Speaker 1: You're listening to Part Time Genius, the production of Kaleidoscope
Speaker 1: and iHeartRadio. Guess what? Well?
Speaker 2: What's that mango?
Speaker 1: So I have a riddle for you. What do h
Speaker 1: g Wells? Were the Worlds? The Carry Grant movie, His
Speaker 1: Girl Friday, and the Mona Lisa all have in common?
Speaker 2: Man?
Speaker 3: Starting this one out with a with a tough one,
Speaker 3: I'm gonna go.
Speaker 2: I've got a guess.
Speaker 3: I'm gonna go with things that inspired the musical artist Prince.
Speaker 1: Maybe. But the answer I was looking for was that
Speaker 1: they're all works that are in the public domain.
Speaker 3: All right, Okay, yeah, that makes sense, which means I
Speaker 3: can set up a Mona Lisa stand in my front
Speaker 3: yard and sell Prince with out getting sued now right.
Speaker 1: Yeah, finally a second career option for you. That what
Speaker 1: I've been waiting for. But creative works in the public
Speaker 1: domain aren't protected by intellectual property law, So that means
Speaker 1: you can take it, you can use it, you can
Speaker 1: remix it, you can sell it in your front yard
Speaker 1: to all your neighbors, and you don't have to worry
Speaker 1: about copyright. So if you want to make a movie
Speaker 1: adaptation of War the World's starring the Mona Lisa. It
Speaker 1: might be difficult creatively, but you know you can do
Speaker 1: it now without getting into any sort of legal trouble.
Speaker 3: Well, when you look at it, the World of the
Speaker 3: World's version that had ice Cube, but that got something
Speaker 3: like I think it was like four percent on rotten tomatoes,
Speaker 3: so it's probably due for a remake.
Speaker 1: Yeah, And I know these are kind of silly examples,
Speaker 1: but public domain is really important for art and culture
Speaker 1: because without it we wouldn't have masterpieces like Westside Story,
Speaker 1: which was based on Romeo and Juliet, or The Little Mermaid,
Speaker 1: which was based on Hans Christian Anderson's fairy tale. And
Speaker 1: public domain also helps is archive important cultural works and
Speaker 1: make them more accessible so anyone can enjoy them. And
Speaker 1: since it is officially twenty twenty six, that means a
Speaker 1: whole new crop of works has entered the public domain.
Speaker 1: And today we're going to tell you about nine of
Speaker 1: our favorites, from an iconic abstract painting to a hard
Speaker 1: boiled detective novel to a voluptuous cartoon who began life
Speaker 1: as a dog. So let's dive in.
Speaker 3: Hey, their podcast listeners, welcome to Part time Genius. I'm
Speaker 3: Will Pearson and as always, I'm here with my good
Speaker 3: friend Mangesh hot ticketter and over there in the booth
Speaker 3: as our PALIN producer Dylan Fagan. Now I'm gonna be honest, Mengo.
Speaker 3: At first, I was very confused by his outfit today
Speaker 3: because he's wearing a plain white T shirt and what
Speaker 3: looks like two capital l's on it, and I have
Speaker 3: to be honest, it's a little bit boring for Dylan's standards.
Speaker 3: But then I remembered something he said this before the holidays.
Speaker 3: He said, guys, in the new year, I'm coming at
Speaker 3: you with more riddles, and I didn't really know what
Speaker 3: it meant. So I've been thinking about this one. I'm
Speaker 3: glad we had a few minutes before to just sort
Speaker 3: of stare and think about this. Those aren't l's. This
Speaker 3: this is my theory, Mango. I think they are right angles.
Speaker 3: So there's a right angle and then a copy of
Speaker 3: a right angle, which would mean can.
Speaker 2: You guess it?
Speaker 1: Ll cool?
Speaker 3: Joe, so close, so close, Mango, But I think it
Speaker 3: means copyright, get it.
Speaker 2: There's it, there's a right angle copyright. So well done.
Speaker 2: Dylan really started to be off.
Speaker 1: H I love that he started the new year with
Speaker 1: a T shirt. Pun I feel like that's an old
Speaker 1: Romanian folk tradition.
Speaker 3: Definitely, definitely that Dylan always observes. All right, So Mango,
Speaker 3: before we get into this, remind me when exactly do
Speaker 3: works enter the public domain?
