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Good Night, Black Tooth
23/10/09 08:11When I was a kid, Soupy Sales was cool. Growing up in Manhattan my brother an I watched all the 4pm-6:30pm kids shows we could on the huge cube of our TV (the "old" TV relegated to our shared room). Uncle Fred Scott, Bozo the Clown, Sandy Becker (I had such a crush on Sandy Becker when I was five). But Soupy Sales, who went beyond anarchy into something sublime, who mixed Borscht Belt attitude with a finely timed sense of chaos, was special. I don't remember if he showed cartoons, but there was always something strange going on--usually it involved Soupy, or one of his guests, being hit with a pie in the face. And his takes--outraged, then thoughtful, then resigned--were brilliant. "Damn. Human condition just caught up with me again."
Did I know all this as a kid? Not to put it into words. But you always knew, watching his show, that chaos was going to break out sooner or later, probably sooner. In this he was a tutelary spirit of the cultural changes that were just down the pike in the late '60s.
There were the regular puppet players: White Fang, the meanest dog on earth, and Black Tooth, the best dog on earth. There was Philo Kvetch, Sales's hardbitten idiot detective alter ego. There was the mailman who, as I recall it, was always heard but never seen--one episode, the "mailman" behind the set was a stripper, and Sales's reaction was, um, fabulous.
Sales came across as a nice guy, edgy, not above saying the first thing that came into his head and damn the consequences, but the sort of guy who would be genuinely horrified if he hurt your feelings in one of his sprees of improvised chaos. Was he a nice guy? I don't know, but he seemed that way to me.
Soupy Sales was cool, and now he's gone. Dammit.
Did I know all this as a kid? Not to put it into words. But you always knew, watching his show, that chaos was going to break out sooner or later, probably sooner. In this he was a tutelary spirit of the cultural changes that were just down the pike in the late '60s.
There were the regular puppet players: White Fang, the meanest dog on earth, and Black Tooth, the best dog on earth. There was Philo Kvetch, Sales's hardbitten idiot detective alter ego. There was the mailman who, as I recall it, was always heard but never seen--one episode, the "mailman" behind the set was a stripper, and Sales's reaction was, um, fabulous.
Sales came across as a nice guy, edgy, not above saying the first thing that came into his head and damn the consequences, but the sort of guy who would be genuinely horrified if he hurt your feelings in one of his sprees of improvised chaos. Was he a nice guy? I don't know, but he seemed that way to me.
Soupy Sales was cool, and now he's gone. Dammit.
