040 Eve’s Dropper transcript (Dick Clark)

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Amit: This is Famous and Gravy, a discussion about quality of life as we see it, one dead celebrity at a time. And now for the opening quiz to reveal today's dead celebrity.

Michael: This person died in 2012, age 82. He was among the most recognizable faces in the world, even if what he was most famous for was on the insubstantial side.

Friend: Merv Griffin.

Michael: Not Merv Griffin. He built an entertainment empire, which expanded into game shows, award shows, comedy specials, talk shows, children's programming, reality programming and movies.

Friend: But I don't watch television. I'm probably not the best person to have asked all of this too.

Michael: His signature show had remarkable longevity and became a cultural touchstone for the baby boomer generation.

Friend: Oh, Gary Marshall.

Michael: Not Gary Marshall, although he's somebody I'm very interested to do. He was the perpetually youthful looking television show host of American Bandstand.

Friend: Dick Clark. Dick Clark.

Michael: Today's dead celebrity is Dick Clark.

Friend: You got ? Yeah, . And me being from Philadelphia who, oh, is that right? I grew up with Bandstand. My sister was on Bandstand.

Michael: No way. Yeah. Oh, that's cool. I can't believe that.

You know, it's hard to believe that Dick Clark started this annual tradition five decades ago, but it's very safe to say that none of us would be here without his influence, his guidance, and his friendship. Let's check out some unforgettable New Year's rocking moments with the legendary.

Archival: Dick Clark. Hi, this is Dick Clark. Live from Times Square. We're at approximately 45th Street in New York City at one Astor Plaza. And if we've got a happy group of people downstairs, all way downstairs at Times Square, you can't slip an envelope between them. They're so close together. 5, 4, 3, 2, 1, and a Happy New Year's Rocking Eve.

Michael: Welcome to Famous and Gravy. I'm Michael Osborne.

Amit: My name is Amit Kapoor,

Michael: And on this show we choose a celebrity who died in the last 10 years and review their quality of life. We go through a series of categories to figure out the things in life that we would actually desire and ultimately answer a big question, would I want that life today?

Dick Clark died 2012, age 82 Category one G. Grading the first line of their obituary. Dick Clark, the perpetually youthful looking television host whose long-running daytime song and dance fest, American Bandstand did as much as anyone or anything to advance the influence of teenagers and rock and roll on American culture died on Wednesday in Santa Monica, California.

He was 82. They really

emphasized the

bandstand. Yeah, they didn't mention New Year's Eve. I know. Which is kind of, that's really jumped out. Right?

Amit: But there's so much. The Dick Clark portfolio is massive, but those are the top two. I mean, you bann a $25,000 Pyramid and American Music Awards. I mean there's tons of really important stuff there.

There is a lot. I guess you had to choose if that is the most influential thing, then probably Bandstand is it? , but I would've edged in New Year's. Well, so

Michael: this is the question. Is it most influential, most important, or do you have to factor in also like what he's most known for and to whom? There's a lot of overlap between people who had a connection with American Bandstand and people who know him from the New Year's Eve celebrations, but certainly our generation, I think like the New Year's Eve celebrations in a way were a little bit more important.

Amit: Exclusively. Yeah, American Bandstand was the thing of the past.

Michael: Well, and it also feels like there's some wasted verbiage here. Okay, so here's what I like perpetually youthful looking television host. Yes. I love that they got that phrase in there. That is actually the thing he was known for for decades is that he didn't age much.

The phrase that's actually sort of funny to me is, well, first of all, song and Dance Fest. Song and dance makes it sound like tongue in cheek, like a shitty thing, right? Yes. It's like a dog and pony show or something, right? That's exactly, literally, Yeah, it literally is a song and dance fest. Those words are hyphenated for what

Amit: it's worth.

Yeah. It's like Dick Clark's underwater Tea party. .

Michael: You're right. . Right, exactly. It's not special necessarily. And then did as much as anyone or anything to advance the influence of teenagers and rock and roll on American culture, the words did as much as anyone or anything feel superfluous to me somehow.

It seems like there's a, a more succinct way of like highlighting just how important American bandstand is in the history of rock and roll. It's

Amit: wasteful for a first line. Yeah, exactly. This is ful real estate we're talking about

Michael: here. Exactly. So yeah, there's some flaws here at the same. I am glad that American Bandstand and Dick Clark advanced the influence of teenagers and rock and roll on American culture.

Like that's big. Yes. That is a big accomplishment for a life. And Dick Clark is at the dead center of that accomplishment. And so there is like a, you know, a deep honoring, even if it sort of took them a while to get there in the first line of this obituary.

Amit: Correct. And it's not a well known thing, I think in our peer set in younger.

Yeah. How big that show was in really creating rock music.

Michael: Our special guest of the day, the Credence Clearwater Revival. Please greet our special guest, miss Donna Summer. This particular album by the Pink Floyd, the Piper of the Gates of Dawn. There's some very interesting sounds. That's great. The Jefferson airplane, there are six in the Jackson five at the moment.

You'll meet 'em all in a second. Jackson five, these are the beach boys.

Amit: We're like, who created rock? And we're like, Elvis. No, really black people did. But Right. Like Dick Clark is nowhere in that conversation or that joke, right?

Michael: Because he is not a musician, he's not a performer. And you have to like sort of understand rock and roll history in the context of television history and what television hosts were doing as culture makers and mediators of culture.

And so like this gets at that and that's, yeah.

Amit: So you and I are agreeing that they are giving him credit where it's due, where a lot of people may not realize it either.

Michael: Correct. That's exactly right. And that's why it's newsworthy as well. Yeah. So I think I've got my score. Okay. You go first. I'm gonna give it a.

I love the perpetually youthful looking television host, and I love the honoring of his place in rock and roll history. It does feel a little bit like there's some wasted opportunity to not mention New Year's Eve, but I don't know how big a deal that is. I mean, 30 years from now, are we really gonna.

Kara all who was on TV when the ball dropped,

Amit: if his name is attached to it in perpetuity. It still is right now. Yeah. 10 years after his death.

Michael: That's fair. I just, I'm not sure that the turning of the clock is super duper significant. It feels more like a TV event than a news event to me most of the time.

But, For the most part, like I, I'm actually really okay that they didn't get

Amit: that in here. I fervently disagree with you on the significance of New Year's, but we'll go there later. God damn right. We'll, I'm gonna go five. I don't like the omission of New Year's Eve. I wanted something despite the importance of Bandstand.

I really did like how they highlighted it and perhaps introduced his significance to people that

Michael: were not

Amit: aware of it. But I wanted a hat tip to a second accomplishment. At least one other, and I wanted that to be New Year's Eve. I didn't so much like the dog and pony show or whatever they called it felt like it was song and dance fest.

Yeah. I felt that it was a little trite and um, perhaps jy. Yeah. And the wasted real estate. I agree. There was superfluous language. This didn't need to be a Dickensian first line.

