What's My Line? - Allan Sherman; Tony Randall & Anita Gillette [panel] (Aug 15, 1965)

[@Enregardant]

By far, Pamela Painter is my favorite non-celebrity contestant in the hundreds of episodes I've watched till now. She deserves a show of her own.

[@TheCosmicVagabond]

She was very feisty! 😎

[@Deejaay83urj38]

Indeed, her and the remarkable "white Hunter". Man should have been another Errol Flynn

[@sstavsky]

@@TheCosmicVagabond I agree! She had a very strong personality, something that you did not usually see with the "non-celebrity" guests.

[@leannsherman6723]

There was something about her I didn’t like. I think she was a little arrogant.

[@bluecamus5162]

Adorable. A statuesque beauty with a level of self-assuredness rarely found in any day. I imagine she has scads of interesting and funny stories to tell which she'll tell over a pint or two. What I ponder is, why would any country give license for a self-employed foreigner to dredge gold on their land?

[@soulierinvestments]

First game -- really one of the most interesting and articulate contestants --- I think ever. Educational sequence, too.

[@jacquelinebell6201]

The gold miner was very self assured. She knew exactly what she was talking about and not afraid to say what she thought. I admire who because she's obviously not a "helpless" female. Times were definitely changing.

[@scottmiller6495]

Allan Sherman was a brilliant entertainer and a super human being!!!!!

[@omargonzalez2641]

Two beautiful accomplished woman on one show plus Allan Sherman! A+

[@bailinnumberguy]

The first guest seemed like a really interesting woman. Stunningly tall and long-legged, studied geology, mined for gold in Brazil, nice personality and sharp.

[@Merrida100]

Yes! I really liked her. Very no-nonsense, and bright, very direct and confident. I wish there was a way to speak more with her. She's a hidden gem, I think. She sounds brilliant and quite educated, and also very clever with her choice of words. I like that she isn't the typical "fashion/household/entertaining" type of housewife.

[@ErisRising]

Absolutely charming, intelligent, and gorgeous. One of my favorite non-mystery guests, of all time, and my current favorite based upon personality rather than having an amusing job.

[@karlschwinbarger105]

She's brilliant and it's refreshing when a guest grabs control the way she does. It is great television. But with the dismal hindsight that 54 years gives us anyone familiar with these miserable gold mining operations in the Amazon has to draw their breath to see how that mess began. No foul for this guest. So much really in hind sight looks God awful after 54 years. Depressing. But she's definitely not.

[@rogeroge50]

@@ErisRising A very interesting woman.

[@waldolydecker8118]

@@karlschwinbarger105 - agree, the woman was off the chart, but the massive criminal goldmining operations in the indigenous Amazon rainforests that have continued in varying degrees right up to today have led to catastrophic pollution and deforestation. Also would submit that 54 years of hindsight was not needed to know these operations were God awful. Like slavery, they were God awful when they were initiate; they simply were able to (and still do) politically get away with it.

[@gregmoorhead7203]

Miss. Painter is very well spoken.

[@kingforaday8725]

Camp Granada!!! I remember hearing on the Perry Como show. Early 60's. Next day kids at school were constantly signing it!

[@turquoisemama33]

typo - but constantly signing it would be a sight to see...

[@eepanusstar5940]

Allan Sherman was stellar on this show. Thanks.

[@romeman01]

Allan Sherman is a brilliant mystery guest, here and in his earlier appearance when he did the voice of Frankie Fontaine. He added value to the voices, however; the value of a quick wit. Cerf: "Well, would you admit that you are a motion picture star?" Sherman: "I'd admit it, but it's not so, unfortunately." I roared with laughter at this. The mystery guests who were as skilled as Sherman must make up a very small list.

