A Long, Hot Misfits Summer

More Stars Soon in Heaven ---Part Two

Problem with event movies was unwashed public needing to agree that they were indeed events. Subject matter still had to matter, doubts frankly as to whether The Misfits would. Robert Mitchum was wanted initially for lead man. Memos I read suggest they wanted him badly. Did Mitchum see this as too much reprise of his previous The Lusty Men for RKO? Was writer Arthur Miller too lofty a prospect? Maybe Monroe as screen mate distanced him. By 1960, would her people have insisted on top billing for MM? There was no argument she’d cede placement to Gable, age before beauty perhaps, or one legend checkmating another. But Monroe was still a working actress at heart, not yet legendary as early and mysterious death would confer. Respective pay level told truth as to that … Gable got $750K, her fee $300K same as director John Huston. Both were in for percentages. I understand Monroe’s estate still gets checks from The Misfits and Some Like It Hot. Gable under such physical stress, and working in Nevada’s beastly heat, made his hardest-earned money, comfort for the widow and unborn son in the end, but what a premature one. Not even sixty … and twenty years too old to play this roistering and hard-luck guy. Wish Mitchum had done The Misfits. But as I’ve said before of other icons who went early, would we wish the sixties upon any of them? Seeing Gable "really act" was maybe a lure, as it evidently was for him going in, though I suspect he’d have done a Pepe cameo if they had given him $750K for it (wouldn’t we all?). As for Gable acting, there is more and I think better of that in both Teacher’s Pet and But Not For Me.

Montgomery Clift was aboard as third of major name trio, billed as such and character support for settled leads that were Gable and Monroe. Clift plays his broken rodeo rider with authority, saddling up against sense or reason for a player seen as delicate since a road accident changed forever a public perception of him. I found myself wishing this time that Clift could somehow have gotten more chance at vigorous work, for sure he was willing to go whatever dangerous distance to make screen action credible. Might someone have mentioned him to John Wayne or Wallis as potential son of Katie Elder? I like Dean Martin, but Monty would have been electric as Tom Elder, even in diminished capacity … or am I just a fan wanting to rewrite history sixty years too late? Eli Wallach has a not very likeable part, and we can admire his not playing in opposition to it. Wallach was gifted at being a rat, or “hypocrite” as his “Guido” character is referred to, the actor for me more accessible where comic emphasis is applied to scurvy sorts, like The Good, the Bad, and the Ugly, or The Magnificent Seven. Wallach would become spokesman for The Misfits cast by dent of all others gone before historical inquiry began, which must have been an uneasy sensation for him. The Misfits bore pressure from the start as an expected masterpiece, everyone just sure it would be the screen’s supreme drama, a natural consequence of genius present in all aspects. Were they as sure, however, of commercial acceptance?

Marilyn Monroe predicted that if The Misfits achieved greatness, it would come in retrospect, history awarding laurels, not first-run critics and audiences. This woman had smarts, pretending sometimes not to where it served her purpose. She for instance liked John Huston because he had been kind to her during The Asphalt Jungle, but Huston was here under a same pressure to mine gold from Arthur Miller’s concept. Maybe this caused Huston to look for escapes from over-heated toil that was The Misfits. “John Huston was constantly flouting his macho director image. He was always off to ride in local parades or attend parties,” said Ralph Roberts. There was also raw edge to the director where realism was sought, him by cast/crew agreement going too far to get effects he wanted. “A lot of the action scenes in the desert with the horses were actually shot indoors at Paramount after we’d left the Nevada location. That’s when I saw Gable take a lot of physical punishment. He was doing the close shots with a prop man holding the fake horse legs. He would thrust them at Gable who was lying on the floor trying to dodge the hoofs. John Huston felt that all this fell short of the realism he wanted to achieve and personally took charge of the prop master’s duties. Well, Gable really scrambled now because Huston was coming after him with everything he had. Huston poked and jabbed with those hoofs but Gable took it without complaining It must have been pretty painful though.” Marilyn Monroe caught blame in part for Gable’s post-Misfits heart attack and death, daily waits for her obliging him to sit idle in roasting heat. But did Huston experience guilt for how he drove the star who had after all barely got insurers’ go-ahead to appear in The Misfits?

Marilyn Monroe was married to Arthur Miller, this a reason for his writing The Misfits. For her part, there was Miller’s looking like Lincoln, and she had a thing for men who looked like Lincoln. Has this been analyzed since? Surely one or more head doctors who grazed on MM explored it. I get the impression that most any guy with an Abe-face could have Marilyn on a plate. How far back did this quirk go with her? Another of Great Emancipators in her life was Yves Montand, who emancipated MM from Miller bed during Let’s Make Love, a last before The Misfits and done for Fox under George Cukor direction. Monroe knew the picture wasn’t much, but seemed intent on transitioning to Montand, this much to Miller’s humiliation and planned get-even to follow. Best way accomplishing this was to write revenge upon The Misfits, a to start love letter he’d rewrite with a now poison pen. Ralph Roberts witnessed the explosion to follow: “ I was standing outside Mr. Gable’s trailer one afternoon talking to his makeup man. The Misfits was nearing the end of production. Suddenly we heard Gable let out a roar to someone over the phone. He was talking to his agent and was obviously very upset and angry. Gable told his agent that he wanted to see “everything we have on The Misfits” the next morning. It turned out that Arthur Miller at this late date had decided to rewrite the screenplay. By now, Marilyn was completely estranged from him and he seemed to be taking it out on the characters in The Misfits. Gable was now an unsympathetic bum, Marilyn nothing more than a whore, and Eli Wallach suddenly emerged as the hero!”

