December 11, 1961: A Date That Will Live in...Something

I had intended to do this post to celebrate my 60th birthday way back in 2021.  But if you have been following this blog since it's beginning, you know that the circumstances of the onset of COVID caused me to lose interest for a period of time and 2021 passed by with only a couple of entries on the blog.  And this one wasn't one of them.

Yes, folks, I'm an old man.  This year I am turning 63. The idea for this blog entry was inspired by an idea.  What would I have watched on TV the night I was born? (Assuming, of course, that I could actually watch TV at only a few hours old...) Using a webpage that lists what was actually on the schedule that night:

December 11, 1961

I arbitrarily decided which shows I would have chosen for the night.  So let's go back to that time and watch a night of TV.

(Note: These times are listed by EST airings (and since I was actually born in Durham, North Carolina, those would be the actual times the shows aired for me.  Of course, the time of the show's airings would have been different depending on where you were at the time. For instance, I now live in Texas, so an 8:00PM airing on the East Coast would have aired at 7:00PM if we had been in Texas. And, BTW, Texas is where I was when my first birthday rolled around..)

A brief spoiler alert!  I tell the plot of the whole episode in the following encapsulations of each TV show. You can still watch the shows, they are all watchable, but if you want to go through the list and find the episodes and watch them first, I'll still be here when you get back.

 TV Night at the Quiggy House  (Dec 11. 1961):

TV Guide: Dec 9-15, 1961

 

Note: To begin, a brief apology: Unfortunately, my first show for the evening, (Pete and Gladys) had a very limited selection of available episodes online. The episode broadcast on Dec. 11, called "The Live-In Couple", was not available anywhere I looked. So by necessity, and for the sake of completion, I selected a later episode.  The actual air date for "Hero in the House" was actually three weeks later., on New Year's Day. (The rest of the slate of shows, however, were actually aired on the date in question)

As a bonus, in case you'd like to watch, I have included the episodes from youtube (always assuming someone hasn't taken them down...).

8:00PM: Pete and Gladys ("Hero in the House")

Background: Pete and Gladys was an early example of the classic "spinoff". On a TV show from the 50's December Bride, starring Spring Byington, Harry Morgan played a next-door neighbor, Pete who often showed up on the show. Pete would often grouse about his wife Gladys (who was never seen on that show).  Sometime after the cancellation of December Bride, a new show, Pete and Gladys appeared giving us some insights into a character already familiar to the fans of the previous show. The brief two season run of the show followed the usual sitcom format, with daily interactions between the stars and various other characters.

Interestingly enough, although it only lasted two seasons, it did garner some attention.  Cara Williams was up against a few others competing for the 1962 Emmy awards for Best Actress in a Leading Role in a Series (she lost to Shirley Booth for her role in the series Hazel, however). 

In addition to Morgan and Williams the shows brief run had a Who's Who cast of guest stars, many of which will be familiar to fans of 50's and 60's TV, as well as movies.   Among them: Donna Douglas, Nancy Kulp  and Raymond Bailey (from The Beverley Hillbillies), Morey Amsterdam and Richard Deacon (from The Dick van Dyke Show), Bea Benaderet and Frank Cady (from Petticoat Junction), Ronny Howard and Howard McNear (from The Andy Griffith Show) and a host of others.  (BTW, I don't really know, but I'm PRETTY sure they were not playing the characters from their other shows... but without the benefit of watching I can't say...)

Pete (Harry Morgan) and Gladys (Cara Williams) are having dinner with their friends, Ernie (Joe Mantell) and Peggy (Mina Kolb). They are going to go to a movie afterwards, which is going to be a French film.  Ernie says he doesn't like foreign films because of the effort to keep up with the subtitles and is promised that next week they'll go to an American film (Gee! A weekly trip to the movies??? Rich people...)

But then Gladys says next week will be out because Pete is going to a veteran's convention, which leads to Gladys pestering Pete to tell his war story, something along the lines of having taken on and captured  a whole platoon of enemies single-handedly.  Except it turns out that the story is not real.  He later tells Ernie that he just made it up to impress his wife, and to explain why he has a Japanese samurai sword.   But his wife thinks it's true, so...

At the movie theater, a rather big, stocky guy tries to make the moves on Gladys.  She gets angry and walks away from him and tells Pete about it.  Pete initially thinks a littler guy is the fresh guy, but when he finds out that it was the bigger guy he backs away from the encounter, and of course later becomes, as is wont to be among these kinds of characters, a little frustrated and guilty with himself for not having shown any backbone against said bigger guy.  And of course, not only is HE not going to get any sleep over it, he's not going to let Gladys get any sleep over it either...

So what's the solution to regain his sense of self-respect?  How about setting up an imaginary fight... (Yeah, that ALWAYS works out... unless you are living in a sitcom...) Ernie takes Pete to meet a friend of his, Charlie (Henry Kulky), who is a big guy. and one who occasionally does stunt work on film.  Charlie teaches Pete how to throw and take fake punches, and then arranges to show up at Pete's house and pose as a burglar, whom Pete will proceed to thrash in front of Gladys.  (You see this coming already, don't you...? I did anyway... or at least, I thought I did...)

 

Charlie shows up, and bangs a few pots around, but Pete has trouble waking Gladys, and when he finally does, she won't let him leave the bedroom to confront the "burglar".  So Charlie, who has to pick up his wife, leaves. Finally Gladys lets Pete go down to investigate, but Charlie is not there.  Who is there is Ernie. Ernie, who had been on hand to let Charlie in, ends up being dragged into an impromptu fight with Pete. (Pete has to justify his ruse somehow, doesn't he?)  After Gladys finds out it was Ernie that Pete was fighting, Pete breaks down and confesses the whole setup.

But Gladys, being the doting, loving wife she is, arranges a separate fight so that Pete can regain his self respect.  She sets up an event where a friend of hers has his cousin flirt with Gladys in public. When they go to the restaurant where the "fight" has been arranged, Gladys spies the guy she thinks is her friend's cousin.  But, it turns out, the man is NOT the friend's cousin, but a total stranger.  Yet Pete, acting like she had planned, stands up to the guy. And becomes her hero, especially after she learns the truth about the guy.

OK, so I (and you, too, maybe) thought the fight back at the apartment was going to turn out to be a real burglar, which is how the plot would have gone if this had been played out the usual way sitcom situations run. I liked the surprise ending of the situation.  But I can see that this sitcom was not along what were the expectations I associated with the tropes that normally occur.  If this was a standard throughout the run, it might have been a nice change.

8:30PM: The Rifleman: ("Long Gun from Tuscon")

Background: In the town of North Fork in New Mexico Territory in the early 1880's, Lucas McCain (Chuck Connors) raises his young son Mark (Johnny Crawford). Much of the series involves moral tales, one in which one character or another is faced with his (or sometimes her)  prejudices or preconceptions and must modify his attitude to be more accepting.  A frequent costar was Paul Fix as Micah, the town marshal (and this is one of those characters that is given a second chance at life, as Micah is a recovering alcoholic.)

Side note: The opening credits of The Rifleman always got to me on various levels.  For one, the rifle that Lucas uses apparently has more rounds in it than I would have believed possible. (By my count he gets off 12 shots before he has to reload.  It's explained during the course of the series that Lucas' gun has been modified, but I still can't believe he has the capacity in that gun to hold 12 shots. 

