Aug 16, 2012

Bill Mumy's Music


As a kid, Billy Mumy was everywhere, on The Twilight Zone, The Fugitive, Ozzie and Harriet, Bewitched, The Munsters.  But Boomers remember him most clearly as Will Robinson on Lost in Space (1965-68), zapping through the universe with his family, facing campy monsters who growled "Crush! Kill!  Destroy!" while the Robot boomed "Danger, Will Robinson!"



And by the way: no episode suggested, in context or subtext, that the hedonistic stowaway Dr. Smith had any erotic intentions toward  the preteen.  They bonded because Dr. Smith was really just a big kid himself.

Boomers followed Bill's post-Lost in Space career with interest.


His homoromantic buddy-bonding (and extended underwear shots) in Wild in the Streets (1968) and Bless the Beasts and Children (1971).

His voice-over work.

His work in science fiction, especially as the alien Lennier on Babylon Five.





His musical career.

As half of the comedy-song duo "Barnes & Barnes," he authored the classics "Fish Heads" and "Homophobic Dream," plus the infinitely risque "Party in My Pants" and "Swallow My Love."

Still, heterosexism intrudes.

Bill wrote the Eclipse comic book version of Lost in Space, which ages Will's two sisters into adulthood, gives them enormous breasts, and places them in seductive positions.





His solo lyrics are loaded down with references to "girls" and "girlfriends" and "wives" and the women who bring meaning to our lives.

"The Ballad of William Robinson" imagines that thirty years have passed and Will Robinson and family are still chugging through the cosmos, discouraged and despondent. The middle-aged Will complains that there are no women in outer space except for his mother and sisters, so:

I’ll never take a wife
No children will I father 
I have no normal life. 

“Show me mercy in this universe,” he wails, “For I am lost in space.”

No matter how iconoclastic, Bill Mumy still equates heterosexual marriage and reproduction with normalcy, and eliminates the existence of gay people from the universe.

4 comments:

  1. I heard that his son Seth is gay.

    ReplyDelete
    Replies
    1. Seth is married to a woman, so probably not.

      Delete
  2. Big crush on him. The only reason to watch Lost in space--esp. the years it was in color and all the shows seemed to center on Will.

    ReplyDelete
  3. Re: The Lost In Space comics. Reportedly, the guy in charge had a major letch for Penny so after aging her up, he decreed every issue needed at least one scene featuring her scantily clad as possible. If the writer didn't provide one, he'd add it himself and while Mumy was employed in an advisory capacity, it was snuck by him. When the guy was removed, those scenes went away.

    ReplyDelete

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