I got to sleep in on the morning of Friday, July 20, 2012, and that felt nice. The convention was underway and we’d had a pretty late night the night before and this one would be even later. So I didn’t bother with Chuck McCann’s morning “Let’s Have Fun Presentation”, nor Silent Cinema, nor the ITJ breakfast (considering I wasn’t invited), and not even ‘breakfast on your own.’ I just slept in. Then at 10am I meandered down to the Grand Council meeting. As has been standard, there has not been any ‘business’ discussed, so the meeting was just restricted to the two convention bids. I was involved with the first.
My good friend Bob Satterfield had decided that it was now or never in hosting a return convention to Hollywood, so he put in a hearty bid, highlighting the many events, film locations, co-star graves, and ‘potential’ for celebrities (without naming any). I agreed to help support his convention in any way needed. For the bid itself, all I was required to do was to advance the slide show and wear the special red convention t-shirt. I had helped design the autograph display on the back. Bob went through a little routine where he wore a Three Stooges shirt when he began the bid, and then I called him on his cell phone to remind him to take it off to reveal the new shirt underneath. Then Lori, Marcia, and I all removed our shirts to show the same one underneath.
Before the unmasking
Bob delivers his rousing presentation. I am on keyboards.
The red crew: Lori, Ed, me, Bob, Marcia
Once Bob presented his bid, Roger Robinson put in a bid on behalf of Chris Coffey for a convention that would take place in various parts of England including Stan’s hometown of Ulverston. Although the bid was good, Roger encouraged everyone to vote for Hollywood ’14, and to consider the England convention for the 2016. So that’s what happened: we’ll be in Hollywood in two years.
Lunch was on our own again, so I went back to JD’s Tavern in the hotel with David, the Wileys, and Gary Cohen. Gary had a tempting mixed drink that put the seeds in my head for an alcohol-laden evening.
Gary and the waitress, for whatever reason
After lunch the next event was the Parade of Tents at 1pm. When we had filled out our registration info, we selected our tent and whether or not were the Grand Sheik. Since there are no rules that state what is required of a tent, I still maintain that I am the Grand Sheik of the A-Haunting We Will Go tent of Dayton, even though it is completely inactive. This particular Parade was unusual in that they called every Grand Sheik up to the microphone, regardless as to whether they were in line for the parade or not.
Those guys at the Parade of Tents
A convention wouldn’t be a convention without Steve and his disposable camera
The Chicago Bacon Grabbers
Lee and Dee comprise The Tree in a Test Tube tent. Always have, always will.
Savannah and Bill watch from the sidelines
The Way Out West tent
More of the Way Out West tent with an original Sons banner from the Sons of the Desert film
The Perfect Day tent of Columbus, with young Bobby, a kid after my own heart
When my time at the mike came, I said something along the lines of, “I actually thought this was the Trivia Contest… (wait for laugh)… and so far I haven’t known a single answer. No actually I’ve been in the Sons of the Desert since I was eight years old (indicating ‘this tall’)… and now I have a grandson, so do you have any idea how old that makes YOU people?”
It got an okay laugh. And several remarked that it did in fact make them feel old. Mission accomplished.
Regaling the crowd (or at least the back of Kathy’s head) with my ascerbic wit
The Trivia Contest began at 2:30. Unlike the last dozen or so years (excepting Amsterdam), this one was not hosted by Henry and John. Instead Scott and Dwain returned to the podium for the first time since 1994. The format was brisk, challenging, and fast-paced, so I liked that aspect. However, I was highly offended that there was no sign-up sheet and instead teams were hand-picked by Scott. Therefore David, Peter, and I were poised to defend our title of two-time champions, yet we sat idly by and watched the contest. This doesn’t take away anything from Ray and Kay, who were the victors because they would have been extremely tough to beat. But I guess we’ll never know if they could have beaten the former champs…
Indicating three lack-of-defeats, or as we interpreted it, victories
After the ‘contest’, we congregated in the foyer to celebrate our lack of defeat. Oh and David, Jimmy, and I had our caricatures made from a local artist hanging out. He had completed a much better caricature of Lori, Marcia, Lee, Dee, and Bob the day before. Ours was terrible.
One of the better caricatures: Lori, Marcia, Lee, Dee, and Bob – the ladies captured the best of the five
Marcia and Bob exercising their pointing
With Jeffrey Weissman, who was the Stan Laurel imperonator at the convention, and had portrayed George McFly in the second and third installments of Back to the Future when contract negotiations failed with Crispin Glover
About to get immoratlized in caricature
Egads! At least our necks were realistic
With the caricaturist
There was a local restaurant called Ollie’s that had somewhat of a Laurel and Hardy theme. Since dinner was on our own again, we decided to have our eats there. The food was decent enough but it’s tough to screw up a Reuben. David and I sat with a few members of the Columbus tent: Mark Turner and Karen and Bobby Thikkurissy. Bobby was roughly the same age that I was when I attended my first convention. It was a treat to talk to someone that age who knew a thing or two about classic comedy. As David said, “how many kids these days know who Margaret Dumont is??”