Michael: So you're a five? I'm a seven, yes. Let's move on. Okay. Uh, category two, five things I love about you here. Amit and I work together to come up with five things we love about this person, five reasons we wanna be talking about them in the first place.

Would you mind if I went first? Uh, go ahead. All right. I went unrivaled ability to usher in a cultural moment. So this was my catchall for the two big accomplishments, certainly New Year's Eve. I think he is a great host and he knows how to bring in the new year and have that feel like a big deal and knows how to do the kind of play by play in a Al Michael sports broadcaster kind of way.

I mean, you hear great sports broadcasters sometimes say, shut up and let the crowd noise do the work. Right? That tape's doing the work. He knew when to insert himself and when not to in the New Year's Eve celebrations. I never felt like he was heavy handed that way. Yeah, I think by far and away though, the more important thing is that he was this mediator of rock and roll culture critically starting in the late fifties and throughout the sixties.

He was the nice looking guy who, you know, parents could get behind and who's pointing to the teenagers and saying, This is okay, this music is okay. You don't need to be scared by this music. You don't need to be threatened by what it represents and what it's saying about teenage culture. And I feel like that takes an unbelievable talent to sort of straddle the intergenerational tension that's happening in the mid 20th century around rock and roll music and rock and roll culture.

So unrivaled ability to usher in a cultural moment

Amit: and usher is a very key word I think you used there. Cause that's what you described what he was doing in terms of bridging teenage culture, youth culture, rock and roll culture between the younger people and their parents. He was really the usher

Michael: I heard him say, you know, in the 1950.

Like the word teenager didn't exactly exist. I mean, it didn't quite mean a phase of life the way we now kind of understand it to be an incredibly critical phase of life. Right. He is like, in some sense rock and roll and television at that time kind of invented this idea of, of the teenager. Yes. And he's right there, like sort of doing some of the sense making around the emergence of that life phase as it's being sort of broadcast literally to, uh, you know, America and the.

Yeah. Are we better off for it? I don't know. Better off for like the idea of there being a teenage phase of life or adolescence or whatever. Yes. And

Amit: putting that

Michael: much emphasis on it. I think that's a really good question. I think we'll get into that as we go. So that's my number one. What do you got?

Amit: I'll piggyback, but this will be a number two and it's gonna be star maker.

So what the New York Times pointed to and what you said about him ushering in this type of music, it had tremendous impact over almost every artist that we are familiar with that came through from the sixties through the nineties.

Michael: Everyone like it's

Amit: insane that list. Yeah. So what Bandstand did as not being a radio show, but being a TV show, it was exposing these artists to national audiences for the first time.

There were over 10,000 musical performances on American Bandstand during his tenure in 1990. When they did an assessment of who had been inducted into the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame, at that point, two-thirds of them had their start on American Bandstand. So a list of some of the artists that first appeared on Bandstand in front of a national audience before they ever did.

Tina Turner, smokey Robinson, Jim Morrison, and The Doors, Stevie Wonder. Simon and Garfunkel, Iggy Pop, prince Madonna, Bonjovi, Johnny Cash and The Beach

Michael: Boys. And on and on and on. Jerry Lee Lewis, r e m, Donna Summer. Chuck Barry. But talking Heads like everybody, right? It's like so much so that when it wasn't American Bandstand introducing.

An artist that was notable, like the omission was notable and the biggest one there is The Beatles. Yes. But still like holy cow.

Amit: Right. I think what I wanna point out though is Bandstand seeming to us to be this relic of the past. You think, okay, Chuck Berry and Johnny B. Good and all that makes sense.

Yeah. But we're also talking too about Iggy Pop and Johnny Cash, like we're talking about a really broad

Michael: range of stuff here and hip hop for that matter. Run. D M C, sorry. The Beastie Boys. That bleeds into something else. I had to say, Amit, which is that I think he had an ability to get people to open their mind.

If Dick Clark says, this band here is great and you should know about them, then you approach it with, well, this recommendation engine called American Bandstand Yes. Has delivered in the past. I think he had an open mind around the music, or at least an open mind in terms of uh, how he presented them and encouraged.

You know the audience to do the same thing and sort of recognize music and culture is always changing and maybe you won't get it on first glance, but I'm telling you, this band is important. This music matters. It may be the next thing. Have a listen. Yeah,

Amit: and I think that's the lovable part of both our number one and our number two is what you said is the ability to open others' minds.

Yeah. He had this kind of futurist sense in him that knowing what is appealing right now to the younger crowd is what is going to be defining culture next. That's right. That's a pretty innovative thing. It's so commonplace now. But 1959 and beyond, it's a pretty big paradigm shift.

Michael: I mean, even when he died, Snoop Dogg was tweeting.

Great man. Thank you for all you've done. I think he's got a little bit of a claim to, I don't know what the word is, but sort of like normalizing maybe teenage culture for an older generation in a way that like just tampons down the intergenerational threat. You know, the feeling that something has been changed and it's dangerous or

Amit: something like that.

Correct. He was deescalating the threat and upping the significance at the same time. Yeah, a hundred percent. Good way of putting that. So it goes to what you said, his mind opening. I mean, Dick Clark was the psilocybin or the mushrooms of, uh, of this

Michael: era, neuroplasticity for American

Amit: culture. I wanted him to be a psychedelic

Michael: Let me have that. I'm good with that. How about just hypnosis? There we go.

Amit: Take it back to Florence Henderson, over to you for number three. I

Michael: wrote had respect for teenagers and allowed them to be themselves in a good way. We started to talk about this a minute ago. Um, so there is a cynical take on him.

He's got a quote on NA M D b, a famous quote. My business is teenagers. I don't set trends. I just find out what they are and exploit them, which is a little bit, you know, opportunistic in a way. But I actually think that like adolescence mostly sucks. When I look back on my own adolescence, it is easily the most awkward period of my life.

And I think most people, when they look back at their adolescence, most people do not do it with much fondness. You might look at your childhood with fondness, you might look at your twenties or thirties or forties or whatever with fondness, but I feel like the teenage years are really, really hard. And I think that.

Kind of got that. And I feel like he was actually a good, I don't know if you wanna call it chaperone or just sympathetic eye, but I feel like he, you know, treated that very delicate period of life with the appropriate amount of attention and honor. And I love that about him because it's something that I struggle to do every teenager I know in my life.

They weird me out. They're awkward. Yeah. Um, this is like cliche, right? How difficult teenagers are. So to actually have a skill and an aptitude for dealing with that phase of life is actually something to be applauded and admired. And he's honoring it. How? Well, I mean, I think giving it constrained and voice, but also a platform.

You know, even this sort of moniker that he gets as world's oldest teenager. I just think, okay, so there's some people out there who are really good with little kids. I'm not one of those people. I'm okay with little kids, but I'm not great with little kids. I tend to be really good with the sort of emerging adulthood crowd, you know, the gotten into college.

Maybe you're outta college and you're fingering out the next thing. That's an age and life stage that I feel like I can speak to pretty well. Some people are really good with the elderly and really good at being patient. I think Dick Clark is really good with teenagers. I think he's just got like a knack for all the angst and complications that go with that age, and I admire that

Amit: and so few people are.