“Monty Clift was eliminated altogether from the new script. You can imagine how Gable felt about these changes. The next day, he screened the footage they had shot and realized that there was enough to release the picture --- so he went to Frank Taylor (the producer) and John Huston and told them he was going home, that he’d done his last day’s work on The Misfits. Since Gable had script approval in his contract, he didn’t have to speak a word of dialogue unless it suited him. Marilyn was very grateful for the action he took since her contract would have required her to go ahead and complete the film under any circumstances.” Thus spake ego and love now thwarted, Miller more sanguine on the matter when interviewed for The Misfits documentary years later. Ralph Roberts was in a unique position for seeing the whole thing and living to tell it. Deep in Marilyn’s confidence, he was able to get her reaction and fear that a cast-off husband might ruin all of work she and others had done up to crisis point. The confrontation apparently did not get press at the time, curtain of silence lowered over all of professionals attached to The Misfits. It would have done none of them good to have this laundry aired. Work wrapped and The Misfits was released, some months after Clark Gable died. There was avalanche of publicity, but the movie was perceived a downer, partly for loss of Gable, plus Monroe’s personal circumstance being so unsettled, The Misfits sort of “meta” but not to anyone's benefit for being so. There was $3.904 million in domestic rentals and two million foreign, not enough to break even. The Misfits had 14,404 bookings, fair enough till you realize other UA product got many more, Follow That Dream for instance with 23,475, or Alias Jesse James which had 24,926.

The Misfits would for many become a movie inhabited by ghosts. An interesting incident saw Gable having supper alone in the hotel dining room, the casino within view and Huston doing nightly drop of thousands. “Look at him,” CG said to management, “No sleep, full day’s work ahead of him … Huston won’t live long like this.” Irony would write its own coda, however, Gable gone within a month, Huston thriving on till 1987. Apropos to gamble setting, one never knew how chips would fall. For Marilyn Monroe, there would come one more feature partially made. Roberts again: “Marilyn had agreed to do Something’s Got to Give in order to work off a contractual commitment to Fox, though she had no respect for the material. She wanted to get it out of the way and move on to something more interesting. She’d always liked Betty Comden and Adolph Green and wanted to do What a Way to Go with them. Anita Loos had written a sequel to Gentlemen Prefer Blondes wherein Marilyn would play an older Lorelei Lee.” Monroe always sought to improve, and to be in better pictures. Added Ralph Roberts: “She was a big Garbo fan. She used to go to the Museum of Modern Art whenever they had a Garbo film.” There was every intent to finish the Fox job, said Ralph: “Marilyn wanted to finish Something’s Got to Give only a few days before her death. She had met with Fox, and they agreed to reactivate production on the film. At one point they had announced that Lee Remick would take over Marilyn’s role. She was very concerned about this and called Dean Martin to tell him she’d be back to finish it up. She wanted Dean to intercede with Fox. I remember her telling him on the phone, Don’t use Lee Remick.” The Misfits is on Blu-Ray and streams most places in High-Def.

Drama Darker Than Imagined in 1960

 

The Misfits a Last or Near Last for Many --- Part One

There’s a story persistent about the night Montgomery Clift died. His assistant rapped upon a closed bedroom door to ask Monty if he’d like to watch The Misfits on television. Account goes that Clift replied, “Absolutely no!” these his last words. I took the tale for truth until just now when I checked dates and found that Clift died on July 23, 1966. The Misfits at that time had only played network dates, 1-3-65 and 5-23-65, as of 7-23-66. These were ABC broadcasts, per their ongoing deal with United Artists for theatrical features to be shown in primetime. There was one more run, 3-22-69, before The Misfits went into UA’s “Showcase 6” syndicated package in 12-70. So how much does this matter, if at all? Enough anecdotes get shine rubbed off by niggling detail to make me feel most should be let alone. Monty-balk at The Misfits for his exit line seems good as any, but if his man mentioned a movie for Clift perhaps to watch, it was probably something more along lines of From Here to Eternity, by 1966 playing heavy on local TV. Deeper research could discover which of his appeared on NY tubes as of 7-23-66, so who volunteers? I think The Misfits fits barbed account simply because this was a misfit movie, one that few looked back on with affection. Certainly not viewers and hardly by cast, most of whom died within shockingly short time either before or not too long after The Misfits was released. Only Eli Wallach of leads stayed to blow out birthday candles, him staying a spectacular ninety-eight years (d. 2014). Suppose Eli ever lay awake and wondered “Why me?, or more to point, “Why not me?” It’s like being sole survivor on some ship that went down.

