Oscar and Tony and Emmy and Grammy

 The Grammy Awards aired the other night on television, to be followed in a month or so by the Oscars, then the Tonys, and, finally, in September, the Emmys. This makes me wonder what all those names mean.

The origin of the Oscar is both well-known and mysterious. First awarded in 1929, it was was known then as the Academy Award, named for the Academy of Motion Pictures Arts and Sciences. There are conflicting stories of how it became known as the Oscar. The Academy’s executive secretary, Margaret Herrick, claimed that when she saw the statuette she thought it resembled her Uncle Oscar (actually her cousin, Oscar Pierce), and began calling it that. But actress Bette Davis maintained that she named the statue after her first husband, bandleader Harmon Oscar Nelson. The name remained unofficial until 1939, when the Academy officially adopted it.
 
The Tony Award, for excellence in the Broadway theatre, was established by the American Theatre Wing and named in honor of the organization’s co-founder, actor-director Antoinette (“Tony”) Perry, who died in 1946, the year before the first award was given.

Emmy Awards were first given in 1949 for TV shows produced in the Los Angeles area. They later became national in scope and are now administered by three separate but related television industry associations.  The first name proposed for the award in the early 1950s was the “Ike,” which was short for “iconoscope,” a tube used in television production.  But that term risked confusion with then President Dwight D. Eisenhower, who was known as “Ike.” “Immy,” the common term for an “image orthicon tube,” used in early cameras, was chosen instead, and this was soon changed to the name “Emmy,” to match the feminine statuette that was given.

The first name proposed for the Grammy Award was the “Eddie,” for Thomas Alva Edison, inventor of the phonograph (which used a cylinder recording).  But the National Academy of Recording Arts and Sciences, which gives the award, decided instead to name it for the gramophone, a German invention that was disc-based. The Gramophone Award, first given in 1958, was immediately shortened to “Grammy.”

These are regarded as the “Big Four” awards in entertainment, and only twelve artists are EGOTs—those who have won all four of them in competitive categories. They are: composer-musicians Richard Rodgers, Jonathan Tunick, Marvin Hamlisch, and Robert Lopez; actors Helen Hayes, Rita Moreno, John Gielgud, Audrey Hepburn, and Whoopi Goldberg; and producer-directors Mel Brooks, Mike Nichols, and Scott Rudin.

It will come as no surprise to learn that the Bard of Buffalo Bayou has not won any of these awards, or any others, for that matter. The reason will be obvious if you read the following:

            Oh, I crave no prize,
            Even one of great size,
            Made of gold that would glisten and flash.
            Such an honor, you see,
            Was not meant for me—
            I’d much rather just have the cash.

Nifty Swifties

Some of the best Tom Swifties I’ve ever seen were posted recently on Facebook. For those who may have forgotten, Tom Swift is the hero of a series of boy’s books, the first of which, Tom Swift and His Motor Cycle, was published in 1910. They were written by the pseudonymous “Victor Appleton,” actually publisher Edward Stratemeyer and several of his employees. The same group also published books about the Bobbsey Twins, the Rover Boys, the Hardy Boys, Uncle Wiggily, Don Sturdy, and Nancy Drew—all by Stratemeyer and his team using various noms de plume.   

The style of the Tom Swift books was noted for usinig adverbial modifiers for many of Tom’s statements, as: “….Tom said cheerfully” or “…Tom said eagerly.”  This practice gave rise in the 1920s to a type of pun called a “Tom Swifty.”

Here are some of the examples I just came across:

“I can’t believe I ate that whole pineapple,” Tom said dolefully.
“I dropped the toothpaste,” Tom said, crestfallen.
“That’s the last time I pet a lion,” Tom said offhandedly.
“I’ll dig another ditch around the castle,” Tom said remotely.
“We need a home-run hitter,” Tom said ruthlessly.
“I shouldn’t sleep on the railroad tracks,” Tom said, beside himself.

And a variant: “You call this a musical?” asked Les miserably.

Some other gems, which, incidentally, can be found in my book Puns, Puzzles & Wordplay (originally Words Gone Wild), still available at a greatly reduced price at amazon.com, are:

“Elvis is dead,” Tom said expressly.
“Your honor, you’re crazy,” Tom said judgmentally.
“I work in the prison cocktail bar,” Tom contended.

The Bard of Buffalo Bayou, in honor of this occasion, has resurrected one of his verses, which needed only a little resuscitation before showing signs of life:

           There once was a guy named Tom Swift,

           Whose 9-to-5 shift got short shrift.

               By noon he would lift

               Several pints—get my drift?               

           To show he was swift getting squiffed.