Speaker 1: So that is a tricky question because the timeline isn't
Speaker 1: consistent throughout the world. Copyright duration varies from country to country,
Speaker 1: and it can depend on the type of work as
Speaker 1: well as whether the work was published or unpublished, or
Speaker 1: if at some point the copyright laps. Now people actually
Speaker 1: have flow charts to figure this stuff out. They also
Speaker 1: have copyright lawyers. It's probably a better use of time
Speaker 1: and money. But for longtime fans, we did an episode
Speaker 1: all about copyright, and this was back in twenty nineteen
Speaker 1: and it covers some of this in more detail. But
Speaker 1: for our purposes today, we're just going to focus on
Speaker 1: the fact that in the United States many works enter
Speaker 1: the public domain ninety five years after their publication or
Speaker 1: their release date. So this year that includes books, movies,
Speaker 1: and music compositions that came out in nineteen thirty plus
Speaker 1: sound recordings from nineteen twenty five. And like I said,
Speaker 1: different types of works have different timelines.
Speaker 2: Okay, that's interesting.
Speaker 3: It's always interesting when they come up with, you know,
Speaker 3: numbers like ninety five. But anyway, I'm gonna kick things
Speaker 3: off for this episode with a legendary cartoon character, and
Speaker 3: that is Betty Boop. Of course, the big eyed, high
Speaker 3: voice temptress was introduced to the world in a nineteen
Speaker 3: thirty animated short. This was by Fleischer Studios and was
Speaker 3: called Dizzy Dishes, which is now in the public domain,
Speaker 3: but of course later versions of Betty are still under copyright.
Speaker 3: And that's important to note because then its first appearance,
Speaker 3: Betty was actually originally a dog.
Speaker 1: That's so weird, like a dog with a tail.
Speaker 3: Well, she's on two legs and she's quite human, and
Speaker 3: she has that short, curly haircut of black dress and garters,
Speaker 3: but for some reason her ears are floppy and kind
Speaker 3: of spaniel like, so.
Speaker 1: That is interesting. What happens in this short film.
Speaker 3: Well, it centers on another character named Bembo, who's also
Speaker 3: a dog, and he's a waiter at a busy jazz
Speaker 3: club full of these anthropomorphized and animals, and Betty only
Speaker 3: appears briefly, so she's a singer on stage who distracts
Speaker 3: Bimbo from his work.
Speaker 2: So, actually you should watch this quick clip.
Speaker 4: Here we come mister right on the way.
Speaker 2: I have roasted up with a greatly year.
Speaker 4: Doosional, I have my.
Speaker 5: I have my mom.
Speaker 1: Oh that's funny. So so even as a dog, she
Speaker 1: was doing the boo boop a dupe line.
Speaker 2: Yeah, you nailed at with that. You did it.
Speaker 3: You did it so well then, And that was there
Speaker 3: from the very beginning because Betty was based on a
Speaker 3: real life anger name Helen Kane, and Helen was famous
Speaker 3: for that kind of baby voice scat singing like that.
Speaker 3: But you know, soon after Dizzy Dishes came out, the
Speaker 3: animators realized that Betty had more potential as a human.
Speaker 3: So in nineteen thirty two, she lost those spaniel ears.
Speaker 3: They replaced them with her signature hoop earrings, and interestingly,
Speaker 3: Bembo remained a dog. So there was this weird moment
Speaker 3: where they were in this interspecies relationship, which didn't sit
Speaker 3: well with the censor board at the time. So as
Speaker 3: a result, Bembo got removed from the franchise and Betty, well,
Speaker 3: Betty became a star.
Speaker 1: That is hilarious. But you know, if you look at
Speaker 1: like kind of another way. It could be the plot
Speaker 1: of I don't know, like a horror movie, right, like
Speaker 1: this woman turns into a dog, turns back into a
Speaker 1: human and realizes she was dating a dog between.
Speaker 2: It's true, it's true.
Speaker 3: It's actually funny that you mentioned horror because if you
Speaker 3: heard of this trend of movie studios turning public domain
Speaker 3: characters into these slasher movies like Winnie the Boo, Blood
Speaker 3: and Honey, you've seen these before?
Speaker 1: What? Yeah?
Speaker 3: Yeah, it's a real movie. And it came out in
Speaker 3: twenty twenty three. And last year a company called vm
Speaker 3: I Worldwide, which brought us Popeye the Slayer Man, they
Speaker 3: announced plans to make a Betty Boop slasher now that
Speaker 3: she's in a public domain. It's about a group of
Speaker 3: horror podcast investigators who break into an abandoned theater and
Speaker 3: find themselves face to face with a homicidal Betty Boop.