There is much mournful about The Misfits, a sort of cursed endeavor. We have also The Conqueror of similar stripe, shot in Utah and ongoing necrology from there. There was sadness not just in making The Misfits, but in how the film would play. Heavy as sandbags as written by Arthur Miller, there was no ounce of fun to be had here, and receipts expected to be big would not end so. How many mimicked Monty where invited to re-watch The Misfits, as in “Absolutely no!”? That I suspect is why The Misfits became object of the false memory. Few fall more squarely into category called “Maybe this time I’ll like it,” but how many pull trigger of taking the task? Reason for revisit to The Misfits is conversation I had with Ralph Roberts on August 13, 1988, just him, me, and Mike Cline in a small conference room, reason for access Ralph’s NC family connection. Ralph was an actor who doubled as masseur for known names including Marilyn Monroe, with whom he became a close chum. Many say he was the last person who spoke with her the night she died (should we say the last friendly person?). Ralph Roberts had Gotham insider status like few else. I’ve seen him on TV and movies that aren’t credited at his page on IMDB. We talked a long while but only about The Misfits, for which I kick myself regular. One topic he hesitated to address was circumstance of Marilyn Monroe’s death. That water ran truly deep, as you could tell by Ralph’s dark expression where her fate came up.

Little went on during The Misfits to escape Ralph Roberts’ scrutiny. Insurers were shy to clear the male lead for service.  “Clark Gable wanted very much to do The Misfits, but he was unable to pass the physical which was required by the insurance carrier. Being so anxious to get the part, Gable stayed in bed for four days in the hopes he’d be ready for his fourth physical exam (he’d failed the first three). He went straight from his bed to the doctor’s office and this time they passed him.” We could wonder if Gable’s doctor warned him about over-stressing on The Misfits, which advise if given went studiously ignored. Had he done another comedy shot on sound stages, I dare say the King might have lived to work into at least part of the sixties (but who would sentence him deeper to that benighted decade?). Word is Gable liked notion of The Misfits for opportunity to “really act,” plus the money was more, at least on a surface, than he had been offered before, him thinking in terms of ultimate percentage payoff, though recent ones proved more profitable than The Misfits would be. Here’s the thing though: Gable was usually in for gross participation after leaving MGM, which meant his came off the top, sometimes at cost to distributors (Fox lost money on The Tall Men … Gable did not). A big enough star, working independent in the fifties, saw reward contract talent of earlier time but dreamed of. Gable found out post-Metro what it was like to be truly enriched by the movie game, at risk sometimes to his health, as here where he crash-dieted after It Started in Naples to rid himself of pasta weight and get in shape for The Misfits.

Gable had been told what a pill Marilyn Monroe could be on working sets, and so came prepared to be patient. Ralph Roberts said he became her champion, the most indulgent of everyone working on The Misfits, she being of that generation having idolized “Clark Gable.” Old timers had to bear transition of co-workers into fans, many distracted by awe they felt just being in the presence of what was less a working colleague than revered idol they simply could not believe was now their co-star. Everyone it seemed wanted to talk over Gable’s greatness with this by all accounts modest man, and that could get awkward for him. Roberts: “Gable always drove himself to the Misfits location and didn’t mingle a lot with the rest of the company. He did though become closer to Marylyn over a period of time and ended up being her strongest supporter.” The much-repeated remark he made to a press rep, to effect that past stars were expected to show up on time “or they’d be fired,” is thought by some to have been critical of Monroe, but overall context suggests it was more a humorous aside on Gable’s part. It’s true the old studios would not tolerate misbehavior on the part of players, a refuse pile filled by those who thought they could get away with bratty conduct. It needed an extraordinary gift to be indulged past strict policy of punching clocks and being ready to perform. Was Judy Garland an only major name to be so “understood” as she was, MGM knowing this was the one and massive talent that could never be replaced? Surely Gable observed this close and marveled at indulgence extended to her, at least till curtain fell in 1950 (her firing from Metro). Gable's true feelings about Marilyn Monroe were revealed to columnist Joe Hyams, him trusted by Gable: "How do you like working with Marilyn?" Gable asked "on or off the record?" Hyams replied "off," to which Gable said, "She's the rudest, most impossible actress I've ever worked with." Hardly the impression Ralph Roberts had of course, but then Gable had known Joe Hyams a long time so was able to be more forthcoming with him. To note is fact Joe Hyams did not spill these beans until 2001 when he penned a look-back on his long association with Gable.

Monroe by many hind sights was cause of The Misfits going up and up in terms of time and costs. Ralph Roberts felt she got a bum rap, though he was clearly an acolyte for being on her personal payroll. Said he on Monroe as scapegoat: “It reached a point where Marylyn was blamed for everything that went wrong. One day the company drove 75 miles or so into the desert for some outdoor shooting, and then discovered that Marylyn’s wig had been left behind We didn’t have a phone of course, so work was held up while someone drove back for the wig. Marilyn was blamed for the oversight, but of course it wasn’t her fault at all. If something went wrong though, everyone just tended to pack it off on Marilyn.” Monroe had gathered many a “handler’ by the time of The Misfits, she by now a production firm in herself, with lots grazing upon her and each jockeying for closeness to the star. Monroe paid Paula Strasberg (above) $3,000 per week to coach her acting, the last thing such instinctive ability needed. One could wonder how much more effective MM might have been had she been spared Strasberg ministrations, but Paula served greater functions than mere actor instruct. Like Ralph Roberts, she'd act also as guard against intruders, defend against those who’d defame MM, Paula like Ralph a majordomo and life raft for the troubled star. I’d say both earned keep, Roberts recalling Marilyn as a most generous employer. This actress, if by now institution, was toting up quite an overhead.

