A true fact (which I've mentioned before): For many years -- beginning in the mid-Sixties, and ending sometime in the Eighties -- WOR-TV Channel 9 in New York City used to broadcast an ape movie marathon every Thanksgiving afternoon. Specifically -- the original King Kong, its sequel Son of Kong, and the wonderful Mighty Joe Young (which was made by the creative team behind Kong).

If truth be told, this never made a lot of sense -- frankly, what the hell was the connection between apes and the Pilgrims? I mean, it's not like showing It's a Wonderful Life at Christmas -- and the practice was never, to my knowledge, ever explained to anybody's satisfaction. But I think I speak for everybody in the Tri-State Metropolitan Area when I say that after a while we thought of the annual Holiday Ape-athon as a beloved tradition, one that we missed when it was no longer observed.

That said, and since things are going to be a tad slow around here today for obvious reasons -- and more importantly, because it is my strongly held belief that there is nothing intrinsically funnier than a man in a gorilla suit -- I thought I'd establish a similar Thanksgiving ape-themed tradition here at BOX OFFICE. In that spirit, then, please enjoy this clip from the original 1975 The Ghost-Busters TV series. In case you missed it back in the day, it featured three bumbling paranormal investigators named Spencer, Tracy and Kong. The joke, of course, was that Kong was a guy named Jake Kong (played by Forrest Tucker), whereas Tracy was the gorilla.

Hey, what can I tell you -- I used to get up early on Saturdays to watch this. There may have been drugs involved, I'm not sure.

Incidentally, I should mention that I really wanted to post a clip from Laurel and Hardy's 1938 laugh riot Swiss Miss, which has the funniest gorilla suit scene in history, but there's nothing from it on YouTube and the only thing I could find on Google Images --

-- was this posed shot which really doesn't quite get it. Alas. Oh well -- maybe next year.

In any case, Happy Thanksgiving, everybody, and be sure to stop by tomorrow when Weekend Cinema Listomania makes its traditional Friday appearance.