CHILDREN’S MEDIA
I think I like working on children’s multi-media projects because I loved children’s books, radio and television so much as a I child. It was a super-thrill to work on Sound-off 3000 with my own children and produce their radio show, an action adventure talk show in which the young protagonists, stranded on a space ship thousands of light years from earth, would broadcast a thousand years in the past to talk to the children of the twentieth century. If they listened well and took action, the children of this century- the listeners to the show broadcast in the Palm Springs Metro area- could divert a tremendous catastrophe in the far-off future. The show was on for one year and dozens of children listened, many winning prizes which they picked up at our offices, which were given out by numerous sponsors like Barnes and Noble, Blockbuster Video, Wakanaga and many local businesses.
When I was a kid, television was just beginning to dominate people’s daily media habits. So, I was fortunate to listen at a time when TV and radio sometimes aired the same shows- either simultaneously or within a few years. Green Hornet, Buzz Korby and the Space Patrol, Dragnet, The Lone Ranger, The Phantom, Superman, Amos N’ Andy, Jack Benny and Burns and Allen. I think as a writer, depending on his powers of visualization, this was a very good way to see how the printed word (a script) could become audio (seen in the imagination) and then finally manifest in the real world (television or movies)
One of my favorite TV programs featured Paul Winchell, a ventriloquist, with Jerry Mahoney and Knucklehead Smiff. A few years before this rather astounding genius died, I worked with him on a multiplicity of projects, including his biography, including co-authoring a film based on the book. The projects went much further than that allowing me to review many of his episodes, look at some of his attempts at animation and get into his incredible songs, his ventriloquist techniques, his experiments with moving hands and legs of his dummies and his inventions. Although Winch was somewhat different than his personae on Television, it was quite an honor to work with him. Not always fun as one might suppose, but always an honor.