This is one of the most searing neo-Film Noir police procedural/syndicate treasure hunts and shadows eye candy featuring a truly frightening and frenetic performance by our beloved Peter Falk who not only manifested THE only possible rumpled detective in a raincoat, that– “just one more question” knows who the guilty party is in the first five minutes of meeting them, Columbo (sorry Lee J. Cobb) whose inimitable style began the television detecting technique where we know who did it.
As ColumboPeter Falk usually uses the art of ‘misunderestimation’ and quaint anecdotes about relatives who may or may not exist, as he politely taunts and squeezes with relenting loose end-tying questions pushing the culprit into a corner they can not escape from. In Murder, Inc (1960) Falk is so dark and brooding as a little thug with mad at the world and no acuity toward right and wrong. The only time I saw him create a darker character that sent chills down the back of my neck was in an episode of The Alfred Hitchcock Hour that aired on December 13th, 1962 called Bonfirewhere he plays a psychopathic lady-killer who is posing as a firebrand evangelist.
Peter Falk plays psychopath Robert Evans who has brought on a heart attack in the kindly rich widow Naomi Freshwater (Patricia Collinge) so he can take over her impressive house.
I am planning a very special tribute to the genius of Peter Falk and his unmade bed detective always on the prowl for the jugular, with a very different slant on the show, (no hints please) hopefully getting it ready by the winter of 2017 if I can enlist the wit & wisdom of fellow Columbo-worshiping Aurora of Once Upon A Screen to join me in pulling it off!
In his 2006 autobiography, Just One More Thing, Peter Falk attributes his performance as the crazed Reles in Murder, Inc. to launching his career! Not to mention that the great stage actress/teacher Eva Le Gallienne highlysuggested after Falk was caught sneaking into her acting class as part of the American Repertory Movement, that he stick with it!
Peter Falk received an Oscar nomination for Best Supporting Actor for his ruthless, violent, and misogynistic murderous thug real-life hit man –Abe Reles.
“Mr. Falk, moving as if weary, looking at people out of the corners of his eyes and talking as if he had borrowed Marlon Brando’s chewing gum, seems a travesty of a killer, until the water suddenly freezes in his eyes and he whips an icepick from his pocket and starts punching holes in someone’s ribs. Then viciousness pours out of him and you get a sense of a felon who is hopelessly cracked and corrupt.”
Reles who reigned over the Brownsville district of Brooklyn during the 1930s depression era, was a clever and shifty taker and hit-man who could make people’s murders appear like brain hemorrhages by using an ice pick in just the right way. Lawman Burton Turkus (Henry Morgan) whose book the screenplay is based on, together with Det. Sgt. William Tobin (Simon Oakland) keeps track of this psychopathic criminal who is now working for the powerful crime boss Louis ‘Lepke’ Buchalter played as a self-indulgent burlesque man-child by David J. Stewart (Carnival Rock 1957, The Young Savages 1961) who runs the nationwide syndicate known as Murder Inc.
Simon Oakland as Detective Tobin and Henry Morgan as district attorney Burton Turkus.
Directed by Burt Balaban (Lady of Vengeance 1957) and Stuart Rosenberg who later went on to direct the sublimely thoughtful Cool Hand Luke 1967 starring Paul Newman, he also directed The Amityville Horror in 1979.
Filmed in CinemaScope Murder, Inc. possesses a gritty realism painted effectively by cinematographer Gayne Rescher (A Face in the Crowd 1957, Man on a String 1960, Rachel, Rachel 1968 and Otto Preminger’s Such Good Friends 1971)
The film’s musical score is indeed a great companion to the mood, as Frank De Vol who usually works with Robert Aldrich (What Ever Happened to Baby Jane? 1962) creates a tense and bitter little pill, a flamboyant world within the universe of egocentric criminals, petty thieves, depression era storekeepers like the wonderful character of Mrs. Corsi (Helen Waters who only appeared one more time in television’s Naked City in 1958) who runs the little soda shop or Joe Rosen (Eli Mintz) who live in fear for their lives. De Vol’s score in addition to a live smoking performance by the late Sarah Vaughan makes the film’s musical personality work very well with the visual story.
The viciousness touches the garment district, the Unions, the burlesque clubs all the way up to the Borscht Belt where comedian Walter Sage (Morey Amsterdam) is hit by Reles at the request of Lepke. There are cops on the beat and the feds looking to finally incarcerate and shut down Murder Inc. The film is seeded with little cameos by some actor’s first appearances, like Sylvia Miles as Sadie the loudmouth who gets Reles’ hand shoved in her face while in the phone booth.
Joseph Campanellawho is just a guy who gets killed in the hallway for whatever he did or didn’t do… and Diane Ladd as a showgirl.
A small but slick performance by Vincent Gardenia as the mob’s attorney Laszlo, and a terrific stage performance by Sarah Vaughansinging Fan My Brow and The Awakening written by composer George Weiss. I saw Sarah Vaughan at the Westbury Music Fair back in the 1980s! She was nothing less than magical!
The inimitable Sarah Vaughan singing The Awakening at the dance hall where Eadie works as a showgirl…Abe ‘Kid Twist’ Reles first meets with Lepke to take the job offer as a hit man for the syndicate.
The basic gist is this–Reles (Peter Falk) and his flunky Bug (Warren Finnerty) meet with Garment District crime boss Lepke Buchalter (David J. Stewart) who wants to hire Reles as the syndicate’s new hitman. Lepke’s first task is for Reles to hit comedian Walter Sage (Morey Amsterdam) who has a headline act up in the Catskills. Sage has been holding out money from the slots and Lepke is a petty hothead (who constantly drinks milk) with a literal belly ache. Enter Joey Collins Stuart Whitman (I’ve had a long-time crush on this guy and his eyebrows!) a singer, who knows Sage from show business, and since he owes Reles $600 which will soon be $1,000 with every day he doesn’t pay back his loan he feels cornered into helping Reles do him a ‘favor.’ Joey Collins (Whitman) is coerced into driving up to the Borscht Belt in order to lure Sage out of the club so Reles can do his dirty work with his nice clean ice pick!
Reles can’t believe that Joey lets his wife mouth off to him like this. She tries to throw Reles out.
Abe Reles: “I’m gonna tell you something about women. I never met one that didn’t need a rap in the head, and often.”
When Reles pays a visit to the small apartment where Joey and his refugee showgirl wife Eadie (May Britt) live, Eadie is not only rude, she tries to throw Reles out. Reles who obviously has an inferiority complex takes Eadie’s dismissal as a rejection of his manhood and he comes back while Joey is out of the apartment and brutally assaults her with his, “dirty hands, his dirty fingers.”
Even after Joey’s wife is violated by this mad dog Reles, he is still paralyzed by fear and too dug into the lifestyle of making a few bucks from the gang to protect Eadie and just try and get away.
But Joey is so entangled and emasculated by the predicament he’s gotten himself into, he doesn’t even try to stand up to Reles, but rather feels he is trapped, though Eadie wants to just run and get as far away from Reles and the whole deal. While the couple stays together because they are forced into a dynamic by Reles, they no longer sleep in the same bedroom nor act as a married couple. The weak and shameful Joey should have listened to Eadie!
Reles set the kids up in this glamorous apartment as a front.
“You see what you can get your hands on and you take!! Don't ask questions"¦ TAKE!!!"
Now that Lepke thinks he has everything under control he has Reles working full force taking out anyone who can fink on him. Reles gives a maniacal soliloquy about ‘taking’ manipulating the couple into living as a cover in his gorgeous apartment that is furnished with imported stolen goods and dope.
The police want to bring Lepke in because they have found a witness, small businessman Rosen who Lepke warned already to keep his mouth shut. He should have had his trusted man crush Mendy push him down the elevator shaft when he had the chance. Rosen is seen brought in by Detective Tobin by Lepke, Mendy, and their lawyer Laszlo in the halls of the courthouse. Rosen is now, at least this time– a dead man…
Mendy Weiss (Joseph Bernard) is asked by Lepke to kill Rosen himself, gunning him down right on the street in front of his shop, one pop in the guts, and then a bullet to the back of his head at Lepke’s request. Lepke comes to hide out at Joey and Eadie’s apartment, where he proceeds to demean and treat Eadie like a servant.
Lepke barks at Eadie “I said two minutes. Do I have to get you a stopwatch so you can tell two minutes"¦ What's the matter with you ha? What kind of a girl are you? Can't cook. You don't talk. I don't understand you. What they teach you over there in Europe?"She answers him a stoic statue of ice "To be civilized."Lepke intestinally insane-“Do you think I don't know two minutes when I taste it? I told you a hundred times I have to be on a special diet. I got the most delicate stomach in the world!"¦ Now go back and bring me another egg. Two minutes!!!!”
While Detective Tobin (Simon Oakland) has been trying to shake things up and harass Reles and Lepke, even asking the small shop owners for their help, as Mrs. Corsi explains to Tobin that innocent people are being threatened, ‘acid thrown’ on their wares, even attacked just being seen talking with the police. She refuses to say a word. He can’t break the protective shield surrounding this gang, nor legally fight against a sly lawyer like Laszlo (Vincent Gardenia).
District Attorney Burton Turkus (Henry Morgan) moves in and begins an all-out mission to bring down Murder Inc. which has its tendrils in Chicago and Florida (What happened to New Jersey? hmm)
Burton Turkus is interrogating Reles after he agrees to turn in state’s evidence. He asks Reles how he can simply murder people without any feelings around it. Reles asks him how his first time on the job as a cop effected him. He tells Reles, he was shaky at first but “he got used to it.” Reles gives him a very matter-of-fact ‘that’s your answer’ look.