[@Deejaay83urj38]

Well spotted. Yes he was brilliant. I wasn't amused by the Downs syndrome at the start at all, but his bright intellect and comic excellence shone through after in dazzling style

[@Beson-SE]

I discovered Allan Sherman some years ago. I find his way of using song parodies in front of a live audience very funny and my favorites are "Sarah Jackman", "Here's to the Crabgrass", "Shake Hands with Your Uncle Max", "Al 'n' Yetta", "Harvey and Sheila", "When I Was a Lad", "Hello Muddah, Hello Fadduh!", "I Can't Dance", "The Twelve Gifts of Christmas" and "Togetherness". Also the songs are educating for me since they contain many names, expressions and events that are unknown to me.

[@strooomon]

Heres to the Crabgrass is all the more brilliant both in being prescient and also cause it was based on an English Ditty, Country Garden

[@DreamDancer82]

My first run in with Allan Sherman was when I was about four or five years old in 1987, when my parents taped the 1971 DePatie Freleng special "The Cat in the Hat" on a Disney Channel preview, and I didn't even know it back then!

[@kenyongray2615]

It was interesting how Miss Painter totally took control of things. There was almost no need for John Daly to explain certain nuances of the answers to the questions.

[@linasaidso1355]

I liked that. It's sometimes a little irritating, the way he repeats the question to the guest, and the answer to the panel, as though he needed to translate them!😂

[@yeahnoonecaresifyouarefirst]

I think he was intimidated by her and I found her a little arrogant

[@daler.steffy1047]

@@yeahnoonecaresifyouarefirst While I agree with the former comments (those just made ahead of yours), I actually do agree with you. I usually trust my first instincts, and that's how she came across to me: being a little too arrogant and overly assertive, and not in keeping with the protocols of that show as we are used to seeing them employed.

[@soulierinvestments]

Allan Sherman. Funny guy! Voice disguise is a cross of W C Fields and Sheldon Leonard. It's nice when you have been fired by G-T in 1956 that you can come back as a success. 1965 is the year of WML water. There's this problem with Allan Sherman's water. Previously, John used of a glass of water to put out that electrical fire when Jack Jones was mystery guest. Stayed tuned folks . . . . Milton Berle's episode coming up. Get a towel ready.

[@MrJoeybabe25]

The gold miner had a gold miner's way about her. She looked as if she gave no ground to anyone. She looked like she was auditioning for her own show. Bravo for women's lib 1965!

[@2508bona]

Too bad she wasn't named Glittering Goldie O'Gilt. That would have been perfect. 😄

[@jmccracken1963]

+shevegen Pamela Painter.

[@MrJoeybabe25]

The first contestant, Miss Painter was stunningly beautiful. AND TALL! I would have thought she was at least a hat check girl or cocktail waitress. Or congresswoman.

[@galileocan]

There's not one shy bone in Miss Painter the Gold Miners body!

[@VahanNisanian]

Videotaped on April 11, 1965. Again, the same rule of thumb as in the last pre-taped episode: Any pre-taped episode that aired in August 1965, in which Dorothy was absent, was taped during two of her three absent periods in 1965. After April 18, Dorothy was never absent again, until her unexpected death on November 8.

[@MrJoeybabe25]

And John goes out of his way to prevaricate by wishing Miss Gillette a happy birthday "tomorrow" August 16th. Broadcast standards should apply here too. John would never introduce a filmed or taped news reports as "live", why lie about what day it is?

[@TyrSkyFatherOfTheGods]

+Vahan Nisanian Does anyone know the reason for her absence? Oddly, the panel doesn't allude to it.

[@VahanNisanian]

fishhead06 She had injuries on her shoulder, and had slipped on a bear skin rug.

[@TyrSkyFatherOfTheGods]

Again? Or was this a recurrence of the injury? After all she'd been back.

[@stevenginsberg8471]

So John was being cute when he referenced Anita's birthday as "tomorrow."

[@poetcomic1]

Allan Sherman was a huge success with his My Son the Folksinger (Hello Mudder, Hello Faddah). He invented the show 'I've Got A Secret' and was a TV producer as well.

[@roaminggnome6878]

Wow, Pamela Painter was awesome! Finally, a contestant with some personality! They usually act like zombies or something.

