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The Dick Van Dyke Show – “Hustling the Hustler”

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It is difficult to overstate the impact The Hustler had on the game of pool in the United States.  Released in October 1961, the movie saved the game of pool from “passing into oblivion,” according to pool historian Mike Shamos.[1]  The Billiards Congress of America noted that after the movie came out “new rooms opened all over the country and for the remainder of the 60’s pool flourished.”[2]

Hustlin' the HustlerThe cultural resonance of the film was also immense.  Since its release The Hustler has been referenced in dialogue or through imagery in more than 65 movies and television episodes, according to IMDB, including The Cincinnati Kid (1965); Wandering Ginza Butterfly (1972); The Odd Couple (1973); The Wanderers (1979); The Outsiders (1983); The Simpsons (1994); Trainspotting (1996); Poolhall Junkies (2002); Nip/Tuck (2007); and NCIS (2009), to name a few.

Certainly, one of the first cultural connections was The Dick Van Dyke Show episode, “Hustling the Hustler,” which aired just one year after the movie’s release, as part of the CBS sitcom’s second season. In fact, not only is the episode’s title a direct reference to the film, but also one of the characters in the episode mentions he’s seen “that movie with Paul Newman and Jackie Gleason.”

As ‘60s television viewers will recall, The Dick Van Dyke Show ran for five seasons, garnering 15 Emmy Awards.  Starring Dick Van Dyke as Rob Petrie, the head writer of the fictitious The Alan Brady Show, the series largely revolved around his work and home life. The series also starred Morey Amsterdam as Rob’s co-writer Buddy Sorrell and Mary Tyler Moore as Rob’s wife Laura.

Hustlin' the HustlerIn the episode “Hustling the Hustler,” Rob invites Buddy’s estranged yet charming brother Blackie (Phil Leeds) to his house for dinner and a friendly game of billiards in the Petrie household basement.  But, Rob is unaware of Blackie’s pool hustling background, which had been established in an earlier strained exchange between Buddy and Blackie.

According to Rob, Laura gave him the pool table to “keep him off the streets.”  Referring to her husband, Laura then warns Blackie (in another direct reference to The Hustler), “[Rob] is a real hustler. You’ve heard of Minnesota Fats. This is Illinois Skinny.”[3] Rob also jibes, “I’ll let my pool cue speak for me. This way, pigeon.”

Given the episode’s title, there’s no surprise how the game will unfold.  As part of the upfront setup, Blackie plays the pool-fool, commenting on the “nice white ball” and guessing that chalking the cue helps reduce friction.  Blackie then asks Rob if he’s a hustler, and Rob replies, “No, but I could have been.  My wife won’t let me go to pool halls alone.”

Blackie then breaks, feigning unfamiliarity with the term “break” as well as with how to hold a cue.  With some coaching from Rob, he successfully breaks, only to sink the 8-ball.  (This scene, unfortunately, has two fundamental errors.  First, it’s clear that assuming the balls were racked correctly, it was not the 8-ball that got pocketed. And second, Rob indicates that sinking the 8-ball on the break is an automatic loss, which is not accurate, per BCA rules.)

Rob wins a few and goes up 5-1, but ultimately, lets his overconfidence become his undoing, as he quickly amasses a $300 debt (equivalent to $2400 in 2016) to Blackie.  The humor from the episode comes in watching Rob’s physical transformation.  As one blogger noted, “the moment when Rob realizes what he’s gotten himself into offers yet another chance for [Dick Van Dyke] one of the masters of facial comedy to provide us with a pitch-perfect comic expression.”[4]

Of course, since The Dick Van Dyke Show was largely wholesome storytelling, the episode cannot end with Rob getting fleeced. Rather, Blackie tears up the $300 check to prove to his estranged brother that he is no longer the pool hustler he once was.

The full “Hustling the Hustler” episode is available to watch here.

[1]       http://www.espn.com/page2/s/closer/020617.html

[2]       A Brief History of the Noble Game of Billiards by Mike Shamos 

[3]       “Hustling the Hustler” would not be the last show to provide a comic twist on the name of Walter Tevis’ fictitious pool shark Minnesota Fats.  In the 1970 “Armando and the Pool Table” episode of The Flying Nun, the Minnesota Fats of San Tanco plays the “Minneapolis Skinny of the Convent.”  And, in 1971, Don Adams played Skittle Pool against “Wisconsin Skinny” in a memorable commercial for the toy game.

[4]  

Auction Kings – “Rolling Stones Snooker Table”

There is clearly a market for celebrity pool tables.

In 1998, a snooker table custom made for the Rolling Stones’ Voodoo Lounge tour sold at auction for $12,075. In 2007, an Adler Victorian-style carved-walnut pool table, which had been customized for musician Ozzy Osbourne, sold at auction for $11,250.  A year later, the Brunswick table that actor Glen Ford had spent countless hours using  to play celebrities such as John Wayne and Frank Sinatra, went for nearly $8000 in a Heritage auction.