And so what you're saying is that he's assuaging some of the awkwardness? That's exactly right.

Michael: People need to be seen and heard at every stage in life. I think, I mean that we need to, you know, have people in our communities who can honor different stages of life. I think Dick Clark honors what is maybe the hardest stage of life to see in sort of full humanity, and I think he does it.

So that's my

Amit: number three. Okay. So I'll take number four and I'm just gonna go, he was a mogul. I'm not saying that I love moguls for mogul's sake, but the inventiveness of the guy to constantly each decade come up with new idea in a new business under his umbrella that almost all have lasted or at least have lasting legacies.

So, you know, we've talked about the two best known ones, American Bandstand and Dick Clark's Rock in New Year's Eve. But in between, we also have the American Music Awards, which he developed as a kind of counterpart to the Grammys. There were the game show's. Best known one would be the $25,000 pyramid.

There was TVs, bloopers and practical jokes. And then there was a whole suite under that. I mean, he was the host and I think part producer of Miss u s A and Miss Universe, he had this attempt at like copying Soul Train, which is just. Horribly misguided, I think. But he tried and he went after it. Like the umbrella of Dick Clark Productions is tremendous, is that he did something to echo every decade that followed after the fifties with at least one of 'em.

He nailed it. He got something extremely right.

Michael: You know, a lot of it is like proto internet preme kind of things, like bloopers especially, right? There is a kind of short clip pioneering aspect that I think, you know, helps him develop and build up his media

Amit: empire. Then let's not limit it to media. I mean, he had restaurants too.

That's for a while. That's so he had, he had almost an everything empire.

Michael: You know, now that you're saying it, the word mogul really could have gone in the first line of the

Amit: obituary. Yeah. Right. Even your first thing was, you know, this ushering quality, which makes the most sense, and I think that's what the New York Times said first, but by God, his empire was vast

Michael: ahed.

I think I want you to take number five. You seem like you're on

Amit: a roll here, so this is a good continuation. I think of number four, and it's a throwback to a previous episode that I want to talk about is he essentially groomed and made a successor in Ryan ccr. Which was really good foresight and really hard to do when you're a man of Dick Clark's power and stature.

You know, he made Ryan Seacrest a producer on Dick Clark's New Year's Rock and Eve, and now Ryan Seacrest hosts it. You know, he filled in for Dick Clark after Dick Clark had his stroke in the mid two thousands. They tried Regis for a year and that was terrible, and so really he mentored Ryan Seacrest into everything.

Ryan Seacrest is now in his own version of a host mogul, and when we talked about Alex Ter. In quintessential Quizmaster was named in that episode. That was the regret that we talked about most is that, you know, he knew he was going, but he never appointed a successor, and now we're in this weird jeopardy of rotating host seats.

Dick Clark had that foresight to a realize that if he wants his creations to live on, he needs to name a successor. Also, he had the humility to say, I'm not gonna be around forever, and I'm not the king for the end of the world, so I need to really find somebody and groom them. I admire that to do that.

He really ensured that his legacy was lasting. He essentially made somebody else's life, uh, that much more significant.

Michael: I, it's not just succession, it's also like graceful succession in a way too. I mean, that's the other thing I, I don't have a strong feelings about Ryan Seacrest one way or another, but I think Dick Clark did identify somebody who he felt a kind of, you know, kindred spirit with and teed up for success in a way that has, you know, generosity to it.

Okay. That's a good list of five. Let's recap. So we got unrivaled ability to usher in a cultural moment. You had star,

Amit: maker, and then I think we wrapped a theme around one and two of being opening minds. I

Michael: like that one a lot. Three I said ability to, uh, sort of see the teenage years and all and their full humanity.

Four was

Amit: mogul and

Michael: inventions. Mogul and inventions. And then five was, uh, groom to successor. Yes. Yes. And mentor. We could say. Oh, great list. Okay, let's move on. Category three, Malkovich Malkovich. This category is named after the movie being John Malkovich, in which people take little water slide into John Malkovich mind, where they can have a front row seat to someone's experiences.

Do you wanna go first? You want me to go first?

Amit: Uh, you go ahead. All right. So

Michael: I decided that I wanted to focus on the New Year's Eve, maybe in part because that's what our episode is here for. And I was trying to think which New Year's Eve would I really want to be behind the eyes of. And I decided to go with New Year's Eve in the year 2000.

Okay.

For this very special, you know, turning of the millennium year. A, B, C did a special, so it wasn't the usual Dick Clark's New Year's Rock and Eve. It was an A, B, C 2000 today. And so they had all hands on deck, Sam Donaldson and Peter Jennings and Barbara Walters and Connie Chung. I think it's kind of hard to explain to younger people today how much Y2K was actually like a real fear, but in the years heading up to 2000, there was this potential for some catastrophic, you know, computer glitch that would just shut down global infrastructure.

You know, that fear was like palpable for many, many, you know, years and months and days and weeks leading up to 2000. Yes. And you are Dick Clark. What I have to assume is that there had to have been a kind of briefing where everybody who was gonna be on television, uh, you know, on for a, B, C and New Year's Eve, you know, got a full sort of, this is what we expect to happen and it's probably not that big of a deal.

But even that, I want the malkovich of, I wanna know. Is there a possibility that shit might go really, really wrong this time? And I'm like the New Year's Eve guy, what's gonna be my role if there is some sort of global economic or physical world meltdown? And so the moment that the ball drops and then we get into 2000 and he kisses his wife and it seems like everything's gonna be okay, there's gotta be a sense of relief.

So I kind of want all of that. Malcolm X wise, I want to know about the briefing with, you know, maybe the three letter agencies leading up to the New Year's Eve. Yes. And then, uh, I want the feeling of relief when. It looks like it's gonna be okay. Two, one, happy 2000. Can you imagine how much work it's gonna take to clean this mess up?

we,

Amit: yeah. I remember the broadcast today cause I think he was even on, cuz the first major countries to kind of welcome it would be New Zealand and Australia and all. And I remember they aired those and like we like got up early to watch those and were like, oh. Sydnee didn't burn down and then you keep going, you're like, oh, Jakarta didn't burn down and bumpy didn't burn down.

But there was still the possibility that maybe, yeah, there was something

Michael: specific American. Yeah, totally. Exactly right. It's got that thought, has

Amit: to be in the back of your mind. Yes. But I do remember going like on December 30th, maybe, maybe it was the 31st morning to like fill up gas and there was a long ass line cuz there was a lot of people doing the just in

Michael: case

Yeah, totally. Totally. Yeah. I mean, and with good reason. Like this was a threat that had been identified that people didn't understand and who knew. So that's my Malkovich.

Amit: Okay, good one. So that helps actually. So I was torn between two, but because that is yours, I'm gonna bring in another New Year's one.

I will say my other one was gonna be when Prince was on American Bandstand.