[@soulierinvestments]

Since this was the first taping session, then this was the first time Anita Gillette was on WML. The broadcast with Marian Anderson was technically the first time she appeared on a WML broadcast. She appeared rather regularly in syndicated WML

[@MrJoeybabe25]

When Bennett asks the question at about 20:10 "are you known for mimicking people" could he have possibly been thinking about Vaughn Meader, whose career had died on November 22nd, 1963. Who else was famous as a mimic and record seller in those days? Gee, wiz, Bennett!

[@jvcomedy]

+Joe Postove Frank Gorshin was very popular at the time and had done numerous guest spots on the Ed Sullivan Show and The Tonight Show as an impressionist so he would have been very well known. Also Rich Little was starting to make a name for himself at this time and had made several TV show appearances. Not sure who Bennett was thinking of, but it could have been any one of these guys and maybe some others I may not be remembering.

[@jmccracken1963]

+Jeff Vaughn Speaking of Frank Gorshin AND Anita Gillette..... Four years after this episode aired, Frank Gorshin (Jimmie Walker), Julie Wilson (Allie Walker), and Anita Gillette (Betty Compton) would co-star in the musical "Jimmy" ("A Musical of the Life and Good Times of Jimmy Walker"), which ran on Broadway at the Winter Garden Theatre from 23 October 1969 through 3 January 1970 - only 84 performances. (The week the show closed was the week that the Metropolitan Opera re-opened, after a long and acrimonious strike which lasted 5 months.) The music and lyrics for the show were by Bill Jacob and Patti Jacob; the book was by Melville Shavelson (based on "Beau James," by Gene Fowler). The show was produced by Jack L. Warner, directed by Joseph Anthony, choreographed by Peter Gennaro, and conducted by Milton Rosenstock, with sets designed by Oliver Smith, costumes designed by W. Robert LaVine, lighting designed by Peggy Clark, and projections designed by Charles E. Hoefler and James Hamilton. As Anita Gillette says in the book "Sing Out, Louise!", the main reason for the failure of the show was Frank Gorshin, who played Jimmy Walker as a street punk, quite unlike the larger-than-life real Jimmy Walker. Gorshin also fought with the director and most of the cast. But Jack L. Warner liked Gorshin's impression of long-time Warner Bros. contract player James Cagney, and he would have pulled his money out of the show had Gorshin been replaced.

[@loissimmons6558]

I'm not surprised by Anita Gillette's explanation. I never considered Frank Gorshin very talented: a man of a million voices, all of them sounding like Cagney, Burt Lancaster, and maybe a little bit of Kirk Douglas. I also consider him one of the worst guest stars on "Star Trek" (TOS). I have no doubt that Gorshin's limitations as a impressionist contributed to his decision to play Mayor Walker out of character.

[@soulierinvestments]

Gil Fates in his WML book praised Sherman's book "The Gift of Laughter," plugged here. In about 4 years, Sherman was involved in writing one of the biggest flops in the history of Broadway.

[@jmccracken1963]

That flop was "The Fig Leaves Are Falling," for which Allan Sherman wrote the book and the lyrics (the music was by Albert Hague) - based on his 1966 divorce, after 21 years of marriage. (I'm thinking that this show was the polar opposite on the subject of marriage of "I Do! I Do!") The show opened at the Broadhurst Theatre on Thursday, 2 January 1969 - and closed on Monday, 6 January 1969, after only 4 performances (preceded by 17 preview performances). What a colossal waste of talent, including Barry Nelson, Dorothy Loudon, Jenny O'Hara, Kenneth Kimmins, Helen Blount, and David Cassidy (all of them in the cast; this show was David Cassidy's Broadway debut), George Abbott (director), Eddie Gasper (choreographer), Abba Bogin (music director), William and Jean Eckart (set design), Robert Mackintosh (costume design), and Tharon Musser (lighting design)!

