Talk:Steve Allen/Archive 1

Cleanup requested
While the factual content of the article is fine, it needs to be rewritten. Too many short paragraphs, sentences left hanging and redundancy (e.g. look how many paragraphs start with 'Allen was' or 'He was'). Somebody needs to swallow this one whole and spit it back out again. --BluePlatypus 14:42, 25 October 2005 (UTC)

And it completely skips that he invented pogs. — Preceding unsigned comment added by 121.98.92.184 (talk) 11:58, 21 June 2011 (UTC)


 * I completeley agree. The career section in particular needs work. It goes on for too long with no breaks. It needs to be split up using meaningful sub-headings. Irishroyalty (talk) 14:38, 9 February 2009 (UTC)

Titling?
I would have to argue that this article should be found at Steve Allen, and the disambiguation page at that page currently should be moved to Steve Allen (disambiguation). thoughts? TheHYPO 07:32, 29 July 2006 (UTC)


 * I think that Steve Allen should be turned into a redirect to Steve Allen (comedian), with a link to a dab page at Steve Allen (disambiguation). That way the history of the article at Steve Allen (comedian) will be maintained. --Daniel Olsen 21:51, 29 July 2006 (UTC)


 * Why hasn't this been done yet? Move Steve Allen to the disambig page, and then create a new Steve Allen which redirects to SA (comedian). Daniel, you signed up for disambiging Steve Allen, go make the changes. Simon12 03:19, 24 August 2006 (UTC)


 * Just "(comedian)"? Steve may haunt you if you don't use something like "(composer/musician/author/actor/playwright/philsopher/emcee/comedian)." WHPratt (talk) 12:43, 8 August 2011 (UTC)

Steve and God
"Allen was a secular humanist and Humanist Laureate for the Academy of Humanism, a member of CSICOP and the Council for Secular Humanism." This is followed by this line a few paragraphs later... "In later years, Allen had speaking engagements at which he refered to himself as an 'involved Presbyterian'." This seems rather odd. TKelly 01:06, 22 August 2006 (UTC)

There was clearly some evolution in Steve's thinking here, as evidinced by his support of World Govt early in his career, but providing the introducting for Free to Choose, a show by Conservative economist Milton Freedman. This evolution could be spun up into an interesting paragraph.

Newspaper ad
"Coincidentally, a full-page ad on the subject appeared in newspapers a day or two before his unexpected death." I'm not sure what the relevance of this is. Did he write the ad? Was it about his involvement in the organization? 128.119.243.24 16:37, 19 December 2006 (UTC) Chris Hoffmann
 * Yes. Wahkeenah 00:48, 20 December 2006 (UTC)
 * I have that ad at home. I kept it because I'd heard Howard Stern on occasion grousing about Allen; Allen evidently despised Howard Stern, although Howard'd had him on his old NBC show. Allen was a very funny guy, but he was not profound & like too many self-styled secular humanists, he flirted with fascism, i.e., censorship, when it was to his advantage. 138.162.128.56 12:24, 16 March 2007 (UTC).

Frank Zappa
Didn't he appear on The Steve Allen Show in the late 50's and play a bicycle? There should be something about that. Guest 20:20, 29 December 2006 (UTC)
 * Find a source. Wahkeenah 03:27, 30 December 2006 (UTC)

Better picture
Lets have a picture that shows them for the actractive couple they were in their salad days. —The preceding unsigned comment was added by 214.16.41.245 (talk) 21:10, 11 May 2007 (UTC).