Before the police finally pick up Lepke, while in hiding Lepke gets paranoid about his people squealing so he orders a hit on anyone in Brownsville that can connect him to the syndicate, especially Joey Collins and his wife Eadie who are living with him and now know too much. Finally, Eadie can’t bear it anymore and goes to the police and becomes an informant. Turkus takes Joey and Eadie into protective custody. Which isn’t so protective but hey, I won’t ruin the film for you.
Once Reles realizes that Lepke is on his trail he agrees to spill the entire can of Murder Inc. beans on the operation too, knowing the law very well, and making a deal with Turkus for a lesser murder sentence and his promise of protection.
So Reles is also hidden away at the less-than-fortress-y Half Moon Hotel room watched over by disgruntled uniformed cops in Coney Island. I won’t give away the defenestration climax, but I will say that Lepke does finally face execution for his part in several unsolved murders. His last meal must have included a gallon of milk for that upset stomach disorder…
You can absolutely say that it’s Peter Falk’s incendiary performance as the high-strung little punk with a Napoleonic complex based on true-life Brooklyn gangster “kid twist’ Abe Reles earning him the Academy Award nomination for his combustive performance and his myriad of colorfully vicious asides.
Joey Collins: (Stuart Whitman) “Why’d you do it? Why did you kill him? Abe “Kid Twist” Reles: “Because he had bad breath.”
It’s what makes Murder, Inc (1960) work so well, but there are a lot of little inlaid gems that make this neo-noir crime drama a conflagration of mind-gripping tropes and wonderful little characterizations.
Murder, Inc is a neo-noir/documentary style/crime-drama masterpiece featuring not only Falk’s searing performance, but David J. Stewart as the despicable complainer -Lepke who ran the syndicate in New York City and was connected to all the major city crime bosses who oversaw big money, murder, and mayhem like a miserable business, taking out potential stool pigeons, or little shop owners who just can’t pay their protection fees — Vicious brutal and utterly mesmerizing the film plays like a nightmare while the well intended but at times inadequate good guys who just can’t seem to legally or physically pin down the bad guys without getting their witnesses murdered. Or it’s suggested that there are also insiders in the police department and government that shield these criminals from prison time. Murder Inc spreads like an insidious disease taking over the city, but like all things violent -they must eventually self-destruct as Stuart Whitman who plays Joey Collins: says to Reles, after he is arrested“I’m gonna watch you fry! I’m gonna watch you fry! I’m gonna watch you fry!”
Eadie (May Britt) is the film’s sufferer and sacrificial lamb as a woman who is either consistently abused and mistreated or woefully looked after by all the men in the film. She is surrounded by dread and ruin.
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Talking about Lepke–“He came in the door like a king. He came with a hole in his stomach. All the time he stayed I was his housemaid. Two Minute Eggs… (she closes her eyes)…Â I boiled a thousand two-minute eggs and never did it right once"¦"
“I boiled a thousand two minute eggs and never did it right once"¦"
This is your EverLovin’ Joey saying I gotta go make a two minute egg!Â
The clever & cheeky Barry of Cinematic Catharsis has summoned this great and powerful idea for a Summer Blogathon! Whether it’s the weather, or giant mutant bugs, blood hungry sharks, large animals run amok, or the elements gone awry–Nature’s Fury can be seen in so many fascinating and awe inspiring feature films and those lovable B movie trends that showcase the natural world in chaos. I immediately thought of Alfred Hitchcock’s The Birds as it is a film that has stayed burned in my mind since I first saw it as a child. Certain scenes will never lose their power to terrify.
And in celebration of this event, I’ve actually written a song and made a film/music mash up to tribute Tippi Hedren in The Birds, with a montage from the film featuring my song Calling Palundra…
“The Birds expresses nature and what it can do, and the dangers of nature. Because there’s no doubt that if the birds did decide, you know, with the millions that they are, to go for everybody’s eyes, then we’d have H.G.Wells Kingdom of the Blind on our hands.”-Alfred Hitchcock
“Why are they doing this? They said when you got here, the whole thing started. Who are you? What are You? Where did you come from? I think you’re the cause of all this… I think you’re evil EVIL!”–Actress Doreen Lang playing the hysterical mother in the diner!
This tribute video features my special song written just for this blogathon…. Here’s Melanie Daniels & the birds– with my piano vocal accompaniment, ‘Calling Palundra’
The children’s song “Risseldy Rosseldy” heard at the school when the crows began to unite as a gang is the Americanization of an old Scottish folk song called “Wee Cooper O’Fife”
Image courtesy of: Jürgen Müller’s colorful Movies of the ’60s
On it’s face The Birds can be taken literally as a cautionary tale about the natural world fighting back against the insensitivity & downright barbaric treatment of nature’s children and the environment at the hands of humankind. Is it a tale of simple unmitigated revenge against the town for the killing of a pigeon? Or is there something more nefarious & psycho-sexual at work? Once you peel back the top layer of the visual narrative there are multi metaphors at work.
From Dark Romance: SEXUALITY IN THE HORROR FILM by David J. Hogan- “Hitchcock's The Birds (1963) is probably the ultimate expression of this sort of nameless dread. It is a film that cheerfully defies description: it is horror, it is science fiction, it is black comedy, it is a scathing look at our mores and manners. It is a highly sexual film, but in a perversely negativistic way.”
Before the release of The Birds in 1963, Tippi Hedren made the cover of Look Magazine with the heading “Hitchcock’s new Grace Kelly.”
Tippi Hedren in Marnie (1964) What Grace Kelly had in pristine beauty and sophistication, Hedren possesses an undertow of sensuality that pulls you into that gorgeous mystique.
As with Hitchcock’s other, worldly beautiful blonde subject — the strong-willed socialite Lisa Carol Fremont (Grace Kelly) in Rear Window (1954)The Birds features the stunning Tippi Hedren as the coy, confident, and a bit manipulative Melanie Daniels a San Fransisco socialite who descends upon Bodega Bay with a similar uncompromising will. Stiff, stolid, and cocky Lawyer Mitch Brenner (Rod Taylor) meets Melanie in a pet shop where the two share shallow, faintly romantic barbs and repartee. Mitch is shopping for a pair of love birds for his sister Cathy’s eleventh birthday and Mitch pretends in a condescending manner to mistake her for the clerk. Melanie goes along with the mistaken identity as a way to flirt until his slightly mean-spirited joke backfires when she accidentally lets a canary loose while it lands in an ashtray Mitch throws his hat on it and places it back in its cage smugly saying “Back in your gilded cage Melanie Daniels.”revealing that he not only knew who she was from the very beginning and has quite a snotty preconceived notion about this socialite whom he appears to judge as running with a ‘wild’ crowd and is amoral. He manages to make a bit of a fool out of Melanie. The contrast between the flirty glib and calculating Melanie Daniels and the less interesting, judgemental, and arrogant Mitch Brenner kicks off a chemistry that really isn’t as vital to the story as what the two personalities represent.Â
As Melanie is about to enter Davidson’s Pet Shop, she hears and sees a tremendous gathering of Seagulls in the sky. It is a foreboding moment of things to come…
So the whole idea is to feel good right? Well I think a lot of us would agree that any Rankin/Bass production is going to put a smile on your face… I couldn’t resist revisiting the children’s & adult animated feature that embraces Boris Karloff as an animagic puppet and a lot of campy inside cheeky humor, that’s not just for the kiddies, as the New York Times review from 1967 says it’s for ‘The monsters in all of us!”
“When I was nine, I played the demon king in “Cinderella” and it launched me on a long and happy life of being a monster.”- Boris Karloff
Presented by Executive Producer Joseph E. Levine and Directed by Jules Bass (Return to Oz 1964, Rudolph, the Red -Nosed Reindeer 1964, The Daydreamer 1966, Frosty the Snowman 1969, produced The Last Unicorn 1982, The Sins of Dorian Gray 1983, The Wind in the Willows 1987)
Mad Monster Party? (1967)is a wonderfully cheeky animagic feature filmed in Eastman color, was released on March 8th, 1967. This puppet comic horror gem stars the voices of Boris Karloffas Baron Boris von Frankenstein, Allen Swift lends his voice to these hairy scary characters Felix Flankin (Swift does a very obvious take off on actor James Stewart) / Peter Lorre character ‘Yetch’ / Dracula / the Invisible Man / Dr. Jekyll/ Mr. Hyde / Chef Machiavelli / the Captain / First Mate / Mr. Kronkite / Mail Man / The Monster and a skeleton band called the Little Tibias and the Phibbianswho are wearing those groovy Beatle wigs.
Gale Garnett is the voice of the Baron’s lovely assistant, the fiery red-headed temptress Francesca, Phyllis Diller is not called the Bride, she is referred to as The Monster’s Mate!
Music by Maury Laws, with cinematography by Tadahito Mochinaga and animation/puppet department by Jack Davis, an illustrator for EC comics in the 1950s, a fellow contributor to Mad Magazine and During the 1970s, he did concept art and storyboards for television commercials (‘Lectric Shave, Utica Club, Cask Mt. Wine, Unispin, Gillette, Sominex, Dodge Boys) animated by the Phil Kimmelman and Associates animation house. He was also the poster artist for the brilliant “It’s A Mad, Mad, Mad, Mad World” (1964)
Plus uncredited Art Direction by mind blowing artist, music albums, poster art and graphic comic books Frank Frazetta.
