The great Soupy Sales died

Soupy's sons, Hunt and Tony Fox Sales, played with Todd Rundgren, Iggy Pop and Tin Machine.  Drums and bass, respectively.

Soupy Sales:

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Soupy_Sales

Including:

Sales also hosted a nighttime show, Soup's On, to compete with11 O'Clock News programs.[17] The guest star was always a musician, often a jazz performer, at a time when jazz was popular in Detroit and the city was home to twenty-four jazz clubs. Sales believed that his show helped sustain jazz in Detroit, as artists would regularly sell out their nightclub shows after appearing on Soup's On.[17]

Coleman Hawkins, Louis Armstrong, Duke Ellington, Billie Holiday, Charlie Parker, and Stan Getz were among the musicians who appeared on the show; Miles Davis made six appearances.[8] Clifford Brown's appearance on Soup's On, according to Sales, may be the only extant footage of Brown, and has been included in Ken Burns' Jazz and an A&E Network biography about Sales.

Also in the above link a good recap of some of his zany characters and some skits from his shows. Had me laughing just reading them.

Bander
The black cat with the violin was "Midnight" he was part of Andy's gang with Andy Devine.
RIP Soupy & thanks for all the laughs & memories of my childhood.

Hey fmpnd. That was Morgus the Magnificent with his sidekick Chopsley along with Eric the skull. What a campy hoot. Production budget must have run about 50 bucks per episode. And they'd just drag in schlubs off the street to participate in their "experiments".

BTW, Morgus is a guy named Sid Noel.