Speaker 1: You know, it reminds me of pride and prejudices and zombies, right,
Speaker 1: Like that idea of taking the old material and reinventing
Speaker 1: it in a new way.
Speaker 2: That's exactly right.
Speaker 1: I know we are not horror podcasters, but I kind
Speaker 1: of want to tell you, like, how do we make
Speaker 1: that happen?
Speaker 2: I have no idea, but I'm with you if we
Speaker 2: figure it out.
Speaker 1: Well, from one boop to another. Our next public domain
Speaker 1: entrant is a comic strip character named Blondie, whose maiden
Speaker 1: name was Boop a Doope. Now you don't meet many
Speaker 1: Boopa dupes these days, but Blondie, if you're a fan
Speaker 1: of the old comic strip, became a bumstead when she
Speaker 1: married Dagwood. Now did you ever see the comic strip
Speaker 1: growing up in Alabama?
Speaker 2: Not really, to be honest, No.
Speaker 1: Yeah, it was definitely in ours growing up both in
Speaker 1: New Jersey and then North Carolina and then Delaware too,
Speaker 1: so like it was a standard in our house. But
Speaker 1: the strip, created by Chick Young, debuted in September nineteen thirty,
Speaker 1: and these earliest versions of the characters are the ones
Speaker 1: now in the public domain. And you might be surprised
Speaker 1: to learn that Blondie was a fun loving flapper, not
Speaker 1: a housewife, and Dagwood was the son of an uptight
Speaker 1: railroad tycoon. Dagwood is well dressed with sleek black hair
Speaker 1: in these early strips, and Blondie is downright glamorous and
Speaker 1: It's interesting that as the strip evolved, Dagwood's appearance gets scruffier,
Speaker 1: but Blondie always remains youthful and pretty.
Speaker 2: Now.
Speaker 1: Unfortunately, the strip wasn't a hit at first. This was
Speaker 1: during the Great Depression and readers were not interested in
Speaker 1: the adventures of like a trust fund kid and his
Speaker 1: gorgeous girlfriend. So Chick Young actually pivoted his comic strip.
Speaker 1: He had Dagwood and Blondie get married, and crucially, Dagwood's
Speaker 1: parents didn't approve their son marrying a lower class woman,
Speaker 1: so they disinherited him, and that kind of left the
Speaker 1: Bumpsteads on their own to make a living.
Speaker 3: You know, when I think of Dagwood Bumpstead, I actually
Speaker 3: don't think about class mobility. I think about sandwiches.
Speaker 1: Yeah, that's right, and those came later too. So once
Speaker 1: Dagwood's character became a clumsy, hungry office worker, Chick Young
Speaker 1: explained piling up fridge leftovers between two slices of bread
Speaker 1: was the only meal that Dagwood knew how to make,
Speaker 1: and the association between the character and the sandwich is
Speaker 1: actually so strong that Merriam Webster defines a Dagwood as
Speaker 1: a many layered sandwich. That said. Producer Mary told us
Speaker 1: that in Maine, her hometown state, a Dagwood is served
Speaker 1: in a pitapocket, and I guess that's because you can
Speaker 1: stuff a lot of fillings in there. Either way, here's
Speaker 1: a bonus back for you. In the mid aus Chick
Speaker 1: Young's son actually tried to get a Dagwood restaurant chain
Speaker 1: off the gun that was supposed to feature a menu
Speaker 1: that had pound and a half sandwiches, but unfortunately that
Speaker 1: never happens. So, yeah, its own horror story.
Speaker 3: That's exactly right. All right, Well, here's something I was
Speaker 3: surprised to see. So Piet Mandrion's painting composition with red,
Speaker 3: blue and yellow. It's now in the public domain. Now,
Speaker 3: I'm sure you've seen this before. It's the one with
Speaker 3: the large red square in the top right corner, blue
Speaker 3: and yellow in the two other corners, and some white
Speaker 3: in between there. Now, it's easy to focus on those
Speaker 3: rectangles of color, but what really makes it pop is
Speaker 3: the black horizontal and vertical lines that outline these. So
Speaker 3: it turns out that Mandrion took his straight lines very seriously.
