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Some people are surprised when I discuss or write about television. I suppose it’s because they probably know me from the radio, when it was unimaginable that two (or more!) competing radio stations would be owned and housed by one company, and unimaginable that a disc jockey would work at not one but two (or more!) stations at the same time. So that I may properly address a furrowed brow, I'll simply lay it out on the table: Being a rock and roll disc jockey at KSHE was perhaps the greatest college gig in the history of higher education. No, it wasn’t a part-time job, but I was attending school and simultaneously working at KSHE—undergrad and grad at Webster University, both for television and film. Many have asked why I didn’t get a degree in radio. It seemed obvious to me, but I never could have found a better job in radio, so television it was.
A significant amount of time has passed since I left KSHE, although some of its fans don’t think so. Case in point: I was recently at Riverport (OK, Verizon Wireless Amphitheatre) for the Queensryche, Ratt, and Tesla show. I'm not a huge fan of those bands—I was there on business, believe it or not. While I was walking around, attending to business, several people came up to introduce themselves, or I was introduced to them as Joe “Mama” Mason. They were generally very nice—complimentary even—but several argued with me. This has happened before, and often at concerts. It always starts out with a somewhat confused look, then a question. “What time are you on the air now?” I reply that I'm not with KSHE any more, and haven’t been for a while. This is always followed by a smile and one of those you’re kidding looks. Then comes the arguing: “Come on, man! I just heard you last week!” “No, I hear your name all the time on there!” Truth be told, I left KSHE in 1987—23 years ago. Of course, I was still on-air at KSD-FM in an identical music format for another six years, so perhaps that adds to the confusion.
My point is that in radio and television, time sometimes holds still. What is dusty and dated can seem (at least in one’s memory) like it was just yesterday. Which is a rather long and detailed introduction to my real topic for this blog, Classic St. Louis “Pitchman” television commercials. And when you read about them, I hope it will seem like you watched them only yesterday…
Why do some people appear in their own TV commercials? 1) They can (they’re footing the bill). 2) Their ad agency says it’s a great idea (if the spots don't sell more goods or services, the owner won't blame himself and consequently the agency, since it's him in the commercial). 3) They're too cheap to pay "real" talent (a certain bedding store springs to mind). 4) They’re egomaniacs (hello, car dealers—hope you learned this trick from the Joe “Mama” Mason Handbook). 5) There really is a strange, unique, comical, and memorable personality lurking inside a business owner, just waiting to spill onto the TV screen in “your very own HOME, here,” as Uncle Leonard (of Leonard’s TV) used to say.
Schweig Engel is a great place to start. While the spots weren’t genius, they were always consistently good. And clever. And odd. Usually, three guys would be running from something, being scared, and acting silly in the name of attracting the attention of anyone with credit that might scare a dinosaur (“Jurassic Credit”).
What they actually sold at the store, I wasn't sure, but I knew you could buy what they were selling on credit. Their holiday jingle, "No Money Down" was a bad-taste classic, as were all of the special effects used in the spots. But for me, one of the coolest things they did was to use African-Americans in commercials that were targeted to African-Americans. Often, two out of three on-camera pitchmen were black, a major difference from similar-era TV spots, especially those targeted to black audiences. The comic posings of the skinny white guy and his high-pitched "un-buh-lievable!" are staple ingredients of low-budget pitchmen.
Friedman Railroad Salvage was an interesting entry into the Pitchmen Hall of Fame. This was the company that sold goods salvaged from railroad cars. These commercials featured no on-camera pitchmen, but we still remember them. Generally, the onscreen visuals were graphics only, and not very exciting. They featured specific brand names and products, like “cases of dented or missing label Libby's creamed corn, now only $2!” There were no special effects, and surprisingly, not even any video. Personally, I believe the reason that Friedman Railroad Salvage commercials became renowned wasn’t because of what was actually shown on the commercials, but what the viewer visualized in his head: the mental image of two trains hurtling toward each other and colliding in a spectacular shower of tin cans and mattresses. Perhaps the mattresses landed first, so the cases of canned vegetables had a softer landing. Perhaps insurance adjusters wandered amid the rubble, behind yellow police tape, kicking cans and using an extendable poker as they inspected the damaged freight. Then, the inevitable words: “Can’t be used? Call the salvage folks!” Later, there’d be penny-pinching twitches as we added up in our heads all that had gone into that case of dented, sometimes label-less creamed corn: millions of dollars in twisted train metal; countless lives lost in the accident; the good Friedman people on hands and knees at the accident site, slowly and painfully assembling the case of creamed corn (despite missing labels!), and then offering it for sale at their store. It was a small price to pay for a souvenir from a tragic event—like buying a piece of coal from the Titanic. And even though not many of us liked creamed corn, the excitement of purchasing something salvaged from wrecked train cars was almost enough to make us buy a whole case of it.
Friedman Railroad Salvage was—still is—owned by a family that also owned another classic pitchman marketing company, Home Furniture in Collinsville, Ill., a relatively late player in the 1970s and 1980s pitchmen commercial category. The company’s spots usually featured a person dressed in a gorilla suit, for no reason except the company's tagline, “No monkey business!” (When I reflect on why we enjoyed these commercials so much, I can't really explain it, other than perhaps there exists such a leeriness towards furniture salespeople that we simply wanted to see them chased down by large apes and humiliated on television.)
Other major players in the pitchman category included the Queens of Carpet and Tile, Becky and Wanda, respectively. Take some flooring salespeople, and put ’em in fancy gowns and tiaras, stick ’em on top of a really bad green-screen flying carpet, et voila! At least the flying carpet prop had something to do with the business—take that, Home Furniture and Schweig Engel! Kudos to Becky for buying out Wanda and then losing all of the weight—but neither feat improved the spots.
