Some people use television to talk to other people.
In the public-television series "Jean Shepherd's America," Shepherd uses television to talk to himself. The man does seem to be in love with the sound of his voice.
Vanity air.
I was expecting better. I really enjoyed Shepherd's semi-autobiographical comedies, "The Great American Fourth of Julv and Other Disasters" and "The Star-crossed Romance of Josephine Cosnowski," both of which have appeared in public television's "American Playhouse" series. I liked the movie he wrote, "A Christmas Story." And I can recall an appearance on "Late Night with David Letterman," in which Shep-herd was a most companionable raconteur. (He is most often described as a humorist.)
But "Jean Shepherd's America" is another story.
Actually, the two shows I have seen - episodes one (last week) and three (next week) - are not stories at all.
They are opportunities for writer and host Shepherd to prattle on for his own amusement, and, unfortunately for the rest of us, he takes full advantage of them.
The first episode of this 13-part se¬ries was called "Mosquitoes and Moon Pies," and featured Shepherd's thoughts on, and in, the Okefenokee Swamp in Georgia.
In the early part of the program, Shepherd, in pretentious stage whisper, went on about a creation called Swamp Man, a term that can describe the per¬sonality of anybody who happens to be spending a few minutes or hours in a swamp.
"He can feel the itchy spots on his shoulders where his fins once flut¬tered," Shepherd said of Swamp Man, "the slight bulges on the neck where the gills once heaved."
For a minute, I thought he was talking about the "Thriller" video.
In the same show, he offered a sa¬lute to Walt Kelly's comic strip "Pogo," which was set in the Okefenokee Swamp, but never bothered to explain what it was he liked about the work, or why we should share the sentiment.
"Mosquitoes and Moon Pies" did have its moments, however, and, not surprisingly, those were on the same basic subjects that made "The Great American Fourth of July" and "Christ¬mas Story" so appealing.
Shepherd has warm, Technicolor memories of growing up in the Mid¬west. He remembers. And that is a real gift.
In his regular voice - and it's a friendly, pull-up-a-stool kind of voice - he talked about the "library phase" he went through when he was a kid, a phase just about everyone experiences.
It is a time, Shepherd pointed out, when you want to read everything that's in the library, every book on every shelf. In his library phase, he was particularly taken with a book titled "Tom Slade in the Okefenokee Swamp."
And he talked about how he and a childhood pal would catch crawdads in the small swamp next to the Warren G. Harding School.
"In that part of the Midwest, lob¬sters were only rumors."
Good stuff. Funny, and recogniz¬able.
But Shepherd seems in need of someone to edit him for this series. He talks too much - I got the idea he was trying out lines for his next movie script - about too little.
In the first show, he dropped the name of a Manhattan saloon (P.J. Clarke's), which means little to most of us who live more than a $3.50 cab fare from the place. He told viewers that his show "ain't 'Three's Company.'" He swore off modern life.
Goodbye, civilization. I've had enough of this TV baloney. I've had enough of it. I'm leaving. I'll see you guys at the end of the evolutionary scale. I'm just staying out here - for¬ever." |