Speaker 3: In nineteen seventeen, he actually found that a magazine with
Speaker 3: fellow artist Teo von Dusburg. It was called The Style,
Speaker 3: which just means you might guess Style and Dutch. It
Speaker 3: was a place where they and other like minded artists
Speaker 3: could share their ideas about art. But in nineteen twenty three,
Speaker 3: after von Dusberg started incorporating these diagonal lines into his art,
Speaker 3: Mandrion formally left it in protest of this.
Speaker 1: I love the idea that like two fellow artists could
Speaker 1: be so upset over the idea of incorporating something like diagonal.
Speaker 3: Lines, so offensive, so offensive to some people.
Speaker 1: Why did Mondrion hate diagonal so much?
Speaker 3: You know, he just felt really strongly that horizontal and
Speaker 3: vertical lines were aesthetically better And it's funny, I mean,
Speaker 3: like the thing is though he wasn't wrong. Research has
Speaker 3: actually shown that people tend to perceive horizontal and vertical
Speaker 3: lines more easily than diagonal ones. It's a phenomenon known
Speaker 3: as the oblique effect. And in two thousand, psychologists from
Speaker 3: the University of Liverpool actually published a study in which
Speaker 3: they put Mandrion's lines to the test. So they showed
Speaker 3: subject slides of eight different paintings by Mondrian. They also
Speaker 3: showed each painting in eight different orientations, so a bunch
Speaker 3: of different angles for a total of sixty images. Then
Speaker 3: the researchers found that participants preferred paintings where they were
Speaker 3: shown in an orientation with horizontal and vertical lines rather
Speaker 3: than the diagonal ones. They also preferred the paintings when
Speaker 3: they were shown in the way Mandrion intended them to
Speaker 3: be oriented. So apparently the guy actually knew what he
Speaker 3: was talking about.
Speaker 1: That's incredible that it's like backed by science, but also
Speaker 1: like the idea that like you could put a crapozoid
Speaker 1: in front of him and you just be furious.
Speaker 2: It's true. It's true. Yeah, it's offensive.
Speaker 1: I do love that, like now that his most famous
Speaker 1: work is in the public domain, that it'll be interesting
Speaker 1: to see how people play with it, right, you re imagine, Yeah,
Speaker 1: so will This next work that's entering the public domain
Speaker 1: is both a great book and a great movie. It's
Speaker 1: called The Maltese Falcon. It's by Dashal Hammett. Have you
Speaker 1: read it or seen it?
Speaker 3: I'm gonna have to confess it's on the list, but
Speaker 3: I have neither read nor seen it before.
Speaker 2: How about you?
Speaker 1: Yeah, I've both read it and seen it. But this
Speaker 1: is Hammett's third novel. It's a master work, and it
Speaker 1: actually started as a serialized story in Black Mask Magazine.
Speaker 1: It's the story of a tough detective, Sam Spade, who
Speaker 1: gets hired by the mysterious Miss Wonderley to help find
Speaker 1: her sister. And as with any great noir, has got
Speaker 1: lots of twists and turns, and that's how it ended
Speaker 1: up being turned into a hit movie starring Humphrey Bogart
Speaker 1: in nineteen forty.
Speaker 2: That's not in the public domain yet.
Speaker 1: No this year is just the novel. But in addition
Speaker 1: to being a great story, it totally revolutionized the detective genre.
Speaker 2: And how's that?
Speaker 1: I mean, this is incredible to think about. So before
Speaker 1: the Maltese Falcon, it was the British detective story that
Speaker 1: sort of ruled mystery stories. Right, Like mystery writers tend
Speaker 1: to follow rules set forth by people like Edgar Allan Poe,
Speaker 1: Arthur Conan Doyle and Agatha Christine and the basic ingredients
Speaker 1: where you've got this genius, eccentric detective and often they
Speaker 1: have a steadfast partner and together they solve an unusual crime, right,
Speaker 1: and the clues are complicated and they're kind of sub
Speaker 1: dropped in through a slow moving plot for the most part.
Speaker 1: But Dashel Hammitt, who is an American, gives a detective
Speaker 1: who is more of an anti hero. Right. Spade is
Speaker 1: hard boiled, he's violent, he follows his own code of ethics.
Speaker 1: His world is gritty, and this isn't a place where
Speaker 1: like crime is an outlier. Right, criminals are everywhere. They're
Speaker 1: kind of par for the course now. Hammitt also infused
Speaker 1: his story with more action and also a colloquial dialogue
Speaker 1: than readers had ever seen before, and in doing so,
Speaker 1: he created a new template for detective novels, and since
Speaker 1: then it's inspired thousands of imitators.