Rolling Stones snooker table

from the Voodoo Lounge tour

So, it was not outrageous for Gallery 63 owner Paul Brown to think that he could make a pretty penny auctioning a snooker table that had been customized for, and used by, the Rolling Stones as part of their 1989 Steel Wheels Tour.  Such is the setup for “Rolling Stones Snooker Table/Aliens,” the fourth episode of the first season of Auction Kings, a reality television series produced by Authentic Entertainment for the Discovery Channel.

Airing in November 2010, the Auction Kings episode, available to watch here, begins with Donald Dukes, the founder and creative talent behind handcrafted table maker Atlantic Billiards, walking into Mr. Brown’s auction house in Sandy Springs, Georgia, looking to sell a custom 12-foot snooker table that he built for the Rolling Stone to bring on tour.

https://youtu.be/ZJMzT_d84lw

This was not the first time Mr. Dukes had been called upon by the Rolling Stones to build a snooker table.  He built a total of five tables for the band and for its lead guitarist Keith Richards, including the aforementioned Voodoo Lounge tour table, which had been crafted from 1,400 pounds of slate playing surface from Italy, worsted wool cloth from Belgium, gum-rubber rail cushions from England, and maple cue sticks from Canada, according to the Christie’s auction site.[1] Mr. Dukes even joined the band on tours in order to maintain the tables.

(It is now well-documented that the Rolling Stones include in their concert tour rider that the promoter installs a snooker table backstage.  Rolling Stones guitarist Ronnie Wood wrote in his 2007 autobiography Ronnie: “The gig organizer is also obliged to set up a snooker table for Keith [Richards] and me – it’s a non-negotiable part of the contract. We always have a game before a concert.”[2])

Rolling Stones snooker table

from the Steel Wheels tour

For the Steel Wheels tour table, which was decorated with names of classic Rolling Stones’ hits, had legs mounted with replicas of John Pasche’s famous 1970 “Tongue and Lips” artwork, and included “ironclad provenance – [Mr. Dukes] and Keith Richards shooting a game on it,” the desired price was at least $4,000. “If all goes well, we will use the cash for 2nd honeymoon for our 40th anniversary,” says Mr. Dukes.

At the time right before the episode’s airing, enthusiasts on the AZBilliards Forum opined that the table should command a significant price.  Estimated ranged from “at least 4K” or “around 8K” to 15K and even 25K.[3]

In the actual episode, an appraiser values the table itself at $3,500 but quickly adds that its celebrity provenance is the true wild card which could favorably impact the value.  Owner Mr. Brown robotically follows up, “I’m hoping the fact it was indeed the Rolling Stones’ snooker table will drive the value up in a Jumping Jack Flash.”

“Rolling Stones Snooker Table/Aliens” ends with the auction, which also includes the sale of some African art and life-size aliens that are also highlighted throughout the episode.  With Mr. Dukes in the audience, the auctioneer begins the bidding at $1250.  An anonymous call-in buyer drives up the price, ultimately buying the table for $4000. Though Mr. Dukes only received his minimum asking price, he seems content; Mr. Brown, too, is relieved, though the lackluster bid prices for some of the other auction items leads him to surmise that there is bad luck in the air.

The theme of bad luck was a motif the show’s producers ran throughout the episode, starting with the scratching of winless lottery tickets and ending with Mr. Brown unwittingly walking beneath a ladder.  Such superstitious events were undoubtedly inserted to build the show’s narrative.

But, ironically, the bad luck gimmicks may have been a real omen.  The series Auction Kings ended in 2013, and Mr. Brown’s auction house Gallery 63 closed in March, 2015.  And, according to an AZBilliards Forum post from NoBull9, who spoke with one of the table’s assemblers, the $4000 deal fell through and the table was locked up in a warehouse, still for sale.[4]

[1]       http://www.christies.com.cn/lotfinder/LotDetailsPrintable.aspx?intObjectID=606212

[2]       http://www.backstageauctions.com/catalog/1587-rolling-stones-1994-one-of-a-kind-voodoo-lounge-tour-used-pool-table/ai/0/24241/

[3]      http://forums.azbilliards.com/showthread.php?t=207833

[4]       http://forums.azbilliards.com/showthread.php?t=207833

The New Show – “The Hustler”

FATS:  Do you like to gamble, Eddie? Gamble money on pool games?

FATS:  Hundred dollars?

EDDIE:  Well, you shoot big-time pool, Fats. I mean, that’s what everybody says, you shoot big-time pool. Let’s make it two hundred dollars a game.

FATS:  Now I know why they call you Fast Eddie. Eddie, you talk my kind of talk… (moving to the main table) Sausage! Rack ’em up!