Mad Monster Party? (1967) is an offbeat stop-motion animation feature made by Rankin/Bass Productions. It's a parody of classic monster movies more aimed at adults than children though it was badly marketed to the wrong audience, the weekend matinee for kids. It blends the art of slapstick with the nostalgia of Universal & RKO monster greats. Harvey Kurtzman, who wrote the script, was a co-creator of Mad Magazine. The characters were designed by Jack Davis, one of the illustrators of Mad Magazine. It explains the element of racy, campy, quirky and delightfully droll humor, and why it has remained a cult classic, since the days of Saturday afternoon programs like Creature Features! Oh those were the days…
“Certainly, I was typed. But what is typing? It is a trademark, a means by which the public recognizes you. Actors work all their lives to achieve that. I got mine with just one picture. It was a blessing.”-Boris Karloff
The film is a feature length ‘animagic’ gem but because they could not get the licensing to homage the actual classy trademarked monsters, they resorted to a parody of the characters using similar names instead. The Bride of Frankenstein is called "the Monster's Mate"and is brought to life by the superb impersonation of the batty and biting Phyllis Diller rather than the surreal & sensual Elsa Lanchester. The Creature from the Black Lagoon is called "Creature." And King Kong is referred to as “IT.”
Boris Karloff himself did the voice for Baron Boris von Frankenstein. Karloff recorded his dialogue in England at the sound stage, which was a much more comfortable job for Boris Karloff made easier on his body, by that time he was suffering from debilitating arthritis and trouble with his lungs.
I know what I’m getting for my birthday this year!
Composer Maury Laws said of the great Karloff, “Boris Karloff was the perfect gentleman.” Producer Arthur Rankin Jr. said “He was suffering from an illness at the time, but he gave us a great performance in Mad Monster Party? (1967) and The Daydreamer (1966) as well!”
Boris Karloff plays the voice of The Rat in Rankin/Bass’ The Daydreamer (1966) stories by Hans Christian Anderson
And let us not forget that Boris Karloffplayed the voice of The Narrator & Grinch in director Chuck Jone’s adaptation of the Dr. Seuss story How The Grinch Stole Christmastv movie (1966)
Dr. Seuss (Theodor Geisel), Boris Karloff and Chuck Jones
The party guests also include The Wolf Man, Quasimodo, various zombies that appear to pay homage to the dreaded flying monkeys from The Wizard of Oz, and a deranged chef named Mafia Machiavelli.
Allen Swift does a great take on Peter Lorre who pines after Francesca… Yetch- “It’s me, Your Don Juan” Francesca, “I Don Juan to look at you!”, and if it’s not my imagination, I could swear that what remains to be seen of the Invisible Man looks and sounds like Sydney Greenstreet’s fez wearing character Signor Ferrari in Casablanca (1942) a coincidence… I think not! And I could swear that monocle wearing version of Dracula bears a striking resemblance to pioneering live show of the ’50s Your Show of Shows, brilliant comedian Sid Caesar.
In the movie, Baron Frankenstein who is equip with a laboratory that would make Kenneth Strickfaden proud, invites his noodle headed, perpetual throat spraying annoyingly allergic nephew Felix Flanken who dreams of being a pharmacist, to take his place as the head of the Worldwide Organization of Monsters to be run at his tropic hide away ‘The Isle of Evil.’
There his uncle will be bestowing on Felix his last great creation, a secret formula capable of destroying all matter. When the Baron announces this to the organization of his new successor, the monstrous guests plot to get rid of the nerdy Felix so they can take over the organization and grab Dr. Frankenstein's secret formula. The Baron's assistant, Francesca, falls in love with Felix, and is kidnapped by the monsters. Boris gets Francesca away from those greedy ghouls, and Felix and Francesca are able to leave the island, rowing away in their tiny row boat, with perhaps a delicious twist ending in store for you!
Singer Garnett creates the voice of the curvy red head Francesca that adds a wonderful spark to the character who radiates Ann Margret & Ann Francis with Mamie Van Doren’s twists & boobs!
Although the film came out in 1967, the distributor Embassy Pictures relegated it to kiddie matinees, instead of reaching older audiences that would've appreciated the human and references. The film got virtually no attention until 1969’s (read here )☞ New York Times review.
Howard Thompson writes, “In this peppery and contagiously droll little color package, a collection of animated puppets scamper across some clever miniature sets, exchanging sass and barbs and occasionally warbling some sprightly tunes.”
Rankin/BassProductions (who brought us those memorable claymation Christmas feel-goods) in affiliation with Avco Embassy found the intended audience for the film in the 1970s and early 1980s by showing it on the small screen. They also made a 1972 prequel called Mad Mad Mad Monsters.
Mad Monster Party’s soundtrack includes 60s songstress Gale Garnett who sang the catchy hit pop song “We’ll Sing in the Sunshine.”Â
The film also includes songs the opening song rendered by jazz great Ethel Ennis with- “Mad Monster Party”, “One Step Ahead” (sung by Boris Karloff) Our Time to Shine & Never Was a Love Like Ours (sung by Gale Garnett) music and lyrics by Maury Laws and Jules Bass, also lets not forget, “You’re Different” sung by Phyllis Diller
Mad Monster Party? (1967) The making of a classic
“My dear old monster. I owe everything to him. He’s my best friend.”-Boris Karloff
Folie à deux (/fɒˈli É™ ˈduË/; French pronunciation: [fÉ”li a dø]; French for “a madness shared by two”), or shared psychosis, is a psychiatric syndrome in which symptoms of a delusional belief and hallucinations are transmitted from one individual to another.
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a·mour fou (ämoÍor ˈfoÍžo)
1. uncontrollable or obsessive passion.
“The puzzle and threat of random violence is one of the defining tropes of true-crime”-Jean Murley
Scott Wilson as Dick Hickock and Robert Blake as Perry Smith.The real killers were Perry Smith and Richard ‘Dick’ Hickock.
In Cold Blood (1967) is director Richard Brooks’s (The First Time I Saw Paris 1954, Cat on a Hot Tin Roof 1958, Elmer Gantry 1960) masterpiece of modern nightmarish nihilistic ‘horror of personality.’
Columbia Studios actually wanted Paul Newman and Steve McQueen to play the roles and wanted it shot in color. Newman went on to do Cool Hand Luke that year and McQueen starred in The Thomas Crown Affair and Bullitt in 1968. Thank god Brooks got his way and got to do his treatment in Black & White, on location and with lesser-known actors, who both went on to earn Oscar nominations for their chilling performances of the murderous pair.
Robert Blake, Scott Wilson, and director Richard Brooks on location for In Cold Blood (1967).Author Truman Capote and director/screenwriter Richard Brooks.
A post-war true crime thriller, what author Elliot Leyton terms Compulsive Killers: The Story of Modern Multiple Murder, the film is steeped in expressive realism about two thugs Robert Blake as Perry Smith a dark and damaged swarthy angel of death & Scott Wilson (In the Heat of the Night 1967, The Gypsy Moths 1969, The New Centurions 1972, The Great Gatsby 1974, The Right Stuff 1983) as Dick Hickock, who inspire in each other a sense of anti-establishment negativity.
These two drifters, having heard about a wealthy wheat farmer from a fellow inmate, think there is a safe in the house filled with $10,000. The two dark souls take siege upon the rural Holcomb Kansas Clutter family in the middle of the night, hogties them, and look for the money, only to find this clean cut humble family has nothing to steal but $43, a bible and pasteurized milk in the icebox. The two proceed to shotgun murder and cut the throats of the entire household so there are… “No witnesses.” –Dick Hickock. There are two surviving daughters, Beverly and Eveanna that were spared this horror.
Robert Blake as Perry Smith, John Forsythe plays Alvin Dewey head of the Kansas Bureau of Investigation and Scott Wilson as Dick Hickock… being brought in…
John Forsythe plays Alvin Dewey head of the Kansas Bureau of Investigation who goes on the hunt collecting clues and tracking down the killers involved in this sensational crime.
Alvin Dewey (John Forsythe) Reporter Bill Jensen (Paul Stewart) who writes for the weekly magazine. Reporter Jensen tells Dewey that it's a strange coincidence that Herb Clutter writes his first insurance check and that the policy paid $40,000 which pays a double indemnity of $80,000. Dewey-“You're not here to write something new, what is your interest?” Jensen “Fairly basic” Dewey-“What's basic about a stupid senseless crime… A violent unknown force destroys a decent ordinary family.” Jensen-“No clues, no logic. Makes us all feel frightened, vulnerable" Dewey- “Murders' no mystery. Only the motive…{…} Someday, somebody will explain to me the motive of a newspaper. First, you scream, “Find the bastards.” Till we find them, you want to get us fired. When we find them, you accuse us of brutality. Before we go into court, you give them a trial by newspaper. When we finally get a conviction, you want to save them by proving they were crazy in the first place.”
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In this semi-documentary police procedural post-noir crime thriller Alvin Dewey studies the bloody bootprint left at the Clutter murder scene.
Dewey tracks down these two bad boys, who have fled to Mexico where Perry (Robert Blake) loses himself in fantasies and painful flashbacks of his childhood with a violent father, whoring mother, of buried treasure, and prospecting for gold. Dick (Scott Wilson) gets tired of languishing around listening to Perry’s dreams and convinces him to head back to the States, passing bad checks along the way and winding up in Las Vegas. The police finally catch up with the murderous anti-social duo, where the men are finally broken of their alibi, and they are sentenced to die by ‘the big swing’ hanging.
Alvin Dewey takes Perry back to the night of the terrible crime…
Mrs. Clutter calmly asks –“Please don’t hurt the children.”
Dick-“Make one move, holler once and we’ll cut their throats.”
Herbert Clutter: “Why do you boys want to do this? Dick: “Shut up!”Perry-“Floyd Wells lied to you. There isn’t any safe.”Perry morbidly superstitious and brooding, while Dick entertains a working girl in the bed across the room, has flashbacks to the night his father (Charles McGraw) finds his drunken whoring mother playing around. Perry’s father proceeds to beat her in front of him and his siblings. Painting a picture of Perry Smith’s traumatic beginnings.
