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| That's Sid, not Fred, fact fans! |
Many Four Or Five Guys© will know Sid as Fred MacMurray's stunt double. That's him in Son Of Flubber, hanging off the flaming B-52 as it crashes into the orphanage! And that's him, providing stunt vocals for Fred's hit chart single The Flubber Song! But few know of his passion for psybient-type records, and in what we hope will be a regliar Sunday feature featured at th' IoF© Sundays, he'll be choosing some psybient-type tunes to share from his extensive collection!
I interviewed Sid yesterday poolside, as Kreemé [20 my ass - Ed.] served us her signature strawberry 'n liver tacos in a crisp baby seal skin shell!
FT3 So, Fred - I mean Sid! - what got you into this psybient-type music that's taking the nation's teens by storm?
SS [chuckles] Well, Farq, I guess it was the drugs. Everybody at Disney© was high as a fucking kite. All the time. Jesus fucking Christ! Planes coming in from Mexico, landing on the back lot! I have to tell you - we called it flubber! We got flubbered! That's where they got the name from! I mean - flying car? The tag line on the poster was fun scores a new high!?!?! Just how obvious could we make it?
FT3 Gee, this sure is a fascinating insight into Tinseltown, Sid! But it wasn't all about scoring a new high, was it?
SS Well, there was a bunch of sex, too. They had to strengthen the shocks on Angela Lansbury's trailer.
FT3 So - what psybient-type record have you brung us today?
SS Which it's - waittaminute - I forget! Shit, they all sound the same anyway!
FT3 Leave us sit back and enjoy Son Of Flubber while you try to remember!
SS [100 minutes later] I got it! It's Shakatura. Old Pschool Psybient from 2002.
FT3 Gee, and is it ever flubber-tastic!
SS [laughs]
FT3 [laughs]
In my extensive research for this swell feature, I discovered this FoamTastic© piece of trivia:
ReplyDelete"In one of the most hapless marketing tie-in attempts in movie history, Hasbro Toys, in cooperation with Disney, issued a toy version of Flubber, marketed just before Christmas time in 1962. Similar to Silly Putty, in that it could bounce like a ball and make comic imprints, the mixture was a combination of rubber, mineral oil, and green food coloring that had been lab-tested with no ill effects and was marketed as being made of "a new parent-approved material that is non-toxic and will not stain." Within weeks, claims came pouring in to both Hasbro and Disney that the toy Flubber was causing full-body rashes and sore throats in many of the children who used it, resulting in several lawsuits by angry parents. Eventually, after much experimentation, and an intensive investigation by the FDA, it was determined that there was a property in the mixture, of unknown origin, that caused an infection of the hair follicles in certain individuals. The product was recalled, but disposing of it turned out to be an even dicier proposition. Trying to incinerate the mixture only produced a heavy, dense black cloud around the Providence, Rhode Island, garbage dump where the attempt was made. Working with the U.S. Coast Guard to sink the substance at sea turned out to be a fiasco, as well, as the next day almost all of the dumped Flubber came floating back into Narragansett Bay. Finally, it was decided to use the mixture as landfill, buried deep under the parking lot at Hasbro's new warehouse, just outside of Providence. Even then, the incredible but true story doesn't end there. A popular "urban legend" among Hasbro employees is that every year, during the hottest days of summer, you can still spot some of the mixture oozing through the cracks in the parking lot."
My granny Tooie got a palm rash from the shit, lasted many years til her death
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ReplyDeletePlaya Mimosa!
Thanksfor the hidden link
DeleteGood morning, young man. I'm originally from Providence and was 8 at the time of the flubber fiasco. I don't know much about it being burned, buried, or sunk, but it was banned from my grammar school. Naturally, since it was banned, we wanted it. Eventually, I found some, played with it, and ultimately threw it away when I got tired of it. I never had a reaction to it and never, until now, knew what the controversy was.
ReplyDeleteThis is great! A 4/5G© who actually had some Flubber!!! It's exactly this kind of connexion that redeems th' internet, you ax me.
DeleteVideo blocked by Disney in your country.....message from youtube ....maybe flubber still a dirty word here..
ReplyDeleteBoy. That's tough. Son Of Flubber is possibly the greatest movie ever made. The nude scenes alone are worth the price of admission.
DeleteWhat has "The Absent Minded Professor" to do with it ?
DeleteTo do with what?
DeleteThat's another McMurray movie.
DeleteYou've just answered your own question!
DeleteI'm going to get "flubbered" later today with the intent of listening to this but will probably forget to causing me to repeat this pattern tomorrow and likely every day hence forward. Thanks!? Class action suit anyone?
ReplyDeleteLurking behind those later Fred McMurray vehicles in which he plays average schmoes and hapless dads are the much darker roles he played earlier on. His treacherous lieutenant in Caine Mutiny and his sap of an insurance agent in Double Indemnity catered to the actor's innately corrupted soul. As to that Flubber fiasco, it's the first I'me hearing of it and feel immeasurably enriched by this high-fiber morsel of trivia.
ReplyDeleteMacMurray was a Real Actor. Unfortunately, he never got the recognition he deserved, missing out on a late career revival a hip director (he was too early for Tarantino or Friedkin) could have given him. Sid Slaw remembers him as "the meanest, most penny-pinching son of a bitch I ever met, but a damn fine Republican!"
DeleteAgreed Macmurray is seriously underrated. Double Indemnity is top notch.
DeleteFlubber was a great album by Souled American
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