As any billiards cinephile knows, these are some of the indelible lines penned by Sidney Carroll and Robert Rossen for the 1961 film The Hustler. The exchange marks the first interaction between Paul Newman (as “Fast” Eddie Felson) and Jackie Gleason (as Minnesota Fats). The dialogue is so precise that the actors’ voices are audible and instantly recognizable from the printed word alone.

Twenty-three years later, in the 1984 “The Hustler” sequence from The New Show, these words are uttered almost verbatim by the same characters, shot in B&W in a cinematographic feel identical to that created by Eugene Shuftan in The Hustler.  But, replacing Mr. Newman and Mr. Gleason are two very different actors: Kevin Kline (as Eddie) and John Candy (as Fats).  The full sequence is below:

Is this a remake?  Are we going to watch a shot-for-shot reenactment, like Gus Van Sant’s 1998 treatment of Psycho?

For those familiar with The New Show, Lorne Michaels’ NBC sketch comedy that aired during the 1983–84 television season, the answer, of course, is no.  There is anticipation that though the dialogue, framing, music, and cinematography all mimic the original The Hustler, something is hopefully about to become wildly different and madcap.  And, boy does The New Show send-up of The Hustler not disappoint!

New ShowOnce Sausage has racked the balls, and the two players have lagged for break, Fats prepares to break and…miscues. His ingenuous follow-up response is priceless:  “Wait, I wasn’t ready for that.  Can I take that again?” For Eddie’s turn, after asking if you need to call balls (“No, you don’t need to call them.  Except the 8-ball.  That you must call.”), he misses wildly on his break, caroming the cue off of several rails without touching the rack.

And so it goes, turn after turn. As Kenyon Hopkins’ noirish score from The Hustler marks the slow passing of the hours, Eddie and Fats miss, scratch, and scratch some more, until a line of nine balls have been put back on the table, penalizing the players for their ineptitude. Fats shares, “It’s time to get something going here Eddie. Maybe a little old-fashioned bangy ball.”

New ShowMore hours pass, the hands of the clock rotating speedily, the cigarette butts amassing on the floor, and still the chalkboard reads, “Game One.” The two players, feuding after 16 hours, about whether the $200 bet really counted, collapse on the table, exhausted.  Fats proposes, “Let’s clear all the balls off the table except the 8-ball and the cue ball. Whoever sinks it is the winner.”   I won’t reveal the ending, but it’s consistent with the previous lunacy.

“The New Show” was intended to mark Mr. Michaels’ return to television, after a five-year hiatus from Saturday Night Live. The comedy show appeared on Fridays, not Saturdays, in prime time, not late night. It was filmed “mock live,”not live, and featured three guest stars, who rotated from show to show, instead of one host. These decisions were intended to differentiate it from SNL.  But, even with its incredible rotating cast of characters (Kevin Kline, John Candy, Steve Martin, Catherine O’Hara, Buck Henry, Jeff Goldblum, Gilda Radner, Raul Julia, Penny Marshall, and Laraine Newman), the show was a ratings disaster. It ran for just nine episodes before getting canned as the lowest rated of 94 programs during the 1983-1984 television season.

If you are like me, and you are only experiencing the joy of watching “The Hustler” for the first time via this blog or seeing it recently posted on YouTube, then we collectively owe a huge amount of gratitude to Tor Lowry, a managing member of Zero-X Billiards and the creator of the billiards web series, 14 Days – The Great Pool Experiment.

For over the past year, Mr. Lowry had been on a personal quest to locate “The Hustler.”  Other clips from The New Show (e.g., “Roy’s Food Repair”, “The Twilight Zonettes”) had been available on YouTube for some time, but only the first several minutes of “The Hustler” were viewable, prior to Mr. Lowry’s successful sleuthing. (I even reached out to the New York Paley Center for Media, with their library of 160,000 television shows, radio programs and commercials, on Mr. Lowry’s behalf, only to come up empty.)  Mr. Lowry finally located someone who had recorded the episode on VHS, and subsequently transferred the recording to YouTube, making it viewable for all.

Given “The Hustler” has already racked up almost 16,000 views in less than a month, there is perhaps hope that this short-lived series may one day be available again to watch.

A Minute with Stan Hooper – “The Hustler”

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Stan HooperThe Fox sitcom A Minute with Stan Hooper pretty much came and went in about that much time. Premiering in late 2003, the series was cancelled after the first six episodes aired. That’s too bad. Based on the third episode, entitled “The Hustler,” the sitcom had some comedic promise, attributable in no small part to the offbeat humor of the show’s creators and writers Norm MacDonald (Saturday Night Live) and Barry Kemp (Newhart).

For those who blinked and missed this series, A Minute with Stan Hooper featured Norm MacDonald in the titular role as a famous newspaper columnist turned television commentator, who moves his family from New York to (fictional) small-town Waterford Falls, Wisconsin, where he hopes to connect with middle America in order to grow the viewership of his weekly minute-long television commentaries.

