Author Archives: dcaligari

July 29, 1983 –NBC’s answer to MTV, Friday Night Videos, premiered on this date. The show, created by Dick Ebersol, had some big-name artists and videos, and there was a fun segment called Video Vote, which pitted two artists/videos against one another to see who fans enjoyed the most (submitting their votes via a 900Continue reading “Does anyone remember Friday Night Videos?”

Today is Milk Chocolate Day. American eat on average 12 lbs of chocolate per year; The Swiss on the other hand eat a little more than 26 lbs a year (that works out to about 450 bars of chocolate.) If you don’t keep this increase in choco-gorging, the terrorist have won. (Psst, I’ve mentioned thisContinue reading “Enjoy it while you can still afford it”

July 28, 1948 – Bud and Lou’s biggest box-office success, Abbott and Costello Meet Frankenstein, opened on this date, (this was one of my favorite childhood films.) The animation sequences of Dracula-as-a-bat and Dracula-changing-from-bat-to-Dracula were done by Universal-International’s Woody Woodpecker animator, Walter Lantz.

July 28, 1988 –The second film in the autobiographical series (Trilogy, The Long Day Closes,) from the phenomenal Terence Davies, Distant Voices, Still Lives opened in the US on this date. Please find time to watch this film. The photograph of a man, standing with a pony, on the wall of the living room, isContinue reading “The Long Day Closes premiered”

July 28, 1973 –Bill Graham produced the Summer Jam at Watkins Glen Rock Festival at the Watkins Glen International Raceway, that featured the Allman Brothers, the Band, and the Grateful Dead. The concert was estimated to have drawn some 650,000 people, The concert drew some 650,000 people, the single largest paying crowd in concert history.

July 27, 1985 –The Eurythmics’ song There Must Be An Angel (Playing With My Heart) went to No.1 on the UK singles chart on this date, the duo’s only UK No.1 single. The song features Stevie Wonder, who provides the harmonica solo. Wonder worked on this own schedule, so when Annie Lennox and Dave StewartContinue reading “There Must Be An Angel topped the charts”

July 27, 1940 – Bugs Bunny made his debut in a cartoon called A Wild Hare, on this day. Warner Brothers’ writers and animators set out to make a rabbit who would be the epitome of cool. They modeled bugs on Groucho Marx with a carrot instead of a cigar. Mel Blanc gave him aContinue reading “What up doc?”

July 27, 1586 –Sir Walter Raleigh and some of his men returned to England and disembarked at Plymouth smoking tobacco from pipes, which caused a sensation, on this date. William Camden, a contemporary witness, reports that “These men who were thus brought back were the first that I know of that brought into England thatContinue reading “So Round, So Firm, So Fully Packed”

July 27, 1984 –Warner Bros. gift to an unsuspecting world, Purple Rain, starring Prince, premiered on this date. A few days before the premiere, Prince had a nightmare that Gene Siskel and Roger Ebert despised the film, with Ebert ripping the film apart. He said, “I dreamed those two guys on the TV were reviewingContinue reading “Purple Rain premiered”

July 27, 1949 –Mighty Joe Young, an RKO Radio Picture made by the same creative team responsible for King Kong, opened in New York City on this date, (in fact, when Joe smashes through the facade during the nightclub riot, the first scream you hear is that of Fay Wray, stock audio from the originalContinue reading “Mighty Joe Joe premiered”