Guinness listing
The article states that Allen composed about 10,000 songs. Regardless of the number, I'm sure that at some point he was listed in the Guinness Book of World Records as the person having composed the most songs, but this fact is not mentioned. Richard K. Carson (talk) 06:46, 8 June 2008 (UTC)

Rock and Roll
Steve appeared as himself presenting Jerry Lee Lewis on his tonight show in the 1989 bio pic Great Balls of Fire! (film) MBG 117.102.157.146 (talk) 13:41, 31 August 2008 (UTC)

The whole section about Steve Allen having Elvis Presley on his show seems overly slanted toward excusing what seems to have been Allen's failure to recognize that Presley had any talent. This is one of the things that makes that whole topic so disproportionately long in comparison to the other points covered. It should just say that Allen's eye as a producer and host of variety shows was more reliable in finding mainstream performers like Steve Lawrence and Eydie Gorme rather than in recognizing merit in those that challenged the musical status quo, like Elvis. Glennhopp (talk) 15:35, 22 July 2009 (UTC)Glenn Hopp

speaking of obtuseness ..
"This was the show Allen wanted to be remembered for, because he believed that the issues and characters were timeless and would survive long after his passing. This may be more an indictment of popular tastes—which Allen himself wrote about in his last book, "Vulgarians at the Gates"—than of any obtuseness on the show's part."

Say what? 208.127.106.53 (talk) 23:29, 19 May 2009 (UTC)

'Impossible' song
I read online that Allen did not compose this song, rather famed composer George Duning did. Allen only wrote some lyrics after the song came out. He may have written thousands of songs, but how many ever became hits? A handful? —Preceding unsigned comment added by 72.72.58.129 (talk) 18:56, 12 August 2009 (UTC)

Steve Allen Shows
The Steve Allen Westinghouse Show (1962-1968) is alternately called The New Steve Allen Show on another website, while steveallen.com does list it as The Steve Allen Westinghouse Show. Just wondering if there's absolutely a definitive answer? NeilCoughlin (talk) —Preceding undated comment added 05:19, 20 November 2009 (UTC).


 * His last regular TV show was, if I recall correctly, "The Allen Show," but with a "Steve" usually floating over the official title. I guess they didn't want to trot out "The Steve Allen Show" an umpteenth time. WHPratt (talk) 16:32, 25 January 2010 (UTC)

Death
Just a suggestion. . .how about:

"Autopsy results concluded that the traffic accident earlier in the day had in fact resulted in four broken ribs and a ruptured blood vessel in Allen's chest, causing blood to leak into the sac surrounding the heart. This condition is known as haemopericardium."

Mentioning the broken ribs after the fatal heart situation recalls an old joke wherein some (old, Jewish -- stereotypical of course!) lady relates in great detail how her neighbor fell to his death with massive head and neck injuries, etc., etc., and then adds " . . . broke his glasses too."

Then again, Steve Allen was a funny guy, and famous for wearing glasses (which few performers did in those days), so he probably wouldn't have objected to the style. WHPratt (talk) 14:30, 5 January 2010 (UTC)

Full name
According to Mr. Allen's interview with the Archive of American Television, he was born Stephen Valentine Allen, and acquired his two other middle names during childhood. See the first part of the interview (where he explains this) at http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=8l5mkzZE56E. 128.2.246.43 (talk) 22:31, 20 February 2010 (UTC)

WW II
I thought I'd heard Allen was discharged from the army due to asthma? That doesn't match the article. BashBrannigan (talk) 19:26, 16 March 2010 (UTC)

Heart "failure"
I have changed the cause of death in the info box. "Heart failure" is not a catch-all phrase for any condition affecting the heart; it is a specific disease, and not one Allen had. --NellieBlyMobile (talk) 22:25, 23 August 2012 (UTC)

External links modified
Hello fellow Wikipedians,

I have just added archive links to 1 one external link on Steve Allen. Please take a moment to review my edit. If necessary, add after the link to keep me from modifying it. Alternatively, you can add to keep me off the page altogether. I made the following changes:
 * Added archive https://web.archive.org/20100813133450/http://csicop.org:80/si/2001-01/steve-allen.html to http://www.csicop.org/si/2001-01/steve-allen.html

When you have finished reviewing my changes, please set the checked parameter below to true to let others know.

Cheers. —cyberbot II  Talk to my owner :Online 21:02, 29 August 2015 (UTC)

10,000 songs
Can we cite this? That seems kinda farfetched for such a busy guy. Redwolf24 (talk) 09:30, 10 September 2009 (UTC)
 * Geez, now it's up to 14000 in the article! This is absurd. Allen was something of a blowhard and a braggart, but this is ridiculous. Can anyone back this up with a credible secondary source? That is, a source that doesn't trace back to Allen himself. And no exaggerations by counting a few impromptu phrases as a "song". If nobody can support this with Wikipdia-compliant evidence, I plan to simply delete this boast.

