October 28, 2011
The other day, Kari left a comment about how she liked the colorful tiles in New York’s subway system. I like them too and my favorite subway tile stop is 50th Street on the 1 line. It’s got tiled artwork of Alice in Wonderland, so I thought I’d go there and take some pictures. It’s cold and rainy out tonight, so I thought I’d stay underground and take a subway ride and then take some photos.
It's stopped raining, but goddamn it's cold out here. It may be time to bust out my winter coat. I dread winter coming.
And here we are at Penn Station.
Nobody's walking on the escalator tonight and that's always a good thing.
Here's our platform.
Could the timing be any more perfect, here's the train, right as we get to the platform. I love it when this happens!
And bang-zoom, here we are at 50th Street. Let's go check out the Alice artwork.
And here's the other piece of Alice in Wonderland tiled art. I thought there was more than this. Two is a little bit of a gyp.
I was going to go across the street and check out the tiles on the other side and wait for a downtown train home. But I saw all the people waiting and an announcement came over the loud speakers that downtown trains were being delayed due to an accident at 72nd Street. I decided to bail on this and just get a cab home.
Fuck, this turned out to be one of those nightmare New York nights trying to get home. I went out of the subway station to get a cab and stood there in the freezing cold trying to get a cab for over a half an hour and there was none to be had. So I walked to 49th Street to take an N or R train to 14th Street and that station was closed. So I had to hoof it in the cold and wade through the tourists in Times Square and get a train from there. It was a real kind of After Hours trip home where over an hour later here we are. This post was a bit of a dud, but at least I've got something special below. Check it out.
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Go Ask Alice—The MAD Movie of the Week
Alice in Wonderland always makes me think of the Jefferson Airplane song, “Go Ask Alice,” which in turn always makes me think of this cheesy-ass movie that was shown on TV in the early ‘70’s called, “Go Ask Alice.” It was a 1973 ABC Movie of the Week, and it was based on a book of the same name that came out in 1971. The book was all the rage when it was published, as it was supposedly a young girl’s unedited, authentic diary about her dark descent into the world of sleazy and dangerous world of drugs. It was later found out the book was a scam and was written by an editor by the name of Beatrice Sparks. It was supposed to scare kids from wanting to take drugs. In 1971 I was in eighth grade and had only gotten drunk once, and had never tried drugs. After reading the book, I couldn’t wait to start trying them, I just didn’t know where to get any. A year later I started smoking pot and by the time this movie came on TV I was doing acid, speed, mushrooms and basically anything I could get my hands on. I remember watching this movie stoned out of my gourd and laughing like crazy at it. I’ve always wanted to see it again, but couldn’t find it on VHS tape or DVD through the years. Well lo and behold, I did a search tonight on YouTube and the whole fucking movie is there! So, I now present a first, a MAD Movie of the Week, for your viewing pleasure. I haven’t done drugs in over a decade, but if you do, I suggest getting high before you start watching. Me, I think I’ll just settle for getting drunk as a stinking skunk. Okay...lights...camera...William Shatner!
Further reading: Ephemeral New York, Laughing Squid and Mental Floss.
I would not feel so all alone,
Everybody must get stoned.
(Surprise link...click on it...I dare you!)
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Bonus Photo by Melanie!
Melanie from East Village Corner sent in this frightening photo where the Cardboard Box Man is marketing himself via hooded sweatshirts. It all seems so innocent...but it fills me with dread! Thanks for the photo, Melanie, it reminds all of us to keep on our toes and be vigilant of the Cardboard Box Man!
33 Comments
Reader Comments (33)
I miss the Fortress of Solitude that Papaya is .........
YES!!! 50th on the 1 line is my favorite mosaic subway artwork!!! Glad you stopped by to see it, bummer about the train/cab delays. Last night was the worst!!!!
AHHH it's Cardboard Box Man with a third eye!!!
It is the cardboard boxman with a third eye!!!!
Marty, the Eggman in this case isn't John Lennon, but Humpty Dumpty. This summer I bought a paperback of Alice in Wonderland at a flea market because I liked the cover, so I read the thing for the first time since I was maybe ten. I recommend it! That was 25 cents well spent. Lewis Carroll was a very psychedelic dude, and funny, too.