In the clothing store, Dick who often refers to Perry as hon or some such affectionate diminutive–wipes the sweat off Perry's brow and says "Easy baby… look casual."the charming and fast-talking Dick passing around bad checks.Perry tells Dick- “You're good you're really good. Smooth. No sweat no strain You're an artist boy.”buying supplies for the robbery/murder.Dick: “Did you see those guys? They coulda robbed us!” Perry: “What of?” Perry: “That was stupid – stealin’ a lousy pack of razor blades! To prove what?”Dick: “It’s the national pastime, baby, stealin’ and cheatin’. If they ever count every cheatin’ wife and tax chiseler, the whole country would be behind prison walls.”
Perry is superstitious he watches the nuns with a sense of foreboding… it’s a lurking bad omen for sure. stealing cars and changing plates.
Holcomb, Kan., Nov. 15 [1959] (UPI) "” A wealthy wheat farmer, his wife and their two young children were found shot to death today in their home. They had been killed by shotgun blasts at close range after being bound and gagged… There were no signs of a struggle, and nothing had been stolen. The telephone lines had been cut.
"”The New York Times
the real Perry Smith led by police into the Garden City Kansas courthouse on Jan. 6, 1960 charged with first degree murder.
The film is based on Truman Capote’s nonfiction novel that started the True Crime trend. Capote was looking to write a non-fiction novel and had been inspired by the shotgun murders of the Clutter family when the sensational crime hit the news in 1959.
Defense lawyer Duane West in court with real killer Richard “Dick’ Hickock.Capote, Wilson, and Blake are on the set of In Cold Blood in Kansas…The Herbert Clutter family portrait.
The two were arrested on January 2, 1960, in Las Vegas and then executed by hanging on April 14, 1965. For the five years the two remained on death row they exchanged letters with Capote twice a week. Capote actually lived near the prison in Garden City and became very close in particular with Perry Smith and Richard ‘Dick’ Hickock. According to Ralph F. Voss in his book Truman Capote and the Legacy of ‘In Cold Blood,’ he writes that Smith had the idea that talking with Capote would spare him from the noose. But when he learns of the working title of the manuscript he winds up confronting Capote, who manages to manipulate him into confessing about the night of the Clutter murders.
Real-life killers Perry Smith and Richard ‘Dick’ Hickock… the mug shots…
Capote tells Smith that “The world will see him as a monster if he doesn’t open up and tell Capote what Capote wants to know.” Eventually, Perry Smith does open up and relates that brutal night in a vivid confession to Capote that winds up being “memorable lines that appear in the book”. As Voss tells us, “It is during this confession that this film, like the book and like both Richard Brook’s and Jonathan Kaplan’s film’s before it portray the brutal murders of the Clutters. Capote marks the fourth time Herb, Kenyon, Nancy, and Bonnie die in artistic representations of their tragedy–once in Capote’s pages, and three times on screen.”
The film doesn’t necessarily convey the emotional conflict that Capote felt for his subjects which is more obvious in his novel, he also created a connection with the killers that would be shared by the reader. According to writer Jean Murley from The Rise of True Crime: The 20th Century Murder and Popular Culture, “The simultaneous evocation of compassion for the murderer and horror at his deeds makes In Cold Blood a new form of murder narration… Capote’s narrative treatment of his subject would draw the reader into an uneasy and unprecedented relationship with killers, creating a sense of simultaneous identification and distance between reader and killer.” Murley asserts that there is a comfortable distance the reader experiences, “a vicarious thrill, a jolt of fear, and a comforting reassurance that the killer is contained.”
The specter of the rope behind Perry.
Just one more point about Capote’s novel that Jean Murley makes which I think is pretty revelatory about the killer (Perry) referred to as ‘sweet, suave and fascinatingly fatal’… ‘ who was at once a devious and dangerous loner and a sensitive wounded man within that is the notion that Murley distills the ‘ambiguity and intensity of the reader/killer relationship that allows the writer to interrogate notions of good and evil, self and other.” The film while starkly angled from the killer’s point of view for a good deal of the film, doesn’t quite evoke that same sympathetic enigma, though Robert Blake does an incredible job of portraying a wounded soul.
The real-life angry mug of Richard ‘Dick’ Hickock
However, Dick Hickock is described and masterfully pulled off by Scott Wilson as “vulgar, ugly, brutal and shallow; he looks like a murderer (the real Hickock looks like a vicious punk) and he wants to rape Nancy Clutter before killing her. Perry Smith is sensitive, handsome, artistic, a dreamer; sickened by Hickock’s lust(there is a scene in the film while the two are in Mexico where Hickock is drinking & carousing with a local working girl in the room with Perry) in the film Perry prevents the rape. And in keeping with the book, Perry almost loses his nerve to even go through with the robbery, getting sick in the gas station right up to the time they drive up to the Clutter’s property. There is some emphasis on Dick’s relationship with his cancer-ridden father (Jeff Corey) which showcases the only genuine connection he has to humanity.
While Dick visits with his sick dad, he takes the opportunity to steal a rifle from the barn.(Dicks dad watching the news about the murders ) Mr. Hickock “Terrible thing that happened”Dick replies like this… “I've never been so hungry in my life.”
Dewey comes to interview Dick’s father (Jeff Corey) who is dying of cancer and he tells them the last thing Dick ever said before he left was "Pa, I ain’t never gonna do anything to hurt ya. And he meant it too."
Dewey (Forsythe) shows Perry’s dad (McGraw) a photo to confirm his son’s identity.Perry’s father worked in the rodeo back in the day.
Mr. Smith "Well then I guess I haven't seen him for 5 or 6 years, that's no surprise though he's a lone wolf. You guys can rest easy on one thing for sure you won't be having any more trouble with Perry. He's learned his lesson for sure. He wrote me from prison I wrote him right back pronto. I taught the boy is you take your punishment with a smile. And I didn't raise you to steal. So don't expect me to cry. just because you got it tough behind the bars. Perry's no fool. He knows when he's beat you fella's got him whipped forever. The law is the boss. He knows the difference between right and wrong. You can bet on that because I taught my kids the golden rule. Always tell the truth, always wash in the morning, always be sober and independent. And I showed him how. How to prospect how to trap fur how to carpenter how to bake bread how to be his own boss. Yes, he's a chip off the old block"¦.”
In particular, Capote became very attached to Perry Smith, and struggled with demons about his execution, believing that both men’s natures were impacted by their early roots in poverty. Capote was tormented because he sold his soul to the devil, in order to write this ‘real’ book fueled by a tragic story that ultimately results not only in the murders of the Clutters but in the deaths of his subject of interest Perry Smith who went to the gallows. As Voss calls it, “the cost of literary non-fiction”. He also came to the conclusion that neither man was by himself a mass-murderer, but linked together they fed each-others egos and compensated for their inadequacies, as John McCarty says, “by constantly arousing and bolstering certain expectations of one another, they evolved into a potentially violent third party that was more than capable of murder.” Â
Eventually, Capote would publish his true crime tome in The New Yorker in four installments between September and October of 1965, published as a book in 1966, and becoming a huge success adapted to film in 1967.
As Jean Murley points out in Rise of True Crime, The 20th-Century Murder and American Popular Culture “Capote brought together and perfected the nascent conventions of what would become true crime, and his basic formula has been copied ever since.”
The film is elevated to a level of intense and searing reality due to brilliant cinematographer Conrad L. Hall’s (Edge of Fury 1958, The Outer Limits television series 1963-64, Harper 1966, Cool Hand Luke 1967, Butch Cassidy and The Sundance Kid 1969, The Day of the Locust 1975, Marathon Man 1976, American Beauty 1999) incredible eye for scoping out a palpable environment filled with dread, tension, and instability in the normally ordinary settings. Either mastering the closed-in spaces between figures who shape the narrative, he also captures the alienation in the scenes when the duo is driving through the dirty dusty openness of the Great Plains. The additional moody atmosphere is lent a heightened sense of anxiety by Quincy Jones’ cool score. The film cast includes; John Forsythe as Alwin Dewey, Paul Stewart as Reporter Jenson, Gerald S. O’ Loughlin as Harold Nye, Jeff Corey as Mr. Hickock, Charles McGraw as Mr. Smith, Sammy Thurman as Mrs. Smith, Will Geeras The Prosecutor.
The incredible opening scene is when Perry is sitting in the dark of the bus, strumming his guitar, and the little girl watches for a brief moment…
In the beginning scene, Perry calls his friend Reverend James Post who tells Perry that he’s already broken parole because he quit his job, and did not dare enter Kansas. It is a warning that Perry still has time to redeem himself before there is no turning back.Perry gets off the bus and calls from the terminal waiting for his friend who is getting paroled that day and meeting Perry there. Reverend Jim Post tells Perry “Whatever you do don't cross that river into Kansas"Â This scene acts as a premonition while Perry shivers, tears up, and just assigns himself to his fate. He was supposed to meet Willy J there. "Can you tell me where he went?… please Jim.”his voice quavers sweaty crying as if he knows that his life is about to turn for the worse. "It’s very important, maybe the most important thing in my life,"Rev. Jim Post tells him "˜Go back why not see your father." Perry hangs up. It is his first fateful decision in the film"¦
The film opens with a starkly gloomy night scene, Quincy Jone’s slick score leading us into the scene, as a Greyhound bus heads toward the camera. Inside, Robert Blake dark and brooding is sitting with his guitar. Conrad L Hall lights Perry’s intense face with the strike of a match he uses to light his cigarette. In a powerful moment, it accesses our full attention. Perry blows the little flame out and all at once the scene is wiped out in one puff! The film begins to peak our sense of danger in much the way Robert Siodmak’s masterpiece of film noir The Killers (1964)opening had led us into the plot.
