October 24-30, 1981

Happy Halloween!

This week Ken welcomes producer/director behind the excellent documentaries "In Search of Darkness", David Weiner.

Ken and David discuss playing Star Trek, TV watching with siblings, the three ages of horror, the video store age, making friends just to watch cable, not getting a VCR until much later in life, being the person in the household who brings in technology, missing four years of television due to attending boarding school, the power of the TV Guide movie section, seeing The Omen, the Exorcist, and Amnityville Horror for the first time on television, Fall Preview love, being able to see photos and images from television, the TV version of a movie, TV series based on movies, Logan's Run, Planet of the Apes, Land of the Lost, Valley of the Dinosaurs, being a 70s kid, Famous Monsters, where you have to grow up to associate King Kong with Thanksgiving, The Crawling Eye, Monster movies, WPIX, Chiller Theater, television images burned into your brain forever, having no identity of your own, being made of exclusievely tv memories, CED Selectadisc, having a Seagram's hook up, having a Kraft food hook up, Ken's sleeping bag collection, Love Boat, Fantasy Island, The Wonderful World of Disney, The Legend of Sleepy Hollow, Disney's Haunted Treat, Ken's theory of Knight Rider taking place in the Halloween III universe, going to film school, all the familar locations you drive by in LA, Moby Dick, Ray Bradbury, Something Wicked This Way Comes, pre-empting shows, the baseball world series, variety shows, The Muppets, Star Wars, Private Benjamin, local variations, mail fraud, record clubs, getting to interview John Carpenter, Star Trek II Wrath of Kahn, Looney Tunes Halloween specials, Fat Albert Halloween, It's The Great Pumpkin Charlie Brown, The Brady Brides, Tom Baker Doctor Who, The Fall Guy, the first time ever network airing of Halloween on NBC, factual inaccuracies, Jaws, seeing things you are not allowed to see, watching Halloween home alone as a teen and being terrified, how you couldn't easily prove people wrong growing up, Close Encounters of the first and second kind, and making an In Search of Darkness 70s documentary.

Be sure to buy the latest In Search of Darkness doc, covering the second half of the 90s, 90shorrordoc.com

March 16-22, 1991

This week Ken welcomes comedian Fabrizio Copano.

Ken and Fabrizio discuss Barbara Walters love of TMNT, inappropriate turtle love, Chile, El Chino, Ninjas, Hero Turtles, Peru, Dragon Ball Z, Japanese content, Ramna, why The Simpsons were so massive in South America, prime time animation, things that aren't just for kids, Bart is forever, Lucha Libre, El Santo, WWF, how things from inside Latin America don't travel that well, El Chavo de Ocho, El Chapulin Colorado, Sabado Gigante, making it world wide, Paul Simon, Batman, Superman, Comics, being a huge movie freak, Pretty Woman, Who Framed Roger Rabbit, Jessica Rabbit rocketing you into puberty, hunting down obscure VHS tapes, traveling all over the country to go to video stores, hating 2010: The Year We Made Contact, being disappointed by Barry Lyndon, the 2009 film La Nana, Machuca, El Club, Catholicism, learning English ten years ago after you've already moved to the U.S.A., how there are no Spanish shows in L.A., doing comedy in a totally different language, how jokes don't quite translate, finding your voice, MTV, Lifetime's Genecology Update, Comic Strip Live, inventing the stand up scene in Chile, The Half Hour Comedy Hour, having an empty Sunday, Indiana Jones, Daughters of Privilege, Nickelodeon animated shows, how Nick shows with humans didn't do well in Latin America, Fabrizio's American wife showing him shows from her youth, Sabrina vs Clarissa, The Lion King, Frog Girl, how only in America do student dissect frogs, Divorce Court, old people running the world, Phil Donohue, Yo! MTV Raps, America's Funniest Home Videos, Video Loco, Fabrizio's brother's journalism career, the Copano boys cable show, getting recognized in public, fame in another country but not in the U.S., recognizing the power of luck, realizing how good you have it, having to put a disclaimer on your citizenship, The Wizard of Oz, Jesus of Nazareth, Titanic, and the insanity of the TV Guide cross word tip line 900 number.

March 2-8, 1996

This week Ken welcomes comedian behind the comedy special "Bougie on a Budget", Denise Winkelman.

Ken and Denise discuss pouring rain in New England, growing up in Minnesota, Ken confusing Minnesota with Michigan, the coldest spot in the country in the Winter, growing up in a very rural town, the magic of cable bringing Pro Wrestling to your home, Wrestling magazines, local wrestling, mad scientists, how Wrestling is basically an improv group, NYPD Blue, nudity on television, Dennis Franz, CSI, David Caruso, Christine Baranski, the legend of The Marlboro Man, ads that work with any tag line, the 90s trend of "one of the guys" girl who smoke cigars, creepy mail order dolls, American Girl Dolls, Empty Nest, American shows CBC ran, The Kids in the Hall, WKRP, Walker Texas Ranger, wrestling alligators, Powers Booth and Peter Coyote, forbidden love, why everyone can't be the wacky neighbor, High Incident, when the whole neighborhood watches you, communist Russia, Eastern Europeans, comedians who become politicians, Hallmark Entertainment on Fox presenting In the Lake of the Woods, Bette Midler, John Travolta, French and Saunders, Joanna Lumley, the US phenomenon of Ab Fab, The Comedy Awards, Richard Pryor, The Jim Henson Hour, trying to do the Muppets without Jim Henson, Michelle Pfeiffer, selling your soul for the corporate dollar, The Babe with John Goodman vs Babe with a pig, 1996, roided baseball hits, Siskel and Ebert, and how it's never appropriate to Jeer Bob Balaban.