There is a Making of The Misfits book, also an hour-long DVD on the subject. Reading/watching is not unlike exploring the Galveston Flood or what happened at Balaclava Heights. Such waste, such self-destruct among talent on march to respective ends. Why should any black-and-white feature other than a grandest spectacle cost four million to make? The Misfits as on-and-on project was grand for tourism. Folks flocked to Reno hoping to interact with stars, and many did. Heat choked to over one hundred degrees on better days. Reno encouraged bad habit John Huston had of gambling beyond reason, $50,000 he left on green felt tables, this an unhealthy one-sixth of the $300K Huston received for directing The Misfits. Never mind smoke/drink as worst scourges of old Hollywood, for I believe betting had those beat, certainly among many who felt too lucky, or underserving, of money fairly thrown at them for engaging what seemed to some a frivolous enterprise. John Huston was not regarded as an artist in a same sense as writer Arthur Miller, pecking order among creatives a steeper stairstep in 1960 when movies were still something best took with popcorn and Raisinets. Will films get respect now that we are largely consuming them alone? Miller was married to Marilyn Monroe, but by Misfit time, they were misfitted as a couple. Was having her for a wife enough to overcome any man’s better judgment? I read how Monaco fixers, intent on finding a Hollywood name for Rainier’s princess, briefly considered Monroe until wiser heads warned that no, she was too unstable. Let’s choose regal if placid Grace Kelly instead.

Watch List for 8/24/2026

 

Watched: Swingers from the Sixties, Over There (The Knack), Over Here (Elvis)

THE KNACK … and HOW TO GET IT (1965) --- This is what director Richard Lester was up to between A Hard Day’s Night and Help!, him on to things mod, hip, gear, whatever else made up Brit slang of the time. We’d learn the language just for seeing enough off the Isles, fully a third of what the Liberty showed me during the mid-sixties British boom. Did however skip The Knack as I would Having a Wild Weekend and Ferry Cross the Mersey, latter even though I’d bought a ticket for the Saturday co-feature which was Tomb of Ligeia, also UK-shot (a story told here). Lester had unique style seen initially on over-there television where the Beatles tabbed him for loopy humor that would liven their first and second features. The director did much with jumpy edits, funny reactions from staid elders watching kids loose on streets and living it up. You’d think there never was a war and years of austerity that followed, this still evident for beat-down spots where virtually all of The Knack was shot, houses distressed rather than mere sets to look that way. Why fake what was all too real in daily life? Postwar locations in London as well as Berlin had to sidestep bombing damage still not repaired unless they wanted to focus on such, which mid-60’s celebrations of youth did not. The Knack was based on a play which was popular despite what its stage director called a collapsing third act. You get that from the movie in spite of Lester to partial rescue with energy he seemed never to run out of. Such talent belonged to times where it burned brightest. When that time passed, Lester and others as dynamic would face workaday where found and projects not necessarily aimed at strengths. The Knack is delightful when it delights, a movie perhaps best watched as “Best Of” highlights, glimpses of what had made the sixties so trippy. Interview extras on the Region Two Blu-Ray see each of participants, Richard Lester, Rita Tushingham among others, asked “what it was like” to live amidst a swinging London scene during such souped-up epoch, them saying they best understood it from hindsight, that while it was happening, there was more a blur from swirling past so fast. Couldn’t all of us say that about all our young years?

TRIPLE ELVIS --- I have twice this week seen Elvis drive irresponsibly on public roads, offenses occurring in Live a Little, Love a Little, and Spinout. He raced too in Speedway but principally at the Charlotte Motor Speedway where seeming all races took place that year (1968). Speedway also references wild animals escaped from Charlotte’s zoo, but to my memory there was not and still isn’t a zoo in Charlotte. Nearest such attraction is Asheboro or Columbia, SC, latter which we visited twenty years ago and learned how fast gorillas can run. In fact, they don’t run, but lope at least twenty feet per exert, which made me realize there is no escaping a gorilla once he/she decides to eat you. Speedway was the first Elvis I ever walked out on. Same annum saw also The Green Slime abandoned. Last week was occasion to see if I’m more tolerant with age. Got through Speedway and did not altogether dislike it. Studio interiors sub for outdoors (a trailer park), sets are plywood, “money” shots take place at a disco where Elvis and co-star Nancy Sinatra sing. She has but one solo (did Colonel Parker draw lines to prevent another Ann-Margret steal?). Elvis socks a hole in a door that looks like cardboard any of us could penetrate with a fingertip. Speedway doesn’t suggest $2.8 million spent, but that's how it was. Elvis raked-off at least a million, plus Nancy took more than average Presley girls. Loss to Metro was $450K. They took a hit also with Stay Away, Joe, suggesting a public now allergic to Elvis movies. Speedway if anything confirmed this. Live a Little, Love a Little was thus necessary reboot. “Watch Elvis click with all these chicks,” said posters, but in fact he clicks with but one, and how, because here for a first time, Elvis spends an unwed night with a “chick,” Michele Carey lately of El Dorado. All this and no clergy present.