As Jürgen Müller eloquently says it in his overview of 1960s cinema –“In Cold Blood opes with a flash and stealthily proceeds to trap its prey in a fog of eerie cinematic expression, born of its black and white photography and Quincy Jones’ dark jazz score.”
In November of 1959 Kansas, two ex-cons and social outliers, the quiet, yet brooding Perry Smith (Robert Blake) and hyper-kinetic egotist Dick Hickock (Scott Wilson) conspire to go out on an adventure to travel 400 miles in a beat-up old Chevy, in order to rob the Clutter family farmhouse. The film is a part genre of the dark road trip film as the two maneuvers, scheme, and machinate on their dark road trip toward their fate. True crime flashback, neo-noir, police procedural, the shades of gray between good vs evil, and a moral commentary on the death penalty, allowing the narrative to elicit sympathy and a vision from both murderers’ point of view, the ‘outlaws perspective’. It is still a very sobering view into the minds of the human offal of society.
Perry Smith’s most infamous statement about the crime, “I thought he was a very nice gentleman. Soft-spoken. I thought so right up to the moment I cut his throat.”Â
Perry talks about his cellmate Willy Jay referring to him (Perry) as being ‘unstable, explosive’ and him laughing about it being true. Dick comments that Willy Jay was a flaming faggot, Perry says he was the best friend he ever had…
Dick had been fed some gossip by an inmate friend, that Herbert Clutter (John McLiam) a wealthy farmer keeps a fortune, $10,000 stashed in his safe at the house. The two decide that it would be an easy job to grab the loot and head for Mexico, leaving their hard lives behind them. What becomes a spiraling coil of nerves, is fed from both Perry’s apprehension about the plot working and Dick’s cock sure attitude. In the twist of fate, it is Perry’s growing inner aggression that becomes the catalyst for the final annihilation of the family. Though Dick acts the part of punk, saying ‘No Witnesses he is not only priming Perry to be the one to have blood on his hands but by this time it is Perry who at first seems hesitant and adverse to violence, explodes in the cold nuclear fission of seemingly senseless bloodshed.
The way In Cold Blood is constructed, it begins to release the tightly wound coil as the two draw nearer to the Clutter home, we are introduced to this clean-cut American family in their daily life, in the light of the day, showing the family as an ordinary close and loving bunch right before they are about to be slaughtered. By the time the two men arrive, it is the dark and ominous shadow of night cloaking the ranch. Perry and Dick begin to wrangle the family bringing the men down to the basement tied up. But it is the day after the murders once the police arrive and are told later on in flashback that we get hints of the savagery, that we could only imagine was about to happen the night before.
The officer standing-“There’s two more in the basement.”
Officer Harold Nye (Gerald O McGlaughlin) asks Alvin Dewey (Forsythe) in the basement of the Clutter Home crime scene “The old Kansas myth. Every farmer with a good spread is supposed to have a hidden black box somewhere filled with money” He also asks if he thinks it’s the work of just one man. Dewey “It could be one man"¦ a mad man"¦”
The Kansas police begin their search in vain, as Perry and Dick make it to Mexico to hide out. Dick who is interested in partying with the senóritas Perry lives half in surreal flashbacks to his bleak beginnings as a child with several siblings and his mother a beautiful Native American woman who liked her alcohol and other young men and committed suicide. His brutal father drew a shotgun on him and chased him out of the house. Perry had a grim, sad, and claustrophobic life, and thus he fantasizes. Perry makes a reference to digging for gold just like Humphrey Bogart in The Treasure of the Sierra Madra 1947. The irony of him finding empty bottles in the desert that only yield a few cents, which he shares with a young homeless boy and his grandfather is a particularly humanizing scene in the midst of the fatalistic outcome that is inevitable. Perry never meant to amount to anything but a lost dreamer with no home.
Perry tells Dick -"I think"¦ you're a bastard…"
Not only is Perry a dreamer, but Dick is an egomaniac and also has delusions of grandeur. Once the two figure out having to come back to Nevada in order to get some cash, they are quickly picked up by the authorities and charged with the murders. Soon after, they realized they will be facing the death penalty.
Perry revisits that night at the Clutters, flashing moments of the night on the screen. We see them fumbling for the non-existent safe. The mass murder only yielded them a mere $43. We see Perry and Dick rummaging through the house looking for anything valuable. Hall’s camera finally settles on the family coldly bound, gagged, and positioned in a certain way that sends chills up the spine. Ultimately it is here that it is revealed that it’s the reluctant and quietly brewing fury inside Perry that goes on a single rampage and executes each family member calmly and cold-bloodily.
“I guess the only thing I’m gonna miss in this world is that poor old man.” referring to his father.
Once again, Jürgen Müller-“The contradictions of the characters give the audience an inkling of what might have led to this senseless act of ultra violence.”
There is an element of homo-erotic attraction between Perry and Dick. It is unspoken yet it’s palpable to me, amidst the warm beer, faded treasure maps, dark brooding antagonism, prison scars, tattoos, sweating, greasy hair, aspirin popping, peacockery, wise-cracking resentment toward society, and the morally driven nuclear family of the mid to late 50s.
From Movie Psychos and Madmen-Film Psychopaths from Jekyll and Hyde to Hannibal Lecter by John McCarty- McCarty’s chapter on Killer Couples points out how Capote’s film was the most “famous example of this type of lethal psychological interrelationship.” And though Smith had boasted to Hickock that he wasn’t a stranger to killing before that fateful night where his pent-up aggression turned violent and he cold-bloodily killed four innocent people. Hickock was the one who “earmarked the Clutters for robbery, and it was he who engineered the heist by passing bad checks to buy the materials needed for the job. More important, it was Hickock, who was the dominant half of the pair.” Hickock appears as the alpha male who uses the term ‘faggot’ too easily and Smith is the submissive lover within the dynamic of their odd relationship. McCarty goes on to write, “Smith looked up to him and slaughtered the defenseless Clutters, toward whom Smith admitted later he never felt any anger, as a way of proving himself to his more glib, brash, and manipulative buddy.”
“You’re good. You’re really good! Smith tells Hickock who moves with ease as he proceeds to con a bunch of store owners passing bad checks. And on the flip side, Hickock is also impressed once Smith kills the helpless Clutters whose only provocation to violence is that they are ordinary. McCarty’s insight points out that like Leopold and Loeb, the same function worked for that killer pair, the less dominant wound up being the one who perpetrated the murder, while the more controlling “partner lent immoral support.”
Will Gear as the Prosecutor: “Mercy for them. The killers. How fortunate that their amicable attorneys were not present at the Clutter house on that fateful evening. How very fortunate for them that they were not present that evening to plead mercy for the doomed family, because otherwise, they would have found their corpses too. If you allow them life imprisonment, they will be eligible for parole in 7 years. That is the law. Gentlemen, 4 of your neighbors were slaughtered like hogs in a pen by them. They did not strike suddenly in the heat of passion but for money. They did not kill in vengeance, they planned it for money. And how cheaply those lives were bought. $40. $10 a life. They drove 400 miles to come here. They brought their weapons with them. [picks up a shotgun]… This shotgun. [picks up a knife] This dagger[picks up a rope] “This is the rope they hogtied their victims with. [picks up a vial of blood] “This is the blood they spilled. Herb Clutter’s. They who had no pity, now ask for yours. They who had no mercy, now ask for yours. They who shed no tears, now ask for yours. If you have tears to shed, weep not for them, weep for their victims.” [picks up a copy of the Holy Bible] “From the way the Holy Bible was quoted here today, You might think the word of God was written only to protect the killers, but they didn’t read you this: Exodus 20:13: ‘Thou shalt not kill.’ Or this: Genesis 9:12: ‘Who so sheddeth man’s blood, by man, shall his blood be shed.’
Here is a recently released article in the Smithsonian about Capote’s long-time friend and writer Harper Lee (To Kill a Mockingbird).
From the Smithsonian.Com Reprinted here for the first time, the article was published five years before Truman Capote's best-selling book.
Dick: [to Perry, just after arrest] “Hey, Buddy, put in a call for that big, ol’ Yellow Bird!”
Dick begins to flip on Perry.
The Big Yellow Bird he is referring to is a symbol, a warrior angel that comes to him in his dreams It is his savior, a protector he had during his dark days. He describes the bird as being “taller than Jesus, yellow like a sunflower.”Â
The irony of the film plays itself out in little subtle commentaries like the insurance salesman who wishes Herb Clutter the night before he is murdered “A very long and healthy life” or the moment in Las Vegas, Dick at the wheel of the car wanting to gamble because he’s feeling lucky, at that split second the police car pulls up next to them and the scene cuts away to the Perry and Dick being brought in to the station.
Dick: “I don’t know gold dust from diarrhea!”… Dick: [to Perry] “I’m SICK of it, maps, buried treasure, ALL OF IT! So ship it, burn it, and get RID of that ton and a half of garbage! There AIN’T no buried treasure, and even if there WAS, boy, hell, you can’t even swim!”Perry says to Dick-“You know, there’s got to be something wrong with us to do what we did.”Dick: “Next move… Mexico. Once we beat it out of the country.” Perry: “On what? $43 and a smile and bullshit.” [First use of the word ‘bullshit’ in a Hollywood film] Perry: “It’s true! Really true! We’re on our way and never coming back. Never! And no regrets.”Dick: “For you. You’re leaving nothing. What about my old man… and my mother? They’ll still be there when my checks start bouncing.” Perry: “It’s nice the way you think about your folks. Dick: “Yeah! I’m a real thoughtful bastard.”part of the opening sequence once Perry gets off the bus and heads to the men’s room to wash up.
