I spent a lot of my childhood in front of the TV. So much, in fact,
that my parents had to set up rules for TV watching in my house: no
watching it before 3:00pm and after 7:00pm. Of course, I would sneak up
behind their back to get my own recommended daily dose. I would pretend to
fall asleep at around 8:00pm and then get up at around 11 to sit in front of the
tube with an earphone. I would even put a towel at the bottom of their
room's door, so the glare from the screen wouldn't give me away.
As a result of this, I have many memories of old TV shows and
commercials. Some of my favorites, however are only a ghost or silhouette in
my mind. I remember what the show was about, but I'll be dammed with the
details. Still, I manage to astound my friends and those of a previous
generation with my remembrances of stupid commercial jingles and some obscure
factoids of the early eighties TV scene.
I remember shows like Sapphire and Steel, Remington Steele, Miami Vice,
Bring
them Back (which aired here as "Frank Buck, legendary hunter"),
Quincy, Simon and Simon, Whiz Kids, and so many others...
Recently, I stumbled upon a writeup called The complete guide to 1980's
television and a particular show brought a lot of memories back: "Tales of
the Gold Monkey", which was misnamed "Tales of the Golden
Monkey". I followed the hardlink and stumbled into an empty
node. In my personal node I remarked that a lot of empty nodes seem to be
present at Everything2 and someone pointed to me that they were filling the
niche of a BBS's commentary fields. Still, I didn't see the point for Gold
Monkey to be an empty writeup so I decided to do a little research and do a
writeup of one of my favorite childhood adventure series.
Tales of the Gold Monkey aired from 1982 to 1983 (only 21
episodes)
and followed the adventures of Jake Cutter, a bush pilot who lives and work in
the island of Boragora in 1938. He is styled after Indiana Jones, no doubt
(just like Frank Buck was) and the Disney character Baloo in Tales of Spin seems
to be styled after him. He flew a seaplane called The Goose and, while his
main job was cargo transport, it always managed to get him in situations where
he had to fight assorted bad guys.
His opponent, Princess Koji, rules a nearby island, and (to my erratic
memory) apparently was a very clean person, for she would spend most of her time
taking hot baths in a barrel. She would even receive visitors that
way. Even though she was always scheming and Jake was always getting in
her way, one of her objectives was to try and get him into her bed.
Other characters included Corky, Jake's co-pilot, Rev. Willie Tenboom, a womanizing
priest who is also a german spy and Jack, a one eyed dog with a glass eye. According to http://www.goldmonkey.com jack could talk both english and japanese, but for the life of me, I can't
remember such a detail. I can't even remember the dog talking. But I
do remember that the dog's fake eye was the plot of many chapters, since it was
valuable for some reason and whenever they were strapped for money, they would
have to trade it, so Jack spent a lot of time wearing an eye patch.
There is not much more I remember. What follows is cast list as seen on
the Internet Movie Database:
Stephen Collins: Jake Cutter
Jeff MacKay: Corky
Caitlin O'Heaney: Sarah Stickney White
Roddy McDowall: Bon Chance Louis
John Calvin: Reverend Willie Tenboom
Marta DuBois: Princess Koji
John Fujioka: Todo
Les Jankey: Gushie the Waiter
Ahmed Kalane: The Bartender
Sources: The Internet Movie Database (http://www.imdb.com), The Unoficial Fansite (http://www.goldmonkey.com/)