A Cream Soda With Gilbert: The Golden Horn Salutes Gilbert Gottfried and the Amazing Colossal Podcast

 

https://thegoldenhornblog.blogspot.com/2021/08/cream-soda.html

https://thegoldenhornblog.blogspot.com/2020/01/coney-island.html

https://thegoldenhornblog.blogspot.com/2020/04/sandwich-of-day-pastrami.html

There is a hole in the schedule with Gilbert's passing. Gilbert was Monday. Not only did I start my week every week with Gilbert and Frank on the Amazing Colossal Podcast, but The Golden Horn started the week every week with Gilbert and Frank.

Most of the time I had no idea who the guest was going to be, but very often while putting a blog post together I would find some connection between the guest and The Golden Horn. Some guests like Barry Sonnenfeld had many, many connections. I didn't realize I was such a big Barry Sonnenfeld fan. Some guests during the podcast the conversation would reveal connections, and I would also often post stuff like old embarrassing commercials they mentioned down in the comments like with Nancy Allen.

Occasionally in the past I would have a personal connection to a celebrity death. Richard Farnsworth, dying from cancer, walked out to his barn and shot himself. That one affected me deeply. That walk. Phil Hartman. More recently Ron Leibman because Ron Leibman was Stan Murch and I am such a big Dortmunder and Donald Westlake fan.

https://thegoldenhornblog.blogspot.com/2019/12/beer-and-salt.html

I am devastated by Gilbert's death. Devastated. Not a manly tear or two, as Cliff Clavin would say. Outright blubbering. Before the podcast I knew Gilbert mainly from USA's Up All Night because I have been a bad movie fan from a very early age. Still the most impressive thing for me on Frank's resume was his early stint writing for Commander USA's Groovie Movies. Not only did I watch Commander USA when it aired, I still watch full episodes occasionally on Youtube or Internet Archive.

 

There is some kind of connection that happens, a one way connection, when you listen to a podcast every week for years and years. Somewhere between 50 and 100 episodes in one day you say, "I should bake these guys a cake." Maybe a nice collage. Collage of Gilbert done lovingly with colored seashells. Orange wedge tucked in there somewhere. At some point the fans want to give something back because of this one way connection. Weird Al gets a lot of that kind of stuff from fans. Fan art. And he felt bad because people would obviously spend a lot of time making these things but what do you do with it? So Al would take a picture of all the art and then toss it.

I would send in things that I would come across in my research. An old funny promo I had seen with the guest that week, or something of interest I had come across that probably even Frank with his voluminous research would not have found. One week Jeff Altman was on talking about Pink Lady and Jeff, the infamous TV bomb, and that same day, while Googling something unrelated about Bob Newhart, I found a Pink Lady and Jeff spoof on Saturday Night Live when Newhart was hosting called Pink Lady and Carl. With Harry Shearer as Carl Sagan and Gilda and Laraine Newman as Pink Lady. Within a minute of finding the Pink Lady parody the first thing that went through my mind was, "Better send this in to Frank." Frank will want to see this without delay. And they ended up using Pink Lady and Carl in the podcast twitter feed. My proudest moment.

Watching all of these old TV shows and commercials on Youtube has many times randomly led me to Gilbert. I would see him while looking for candy bars (Baby Ruth.) I would see him while looking for cereal. I found a Frosted Cheerios commercial with Florence Henderson and the three people with her were Gilbert Gottfried, Chris Elliott, and Larry "Bud" Melman. My question then was what kind of breakfast cereal casting session ends with the decision being Gilbert Gottfried, Chris Elliott, and Larry "Bud" Melman? In what universe does that make sense? And selling breakfast cereal too, I just don't understand how that happens. It was a good commercial, and well-produced. They had the camera in the cereal box, looking up, and then Gilbert would be yelling down at the box, "You're so crunchy!"

I was watching an NBC sitcom from the 90s that had Drew Carey in it in an early supporting role, called The Good Life, and the recording had all of the original commercials. In one commercial break there was an NBC Must See Thursday promo that started out with, "First on Frasier..." and then, "Then on Wings," and they have a picture of Crystal Bernard, "Helen spends the night with..." cut to picture of Gilbert, "Gilbert Gottfried?" in incredulous tone. Not the first time I had seen Gilbert's face used as a punchline. His wonderful performance on Wings as Lewis Blanchard, along with William Hickey, who was also great as his Uncle Carlton, had the strangest character arc. Both Gilbert and William Hickey came back several times, together and separately, and every time they came back the entire cast hated them twice as much. Being insulted to his face actually made Gilbert more cheerful. He enjoyed it. In Gilbert's final appearance on the very bizarre Christmas episode in season seven, the episode starts out like this: door to tarmac opens and Gilbert walks into the airport. Antonio (Tony Shalhoub) is sitting at the lunch counter, he looks over and sees Gilbert walk in the door and he says, "I'm gonna be sick."

That's an entrance.

My fondest wish was that one day I might get to watch an episode of the Amazing Colossal Podcast being recorded live in studio. And then afterwards I could take Gilbert and Frank out for a cream soda. Maybe a nice sandwich. A Reuben. Pastrami on rye. For me that would be the perfect day. At least I will always have all of those memories of all of those Mondays that I never wanted to end.

Thank you, Gilbert.