While in the bathroom mirror, Perry fantasizes about being a huge celebrity playing the circuit in Las Vegas.
Dick: “You guessed it, chief. It’s the smile that does it. Like it says in the commercials, the family that sticks together lives forever.” Perry: [to himself, looking in a bathroom mirror] “Stick ’em up!” Perry: “Hey, buddy!” Perry: [realizing he’s being watched] “How long you been standin’ there?” Dick: “Long enough to catch your late late show.”Â
Perry: [quoting his father] “Look at me, boy! Take a good look! Cause I’m the last living thing you’re ever gonna see!”Dick-“Hey Andy, does it tell anywhere in those big books what happens when you take the big drop?”Andy-“Well your neck breaks… and you crap your pants.”
Dick-“Hey Andy say hello to Mr. Jenson he’s writing the story of my life.” Andy asks “Why?” and Dick giggles and tells Jenson how Andy killed his entire family. “Andy’s a nut but I like him!"Jensen asks"What about Perry don’t you get along?” Dick says, "Heck there ain’t nobody get along with him. There’s 5 guys waiting in here for the big swing. Little Perry’s the only one yapping against Capital Punishment” Jensen surprised asks, “Don’t tell me you’re for it” Dick answers, "Hanging will only get ya revenge. What’s wrong with revenge? I’ve been revenging myself all my life…”Perry to the guard “I’ve got to go to the toilet.” Guard-“We can’t remove the harness there may not be time.” Perry-“Please” Guard-“Try to control yourself.”Perry-“But that’s it when you hit the end of the rope… your muscles lose control. I’m afraid I’ll mess myself.” Guard-“It’s nothing to be ashamed of. They all do it”… Perry-“I despise people who can’t control themselves.”And the most senseless gist of the whole story… Perry explains: “It doesn’t make sense. I mean what happened. It had nothing to do with the Clutters. They never hurt me. They just happened to be there. I thought Mr. Clutter was a very nice gentleman… I thought so right up to the time I cut his throat.”
Jensen: “I see, the hangman’s ready. What’s his name?”Perry: [his last words] ‘I’d like to apologize, but… who to?’
I became a recent fan of this extraordinary actress when I watched her play the feisty Eve Gill in Alfred Hitchcock’s awesome thriller Stage Fright (1950). It’s no wonder why Jane Wyman (The Lost Weekend 1945, Stage Fright 1950, All that Heaven Allows 1955) won the Oscar for her extraordinarily poignant and heart-wrenching portrayal of a deaf-mute Belinda MacDonald, in rural fishing village referred to thoughtlessly by many as ‘the dummy.’ Belinda must brave her physical challenges, the wall between herself and her stern yet loving father (Charles Bickford), and her austere and grim aunt Aggie (Agnes Moorehead) who raises her after her mother dies in childbirth.
Within this quaint seascape brews a sickening hypocrisy, inhabited by locals that are predatory, gossiping, and judgemental churchgoers who live in the sanctimonious fishing village off the Nova Scotia coast. Along comes the kindly mild-mannered and ethical family practitioner Dr. Robert Richardson (Lew Ayers) who doesn’t mind taking chickens as payment for doctoring, delivering calves in the middle of his supper, and becomes Belinda’s ally and teacher, opening up a whole new world for her, unlocking the grace and passion that hungers for expression. Wyman and Ayers are incredibly believable as Belinda and Robert whose sensitive and loving relationship is mesmerizing!
Robert shows Belinda the symbol for the tree… beautiful moments in an agonizing portrait of life.
Belinda’s father Black is stunned at how intelligent his daughter is. Robert has given this hardened fatalist such hope, by showing him the enormous potential she has to thrive and learn, though she has been neglected by everyone surrounding her.
Offbeat and elegant unsung auteur, director Jean Negulesco is a Romanian immigrant who came to Hollywood at the turn of the century, starting out as an assistant producer and second unit director. Perhaps acquiring his artistic sensibilities having been a stage designer and painter in the Paris of the artsy twenties. Okay, he has done some obscure curiosities over his career but let’s focus on the early work with the intense tones of noir.
His first feature for Warner Bros. in 1941 was the remake of Dangerous 1935, but it wasn’t until he became proficient in the realm of noir with his first masterpiece The Mask of Dimitrios (1944) starring one of Warner Bros. most recognized, quirky characters Peter Lorre and Sidney Greenstreet. Then he directed these two great character actors alongside Hedy Lamarr in The Conspirators (1944), then Nobody Lives Forever (1946) with John Garfield and Geraldine Fitzgerald.
Once again, Negulesco arranges his unusual & wonderful noir/suspense yarn about three random people whose lives become entwined around a lottery ticket, starring Lorre, Greenstreet, and Fitzgerald, in Three Strangers (1946). Eventually directing the memorable Humoresque (1947) with John Garfield and Joan Crawford as the brilliant opportunistic violinist and the dynamic Crawford as the wealthy, hysterical dame Helen Wright who idolizes him. Then came Deep Valley (1947)starring Ida Lupino who is amazing as the alienated woman awakened by gangster Dane Clark. Jack Warner made a big mistake when he let go of Negulesco who then went to Fox and made the way a cool noir favorite of mine, Road House (1948) with Ida Lupino, followed by Three Came Home ( (1950)with Claudette Colbert and one of my favorite quirky melodrama’s Phone Call From a Stranger (1952) starring Bette Davis, Gary Merrill, Shelley Winters, Michael Rennie, Keenan Wynn, Warren Stevens, and Beatrice Straight.
But truly what must be his most notable masterpiece and greatest work, is the beautifully filmed melodrama that exudes realism in Johnny Belinda (1948)dealing with the subject of poverty, rape, and single motherhood in a starkly bold manner. A tale of human suffering, human kindness, self-righteous aggression, sacrifice, and release that is partly due to the marvelous casting making the story come to life from the adapted screenplay by Irmgard VonCube.
Enough loaves already… Aggie is pooped!
Belinda’s father Black McDonald, who runs a modest grist mill, is a stoic and pragmatic man portrayed with the granitized masculinity of Charles Bickford. His sister is the harsh seemingly unsympathetic downright cantankerous bread-making machine, Aunt Aggie manifested by the great Agnes Moorehead, who has perhaps some of the best lines as usual! Aggie comes around eventually showing loyalty, compassion, and a steadfast protectiveness for her tragic yet beautiful and inspirational niece Belinda.
Stephen McNally plays the smarmy Locky McCormick, the egotistical brute & lothario who wants to marry Stella (Jan Sterling) partly for her inheritance, but mostly for her unabashed enchanting cuteness. He lusts after Belinda after watching her dance to the vibration of a violin when he and his rowdy gang invade the McDonald’s mill to pick up their dried goods. He comes back while Belinda is alone, the night of the town dance, because she is seemingly defenseless, figuring she cannot relate her attack to anyone. Once Belinda becomes pregnant by the rape, it puts more of a burden on this ostracized family, not to be targets of ridicule by the locals. What’s worse she can’t even negotiate the import of bearing his child, she only knows that she loves the little guy fiercely, though I won’t give away the climax of the film.
Black McDonald asks Belinda “Who was it that hurt ya? Show me the name.”Aunt Aggie agonizes over pushing Belinda who she believes has shut out the memories of her ordeal.Locky (Stephen McNally) comes to grab a nibble from his naive, kind-hearted yet potentially jealous girlfriend Stella (Jan Sterling) The two are not a match made in heaven, as he is just a rabid dog and she is hopelessly fixated on her boss Dr. Richardson (Lew Ayers) who is clueless about her feelings for him.
Jan Sterling is painfully sympathetic as the fay lass Stella who pines hopelessly for Dr Robert Richardson played wonderfully by that darn likable Lew Ayers, There’s also an assortment of disgraceful gossips in town –Rosalind Ivan, Dan Seymour, and the mean-spirited old biddies Mabel Paige and Ida Moore as Mrs. Lutz & Mrs. Mckee.
With an incredibly moving score by Max Steiner and gorgeously evocative cinematography by Ted D McCord (The Treasure of the Sierra Madre (1948), East of Eden (1955), and The Sound of Music (1965).
I couldn’t resist taking notice of the quintessential gist of the film, spoken as only ferociously honest as Agnes Moorehead can deliver here’s her memorable quote:
Agnes Moorehead as Aggie McDonald “It’s hard to get born and it’s hard to die!”
Your EverLovin’ Joey saying no matter how many loaves of bread you have to bake, life should never be hard for ya!
I’ll be covering two notorious true-life crimes involving folie a deux. First Truman Capote’s adapted story- Richard Brooks directs IN COLD BLOOD (1967) about the murder of the Clutters a Kansas family who were blitz attacked by psychopathic punks, two self-loathing homosexuals Perry & Dick portrayed phenomenally by Robert Blake and the remarkable character actor- Scott Wilson. Their embodiment of pure emotional sickness is burned into the screen like acid.
Then a more off-the-beaten path yet ruthlessly cruel and just as true and ghastly a tale about a couple- Shirley Stoler and Tony Lo Bianco as Ray Fernandez and Martha Beck who derive pleasure from luring wealthy, lonely older women to their deaths for money in director Leonard Kastle’s THE HONEYMOON KILLERS(1969)
In the spirit of this upcoming event, featuring all sorts of criminals & evil types, I thought I’d briefly pull out Evelyn as a kind of amuse-bouche to the huge Blogathon coming up in May! I felt like tossing out a crumb to entice those of you who will be titillated by the fantastic submissions by bloggers paying tribute to the villains, villainesses, and anti-heroes we love to hate/love… fear and cheer!
