One of my childhood heroes, Soupy Sales, has died. Alas.Soupy was often accused of using sexual innuendo in his children's show Lunch With Soupy Sales. He not only consistently and adamantly denied this, but had a standing offer of $10,000 to anyone who could ever present any evidence, whatsoever, that he ever introduced "blue" material in any of his kids' shows. No one ever even tried to collect the money!
Nevertheless Soupy Sales was a subversive, like all great comedians. But his was a gentle, if "zany" (and literally "in your face"!), subversion. To this day, Soupy Sales trademark pie-in-the-face is used by non-violent protesters the world across to get their point across with humor and style.
Ah, memories! I used to watch him religiously on What's My Line and Hollywood Squares...
ReplyDeleteR.I.P., Soupy.
ReplyDeleteMy favorite political pie-in-the-face moment is Anita Bryant getting pied by gay activists back in the seventies. I have a clip of that on my blog somewhere. I had no idea they were doing that so long ago. I hope Soupy provided their inspiration.