Do you remember...?

A couple of weeks ago, I talked here briefly about how much fun I was having with The Dick Cavett Show: Rock Icons, a set of three DVDs I received as a Christmas gift. Well, I had such a great time that I rushed to Best Buy and purchased a complementary set, The Dick Cavett Show: John Lennon & Yoko Ono, two discs containing two complete Cavett shows from fall 1971 and a third show from May 1972. What’s remarkable about watching these programs for the first time since I was in high school is how much of them I genuinely recall: John’s constant wordplay (“Ella Fitzgerald, my dear Watson”), his obvious affection for Yoko, their deportation concerns, their performances with Elephant’s Memory (Sometime in New York City was almost ready for release), and how Cavett guest Shirley MacLaine (campaigning doggedly at the time for Senator George McGovern’s presidential nomination) enthusiastically hugged Yoko after hearing her screeching (but somehow charming) performance of “We’re All Water.” This is all fantastic stuff, and now I can revisit it occasionally, like old home movies. Isn’t the DVD explosion great?