Doodles Weaver

Comedian Doodles Weaver was a key member of Spike Jones' City Slickers during the years following World War II. Born Winstead Sheffield Weaver in Los Angeles on May 11, 1911, he earned the childhood nickname "Doodlebug" from his mother in reference to his odd, malleable looks. While attending Stanford University, Weaver reportedly spent more time playing pranks and practical jokes than studying, and by the late '30s he had racked up a series of small film roles and was a regular guest on Rudy Vallée's radio show. He also toured nightclubs, developing a routine highlighted by a series of manic, absurd sports commentaries, and was thus the logical choice to narrate the 1945 Disney animated short Hockey Homicide. Upon joining Jones and his musical pranksters the City Slickers in 1946, Weaver specialized in horse and auto racing routines, delivering rapid-fire spoonerisms that galvanized such fan-favorite routines as "The Man on the Flying Trapeze," "The William Tell Overture," and "Dance of the Hours." Weaver also co-starred from 1947 to 1949 on The Spike Jones Radio Show, there honing his popular horse character Feetlebaum. However, his relentlessly cornball material was best enjoyed in small doses, and Jones used him sparingly. Moreover, Weaver suffered from alcoholism, and after he took a live television routine too far, Jones let him go in 1951, although he returned to the fold often in the years leading up to the bandleader's 1965 death. Despite the terms of his exit from Jones' show, Weaver was awarded his own summer replacement series in 1951. The Doodles Weaver Show aired for three months on NBC, the television network headed by the comedian's brother Pat. The series was refreshingly high-concept. Weaver is told to produce his own variety program, but given only costumes and sets from other NBC series currently on hiatus. But ratings were poor, and after the show's cancellation he joined the cast of The Horace Heidt Show. He also hosted Doodles' Club House, a local children's program produced for the Los Angeles market, and in 1956 starred in A Day with Doodles, a collection of six-minute silent comedies syndicated to other local kids' shows as an alternative to cartoons. By the late '50s, Weaver's drinking problem made his career and personal life shambles, and when he appeared as a contestant on Groucho Marx's hit quiz show You Bet Your Life, he admitted he hadn't worked in three years. During the 1960s, he scored a handful of television guest roles, most notably appearing as "Crier Tuck" on two episodes of the smash Batman. Near the end of the decade, Weaver also cut a comedy LP, Feetlebaum Returns, for the tiny Fremont label. Apart from a two-episode guest appearance on Starsky and Hutch and a clutch of small film roles, the 1970s were no less unkind to Weaver, and he committed suicide at his L.A. home on January 17, 1983. ~ Jason Ankeny