Soupy Sales Death: Pies in the Face, Bloopers and Other Best Moments
Soupy Sales, who died yesterday at 83, will probably be best remembered as the face that launched 20,000 pies, but even though he was the undisputed master of pastry faceplants, there was a lot more to him than his skill at targeting others (and being targeted) with creamy projectiles.By day, he was a zany kids' performer; by night, a strictly-for-grownups raconteur who might be seen guest-hosting 'The Tonight Show' or showcasing the top names in jazz on his own nighttime series. As a children's host who mixed deliberately silly juvenile humor with sly wit that winked at adults, he anticipated recent kids' entertainment from 'Pee-wee's Playhouse' to 'SpongeBob SquarePants.'
Before the current reign of Regis Philbin, he was probably the most ubiquitous celebrity on television, logging thousands of appearances on his own long-running shows in the '50s and '60s as well as on countless game shows in the '70s and '80s. And of course, there were the infamous scandalous ad libs that, paradoxically, made him a subversive hero to Baby Boomers coming of age in the '60s. Here are video clips of some of his most memorable moments:
• Frank Sinatra and Sammy Davis Jr. Get Pied. Soupy's show was so popular among adults that celebrities lined up to take a cream pie in the kisser. First up: Frank Sinatra, who demanded to be hit with a pie as a condition of his appearance on the show. Sales happily complied, as you can see in this 1965 sketch featuring the Chairman and fellow Rat Pack-er Sammy Davis Jr.
• All That Jazz. Sales, who got his showbiz start as a DJ, was a jazz aficionado who booked top artists on his nighttime show. Here's a rare clip of Clifford Brown, one of the best trumpeters of the 1950s, performing and chatting with Soupy in 1955.
• 'The Mouse.' Sales had a pop hit of his own, the novelty song 'The Mouse,' based on a dance he created for his show. (Sales' sons, Hunt and Tony, inherited their dad's love of music; they became celebrated rock musicians, best known for backing David Bowie in the band Tin Machine.) Here's Soupy performing his hit, before a tough critic, in 1965.
• Soupy Sees a Stripper. Sometimes, when Soupy would open the door at the rear of his set, celebrities would walk through, and sometimes, sketch characters and puppets would be on the other side. But on one notorious day in 1959, pranksters on his crew hid a topless dancer behind the door. Kids watching at home saw only a strategically placed balloon.
• Playing Games. From 1968 on, Sales appeared on numerous game shows - he spent years holding down the first chair on the panel on 'What's My Line?,' played on every version of 'Pyramid' from the '70s through the early '90s, and was a frequent guest on such shows 'To Tell the Truth,' 'Hollywood Squares,' and 'Match Game.' Here he is showing his skill on 'What's My Line?' in 1974:
And here he is doing the same on a '$50,000 Pyramid' in 1978:
• Go Ask Alice. In 1979, Sales resurrected his classic kiddie show. The guests were fresh, but the set, puppets, and jokes were pretty much the same as a decade and a half earlier. The show lasted only one season, but not before guest Alice Cooper got creamed.
• Little Green Pieces of Paper. Here's Soupy, years later, recounting the most infamous incident of his career. On New Year's Day 1965, he ad libbed a message to the kids at home, asking them to find the funny little green pieces of paper from their parents' pocketbooks and mail them to him; in return, he'd send them a postcard from Puerto Rico. Much to the chagrin of his bosses, some $80,000 rolled in. (Sales later claimed it was mostly Monopoly money, and that he gave the few real dollars he received to charity.) After a parent complained to the FCC, Sales was suspended for a week. Irate kids saw finally saw their hero return to the air, unrepentant and heralded by a fanfare of 'Happy Days Are Here Again.' Recalling the stunt, and the edginess it lent its perpetrator, one Boomer fan wrote, "It was Soupy who inspired my generation to anarchy." Maybe they should have called Sales the Pie'd Piper.
