Your dad was an amazing man. For some reason, I was reminiscing about some Christmas comedy songs that I had listened to as a kid, so I decided to look them up and check out Stan's bio on Wikipedia, I did not know that he passed on this date in 2015. He brought my family many great times and memories. He was a treasure and I send my thanks for sharing him with the world.
Donavan, I just re-read "It Only Hurts When I Laugh" and, as with the previous readings, thoroughly enjoyed it. In the Epilogue, your Dad's left-brain and right-brain had a Q & A where he revealed that Part Two of this story is "Still in my word processor". Is there a chance that Part Two might be published? Or, are there legal elements that would prevent that happening? I, for one, vote for it being published.
My father gave me a 78rpm record of the Yellow Rose of Texas because that's the song I was singing when our car slid off the road into a ditch in 1958 (I was 6, in the backseat, not driving). His work clearly made a big impression on me. And the car. But I have always loved his wonderful humour. A real treasure as Ryan Norris (above) said.
Freberg was the greatest ad man ever! And a satirist par excellence as well. His LP "Stan Freberg Presents The United States of America" is one of the greatest comedy albums of all time. He was also a man of good character. We need more like him today.
God bless the man. No wonder my father used to just HOWL over his albums...and, later, ME. ("Child's Garden of Freberg" in particular.) It just struck me that what Rod Serling was to quality TV-drama writing, Stan Freberg was to the TV ad industry. Genius, as was Ernie Kovaks! I'd bet they all knew each other.
I’ve made over10,000 commercials, the majority of which were funny. Just a little something I learned by paying attention to the brilliant productions of “Uncle” Stan Freberg. There was no one like him, before or since.
Wow--these were great commercials. They don't make them like this anymore. The encyclopedia commercial--which was made in 1990--talked about global warming and the greenhouse effect. We knew about it so long ago. It's a damn shame we didn't start to do anything about it then.
I remember that prune commercial like it was yesterday. "They're still badly wrinkled, you know..." And of course Great American Soups with Ann Miller... CLASSIC!!!!!!
So it's 5 years after this collection of spots was posted. I go to the local food store to buy some typical items, and in the checkout line are all these candy bars. 3 Musketeers, Snickers, Milky Way, Hershey bars, a dozen others. As I don't really buy these things nor consume candy bars I paid no attention. But suddenly the thought occurred to me "what about ZAGNUT?" which was an odd candy bar that came out in the 60's; and I really didn't remember the spots, but the name just kind of speared through my awareness. Again, I thought nothing of it. Then I go to my favorite radio spot of all time, just to hear it, the Sarah Vaughan "Who listens to radio" spot. Written by Stan Freberg. Then this collection of Stan Freberg ads comes up in the sidebar. So I click on it, and right in the middle is Stan's commercial for ZAGNUT. Pretty weird!
Thanks for this post! I’m sending this to my older brother. We grew up in the 1960s with “Stan Freberg Presents The United States of America.” I still have the original LP!
@@KC6SOR Yes, I’ve listened to it on here a number of times over the last few years. I think it still stands up over time. The second album, wasn’t as good in my view!
For fans of old time radio, that’s Billy Idelson, who played Rush on Vic & Sade, with Frank Nelson on the Zagnut commercial. Both OTR royalty, along with Stan Freberg. I remember that Encyclopedia Brittanica commercial. When I was in high school, I knew a kid who was an exact double of the kid on the commercial and always thought it might actually be the kid I knew. Now it turns out it was Stan Freberg’s kid.
For those who may not know, Bill Idelson also played Herman Glimscher, Sally's sometime boyfriend, on The Dick Van Dyke Show. And he also did some writing for the show.
...And on top of everything else, Stan did a very funny spoof of "DRAGNET" called "ST. GEORGE AND THE DRAGONET". It sold a million copies. If you haven't heard it, it's on RU-vid.
I remember a slogan for Chun King from a billboard in 1962 or so. "Fried Rice in a can. Like convenient, man!" I remember from about the same time a TV commercial featuring the " Chun Kingston Trio." Met Stan in 1987. He very kindly autographed a couple of albums for me.
Oh, yeah: "Well, it makes a difference to the sheep", "He ruined the ending, one of the loveliest parts in the whole piece", "Don't sing about spiders, man, like I don't dig spiders", "Don't give me any more of that pling-pling-pling jazz". If you remember his spoof records, you know what I'm referring to.
The second Jeno's Pizza Rolls spot is hilarious, with all the commercial parodies invading the party. They gave a nod to Olsen & Johnson in the parody of Mrs. Olson (her name was Mrs. Johnson, get it?)