[@mtp4430]

Allan Sherman blew it when he said he worked with Tony Randall recently. Had he just acknowledged that he worked with Tony Randall, he would have fooled them, because Tony Randall has worked with hundreds of people, and it wouldn't have been so easy narrowing it down

[@preppysocks209]

He wanted to be guessed at that point. If you have ever read anything Allan Sherman ever wrote, it is clear that he was one of the most insecure people on the planet. He obviously enjoyed playing with the panel for a bit but I don't think his ego would have taken not being guessed because that meant he wouldn't have been a huge celebrity. So he didn't blow it, meaning making a mistake -- given the clip that someone posted above, there was no way Tony Randall was not going to know it was Sherman, which was the whole point of adding "recently."

[@joelfogelsanger5773]

I think he sensed they were getting close to guessing his identity plus they had been questioning him so long that he decided to give himself up.

[@soulierinvestments]

Easy to see why G-T thought of Anita when hiring panelists for syndicated WML. Very charming and witty here.

[@waldolydecker8118]

Yes, and many today are still shaving with her brand of razor blades over fifty years later.

[@Baskerville22]

The lady gold-miner was impressive

[@MrJoeybabe25]

The second contestant wasn't going to be a pushover either.

[@MrJoeybabe25]

Bennett refers to "The Hollywood Palace" as "just upstairs". Wasn't the "Palace" TV show in the old Jerry Lewis studio in Hollywood?

[@daler.steffy1047]

Pamela Painter, the gold miner from Califipornia, who was on this episode of "What's My Line," was a guest who offered a refreshing change from many of her predecessors whose comments were always a bit stilted (although that was partly because Mr. Daley couldn't keep his mouth shut long enough for them to say anything). However, there is often a delicate balance in place when measuring seemingly opposing situations; and in the way Miss Painter came across to the panelists, while I agreed with her displaying a knowledgeable and assertive presence, I think she was a little bit too aggressive; and in doing so, she stepped outside the protocols that were in place for "proper conduct" on that program. But there was something also refreshing about her, and about many of her contemporaries that had been already on that program, which I have enjoyed watching over the last several months through these posted episodes. It's wonderful to see women who aren't (all) ridiculously "decorated" in out-of-control tattoos, weird hair colors, and piercings, including nose rings and earrings and eyeball rings and brain rings and nip*le rings and knee rings and toenail rings and ring-a-ding dings; and false eyelashes and mascara put around the eyes in such great quantities that looks like they were given two black eyes by somebody who tried to rob them in the alleyway before they got to their destination. People with their massively stupid tattoos and/or piercings think they are "expressing" their true individualism, by displaying themselves in the manner of believing they are being so "unique," so different; but ironically, they are just like millions of other people who look just like them, and that saturates the sense of what truly identifies as an individual spirit, thus making them part of just another click, where they think they are being a "true individual"; but, ultimately they are wanting to be like everybody else who want to be individuals and have a bunch of tattoos and piercings so they can be, in fact, like everyone else--and NOT get left behind (but "behind what" I wouldn't know!). You have to think about that one, because there is a lot of truth in it! It takes a True Individual to know what a true individual really means--or really is. It's a Grand Uniqueness set apart from everybody else's.

[@VahanNisanian]

Notice Tony introducing Anita, saying that this is "her first time". Technically this is correct, because this was taped a week before the next she came on this show, and the April 18 edition was Live.

[@MrJoeybabe25]

About 5 months after this taping Anita Gillette would be 29 years old.

[@kentetalman9008]

Pamela Painter was also a contestant on TTTT.

[@bigoldinosaur]

Who wants to go to Camp Grenada?

[@PhilBagels]

Camp is very entertaining.

[@bigoldinosaur]

Eeyup.

[@jmccracken1963]

+bigoldinosaur Not Camp Grenada, certainly - unless I was part of Gunnery Sergeant Highway's recon platoon. Nor Camp Grenada, either; remember that "All the counselors hate the waiters - and the lake has alligators. Our director wants no sissies; so he reads to us from something called 'Ulysses.'"