Michael: Yeah, I mean this is not the kind of music that comes from Minneapolis, Minnesota. No. How many years ago did you make these demos and then, uh, have offers on 'em? You were 15 at the time. Yeah. But they think you didn't know what you were doing. They wouldn't let me produce myself. Did somebody tell me you played every instrument on this album, is that correct?

Amit: Maybe, but no. I'm gonna take a New Year's one, so I'm gonna go exactly two years after you. New Year's Eve, 2001, leading into 2002 held famously every year in Times Square. So at this point we are only three and a half months past nine 11. So there was a very important significance to that New Year.

Because of that, if we can all put ourselves back, We were all on the edge of our seats for months, if not another year. Right? Like we just didn't know when the next one was coming. We were still scared. We didn't know how to move past

Michael: this. Like the way that, like the fear that existed on September 12th in terms of what might happen next was not that different than the fear that existed December 31st, 2001.

Correct.

Amit: There was something different about, let's put 2001 behind us in a certain way. Not this we're gonna forget, but let's at. Put it behind us and move on in January 1st. Kind of get ourselves back in there. Yeah. Dick Clark was in that pilot seat when the ball dropped in New York City on New Year's Eve.

So that's a big deal. A because gatherings we were still pretty afraid of. We're like, is this gonna be a big target? So he had to be that calm voice of ushering reason. And there's just some really interesting language that he said about, you know, this year that's passed. But he said

Michael: everybody remembers the last year with great reverence, great support.

Great sympathy was not the happiest year in America's life, but we are pressing on and New Yorkers are with it. They are dynamic people. They're ready to go. They're ready to look forward to the year 2002. Look forward to the best year ever. We've got 15 seconds. Gather around, get somebody close to you because in 10 seconds it'll be the new year in 6, 7, 6, 5,

Amit: 4.

To be the person that gets. To really announce that we're flipping the clock and we are changing the channel, uh, and we're gonna become less scared again, was what Dick Clark got to do that night. And he really, really did it in the language that he used. And in that same ushering calmness that he was able to kind of introduce rock and roll and pacify older generat.

I remember being at a party that night and it was probably like one of the big first like celebratory parties that there had been before August. Everything was just kind of subdued until then, but this was a big deal to move and, and put this year behind us and he got to say, you know, we can put the tragedy of last year in the past.

This to me is, is a role in history. This is not just being the voice or the face of New Year's Eve. This is the voice in the face of a renewed attitude. I

Michael: mean, I agree with that. What's sort of funny about our two malkovich moments is that most of the time, new Year's Eve is kind of an arbitrary party.

We just happened to be able to do it because we're, you know, flipping into a new calendar year all based on the Christian calendar of when Jesus died. Right? and both of these were actually newsmaking. Events in their own way for very different reasons. One, because of what could have happened Y2K and another because of what did happen nine 11.

Well, good. That feels like, uh, the right two malov ites for our New Year's themed

Amit: episode. Yeah. And how kind of a strange, in an 82 year life that we picked two malov ites that are only two years

Michael: apart, they're clustered right there. Let's pause for a word from our sponsor,

Amit: Michael. You know, when we go to restaurants and I don't know what to order, then ultimately I'll just ask the server, well, what should I order next?

Yeah. And I wish a similar thing existed for other things I consume like, like books

Michael: did you say? For books. For books. Oh. Well that's easy if you go to half price books. There are all kinds of people who work in the store who are excellent at recommending books. Have you ever done this? No, I've never

Amit: known to ask them.

I thought they were

Michael: just, they are knowledge keepers. They are readers and they're there to say, Hey, how can I help you? What are you reading these days?

Amit: What are you into? What are

Michael: you looking for? I mean, every time I've gotten into a conversation with one of the half Price Books employees, I've always walked out of there with something new.

That was excellent. So

Amit: you're saying I can go ask a half-Price Books book seller if I don't know what to read next, or I'm looking for a

Michael: gift idea? I think that's exactly right. You don't need to know what you're gonna buy when you walk into half-price books. And if you just need a book, these people are there to help.

And you know what? Half Price Books is the nation's largest new and used book seller with 120 stores in 19 states. And Half Price Books is also online@hpv.com.

Category four, love and marriage. How many marriages? Also, how many kids? And is there anything public about these relationships? Three marriages. So the first one, wife number one. Barbara Mallory in 1952, Dick was 23 years old. She was a childhood sweetheart. They divorced in 1961, so Dick is 32. They had one son, Richard, from that first marriage.

Wife number two. Loretta Martin married in 1962, so just one year after the previous marriage. Dick was 33. Loretta was Dick's former secretary. They had two children. They divorced in 1971 when Dick was 42. I did see that. One friend said during this period he was kind of money obsessed and actually he was not much of a drinker, but apparently during this period he was drinking and smoking quite a bit.

Then wife number three, Carrie, they married in 1977. Dick was 48. She was also a former employee. She ended up becoming his executive assistant. They were married all the way through to the end and no children. Okay, so I got some shit to say here. Yeah, go. I don't wanna bleed over into the next category too much, but I think Dick Clark is work obsessed and I think he would admit to that.

There's something really off putting to me that relationships between powerful men and less powerful women within organizations were kind of frequent. Mm-hmm. . It's really kind of off-putting to me here that there's two marriages that came about from women who work for him. It does sound like marriage number three is talked about and like they really love each other and they see each other and they get each other.

So I don't wanna throw water on it, but at least the first two marriages, Look kind of selfish to me and self-centered to me. I really thought about this a lot because Dick Clark has this like wholesome image. You know, I mean as, as we were talking about in five things, there is this perception of him as this adult who is good with teenagers and can explain rock and roll to the older generation in the marriage record alone, you can see some differences between that image and who the guy is behind the scenes.

Okay. The more I looked at it, the more I kind of felt like that. While we may want to think of Dick Clark as a kind of family man, and in some ways he is, I mean he did, all his kids did end up working in entertainment, some of them for Dick Clark Productions. Mm-hmm. , I still sort of overall feel like, at least for the majority of his adult life, Work was the top priority.

And if you marry somebody who works within your organization, I don't know, that sort of seems like

Amit: it's keeping the power trip going. Is

Michael: that what you're going at? Yeah, something like that. And there's even a sort of like my start is rising. This show started in Philadelphia. Oh, now I'm in la I'm gonna get a new wife.

Oh, that's not working out, but I'm still on TV and you know, TV is this. What, what is that Kissinger quote? You know, power is the ultimate aphrodisiac or whatever. He's like accruing power here. Both financial power, but also in terms of like cultural sway and you know, how people react to him on the street because he's on television and it's a big goddamn deal.

And so like, I don't see a whole lot of equality in how he approaches his marriages, even if he's from a different era. It bothers me here. Is it exploitative? I mean, isn't it, isn't it, obviously if you are

Amit: a, if you're a superior in an organization

Michael: of any type, I I think we have to look on it skeptically overall.