Speaker 2: I love that. All Right, Well, we have to take
Speaker 2: a quick break.
Speaker 3: But when we come back, a song that changed blues
Speaker 3: forever and the inside scoop on the three Stooges, So
Speaker 3: don't go anywhere.
Speaker 1: Welcome back to Part Time Genius. We're talking about nine
Speaker 1: works of art that are in the public domain as
Speaker 1: of January first, and now that we're in twenty twenty six,
Speaker 1: I can tell you that we are planning a big
Speaker 1: year here on the show. So be sure to subscribe
Speaker 1: on your favorite podcast app. We also love hearing from you,
Speaker 1: so let us know if you have a question or
Speaker 1: idea we should explore, or if you'd like one of
Speaker 1: our official membership cards. We do have a few left,
Speaker 1: so give us a call at three oh two, four
Speaker 1: oh five five nine two five. You can also email
Speaker 1: us at high Geniuses at gmail dot com. That's Hi
Speaker 1: Geniuses at gmail dot com, or you can find us
Speaker 1: on blue Sky and Instagram at part time Genius. Okay, well,
Speaker 1: so what is our next public domain work?
Speaker 3: All right, Well, before the break, you've talked about how
Speaker 3: the novel The Maltese Falcon is now in the public domain,
Speaker 3: but we have to wait another decade for the film
Speaker 3: to join it there. But last year Eric Maria remarks,
Speaker 3: novel All Quiet on the Western Front On entered the
Speaker 3: public domain, and this year it's now joined by the film.
Speaker 1: This is one of those films that I've actually never
Speaker 1: seen as much as I've heard about it, just because
Speaker 1: I'm not as into war films. But tell me a
Speaker 1: little bit about it.
Speaker 3: Well, if you're not into war films, this one actually
Speaker 3: became an instant classic because of its realistic depiction of war.
Speaker 3: So it is pretty intense it stunned American audiences, who
Speaker 3: often had to collect themselves for a moment before quietly
Speaker 3: leaving the theater. Critics gave the World War I film
Speaker 3: glowing reviews, and All Quiet won the Academy Award for
Speaker 3: Outstanding Production, which was the early name for Best Picture.
Speaker 3: Director Lewis Milestone also won Best Director. But when it
Speaker 3: was released in Germany and December of nineteen thirty, about
Speaker 3: seven months after the US premiere, the reaction gave the
Speaker 3: world a sense of things to come. Nazi protests broke out,
Speaker 3: including one incident in which they released mice and set
Speaker 3: off stink bombs during a screening of the film. Yeah
Speaker 3: for Real, And they wanted the film banned for what
Speaker 3: they claim was slander of German war heroes, and they
Speaker 3: felt it was created by a filmmaking industry dominated by
Speaker 3: Jewish Americans. So the Variety headline read quote Berlin riot
Speaker 3: over all Quiet, as much anti Semitic as anything else,
Speaker 3: and the Nazis got what they wanted. The film was
Speaker 3: banned in Germany for quote damaging the country's reputation. Two
Speaker 3: years later, Hitler became Chancellor and the film wouldn't screen
Speaker 3: in Germany again. Until nineteen fifty two.
Speaker 1: That's crazy. I had no idea, but you know, I
Speaker 1: do remember hearing about a German remake that came out.
Speaker 1: I don't know, just like a few.
Speaker 2: Years ago, right, Yeah, it was not long ago at all.
Speaker 3: It was in twenty twenty two, and it won a
Speaker 3: ton of awards, including Oscars for Best Cinematography, Best International
Speaker 3: Feature Film, and the critical response was overwhelmingly positive, although
Speaker 3: some people said basically that nothing could top the nineteen
Speaker 3: thirty film or the original novel. They're sort of in
Speaker 3: a league of their own.
Speaker 1: Okay, so I already told you about one great detective
Speaker 1: who's now in the public domain, Sam Spain. But here
Speaker 1: is another, the iconic Nancy Drew. Now. The first novels
Speaker 1: featuring the teen detective were published in nineteen thirty, The
Speaker 1: Secret of the Old Clock, The Hidden Staircase, The Bungalow Mystery,
Speaker 1: and the Mystery at Lilac Inn. And there's actually a
Speaker 1: bit of mystery behind.
