Episode: Clem and the Beanstalk – Season 9 – Episode 29
Original Air Date: 1960/05/24
Guest Star: Mamie Van Doren, Peter Lorre

Okay, before I started I had to figure out, “who is Mamie Van Doren?” A quick search lets me know that, well now, she’s thaaaat Mamie Van Doren. One of the early sex symbols in American television history. Posed for Playboy in 1963 a couple times. Has a Star on the Hollywood Walk of Fame. She might have even acted, too – given the Broadway credits.

Here we go. “Live from Hollywood; It’s the Red Skelton Show with David Rose and his orchestra.”

Oooh, they switched up the intro to also give props to David Rose as well as Mamie Van Doren and Peter Lorre.

“We were lucky to get Peter Lorre. I found him in an Easter Egg hunt,” - Red Skelton starts firing away already.

The reason they choose to do a show based on Jack and the Beanstalk:

“With all the politicians making speeches nowadays we thought we would do ‘Jack and the Beanstalk.’ That’s a fairy tale, too.”  1960 - (the time of the Nixon vs. Kennedy election).

Red’s gonna pantomime something other than little old man and the boy. He’s doing “The Ugly Duckling.”

The moderator’s left turn during the storytelling:  “People felt sorry for him and threw him poison popcorn.”

The dancers look all martian. I think they’re lost in space :-). They’re inviting us to Mars. They’re highly civilized. Man, every fabulous place seems caught up in tourism anymore :-P.

Red’s always good at pulling the tails off animals. Poor cow. Poor as Clem’s family.

“What do you take me for, a Mormon?” - Clem during the sale of the cow. Clem (Red) quickly corrected himself. Looks like the writing on the cue cards needs to be bigger. Another moment to show why live comedy can be so much fun to watch.

Apparently magic beans don’t grow as fast when you’re watching them. Ooh, it grew. Phew. Looks like an infomercial tomato planter.

Peter Lorre is the martian king. His sneaky, sly german cadence is timeless. The golden egg will “scramble the earth.”

His daughter is Mamie Van Doren. She can be a queen.

The beanstalk just happened to stop growing outside the martian window. Clem climbs it and sees the ‘giant.’

“I bet even Dean Martin’s never been this high.”

Oooh, martian Mamie is gonna do her dance of the heavenly bodies and place him under a spell. Lucky Clem. Easy way to sneak in a lip sync of a Broadway number.

Clem is too dumb to hypnotize. Martian Mamie thinks the human kiss might be a secret weapon. Clem shows her, again and again. Clems kisses have convinced Mamie to help save the world. The king has been hit with a stun gun. Clem’s gonna test how stunned the king really is:

“Before I go, tell me, what did you and Sidney Greenstreet really do with the Maltese Falcon?”

“You saw that? I’ll tell you what we did…” - The Martian King

“No. No one will ever listen to the end of ‘The Maltese Falcon.’” - the Martian King (Lorre).

Ma dropped the egg and the world blew up. Who’s to explain what happened to the earth? None other than “The Twilight Show’s,” Rod Serling.

Final Thoughts:

Clem and The Beanstalk has to be considered one of the classic The Red Skelton Show episodes. You had stars, the show ended with a twist, and it ended with Rod Serling. Also, filled with many, many one-liners both of political and general nature. The 1960 Political Primaries were heating up and Television was getting it’s hands into everything. Red’s humor was very indicative of Television’s influence in 1960, and using Clem Kadiddlehopper in the same way the Simpsons now use Homer Simpson to make light and references to the political and cutural news was pure genius.

Another episode review coming soon.