Stan HooperIn “The Hustler,” Stan is invited out by Lou Peterson (Garrett Dillahunt from Raising Hope), one of the locals, to “shoot a little pool, drink a little beer” at Jimmy’s Tavern, where they will play billiards for “nickels and dimes.” Feeling this will give him a chance to connect with the town’s denizens, he readily agrees and goes to the bar, where humorously everyone is named Jimmy. But, when he sees Lou unsheathe his cue stick and go through his routine of polishing and chalking, he questions if he is being hustled.

That suspicion increases after Stan sees Lou miss wildly on his shot after the break. Yet, the gaffe elicits “oohs” and “aahs” from the bystanders, and Lou’s good friend Jimmy consoles him with, “That was close.” Stan, who has already admitted he is not very good, botches his next shot, prompting Fred (the ever reliable Fred Willard) to share, “Gents, this has all the making of a great one.”

Confused? So is Stan. The television viewer’s vantage shifts from eye-level to birds-eye, hovering over the pool table, as simple shot after simple shot is horribly missed.   When Stan finally makes a gimme in the side pocket, the locals go crazy. Stan dryly retorts, “I’ve made three balls in 90 minutes.”

Finally, as the game hits the three-and-half-hour mark, according to a clock in the tavern, Stan lines up to shoot the 8-ball. Lou, drenched with sweat, shudders, “He’s not going to sink the 8-ball. That’s the hardest one.” And Fred, with an inside reference to Minnesota Fats’ character in The Hustler, says to all, “You are watching an artist. Watch that fat man [Stan] shoot with his fat hands.”

When Stan wins the game by five balls, he is owed “two dimes and a nickel,” which he learns does not equal 25 cents, but is equivalent to $2500, an enormous sum that will force Lou to close his diner to pay the bet. Stan later inquires why they play for such high stakes. The answer, according to Fred, is “they’re simple folks. It makes them feel important. And because no one plays well enough to finish a game, no one has ever lost. Until now.”   The remainder of the episode focuses on Stan’s ill-conceived attempts to return the $2500 to Lou. The full episode is available to watch here.

“The Hustler” is not the first television episode to focus on pathetic pool.   In the 1996 “City Slackers” episode of Boy Meets World, Eric challenges an opponent to a game of pool to win the heart of a girl, but his plan fails after “15 hours of someone yet sinking a ball.” A far more interesting spin on bad pool is the episode “Water Park” from Malcolm in the Middle, in which Malcolm’s older brother Francis competes with his Commandant to see who can lose in eight-ball in the most spectacular fashion. But, perhaps, the most hilarious take on bad billiards is from the 1984 “The Hustler” skit for The New Show, in which “Fast” Eddie Felson (Kevin Kline) challenges the Fat Man (John Candy) to $200/games of pool, and both proceed to shoot horribly.

The Jersey – “New Kid in Town”

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The premise behind The Jersey, a vanilla television series that aired on the Disney Channel from 1999-2004, is that four teens – Nick, Morgan, Coleman, and Elliot – discover the magic of “the jersey,” a mystical football jersey that transports them into the bodies of professional athletes. So, when I first learned the series included a 2003 billiards episode entitled “The New Kid in Town,” I got a wee bit giddy. Perhaps, Nick would morph into Earl “The Pearl” Strickland, who reigned in 9-ball in 2002, or Morgan Hudson would transfigure into Jeanette “Black Widow” Lee, who won the gold medal at the World Games in 2001.

New Kid in TownWas I so naïve to think that the producers and writers of The Jersey might distinguish themselves by deeming billiards players professional athletes? After all, past episodes had featured not only familiar superstars like Terrell Davis (football), David Robinson (basketball) and Randy Johnson (baseball), but also household names from less popular sports, such as Kelly Slater (surfing), Dan Lyle (rugby), Scott Steiner (wrestling), and Dominique Dawes (gymnastics).

Alas, my hopes were dashed as I began watching “The New Kid in Town,” which, like many sitcoms, actually included two unrelated storylines, and most definitely did not include any billiards professionals. The jersey/athlete storyline involves Elliot Rifkin (Theo Greenley) assuming the body of professional BMX rider and X Games Dirt Jumping gold medal winner Ryan Nyquist in order to better understand why a “new kid in town” has a chip on his shoulder. Lots of killer bike jumps follow.

The non-jersey, utterly unimaginative storyline involves the show’s father figure, Larry Lighter (Michael Bofshever), having just re-felted his pool table, trying to relive his college glory days when he was known as – wait for it – Missouri Fats.[1] His first opponent is his daughter, Hilary, who has never before shot pool. Unfortunately, his skills have apparently atrophied over time, and he becomes insufferable after repeated losses to his daughter. As she says, “I must be really good considering you’ve been playing like 25 years and I’ve been playing like 25 hours.” (Of course, given his blatantly incorrect racking of the balls, it’s not clear he ever had the skills.)

