Episode: Deadeye the Outlaw – Season 7, Episode 11.
Original Air Date: 1957/12/17
Guest Star: Mickey Rooney

I can’t tell you how much I’ve been looking forward to combing back over these episodes of The Red Skelton Show. Maybe because, for me, these episodes are mirrors, moments in time that shine back into my parents’ youth. Or maybe I just want to see how comedians performed live on TV, working without a net.

As I start into the episode, Deadeye the Outlaw, I actually fall for the old, “pull the flask out on accident trick.” The trick caught me off-guard. It was these kind of tricks I assumed I would be prepared for, but I suppose it goes to show that timing is everything.

Deadeye the Outlaw Highlights:

- “…what a bust.” - it’s a Sputnik thing (you’ll have to see the whole episode to understand).

- Red Skelton really gets into his monologues. I can’t tell who’s laughing harder, Red or the audience (with the laugh track help). It’s the gimmicks that make it all the more interesting. Take the opening skit for example: Red used the flask trick in the monologue, but when he goes to mime the story of the little old man, he doesn’t pull the flask out – yet you know it’s there. Does he do that on purpose?

- The great part about the opening skit is the fact Red doesn’t know where the moderator is going with the story so Red has to play out the skit as he goes along. You can tell Red isn’t certain where the script is going. It’s noticible when Red’s old man character takes another drink from the flask and the moderator calls the liquid in the flask, “pet milk.” Red loses it for a second. It’s this type of skit that was the precursor to the modern-day shows “Whose Line Is It Anyway?” and the like.

- Next skit – old saloon, dancing girls. A singing number about coming west. “Because We Love the West,” I’m guessing is the title. The song becomes an intro for Red’s Deadeye the Outlaw. The skit takes place at the “Civic Center” (aka: Saloon).

- “Careful, son, you’re going against the grain,” Sheriff Zachary O’Toole (Kirkwood) to Deadeye (Red) as Dead lights a match off the Sheriff’s beard. A long pause between lines as neither actor wants to crack the smile forming on their face.
“That’s funny. That was mine in rehearsal,” Deadeye to O’Toole. Half of the improv is to cover the mistakes and forgotten lines. Red recovers in the same way Jimmy Fallon never recovered during the SNL skits.

- “I kill me.” - Deadeye

- “Now, sheriff, you mean to tell me that you think little Rollo is gonna be able to handle Deadeye?”
“What do you mean, little Rollo? 12 years ago he was little Rollo. Then he wasn’t no higher than this (nose high to the Sheriff), but now…” And in walks Mickey Rooney, a good 6 inches under the sheriff’s hand. A nice applause ensues. Needless to say that little Rollo didn’t quite grow into the man his father, the sheriff, hoped for.

- “I bet you tell that to all the girls,” says Deadeye’s girl to little Rollo.
“Yes. The boys don’t care to hear it,” little Rollo laments.

- The duel between Deadeye and Rollo is fast approaching. Deadeye just ran the horse through the wall. Rollo’s use of a pocket-watch to hypnotize Deadeye seems to have worked really, really well:
“I’ve been mean. - Look, we’ve got time. - I’ve been mean.”

- And Deadeye goes to jail – Red Skelton style. Deadeye rattles the bars and about has to hold them up to keep them from falling – the pains and joys of physical comedy. Red keeps it together in style.

- “Boy them college educations will kill you every time.”

Final Thoughts on Deadeye the Outlaw:

Actors definitely had to keep their wits about them to work with Red. As Deadeye the Outlaw episode would indicate, Red would go for the laugh whether that meant staying on cue, on script, or abandoning it all together. Now I’m curious, because Mickey Rooney could stay on cue, improv, and hold true to character, but some of the guest stars coming up in these episodes weren’t as known for their wit and acting chops. I’m looking forward to seeing who can stay character when Red Skelton gets going.

And I’m looking forward to the next episode. That’s a very good sign.