Other honorable mentions:
Rozell’s: A clothing boutique serving the near North Side. The commercials starred one rather stout store employee, who modeled every outfit being promoted. I never did know his name, but I thoroughly enjoyed the way he'd primp and preen. My favorite was the sweatsuit; as everyone knows, sweatsuits make even skinny people look plump, so this guy looked just enormous with his sweatsuit, and he'd neatly pirouette at the request of the intern, who was directing the 30-minute shoot. Roll jingle: “Who's got the baddest clothes in town? Rozell’s!”
V.I.P. (Very Intimate Playthings): An adult novelty store on North Lindbergh. “Hi, I'm Ron Jeremy for V.I.P.” “Hello, I’m Nina Hartley and I go to V.I.P.” Low-tech, low-budget—and brilliant. Back in the day, before everyone realized the porn industry would generate more than the airlines, the adult video sellers and makers would meet annually in the basement at the Consumer Electronics Show in Chicago. There, you could preorder titles, and, as an incentive, shake hands with (eeeww!) and get autographs from the biggest of the big (ahem) porn stars. Included were John Leslie, Seka, Serena, Marilyn Chambers, and John Holmes. Seems a certain store owner with some foresight brought his handy-dandy home video camera there and, on a whim, told the porn stars, “Repeat after me.” Every single one did. The commercial was edited together from these porn star clips, and…a star was born. This was a great late-night commercial that only ran well after midnight. Some believed it was because of the content—since V.I.P. sold adult videos and toys. I knew better. Howard, the owner, was too…um, frugal, to pay for anything that ran earlier. I believe he paid only $10 per commercial for each airing. And the sultry female voice that did the voiceover? None other than the sweet and lovely local radio announcer Kris Kelly (KEZK), who was convinced to do the voiceover only when promised that it would only run very late at night (true) and probably only run for a month or so (does four years count?) by a certain radio disc jockey turned director/producer of television.
Fantasy Jim for Fantasy Coachworks: Although this might be hard to believe, there was a time when some folks’ fantasies centered around customizing their van. You know—doing cool stuff to it like adding shag carpeting, AM/FM Cassette Pioneer radio, or one of those smoked bubbles that involved cutting a hole in the side of your vehicle. (Think Scooby-Doo). I liked the Fantasy spots because, like many of the other memorable commercials, their clientele was very specific. As in South County. Old-school South County. So it only made sense to recruit South County’s finest for the Fantasy Jim beauty contest—I mean calendar…er, TV commercial…I mean photoshoot—and I promise not to show these pictures to anyone… Yep, it was a little bit o’ airbrushed, shag-carpeted, rock ‘n’ roll reverie in “your very own HOME, there” (to mix metaphors with Uncle Leonard). And, of course, Aldo Nova’s “Fantasy” was always blaring in the commercial's background.
Of course, the granddaddy of ’em all was, is, and will always be Steve Mizerany. Yes, I know he was in business with Joe Fahrat, the guy who not many remember. They, of course, were The Decent Boys. Everyone claimed to know Steve. He was a fun guy, very extroverted, and took well to the public eye. He even had his own headshots taken and printed, so he could sign autographs. He started out on roller skates as a gimmick, used a guy in a monkey suit (Why you, Home Furniture, I oughta. . .) and nothing was too corny or cheap a gimmick not to try. The New Deal—right next to the Bevo Mill! On the Hill! Don’t be confused! The Decent Boys! Three-word utterances seemed to be the magic combination, especially from Mizerany’s mouth. On one of my favorite spots, Mizerany got so worked up and the words came gushing out so quickly, he literally said (and I quote): “Blah blah blee-blah!” There was another time when the ending of his monologue degenerated into indiscernible grunting and moaning. He was King, the undisputed champ of 'em all. Uncle Leonard, Larry Lammert—none of them could hold a candle to the torch that Mizerany put forth. In person, Mizerany shone just as brightly. Once, while eating lunch with my then-fiancée at St. Raymond’s Maronite Cathedral (Lebanese food, so a frequent Mizerany haunt), Steve saw me through the doors as I approached and bolted up from the table to greet me. My lunch companion was from Denmark, and had no idea how Americans could act—especially not Steve Mizerany, who rushed to the door, flung it open wide and began excitedly screaming, the pitch and volume increasing with duration, “Joooooooe MMMMAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAmmaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaa…." trailing off only when he ran out of wind. Needless to say, the Danish girl was freaked out beyond measure and returned to Denmark…never again to step foot on U.S. soil.
Although perhaps most widely known as a radio personality at KSHE-FM and KSD-FM, Joe “Mama” Mason majored in television and film in college, was an on-camera talent/reporter for KPLR-TV, and appeared as talent at various times on all of the local affiliate stations. Since 1992, he has been directing TV and film. His credits include national work for Sea-Doo, Ocean Spray, Blue Man Group, Ozzfest, and Santana. Locally, he directs for The Muny, Doc’s, McCarthy, and others. His work has been seen on TV networks including CBS, CNN, Animal Planet, VH1, Travel Channel, Lifetime, and Discovery Health, and has won more than 75 national awards. In addition, Mason is an adjunct professor for Webster University’s School of Communications, where he has written and taught curricula for several classes. He also volunteers for and serves on the boards of several large charitable organizations, and has served as vice president of the National Academy of Television Arts & Sciences, the organization that awards the Emmys. Mason is currently senior creative director and president of the Clayton-based advertising and marketing agency Illustrated Man.