Allen liked to boast, calling himself TV's renaissance man. Even if he did write that many, how many were recorded, how many were good. Most had to be worthless. I could write that many, but all of them would be worthless. —Preceding unsigned comment added by 72.72.96.60 (talk) 02:06, 20 November 2009 (UTC)

I believe that he composed a lot of joke songs off the cuff and on his shows, in Stump-the-Band type sketches. I'd also read that, on a bet, he once (or often) sat at a piano in a department store window so that people could see him writing X number of songs in a day. You wouldn't expect much quality under those circumstances, but the numbers are there.

As a kid, I loved Allen's ultra-silly comedy, but I really hated it when he'd appear on a show to play the piano in straightfaced fashion, so I'm not a fair judge of his musical; abilities. WHPratt (talk) 05:20, 8 January 2010 (UTC)


 * He had one hit that I know of, "This Could Be the Start of Something Big". How he counted his 10,000 is hard to say. One of them he might have counted was when he was on Carson one time and invited 4 or 5 audience members to randomly tap a key on the piano, and he would construct a song from those notes. And it worked. Not exactly a hit, but it worked. ←Baseball Bugs What's up, Doc? carrots→ 07:43, 8 January 2010 (UTC)

Steve Allen also wrote "Pretend You Don't Love Her, My Heart". The Jerry Vale cover was used in the movie Goodfellas. I have added this song to the list. —Preceding unsigned comment added by 68.220.195.101 (talk) 05:41, 4 February 2010 (UTC)


 * I also recall that he had a stunt on his show wherein he'd sit at the piano, read a current newspaper headline and compose, on the spot, a song that had the exact headline text as a proper lyric. For some legal reason, these "songs" had to be registered with the songwriters' union. WHPratt (talk) 16:30, 25 January 2010 (UTC)
 * "registered with the songwriters' union" ???? Sounds lile gibberish to me. They may have been copyrighted.
 * "May"? All songs written in the US are automatically immediately under copyright from the instant they exist. --NellieBlyMobile (talk) 22:28, 23 August 2012 (UTC)
 * I meant that the newly contrived songs were registered with ASCAP. Allen claimed that he'd sometimes get a communication that read "Now, did you really compose a song called 'No Clues in Mugging Case'?" WHPratt (talk) 00:25, 24 August 2012 (UTC)
 * His website claims "over 8,500", though it offers no real details. I don't think anyone believes he wrote 8,500 actual recorded songs.  It doesn't look like he registered anywhere near that many, either.  A search of the ASCAP database reveals 560 compositions registered to Allen.  (Note that not all are exactly "songs", as some are music cues for TV shows.)  Everyone But You (talk) 03:09, 6 June 2016 (UTC)

List of works by Steve Allen

 *  Support split - List of works takes up close to one third of the page and should be split to a new article entitled List of works by Steve Allen. --Jax 0677 (talk) 02:04, 31 May 2016 (UTC)

Propose consolidation section on the Steve Allen Show with the Steve Allen Show page.
This page's section on this show should be shortened to a summary with a link to the Steve Allen Show page. The section on the Tonight Show is handled that way. There is also information on this page not found on the Steve Allen Show page. Neither page mentions the Nikolais Dancers. Rmrwiki (talk) 05:05, 19 March 2018 (UTC)

World War II service
Although Allen served in the army during World War II era, the article said he served stateside. No reliable sources found as of yet state that he actually served overseas during the war. Accordingly, Category:American military personnel of World War II was removed from the article. Semper Fi! FieldMarine (talk) 20:01, 29 December 2018 (UTC)

Reference to Chris Mortensen is vague
There is no reference to The Unreal Story of Professional Wrestling on the wiki page Chris Mortensen. This is Confusing. — Preceding unsigned comment added by Johnedwardmiller (talk • contribs) 00:26, 26 January 2020 (UTC)