Speaker 2: Them, a case fit for Nancy Drew.
Speaker 1: Maybe, so for many years the public didn't know who
Speaker 1: wrote Nancy Drew. The series was created by a company
Speaker 1: called Stratmeier Syndicate, which released the books under pseudonym Carolyn Keene.
Speaker 1: Authors who wrote Nancy Drew books had to sign a
Speaker 1: contract waiving any rights to talk about their work. But
Speaker 1: in nineteen eighty, Stratameier got caught up in a lawsuit
Speaker 1: after signing a deal that allowed Simon and Schuster to
Speaker 1: publish new Nancy Drew books. The book's hardcover publisher, Grossen Dunlap,
Speaker 1: suit to try to prevent this quote unfair competition, and
Speaker 1: as a result of that lawsuit, the original author had
Speaker 1: to take the stand. So that's how the world learned
Speaker 1: that Mildred wert Benson wrote twenty three of the first
Speaker 1: thirty Nancy Drew novels. The shame of it is that
Speaker 1: she earned just one hundred and twenty five dollars per book,
Speaker 1: which is about twenty three hundred dollars in today's term.
Speaker 2: Wow. Knowing how many of those have sold, that is
Speaker 2: that's crazy.
Speaker 1: Yeah, there were fifty six novels in the original Nancy
Speaker 1: Drew series, and it's believed they were the work of
Speaker 1: several ghostwriters. But Simon and Schuster emerged from that nineteen
Speaker 1: eighty lawsuit with the ability to publish Nancy Drew books,
Speaker 1: and they're still doing that today all still under the
Speaker 1: name Carolyn Keene, of course, but now the first four
Speaker 1: novels they actually belong to everyone.
Speaker 2: Wow.
Speaker 3: Well, there are probably as many Nancy Drew books as
Speaker 3: there are covers of the popular song Saint Louis Blues,
Speaker 3: which was originally composed by W. C.
Speaker 2: Handy. This was back in nineteen fourteen.
Speaker 1: Yeah, and one of those covers was by my fourth
Speaker 1: grade middle school band HB. Du Pont in Delaware. I'm
Speaker 1: sure that's the recording that everyone is cleimbed.
Speaker 3: I think it's the first one that comes up when
Speaker 3: you look it up online.
Speaker 2: So well, maybe not.
Speaker 3: But there is one that stands out from the rest,
Speaker 3: and this is, of course Bessie Smith's nineteen twenty five rendition,
Speaker 3: which is now in the public domain. It was inducted
Speaker 3: into the Grammy Hall of Fame. It was on Time
Speaker 3: Magazine's All Time one hundred Songs, plus NPR's list of
Speaker 3: the most important American musical works of the twentieth century.
Speaker 3: If you're not familiar with it, or just need a
Speaker 3: reminder of what this is, give it a quick listen.
Speaker 2: Here make me.
Speaker 4: A for.
Speaker 3: By the way, that's twenty four year old Louis Armstrong
Speaker 3: playing the coronet. There By the time Smith recorded it,
Speaker 3: the song was already famous, maybe even the most famous
Speaker 3: blues song in the world at the time. It had
Speaker 3: been performed by dance bands vaudevillians. The sheet music had
Speaker 3: sold tens of thousands of copies, and one thing that
Speaker 3: really set it apart was the use of the minor key.
Speaker 3: So other blues pieces had these minor inflections, or blue
Speaker 3: notes as they call them, but this was the first
Speaker 3: published piece of music with an entire section and a
Speaker 3: minor key. It was an innovation that changed blues music
Speaker 3: forever and earn Handy the title of Father of the Blues.
Speaker 3: But Bessie Smith's version has proved legendary. In nineteen twenty nine,
Speaker 3: she made her first and only film appearance, singing the
Speaker 3: song in a sixteen minute movie called Appropriate Enough Saint
Speaker 3: Louis Blues, and the movie entered the public domain last year,
Speaker 3: and if you're curious, you can actually watch it on
Speaker 3: the Library of Congress website.
