Ashley Morris: the blog: Tom Snyder

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So I was a different kind of kid growing up. I would always try to stay up late and watch Tom Snyder. I even tried to get my hair cut like his once -- I brought in a pic of Tom out of TV Guide, and the barber asked me: you want your hair to look like this?

Yeah, I was a fan. I wrote him a letter once, but just got back an NBC postcard with his name stamped on it. Hell, even Isaac Asimov wrote me back.

But I would watch Tom all the time, and that, along with SNL, really influenced what I liked to watch, my sense of humor, and my tolerance for bullshit. Dan Aykroyd's impression of Snyder was very good, and I always said that my impression of Snyder was really an impression of Aykroyd doing Snyder.

Tom had a very low bullshit tolerance, and this came out when he was interviewing people like Johnny Rotten, who didn't want to be interviewed, but wanted to show how cool he was: “It’s unfortunate that we are all out of step except for you.” As they were to break for commercial, Lydon said "Humor me", to which Snyder replied "Not for long".

Tom was at his best interviewing the non-famous, and getting you to be interested in them. I haven't found any sources for this, but I remember it as clear as day. One time, Tom was interviewing a man who had been married something like 35 times. He said "and 18 of my wives were virgins when we married. So for me, life has just been a bowl of cherries." Tom laughed his ass off and went to commercial.

He also interviewed a claimed serial killer/mob hitman named Joey who wore a mask on the show. Snyder asked, “And what would you do if I reached across and took that mask off your face.” Joey replied calmly, “I’d kill you, Tom.” Matter of factly, Snyder replied, “Fair enough.”

I also remember interviews he did with Christine Jorgensen, KISS (where Ace was drunk and Peter just didn't want to be there and Paul is playing rock star and Gene is pissed at everyone for 'breaking character'), Charlie Manson, Harlan Ellison, Peter Allen, Robert Blake, Don Rickles, Frank Zappa, David Brenner, Too Tall Jones, Howard Cosell, Melvin Dummar, and of course, Wendy O and the Plasmatics. Wendy blew up a TV, and you could hear it on the set of NBC nightly news, 2 floors up.

I remember being about 14 or so, and thinking how, when I was a grown-up, I could sit at the bar in the red sparkle naugahyde stool between Jack Webb and Tom Snyder having a conversation, Webb with his rye and soda on the rocks, and Snyder with his Colortini (or simultini, as the case may be). On the stage in the corner was a cool jazz band, the drummer having a 4 piece Gretsch satin flame set, and the cornet player up front playing a muted solo. The epitome of mid 70s LA retro-cool, in my 14 year old eyes.

Later on, he was one of the first bloggers I knew of, and he also quit blogging when he left LA and moved to SF, stating "The novelty of communicating this way has worn off."

Adrastos and Ken Levine have more.

Rest in Peace, Tom.

Comments

As a kid I stayed up to watch him too. He was great.
Thanks for the memories Tom and Ashley

Posted by: scout | 01 August 2007 at 10:50 AM

What a fine post. I recall almost all of the interviews that you mention. There were so many individuals whose work I had been familiar with but, until Tom, had no idea what they were like as people. He had the uncanny ability, it seemed, to bring out the best in them (which is to say, in John Lydon's instance, his worst). And tying this all in to a Jack Webb-at-the-counter experience was genius.

Posted by: Kevin Avery | 02 August 2007 at 06:19 AM