PLAY MISTY FOR ME (1971) is Clint Eastwood’s directorial debut, just coming off The Beguiled directed by friend Don Siegel.
Play Misty For Me is scripted by Jo Heims (The Girl in Lover’s Lane 1960, The Devil’s Hand 1961, uncredited Dirty Harry 1971, You’ll Like My Mother 1972) Heims has a gift for extracting the perfect essence of mental instability on screen and constructing an atmosphere of unease in otherwise beautiful settings.
Ahhh… The Enduring Derangement of Evelyn Draper:
Set in the cool quaint and laid-back atmosphere of 70s coastal California living, Clint Eastwood who makes his directorial debut, plays the smooth-talking late-nite Carmel Disc jockey, David ‘Dave’ Garver who winds up becoming the object of desire for a psychopathic stalker, the love-sick Evelyn Draper, brought to ‘too real’ life by extraordinary actress Jessica Walter.
Each night, she calls the radio station to lure David, her sultry voice like dark amber honey dripping on the other end of the phone, mysterious with that hint of perilous in flavor and tone. Evelyn epitomizes the deranged & obsessive fan who becomes so fixated on David that she keeps calling, asking David to play the classic torch song “Misty” sung, composed, and performed by Erroll Garner.
This iconic performance must be the catalyst for Glenn Close’s role as the demented stalker Alex Forrest in Fatal Attraction (1987). Play Misty For Me set the tone, and sent the moralizing message, that it’s dangerous and amoral to folly with a random, casual one-night stand, and that having only ‘respectable relationships’ and monogamous or marital sex will keep you safe from being butchered into a puddle of blood splatter evidence…
All snarkiness aside, Eastwood has offered a beautifully painted– groovy, easy world, filled with jazz and seascapes that underscore this moral tale about the backlash of the sexual revolution and its warnings to beware. And to be fair to this symbol of female rage, Evelyn is no more than a ‘sexual object’ to David. As much as Evelyn has fantasized about a great romance with this very charismatic guy, that ‘love’ does not exist. David has used her to fulfill his own desires and needs, yet he is not seen as predatory, and she is. The difference is, he uses his penis and she must wield the nearest symbol, something else that penetrates, a knife or a good old-fashioned pair of large, sharp scissors.
David picks Evelyn up in a bar and has a one-night roll in the sheets after she tells him that she’s his ‘Misty’ girl. David warns her that he’s involved with someone (artsy painter, Donna Mills), but she assures him that she just wants one night with him, no strings attached. Unfortunately, those strings are like steel cables and they are tethered to David with a fierce homicidal grip. When he gets home the next night, Evelyn returns to his place with steaks and all the fixings for a romantic dinner. David definitely now senses something a bit ‘off’ with Evelyn, but what the hell, he sleeps with her again. Her inner machinations and jealous rage rears its ugly head when David’s neighbor responds to her rude and rowdy behavior while firmly (getting lost already) escorting her to the car. She blasts the horn and opens up a mouth like a trucker after a six-pack of Schlitz, “Yeah, Get lost Asshole!” David squints, that classic Eastwood glance when he’s containing his ‘miffed’, and his look is forever delivered on screen.
The refined Evelyn Draper loses her serene “Yeah, Get lost Asshole!”
Of course, the one woman David is truly in love with Tobie (Donna Mills) shows up soon after and they begin where they left off. Tobie had left for a while because of his womanizing. Evelyn starts shadowing David, following him to a bar where she gets belligerent, demanding he spends more time with her, after which she steals his car keys. She shows up at his house, fully naked under a smashing coat… but crazy, and of course David calls the police. No… David sleeps with her one more time. Naked trumps crazy with a smooth-talking womanizing squinting louse! He promises her that he’ll call her. Sure Dave sure…
But David does not call her. He also misses a special dinner she has planned. She calls into KRML to chastise him for missing their date. He drives to her place to break off the three– one night stands with her. Evelyn reveals her primal rage once more but calls David later on filled with regrets, but this time he is done with her. No really… No more naked trumps crazy.
Evelyn stalks David while he is busy rekindling his romance with Tobie. Evelyn shows up at his place once again, this time going into his bathroom and slicing her wrists. This suicide attempt prompts David’s sense of guilt, so he spends the night and the following day sitting with her, breaking a date he has with Tobie. The shot of David panicked and befuddled state while his hand holds Evelyn now resting in bed after her suicide attempt looks like this…
David ‘Dave’ Garver: Where does it say that I gotta drop what I’m doing and answer the phone every time it rings?
Evelyn: Do you know your nostrils flare out into little wings when you’re mad? It’s kinda cute.
David ‘Dave’ Garver: I’m just trying to tell you something. I’m trying to tell you there’s a telephone. I pick it up and I dial it.
Evelyn: “I should’ve known you’d never do anything to spoil it.” ‘Dave’ Garver: “To spoil what? Evelyn: What we have between us.” David ‘Dave’ Garver: “We don’t have a goddam thing between us.”
The film is a groovy and intense nail-biter as Evelyn spirals dangerously out of rational’s orbit, stalking, sneaking around, and ultimately going in and out of homicidal fits.
She sabotages a business lunch with a potential radio station executive Madge (Irene Hervey), insulting her with foul-mouthed accusations, trashes David’s house, takes a butcher knife and slashes to ribbons David’s maid Birdie (Clarice Taylor- Tell Me You Love Me, Junie Moon (1970), Such Good Friends (1971) and Five on the Black Hand Side (1973)).
The police come and take Evelyn away in the happy wagon, and David briefly gets a reprieve from the madness until he finds out that she has been released when he gets that familiar yet chilling request over the phone to “Play Misty” Evelyn assures him that she has gotten straightened out and is leaving for a new job in Hawaii. Leaving him with a creepy clue as she quotes a passage from Edgar Allan Poe’s ‘Annabel Lee.’
Once again, Evelyn appears in David’s house, where she attacks him with a very large carving knife. Sgt. McCallum (John Larch) appears on the scene, tells David to change the locks, and wants to try and track Evelyn down, by luring her out with that memorable song Misty, by tracing the phone call.
Cleverly Evelyn manipulates Tobie into becoming her new roommate named of course, Annabel, thus abducting David’s sane and wholesome as pasteurized milk girlfriend Tobie, and ultimately tries to annihilate David’s cool world and himself her lover, who has spurned her affections. Evelyn as the ‘monstrous feminine’ power finally erupts into a climatic vengeful frenzy, as a vicious butcher who has a one-track libido for a guy who it takes half the film to finally see how sick she really is. It only took three one-night stands to get through to this smirking Lothario. Don’t get me wrong, I would have swooned for Eastwood myself back in the day of bell bottoms, guys with enormous sideburns, jazz festivals, and free love!
Sgt. McCallum (John Larch): “Why don’t you play some Montovani sometime?” David ‘Dave’ Garver: “Didn’t know you liked the show.” Sgt. McCallum: “I don’t. I like Montovani.”
The film also features one of the most memorable beautiful love songs sung by iconic songstress Roberta Flack (one of my all-time idols as a songwriter), who delivers a quiver inducing The First Time Ever I Saw Your Face, which underscores a love-making scene in the woods between the naked Eastwood and Donna Mills. Groovy just watch out for poison oak and briars.
It’s 1971 and this hippie love-making scene ala Adam & Eve in the greening woods… set to Roberta Flack’s profoundly earnest and beautiful “The First Time Ever I Saw Your Face.” David is seeing more than just Tobie’s face in this sexy 70s love-power scene!
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Mills who plays David’s pretty girlfriend Tobie gets in the way of Evelyn’s imagined love affair, and winds up–tied up at knife point while the immortal words are spoken out of that psychotically cold and emotionless voice saying… “God you’re dumb.”
Evelyn Draper is perhaps one of the most mystifying and intoxicating evil culprits of skin-crawling obsessive love, setting the pace for future female monsters, personifying the ‘monstrous feminine’ a knife ( yoohoo–CASTRATING!!) wielding threat to both male and female alike.
The incredible transformation that Jessica Walters performs for us is nothing short of brilliant as this sophisticated lady creates an otherwise appealing attractive single seductress into a predatory huntress with no sense of right or wrong. Just an obsessive blood lust to dominate and possess David, the savvy cool as the center seed of a cucumber DJ who spins records and turns on the ladies with his velveteen voice. Her menacing, neurotic, and unstable behavior builds perfectly creating unease as we watch her devolve into a disturbing feminine force (she uses many feminine social mechanisms to try and entrap David). Evelyn Draper is one powerful, memorable villainess, thanks to Jessica Walters’ incredibly believable manifestation of female rage, rage against a system of morals that aren’t the same for men!
Steve McQueen turned down the lead role, claiming that the female lead was stronger than the male.-IMDb tidbit
The bewitchingly beautiful Audrey Dalton was born in Dublin, Ireland who maintains the most delicately embroidered lilt of Gaelic tones became an American actress of film in the heyday of Hollywood and the Golden Age of television. Knowing from early on that she wanted to be an actress while studying at the Royal Academy of Dramatic Arts was discovered by a Paramount Studio executive in London, thus beginning her notable career starring in classic drama, comedy, film noir, science fiction, campy cult classic horror and dramatic television hits!
Audrey Dalton as the lovely Louise Kendall in Daphne du Maurier’s My Cousin Rachel (1952) directed by Henry Koster.
Recently Audrey Dalton celebrated her birthday on January 21st and I did a little tribute here at The Last Drive In. Visit the link above for more great info and special clips of Audrey Dalton’s work!