Here was nuclear blast to the Elvis universe, though I’m not sure how many by then noticed or cared. He “swings” to extent of occasional profanities, “What the hell…,” a few damns. He’s stalked by Michele’s manic-pixie-dream girl, that sort explained to me at time of Greenbriar’s My Man Godfrey post. Live a Little, Love a Little is 60s closest to screwball spirit. There’s even Rudy Vallee a Preston Sturges hark-back. Other aspects depart Presley formula. There’s a good song about a little less conversation and a lot more lovin,’ something to that effect. It plays today more than most tunes from Elvis movies. I like how he worked often with veterans. In addition to Vallee, there was Sterling Holloway, Don Porter, Joan Shawlee. Whose idea? I’ll propose Norman Taurog’s. He directed all three of what I watched and just show me who could have done them better. Word is, Elvis liked Norman a lot. A dad figure? He could use upgrade on poor Vernon shambling around Graceland. Handlers had to try things different for Live a Little, Love a Little, as Elvis so far constituted didn’t sell anymore. How many soundtrack albums were his films moving? --- because so far as the Colonel was concerned, platters were a best if not only good reason to keep making features.

Third and last selection was Spinout. This one I saw and liked at the Liberty in 1966. In fact, it may have been the last Elvis that seemed at least OK to me. Joe Pasternak produced as he had the majestic Girl Happy from a year before. Pasternak spent more than Sam Katzman did on cheaters Kissin’ Cousins and Harum Scarum, the latter losing money despite a low budget of $1.9 million and imagine how cheap it looked for Elvis collecting more than half that. Kissin’ Cousins was a hit which I bet got that way just for playing the Liberty to jammed seating with lines up the block for Sunday open. Hold my beer, Ben-Hur. Spinout being Pasternak cost $2.6 million but frankly has not the polish of Girl Happy, let alone Viva Las Vegas. Elvis is flanked by Shelly Faberes, Deborah Walley, Diane McBain, each familiar to such setting, plus Cecil Kellaway and Una Merkel to represent industry past. I recalled Kellaway from doomed descent to find the beast from 20,000 fathoms, and that if nothing else resonated. Elvis always had comic sidekicks, two in Spinout (three if you count Deborah Walley), each less annoying than Bill Bixby in Speedway conning Elvis out of race winnings and losing it all on horses. Such aspect of Elvis formula bothered me then and still does. Do Presley lead ladies continue to be tagged by fans wanting to hear again what they recalled of the King from sixty years ago? Celebs tend to be more forthcoming when you pipe the unexpected, like with Shirley Eaton at a western show in Winston-Salem (imagine Shirley Eaton in Winston-Salem for any reason). So did I speak of Goldfinger? No --- Eight on the Lam --- and she was plenty animated about that.

Best Liberty Show a Quarter Bought in 1966

 

You Don't Need the Title to Signify What This Art Represents, Which is Why I Don't Include It.

Among the One Hundred: The Professionals

Where it comes to first capturing favorites, timing is all. I came to The Professionals, rather it came to me, at age twelve on verge of thirteen. Story, setting, stars, never better aligned. I’d not hope to be James Bond, but could right circumstance of adulthood see me as variant at least on Lee Marvin? He as role model grew far back as M-Squad watched since five and kindergarten. Marvin toplines these professionals more than Burt Lancaster despite latter’s top billing, Lee’s “Henry Rico Fardan” most experienced and intellectually equipped to the mission, this confirmed by “J.W. Grant” (Ralph Bellamy) who cites Fardan completion at VMI and service to follow at San Juan Hill. If ever a man was “tempered like steel” in 1966-67, it was Lee Marvin. He’d do three in succession to dazzle boys of tender age, The Professionals, The Dirty Dozen, then Point Blank. Fact these would be ideal, if final ideal platforms for Marvin, went unrealized at the time … who knew bitter tea to brew by Sergeant Ryker, Hell in the Pacific (looked promising, so why would the Liberty not play it?), final insult of Paint Your Wagon, affront to all so far invested in Marvin and co-star Clint Eastwood. Pity passing of days when others chose for leading men, at least had a voice in selections, an advantage gone with Classic Era wind. As much applied re Lancaster, my first growth of beard likelier to arrive before he’d worthily follow-up The Professionals (1968’s The Scalphunters promising on posters, then as now a letdown). Lancaster’s 60’s output in retrospect seems a willful withhold of satisfaction that could have gone hand-in-hand with The Professionals, this to show how hard it would have been for anything to meet, let alone surpass, standard set here. What better for young or older men to aspire to than Burt Lancaster at age fifty-two scaling up a sheer rock wall on a rope, doubtless in sweltering heat? I don't know a male not profoundly impressed for having seen that.