Speaker 1: I'm definitely gonna do that. Speaking of film debuts, the
Speaker 1: first three Stooges movie, Soup to Nuts, is now in
Speaker 1: the public domain. The seventy minute film is the story
Speaker 1: of Ted, who works at a struggling business called the
Speaker 1: Schmidt Costume Shop. The Stooges played Ted's firefighter friends, whom
Speaker 1: he often visits at work. Now to the Stooges, brothers
Speaker 1: Moe and Shemp Howard had been working together in a
Speaker 1: vaudeville act since nineteen twenty two. Their friend Ted Healey,
Speaker 1: who plays Ted, joined them, as did a comedian slash
Speaker 1: violinist Larry Fine, and at the time Ted was the
Speaker 1: frontman while Moe, Shemp and Larry provided comedic interruptions. But
Speaker 1: after the nineteen thirty film, Shemp quit the group due
Speaker 1: to differences with Ted, and another brother, Jerry Howard, took
Speaker 1: his place. Now, Jerry's childhood nickname was Curly it's obviously
Speaker 1: a nickname that's stuck for the character, and he retired
Speaker 1: in nineteen forty six, and then Shemp returned to the
Speaker 1: Stooges after fifteen years away. He went on to make
Speaker 1: seventy eight three Stooges films.
Speaker 3: Seventy eight films. That's so many bunks on the head Mango.
Speaker 1: Yeah, you know I am going to get in trouble
Speaker 1: for saying this, but uh were you a three Stooges fan.
Speaker 3: I was a three Stooges fan for like, let's call
Speaker 3: it fifteen to twenty second set a time, like to
Speaker 3: watch a quick clip of it and be like, Okay,
Speaker 3: that's funny that that existed, But it wasn't something I
Speaker 3: could really watch for any sort of extended period of time.
Speaker 2: How about you?
Speaker 1: Yeah, I mean I could appreciate what they're doing, I guess,
Speaker 1: but like, I really wasn't a fan. When the students
Speaker 1: came on TV. That was when I knew it was
Speaker 1: time to turn off the television and go outside, like
Speaker 1: which is what happened on like Saturday mornings or whatever.
Speaker 1: But you know, obviously they're comedy legends and everyone now
Speaker 1: can remake their own version of Soup to nuts. But
Speaker 1: there's one more fact about the movie that I want
Speaker 1: to mention. So remember how I said that the costume
Speaker 1: shop where Ted works in the film isn't doing that well? Yeah,
Speaker 1: and the reason is that the shop's owner, Auto is
Speaker 1: distracted by building these ridiculously complicated inventions, like he makes
Speaker 1: an automatic coffee sweetener, which requires putting a sugar cube
Speaker 1: on a lever that's attached to a ramp. Then Auto
Speaker 1: uses a pool cube to push a marble down the ramp,
Speaker 1: which activates the lever to send the cube flying all
Speaker 1: the way across the room into a mug of coffee.
Speaker 1: And I'm kind of curious. Does that sound like a
Speaker 1: familiar contraption to you?
Speaker 3: Actually, as you were describing that, it does sort of
Speaker 3: sound like a Rube Goldberg machine, right.
Speaker 1: Yeah, So Rube Goldberg co wrote the film No Way,
Speaker 1: Auto was apparently playing a version of himself, and Goldberg
Speaker 1: even has a cameo in the movie, appearing as a
Speaker 1: customer in a restaurant.
Speaker 2: Isn't that cool?
Speaker 3: That is such a great fact, and that's going to
Speaker 3: be really hard to top. But we do have one
Speaker 3: more to talk about, our ninth fact, So I'll finish
Speaker 3: our list today with this song, and specifically, it's a
Speaker 3: song that's been recorded by Nancy Sinatra, Ella Fitzgerald and
Speaker 3: the Beatles, not all at the same time, though.
Speaker 2: Can you guess what this is?
Speaker 1: Yeah? I think I would have known it if they
Speaker 1: sang it at the sime time. No, what is it? Yeah?
Speaker 3: It's different versions here, and I'm talking, of course about
Speaker 3: Sweet Georgia Brown and the version that's now in the
Speaker 3: public domain, was recorded in nineteen twenty five by the
Speaker 3: songwriter Ben Bernie and his Hotel Roosevelt Orchestra, and he
Speaker 3: wrote the song earlier that same year, and it went
Speaker 3: on to become a jazz standard, although these days most
Speaker 3: people recognize it as the Harlem Globetrotter's theme song.
Speaker 1: Which I love and also I have a sucker for
Speaker 1: anything with whistling.
Speaker 2: One hundred percent.
Speaker 3: Well, that's actually a later version from nineteen forty nine
Speaker 3: recorded by an Alabama musician named Brother Bones. The original
Speaker 3: version that Bernie wrote doesn't have any whistling in it.