New Kid in TownMore bad jokes follow (“It’s not me, it’s the table…somehow when they re-felted it, they messed it up.”) before Larry confesses to his wife, “I just want to be competitive at one thing, and pool was my last salvation, and now I can’t even win at that. Missouri Fats is no more.”

Last salvation?! And, in a final twist of the knife, Larry only wins a game because his wife bribed his daughter to throw it. Larry proclaims he will celebrate the win by buying himself a new graphite cue. Billiards fans, on the other hand, shrug their shoulders, dismayed that yet another television episode reduced their sport to bad racks, bad jokes, bribes, and the basement floor of avocations.

************

[1]       For a more original and funnier permutation of billiards legend Minnesota Fats’ name, watch the Aurora Skittle Pool commercial (1970), featuring comedian Don Adams as “Wisconsin Skinny.”

Martin – “Martin in the Corner Pocket”

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About every six weeks, I read someone’s tweet sarcastically asking whether every black television comedy of the ‘90s had a pool hustler episode. Given there were 15 prime-time black comedies on TV at the decade’s peak in 1997, the answer, based on my extensive research, is a clear no. However, the question is also not uninformed, as four of the seminal ‘90s shows of the genre – specifically, The Fresh Prince of Bel-Air, The Steve Harvey Show, Family Matters, and Martin – all dedicated at least one episode to this subject matter. For Martin, it was “Martin in the Corner Pocket,” an uneven 22-minute episode from 1995 that couples laugh-out-loud moments with deplorable technical editing of the billiards.

Martin in the Corner Pocket For the uninitiated, Martin was an American sitcom that aired on Fox from 1992-1997 and was one of the network’s highest-rated shows at that time. The series starred comedian Martin Lawrence as Martin Payne, a smart-mouthed, self-centered, yet ultimately warm-hearted and loyal, Detroit disc jockey with a girlfriend (and later wife) Gina Waters (Tisha Campbell). Other main characters on the series included Martin’s two closest friends: level-headed and charming Tommy (Thomas Mikal Ford) and dimwitted but well-meaning Cole (Carl Anthony Payne II). Having attracted a viewership of more than 6 million (even at its nadir), Martin now regularly runs in syndication in most major U.S. cities.

“Martin in the Corner Pocket” kicks offs the series’ fourth season, with Martin and Gina returning from their honeymoon. Gina expects their first night at home as a married couple to be an intimate one, but Martin already had made other plans to meet his close friends, Tommy and Cole, at Nipsey’s to shoot some pool. As Martin says, “I do have business to take care of, Gina…I got to go down to the pool hall and open a can of whup-ass on Tommy and Cole.”

Martin.2The initial billiards sequence plays out over classic Martin banter, with Martin chest-thumping upon entering the pool hall, “Pool school is in session, now who wants the first lesson?” and later proclaiming, “Damn I’m good. I don’t know why I’m this good,” and even boasting in the third-person, “Marty Mar has the skills to pay the bills.”

The thin plotline involves Martin getting hustled by Vanessa (Alex Datcher), a hot-to-trot vixen who initially feigns she can barely hold a cue. After telling Vanessa she can shoot first and to “have fun because you might not get another one,” Martin wins the game on a four-rail shot, prompting Tommy to announce, “You beat her like she stole something.

Martin in the Corner PocketHaving won Martin’s confidence, Vanessa then tries to lure Martin into playing for $20/ball. Since “Marty Mar don’t gamble,” she suggests they play for his watch. As expected, Vanessa is a shark, and after winning the watch, subsequently hustles him out of everything but his undershirt, boxers, and one sock, winning the final match on a four pocket combination.

Where “Martin in the Corner Pocket” falls apart, however, is in the unforgivably awful technical editing of the billiards. Watching the episode on YouTube, it is disturbingly apparent that at 5:20 the rack only has 13 balls and includes no 8-ball. At 5:22, Martin breaks and the 9-ball falls in the corner pocket, but at 5:29, Martin continues to play with all 15 balls now back on the table. I don’t understand how a shows that invests the time carefully setting up trick shots (e.g., Martin’s four-rail, Vanessa’s four balls) can so glaringly screw up the basic fundamentals of how to do an opening rack or how ensure balls pocketed stay down.

Like many Martin episodes, “Martin in the Corner Pocket” ends with an only loosely-related post-credits sequence. This vignette features Martin Lawrence reprising his recurring role as Dragonfly Jones, a martial arts “expert” who is stalked by Kenji, a real martial arts student owed money by Dragonfly. In the scene, Dragonfly is pool hustling at Nipsey’s. Having just taken an old woman’s bus fare, he gets into a fight with Kenji that involves Dragonfly jumping on pool tables, breaking pool talc, knocking down pool balls, and ultimately going karate-crazy when one-hit wonder Carl Douglas’ 1974 “Kung Fu Fighting” blares from the jukebox. After four seasons of losing, Dragonfly successfully knocks out his nemesis, only to then be clocked unconscious by the old bus fare woman.