This is Ollie’s
Caricature victims at Ollie’s
Joining the Columbus contituents
The Wileys, Rick, and Ed enjoy Rick’s plate of food
Gangbusters
At 8pm was the Palace Theatre Variety Show. The theatre itself was about four blocks away from the Radisson. I had very strong reservations about having a ‘contemporary’ vaudeville show as our main event of the convention. However it took no time at all for the acts to win me over.
The attractive Palace Theatre
On the edge of our seats
Co-chairs do a number on the theatre chairs
The show was kicked off by a local R&B band known as the River Birds. I didn’t realize until after the fact that our convention host Dave Stevenson was playing in the band. This was followed by the amazing Samuel James, a guitar virtuoso and ‘root troubadour’, who kept the crowd enraptured with his music, storytelling, and dexterity on the guitar – which he would spin around in impossible configurations as he played.
But the best part of the show was Emo Philips, who acted as emcee to the evening’s events, and did two sets of stand-up comedy, the first of which occurred after Samuel James. I recall Emo from the 1980’s, when he was a frequent visitor on the Late Night shows and occasional HBO comedy special. I recalled that David Letterman once told him in an interview, “I’d like to swat you with a stick.” I naturally reminded him of that later that night. I always liked his comedy and he was a riot during the vaudeville show.
With the very friendly Samuel James
Next up was Carla Rhodes, who describes herself as a Rock ‘n Roll Ventriloquist. I don’t know what the politically correct term for the dummies are these days (but I could tell from the look on her face that it wasn’t ‘dummy’), but she had two of them, the centerpiece being Cecil Sinclair, a crotchety, dirty old dummy… er, flesh-challenged man. Her act was funny and she had talent, although I think she made the audience of Sons squirm more than the other acts. (By the way, the event was open to the general public as well).
With Carla and Cecil and an over-zealous Jamie McKenna as Ollie in the background
Emo did his second and final set and then we had a screening of the Laurel and Hardy silent That’s My Wife. David, Peter, and I were busily making mental notes about the minutiae of the film for when we make our triumphant return two years later. The evening concluded with the entire cast and Becky Kane singing Shine On Harvest Moon.
With Jeffrey and Jamie as the boys; they went through a whole routine of trying to pose without gettting tied up in each other
With convention hosts Ali and Dave Stevenson
After the show I stuck around to get photos with Carla and Cecil, meet Samuel James, and get another photo with Emo. Since the event was opened up to the public, there were a lot of autograph seekers trying to get him, so the line was rather long. In the end, he told us he’d meet us back at the hotel. So we walked back while he took care of the other fans.
Back in the hotel lobby, we hung out and chatted with Emo for about a half an hour. I didn’t even think to bring along anything meaningful for him to sign, so I just had him sign my ticket stub. How amateur of me. He’s a fun guy to talk to. While we were hanging out, someone from the nearby tattoo convention recognized him and ran out to grab an Emo CD from his car to have it signed. Seriously, this guy was more prepared than I was and he didn’t even know Emo would be there.
Emo was in a very picture-friendly mood
Perhaps this one makes more sense
My signed ticket stub. He doesn’t care for Mormons.
He said that the pole ‘called to’ him
And then apparently it called to me
It was almost 1am at this point and David, Gary, and I attempted to get a drink at JD’s, only to find that they were closing. However, we ran into Jeffrey Weissman in the lobby and he told us that there was a hospitality suite on the penthouse going quite strong, so we headed up there directly.
Since my pal Cliff was hosting, we had no problem gaining an all-access pass to the premises, the snacks, and the little bottles of vodka that would ultimately be our downfall. We stayed in there are partied with the vaudeville cast and a few other Sons members until almost 3am. I think David almost fell off his shoes at one point. It was a rip roaring time and probably the most fun I had during the whole convention. It was a hoot listening to David chat with Gary (“all men sing when they’re in their cup”), talk about my history in the Sons with Jeffrey, play with Carla and Jordan’s Laurel and Hardy ventriloquist ‘things’, and listen to Jamie McKenna play the ukulele.
David crashes the party with me
Spiffed
Carla’s friend Jordan and her have some fun with Laurel and Hardy dummies
We convince Emo that he should help us protest the trivia contest as well
With Carla, Jordan, and the little guys
Jamie strums on the ukulele
Toasting with Jeffrey McFly
All men sing when they’re in their cup
Late night debauchery with David and Gary
I have no idea if Bob heard me come in during the middle of the night, but I’m not sure how he could stay asleep with the bed spinning like that. No sweat, I’d be back down resuming activities the next morning around 9:30am.
The 2012 Sons of the Desert convention will continue…
Leave a Reply