 

The second is that dirty go-to-hell look he gives the camera as the announcer intones "The Rifleman... starring Chuck Connors". I remember as a kid watching the show (in reruns)  I used to get up and slap the TV screen, telling him to wipe that nasty look off his face.

Anyway the episode opens with John Holliver (Peter Whitney) showing off the shooting advantages of his "long gun" to his associates.  In rides a fellow conspirator, Deecie (Brian G. Hutton) who informs Holliver that the whole town is basically deserted as most of the town has left to go to a neighboring town for a celebration.  Holliver says there's no rush; in fact it might be a nice gesture to let the man Holliver has come to North Fork to kill spend the night worrying about his impending death.

In the temporarily deserted town Lucas is acting as a temporary marshal while Micah is out of town.  But he was not around 5 years earlier.  That's when Holliver had gunned down a 19 year old boy, making it look like self defense.  Except the town didn't see it that way and ran him out of town.  Not just "ran him out of town" but apparently ran him out of town on a rail, which isn't just a euphemism. They actually tied him to a rail.  Which hurt Holliver's pride (not to mention probably his butt and back...)

Anyway, Holliver has returned to seek vengeance on the town.  But in the tradition of an old western trope, the town is full of a bunch of lily liver chickens who don't want to face him.  Leaving Lucas, as acting sheriff, to stand up to Holliver and his three men. At sunup. (of course, its sunup, when else would it be.)

Even though Mark wants to help, Luke tells him to stay put in his friend's house and not interfere, because he wants the boy to have time to "grow up", to be a boy while he can, and approach manhood at a normal pace.

At sunup, Holliver and his men enter the street.  Lucas comes out to meet them, but at the last minute he has three others join him, three men who had expressed a desire to not be involved, but apparently had a last minute change of heart.  And, of course, it's now four on four, and of course, the good guys win and the bad guys go down in short order.

BTW, if you are like me and have a fairly good memory for faces, Peter Whitney might look familiar.  He had a pretty decent career in the film field. ("Hey, I Know That Guy" has been a idea that had been percolating on my to do list for this blog, which I actually kicked off last month. The idea being that somebody in the supporting role on a TV show triggers a memory and I go do a review of the film I remember him or her from. But I had to go to my old standby of IMDb to figure out where I remembered Whitney.  And surprise, surprise... the memory was from the same movie that inspired me to that blog idea... he was Deputy Courtney in In the Heat of the Night). See the "Hey! I KNOW that Guy"s first entry here for more on that.

 

9:00 PM: The Danny Thomas Show: ("Toonoose's Plot)

Background: The Danny Thomas Show started out life as Make Room for Daddy, but due to some necessary changes (brought own by the death of Jean Hagen, the original star as Danny's wife, and a few other issues) was transformed into The Danny Thomas Show.  The basic premise remained in effect throughout, however.  A family oriented comedy which involved the daily interactions of Danny Williams who was a successful nightclub comedian and his family.  By 1961 the cast included Marjorie Lord as his wife and Rusty Hamer and Angela Cartwright as his kids.

 

Danny (Danny Thomas) and his wife, Kathy (Marjorie Lord) are frantically trying to get ready for a date night.  Or at least Danny is... As is typical in the 50's and 60's family scenes at least on TV, Kathy is delaying the start (because after all, women could never have the sense of urgency for a date night that men did...)

Both of the children are extremely friendly towards their dad, although each has an ulterior motive for their agreeable attention: Rusty (Rusty Hamer) wants Dad to sign his report card without even looking at his grades (which must not be very impressive), and Linda (Angela Cartwight) has apparently done something not that good with Dad's electric razor (Getting bubblegum out of it?  She was shaving bubblegum?)

To complicate matters, Danny's uncle, Toonoose (Hans Conreid) shows up, with the intention of moving in.  He has left his home in Toledo to come to New York, with the stated intention of never going back.  The reason?  The family bought a plot of land on a former golf course, with the intention of turning it into a burial ground for members of the family.

The prime spot on the land is a hill over looking it all, with a nice plum tree at the top.  Toonoose is of the opinion that it should be afforded to the most prominent member of the family... and who is the most prominent member?  Why, Toonoose, of course.  But cousin Habib has initiated a coup that will insure that he, Habib, gets that spot. So Toonoose has abandoned the Toledo family for good in disgust.  And intends to move in with his favorite nephew.

Hijinks ensue as Toonoose becomes an unwanted guest (in more ways than one).  He "educates" Linda in an American history that does not fit the accepted one.  He convinces Rusty that real he-men members of the family are strong warriors, causing Rusty to get a black eye after instigating a fight with the biggest kid in school.  He redecorates the apartment with some really ugly stuff that Kathy objects to.  He makes a mess of the kitchen, which doesn't set well with the maid, Louise (Amanda Randolph).  And the straw that breaks the camel's back is that Toonoose dumps Danny's golf clubs out of the golf bag so he has a place to store the rice he cooked while making a mess of Louise's kitchen.

So the diplomatic Danny takes things into his own hands and calls Habib to try to remedy the situation.  He tells Habib that really, the prime spot in the family plot would be the area of the sand trap which would cause family members to remember Habib as the most humble of all the family members.  Which convinces Habib to relent and let Toonoose have the hilltop plot.... Only, Toonoose, overhearing Danny's conversation with Habib, has now decided that HE wants to be the most humble member... (If you strive to be known as "humble" you failed already, but that is a lesson for another story.)

9:30PM: The Andy Griffith Show ("The Clubmen"):

The Clubmen

Background: The Andy Griffith Show revolved around the daily goings on in the small town of Mayberry in North Carolina.  Andy Taylor was the sheriff, a widowed man with a young son, Opie, his Aunt Bee and his best friend, Barney Fife, who also served duty as his deputy at the sheriff's office.  Various other characters made appearances now and then, townspeople which are doubtless familiar to just about anyone even if they have never watched the series: Floyd, the barber. Otis, the town drunk.  Gomer Pyle, the local service station operator and mechanic. And a few others that would crop up now and then, including Helen Crump and Thelma Lou, who were romantic interests for Andy and Barney respectively.

By the way, did you know that The Andy Griffith Show was a spinoff of the previous show in tonight's program, The Danny Thomas Show?  It's true.  Danny Williams had a run-in with Andy Taylor while traveling through Mayberry in an episode of said show which was the jumping off point to create this show a year or so earlier

 

Andy (Andy Griffith) is dropped off in front of the sheriff's office by a friend, George (George Neise), with whom he has been fishing.  George expresses a desire to go fishing again, bringing a few friends from the state capitol (Raleigh, in case you don't know your geography) and Andy tells him come by any time.  George invites Andy to come up to Raleigh for the next meeting of his men's social club, The Esquire Club.  Everybody knows that The Esquire Club is the be all and end all of all the clubs out there.  It is known as fairly elitist, acquiring only the best of the best of the best, so a membership means something.

Andy says the only way he could come if he could bring his deputy Barney (Don Knotts) and George, never having met Barney, assumes that any friend of Andy is good enough for him and his fellow members. Andy is fairly laid back about the opportunity.  But Barney just about hits the moon over the possibility.  And proceeds to let the rest of the town know about what is a sure thing in his mind, acceptance of membership.  But if you know anything about Barney you know that he is NOT exactly "laid back".

Barney insists that he and Andy (especially Andy) has to learn how to act with these bigwigs.  Andy, of course, just wants to be himself and let the cards land as they are dealt.  At the meeting, Barney of course, comes across as a little brash and not very well knowledgeable.  (For instance, he thinks that one member, who shots in the 80's in golf ought to be taking lessons from one who shoots in the 90's instead of the other way around...)

As expected, Barney is blissfully unaware of the faux pas he is committing.  And thinks that they are both a shoe-in for membership.  But when George and a friend show up at the sheriff's office later, they tell Andy that he is accepted, but the members decided that Barney was not club material.  Andy, ever diplomatic, tells the group that he appreciates the honor, but that he and Barney will not be joining.  When Barney comes in and Andy tells him that only one of them was admitted, Barney is absolutely incensed, sure that it was ANDY that was rejected.

The show ends with Andy telling Barney that another club has accepted both of them as members.  It is young Opie's (Ronny Howard) Tomahawk Club.

 

10:00PM: Thriller  ("The Return of Andrew Bentley")

Background: The basic premise of Thriller was the same as it's competitor The Twilight Zone,  an anthology series in which each week the host, Boris Karloff, would present a story. Although with an eerie, suspenseful plot, with sometimes horror elements added to it to differentiate it from the other more well-known show.

 

The time period for this episode, apparently is the late 1800's ( a deduction made by the fact that the style of clothes hints at it, as well as the fact that our two protagonists arrive in a horse drawn carriage).  A suitably Gothic scene for what will turn out to be a suitably Gothic story. 

Arriving at the home of his Uncle Amos (Terence de Marney), Ellis Corbett (John Newland) and his wife, Sheila (Antoinette Bower)  find the old man in an agitated state.  He tells Ellis that he is about to die and his leaving his estate to  Ellis,  because Ellis is his only living relative.  Even though, as he states he is not happy about it, but he has no choice.  

Why?  Because he has certain stipulations that accompany this bequeath of his estate. First he must promise to stay in the house 24/7 (that alone would leave me out.  I get antsy even after about 6 hours in the house.).  Second he must be on constant watch for evil spirits that might come to take the body, or worse, the soul, of Amos. Apparently he has plans to be entombed in the confines of his house for eternity. (That is not entirely bad, in my mind, even if it is a little weird). One of the other rules to get his inheritance is that Ellis must inspect the tomb every day for signs of tampering.

As Boris Karloff, the host warns the audience there are unknown things in the arts of black magic, but "everyone knows here is no such thing as magic".

Or is there?

It seems that Amos is worried about a previous event in his life.  Amos is a practitioner of black magic. He had a partner named Andrew Bentley (Huh? Amos and Andy?  Really?)  By the way, Andrew's spirit is played by Reggie Nalder.  For those of you unfamiliar with the name (or his repertoire), he was the uncanny faced villain in several movies, including the assassin who was such a threat to Jimmy Stewart in The Man Who Knew Too much, and notably, for me, as the vampire in the 1979 TV movie adaptation of 'Salem's Lot.

Well Ellis and Shiela eventually get the estate, but Shiela keeps trying to get Ellis to renege on the deal because the place gives her the willies. But it's not until Ellis actually sees the ghost of Bentley trying to break into the crypt that he starts to get edgy himself.  The ultimate facts come to light.  The only way to get rid of Bentley is to destroy his corpse.  But no one knows where it is.  Amos killed Andrew 3 years earlier,  but some one stole his corpse.  And now it is a threat.

Ellis enlists the help of the local Reverend (played by Oscar Beregi, whom you will recognize as having been a frequent actor in The Twilight Zone) Together they find the corpse and destroy it, thus saving the day and the resting place of Amos.  

This episode really gave me the creeps.  I'm glad I watched it in the afternoon, instead of around bedtime.  Which is a good thing, because in terms of the blog, this would be the wrap for the evening.

Well, folks, it's time to toddle off to bed.  And since I'm only a few hours old at this point, I bet I sleep like a baby.  (OK, save the groans and the raspberries... don't even THINK I didn't hear that.)

Quiggy

Final note: Above is a sign off from a TV station in Raleigh NC, which would have been one of the local TV stations (for me) at that time.  Sign offs were de rigueur in those days because TV stations went off the air after the news (or the late show).

Quiggy

Sand and Stars

 

 

 

 

 

This is my entry in the John Saxon Blogathon hosted by Realweegiemidget Reviews and Cinematic Catharsis

 

 

 

 

So who is John Saxon? Well, Saxon, whose real name was Carmine Orrico, was a guy who made a name for himself in the 70's and 80's as a go to guy for such low budget horror and martial arts films that were the bread and butter of the drive-in movie circuit.  You may not recognize the name, but it's a sure bet you would recognize the face, especially if you watched those kinds of movies.

During his heyday he was a presence in such films as  Enter the Dragon (notably Bruce lee's last completed film) in which he is among a group of competitors in a tournament on a remote island. and many Westerns and crime dramas in the 70's.  Although he never achieved a high profile starring role for the most part, he did get a lot of attention whenever he was on screen.  He managed to win a Golden Globes award as New Star of the Year, an award he shared with James Garner and Patrick Wayne (from 1954-1965 there were multiple winners of the award  each year).

Saxon had a career that spanned from 1954 to 2017 (a few years before his death), but he was most active in the 70's and 80's. He did get roles ointo even the 90's and 2000's.   I didn't know it at the time, but I recently re-watched Beverly Hills Cop III, and lo and behold, there was Saxon in yet another role, this time as one of the baddies.

Blood Beach (1979):

Just when you thought it was safe to go back in the water... you can't get past the beach! 

You know, for years, I thought that was the tagline from this movie. It plays on the fears caused by the blockbuster Jaws from a few years previous.  However, it turns out that the tagline is slightly different.

Just when you thought it was safe to go back in the water ... you can't get to it!

Notice the difference?  I think my tag is better, but, we can't do anything about it now...

Anyway, as intimated in the tagline, this movie initially plays off the fears of beach fun that that blockbuster had on vacation traffic back in 1975.  Surely the makers of this movie did not envision having that kind of impact on vacationers.  (If they did, then I want some of what they were smoking in the boardroom...)

And while I'm admitting misconceptions, for years, before I ever got to actually see the movie, I had sworn that I heard that the creature at the end of the film turned out to be a giant ant lion.  Whether that was an actual ending of another film, I can't say, but as you will see if you make it to the end of this review, you will see that it was NOT necessarily a giant ant lion.

The movie opens with Harry (David Huffman) going off to his job as a harbor patrol man.  He apparently swims out to his job. On the beach he greets a woman, Ruth, who is doing her daily walk on the beach with her dog.  While Harry is out swimming he hears the screams of the woman, whom we see pulled down into the sand and disappear.

 

What happened to her?  No one seems to know, since it seems no one saw her disappear.  At least no one who is coming forward.  We do see a woman watching the scene from an abandoned building, but she is not making herself known.

The LA Police are dubious.about her disappearance.  The two detective partners who discuss the disappearance with Harry (played by the Young brothers, Otis and Burt... OK they aren't really brothers, but isn't it interesting that they are both named Young?)

 

 

There former girlfriend of Harry, Catherine (Marianne Hill) shows up, because, coincidentally, she was also the daughter of Ruth, and has shown up to find out what happened to her mother.

 

 

 

The incident with Ruth is investigated, but no one is sure how a woman can just suddenly disappear from a deserted beach.  One of the better parts of the film, at least for me,  is when Burt Young is on the screen.  Sure, he is playing a character that is typical for him, a crass, brash and not too bright bruiser type.  But Burt always did brighten up movies I saw him in.  

The next "victim" of of our mysterious enemy is the pet dog of the woman killed earlier.  The dog is looking for his missing mistress and ends up losing it's head over the loss.  Literally.

Cut to the crowded beach.  The next potential victim is a girl who is with friends being covered in sand.  She starts screaming that something is biting her legs. She is pulled from the sand, her loegs covered in blood (but still intact).  (And depending on which cut of the movie you see, there is a brief (very brief) glimpse of whatever is doing this.

Finally, our star makes his appearance.  Saxon, who is the chief of police, Captain Pearson, is talking with the assembly of police discussing the incidents, the missing woman, the dog and the girl who was "slumming; I presume" from Beverly Hills. And he wants answers.  (Well, who doesn't, John?  Who doesn't?) He's got everybody from the mayor to the daughter to the parents of the girl to the ASPCA (who want to know what the police are doing to investigate a blatant act of cruelty to animals because of the dog victim.  (Yes, there are some attempts of comedy in this film...  poor attempts, but attempts, nonetheless.)

Several more people are attacked by this sand creature including a would be sex offender who, without being too graphic, won't be doing any sexual offenses in the future.  Viewing the scene Capt Pearson says the tag line "just when you thought it was safe..."  (The writers don't miss a chance with this one...)

As with that other classic beach monster film, no one seems to have any idea that if there is something dangerous around, maybe a good idea would be to avoid the dangerous area.  So we are going to see a couple more victims being swallowed up by the beach.  (And for a movie called :"Blood Beach" there is surprisingly little "blood"in these attacks.  The ones that are swallowed whole apparently have no blood in them.)

Interestingly enough, we do get some very brief looks at this creature as it shows it consuming the victims below the surface.  It's looking almost like some kind of slug. But the real thing is, when the authorities finally discover it's lair and set up video cameras, that it looks more like some kind of Venus flytrap. 

 

 Captain Pearson has the lair rigged up with explosives designed to blow the thing to smithereens.  But as a doctor intimates, there are some things that exist in the world that are capable of regeneration and wonders what might become of each smithereens if they do blow the thing to Kingdom come.

 OK, so if you are operating on all cylinders, you can see how the final scene rolls out.  

Is this movie any good?  Well, I can give you the best thing I can, which is tell you how one of my review books puts it.  It's a "silly little shocker that can best be described as "sucky"." Which is a tongue-in-cheek reference to the way the creatures sucks it's victims into the beach, but is not a bad description of the film.  If you want to save time, just think of it as Baywatch with less bikinis and more blood.  Or at least more disappearing bodies...

Battle Beyond the Stars (1980):

This film, made on the cheap by the famous low budget mogul Roger Corman has a cache of stars and future stars to boost it into the stratosphere.  Besides our current subject, Saxon, the film also has Richard Thomas (yes, John-Boy Walton is in this...).  It also features George Peppard (Col. Hannibal Smith from The A-Team, and the titular detective Banacek... or for those of you into that kind of movie, Paul from Breakfast at Tiffany's).  Additionally you've got Robert Vaughn (Napoleon Solo from The Man from U.N.C.L.E., among others...), Jeff Corey ( a face you would recognize, even if the name is not familiar), Sybil Danning (one of the big names in the babes with guns and/or swords genre of film) and Marta Kristen (Judy Robinson from the TV series Lost in Space). And Julia Duffy (Newhart) makes her big screen debut. It also has music composed by James Horner (whose resume included, among others, the films Titanic and Field of Dreams).. And James (Jim) Cameron was involved in the art direction and visual effects. And the script was written by another giant in the industry, John Sayles (who directed several high profile films, including my favorite sports movie, Eight Men Out).

The film has been described as Star Wars meets Seven Samurai, At the start, Sador (John Saxon) of the Malmori has come to the planet Akir. (A name that is homage to Akira Kurosawa, director of Seven Samurai, among other great Japanese samurai flicks). He informs the people of Akir that he intends to subjugate them in a short time. 

 

 

Zed (Jeff Corey) tells the people they must learn to fight, a thing that has not been a part of Akir society for many years.  What must happen is they must gather some mercenaries to help them, and thus we have Shad (Richard Thomas), the only one who apparently can fly their lone star ship to head out to recruit these mercenaries.

 

 

But first he needs the help of old Zed's former ally, Dr. Hephaestus (Sam Jaffe).  He goes to the spaceport home of the doc, but the Doc is just a shadow of his former self, in more ways than one.  He insists that Akir is doomed, with or without help, and wants Shad to stay on the spaceport and, with his daughter, Nanelia (Darlanne Fluegel), repopulate the spaceport. (All it has are androids...)  But Shad is insistent on saving Akir, and with Nanelia's help, escapes.

 

 

The next goal is to round up the mercenaries.  Fortunately for Shad, one is just around the corner.  Cowboy (George Peppard) could be a big help, that is if Shad can exercise a little bravado and kill a few people who are trying to kill Cowboy themselves... 

 

When he has finished, Shad tries to convince Cowboy to join the team.  But before he does, we get to see why Sador is such a badass.  He has a "stellar converter". Think Death Star, but on a smaller budget.  Essentially, instead of blowing up planets, Sador can eliminate his enemies by turning their planets into suns.

 Meanwhile, Nanelia is rescued (captured?) by another race, a mercenary creature who goes by the name of Cayman. (And Cayman looks a lot like a couple of other creatures from movies I've seen, like the alien in Enemy Mine). Cayman rescued her, but intends to sell her to another party.  That is until he finds out that Nanelia is seeking mercenaries to fight Sador. It seems Cayman and Sador are NOT bosom buddies... 

 

And Shad runs into the Nestor who want in on the action. (BTW, I wonder if this is where Star Trek got the idea for the Borg.  The Nestor are sentient beings who share one consciousness... "What one sees, all see, what one knows, all know...) They are not looking for gain in the matter, they just want to join in the quest, however.

 

And then Shad meets up with Gelt (Robert Vaughn) the sole remaining mercenary of his own world.  And Gelt is reminiscent of the character that Vaughn played in The Magnificent Seven, Lee, a guy who doesn't care what he has to do, just as long as he gets paid to do it.

 

The final piece of the puzzle is St. Exmin of the Valkiri (Sybil Danning).  Shad is not entirely gung-ho about her joining the party however, since he ship is small and it doesn't look much like a fighting machine.  (Of course, if he could see her, he might make an exception...)  But she is nothing if not determined and somehow ends up on the fighting team anyway.

 

Which leads up to the final battle.  As any good Star Wars knockoff, there are some decent space battles, but since, as I said before, this has some elements of Seven Samurai (or The Magnificent Seven, for you neophytes), there is also a battle on Akir's surface. And that's where Cowboy's help comes in handy, since his trade of choice is hand weapons, so he has taught the Akir how to handle themselves in hand-to-hand combat.

Ultimately, a few brave souls have to die.  And most of them die spectacularly.  (That $2 million budget wasn't all wasted on actor talent...).  This isn't Star Wars, of course, it's just Star Wars Lite.  But damn, it is a great movie in it's own right.  If you have an hour and a half to kill, I recommend it.

Well, folks, that wraps up this trip.  The old Plymouth may not make it to Akir, but it's good enough to get home (as long as I don't run into Saxon on the way...)  Drive safely, folks.

Quiggy

 

 

"Hey! I Know That Guy!" Episode #2

"Hey! I know that guy!"

 

Well, it's time for another installment of the ongoing series.  To refresh your memory, the plan is to discuss an episode of The Twilight Zone and highlight one of the actors or actresses appearing in the episode and talk about their career before and after their role in the episode.  Usually I will be taking a secondary character as my focus, not one of the stars.

For instance, in the first installment I went with James Gregory who appeared briefly at the end of the premiere episode of The Twilight Zone.  But as I stated in that post, there are at least two (that I can think of off the top of my head), that only have two characters, so in those episodes neither of the actors or actresses could be considered secondary.

And thus, this time I am going with what is one of my all-time favorite episodes of The Twilight Zone, "A Game of Pool". In this episode, a wanna be pool star is frustrated because, although he considers himself to be top notch, he is always being compared to a champion pool stud who is no longer living. The episode starred Jack Klugman as the would be star and Jonathan Winters (in a rare dramatic performance) as the former stud come back to life to play a one-on-one game with the wannabe.

In choosing which of the two stars to focus on, it would have been my natural tendency to go with Winters.  He was a great comic actor.  But then, Klugman had a good career on film, too.  I picked Klugman in the end  because, not only can I talk about a fairly extensive career, I also can review a long neglected film, Twelve Angry Men.

Jack Klugman's career spanned 60 years, beginning in 1950 as a bit player. But by the time of his first role on the Zone he already had a good resume, including one of the lead roles in a TV soap opera called The Greatest Gift  (1954-55). And, of course, after the stint on The Zone, everyone knows he went on to greater heights.  He is well remembered for playing Oscar Madison, foil to co-star Tony Randall's Felix Unger on the comedy The Odd Couple. (And by the way, he got his feet warm for that role by subbing for Walter Matthau in the stage production of the original play on Broadway.)

And when his term as Oscar ended, he also found dramatic success as the titular character of the mystery series Quincy, M.D.. Like the previous installment's Gregory,  Klugman  made his biggest impact on the small screen, but as we will see, he did have some rather memorable impact in the theater as well.

If you are a child of the 70's, you may also remember him appearing from time to time with his (then)  wife, Bret Somers on TV shows like Tattletales. And Bret also mentioned him from time to time during her stint as a regular on The Match Game. 

So on to the TV stint on The Twilight Zone. Klugman had 4 turns at starring on the show.  His first was as a downtrodden has been trumpet player who eventually finds a new lease on life in "A Passage for Trumpet". Besides his second role as the pool player in today's episode, he also appeared in two other episodes "Death Ship" and "In Praise of Pip". All four rank in the upper half of most full series episode rankings, and I'm happy to say, most people agree with me that "A Game of Pool" was his best.

In "A Game of Pool", Jesse Cardiff (Klugman) plays alone in a poolroom, showing off to everyone (and no one) how good he is.  But he laments that everyone else claims that he is not the equal of Fats Brown, a legend who has been dead for 15 years, Jesse wishes he could play Fats just one game and prove his mettle.  But making a wish in the Twilight Zone can bring about things you never expected.  Such as Fats Brown (Winters) appearing and answering the challenge.

Ultimately it comes down to Jesse playing for his life against Fats.  "You win; you live. You lose; you die." says Fats.  Which Jesse reluctantly accepts as the stakes seeing as to how he wants to win the prestige of being called the best so badly.  And when it comes down to the final ball, take it whichever way you want, Fats ends up losing (By choice or by misstep, you decide.  But I tend to think he flubbed on purpose.)  And Jesse ends up being the best.  But after he dies (sometime in the future, mind you, not right away) he finds that he has taken on the mantle that Fats vacated and has to show up whenever anyone wishes they could have played one game against the great Jesse Cardiff.

Klugman is the outstanding of the two here.  Not that there is anything to fault Winters by for his portrayal, but if an Emmy were going for one or the other I would have given it to Jack.  This is one of those episodes I end up watching about once every other month, just because I can get into it.  And not just because I wish I could play pool half as good as either of the two characters (although that does factor in to it). 

I'm given to understand both actors actually pulled off most of the shots in the episode. (The same seems to be true for the shots made by Newman and Gleason in The Hustler, and Laura (Mary Tyler Moore) did the stunt shot at the end of the "Hustling the Hustler" episode of The Dick Van Dyke Show. Yes, I do love me some pool.  I even watch pool tournaments on TV. )

 

 

Klugman had very few roles in which he was the star on the big screen.  But even as a co-star, he managed to hold his own.  In particular was his presence in the Henry Fonda led film 12 Angry Men. Klugman was just one of 11, and admittedly he didn't garner the attraction that Fonda or co-star Lee J. Cobb. But when his turn to come on screen arrived, you knew he was there.  

I read the screenplay for 12 Angry Men in high school.  It was years before I finally got to watch it on video.  (I may have seen it on network TV before then,  but I don't remember).  

Even longer years later I had the opportunity to serve on a jury myself.  Not a murder trial.  It was a simple case of possession with intent to sell illegal drugs.  And I remember we initially had a hung jury.  The jury room didn't turn out acrimonious as it did here, but we did have some discussions.  And I remember we had one hold out until the very end.  Also I remembered the scene from this movie where one juror admonished another juror for changing his vote just so they could go home. So the situation was on my mind at that time.

If you know anything about the film you know that the 12 men are jurors deciding the outcome of a murder trial. Initially the vote is 11-1 "guilty". with one hold out, that being Henry Fonda's character.  Gradually over the course of the film, however, Fonda , and eventually some others are able to instill some doubts about the "guilty" verdict they initially cast until it comes down to one adamant hold out.  Klugman (credited as Juror #5; none of them actually have names they are all identified by their numbers in the jury seating) is one of the early jurors to change his vote.  And he becomes an advocate for others who change their votes to the hostile holdouts.

!2 Angry Men is a great character study, even though a couple of them sometimes come across as a little caricaturistic. (I speak here mainly of the immigrant character (Juror #11), played by George Voskovec, who himself was an immigrant, so maybe it wasn't intentional. Klugman's presence in the jury room is sometimes sedate, but that is in fitting with the character. Juror #5 is a city slum kid like the defendant and has much more sympathy for him as a result.

AS a film, this is one well worth seeing.  Despite the studio reluctance to a film with no actual action or sets to enhance the story, the film managed to get recognition, It was nominated for Best Picture, Best Director and Best Screenplay (all of which it lost to Bridge on the River Kwai). I don't think it's too big a surprise there were no nominations for Best Actor or Best Supporting Actor for this film because, after all, how could you choose any one over the others as prominently lead actor?

For the best that Klugman had to offer, I would still go with watching him as Oscar Madison, but if you want to see his dramatic chops, you can't go wrong with !2 Angry Men.

 

Thanks for your time.

Quiggy

Be NIce...Until...

 

When the summer of 1989 rolled around I was a student at Southwest Texas State University (since renamed Texas State University).  I was heavily involved in an on-campus Christian group called The Great Commission.  At that time (I have no idea whether the program is still in effect), the on-campus group held an annual event every year in which those of us with the funds would pack up and move to Washington D.C. area for a leadership conference.  Essentially we got full time jobs during the day and attended leadership conferences at night.

I admit even today that I was not cut out to be a church leader.  Hell, I'm probably lucky to even be in God's good graces. If God is patient, (and people who are devout will tell you He is) then He has his work cut out for Him, in my case.

At any rate, I was in D,C. are when this movie came out.  By the time I actually had the opportunity to see it, it had already made it's run through theaters and was on it's last legs in the $1 theaters. (Yes folks, there was a time when you could actually go to see a movie for a $1.  But, to be fair, a regular price ticket was only about $6 ..)

I only vaguely remembered this film before watching again today.  I remembered, of course, Swayze as a top dog bouncer, and I remembered Kevin Tighe (formerly from one of my sister's favorite TV shows Emergency!) as the owner of a bar who entices Swayze's character to come work for him.  And that's about it.

Swayze was always a stud in my opinion, but he had some tendencies to playing less than he-man characters over the years.  Consider: He was a man's man in such films as Uncommon Valor,  Red Dawn, Steel Dawn, and to some extent The Outsiders.  But he was also in such less man-friendly films such as Dirty Dancing, Ghost and of course Too Wong Foo, Thanks for Everything, Julie Newmar. Don't get me wrong.  I actually liked some of those films, but being a gung-ho type movie buff, I gravitated to ones where he was kicking ass and taking names as opposed to ones where he making women swoon.

Which brings us to Roadhouse. This movie was directed by a guy credited as "Rowdy Herrington" , and if this movie is an indication that "Rowdy" nickname is not a misnomer.  I think the director was in the cutting room saying something like "O.K. we've been 5 minutes without a fight, it's time to stick another one in...".

Roadhouse (1989):

Dalton (Patrick Swayze) is the top dog bouncer at a bar in New York City. (Note I see credits for his first name being "James" but I can't recall it ever being mentioned in the movie.  Everybody call him "Dalton"). Dalton has such a reputation that all you have to say his name and everybody gives a low whistle and says "Dalton?" Man he's the best."

 

Into his world comes Frank Tilghman (Kevin Tighe). Frank is the owner of the Double Deuce, a bar in Missouri that he wants to invest money and time in to make a profitable venture.  The town is on the outskirts of Kansas City, according to the early dialogue, but the actual town is Jasper.

 

(OK, so something you need to know here is that the real town of Jasper, Missouri has nothing to do with the town in the movie.  For one thing the real Jasper is WAY too small to even support a bar of the size of the Double Deuce. But the real issue I have with the prospect of hiring Dalton for this venture will pan out over the course of this review).

The town of Jasper is basically being run by a mob boss wannabe by the name of  Brad Wesley (Ben Gazzara).  It becomes evident that Brad has the run of the town, and has everyone trembling at his feet.  He has everyone paying protection to him to be allowed to function within the town.  He also has the law enforcement under his thumb.  (Which explains how no cops seem to ever show up when fights break out.)

The first thing that Dalton demands from Frank is $5000 up front and $500 a day as the top dog.  Which brings one to wonder how much money a small town bar expects to bring in on a daily basis...

You can see from the beginning that Dalton has his work cut out for him.  This bar makes the average Western saloon look like a mom and pop fine diner.  There are more bottle flying and fists pumping in the space of a minute than you can even keep count.  The waitresses are selling extracurricular enhancements, the bartenders are skimming the till, and the bouncers are not pulling their own weight.  One of Dalton's rules at the beginning is that he must be given free reign to make the changes he deems necessary.  Which includes getting rid of the excess weight.

HE sets down the law with his three rules:

1. Never underestimate your opponent. Always expect the unexpected.

2. Take it outside.  Never start anything in the bar unless it's absolutely necessary.

3. Be nice. Until its time to not be nice.

Of course, these new rules do not necessarily set well, not just with unruly patrons, but even with former employees.  And time and again Dalton goes out to the parking lot to find his car has been vandalized.  But he takes it in stride.

He finds a place to live, a room on a dilapidated farm owned by an old geezer named Emmett (Sunshine Parker).  And he finds time to develop a relationship with Dr. Clay (Kelly Lynch), the local female doctor.  Making for one of the screen's most quick romances.  He just meets her and they fall in bed together (oh the charm of Swayze..)

 

 

It takes almost half the movie to introduce the real conflict, however, that of the villain of the film. Wesley.  Wesley develops an intense dislike for Dalton, some of it due to the fact that he is helping turn the Double Deuce into a better and more profitable place (which probably irks him more because he can't dip his fingers in the pie...)  But also because Dalton is developing a relationship wit Dr. Clay, a girl that Wesley once had, but apparently lost sometime in the past.  (Could it be because he is an unprincipled jackass...?)

 

Wesley and his hoodlums cause all kinds of ruckus, including the demolishing of the local auto parts place (ostensibly because the owner would.t pay he protection racket fees.)  But eventually he sets his sights on getting rid of Dalton one way or another.  Dalton has some help however, when his mentor, Wade (Sam Elliot) shows up and helps him kick some villain butt.  

 

But even this is not eventually enough.  And Dalton has a decision to make, either stay and fight, or just get out while the getting is good.  It turns out, however, that Dalton has his choice made for him by the actions of Wesley.

 So is this a good movie?  Well, as I mentioned there is a couple of major plot point that just doesn't make sense.  For one, I find it hard to believe that small town bar is such a going concern (even if it is on the outskirts of Kansas City). And how a town located that close to a major metropolis could have a small time hoodlum exercising that much control over the operations seems to be a bit far-fetched.

One of the things I mentioned in the beginning is this movie seems to be just  looking for a fight to happen.  It seems like every five or ten minutes a fight breaks out just to break up the monotony of dialogue and character interaction.  And they are quite a few dead bodies by the end of it, but most of those crop up in the final 10 minutes.  Looked at from a different angle, you could say it's one big fight scene broken up by the occasional breaks of dialogue...

You should know that the movie did get nominated for several Razzies including Worst Actor, Worst Director and Worst Picture (but fortunately for this outing it came out the same year as that turkey Star Trek V The final Frontier. There are some things that just deserve to be left on the dung heap) 

I wouldn't say this is a movie every action film fan should watch.  I wouldn't even say you should watch it if you want to be called a Swayze completist.   But if you have an hour and a half to kill and don't want to get into anything too deep, it's not too bad.

Quiggy

 

"Hey! I Know That Guy" Episode #1 ( of a Hopeful Series)

 Presenting Episode #1 of a series of posts I'm titling:

HEY! I know that guy!

OK, so you may not have noticed I do this frequently.  Get some inspirational idea and try to run with it.  So this may be an ongoing series (and then again it may die on the operating table) But  I am going to give it a shot.

Premise:  One of my favorite TV shows is the old 50's/60's TV show, The Twilight Zone.  The old anthology series had a strange story each week, and, since it was an anthology series, as opposed to a weekly drama, there were no recurring characters, or for that matter, recurring actors.  Admittedly, there were a smattering of actors who came back time and again for the series, but the only mainstay was the show's host, Rod Serling.

The man himself

 

Now, the headliner in these episodes was almost always a star in his or her own right. The first season alone had such luminaries as Ida Lupino,  Ed Wynn, Rod Taylor, Anne Francis and Howard Duff, just to name a few.  But each episode also had a supporting cast, some of which had not quite hit the heights they would later claim.   Many of the minor characters in these vignettes were just riding on the verge of discovery.

Of course, at least two of those  episodes had only two people on screen the entire time of the episode, and in those cases both actors were fairly well established by then: I am speaking, of course of  the third season episodes of "Two" and "A Game of Pool".  "Two" featured on Charles Bronson and Elizabeth Montgomery, and "A Game of Pool" featured only Jack Klugman and Jonathan Winters. So if this series goes on long enough and I choose to focus on one or both of those episodes, my choices will be limited.

 

Chuck and Liz

 

Jonny and Jack

 

So, anyway, back to the inspiration. One day, several years ago, I came home from being out carousing and turned on my TV to see what was on.  I started watching what turned out to be the Robert Redford movie Brubaker. In one scene, Redford is conversing with a character who is one of the prison trustees.  And I said "Hey! I know that guy!" But I couldn't figure out where I knew him.  Fortunately I had access to the internet by then and zipped over to my computer.  With a little effort, I found out the actor  was Matt Clark.  Still wasn't sure even with that, but a glance at IMDb told me Clark played Packy Harrison in the film In The Heat of the Night, and I immediately recalled his brief scene.

Thus, we have the inspiration for this series.  I'm going to pick one of the secondary characters from an episode of The Twilight Zone. In each post I will encapsulate the plot of the episode, as well as point out the actor and where he or she appears in the episode.  Then I will give some brief background on said actor, and highlight one (or more) of his or her memorable performances.

I hope this is enjoyable.  Don't know yet how it will all flesh out.  And I'm probably not going to stick to any predetermined sequence.  But I have decided to start at the beginning anyway.  The very first episode had only one character in it for 90% of the story.  The main character was played by Earl Holliman, a somewhat star in his own right by this time, though mostly as a supporting cast member.  For instance he was one of the astronaut crew accompanying Leslie Nielsen in the classic sci-fi movie Forbidden Planet.

 But at the very end, after the denouement, several more characters make their presence known and one these is played by James Gregory. 

 

So who is James Gregory, you might ask?Gregory was one of those actors who, even if you don't know his name, is definitely a familiar face (and voice).  Some of you may remember him best from the TV series from the late 70's - early 80's, Barney Miller.  Gregory had a recurring role as Inspector Luger.  And, although he was hidden by makeup, his voice was recognizable from Beneath the Planet of the Apes as General Ursus, one of the gorillas who sought to capture the main character in the film.

 

Interestingly, Gregory got his start in 1941 in a religious film called Journey to Jerusalem, but his acting career got put on hold (sort of) with the outbreak of WWII. Not sure what his actual duties involved during his service work, but he apparently got involved in helping make propaganda films, since he made at least one during that time. (There is a clip of him and a couple of other soldiers confronting a Communist street speaker in the film The Atomic Cafe. But try as I might I have been unable to find a title for the original film they gleaned for the clip).

After his return to civilian life, he started doing more acting work, including being the lead actor on a TV series from the 50's called The Lawless Years.  Gregory would go on to some more prominent work during this time, although he never really became a headliner.  One of the more prominent roles I remember is he was Senator Iselin, the prime target for the assassination attempt in the 60's thriller The Manchurian Candidate.

But his mainstay during his career was really with TV.  Notably he played the victim in one Columbo episode ("Short Fuse", featuring Roddy McDowall as the killer) and as a subsidiary character, the coach of a football team being run by another killer (Robert Culp) in "The Most Crucial Game", thus making him one of a handful of actors who appeared more than once on that iconic mystery series.

And, back to The Twilight Zone, he also had a meatier part as a Confederate soldier who stops to talk to a woman on her porch as the road filled with soldiers trudges by on the nearby road.  (The Passerby) 

In the first Twilight Zone episode, however,  the main focus is on a character, played by Earl Holliman, who finds himself in a town where there is no one else, although it appears at times they may have just left within the past hour or so.  Holliman's character desperately tries to figure out what is going on, as well as try to remember who he is and and how he got there in the first place.  It turns out that Holliman had been going though isolation and sensory deprivation exercises to see how they might affect potential astronauts on deep space travel.  At the end of the episode it is revealed that he has been watched by several Armed Forces  bigwigs, one of whom was a General played by Gregory.

In this episode, Gregory serves as the grounding in reality, the connection to the poor schmo who had to spend some 484 hours (that comes out to about 20 days, to give you perspective)  in this box as a guinea pig to see how long term isolation would affect his mind. The General may come off a bit uncaring, since it was his experiment, but he does show some compassion at the end.  

As mentioned earlier, Gregory's biggest bulk of acting roles occurred on the small screen.  He was really an important cast member in Barney Miller during that series' run.  He was introduced in the first season, but only had a few limited guest shots in the first couple of seasons.  He became a frequent star as the series went on , and in season 4 he was included as one of the stars of the show as the opening credits rolled.

Over the course of it's six seasons, there would be some characters that would come and go.  Notably Gregory Sierra, who many probably remember as Julio on Sanford and Son, stayed only through two seasons.  Abe Vigoda likewise left the series after a few years.  Jack Soo unfortunately passed away during the series run.  And there were a few additions that came on to compliment the cast, like Steve Landesburg, and surprisingly enough to me,  since he was such a strong presence later in the series, Ron Carey. 

The Season 4 Cast

 

With such an ensemble cast, there were often two or three stories going on in any episode, and thus not much dominant screen time for any one character.  But a highlight, for the episodes where he did appear,   was when Gregory walked into the squad room as Inspector Luger. He always came unannounced, just seemingly "happened to be in the neighborhood" kind of visit.  Of course, with Inspector Luger you never knew .  Ofttimes he was just showing up because he was a lonely man that craved attention and recognition,  Luger was guy you could get annoyed with because he was insensitive and oblivious to any one who might take offense, because he was just being genuine.  And then he could drop a bomb on you and make you feel sympathetic for his predicament. because, after all, he was a 50 something year old lifelong bachelor who almost never seemed to be able to settle down in a relationship, which might have mellowed him.

Oh sure, there was that one season when he had a fiance named Agnes (or maybe "Ag-a-nes", since that's how he pronounced it), but as wedding bells advanced he became more and more worried about the loss of independence.

By far, one of the more entertaining episodes of the series was the two-part "Quarantine" episode.  In this episode we got to see how the individual members of the squad were able to cope with being cooped up together, by force.  A prisoner was brought in who was sick and later determined to have either chicken pox or small pox.  As a result a doctor quarantines the entire precinct, and especially the squad room.  Not especially good even in the best of circumstances, but included in the mix are a gay couple who had just come to see Barney about helping them get a reprieve from one of them who was on probation.  And the unfortunate Luger who just happened to decide to visit the squad room at the wrong time.

Most of the rest of the squad room are somewhat upset, obviously, but Luger, being Luger, tries to manipulate the procedure.  And he is also not quite so accommodating to the fact that there is a gay couple in the quarantine.  

This being the 70's, the gay couple do receive some of the humorous remarks,and the gay viewing audience were not always receptive to the portrayal, but the writers did their best to be sympathetic and not condescending when presenting the characters.  There is an interesting video out there on youtube about the trials and tribulations behind the scenes.

Eventually the whole squad room finally settles down to crash on cots put up for the quarantine and Luger has to concede the couch in Barney's office to the only woman who has been quarantined with them (showing one of the rare moments when he is willing to think of others well being. 