[@ErisRising]

Depends on the weather.

[@Kat-fw9se]

Me!😝

[@loissimmons6558]

In her youth, Anita Gillette published a horse racing tout sheet. Who knew?

[@MrJoeybabe25]

I think (correct me if I'm wrong) that the second contestant got a lot more whistles than the first one. They must have been for...(ahem) 'scuse me, that rather large derrière. Her fronterrière was not that great. I think the boys in the audience were intimidated by contestant #1, huh?

[@Beson-SE]

Where did they get the male audience from? Sailors on leave after six months in a submarine? :)

[@MrJoeybabe25]

Johan Bengtsson t seems that way sometimes. Or maybe remnants from the Hal Block Appreciation Society!

[@ModMokkaMatti]

@@MrJoeybabe25 Blockheads, but not from the Ian Drury camp?

[@joelfogelsanger5773]

Leave it to Arlene to get Ms. Painter's profession.

[@WhatsMyLine]

Again, with the "Fluffy"? I thought we were finally done with this when they plugged "Amanda" in Tony Randall's last appearance. For a movie that played as long as it apparently did, it's impressive how totally forgotten it is. . .

[@sabinebeyer9249]

Finaly i've seen the "Fluffy" picture. It isn't as quite as bad as I thought. It has some funny moments. It's good entertainment for a rainy afternoon for example. If one isn't expect to much sense in the movie. One can see this whithout pain ;-)

[@toddmccreary4579]

The beautiful Anita Gillette only turned 29 the day after the show aired.

[@Lisa-di1wi]

Anita Gillette's birthday also falls on the anniversary of the deaths of both the King of Rock and Roll and the Queen of Soul.

[@ChrisHansonCanada]

*_GOLD MINER_* *_HORSE RACE HANDICAPPER (GIVES TIPS FOR BETTORS ON RADIO)_*

[@Traderjoe]

Miss Painter is gorgeous

[@elizabethramirezsierra3700]

The Cat in the Hat in What's My Line

[@MrJoeybabe25]

Anita Gillette is alive and 78 years old.

[@granthoops]

She did a good job playing along with the game and not bringing it to an abrupt halt as numerous comedians did.

[@MrJoeybabe25]

@@granthoops Miss Gillette is alive at 86 and will be 87 on August 16th, 2023!

[@D0S81]

it came up 'horse race handicapper' and i just saw her going around with a mallet handicapping horses by smackin em in the knees, ''she must woik for da mafioso methinks''

[@petersanders5321]

Lovely women, period. So much civility, too.

[@kumppi]

Don't really understand what the first guest meant when she implied that gold grows. It does not do so on earth considering that gold is the byproduct of a dying star. The only way to get more gold on earth is if an outer space object containing gold hits earth. Even then I wouldn't consider it growing.

[@alanfollett6242]

+kumppi The belief that precious metals grow in the earth was once widespread. It's alluded to, for instance, in John Dryden's "Heroic Stanzas on the Death of Oliver Cromwell": "As wands of divination downward draw / And point to beds where sovereign gold doth grow." Still, it does seem unlikely that the contestant, who had studied geology and was obviously a smart cookie, still held this ancient belief three hundred years after Dryden. I'd love to know what she meant.

[@loissimmons6558]

I believe Miss Painter was referring to the fact that gold has a crystalline structure and that crystals have the ability to grow in the sense of expanding volume (not in the sense of producing more gold).

[@pattimaeda6097]

kumppi yeah I’m sure the person with a degree in geology got it wrong🙄

[@winonafrog]

Yes, strange argument by someone I otherwise would marry immediately nqa. Gold does not grow! All I can think is she meant accumulates?

[@kentetalman9008]

"Is this product larger than an elephant blanket?"

[@MajorSeventh]

Hello lamp post, Whatcha' knowin? Come to watch your Flowers growin'. Aintcha' got no Rhymes for me-e Dootin' dootin' dootin' dootin' feelin' groovy.

