\u201cNothing ever happens if you don\u2019t say yes, even if\u2026it seems like a bad idea at the time,\u201d writes Vilanch at the end of a meandering catalog of onscreen disasters, some so improbable that it\u2019s amazing they made it past the cutting-room floor. Take a sitcom with Charo, the cuchi-cuchi Spanish \u201cforce of nature\u201d who played a mean flamenco guitar (taught to her by none other than Andr\u00e9s Segovia) and who put her brilliance under a bushel: \u201cThe biggest thing about Charo is her brain, topped only by her good nature,\u201d Vilanch confides. Even so, someone cooked up the notion that she should be married to a Marine sergeant and create bilingual\/bicultural havoc at every turn. It didn\u2019t fly, but the writers did cook up a variety show for Charo that, though a ratings hit, was a one-off. Other flops pepper his pages, most of them in the variety vein, and not all of them his fault: He reckons that the film version of Mommie Dearest \u201cholds pride of place in the bad idea hall of fame.\u201d Still, Vilanch owns up to many stinkers of his own (he promises a follow-up volume on the good ideas). There\u2019s nice dish along the way on the likes of Paul Lynde (\u201ceffeminate, bitchy, slightly mincy, he was more like the guncle no one talked about\u201d), Betty White (\u201cas sexually charged a personality as you\u2019ve ever seen\u201d), and his own \u201970s-era cohort of TV folks before and behind the camera (\u201cEverybody, or almost everybody of a certain generation\u2014Osmonds excepted\u2014was somewhat baked some of the time.\u201d). His central question remains, too: \u201cWhy was there a Star Wars holiday special, you might ask.\u201d<\/p>","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"
\u201cNothing ever happens if you don\u2019t say yes, even if\u2026it seems like a bad idea at the time,\u201d writes Vilanch at the end of a meandering catalog of onscreen disasters, some so improbable that it\u2019s amazing they made it past the cutting-room floor. Take a sitcom with Charo, the cuchi-cuchi Spanish \u201cforce of nature\u201d who […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":0,"featured_media":2165,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[6],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-2164","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-interesting"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/bookloves.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2164"}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/bookloves.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/bookloves.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/bookloves.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=2164"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/bookloves.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2164\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/bookloves.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/media\/2165"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/bookloves.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=2164"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/bookloves.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=2164"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/bookloves.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=2164"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}