Yet another underrated Karloff Thriller episode in brief. Yes, I know, I”m long-winded, and if you had to wait for me to do the whole transcription for some of these wonderful shows and films, I’d never write anything. I am trying to be disciplined here. Less photo work, less rambling on, and more to the gist of the story!
But don’t get too comfy with my brevity, The long-winded MonsterGirl lurks around the corner to sweep you up with 2 part series and photo galleries that could fill an entire album. That’s just how I roll, and I truly hope most of you take me as I am…!
“They Called Me “Bad Girl” – Rose French
Karloff begins his opening soliloquy…
“Rose French. in the blur of memory…the face grows dim…but do you remember the name….20 years ago…Rose French, the remarkable Rose French. As a servant girl, or as a princess. She was a quicksilver star in celluloid heaven. If a woman could sell her soul to achieve such fame, what wouldn’t she do to get it back? Poor Rose, that was all she wanted, to relive the past. And those who loved her, Frank Clyde for instance could do nothing to stop her, but the comeback trail could lead to strange and sinister places. To a lonely garden. And to a night of terror!
It could even lead to the face of a painted doll…but the comeback trail is a journey without maps…as sure as my name is Boris Karloff…Poor Rose French and her last desperate summer…That’s the name of our story ROSE’S LAST SUMMER. Our principal players are Ms. Mary Astor, Mr. Lin McCarthy, and Miss Helen Quintal …
Let me assure you this is a THRILLER!”
Starring Mary Astor as Rose French/Mrs. Horace Goodfield/Helen Quintal. This teleplay would poetically mirror Astor’s personal journey as a Hollywood movie star whose life took a different direction, one mixed with alcohol and scandal.
Lin McCarthy as Frank Clyde, Jack Livesey as Haley Dalloway, Hardie Albright as Willet Goodfield, Dorothy Green as Ethel Goodfield
In the beginning scenes of Roses Last Summer we see a weary yet unrestrained drunk, an uninhibited woman who looks like she’s got a mad on at the world, stumbling outside a night crawlers bar. She’s having an argument with the bar owner who apparently has thrown her out of his establishment. After spouting a few barbs at the place, she takes off her shoe and throws it through the glass window with neon letters that spell BAR.
She then stumbles in front of a moving truck which strikes her down in the street. A crowd gathers around her unconscious body. Someone picks up a snapshot of her from her handbag and announces, that this is no ordinary lush, this is the once famous but now aged star of the silver screen Rose French. An intense and curious man in the throng of street faces begins looking suspiciously at poor Rose splayed out on the asphalt.
But this is just the beginning of the story.
Continue reading “Sure as my name is MonsterGirl, This is a Boris Karloff’s Thriller ” Rose’s Last Summer”” →
