife Chaz.

When we met, Roger was already struggling with the cancer that would eventually ravage his larynx, shoulder, jawbone, and facial structure.  Head held high, he soldiers on un-deterred, and un-abashed, just like his best friend.

News: Roger Ebert passed away April 4, 2013.

Rest In Peace, and See You At The Movies. 

Rockin' the Vote with Martha Quinn - My MTV All-Nighter

As an unsullied early-career kid, circa 1982-83, I had but one dream: to move to NYC and work in business development for MTV.  I got my shot in 1985, but before then something even more magical happened: I met and of course fell in love with Martha Quinn.

My Martha: Ah, the Eighties ...

Well, we all were in love with Martha, once she and her confreres hit the airwaves in August '81. But of course I was sure that I loved her more than anyone else possibly could.

California My Way - 5th Dimension, later Main Ingredient

So it's late 1983, and I'm an east coast boy on his first visit to California. Had already hit the beach in Malibu with Dick "Laugh-In" Martin, then rented a car and drove in a SoCal freeway Lot-49-and-L.A.-Woman revery down "the 5" and then east and west on Ball Road, bulked at Spaghetti Station, before checking in to the Anaheim Hyatt on the Disneyland perimeter for two days of the Western Cable Show.

I quickly found out where the night's action would be: upstairs at the WASEC reception.

Deep Purple: Place in Line

Bob Pittman was there, I schmoozed him a bit, hung with the marketing guys for a while, and then I spotted her, perched on a stool at the countertop, and lighting up the hospitality suite with her smile and laughter.  Martha Quinn - tiny as a mouse, and bubbly like new champagne. Chortling along: uplink site techie Paul Beeman, a jolly middle-aged guy from the Smithtown TOC.

Diamond Dave - Always On

What developed next was a boisterous, high-pitched music trivia game between the three of us, and it went on for over three hours.  Her handler got cranky because Martha was engrossed with us instead of working the crowd, but finally gave up and left us alone.  Forward we rolled like Def Leppard - On Through The Night.

I'll Join You In That Time Capsule

Martha really knew her 60's stuff, 80's Thompson-Twin techno/poppy-pop, and folk music, and she of course had the inside track on all the acts of the moment including the L.A. hair-metalers.  Beeman was an encyclopedia - acts, songs, dates, labels and chart position.  I held my own on heavy metal/NWOBHM, 70's soul/R&B, San Francisco sound - and early 50's vocal groups.  It is safe to say that we all showed each other up, and blew each other away.  Over and over and over.  I could hear music....

*  *  *  *  *

We stayed up nearly 'til sunrise.  Paul disappeared.  Great breathtaking fun, lots and lots of jazzy, twinkly eye contact.  Where would it end?  Well, it would end back in New York....

All Within Reach ... If You Know What To Do.

Naturally - what a rube! - I imagined/hoped that this night was just the beginning.  We exchanged numbers in the Hyatt lobby, agreed to each think about a trivia question that was really just a conversation continu-er concerning Van Halen and the high number and interesting selection of cover songs they had produced and might next produce, and we made vague plans to see each other in New York.

Martha in Malibu - I Want My ...

I had to call through the MTV switchboard many, many fruitless times for her (it was obvious there was a never-ending queue of clowns calling and panting for her, and I guess I was one, albeit ultimately with an edge of slight legitimacy), and we did indeed re-connect later that winter, for coffee on Astor Place, and separately, briefly and awkwardly, at the Cherry Lane Theater, but the magic was gone.  She was in her world, and I a visiting nobody from Nowheresville.

I later had opportunities to cross paths at the end-of-'84 MTV New Year's Eve Party, and at the 1985 MTV Music Awards, but by then fate had cruelly decided that nothing would materialize.

Still, ....

Keep Counting, Florida !!

My shining moment with Madame Secretary, here.

Cheers, all!

Katherine Harris, at the Orchid Ball
"Those Who Do Not Learn From Their History Are Doomed To Repeat It ! "

Winston Churchill,   paraphrasing George Santayana