Speaker 3: Here's what his nineteen twenty five rendition sounds like. So
Speaker 3: the song also has lyrics to it, believe it or not,
Speaker 3: written by a child actor turned songwriter named Kenneth Casey,
Speaker 3: who incidentally appeared in an early Three Stooges film.
Speaker 1: Oh it always comes back to the three students.
Speaker 2: Exactly right, your heroes.
Speaker 3: Anyway, The lyrics tell the story of sweet Georgia Brown,
Speaker 3: who quote has two left feet, but she's neat and
Speaker 3: she makes all the fellasigh and want to die. But
Speaker 3: you shouldn't feel bad about not knowing all that because
Speaker 3: the Globe Charter's popularity has definitely overshadowed Bernie's original work.
Speaker 1: That Globe Tartter song is so good, but I've always
Speaker 1: kind of wondered, like, why did they pick that song?
Speaker 3: Yeah, you know, unfortunately that story has been lost to time.
Speaker 3: I think we've been looking into this for years, even
Speaker 3: back in our mental lost days. I mean, we know
Speaker 3: they adopted it in nineteen fifty two, and apparently the
Speaker 3: first time it was played it was a surprise to
Speaker 3: the players. Former Globetrotter Bobby Milton once explained, quote, we
Speaker 3: all started moving about and dancing with the music, and
Speaker 3: now it's as much a part of us as the name.
Speaker 3: So the song and the organization became so intertwined that
Speaker 3: Brother Bones traveled with the Globetrotters for years, not to
Speaker 3: play ball, but to sell copies of his record.
Speaker 1: I really liked that, and I think it's kind of
Speaker 1: a delightful note to end this episode on. So I
Speaker 1: think you deserved today's trophy, but will Before we wrap up,
Speaker 1: let's hear a recent call that came into the Part
Speaker 1: Time Genius hotline. Because you know how much I love these.
Speaker 6: Hi, I'm Samson, and I really enjoy your podcast. I've
Speaker 6: been listening for about eight hours and it's really great
Speaker 6: and I've learned a lot. Thank you so much, especially
Speaker 6: for the episode about flutes. I found that hilarious. Can
Speaker 6: you please keep going and it's amazing. Thank you.
Speaker 2: Wow, eight hours, Mango, I know it's crazy. It's a
Speaker 2: very long time to listen to anything. For that matter,
Speaker 2: it really is.
Speaker 1: Sam said, we are so glad you love the show,
Speaker 1: but be careful. That is a lot of information to
Speaker 1: consume all at once.
Speaker 3: All right, Well, that does it for today's show, and
Speaker 3: if you want to check out some of the works
Speaker 3: we've just talked about, we'll put all the links in
Speaker 3: the show notes. The episode was written by our good
Speaker 3: pal Meredith Danko. Thank you so much, Meredith. We couldn't
Speaker 3: have Booby Duped without you. We'll be back next week
Speaker 3: with another brand new episode and in the meantime form Mango, Dylan, Gabe,
Speaker 3: Mary and Me.
Speaker 2: Thanks so much for listening.
Speaker 1: Part Time Genius is a production of Kaleidoscope and iHeartRadio.
Speaker 1: It is hosted by my good pal Will Pearson, who
Speaker 1: I've known for almost three decades now. That is insane
Speaker 1: to me. I'm the Utaco host Mangeshatikular aka Mango. Our
Speaker 1: producer is Mary Phillips Sandy. She's actually a super producer.
Speaker 1: I'm going to fix that in post. Our writer is
Speaker 1: Gabe Lucier, who I've also known for like a decade
Speaker 1: at this point, maybe more. Dylan Fagan is in the booth.
Speaker 1: He is always dressed up, always cheering us on, and
Speaker 1: always ready to hit record and then mix the show
Speaker 1: after he does a great job. I also want to
Speaker 1: shout out the executive producers from iHeart my good pals
Speaker 1: Katrina and Norvel and Ali Perry. We have social media
Speaker 1: support from Calypso Rallis. If you like our videos, that
Speaker 1: is all Calypso's handiwork for more podcasts from Kaleidoscope and iHeartRadio.
Speaker 1: Visit the iHeartRadio.
Speaker 2: App, Apple Podcasts.
Speaker 1: Or tune in wherever you listen to your favorite shows.
Speaker 1: That's it from us here at Part Time Genius. Thank
Speaker 1: you so much for listening.