“Martin in the Corner Pocket” is available on demand from Amazon.

The Rifleman – “Shattered Idol”

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“The game of billiards has destroyed my naturally sweet disposition.” – Mark Twain, April 24, 1906

Among my literary loves is historical fiction, that malleable genre that permits imaginary, engaging storylines through the creative and (hopefully) well-researched use of real people, places, and events. (If you’re itching for a good read, check out some highly entertaining and educational examples, such as Twelve Fingers by Jo Soares, The Adventures of Kavalier & Clay by Michael Chabon, or The Alienist by Caleb Carr.)

Shattered IdolThus, I got a bit giddy when I first learned about and watched the December 1961 episode “Shattered Idol” from the fourth season of The Rifleman television series. The Rifleman was an American Western television show that starred Chuck Connors as Lucas McCain, a widowed Union Civil War veteran raising his son Mark (Johnny Crawford) during the 1870s and 1880s. The 30-minute episodes, all filmed in black-and-white, ran on ABC from September, 1958 to April, 1963.

The fictitious “Shattered Idol” episode begins with Samuel Clemens (aka Mark Twain, played by Oscar nominee Kevin McCarthy), in his trademark white suit, disheveled hair, and overgrown mustache, passing through the town of North Fork, New Mexico Territory in stagecoach, when his vehicle has wheel trouble, forcing a several day layover. Unexplainably crotchety and rude to the local denizens, including the young, author-worshiping Mark McCain, Twain opts to hole up in the town’s inn, with its solitary four-cushion billiards table, removed from any contact with anyone.

So far, so make-believe (and the author’s surliness so intentionally bewildering).

Shattered IdolIn time, Twain emerges from his room and is prodded into making a billiards wager with Mr. Russell, the local cowpoke and pool shark, who says, “Here’s $70 you play billiards as well as you write: rotten.” Twain invites Mr. Russell to set up three balls anywhere on the table and that Twain can make a successful three-cushion shot (i.e., use the cue ball to hit the other two balls while also contacting three cushions). Twain makes the winner-takes-all shot, pockets the winnings, and dismisses his buffoonish opponent.

Twain’s demonstrated billiards acumen is rooted in history. According to biographer Albert Bigelow Paine, who wrote The Boys’ Life of Mark Twain (1916), Twain was passionate about billiards. Paine writes:

Every Friday evening, or oftener, a small party of billiard lovers gathered, and played until the late hour, told stories, smoked till the room was blue, comforting themselves with hot Scotch and general good-fellowship. Mark Twain always had a genuine passion for billiards. He never tired of the game. He could play all night. He could stay until the last man gave out from sheer weariness, then he would go on knocking the balls about alone.

In fact, Twain’s billiards room served as his “office, study and private domain…away from the bustle of a busy household, it was the place where the author would write his great works, fanning the manuscripts on the billiard table to be edited.”[1]

Shattered Idol

The real Mark Twain

“Shattered Idol” includes another historical fact – the early death of Twain’s son Langdon – which is revealed mid-episode to be the source of Twain’s dismissiveness and the rationale for his self-imposed isolation. Twain’s son Langdon died of diphtheria in 1872. In “Shattered Idol,” Twain believes he could have prevented hi son’s death, citing it as his reason to discontinue writing the then-serialized novel The Adventures of Huckleberry Finn. (In truth, Twain did lose interest in writing the famous American classic for several years, but the delay was not attributable to Langdon’s death.)

Fortunately, for Huck, Jim, young Mark McCain, and millions of voracious future readers, the titular rancher Lucas McCain is able to help Twain overcome his grief (and save the imperiled novel) through a rematch on the billiards table.

Twain is once again challenged by the local town hustler to a 5-point game of three-cushion billiards for $100. Lacking concentration and distraught with grief, Twain initially loses. But, when Lucas gives him a pep talk about not living in the past, Twain is able to rebound and makes a stunning, consecutive series of five three-cushion shots, thereby defeating the hustler, winning the wager, regaining his desire to live, and recommitting to finish writing Huckleberry Finn.

The “Shattered Idol” episode of The Rifleman is not currently available online or on DVD.

[1]       https://marktwainhouse.org/about/the-house/HartfordHome/rooms/

Sledge Hammer! – “The Color of Hammer”

Billiards has been the centerpiece of some great television parodies, such as Mad TV – “The Hustler” (1999), Mr. Show – “Van Hammersly” (1995), and, of course, the hilarious 1987 short “The Hustler of Money,” which featured Ben Stiller doing an over-the-top impersonation of Tom Cruise’s The Color of Money character, who has traded in his cue stick for a bowling ball.

Color of HammerUnfortunately, not all billiards spoofs have been this humorous. For example, way down at the other end of the baize is the insufferable and utterly uncomic Sledge Hammer! episode, “The Color of Hammer.”

