Tuesday, May 11, 2021

THE COUNTYNENTAL

THE CONTINENTAL
1952-1954 CBS, SYND

THE COUNTYNENTAL
MAD #14, August 1954
w: Harvey Kurtzman
a: Jack Davis

A short-lived radio and TV show where a Latin Lothario (Renzo Cesana) spoke directly into the camera from his penthouse apartment seducing the lonely housewife viewing the show. A show that would probably not exist post-MeToo.
Better known for recurring sketches whenever Christopher Walken hosted Saturday Night Live.

He was also parodied in cartoons around then.

1 comment:

  1. Shortly before Mad's parody came out, there was one in Bughouse #3, called The Trans-Continental. It's not online anywhere that I can find, but the splash panel is in the book The Sincerest Form of Parody. (The book also notes that there were several of spoofs on sketch comedy shows of the time too, by Ernie Kovacs, Red Skelton, and Jerry Lewis.)

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