I was lucky enough to be on the show (on and off) for about 10 years. We taped it at CBS every week. The show had to be 28 minutes long and the scripts were often shorter so we made the rest up. I started out being a 'live' actor and then did voices when it changed to puppets (Nathaniel Bowditch the inventor of the American System of navigation for one). Irv Kaplan was Tiny Tov when I was on it.
To answer some questions: Henry Mamet was David Mamets Uncle and he was a very nice person. It was even rumored that David wrote some of the scripts when we were in a bind for ideas. It was Bubi Beaver and there was Granny Goodwitch and Dr. Spillapill too (pronounced Sphill-a-pill). I remember the puppeteer's name as Carol Oppenheimer and I think she was related to the famous PHD of the same name.
There was a prop cabinet for the show and I remember the crew drawing a line on the door for my height when I was about 10 all the way up to age 16 in high school.
The most fun was making up dialog with the other actors. Many (to me anyway) famous people from CBS Chicago would pop in and do a few lines of voices just for fun. I remember Walter Jacobson and other newscasters of the time having a hoot doing the voices. I have some old photo's from the show somewhere.
I learned values, how to think on my feet and how to be a professional by being on this show. It was great fun.
Later on after I grew up and got a Masters from Northwestern I was coaching a High School Tennis team. The boys found out I had been on the Magic Door and before a match the whole team serenaded me with the opening song "A-rumm-zoom-zoom...". I think we won the match because the visiting team never stopped laughing. It turned out they all watched The Magic Door too.
To answer some questions: Henry Mamet was David Mamets Uncle and he was a very nice person. It was even rumored that David wrote some of the scripts when we were in a bind for ideas. It was Bubi Beaver and there was Granny Goodwitch and Dr. Spillapill too (pronounced Sphill-a-pill). I remember the puppeteer's name as Carol Oppenheimer and I think she was related to the famous PHD of the same name.
There was a prop cabinet for the show and I remember the crew drawing a line on the door for my height when I was about 10 all the way up to age 16 in high school.
The most fun was making up dialog with the other actors. Many (to me anyway) famous people from CBS Chicago would pop in and do a few lines of voices just for fun. I remember Walter Jacobson and other newscasters of the time having a hoot doing the voices. I have some old photo's from the show somewhere.
I learned values, how to think on my feet and how to be a professional by being on this show. It was great fun.
Later on after I grew up and got a Masters from Northwestern I was coaching a High School Tennis team. The boys found out I had been on the Magic Door and before a match the whole team serenaded me with the opening song "A-rumm-zoom-zoom...". I think we won the match because the visiting team never stopped laughing. It turned out they all watched The Magic Door too.