Yeah. I think it, it is potentially exploitative, and if it's not, then we have to sort of elaborate on why, and I wouldn't be able to do that based on what I found out about Dick Clark and his marriages.

Amit: Yeah, I, you know, I'm torn on it. I, I hear all your arguments. Um, I don't know, just so we just don't know what works.

I agree. It should feel like it should be two equal spirits on equal footing entering into a collaborative partnership in which there is equal contribution. Most importantly, equal respect for each other to where if you enter into it to where there was a previously existing hierarchy in an organization that's gonna screw

Michael: with it a little bit, may, maybe it is there with his third wife.

And maybe there is some humbling and some, you know, I call him out on his bullshit afterwards, and maybe it took three marriages because his star rose so fast. But at least early on, you know, as his stars rising, I wonder about him being a little bit power obsessed. That's the story I see in this marriage.

Okay.

Amit: I can sign off on that. I buy that. I don't think I have a lot to add. I would just like to wedge in there that the relationship with his parents seemed pretty good. His father made a lot of sacrifices and steps to make sure that Dick Clark could pursue a career in radio, which he fantasized about since he was age 10.

Michael: Yeah. Broadcasting was his calling from a young age. Yeah. Yeah. And

Amit: so his father took a job via his uncle at a radio station for kind of that purpose to sort of help Dick Clark do that. I, I think that

Michael: was incredible. Also worth noting some early trauma with his brother dying in World War II and the Battle of the Bulge.

Yes. His only sibling. And I think that did haunt him. It sounds like they were close. Exactly.

Amit: And Dick Clark was just a little too young to be drafted

Michael: in World War ii. Yeah. Okay. Category five net worth. I saw 200 million. 200 million? Yes.

Amit: Wow. It's mega. It's a lot of money. It's a lot of money. I would not have been surprised if it was more

Michael: than that.

I think this speaks to my previous point about him being obsessed with career, and there's a few places where I saw the late night talk show hosts ribbing him. Did you see any of this? No. Oh yeah. Like Letterman asks him about it and you must have made a lot of money doing that show

But did you end up, what kind of a question is that? Did you end up owning the show? You probably did it. Yeah. Well then you made a lot of money. . I mean, I think his power and his wealth were kind of like, you know, the late night talk show host at least felt the the need to call it out.

Amit: You've done very

Michael: well in show business.

I've been very, you've done extremely well and you have made. You've made a lot of money. You are, uh, you, you're associated with a lot of different shows. Uh, you know, you probably own a piece of me and I don't know about it. , no. Okay. Only good investments.

Amit: Uh, yeah, I mean, I really would like to get into the motivation, um, and ambition behind this guy.

You know, some of it is pretty mindless entertainment. He surely like had enough feathers in his cap. He had created a cultural legacy. I think the ambition is just something that I cannot wrap my head around because it so far exceeds things that I am familiar with on how a brain is wired.

Michael: I do think he liked the job.

I mean, I do think he was having

Amit: fun and he, he said as much as that, like repeatedly

Michael: over and over overuse. And he's like, yes, yes, I work all the time, but I really like this work. Correct, of course. And I'm having a lot of fun there. Yeah. Or it's not work if I'm having fun. Yeah. I mean, I guess it becomes a complicated thing where you cannot disentangle if the, I love working because it's an act of self-love and validation and I am exposed to art and I enjoy the hosting responsibilities if that's so tightly correlated with, and I'm making a shit ton of money along the way.

It's sort of difficult to building my power profile. Yeah, right. It, it's sort of impossible at some point to disentangle, do I love it because of that power? Or if the money wasn't there, would I still be doing it? If life doesn't force you to ask those questions, maybe you never

Amit: know. So my question to you, Michael, is, is there anything wrong with it?

I do

Michael: feel like this came at the expense of meaningful interpersonal relationships.

Amit: Yeah. And it's funny you, you know, you did see the outpourings when he died, but it's not like this was one of my best friends. I didn't see that from anybody in Dick Clark. Yeah. The only

Michael: person who I ever saw, you know, who the only person I ever saw referred to him as a close friend was Donna Summer.

I mean, there's a couple of other people, and Donna Summer called back to that episode. She's the only one who ever guest hosted the American Bandstand. Yeah.

Amit: So, rich Man, Dick Clark, possibly at the expense of deep personal relationships, possibly fueled by a

Michael: little too much. I think he does soften with age and I, I want to talk more about that in the future category.

For now, let's move on. Category six, Simpson Saturday Night Live or Hall of Fame. This category is a measure of how famous a person is. We include both guest appearances on S N L or the Simpsons as well as impersonations. So Simpsons. He guest starred as himself. He actually voiced himself in treehouse of horror 10.

It's been a while since we've had somebody who actually voiced themselves. Yeah, it has been. I was actually really happy to see this. He's imitated in a couple other places, but his voice actually appeared. This is Dick Clark rocking down to the year 2000 and that was white snake. We're not white snake dude.

We're poisoned. I thought we were quiet, Roy. He says Here we're rat and this, this was the Y2K episode, correct? I think that's right actually, that that

Amit: was the theme of the episode. As the world is melting as Dick Clark ushers in the near, I think that's right. And he physically does melt in the episode and is revealed to be a robot underneath.

That's right.

Michael: I forgot all about this. Yes. Okay. Saturday Night Live, I didn't see him ever make any cameos, which I really looked around for. I would've thought he would have. There is the David Spades Get where David Spade is a receptionist and he is. He does that and you are saying yes. I don't know if you remember this.

He was the receptionist for Dick Clark Productions. So that's a SNL tie. There's also a thing where Dick Clark presents an honors Mr. Bill. Yes, the, you know, Mr. Bill was one of those SNL shorts. Other than that, you know, I didn't see a whole lot

Amit: on it. Saturday Night Live, there was also a parody of $25,000 pyramid, but it wasn't actually $25,000 pyramid.

Uh, it's actually one of my favorite SNL game show skits. So, I'll, I'll show notes. It, I

Michael: mean, what's sort of interesting, just to stick with SNL for a second, is parroting him, doesn't. Lend itself to humor. Like there is, you know, bill Hader did a Casey Kasem, so did Dana Carvey and they were both kind of funny.

There is something mock or something funny about mocking Casey Kasem in a way that's just not quite as true for Dick Clarke for some reason. Okay. Uh, he was never on Arsenio Hall, I'm afraid. I feel like it was

Amit: too big for

Michael: Arsenio. Well, but there is a picture of Arsenio and Dick Clark together backstage before, uh, an M T V Music Awards event, and then he does have a Hollywood Star, which he got in 1976 and inducted

Amit: into the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame.

Michael: Correct. Which rightly so here's something that I want to talk about with the nature of fame here in Dick Clark. We talked in the first line of the obituary about. How he sort of plays this very important role in the history of rock and roll and rock and roll as a phenomenon of youth culture that, you know, had political power and social power to really affect minds and to like organize, you know, young people in the mid 20th century leading up to the sixties.