I didn't know that! Thanks! That spot is at 10:29 For those who may not know, "Mrs. Olsen" was a character in the Folger's "mountain-grown" coffee commercial.
freberg hated commercials....which is why he created these mini-masterpieces i dont think he gets enough credit for making ads "art" when i watched madmen, i kept waiting for them to introduce a stan freberg character and talk about a man with principles....he refused to have his radio show be sponsored by tobacco products
I love Stan Freberg Presents The United States of America." See Ben Franklin, below. "It's pretty hard to hit a porch (with a thrown copy of The Saturday Night Post) from the back of a horse."
Stan was a big part of my life. At age 3, I watched Beanie and Cecil where Stan was a writer, voice actor and puppeteer. In elementary school and junior high I enjoyed his comedy records. As a young adult working in broadcasting, Stan showed me how to apply humor to advertising. In middle age, as a university marketing professor, I taught students about audio theater using his famous "Stretching the Imagination" spot showing the creative aspects of radio. And as a professor, another professor and I wrote academic papers about him. I could probably say more, but Freberg fans out there might consider that a 412.
The only Southern gothic commercial I've ever seen. Note that as the "giblet gravy" is the principal ingredient, it can't have won a prize for "supporting role".
You've got to be kidding. Stan Freberg and Jesse White were quite different people. White was a successful comic actor, and the original Maytag laundry guy, who never had anything to do.
@@mike_minnick Oh, so Freeberg did the Jesse White Maytag ads, too? Amazing, even though I remember so many of these ads, up until this time I was only aware of his involvement with Chungking.
@@TroyOi I've never seen anything about stands involvement with Maytag. But Jesse White was somebody that he used fairly often although he wasn't exclusive to Stan
The pizza roll/Lark cigarette commercial with Moore and Silverheels is my all time favorite. I wonder how many would remember the original Lark commercial on 2022!
Absolutely brilliant stuff. Just beginning to learn about Stan, myself, and this was a great 'starter pack'. ;) Never cared for that Brittanica ad, though -- even when it was new, I thought the kid was way too rude. Nice to have some great trivia to go with it, though!
More trivia: in the PC version (now on Steam, but might be different) of the game "Zork: Grand Inquisitor", the main character checks his voice mail, and one of them is clearly the voice of Donavan Freberg. The main character says, "Isn't that the kid from those Encyclopedia Frobozzica commercials?" Bonus trivia: The printed material had a foldout timeline of the events in Zork. On it was a picture of Belboz the wizard, played by Stan Freberg.
I think that's Doodles Weaver in white sweater as homeowner in the Jacobsen lawn mower with sheep commercial. And the interviewer in suit sounds like Gary Owens, but doesn't look like Gary.
Yes. Donavan Freberg. Stan's son did the Britannica Commercials from 1986-1993. Here's the first Commercial Donavan did for EB: ru-vid.com/video/%D0%B2%D0%B8%D0%B4%D0%B5%D0%BE-ssb_-7lTOfI.html Donavan also did voice work on Charlie Brown during the Early 80s.
Stan was unfairly ignored by Madison Avenue because he was a successful maverick in advertising. He proved you could entertain people into remembering a product, and the big guys didn’t know how to do it.
@@markschildberg1667 Part of that was probably due to "Green Chri$tma$", his biting 1958 satire on Christmas ads and commercials. That got a lot of negative reaction from advertisers.
@Roy G Biv Love the youtube name, LOL! Sort of reminds me of the color codes for resistors. I think a guy at the New Jersey antique radio club uses that as his nickname too....red, orange yellow...
The only thing that ever got me confused between the two was Ward Kimball's "Dad Can I Borrow the Car". I would swear this was Stan: ru-vid.com/video/%D0%B2%D0%B8%D0%B4%D0%B5%D0%BE-_wzaPpZKAJo.html and the voice throughout is Jesse. (Still no idea whose lower face that is!)
Those good folks in the elevator are probably silently thinking, "We've just flown in from Vegas. The kids and In-Laws are tired and hungry and this big, fat guy gets out of the elevator mumbling about f*****g 'chop suey' in a can! We're going to Shake Shack".
These seem quite experimental. Judging by the fashion, acting and video/film technique, these look like about 1962-69. Question: were these actually used in broadcast TV?
All of them yes. Some are very much remembered by older Americans. A few are from the early 70's. The soup ad was the most expensive commercial ever made at the time.
I’m 69 years old, and I remember seeing some of these commercials when they were on the air-especially the chubby rich guy complaining about wrinkled prunes.
