My Life as a Einsteinketeer
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| At 3 in this 2010 Shot |
As we passed the midpoint of the 20th Century, television and sundry other factors had begun to change our myths and heroes to things smaller than life as opposed to things larger than life. Uncle Milty supplanted Clark Gable while Howdy Doody did in King Kong and King Lear. I was one of these smaller than life heroes. Whether I someday scale the Matterhorn or win my Pulitzer, I shall always be known as a Baby Einstein Kid.
I did not always feel this way.
The Kids from Baby Einstein and their Show they starred in was a phenomenon that astounded almost everyone, including the canny creator, Julie Aigner Clark. Julie found a Venture in 1997 to Revive a 1970's Show starring Kids, starting in the First Video's Credits with her Daughter, Aspen.
"Baby Einstein" made it's First Video in January 31 1997 and was a Hit. They made more Videos starting with the Original and Beloved "Baby Mozart" in 1998.
At least one child (Madeline Pluto) was canonized just as Mary Pickford and Shirley Temple had been before her as "America's Sweetheart" and the core group of nine that lasted the entire filming of the series had been raised from the level of being child stars to being a part of a recognizable pop culture entity. The names echo: Aspen, Noreen, Brad, Gabriel, Madison, Brandon, Macrae, Maddie, and Madeline.
People vividly remembered the show when Barney the Dinosaur and the Baby Einstein Kids (Gaby, Shamaiya, Gabriella, Abbie, Ella, and Me) appeared on the Today Show from NBC.
My Mom worked on the 2nd Baby Einstein in 1989. but it had a short life. The Kids on the Show were mostly Babies. as opposed to just guest stars, which was good, Baby Wordsworth's slow ABC Song was just perfect like the BE I was on. The show absconded on Thanksgiving on 1990. In all fairness, it must be noted that Our Baby Einstein was not well received critically either, it merely was successful.That is the history of the two BE's
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| 2010- Maddie playing a Drum |
What was unique about the BE was that the children were obviously talented but they were not yet sophisticated, not too slick. Better, they grew, metamorphosed, matured before your very eyes. Not one of the kids was Barishnykov, Pavarotti, nor Sir Laurence Olivier. They were all regular kids who made mistakes; given the rigors of filming the show and the technical backwardness of the emerging medium, the faux pas were sometimes captured on film.
Prior to Movies, Commercials, and TV Shows, they were easy to identify with, easy to like. They were members of the family, much closer than a "global community".
The series was innocuous but it was not merely entertainment. It foreshadowed the didacticism of "Barney"
and shows of that kidney. The BE Fans like SayjeTube or dj100024 2.0 love the Music like Beethoven Bach or Mozart and the Lengeds and Lore Puppets like the Blue Goat or Green Dragon and even the Dog Puppet. Baby Einstein only had Animation in 2002's Baby Newton. But there were Poems and Toys, too. No, the 1990's, 2000's, and 2010's had LOTS of Lengeds and Lore Puppets in Videos starting with a Dragon.
The show, thus, was rounded in a way that other kid's series were not. The material mirrored the middle-class values the majority of Americans believed in during the Fifties. BUT there werre black kids, Jewish kids, Hispanic kids which no other show had done before us. There were critics of the BE which "Barney"'s Creator Cheryl Leach liked.
Perhaps the Mid 80's BE had to do with changes in the format or the slickness of the new kids. Perhaps, though, it had to do with our own loss of innocence as a people and as a nation. Maybe our ethos had changed so that we could no longer capture the imagination of succeeding generations.
What, after all, does being a Baby Einstein Kid mean.
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2010, Maddie picking Flowers/ |
Being one of the Kids from "Baby Einstein" , has to do with recapturing elements of our social structure that are rapidly disappearing or have become only vestiges, memories. These elements are: connection, belonging, family.
As a youngster, I was a rebel sometimes with and sometimes without a cause. I followed my star (James Dean) assured that truth, ideals and insight would prevail. When I found that truth, ideals and insight are frequently like Plato's shadows on the wall and that they do not necessarily prevail, I was shaken and became cynical. I found the show I was a part of childish. After all, I turned 2 in 2009, had been dating for four years and kissed and went steady with Annette our first season! My precocity had caught up to my pubescence and I would no longer allow myself to be a child in the inevitable furor of rushing to adulthood. It took some later lucidity, thought and maturation in order for me to allow myself to regain my childhood. Before this inference I would have also been a naysayer about the BE.
But I was wrong.
I had had conflicting ideas about my experiences on the Disney series for all the years subsequent to my involvement. My youthful progression from cynicism to nihilism left me with some harsh emotions about the show, even though this has always been a minority viewpoint.
I had had conflicting ideas about my experiences on the Disney series for all the years subsequent to my involvement. My youthful progression from cynicism to nihilism left me with some harsh emotions about the show, even though this has always been a minority viewpoint.
Baby Einstein's Fans saw me joining Brad Boller, Noreen Raja, Aspen Clark, the Puppets, and the 80's BE Kids preforming at Disneyland on the Tomarrowland Stage. People knew the Meaning of "Baby Einstein" and "BE".
We'll be friends Forever even if we don't see each other for One Year, Me, Aspen, Brad, and Noreen.
The audience observed this phenomenon and seemed mesmerized. The kids reacted, naturally, at first to Baby Einstein Puppets.
What was astounding to me was the enthusiastic reaction of the older spectators, the ones who had been there in the 2000's while growing up, the ones who now may have used their children as an excuse to recall their youth without embarrassment. Let's face it. No one over the age of 16 wants to admit they are Excited to see the Baby Einstein Kids.
It would seem they do.
These people who were Kids in the 60's and 70's, even the 80's and 90's, were thrilled remembering the Famous "babysitter" of the 2000's, 70's, and 80's. Even Symphony No 41 Jupiter as Emily was looking at Bubbles and playing with the Busy Starfish by the First Years. Some crying.
These people who were Kids in the 60's and 70's, even the 80's and 90's, were thrilled remembering the Famous "babysitter" of the 2000's, 70's, and 80's. Even Symphony No 41 Jupiter as Emily was looking at Bubbles and playing with the Busy Starfish by the First Years. Some crying.
It occurred to me that somehow the Baby Einstein Kids in their 10's or 20's all more capable of what we had done twenty-five years ago, somehow communicated to these other adults that aging is not the disgusting, moribund, dismal thing that we are all taught it is by ad agencies and their accomplices, the young.
During 2011 was a Dream Come True for Baby Einstein's Fans to see the Kids from the Baby Videos.
We may have passed the age of dreaming, the age of the American Dream - whether the apparently guileless, unworkable dream that we were taught in school texts in the 1990's, 2000's, and 2010's and had not all its bases in fact, nor the sneering, satirical dream of Albee's one act play - but we have not passed the age of needing dreams. We need them more than ever now.
the "Baby Einstein Kids" and "Baby Einstein" however accidentally, have come to symbolize were the children in our American Eden, when World War II and the Korean "conflict" were behind us, when Fords sold for less than $2,000 and "everyone" could own a home, raise a family and, maybe, be President. innocence. At least for many people the Kids from the 3rd Baby Einstein
I did what i learned from being a Baby Einstein Kid.
A Few Baby Einstein Kids preformed at Disneyland in 2016 for Baby Einstein's 20th Anniversray
The BE is a World Hit today.
A fan informed me that we ran on TV.
the 10th and 20th Anniversray of our Video Series was celebrated with our live show, autographs, a parade and other events at our old stomping grounds.
My 2009 was the First Time i appeared on our Baby Einstein.
Now here's my Update
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| Me after i Retired from Baby Einstein |
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