Is Dick Clark important? Should he be remembered as a historical figure? Because I feel like he's not going to be, I mean, you might see Dick Clark productions on, on something 30, 40 years from now, but you know, some famous en gravy dead celebrities are in this like, History category. Muhammad Ali, Ruth Bader Ginsburg, Margaret Thatcher, Nelson Mandela, and some are in the Judge Wapner zone where most of us are gonna forget.

How important is Dick Clarke? Like how, you know I, I guess I feel like this is the right place to talk about it since we're talking about the nature of his fame.

Amit: My position on him is kind of like somebody else might have done it a hundred percent and Dick Clark just had that right ambition and timing to

Michael: do it well.

And rapport with the mic. I mean, he is great on tv. Yes. And he comes across so authentic and you feel like he's talking to you and you like there's something about his demeanor where there is like connection from the one to many medium that is televis.

Amit: Yeah, and he, you know, he made these, these two transitions of both music going from kind of big band orchestral music to being rock and pop music.

And he also made the tradition of New Year's Eve go from this tuxedoed type of event that we associated only with hotels to be this public celebration with, again, rock music and fireworks and ball dropping. But somebody else probably could have done it. I think he is important because he did do it right and it's kind of a useless exercise to say somebody else could have done it.

But he is forgettable. I think

Michael: he's forgettable. He's forgettable in a funny way. He's omnipresent for some and then he's forgettable. .

Amit: Yeah, cuz he created those. But it doesn't really seem to matter because we all believe that somebody could have created those. And I think that goes back to one of the very first things you said was the word usher.

If you're the type of person that ushers in, what you're basically saying is something is already coming and I'm just making it smoother, you know, showing it to its seat or putting a spotlight on it. And that seems to be a lot of his role in history.

Michael: Yeah. All right. Category seven Over under, in this category, we look at the life expectancy for the year somebody was born to see if they beat the house odds and as a measure of grace.

So, Life expectancy for a man born in the US in nineteen twenty nine, fifty eight 0.7 years. He lived 2 82. So crushed it. Handsomely lived till 80. Handsome, famously handsome, famously didn't age, uh, until his stroke in 2004. And you feel like that's

Amit: actually, so the physical appearance still held intact.

His speech, he did have a speech

Michael: impediment. I actually wanted to talk most about the post-stroke thing because I do think that up until his stroke, you know, aging with exceptional grace in just in terms of the look and frequently

Amit: mocked and derided,

Michael: right? This was a punchline. You'll never age like Dick Clark.

He's the world's oldest teenager,

Amit: right? Yes. Or there's no way he's not having plastic surgery and using hair plug. You look fantastic. This man looks, and I wanna say something.

Michael: For a long time it was charming and cool that you just don't age now. It's frightening. . He got the good jeans. Nothing beats the good jeans and the hair. Let's talk about the hair. You are my hair hero. What do you think of mine? Huh? . So the, on the one thing I wanted to talk about here is the decision to go, you know, after he is had a stroke and a speech impediment and he is sort of returning to the New Year's events, especially, I think this gets back to something we were talking about earlier.

On one hand it looks like an ego, ego-driven move. You know, I'm supposed to be on television, I'm Dick Clark. There are also other people and especially survivors of strokes who are like, thank you Dick Clark for doing this. You are for you to go on TV now that you have a speech impediment because of this stroke.

Sort of n normalize what happens or what can happen after a stroke is a good thing. So, I don't know. I feel like once again, we're at this sort of like Izzy of service or is it ego-driven and it's a little hard to, you know, to say which one is in the lead there. You know what I'm.

Amit: Yes. My take on it is service.

I think people that have had a stroke, I think that's a

Michael: grand gesture. I agree with that, Amit. And, and I, you know, certainly I think part of Famous and Gravy is let's have the generous interpretation in the absence of something else. So anything else you wanna say on over under 82? Feels about like appropriately old.

I think we covered it. All right. Let's pause. Mary Tyler Moore. I

Amit: think dead. The rules are simple.

Michael: Dead are alive. She died in 2017. William

Amit: the refrigerator Perry,

Michael: I think the fridge died.

Amit: The fridge is still alive.

Michael: Author Jackie Collins Alive. . We lost her in 2015. I'm afraid. Willie D. I'll take a head from this one.

Willie D is a ghetto boy's rapper alive. Willie D is still with us at 55 years old. Wow. He's good. Yeah, he is good. Test your knowledge. Dead or alive? app.com.

The first of the introspective categories is Category eight Man in the Mirror. What did they think about their own reflection? This was not complicated to me. I already loved it.

Amit: Really? This was really complicated for me.

Michael: Really? Okay. Yeah. What's

Amit: your case for largely unchanged? Look from the late fifties when he first appeared on television up until when he died in 2012.

I just don't see how you can be surrounded by Prince and George Carlin and all of these people all the time that are the kings of individualistic expression and not look in the mirror and ask, who the hell am I? Uh,

Michael: yeah. I go the other way with it. I see self-assuredness. I, I see, I have a role to play, which is to be a fixture, a mainstay, and to kind of look and act more or less the same way, regardless of the changing attitudes and cultures around me.

And I'm glad that I, uh, don't age that much and that I look, you know, good enough that, uh, that I, that I can do that For many, many

Amit: decades, I, I'm gonna agree that he likes it, but being surrounded by what he was. Surrounded by. I just don't see how he didn't have the questions.

Michael: Okay. All right. Category nine, outgoing message.

Like men in the mirror, how do we think they felt about the sound of their voice when they heard it on an answering machine? Also, would they have used their own voice in the default setting for outgoing voicemail, or would they use the default setting that comes with cell

Amit: phones? So I'd go absolutely, yes.

Unliked it absolutely no on lending his

Michael: voice to him. The exact same thing, a hundred percent. He's a little too proud of himself, a little too proud.

Amit: That voice is worth way too much. The look is worth way too much. He is not giving that away for free on his

Michael: outgoing message. Okay. Uh, category 10 regrets, public or private.

What we really want to know is what, if anything, kept this person awake at night? I have one thing here that I want to talk about. I'm not even sure if it's private or public.

Amit: Okay. You start, I've got

Michael: a couple. You've gotta go. Why don't you go first? I usually go first with this guy. Or you take

Amit: it. So the easy ones, I think are the payola scandals.

Yeah. I think he has little regret, but it's worth, this is

Michael: late fifties. This was like, bands would pay, or ax would pay to be on television and there'd be a kickback for the producers. Correct.

Amit: For television or radio basically. Oh, radio. Right. It's a pay, it's a pay for play, um, type of thing. And so, uh, it became a a really, it was a really big case.

Yeah. Um, and although his

Michael: part in it was small, right. He, he had signed on for one thing and then they said, if you wanna stay on, you need to sell your shares in this thing. And he said, absolutely. And I get it. And Maya culpa and let's move.

Amit: Yeah, he just divested his business interests. I just wanna give him a little kudos to preventing regret.

Michael: Yeah. But I think that was a regret once called out, it does seem like there was a Maya culpa, so that qualifies to me as a regret.

