Author Archives: dcaligari

April 8, 2000 –In a Saturday Night Live skit where Blue Öyster Cult is recording (Don’t Fear) The Reaper, Christopher Walken demands more cowbell from Will Ferrell, who complies. A catch phrase is born

April 8, 1983 –In front of a live audience of 20 tourists, David Copperfield makes the Statue of Liberty disappear. A large opaque screen appeared between two giant pillars. When the screen fell, the Statue of Liberty vanished. Then the screen went back up, and when it fell again, the statue was back. The secretContinue reading “Shhh, here’s how he did it”

April 8, 1968 –The TV special Petula airs on NBC on this date. Most people would not remember this special except at one point in the show, host Petula Clark grabs hold of Harry Belafonte’s arm while they are singing a duet. As bizarre as this may seem, the show marked the first time aContinue reading “This program gave people the vapors in the South”

(If you’re reading this in Japan and I’m sure I have many readers there) it may be the birthday of Siddhartha Gautama. ACME would like to wish you Namo Amituofo – Otherwise, just calculate the first full moon day of the sixth month of the Buddhist lunar calendar, which would be the fourth month ofContinue reading “Each Morning We Are Born Again”

April 7, 1978 –The Police release Roxanne in the UK on this date. BBC Radio 1 refuses to play it, which tanks the song, but when the band tours America a year later it catches on in that country, becoming their first hit.

April 7, 1970 –John Schlesinger’s Midnight Cowboy won the Oscar for Best Picture on this date. It remains the only X-rated film to win an Academy Award. The film was rated “X” (no one under 17 admitted) upon its original release in 1969, but the unrestricted use of that rating by pornographic filmmakers caused theContinue reading “I’m walkin’ here”

April 7, 1933 –Arguably his most influential film, French filmmaker Jean Vigo’s feature, Zero de Conduite (Zero for Conduct) was released on this date. The film was banned by the French censor until after 1946. The film has been ranked as one of the “100 Movies That Shook the World“.

April 7, 1915 –Eleanora Fagan, considered by many to be the greatest jazz vocalist of all time, was born on this day. Though her career was relatively short and often erratic, she left behind a body of work as great as any vocalist before or since. Eleanora’s (or as she was professionally known, Billie Holiday)Continue reading “Billie Holiday”

April 7, 1933 –Today is National Beer Day. While it is not actual a national holiday, in March of 1933, President Roosevelt signed the Cullen–Harrison Act allowing the sale of beer once again with the proviso, the beer remain no more than 3.2% alcohol by weight, the first legal alcohol allowed since Prohibition began inContinue reading “Save water, drink beer.”

April 6, 1953 –Universal Pictures released the science fiction comedy film Abbott and Costello Go To Mars, directed by Charles Lamont and starring Bud Abbott and Lou Costello, in U.S. theaters on this date. A very young Harry Shearer appears as one of the boys seen near the beginning.