Six Degrees of Stark Naked

Yesterday my friend Cal Spitzer electrogrammed this snazzy 8x10 publicity shot of the delightfully named (and delightfully shod) Stark Naked and the Car Thieves. Research reveals that this combo had its beginnings as a conglomeration of several Indianapolis area garage and doo-wop groups,   finally relocating to Los Angeles where they had several minor hits, and rotating list of members. Despite the wild name (and a reportedly crazy Vegas stage show), their surviving recordings are decidedly tame. Further research reveals that their name was eventually stolen by a New Zealand band who went on to record a minor hit cover of another name-thieving band: the Monks' (UK) "Nice Legs, Shame About the Face."

The thing that really struck me, though, is the small print: SN&CT's booking agency is listed as "Jimmy O'Neill Management." I believe this would be the very same DJ Jimmy O'Neill whom I listened to on WOW Radio 590 Omaha during the '70s. Before his days of spinning hot Top 40 wax in Omaha, Jimmy managed several L.A. bands; before that he was a Los Angeles DJ, but best known as the host of ABC's mid-60's teen music program Shindig. The program was created by O'Neill and then-wife Sharon Sheeley, an accomplished songwriter who penned the #1 hit "Poor Little Fool" for Ricky Nelson and co-wrote  the Eddie Cochran classic "Come on Everybody."

Sheeley and Cochran later became boyfriend and girlfriend, and she (along with Gene Vincent) survived the car accident that killed Cochran in England in 1960. Their ill-fated romance later became the subject of a 1980's Levis 501 commercial. Following the wreck, Cochran's car and its contents were impounded at the local police station.  A police cadet at the station named David Harman borrowed Cochran's impounded Gretsch guitar and taught himself how to play. As "Dave Dee" he later led the 60's British pop chart-toppers  Dave Dee, Dozy, Beaky, Mick & Tich, who had a mini-revival last year when their nugget "Hold Tight" was featured in an ironically bloody car wreck scene in Quentin Tarantino's "Death Proof":   

Where was I? Oh yeah, Shindig. It was a brief but big TV hit with Jimmy introducing many of the big acts of the day. Despite solid ratings it was canceled in 1966 to make room on the ABC schedule for a second weekly episode the red-hot Batman series (delighting a young Batman fanatic named Quentin Tarantino who would pay homage to Adam West's Bat-dance in Pulp Fiction).  Shindig performers included The Beatles and this rival quartet of English Invaders:

The Who, as fate would have it, would later score a US Top 20 chart hit with a cover of Eddie Cochran's "Summertime Blues." Jimmy's O'Neill's spotlight on Shindig also brought him immortality in 1965 as a Flintstone character -- here's "Jimmy  O'Neillstone" introducing "The Beau Brummelstones" on "Shinrock."

My favorite nugget from the real Shindig is this Halloween '65 bit with Jimmy introducing Boris Karloff for a cover of Bobby "Boris" Pickett's Monster Mash:

In the background, those cute go-go girls included Terri Garr, who would go on to have a starring role in "Close Encounters of the Third Kind" and earn an Oscar nomination for "Tootsie." Another was Toni Basil, the 80's one-hit wonder of "Mickey" fame.  Between her Shindig go-go gig and MTV mall rat celebrity, Basil was a bit player in films, including Mary the prostitute in 1969's "Easy Rider" with  Jack Nicholson, who received an Oscar nomination for best supporting actor. Basil teamed up with Nicholson again the next year as Terry the hitchhiker girl in "Five Easy Pieces," which earned Nicholson his first Oscar nomination for best actor.  Here you can see her sitting in the diner booth during the film's famous sandwich scene:

Nicholson, of course, went on to star in dozens of films, including Batman and a cameo appearance in Tommy, the rock opera written by The Who a few years after their Shindig appearance. As noted here previously, that film also spawned a totally bitchin' pinball machine -- the model I frequently played while listening to Jimmy O'Neill on WOW.

Along the way Nicholson earn a boatload of Oscar nominations, most recently for the Omaha-based "About Schmidt." In that film, Nicholson's character works as an actuary at the downtown HQ of the Woodmen of the World insurance company, once Omaha's tallest building. Woodmen of the World insurace, incidentally, owned WOW Radio and gave it its call letters. When Jimmy O'Neill was a DJ there, his studio was in the same building.

But my personal favorite Nicholson screen moment occured a few years earlier, as Marine Colonel Nathan Jessup in 1992's "A Few Good Men." Another Oscar nomination, likely clinched by this memorable scene:

Recognize Nicholson's Marine lawyer in the scene? Yep, inevitably, KEVIN BACON. But that's another story.

Comments

[COOP]

...we're throught the looking glass here, people... left, and to the back, left, and to the back...

[iowahawk]

My mommy dropped me on my head once.

[cratedigger]

the car thieves were also a garage band in the 90s. One of the SF Planet Pimp projects.

Here is their discog:
http://www.grunnenrocks.nl/bands/c/carthieves.htm

I thought for sure that they were on the must have "Fuck You Spaceman" 7" comp, but alas, I was wrong.

[89]

The band name was also taken by a Norwegian band: Sterk Naken og Biltyvene. It means "Strong Naked and The Car Theives"

[j]

Nice set of linked factoids.

Caught one error. Kevin Bacon played a military prosecutor, not Col. Jessup's lawyer, in "A Few Good Men."

[kevin of southbank]

Very interesting. Much like http://www.slanderyou2.blogspot.com

[Slash Landeryou's Throat]

Slash Landeryou's Throat