Amit: Yeah, I suppose so. But I think it was pretty pervasive in across all TV and radio when this was brought to light. Um, so you go ahead with yours and then I'll bring up my final one.

Michael: Okay. I mentioned this a couple times. The way he softens with old age, so. You know, you read between the lines with the interviews and the stories and the way people talk about 'em. He does sound like a, a, a strict, harsh, not easy figure behind the scenes that the nice guy who's smiling for the camera may be a dick behind the scenes, maybe, so to speak.

Yeah. I just got to thinking about what does it mean to soften with old age? I think that's something that maybe there's some women who qualify, but for the most part, it seems to be largely a man thing, uh, and a man men of a certain generation. And, and it does seem normal, but like I have to wonder if he looked back and was like, man, did I need all that money?

Did I need all that power? , did I miss something on the family front? Did I miss something somewhere else there? There's a, there's a bigger question in my mind about a, like, deathbed style regret. Um, and you see it as he gets like more sentimental with age too. Yes. I, I guess I, I just wanna like, sort of ask maybe in the more abstract sense of how, of, of what to make of somebody who softens with old age.

Doesn't that like on its face tell you there's,

Amit: Yes, I

Michael: think so. I, and I don't know exact, and I, and, and I think it's about what we've been talking about. I'm not sure it's about anything else that I can obviously see, but as sort of like, what was it all

Amit: worth? Yeah. And I think the, the advice normally given by people that soften with old age is don't be so tight.

You know, don't hold on to things so clutching, um, have a little more love and connection in your life. Have more sunrises and sunsets and less long work days, and less reaching for possessions and money and status.

Michael: I don't want to overplay. The sort of, you know, Dick Clark was a asshole behind the scenes thing.

When he is getting Lifetime Achievement Awards, his wife and children are there and there does seem to be love. And when Ryan Seacrest is saying, I am grateful to this man, it is genuine. I don't think he was a, like, you know, full on hypocrite prick behind the scenes. Nice guy. You know, I don't wanna, I don't wanna like amplify some story here.

I don't know how you avoid some of those trappings when you are, you have the kind of power he has. You know, I'm not sure it's especially bad with him, but I do see some sort of like Hollywood power cliches playing out here, you know? Yeah. Yeah, I think very much so. That's what I got. What'd you have?

Amit: So mine is broad.

It's just Bing, Dick Clark. You know, when he creates American Bandstand, he's very open about saying, this is not the type of music that I like, like, I like the big band music. And what he did was essentially destroy big band music. And so just because he saw how teenagers think and saw that, you know, with the way media is evolving, he had a choice to make really of, you know, does he preserve the things that he loves or sort of capitalize on what's coming?

And he made the smarter, definitely more lucrative decision. But these things that he created American Bandstand and even rocking New Year's Eve, were counter to his preferences and passions. So are you asking

Michael: the question like, what did he compromise here? Like what did he sell out on or something?

Amit: I mean, I know he did.

He says very openly,

Michael: this is not how, how should we feel about the fact that something was compromised? Yes. How should he feel about it? Yes, on the inside. Yeah. That

Amit: you make your life, you make riches and wealth and you usher in for the world. Something that is not necessarily

Michael: your preference. I mean, the counter to that is that you don't have that much control over it and either like get with the program or risk letting the world pass you

Amit: by.

These seem like minor questions, but these are huge things. They are, what do you

Michael: stand good for? Here I'm willing to give Dick Clark a, a pretty generous interpretation, which is I stand for the inevitability of cultural churn and change. Ah, that's so weak. No, it's not. That's a hard thing to embrace. I think it happened to be very lucrative, but I think it, if it's not authentic, then he would not have been able to play the role for that many decades.

I think that it, while it may not have been to his taste, it is an acceptance of time and of age and of the march of age and of new things are coming along and I need to do what I can to try and keep up, and that's not easy, but I'm gonna accept it.

Amit: I see it as acceptance. And so you're, I mean, you're giving him monk-like features, which perhaps, perhaps I'm saying it's possible that he did, but don't you wanna see a little bit of fight in preservation?

Michael: Yeah, I agree with that. And I think that there was probably some room for that. And if he could, if he's got deathbed regrets of what it had all mean, and did I really need 200 million to live a meaningful life, maybe he would've gone back and said, I'd like to dedicate 10% of my time to the preservation of what was lost in all this, and what was lost in things that I, that I celebrate.

And I don't wanna call him monk-like necessarily, but I do think that to be able to accept the inevitable turnover of new things, new art, new music, new culture, that's fucking hard. That's really fucking hard. And, and, and he did it and he deserves credit

Amit: for that. , I guess, but like, it's like you and I just jumping on TikTok or something and saying, and I can't,

Michael: and he could have, right?

I guess that's my point is that the people who are able to do that, they do have to accept that this next thing has some good qualities about it and, and let's, let's approach it with an open mind. And if I approach it with an open mind, then maybe all the people who are uncomfortable about this change can also approach it with an open mind.

Like I think it's actually an admirable quality. I applaud it. Yeah. I applaud it more than I consider it a regret.

Amit: I certainly think it's a formula for more happiness, less resistance and just, and

Michael: desirable. Desirable. I don't, I don't want to be like, back in my day it was better. I, you know, I, I, I wanna honor the past.

I wanna remember it, but I also don't wanna be scared of whatever teenagers are gonna bring in next. I mean,

Amit: I agree. I agree. And permanence is listed as, you know, one of the paths to enlightenment via the Buddha, but I don't, I think he was accidental in it, but I think that did make a pretty happy dick clerk.

Yeah, maybe I'm just arguing because I envy it.

Michael: Yeah, yeah, I do too. I do too. Okay, let's move on. Category 11, good dreams, bad dreams. This is not about personal perception, but rather, does this person have a haunted look in the eye? Something that suggests inner turmoil, inner demons or unresolved trauma.

You know, we've talked about a lot of this so far. I don't see it. I went good dreams, and I see it as good dreams. I think that there's some hint that he might have battled depression. Maybe he's just good on television, but I don't see the haunted look in the eye. Do

Amit: you see something? No, I don't. I don't.

I think if it were me living that life that it would probably would be, but I think Dick Clark had the right blinders on. I think he had the right ambition. I think he was so focused that he didn't let the other things get to him. And this goes to exactly our point that we just said is that, you know, he, he was a character of impermanence.

You know, things are coming. Things are happening. He doesn't linger on regret or on. the past, and so I think he slept sound. I agree.

Michael: Category 12. Second to last category, cocktail coffee or cannabis. This is where we ask which one would we most want to do with our dead celebrity. This may be a question of what drug sounds like the most fun to partake with this person or another philosophy is that a particular kind of drug might allow access to a part of them.

We are most curious about, shall I? Or do you wanna take it? Uh, go ahead. I want cocktail, obviously I wanna have a cocktail with probably Champagne with Dick Clark on New Year's Eve. I also do think I would enjoy his company for many hours. I'd like to sit down and talk with this guy. I mean, all the questions we're raising about the inner life, it's speculative.

