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Scott Marks flies solo on KPBS Radio’s “These Days”

August 27th, 2008 by Scott Marks

It is not as though I have never done the Film Club before, but this morning’s ride to the station found me shaking harder than a Katherine Hepburn Jell-O mold. This was the first time since my days on The Lounge where I would be the sole guest

Beth Accomando and I make a good team, and the thought of not having her to bounce off of made me nervous. Very nervous. In the words of Daffy Duck, I was as black as a sheet. It’s not that the material was unfamiliar — if I can’t talk about the Marx Brothers and Jerry Lewis, who can? For some reason, I felt that the pressure was on to be brilliant. My producer, the indispensable Angela Carone, put a lot of work into today’s show and I didn’t want to let her down. Nor did I want to come off as the guy who hates everything. Truth be told, I love more movies than most people have seen, it’s just that the majority of them were made before 1975. Generally, my batting average on the show is 1 for 10. For every ten movies we review, I like one of them.

Instead of assuming my usual position on the opposite side of the console, I sat next to host Tom Fudge and we couldn’t have been more comfortable had we been sitting in a living room. As soon as the “On the Air” light was turned on, the 45 minutes flew by faster than Sherlock, Jr.

Some of the listeners threw me for a loop. This was a show about classic comedy and calling in to praise Soapdish is kind of like referencing The Apple Dumpling Gang during a discussion of John Ford, Anthony Mann and Budd Boetticher. And of all the directors, I never expected Ingmar Bergman’s Smiles of a Summer Night to be on a caller’s mind.

There were many discussion points that we didn’t have time for and I failed to mention that it was Ms. Accomando’s idea to give me an hour to myself. In the words of Ricky Riccardo, “Thanks, par’ner!”

Four badges of honor:

1) Tom sat and watched Sherlock, Jr. with his kids. Nothing makes me happier than exposing a new generation to Buster’s brilliance.

2) Lewisophobe Fudge was actually laughing his head off during The Nutty Professor clip. :P

3) I was able to mention Thomas Racz’s recent discovery of a longer print of A Night at the Opera. Hopefully someone in L.A. was listening.

4) And this is the big one — Angela actually took home my copy of The Nutty Professor to watch…actually. Can’t wait for her breathless phone call begging to borrow my copy of Cracking Up.

Listen to the show here.

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