Crazy Eddie

It's not surprising that I'm as messed up as I am, what with a childhood full of Heino, Barney's Army and Commander USA, but I also lived in the Tri-State area (New York, New Jersey and Pennsylvania) for a while in the late 1970s. Fort Dix, New Jersey, to be exact. In the days before cable all we had was the big three networks and a bunch of rinky-dink local UHF stations, most showing reruns of "Get Smart" or "I Love Lucy." They also aired some of the greatest TV commercials ever produced by the human mind:

Crazy Eddie's was a chain of electronic stores in the Tri-State area, and their over-the-top commercials developed something of a cult following over the years, being lampooned on "Seinfeld" and appearing in the movie "Splash." The man in the commercial, contrary to popular belief, is not owner "Crazy Eddie" Antar, but radio DJ Jerry Carroll:

"Crazy Eddie" himself was crazy like a fox. After driving the chain into bankruptcy in the late 80s through Enron-like financial chicanery, he fled the country ahead of federal investigators and lived abroad before being extradited back to the states to serve several years in prison (and no, Crazy Eddie's never had a "jailbreak" sale, unfortunately).

Another popular chain up north was Carvel ice cream, famous for their ice cream cakes (I can still remember the one my parents got me for my tenth birthday), as well as ameteurish commercial voice-overs courtesy of owner Tom Carvel:

Carvel's "Cookie Puss" cake inspired a punk rock band called the Beastie Boys to make a prank call to their local Carvel franchise, resulting in a Jerky Boys-esque song entitled "Cooky Puss" that took the group's music in an entirely different direction:

Imagine the culture shock when I moved to North Carolina and discovered that no one down here knew what I was talking about when I walked into a store and exclaimed, "These prices are INSANE!" Ah, the good old days when pop-culture references were a regional phenomenon...

Extra special bonus commercial: Anyone remember Burger Chef? I do. Their burgers were OK, but I mostly remember their frozen "Icee"-style treats: