Tonight, Let it Be Jack Kelly--Again! :)

Hi!

I found another Lowenbrau commercial with Jack Kelly's voiceover. That's not the only interesting thing about this 1978 commercial, though. Its "star" is a youthful looking Danny Aiello. Enjoy! :->

The Kelly Pages: Comic Jack Kelly II

Hello!

I found another great Maverick comic album (annual), this one with Jack Kelly shown solo on the cover. (I hope he notices that desperado in the yellow shirt in time!) This annual contains stories as well as black-and-white comics starring Bart Maverick.

I discovered that most of the British annuals for Maverick and many other popular TV series were illustrated by one artist, Walt Howarth. Sadly, the prolific Mr. Howarth passed away in 2008. However, there's a commemorative MySpace page for Mr. Howarth that includes this wonderful gallery of his TV annual covers. [UPDATE: The MySpace page and gallery are unfortunately gone, but there's a nice blog post about Mr. Howarth here, and another look at his life and career is here.]

On his page, Mr. Howarth is quoted as saying that he based most of his TV character drawings on photographs, but he wished he'd had a VCR back in the early days so he could have sketched the freeze-framed images. Well, I think he did all right with just the photographs--JK really looks smashing on that cover. :)

I have two more of Mr. Howarth's Maverick annuals that I'll post about in the near future.

The Kelly Pages: "I Almost Didn't Get My Man"

Howdy!

Here's one of my favorite magazine covers from the "Kellection". It's from a 1959 issue of TV Picture Life. I just love JK's smile in this pic.

The corresponding cover story inside is one of my favorites, too. In it, May Wynn confesses that she almost scared Jack Kelly away by saying those three little words: "I love you." But, he surprised her by writing a heartfelt 28-page letter "describing what he felt about love and marriage, the obligations of a husband and wife, and what he could promise me." They eloped shortly afterward.

Ms. Wynn goes on to describe Jack Kelly as an excellent swimmer who also enjoyed horseback riding, sailing and, of course, golfing. She adds that JK "is crazy about people--wants to talk to them, hear their problems, share all he can." :)