@GENE: It has been a while, maybe tonight!
@Lindsay: I like the mosaic there too, but I thought there was more, maybe there's more on the other side of the tracks. Last night was a bad night for public transportation. And the third eye CBBM is truly frightening, especially since he's now mass-marketing himself!
@Melanie: Thanks again for the photo!
@Ned Sparks: I haven't read "Alice in Wonderland" in years either, I'll have to get a copy, thanks for the recommendation!
Thanks for posting 'Go Ask Alice' Marty...this film reminds me of another piece of mid-seventies made for TV schlock...an anti drug special called 'The Death of Richie' starring Ben Gazzara and little Robbie Benson (1977)...a classic bit of mid '70's paranoia mongering that triggered a complete psychotic break on the part of my megalomaniac control freak father. Dad was always a bit of a kid hater, made me wonder why he decided to start a family at all sometimes and he did not handle the late sixties or the seventies very well at all. I was two years out of the army at that point living with two crazy roomates in Minneapolis and struggling to make it through drafting school at the time so I could get certified and find some decent work in the double digit inflation years of the Carter administration....perhaps the most abysmal period of my entire life. The VA was paying for my training, and my budget for everything else was next to non-existent. Less than two weeks after getting out of the Army I'd realized why I'd joined the Army in the first place...my dad was paranoid and shit out of his mind when it came to running other peoples lives for them...worst control freak imaginable. I was living on my own and paying my own way at the time, finishing drafting school and getting a start on the rest of my life was my main obsession during this period. 1977 was the worst year of my life. Dear old dads saw 'The Death of Riche' on the tube one night, called me up on the phone and railed at me for about 30 or 40 minututes straight, then hung up. He must have pictured me as Charles Manson or something in his mind and all because of that stupid fucking movie. To this day I'm eternally grateful I got out of his house in time...my younger brother wasn't so lucky. Dad drove him to suicide in 1982.
In Boris's words..."damned uneditable posts" ...forgot to change my authorship over from yesterday, it's me, Jaws and not Lego man son of CBBM!
Oh I love those! My girls loved looking at them too-they are big Alice fans. I always feel bad for the boring subway stops-some of them are really cool but a bunch are just the street name.
“William Shatner (from Go Ask Alice), 1973-The scariest picture ever linked in MAD! Happy Halloween indeed.
I LOVE tiles in subways, there are some in Chicago that are SOOO pretty and colorful. Anywho- about Go ask Alice- when I was 13, I read the book and of course loved it. It most definitely didn't have the desired effect of the editor. As you said, it made me want to do it all more. I just unpacked all my stuff, and I found the book- after all these years, I've still kept it. I never knew there was a movie!
Oh! I absolutely *LOVE* the tiled artwork of Alice in Wonderland!
@Jaws: I remember The Death of Richie too! I see that it's on YouTube as well. Wow, those are some horrific memories you have and makes me appreciate my parents and the fact I get along with them. Very sorry to hear about your brother, that had to be bad.
@Britta: I love them too, I just thought there was more of them, I need to check out the other side sometime.
@Duncester: Scary, indeed! Happy Halloweeny to you!
@SuzRocks: I read that book about twenty times and couldn't wait to start doing drugs! Luckily I lived through it. Good to see you back online, I need to go check your blog!
@Meleah: Me too, it's very cool! I wish every subway stop had artwork like this!
@Marty; Yes, it was. And yes you are lucky...always count your blessings man.
Marty, I tried to send you an e-mail, but my Outlook is acting like a tweaker in a Sudafed factory. Anyways, I found a whole version of the classic horror flick, Brain of Blood. The whole thing is here, including the live brain transplant. http://www.youtube.com/movie?v=EOQo25TS4HU&feature=mv_sr Your post reminded me of this movie because I was tripping on acid the first time I saw this horrible movie. It's so horrible that it becomes excellent, in fact there's a correlation between the excellence of the movie and how many illegal drugs you take before watching it.
Trying to watch this movie, never seen it.
I always hated "Alice in Wonderland." Freaked me right out. But I do like those tile installations. As for cardboard box man...back off, three eyes.
