This article is being considered for deletion in accordance with Wikipedia's deletion policy. Please share your thoughts on the matter at this article's entry on the Articles for deletion page. |
The Shmenge Brothers were a fictional polka duo who, along with their band The Happy Wanderers, featured on the SCTV television comedy program in 1982-1983. They were played by John Candy as clarinetist Yosh Shmenge and Eugene Levy as accordionist Stan Shmenge. The Shmenge Brothers and their audience are mostly Eastern European expatriates from the fictional country of Leutonia [1] . John Candy based the characters on Czechoslovakian-born Edmonton-based polka cable show host Gaby Haas, and the program draws other humor from the culture surrounding The Lawrence Welk Show which dominated traditional television entertainment in the 1960s.
The polka is originally a Bohemian dance and genre of dance music familiar throughout Europe and the Americas. It originated in the middle of the 19th century in Bohemia, now part of the Czech Republic. The polka remains a popular folk music genre in many European countries, and is performed by folk artists in the Czech Republic, Germany, Austria, Switzerland, Slovenia, and Finland, and to a lesser extent in Latvia, Lithuania, the Netherlands, Slovakia, Hungary, Italy, Romania, Croatia, Belarus, Ukraine and Russia. Local varieties of this dance are also found in the other Nordic countries, Spain's Basque Country, the United Kingdom, Ireland, Latin America, Canada and the United States.
Second City Television, commonly shortened to SCTV, is a Canadian television sketch comedy show that ran between 1976 and 1984. It was created as an offshoot from Toronto's Second City troupe. It is a rare example of a Canadian show that moved successfully to American TV.
John Franklin Candy was a Canadian actor and comedian, known mainly for his work in Hollywood films. Candy rose to fame as a member of the Toronto branch of the Second City and its related Second City Television series, and through his appearances in such comedy films as Stripes, Splash, Cool Runnings, Summer Rental, Home Alone, The Great Outdoors, Spaceballs, and Uncle Buck, as well as more dramatic roles in Only the Lonely and JFK. One of his most renowned onscreen performances was as Del Griffith, the talkative shower-curtain ring salesman in the John Hughes comedy Planes, Trains and Automobiles. In addition to his work as an actor, Candy was a co-owner of the Toronto Argonauts of the Canadian Football League from 1991 until his death, and the team won the 1991 Grey Cup under his ownership.
Much of the oblique humour comes from the subtle but consistent disparity in the brothers' pronunciation of "Shmenge." Together they played polka for an aging eastern-European immigrant audience, who typically dined on cabbage rolls and coffee (provided by the fictional Mrs. Vilve Yachke). Many of their songs were cover versions of popular songs in the tradition of "Weird Al" Yankovic, such as "Wishing (If I Had a Photograph of You)" (A Flock of Seagulls) and "Billie Jean" (Michael Jackson). The duo also performed original songs, such as "There's Rhythm In My Lederhosen," and "Mama Cook Me Cabbage Rolls," and "The Cabbage Rolls and Coffee Polka."
Alfred Matthew "Weird Al" Yankovic is an American singer-songwriter, record producer, satirist, actor, voice actor, music video director, comedian, and author. He is known for his humorous songs that make light of popular culture and often parody specific songs by contemporary musical acts; original songs that are style pastiches of the work of other acts; and polka medleys of several popular songs, featuring his favored instrument, the accordion.
"Wishing " is a 1982 song by A Flock of Seagulls, the opening song and only hit single from their second album Listen. The song exemplifies "synth-pop's spaced-out loneliness" and yearning for imagined, absent lovers, and is noted for its Wall of Sound-styled layer of synthesizer padding – a "multi-layered, hypnotic song", according to AllMusic.
A Flock of Seagulls are an English new wave and synth-pop band originally formed in 1980 in Liverpool by Michael "Mike" Score, his brother Alister "Ali" James Score (drums), and Francis Lee "Frank" Maudsley (bass), with their most famous line-up consisting of the Score brothers, Maudsley, and lead guitarist Paul Reynolds.
The Happy Wanderers got their start in Leutonian vaudeville playing the gelkis (an instrument, like the glass harmonica, made of glass jars, but played by smashing rather than sliding a finger along the wet rim), and took up polka during wartime. The duo still celebrates the traditions of Leutonia, where Christmas is celebrated with a symbolic egg, a feast of "haloopniks", and the "exchanging of the socks".
Vaudeville is a theatrical genre of variety entertainment born in France at the end of the 18th century. A vaudeville was originally a comedy without psychological or moral intentions, based on a comical situation: a kind of dramatic composition or light poetry, interspersed with songs or ballets. It became popular in the United States and Canada from the early 1880s until the early 1930s, but the idea of vaudeville's theatre changed radically from its French antecedent.
The Shmenge Brothers were the subjects of the 1984 mockumentary The Last Polka . To promote The Last Polka, on February 26, 1985 the Shmenges guested on Late Night with David Letterman where they performed "Cabbage Rolls and Coffee Polka", which included a sing-along with the audience. [2] Their appearance in the 1986 Comic Relief release was their last performance.
A mockumentary or docucomedy is a type of movie or television show depicting fictional events but presented as a documentary.
The Last Polka is a 1985 comedy television film, and one of the first mockumentaries. It was written by and starred John Candy and Eugene Levy, and directed by John Blanchard.
Late Night with David Letterman is an American late-night talk show hosted by David Letterman. It premiered on NBC on February 1, 1982, and concluded on June 25, 1993. Letterman began hosting Late Show with David Letterman on CBS in August 1993. The series has since been reformatted as Late Night with Conan O'Brien, Late Night with Jimmy Fallon and Late Night with Seth Meyers.
