Mr. T and Saturday Nights

Saturday nights were often the busiest night of the week in the video retail business. Customers craving the latest releases crowded the aisles looking for the hottest titles. It was always the same last minute customers who would show up shortly before closing and take their time choosing a movie. I was all for providing quality customer service, but when we realized it was the same people each week who were taking up our time, I had very little patience for them. Of course I couldn't tell these slugs what I was truly feeling about them, but in time we did find the perfect way to deal with these last minute time bandits.

Enter Mr. T! Yes, the very same "I pity the fool!" Mr. T of 1980s A-Team fame! In the early days of home video the educational video was a popular new tool for marketing legitimate lessons for the home. But as with all things popular, abuses would soon follow. Our educational video section was full of titles dealing with childbirth, foreign language lessons, cooking videos, computer instruction and auto repair. We had our share of celebrity driven instructional videos including titles like; "Playing Bridge with Omar Sharif", "Swayze Dancing" (with Patrick Swayze), and an all-star fiasco called "The Celebrity Guide to Entertaining." The guide consisted of personal testimonies by the likes of Jackie Collins, Merv Griffin, Rod Steiger, Dudley Moore, Henry Winkler, Steven Seagal and many many more on tips for fine entertaining. It was just one of the many videos of the time that falls under the category of "having to be seen to be believed!"

But the granddaddy of all celebrity educational or instructional videos has to be "Mr. T.'s Be Somebody... or Be Somebody's Fool!" Made in 1984 during the height of Mr. T's popularity, this 60 minute feast for the eyes and ears has become something of a cult classic through the years. In what can only be described as truly bizarre, Mr. T (Laurence Tureaud) dressed in his trademark gold chains and Mohawk haircut, teaches kids of all ages about the dangers of drugs, dealing with peer pressure, and being somebody. It is one of the strangest motivational videos ever conceived. New Edition, the vocal group featuring a young Bobby Brown are on hand to supply cheesy musical interludes between each of Mr. T's lessons. One of these lessons is about "Roots!" declares Mr. T. "You can't know where you're going if you don't know where you're from!" Continuing..."My folkses come from Africa! And they was from the Mandinka tribe! And they wore they hair like this," referring to his famous Mohawk. I fully understand where they were going with this, but was Mr. T and his peculiar use of the English language the right messenger for the job?

When pointing out the gold chains around his neck he tells the kids, "And these gold changes I wear, they symbolize the fact that my ancestors, they was brought over here as slaves!" Changes? Did he mean Chains? Wow! Despite countless examples like the one I just mentioned, the highlight of the video are the musical numbers. Songs about love, peer pressure and T's rap-like tribute to his own mother are why we played this little gem from the 80s during the last hour on Saturday nights at the store. Most people stared at the screens in disbelief. Some got the joke and as for the intended targets, the time bandits, well they eventually grew tired of the same songs every week and soon stopped coming in at the last minute. So in the end just like Mr. T's lesson on anger presented in the video, I didn't let my frustrations towards the time bandits get the best of me. As in the immortal words of Mr. T... "The best way of dealing with ang-uh is to think nice thoughts! That way, you challenge all negative energies into something useful!" I couldn't have said it better myself.