@Jaws: Counting my blessings right now. Also counting the hours till I can get out of work!
@Mike Hunt: Thanks for the linkage! I'll watch it tonight, now I need to score some acid, too bad Alice is dead or I'd ask her!
@Al: I hadn't seen it in years and it doesn't age well!
@Biff: I like the installations as well and I'm going to re-read Alice and see if I get freaked out.
Malice und Wunderkind
I love Alice in Wonderland. Carroll was one of those English children's writers who didn't get all preachy & moralistic & allowed a kind of dangerous twist into the picture. There's not that much innocence there, & it's very clever. There's a whole English tradition of not treating children as babies or idiots & allowing the fantasy to veer into quite dark territory...ffrom Carroll to T.H.White & all the way up to writers like Alan Garner & more recently, Philip Pullman.
There are Alices all over New York - a nice deco one on the doors of the Central Brooklyn Library & there used to be a crazy WPA mural of Alice & pals (flying over the East River in an airplane), at Coney Island Hospital. There's also a 1903 (!) film of Alice in Wonderland knocking around on youtube.
As a kid I HATED condescending writers who wanted to sanitize the world for the benefit of the Little Ones. Ugh. And most of the best children's writers were decidely odd or deviant.
Never read Go Ask Alice. Will have to check it out!
@csp: Deja view!
@onemorefoldedsunset: I remember reading Alice in Wonderland as a kid, as I stated earlier, I need to re-read it. Check out Go Ask Alice, I think I'm going to order a copy and re-read it myself. It's particularly funny to me when you learn the whole thing was a sham!
oh yeah…tiles were very interesting…I also have not read alice in wonderland in a number of years…did read the unauthorized auto-biography and a couple biographies of lewis carroll…one strange dude (supposedly no drugs involved)…there are a couple movies that one should view on a heavy dose…don’t want to babble on but all this talk ‘bout alice made me ponder on the rabbit hole which in turn made me question “didn’t 365 go out in search of the rabbit hole?”…ah but no it was in search of the 124 rabbit club…365 never rang the buzzer maybe MAD can work it into one of his adventures…hell maybe MAD could have a 365 originally headed for but never made it run…hell maybe work it into the search for the elusive swizzle stick thing…just a “rotgut 45” fueled thought…
We're not in Wonderland anymore Alice.
~Charles Manson
wait…what?...razor blades and black licorice don’t seem to recall that at all…
rr
@MAD: Sometimes the same thing can look a bit different when viewed through the looking glass.
@rr: I forgot all about the 124 Rabbit Club, you remember this stuff better than me! Going back to some of them is a great idea, if you remember any more, please email them to me. As far as razor blades and black licorice, your glass appears half empty! Great Charlie quote!
@csp: Truthfully, are you high on acid right now? If so, watch out for the bats!
Jabberwocky.
@csp: I learned about Jabberwocky from this book, I read it before I ever read Alice in Wonderland.
@MAD: Ha ha. I tried reading that book in the 70's and it didn't make much sense to me then. To ridiculously long hyperlinks!
@csp: Here, he'll read it to you.
Thanks for going Marty! I love them even if you only got a few. Sorry it started an After Hours night, that movie still freaks me out.
@kari: You're welcome. I hear you about the After Hours movie, everyone I know that has lived has had nights like that where you just can't get home.
Well. After watching Barbarella last night, I inexplicably decided to follow it up with Go Ask Alice. It was 3am and I'd had a few, so I found it rather hilarious. However, I went to bed with that damn song in my head and had high-angst teenage nightmares, which awoke me with a feeling of dread. Thanks, MAD.
@Goggla: No thanks necessary, that's what I'm here for!
"Go Ask Alice" Great 70's stuff.
Thanks for finding and posting this classic.
If I watch too much I'll fucking relapse.
All those Public Service Movies and Presentations in school.
Only whetted my appetite TO experiment. (and I did).
Like everything else in life, I best learned from 'Hands On' training.
Shatner with a 'stache. Real or not?
@"Boris:" "If I watch too much I'll fucking relapse" Ha ha ha! Don't do that Daddio! I think the 'stache was a fake, didn't match his hair...although is that his real hair? Only Spock knows for sure!