Sledge Hammer! is a satirical police sitcom starring David Rasche as Sledge Hammer, a San Francisco Police Department inspector who is destructive, sexist, insensitive, simplistic, and calloused. As hinted by the opening sequence, a sensual close-up of a .44 Magnum resting on a satin pillow, Hammer’s natural instinct is to solve every case with violence. His crime-fighting ways naturally draw the ire of his partner, the beautiful, intelligent and sophisticated Detective Dori Doreau (Anne-Marie Martin) and the uptight, apoplectic Captain Trunk (Harrison Page). The series lasted on ABC for only two seasons before it was canceled in 1988 due to low ratings and direct competition from superior shows like Miami Vice.

“The Color of Hammer” aired in January 1987, at the tail end of the show’s first season. (Many of the episodes’ titles lampooned 1980s films and television shows – e.g., “The Spa Who Loved Me,” “The Secret of My Excess,” and “Miss of the Spider Woman.”) The full episode is available to watch here.

The episode centers on Sledge’s investigation of the murder of hardline Superior Court Judge Liam Jackson, who is killed shortly after inexplicably dismissing all charges against an obviously guilty mob figure. Though Hammer seems oblivious to the knife sticking out of the judge’s back, he has a flash of genius when he connects the blue chalk under the judge’s fingernails with the Cues ‘R’ Us matchbook in his pocket, and deduces that the judge may have been hustled and blackmailed, which ultimately got him stabbed. Sure enough, the judge had fallen victim to the sharking tactics of Lana (Martine Beswick, former Miss Jamaica), who had tricked the judge into a making a no-win bet of $50,000.

Hammer arrives at the pool hall to sniff out the hustler. Meeting Lana, he initially dismisses her, telling her to “go get her ears pierced.” Assuming a woman could not be the culprit, Hammer is persuaded to play her in 9-ball for $100/game. After winning the first game, he eventually goes down $50,000, which is enough to realize she is the villain. (The silver lining of this sequence is that the pool-playing is cleverly shot to Hall & Oates’ ‘80s anthem “Man-Eater.”)

Hammer encourages Lana to play one more double-or-nothing game. A dreadfully filmed game of nine-ball ensues, with balls falling out of order, and illogical shots getting made. Lana resorts to cheap distractions (e.g., blowing cigar smoke in his face, kissing his ear), but Hammer proves unflappable, and wins the game.

Color of HammerWhen Hammer calls out Lana as the killer (“Sorry lady, the pool party is over!”), her cue stick is unsheathed to reveal a stiletto, and the standard pool table battle occurs, with Hammer knocking out his opponent by making her trip on the cue ball (“Best shot I made all day”). And for true tired slapstick, this “The Color of Hammer” sequence even includes a jump shot that bounces off the table, caroming into the Captain.

The late great billiards legend Minnesota Fats once said, “When I played pool I was like a good psychiatrist. I cured ‘em of all their daydreams and delusions.”

Now that’s funny.

Telling the Captain after beaning him with a cue ball on a botched jump: “You knew when you signed up that police work is dangerous.”

Well, that’s just plain stupid.

Dog Eat Dog – “Beat the Shark”

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As evidenced by the 32 biographies that comprise David Baber’s 2009 book Television Game Show Hosts, the game show host had been, until recently, a celebrity vocation ruled almost exclusively by men. (Case in point: there are no women featured in Baber’s book.) Then, at the start of the millennium, several women finally grabbed the microphone. They included Anne Robinson, the host of the Weakest Link; Meredith Vieira, the host of the syndicated version of Who Wants to be a Millionaire; and Brooke Burns, the host of Dog Eat Dog, an NBC import that included a famous “Beat the Shark” billiards challenge as part of its first season in July, 2002.

Beat the Shark

Host Brooke Burns (center) with contestant Anastasia Normandin and British billiards sensation Dave Pearson.

While the choice of Ms. Burns helped dismantle the male game show host archetype, the decision to hire the 5’8” former fashion model and star of Baywatch was more likely intended to help NBC build momentum on top of its already popular and superior Fear Factor, a reality game show that similarly tasked eye-pleasing contestants with competing in a variety of physically and mentally challenging stunts (including a billiards-themed sequence in the “Billiards for Gross Eats” episode). Dog Eat Dog, too, often asked contestants to strip down to bathing suits, or in the case of playing Strip Quarterback, disrobe to nothing at all, for a chance to win $25,000. Thus, it’s no surprise that a show marketing the physical bodies of its contestants would, in turn, select a host equally gorgeous and marketable.

Beat the SharkOn each episode of Dog Eat Dog, the six contestants vied in a series of physical competitions, trivia challenges, and assorted games. For the “Beat the Shark” sequence, contestant Anastasia Normandin is chosen by the other players to compete in a round of speed pool against Dave “The Ginger Wizard” Pearson, a British billiards player, who shortly after the airing of the episode set a new Guinness World Record by potting two consecutive racks of 15 pool balls in 82 seconds. (He currently owns four world records, though he has set 20 of them in his billiards career.) In the sequence, Ms. Normandin must sink four balls on her table before Mr. Pearson clears two full tables.