Over the years that Gregory was in the acting business, he managed to accumulate over 200 appearances in TV and movies.  Pretty impressive by any standard.  He passed away in 2002 at the age of 90. 

Well, folks, thus ends our first entry in this venture. I had fun, so maybe it won't be the last entry...

 

Quiggy

The Big Bad Wolfe

 

In 2000, A & E Television produced a one off film The Golden Spiders: A Nero Wolfe Mystery, which starred Timothy Hutton and Maury Chaykin as, respectively, Archie Goodwin and Nero Wolfe.  

The Nero Wolfe series of novels, written by Rex Stout had been created in the 30's and were published, both as short stories in magazines (later to be collected 3 or 4 at a time in book form) and novels until the author's death in 1975.  

(Side note:  The mantle of Nero Wolfe has, in recent years, been taken up by one Robert Goldsborough, who does an admirable job of it.)

The background of Nero Wolfe over the years has been spotty, to say the least.  There were at least 4 separate radio series, (3 of which aired during the heyday of radio entertainment,  radio being the prominent format for home entertainment, pre- television), and, as near as I can tell, at least 2 attempts to try to move Nero Wolfe into the television era of entertainment (prior to the series discussed today.)

One of those, which I remembered fondly and have been lucky enough to have found on DVD featured William Conrad as Wolfe and Lee Horsley. 

Conrad, of course, will be familiar to most of you.  Not only was he the voice of Matt Dillon when Gunsmoke was a radio show (obviously if you've seen him you know why he didn't transition to that role on TV), and he played lead roles in two TV series, Cannon and Jake and the Fatman.  Lee Horsely, on the other hand, may not be all that familiar, depending on your perspective.  He did have the lead role in a Magnum, P.I. knockoff (my perspective of it anyway), Matt Houston. But other than that, he has a very slim file of appearances.

There were also a couple of attempts to bring the character to the big screen, both of which took such liberties with the character that Stout himself refused to authorize another adaptation.  (Seems like Stout had much the same opinion of these attempts as Stephen King has been known to have for film adaptations of his works.)

So back to the original premise of this post.  A very good adaptation of Stout's The Golden Spiders was produced for A & E.  Not only did they stick with the story as much as possible (which includes...spoiler alert!....the death of the kid who comes to Wolfe's door early in the story).  And, BTW, not the same with an earlier adaptation. In the 1977 TV movie that preceded the Conrad/Horsely series, the boy survives... so much for PC TV. 

Anyway, the reception to the A & E movie was such that the studio greenlighted a series.   And each one was to remain true to the original Stout vision.  The sad part is only 20 episodes were made,  But each one of those was adaptations of already published Rex Stout stories.  Unlike the multiple radio series and the 1981 TV series, the producers didn't attempt to create their own intricate mysteries for the detective.

And there was a new twist (one that I hadn't seen at any rate) on this new series.  Th episode featured a repertory (multiple actors who came back each episode playing different characters each time. There were a few recurring characters in the series, including the familiar ones such as Fritz Brenner, Wolfe's major domo and chef (always played by Colin Fox) and the irascible Inspector Cramer (always played by Bill Smitrovich). Plus frequent secondary help from independent P.I.s Saul Panzer (Conrad Dunn, Fred Durkin (Fulvio Cecere) and Orrie Cather (Trent McMullen).

Colin Fox

Bill Smitrovich

Conrad Dunn

(And, BTW, does Dunn look familiar?  He was the character "Psycho" in the Bill Murray movie "Stripes"...)

But in addition, there were multiple members of the cast who were part of the repertory who would come on in various roles as needed.  Among these were a couple of familiar people.  James Tolkan (who, if not familiar by name, is definitely familiar by face... he was Principal Strickland in the Back to the Future series of films). Tolkan is recognizable, most of the time.  It took me by surprise that it was him in one episode, however, since the character sports a shaggy toupee(?) and a big bushy mustache, but you hear his voice and think, "oh, yeah, it's him...")

 George Plimpton (probably better known as an author than as an actor, but he did have some acting credits), is also among the familiar names.

The rest of the recurring repertory were names I had never heard of prior to watching the series, and none of them appeared in ALL the episodes.  It usually depended on what characters were present in the stories. And since they were instrumental members specific to the plot of each individual episode, they were, of course, not reprising a previous role from a preceding episode.

One of the highlights when watching the opening credits, for me, was seeing that Kari Matchett was included in the cast. 

Twice she only briefly appeared, as Lily Rowan, Archie Goodwin's now and again enamorata, and was thus only briefly involved in the story.  At other times she was a significant player in the ongoing plot of the episode., and so I got to see more of her.

A complete list of the actors and actresses who appeared over the course of the series can be found here:

Nero Wolfe Characters (2001-2002)

The series was well-scripted with much attention to keeping it in line with the original stories.  The list of teleplay authors is pretty good, too. Sharon Elizabeth Doyle wrote a majority of them, and her resume is not real extensive, but she did a good job with the adaptations.  

But also included in the cast of writers was Stuart Kaminsky, whom some will remember has the writer of at least two fairly well known detective fiction series, one of which ranks among my favorites, that of Toby Peters. Peters was to put it in my own terms "detective to the stars".  Each book involved the detective working with stars of the 30's and 40's Hollywood.

And then, the final set of writers I want to highlight are Lee Goldberg and William Rabkin, both of whom later wrote scrips for one of my favorite TV series, Monk. And Goldberg has even a few of the Monk novels under his name. (not to mention a few others, he is prolific...)

The A & E was far too short, however.  What could have gone on for several years only lasted two.  With a combined total of 74 stories and novels by Stout alone, that could have expanded the show at least  for another 3 or 4 years.  The biggest disappointment, for me, though was that the series did not adapt my favorite Stout book "Too Many Cooks".  (Of course, adapting that one would have necessitated that most of the female members of the repertory be sidelined, since that one consists of almost all male characters).

At any rate, having been cooped up this week, I finally got a chance to more or less binge the entire series.  It gave me a serious jonesing to see more of Timothy Hutton, whom I had forgotten was such a great actor.  I remember my first experience was seeing him in Taps  and Turk 182 in the early 80's. The last thing I remember seeing him in was as the main character in the adaptation of Stephen King's The Dark Half. 

Primarily I remember Turk 182 as it was a big influence on me in my youth.  I still remember it some 40 years later, even though I only saw it that one time in the theater.  Currently trying to track down a copy for a review, but might have to break down and buy it retail, since I can't find it in the used stacks and it's not streaming currently.

Maybe one day (I doubt it, but one can hope), another well produced Nero Wolfe series may appear on the scene.  Not sure who among the current available actors could pull off a believable Nero Wolfe, however.  Unfortunately Chaykin passed away a few years ago, so it would have to be somebody else, and the role is limited in it's potential prospects, given the size of Wolfe himself.  (God forbid they get somebody like an Arnold or Sylvester and put a fat suit on them... and if you needed last names there, boy are you a newcomer...)

Well, folks, if you happen upon this great adaptation, it's worth a look. And if you only get to one or two, might I suggest you start with The Doorbell Rang as your first?  You really get to see Archie (Hutton) at his best and Nero (Chaykin) holds his own especially in moments of exasperation with others.

Drive safely folks.

Quiggy