Whatever to Do With Weaponry, Henry Rico Fardan Knows It, So Of Course We Wanted to Be Him 

Much about their mission seems fishy (retrieving a kidnap), but these are not men to care. There are four (Marvin, Lancaster, Robert Ryan, Woody Strode) dispatched by one (Bellamy, millionaire husband of abducted wife). Bellamy will pay each $10K for her return, entrusting the foursome with one hundred thousand in gold for ransom. Lancaster being all about money and getting what of it he can makes us wonder in hindsight why the ransom itself wasn’t in play, at least by him. The Professionals refreshes for its simplicity, a surprise by the cynical sixties. The Code was being ushered out with nudity and salty language on the increase, The Professionals teasing with both. Politics peep in though gringos here sell their guns rather than imperialist notions. Robert Mitchum in 1956’s Bandido similarly focused on main prize that was cash for arms he’d supply. Lee Marvin’s Fardan begins The Professionals as weapons dealer for faceless munitions manufacturing, but nothing is made of this past point of him so employed and how much it pays ($35 per week). We will learn later that Fardan lived previously in Mexico, took a wife there, and worked with/for identified-as-abductor Jesus Raza (Jack Palance). Lancaster as “Bill Dalworth” observes part way into the mission that revolutions resolve to “the good guys against the bad guys” and wonders who in the long run are the good guys, a line that made me go whoops at first seeing The Professionals and wondering if we were headed for a preachment. Would the quartet we recognize as men of individual action for profit take sides like Gary Cooper ultimately did in Vera Cruz (1954)? That was always a temptation where oppression and revolt issues were aired, result too often fun let out of tires once heroes got impulse to be too heroic.

I Knew Marvin Better Than Lancaster in 1966, So Naturally Chose Him to Identify With.

We see automobiles put to practical use in The Professionals and several years later The Wild Bunch. They were in fuller abundance for Bandido which filmed near 100% on Mexican locations. Time set for all these was 1916-17, midst of civil war in the country that lasted more/less, on-off for ten years (1910-1920). This being complicated meant movies dealt most with specific aspects or personalities involved (Villa, Madero, Zapata) or used the background for novel spin upon westerns, autos plus other modernities to link them closer with life we knew. Why do men answer a dangerous calling if not for selfish gain? Fact they’ve done so previous, if often, assures they will be seasoned, wised up enough to stay clear of causes. None of our four appear to have criminal histories. If they’ve been militarily trained, it is not emphasized, though we assume from Fardan’s background and mode of dress that he’s spent considerable time in uniform. To strike across the desert for a stolen wife seems beneath such a crew. We sense there is plenty they are unaware of. Such a team seems better suited to a Kwai or Navarone sort of operation, but this was the mid-sixties, where to fulfill a patriotic obligation seems naïve for men wised-up as these. Soon enough to movies would come doubt as to value of even World War Two engagements. Convicted murderers work wiles upon worse butchers that are the German command in The Dirty Dozen, Lee Marvin appropriately leading them. All are in it for amnesty, provided they survive. Kelly’s “heroes” sneak across enemy lines to steal Nazi gold, personal goals a priority over Allied need. The concept off-put me enough to skip the movie when it was released in 1970.

MAD Magazine Often Flattered It's Readership With "Smartie-Pants" Verbiage Like Above

The Professionals refreshes for its humor, a “twist” end I still don’t fully get, and pleasing fact all four of principals get to live, in fact no one of the cast dies save faceless fall downs among banditry and bystanders innocent or not. To unsettle is Raza executing one after another of surrendered Federales, shock imagery checkmated by The Wild Bunch three years later. MAD magazine took a cleaver to The Professionals, page samples to show mixed results pretty much as I remember from the time. Do people much go back and read old MAD’s? I liked it in a sort-of way, though choice of where to dispose of thirty-five cents saw Castle of Frankenstein the winner rather than MAD. The Professionals would be overshadowed by the Sergio Leone westerns out of Italy and yes, The Wild Bunch. Others of US origin, save True Grit and Butch Cassidy, took back seats and stayed in them, Grit and Butch to better please a mainstream by not rocking genre boats though seeming to with off-casting (John Wayne) and/or all-in-fun revisionism (raindrops and bicycles). The Liberty tickled me pink for bringing The Professionals back one 1970 Saturday, 1975 sojourn to USC brightened when a 35mm print of The Professionals along with The Happy Ending (Richard Brooks salute) played to hard back cinema student seating. Whatever got it done. Imagine watching two such disparate features back-to-back that the same guy directed. Very scope The Professionals played CBS February 1973 primetime and died there (no letterbox). Eventually got a 16mm scope/IB Tech from a collector so dedicated to The Professionals that he blew up frames from every single shot to 8X10. Hundreds of stills fuzzy as the narrow-gauge image itself. And here I was figuring to be deep in the life. A nice Blu-Ray is out there, 4K too if you’re prepared to give Netflix $27 per month for privilege to watch. An out-of-print CD of the Maurice Jarre score goes for plenty more than when first issued in 1992. How many like me could whistle every theme without missing a note, and often do?