We don't really know. When David Letterman asked him, you made a lot of money. Sort of like ha ha laughing and awful kind of question is that, I'd like to get at some truth serum here. I'd like to really, really know. But he, I also think that the stories are great. I think he's charismatic. I think he'd think he'd be a pretty fun hang and I'd love to usher in the new year with Dick Clark and apparently so do millions of other people throughout history.

Yeah, so I want cocktail.

Amit: I have a lot of the same reasoning as you, but I, uh, am choosing cannabis interesting. So I want the hang the stories, especially the amount of acts that he saw on American Bandstand, the amount of New Year's eves that he witnessed in Times Square. The man can entertain you for hours with stories.

I want him to be high. While he does it though, because I think there's certain twists and there's that kind of robotic aspect to him that the Simpsons highlighted. And I want a little variance in voice and I want the sweater to be untucked and I want to get a little more color in into those stories.

And I do wanna wedge in probably this question about, is teenage culture good? What do you think, Dick? Um, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah. And I think they're just all gonna arise as he tells me the stories about, you know, meeting Tina Turner or Iggy Pop when they were 17, or just how Times Square looks different in a time lapse between 1972 and 2011.

Michael: For that question about like, let's talk about teenage culture. That would be a really interesting conversation. What to do with teenagers, what to do with them. Uh, in terms of this mass media world we live in, what to do with the art that they, they create and how much to elevate or downplay it. How do you feel about that overall?

That's an interesting set of questions and it matters because we sort of take it for granted now that that's how it works. That's what sells, that's what, um, you know, that's, that's what we should be paying attention to in consumer culture. And, uh, and you know, and, and I, I think you and I are both kind of questioning whether that is for the better or not.

To hear Dick Dick Clark's take on this As somebody who we think, you know, you and I agree. Does see teenagers for what they are in, in a way that Maurice Sendak sees children for what they are. Right. There's something to that, and I think that would be a great conversation to have. I want, I think I, I want a joint, I'm still going cocktail, but I'm curious what kind of, how, how you, what kind cannabis wanna do the camp?

Yeah.

Amit: How do you wanna do it? I think the joint could be too difficult for him. Do they

Michael: still do bowls? Yeah. Dick Clark does. Are you kidding me? This is the 20th century. Yeah.

Amit: So, yeah. Maybe that, I don't know. It's all, it's all vapes and, uh, gummies and stuff these days. You don't see, well, I, I, I don't The classic

Michael: Yes.

Yeah. Throwbacks, it'll come back. Just like cassette tapes. Yes. All right. I think we're here. The Vander big final category named after James VanDerBeek, who famously said In Varsity Blues, I don't want your, Where are we at on it? Do you want Dick Clark's life? Yeah,

Amit: so I like to start with what I don't like.

I don't like the putting forward of a culture and themes that are counter to your own preference. I do like your take on it that that is really just a state of understanding impermanence and inevitability, and it's going through it and it's not letting things stick. So there is a positive to that, but.

Don't like it off the bat as a character trait. I don't like this apparent life of working and accumulating power and wealth nonstop to the end. You know, like you pointed out with a couple of the marriages that everything seems to be an accumulation, it's a power play. But I can also give that the benefit of the doubt and that, you know, if he did find the one Carrie that he married in 1977 that, you know, was a pretty good marriage for 35 years up until his death and you know, she was up there in the booth and they always, you know, gently kissed when that ball dropped.

So that is something to be light. It looks like he found that. And he softened, as you said. Will he be remembered in 50 years or a hundred years? I don't think so. I gave you my take on that, but I think the contributions are valid. And even if he was the. Place at the right time type of person. The man made some serious things to change the culture of the United States and the world.

He was significant, you know, and he worked around music the whole time and I'd like to think that he went through it and there was always a song playing in his head. And what I see in that is probably a life that kind of looks a little bit like a musical or like a movie. Like it's fun and it's flowy and it's creating big things and it's around the next stars.

And he was there for the big moments of other people's lives. He ushered in gently. He gave comfort. And I think there's a lot of meaning in that. So it sounds more favorable than unfavorable. So I'm a little more than a lean. Yes, I'm a fairly confident, yes. I want your life, Dick Clark.

Michael: Wow, I didn't expect you to go there.

I really like this thing about being able to. be a helpful person to a particular demographic and a particular age group. Um, and, uh, I feel like he found that in himself and, and, and he rode that wave. I also

Amit: like, I, I

Michael: think the thing about being a culture maker and sort of like making it okay for other people to embrace whatever's new, I think that that's a really essential role and I admire it.

There are some things he's doing in his life that the more I think about it, the more it's like, those are qualities I absolutely want, but I do think the family life, the obsession with money and the hunger for power, even if it aligned with his God-given talents, I think it's a non-starter for me. I guess I'll add one other thing in the desirable quality, I think we should talk about this idea of New Year's.

You know, that among the other messages that come with. Youth and youth culture or, or whatever it may be, is that, you know, there's always an opportunity for new beginnings next year, right? Let's take stock of where we are and what we have and who we are and what we're doing and how the world is turning.

And let's have an open mind and let's apply that to our lives. And the more we embrace that with curiosity and humility, the better off we all are. And I do think that that's the grand message of his life. So in terms of the work he did, in terms of his significance, I think he is more significant than what he will be remembered for.

And I'm glad you and I sat and talked about it. I think it's all the stuff outside of that that has me a no. So I'm a no. I don't want your life Dick Clark. It's a little too much power and it's a little too much imbalance for me. But I admire this life and, uh, I'm glad you and I had this conversation as we close out 2022.

Okay. Uh,

Amit: I've learned a little something about you.

Michael: Yeah, me as you. With you as

Amit: well. Okay. So, Michael, your Dick Clark in front of you is the pearl gates. Standing in front of the pearl Gates is St. Peter, who is the Unitarian proxy for the afterlife. Make your pitch.

Michael: You know, I had a very successful career.

A lot of people knew who I was and a lot of people learned about things through me. In particular, learned about music, but also learned about themselves. And while I did succeed in work, I think that what I was doing on Earth back when I was down there was trying to convey a message to everybody that whoever you are today, and whatever you're into today, that's gonna change and that's okay.

That change is inevitable, that we are always turning over new leafs. The children always have something to teach us, and that there is always going to be great new art to be experienced and celebrated and honored. I feel like my whole life was about directing the world's attention and certainly America's attention in that direction, and I think that was fundamentally an act of service.

So for that, I hope you will let me in.

Thanks so much for listening to this episode of Famous and Gravy. If you're enjoying our show, please tell your friends about us, help spread the word. Find us on Twitter. Our Twitter handle is at Famous en Gravy, and we also have a newsletter which you can sign up for on our website, famous en gravy.com.

Famous and Gravy was created by Amit Kapoor and me, Michael Osborne. This episode was produced by Jacob Weiss, original theme music by Kevin Strang. Thanks for listening. See you next time.