The results are highly amusing and sadly predictable. Mr. Pearson moves around the table like a man on fire, shooting effortlessly and never missing a single shot; Ms. Normandin struggles to set up shots, fumbles with a cue stick, and seems incapable of making even the simplest ball-in-pocket. As a result, she is sent to the “Dog Pound,” like the other contestants who failed before her in earlier games. The full sequence is available to watch here.

In addition to “Beat the Shark,” the seventh episode included “Treadmill Trivia” (answering general knowledge questions while running on a treadmill suspended over a water tank); “Ladder Wheel” (climbing around a large wheel while removing flags); the aforementioned “Strip Quarterback” (trading articles of clothing for footballs which must be thrown through an elevated hole in a tower); and “Hang in There” (suspending from handle bars in the air while “rain” pours down).

Dog Eat Dog only lasted two seasons. (There is speculation that the show’s demise was inevitable after one former contestant sued NBC after he was hospitalized and had alleged brain damage resulting from losing consciousness during a particular underwater stunt.[1])

Since the cancellation of Dog Eat Dog, Ms. Burns had continued to host game shows, most recently The Chase on the Game Show Network. Mr. Pearson has continued to try to break his own world records on the billiards table. Last October, he flew into Ozone Billiards in Kennesaw, Georgia to try to beat his 10 table record in eight minutes and 51 seconds.[2] Unfortunately, I can find no further information on Ms. Normandin. Apparently, the humiliating defeat was more than she could bear.

Special thanks to Mike L for alerting me to this particular billiards television episode!

[1] https://gameshows.fandom.com/wiki/Dog_Eat_Dog

[2] http://www.azbilliards.com/news/stories/11582-the-ginger-wizard-goes-for-world-record-at-ozone-for-cancer-charity/

The Waltons – “The Song”

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In competitive billiards, the stakes can be quite high. Archie “The Greek” Karas was known to have played one opponent for $40,000 matches in a Las Vegas pool room, and one night lost $740,000 playing 9-ball.[1] Professional boxer Manny Pacquiao was known to stake-horse Filipino billiards sensation Dennis Orcollo for matches up to $60,000, earning Orcollo the nickname “the Philippines Money-Game King.”[2]

The WaltonsSimilarly, movies and television have witnessed their share of high-risk wagers, including the deed to one’s land (Legend of the Dragon), the Duke boys’ General Lee Dodge Charger (Dukes of Hazzard – “A Little Game of Pool”) and the right to live or die (Twilight Zone – “A Game of Pool”).

On The Waltons, the stakes may not have seemed so perilous in the 1975, third-season episode “The Song,” but remember that this television show centered on a rural Virginia community during the Great Depression. So, when family patriarch John Walton Sr. (Richard Waite) and Grandpa Zeb (Will Greer) join several of the other local men for a 4-day, no-money, winner-takes-all, Walton’s Mountain 8-Ball Tournament, the wagers are reflective of the era and the conditions of the backwoods community. Specifically, the Walton men put up a truckload of firewood between them; Horace (Wilfred Brimely in his career-launching role) offers “six fat hens, Rhode Island Reds, all laying double-yolk eggs”; Zach Roswell bets a 200-pound prize pig named Jews Harp; Easy bets his old .22 rifle; and tournament organizer Ike Godsey wagers a “one-week supply of groceries not to exceed $7” (about $125 of buying power today).

The WaltonsAdding to the gravity of the tournament is that the Walton’s Mountain women consider billiards so odious (“trashy goings-on,” “low doing,” a “gambling game”) that the men risk, at a minimum, their wives’ scorn and opprobrium, and in the case of Zach Roswell, risk their manhood and future, hiding and telling lies to escape his shrewish spouse’s wrath.

Unfortunately, while the billiards in “The Song” is novel in its stakes and familial hazard, it ultimately is too brief and too bland, with little tension forming around the tournament and a minimal amount of pool actually played. Grandpa Walton inserts a couple of polite jeers (“Zach, are you celebrating or mourning?”), and even attempts a behind-the-back shot, but otherwise the game is a McGuffin (and not a very good one).

Perhaps, of greater interest for television trivia wonks is that Erin Moran (aka Joanie Cunningham from Happy Days) has a starring role in “The Song” as one of the titular songbirds. Regrettably, she, too, does not shoot any pool.

“The Song” episode of The Waltons is available on the complete, third-season DVD collection.

[1] http://www.pokernews.com/news/2008/02/sextons-corner-32-archie-karas-part-2.htm

[2] http://espn.go.com/espn/story/_/id/7879307/pool-dennis-orcollo-best-money-game-player-world-espn-magazine