Lightning Sketches #1

 

Quick-Draw J. Stuart Blackton Demonstrates His Art

Speedy and Shorter and Welcome, AI

Pioneer filmmaker J. Stuart Blackton got a start in vaudeville doing what was called “lightning sketches,” artist and easel on stage to astonish watchers by how fast he could draw. Stuart sped so at the game that he took up cartooning, which made switch to movies a cinch. This was pre-teens when everything in that business amounted to history being made. Lightning sketching is sort of what Greenbriar proposes here, a cousin to quickie cartooning before, and a way to jam more topics into posts under these new umbrellas. First off I confess to willing enslavement by AI, that innovation arrived at artistic place no longer to be ignored or dismissed. We’ve lived so long with black-and-white images to shun whatever proposes to assume its place. AI is not “colorization” to my eyes, being instead a reality we knew was there, at least once there, and now comes recapture. Yes, it feels to me like standing in front of those theatres. I tend to take years embracing new technology, having ignored VHS except for novelty or last-resort, like when Captain Blood showed up complete on cassette in 1986, a first time ever we could enjoy 119 minutes rather than 99. Still there was no giving up 16mm for the rest … until the rest became DVD and death of analog, the Night Film Ended as recalled previous at Greenbriar. I’m giddy each time I color convert an image till now monochrome. Think of AI as ideal way lobby cards looked where artfully tinted from the twenties forward. We’ve now passed that to a highest point knowable, not by way of process slowly got at, but gratification had instant, push-button the door to paradise. Do I somehow settle for less, joining philistines who would wreck our culture? If so, consider me and mine wrecked, and welcome to AI arrived at apex.

I'll Never Regard a Black-and-White Marquee Online Again, Now That I Can "Fix It"

Latest from Lubitsch --- This was news alright, the second teaming of Maurice Chevalier with director Ernst Lubitsch. The Smiling Lieutenant was made particularly for an urban carriage trade. They wanted what mid-staters did not, so money had to come from bookings in the largest and perceived most sophisticated bergs. How to best and quickest get it was answered by roadshowing, twice daily shows at advanced prices. Here was asking a lot in May 1931, Depression teeth sunk in and admissions far harder come by. The Criterion bespoke home for the best, generally from Paramount, Wings having landed there for 63 weeks, The Love Parade soon after which suggested hard ticket possibilities for Chevalier-Lubitsch output. Two dollars was price for the ducats. To stand outside and regard a lavishly decorated front would alone have been worth that to me. The Smiling Lieutenant stayed fourteen weeks at the Criterion, a throughout-the-summer hit (An American Tragedy would follow with a late August opening). The Criterion seated 900, “a relatively intimate size,” said trade observers, especially by palaces up Broadway like the Loew’s State that could accommodate 3,000+. We could wonder how much negative cost was earned back for this single engagement, not forgetting theatre overhead always aspect of such an event.

World Mad and Maddest --- Greenbriar talked about It’s a Mad, Mad, Mad, Mad World  way way way back in May 2010. The column drew fifty-two comments, a record I believe to that time. Clearly this was a film passionately liked. Clear too was fact any book devoted to it would be met by mobs, at least what mob survives sixty-three years after the Cinerama show was released and sixteen annums past all those comments at GPS. This may well be sixties sentiment folks feel deepest for and are most eager to learn more about. From what I’m hearing of James Curtis’ new book, Comedy Is a Grim Business: The Making of It’s a Mad, Mad, Mad, Mad World, there are lots in wait for this telling and all are devoted beyond feeling most could have for any movie so long past. Author Curtis as expected reveals facts and data unknown to myself and likely oceans of others. He explores the background of producer-director Stanley Kramer (fascinating in itself), also of writers William and Tania Rose (I never knew they were behind Genevieve and so many of the Ealing comedies, but there it is, and Curtis covers all in fascinating detail). And how he explores horde of comedians in front of the camera … let’s just say we hardly knew them ... till now. So many personalities and so deftly examined. You don’t have to like the movie to love this book. So who were two cast members to cast longest reach of awe among colleagues? Spencer Tracy and Buster Keaton. They’d have been my picks as well, and here’s the thing, James Curtis has written definitive bios of both. He tends to outdo himself each time out of the gate, this occasion per always rousing result. Go get it, plus Criterion's Mad Blu-Ray, or streaming, whatever media will enrich the experience of learning all, all, all about It’s a Mad, Mad, Mad, Mad World.

Depth But Barely Dreamed Of --- My Blu-Ray of the 3-D Money From Home arrived a few days early, so here's rave all round for this summit of 3-D Archive artistry. Masterminds Bob Furmanek, Greg Kintz, and Jack Theakston have done it again, and that says plenty considering fabulous work they’ve done on previous depth releases. Let me go ahead and declare it: Money From Home is the best 3-D restoration I have so far seen, the expert triumvirate having spent several years to get things right, and with Paramount’s full cooperation, they sure did. Jack says in an extra that elements they used filled a room. Remember this was three-strip Technicolor which meant three strips of everything at 100 minute total, plus 3-D meaning multiple miles more of film to finesse. If not for this team, who on earth could have had enough patience, let alone expertise, to get such massive work done? I ducked Money From Home all these years thinking someday maybe it’ll show up on 3-D, grateful now for the wait as here’s an M&L to rank among favorite of theirs. Color also is astounding, Paramount truly on visual parade. We are privileged by receipt of Money From Home in 3-D considering a distinct minority of patrons saw it that way in 1953-54, that story told in 2014 at Greenbriar. Be sure also to consult the 3-D Archive's extensive production history of Money From Home here.

