6/8/22

The Continental - Yep, a real thing. Not made up.

Our Diligent Readers over the age of ten may remember a reliably hilarious series of sketches from Saturday Night Live in the Nineties. They starred Christopher Walken as a romantically obsessed man of indeterminate non-American nationality in endless pursuit of an unnamed female protagonist with no dialogue, in the form of the camera operator. Very funny. They looked like this:



Few people know that the sketches were satirical creations referencing a series of radio and television broadcasts created by Renzo Cesana in the early Nineteen Fifties. The show seems to have been conceived as pandering to lonely women. He would talk to the camera and tell made-up stories of his supposedly romantic adventures with the viewer.

Walken as The Continental (The hilarious version), and Cesana as The Continental (Also the hilarious version).

Astute observers of pop culture schmaltz may remember a few tracks by Cesana appearing on the Ultra-Lounge albums here and there, during the lounge / exotica craze of The Nineties.

https://youtu.be/FHlKaPyi9Rk


Well, good news / bad news, depending on your viewpoint! Our sultry pal Renzo recorded a whole album of smokey love burbles, and you can enjoy / endure the whole thing on FaceTube! The More You Knowwwww... You're welome! Also, sorry not sorry!

Side A


Side B