[@waldolydecker8118]

Two very nice looking professional women guests on this show.

[@MrErsamo]

Did I miss something? While Tony Randall clearly indicated he knew who it was, neither he nor anyone else on the panel actually said, "It's Allan Sherman."

[@rmelin13231]

Yeah, I suspect maybe a brief moment of the kinescope ended up on the cutting room floor. We also didn't see the panel members remove their blindfolds..

[@MM-fr9yh]

I thought Alland Sherman was Dorothy Killgelan's son.

[@kentetalman9008]

She would have had him when she was 11.

[@exapnomapcase]

Finally a guest who can get Daly to STFU and not answer guests' questions before they can! #gold :)

[@preppysocks209]

I know of only one other guest who was able to do this, a highly articulate male guest from a few years earlier. Ironic that this was the night Bennett said Daly couldn't stop talking, which was true in virtually every other show but this one.

[@loissimmons6558]

A taped episode of Password aired three days earlier (8/12/65) with Tony Randall and Phyllis Newman as the celebrity players. "Fluffy" gets plugged once again, as well as Tony's newest movie which had just been completed but not released. By this time it is plugged as "The Alphabet Murders", not "Amanda". For those who enjoy Password, it has some excellent game play, including very good lightning rounds. kzbin.info/www/bejne/pJOTgXSefdhgotU

[@SueProv]

John was peevish about the spilled water. The poor man apologized 4x and John mopped it up in high drama and no alleviating the mystery guests embarrassment.

[@ModMokkaMatti]

Timex takes a licking and keeps on ticking.

[@2508bona]

Anita Gillette's hairdo wasn't styled. It was woven.

[@daler.steffy1047]

Sorry..., but I just thought of something else. Miss Painter mines gold on a river in the Amazon through a dredging process. I wonder how gentle that is on the environment, especially in the "sensitive" Amazon basin/rainforest region. That doesn't appear that anyone cared--or was paying attention--to conservation issues, or having any conservation measures put in place before ripping the gold out of the river! (But who cares about the delicate balance that nature has had to accept in that area of the world, or anywhere else! Money is far more important than nature's True Offerings! Or is it?)

[@berwyn58]

I'd whisper sweet nothings into Anita Gillette's ear any day - oops, sorry, the Hal Block inside me escaped for a moment - LOL

[@TheBraveIntrovert]

Not all women are gold diggers. I don't wear jewelry that much. Other than earrings I wear maybe my mothers ring or my grandmothers necklace from time to time.

[@WhatsMyLine]

Sorry-- I'm not clear what you're responding to when you say "not all women are gold diggers." Replying, I assume, to something that was said in the program?

[@TheBraveIntrovert]

One of the guest was a goldminer and she said women are gold diggers or something like that.What's My Line?

[@WhatsMyLine]

Purple Capricorn I figured it was something along those lines! :)

[@jess4metoo]

I think she meant they all like nice things.

[@jmccracken1963]

+shevegen She wrote it right up there on the board; you can go back and re-run it any time you like. For the record, her name is Pamela Painter.

[@phildirt3]

Hello mudda hello fahda

[@cathykinn4516]

What a contrast between the assured Gold Miner & the dolly bird on the panel. There seemed to be 2 different types of Woman or there were Women & then there were females in the 60s. Self assured Women & silly girly dolly birds. The dolly has not stood the test of time. No Dorothy again. She had a lkt of problems leading up to her death its stated - was afraid she'd lose her home even.

[@scottpardee6303]

Anita Gillette was born in 1936, so she would be celebrating her 29th birthday. Sorry tell the secret.

[@joelfogelsanger5773]

Anita Gilette was a lousy panelist. She seemed confused most of the time and didn't pay attention to responses to previous questions.

[@Fush1234]

Imagine dealing with that personality. My god. Divorced in weeks

[@charleskeefer3043]

Tickles colored breakfast comb dental appt for fright night at bogarts flamingos of children order at Oxford glacier buck beep.