A Book Filled with Revelation, Typical of William M. Drew.

Final Straw --- There ought be a book by that title, when and what was moment when stars or others of movie hire got their fill and pushed away from the buffet for good. One that notably did was Billie Dove, at exotic left, who excelled doing Blondie of the Follies, then found herself dealt out by editing and service (at Billie’s expense) to first-billed star that was Marion Davies. Billie said “I’ve had mine” and quit movies cold. She tells that story and plenty more in William M. Drew’s At the Center of the Frame, a dazzling compendium of chats the author had with leading ladies of the twenties and thirties, published in 1999. Festooned with arresting stills, this volume and Drew’s companion book, Speaking of Silents, also made up of star interviews, are must-haves for anyone curious as to great female leads of past times and what became of them. Talks are detailed enough to get the essence of these personalities and depths they plumbed looking back. They’ll not be more books like Drew’s because there are no veterans left to testify so forcefully as here. I’m just thankful Drew went the mile(s) to get it all down when he did and present the lot in print.

Blood and Sand By Coincidence? No, Anthony Slide Did the Blu-Ray's Audio Commentary, and It's Excellent

THE SILENT PICTURE --- Another who blazed history’s trail and still doing same was/is Anthony Slide, who edited/published “The Silent Picture,” a Brit publication from the late sixties/early seventies that lasted nineteen issues and had, among other things, breathtaking sit-downs with stars not approached by others, at least not successfully, but Slide always had a way with folk not so accessible to plain press and curiosity seekers. I had a pile of past issues gotten at shows but lately figured to fill in missing ones via eBay, thus recent grab of one where Slide spoke with Bebe Daniels for what had to be her final interview, husband Ben Lyon also present and commenting. I really like how “The Silent Picture” had ongoing commentary on attitudes toward silent film and the struggle to make audiences appreciate the era again. To think these were published while I was still in high school, Anthony Slide to this day active as ever and frequently showing up to audio-commentate for silent movies released on Blu-Ray. Nobody knows this stuff like him.

Unknown To Me Till You Tube Host Jake Reed Dredged It Up ... Bravo to Him!

BLANCHE IS BACK and YOU TUBE HAS HER --- Never mind treks to museums and archives. I’m for sitting home and letting YT discoveries wash over me, especially where talkless favorites Blanche Sweet and Bebe Daniels venture into sound and such rarities unseen by me turn up on exemplary quality formats free for the viewing. Are we sailing upon digital magic carpets or what? YT provider Jake Reed lately added Blanche in The Woman Racket to his upload inventory, and it’s a 1930 creampuff, done by MGM, in fact Sweet’s first with dialogue, her a better Ruth Chatterton than Ruth Chatterton for my money. What a shame silent stars were being bum-rushed out sound stage doors, for Sweet had the goods as ever, age (34) setting stage for character work to come, but where to shine with so little studio opportunity tendered? She’d go east and do legit (in, among things, The Petrified Forest), then television, finally becoming senior spokeswoman for age of innocence few were left to tell of and yes, she spoke extensively with Anthony Slide and William M. Drew.

Seen This is Your Life, Bebe Daniels on You Tube? It's a Treat

Bebe Does Song --- I toot my grateful horn not for archives that hoard, but for home archivists that share, like the Vitaphone Sound Project, whose work of late has been astonishing. They uploaded last week a 1930 musical from Radio Pictures called Love Comes Along, starring Bebe Daniels, Lloyd Hughes, and Montague Love. All Talk, All Music says the lobby card, as would others through avalanche of tunes till the format ran dry in 1931. Love Comes Along was of sort that might slither to surface on AMC back in eighties day, a likely source for the video cassette from which the Vitaphone Sound Project derived their online version. I did not expect such quality going in --- how could anything off ancient VHS look good still? --- here my mea culpa, because this transfer is astounding for what Vitaphone was able to coax from on-its-face unpromising material. Let’s just say (once again) that miracles are being wrought at home by preservationists who take it upon themselves to discover and then uproot one rare title after another. Remember in May of this year when I pearl-dived at You Tube? Well, there’s been oceans of oysters since, Love Comes Along just one more in a seeming endless parade of pearls. Dispatch yourself quick to Vitaphone’s content page and be amazed at what they’ve come up with so far. Such creators as these make every morning Christmas for classic gatherers.

UPDATE: 8/13/2026: Being drunk still on AI and its impact on vintage marquees, I revisited a couple of columns and waved wand over stills stalled by black-and-white now rendered full color and what a difference it makes. See Mutiny on the Bounty Meets Day at the Races in 1950 and Time Travel to 1938.