The Simple Simon Pieman

When they set the date, no one realized. Manhattan's Paramount Theater found itself reopening, after an eight-month supposedly permanent closing, on Good Friday, traditionally among the worst box-office days of the year. What's more, it was also the beginning of Passover. It should have been double cyanide for the grosses. Instead, the first customers lined up at 2 a.m., and by 8, when the doors opened, the crowd was so thick that people were getting sick. The crush broke the glass on the cashier's box, and the money came in so hand-over-fist that it had to be carted off repeatedly in cardboard boxes.

It was just like the good old days, when the Paramount's bobby-soxers swung and shrieked to Benny Goodman's clarinet and all but ate up Frankie Sinatra alive. But with a difference. TV has created a new generation of fans, and the man that the special 40-cop detail inside the Paramount was trying to keep alive was nobody from the ten rock-'n'-roll acts on the bill, but a 39-year-old nerve end who goes by the name of Soupy Sales. As a comedian, he is hardly believable even when seen: a pastiche nut in kook's clothing, whose act wanders in and out of plain idiocy, with every tired old slapstick gag in the joke book thrown in free. Among other things, he throws pies. And his fans were right there with him, saluting their hero with salvos of everything from teddy bears to a training bra.

White Fang & Black Tooth. Soupy (years ago he legally changed his name from Milton Hines) has been that way for years, dressed in a loose, V-necked black sweater and floppy, polka-dotted bow tie, taking pies in the face. Born in North Carolina, he started as a disk jockey in West Virginia, first hit it big in 1953 on Detroit's WXYZ-TV, where his TV antics cadged kids into eating lunch. Then he transplanted to Hollywood and bloomed on. He was such a smash that the stars lined up to get smacked by one of Soup's foam-filled pies. Things were going so well that ABC put him on the network. He bombed out. Then last fall a local New York channel tried him.

He was still doing the same stuff--talking to White Fang and Black Tooth, the meanest and nicest, respectively, dogs in the world, so huge that only their clawed paws are seen on camera. There was Pookie, a rubber-faced lion puppet, and, as always, corn as high as pie-in-the-eye. But once again it was a big click. Kids began strong-arming Mom into having dinner early or late, but not when Soup's on. And the result was that now 22% of his audience are adults.

A Love Thing. Even when Soupy's ways led him to transgressions, he was forgiven. In January, for instance, an antic whim led him to suggest to all those kiddies out there that they get ahold of Daddy's wallet and remove "those little green pieces of paper with pictures of George Washington, Benjamin Franklin, Lincoln and Jefferson and send them to me, and I'll send you a postcard from Puerto Rico." Four $1 bills came in, and so did a stiff complaint. Soup was canned, but only temporarily. His suspension became an instant cause. The phone calls never quit, petitions piled up, the station was picketed, and five days later his hourlong, six-times-a-week show roared back on the air.

Now he gets 800 letters a day. When it's time for a Soupy Sez blackboard two-liner ("Show me a country that has only pink automobiles . . . and I'll show you a pink carnation"), fans mumble the predictable lines along with him and then fall on their heads with delight. "It's some sort of a love thing," explains his manager, who calls himself Irving Manager. Soup's humor is epidemically catching.

Over-Shucked Cornball. That's the way it is at the Paramount, too. He does The Mouse, a dance of his own invention in which he wiggles, sticks out his teeth, puts his thumbs to his ears and makes what once used to be considered a rude gesture. Everyone screams. He does a few more songs from a new album (in New York alone his recording of The Mouse has sold more than a quarter of a million copies in the past month) and, more screams, the show is over. For doing just that five times a day for ten days, Soup will collect $20,000. The networks, says Irving Manager, are dying to try him again. Soupy's name is all over trading cards, pins, wallets, ties, sweat shirts, T shirts, pajamas, dolls, and he expects to gross $500,000 this year. He is an overshucked cornball, but he is the moment's golden goose. And he means to lay eggs by the gross.

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