SAW HIM NOT ONCE BUT THREE TIMES...
Yes, I can count the times I saw him "In Person" on one hand...
First time was when my Dad took for a a graduation lunch at the Brown Derby in Hollywood...He was at a table that HAD a phone...
The would have been early June in 1966...
The would have been early June in 1966...
Second time he was actually before me was when he spoke to a USC marketing class I took during my undergraduate days...
That would have been a year later in 1967...
The final time he was eating a nice huge (and very tasty looking sandwich) at Nate n' Al Deli in Beverly Hills...
The would have been when I was living on the West side of LA and running Century Cable TV Ad Sales in the late 80's...
He was alone, but I didn't want to disturb him...
He looked like he was savoring that sandwich
so damn much...
The man was a comedy idol to me back when
and he still is today...
He is STAN FREBERG...
Born in Pasadena, Stan continues to be active today...
He is now 88 and has had a more than fulfilling venture into multiple worlds of media and advertising and performing...
Let's take a gander at some of his work over the decades...
He has had a long and fruitful career in
radio, TV, movies, and advertising...
Plus he has done voice work for Warner Bros and Disney animation films...
Early on Stan made his voice work as he scored
a gig putting his fist in a puppet..
BUT what a puppet it was...
It was on "Time For Beany" on KTLA, Channel 5 in LA...
Later the show moved over to channel 11...
Local "LIVE" TV from the very early days ...
Just a week or two back my friend in LA, Marc Graue (who is a VO king with his own famous studio) told me the story of him wandering the Channel 5 lot...
His Dad was a famous TV personality in that era...He was watching them do the "Beany and Cecil " show "LIVE" when he was a tyke and they had to use heaps of lights on the set...It was early TV and the puppets needed all that illumination...
Well, it was so hot that the Cecil puppet actually melted on Stan's hand one day...
Ah, the perils of "LIVE" TV back then...
He really started to hit his stride when he produced a whole series of satirical records for the Capitol label beginning in 1951...
So many top hits...
Here is a parody of a Harry Belafonte song...
This whimsical record also was a chart topper for Stan...
And the CLASSIC "Green Christmas" hit the top of the charts in 1959...
I love this take off of the Lawrence Welk Show...
Stan also had some of the most clever network radio shows ever produced...
He was a Summer fill in on CBS for Jack Benny...
He had a huge sable of comedy VO folks like Jessie White, June Foray and Peter Leeds.,...
Next in his career came the onslaught of creative and FUNNY TV commercials...
Some TV work...a funny lawnmower commercial...
Stan in a promo pix with the owner of Jeno's...Watch his classic spot...
Famous Freberg spot for Chun King...
He even made selling prunes a hoot...
In later years Stan appeared less and less on TV...
This interview with Dick Cavett might shed some answers
on why he stayed off the tube so much...
And this shows the serious side of Mr. Freberg...
I so recall us getting these spots to air at K-RAM Radio in Las Vegas...
Back then they were so far out...Blew all of us away at the radio station...
Here is Stan doing an interview for a TV show from down under...Stan appears with some super video and stories about his career...
Plus Stan voiced many PSA's and commercials...Here is one:
All is said and done...
for me this sums up the
COMEDY GENIUS
of Stan Freberg...
A promo spot for the Radio Advertising Bureau in 1964...
What a line...
"Cue the..."
What a talent
STAN FREBERG...
p.s. I would like to meet up with him ONE more time...
I hope that happens...
p.p.s. Just hours after I posted this blog Stan Freberg passed...
Now I will NEVER see him a fourth time...
SOB!