Since then I’ve had the incredible honor of chatting with this very special lady whom I consider not only one of THE most ethereal beauties of the silver screen, Audrey Dalton is a versatile actress, and an extremely gracious and kind person.
While I’ve read a few interviews one in particular in a division of USA TODAY: The Spectrum Audrey Dalton survived a sinking, a ‘Serpent’ and a stallionby Nick Thomas.Â
The article in USA Today asked about Titanic, Deborah Kerr, Rita Hayworth, designer Edith head, the pesky mollusk and her appearances in several notable film and television westerns.
Naturally they inquired about Audrey Dalton’s monumental contribution to one of the biggest beloved 1950s ‘B’ Sci-Fi treasures and she deserves to be honored for her legacy as the heroine in distress, pursued by a giant Mollusk, no not a Serpent nor giant caterpillar it be!
She is asked… eternally asked about this crusty bug eyed monster, and why not! it’s part of a fabulous celebration of what makes films like The Monster that Challenged the World (1957) memorable for so many of us!
The love for these sentimental sci-fi films are still so much alive! Early this year, Audrey Dalton joined Julie Adams to celebrate with fans both their iconic legacies for starring in two of the most popular monster films of all time… The Monster That Challenged the World (1957) and The Creature From the Black Lagoon (1954).
She’s been asked about her wonderful performance as Annette Sturges in Titanic (1953) with focus on her co-stars Barbara Stanwyck and Clifton Webb, and of course about one hilarious anecdote around her role in several westerns, including TV shows like The Big Valley, Gunsmoke, Bonanza and Wagon Train, and her fabulous fear of horses! Even more than that giant drooling crustacean? "That monster was enormous!" –Audrey commented in her interview with USA Today.
I don’t have a video of Ms Dalton on a rambunctious horse, but here she is giving a fine performance in the television hit series that ironically reunites Stanwyck as the matriarch of the Barclay family and Audrey together again…tho Stanwyck is not in this scene, she works well with actor Richard Long in an episode called ‘Hazard’ in The Big Valley (1966). Audrey went on to do one more episode as Ann Snyder in season one called Earthquake.
I am most taken with Audrey Dalton’s wonderful nostalgic joy and her earnest appreciation for the collaborations off camera and on the set- having a true sense of warmth, togetherness and a passion for her craft and fellow cinema & television artists, crew and players. I’ve used the term “players” when I refer to actors, something that Audrey Dalton pointed out to me was not only a very endearing description, but in addition, something I hadn’t known and felt an adrenaline rush to learn that Boris Karloff was known to do as well. Perhaps he is my grandpa after all. I can dream can’t I?
Alan Ladd and Audrey Dalton on a horse in Delmer Daves’ western Drum Beat (1954)
Audrey told me that she had a fear of horses, having expanded on it when interviewed by USA Today“I hate horses!” she admitted. “I mean I’m really scared to death of them. In one show I had to ride down a very steep hill and felt sure I was going to fall. I got through it, but when the scene was over the director asked, “Could you do it again, this time with your eyes open?”
My little conversations with Audrey seem to drift more toward our mutual appreciation of her experience working with Boris Karloff in some of the most evocative episodes of that ground breaking television anthology show THRILLERÂ hosted by the great and dear Boris Karloff.
Audrey plays the beautiful woman/child Meg O’Danagh Wheeler a mail order bride from Ireland married to Warren Oates the son of a bully played masterfully by Denver Pyle, Meg is a jewel trapped in a tortured space of rural repression and hounded by a folk lorish Boogeyman called The Hollow Watcher released in 1962-Link to past post above.
I hesitated asking one question which this feature is usually founded on. Because of my great admiration for years that I’ve held for Ms.Dalton, I couldn’t put restrictions on this wonderful opportunity to listen to the wisdom and sacred reminiscence by such a special actress.
Normally I call this particular feature MonsterGirl Asks, where I put one specific question to someone special in the entertainment industry, arts or academic world instead a full blown interview asking predictable or possibly stale musings that are often over asked or just not inspiring for all concerned. I’ve had several wonderful chances at getting to ask a question here or there. But I have to say, THIS feature is centered around a very heart-warming exchange between myself and Audrey Dalton, yes the sublimely beautiful, versatile & talented actress of film & television.
So I took a chance and asked if she would agree to do my MonsterGirl Asks feature. What happened was she generously shared some very wonderful memories with me so instead of calling it MonsterGirl Asks, I defer to the much lauded star and changed the title special feature as I humbly open myself up as MonsterGirl Listens to a great star who has had the graciousness and kindness to allow me to share these reminiscings with you.
For years I have been such a fan of this otherworldly beauty, not just from watching Boris Karloff’s Thriller where Audrey graced three of the BEST episodes, nor is it her attractive self-reliance in defying Tim Holt’s priggishness as Lt. Cmdr. John ‘Twill’ Twillinger or showing shear guts in the midst of that giant Mollusk, that Monster That Challenged the World, nor is it just her ability to stare danger and death in the face, the very frightening face of Guy Rolfe otherwise known as Mr. Sardonicusin William Castle’s eerie cheeky masterpiece. Audrey Dalton has appeared in two of the most iconic treasures from exquisitely better times in the realm of Sci-Fi & Classical Horror film. She is still beloved by so many fans!
Tim Holt and Audrey Dalton in director Arnold Laven’s memorable & beloved sci-fi jaunt into the giant creature movie of the 1950s!Audrey Dalton and Ronald Lewis are unfortunate prisoners of the sadistic Mr. Sardonicus (1961) brought to you by the great showman of cult horror William Castle!
Though Audrey Dalton may have graced the world of cult horror & ‘B’ Sci-Fi phantasmagoria, she is quite the serious actress having been one of the main stars in Titanic (1953). Here she is shown with Robert Wagner.
Audrey Dalton co-stars with Robert Wagner in Titanic (1953)
Then Audrey brings a delightful bit of class to director Delbert Mann’s Separate Tables 1958, Audrey is provocative, self-reliant and wonderfully flirtatious as Jean who joyfully seduces Rod Taylor, keeping him charmingly distracted and constantly on his toes! Though this gif has him pecking her adorable nose!
Audrey with Don Taylor in her first film The Girls of Pleasure Island (1953) Alamy Stock Photo. Audrey Dalton co-stars with Rex Reason in Thundering Jets (1958)
Audrey played the lovely Louise Kendall quite enamored with Richard Burton in Daphne du Maurier’s romantic thriller My Cousin Rachel 1952 also c0-starring Olivia de Havilland as the cunning Rachel.
Audrey Dalton co-stars with Richard Burton in My Cousin Rachel (1952)-photo: Alamy Stock Photo.
Audrey’s been the elegant Donna Elena Di Gambetta co-starring in the romantic comedy with Bob Hope and Joan Fontaine in Cassanova’s Big Night (1954),
Audrey Dalton, Bob Hope and Joan Fontaine in Cassanova’s Big Night : Alamy Stock Photo.Here’s Audrey in Drum Beat (1954) as Nancy Meek who must be escorted by Indian fighter Johnny MacKay played by Alan Ladd
Audrey Dalton as the sensuous Nancy Meek in Delmer Dave’s Drum Beat (1954) co-starring with dreamy Alan Ladd. :Alamy Stock PhotoAudrey plays Louise Nelson in this superb British film noir The Deadliest Sin (1955).
I am so touched by Audrey Dalton’s kindness. She not only possesses a beauty that could be considered otherworldly, and up there in the ranks of so many of the great beauties of that Golden Age of Hollywood, it turns out she is one of THE most gracious and kind people in an industry filled with egos and eccentrics.
I shared a bit about why I call myself MonsterGirl, that I am a singer/songwriter and how much I’ve loved her work in film and television for as far back as I can remember. I mentioned that I had heard so many stories about how kind and gentle Boris Karloff was in real life. That I wished Boris Karloff had been my grandfather. My own was a real "˜meanie' and so around here we often joke and say Grandpa Boris.
I was so glad that I got the chance to tell her how much her contribution to THRILLER elevated the episodes to a whole new level, including Boris himself who brought to life a confluence of genius, the immense collaborative efforts of some of the most talented artists and people in the industry. Audrey Dalton worked with directors– Herschel Daugherty on Hay-Fork and Bill-Hook, with John Brahm on The Prediction starring along side Boris Karloff and director William F. Claxton and co-starring with another great actor Warren Oates in The Hollow WatcherÂ
The series has never been imitated nor surpassed in it’s originality and atmosphere. We conferred about our shared love of THRILLER and it's impact on television as a visionary program and a wonderful working space off camera.
Audrey Dalton has a fay-like smile, a pair of eyes that are deep & mesmerizing with a sparkle of kindness besides…
MonsterGirl Listens-
Audrey Dalton– “Here's some thoughts for you on my most beloved work as an actor.”
“I was on a lot of Westerns (despite my fear of horses) but my most favorite show was the Thriller series. I had an agreement with Boris to do one a season. Boris Karloff was a lovely, gentle man who was loved by the crew. Many of them had worked with him years before. That was nice to see. The Thriller set was a wonderful place to be. We all had so much fun working with one another. When we filmed Hay-Fork, we would all go out for late dinners after filming. Alan Napier was very tall and had a wonderful sense of humor about it. He would tease Boris that he should've played Frankenstein's Monster because of his height and strong features. But Boris was the best Monster of all. He was always a gentleman and genuinely enjoyed listening to everyone talk. He was a true actor and director. He watched people and life around him with huge eyes.”
On BORIS KARLOFF and his iconic anthology television series THRILLER:
It must have been wonderful working with Boris Karloff on this remarkable series that possessed an innovative and unique sense of atmosphere, blending mystery & suspense, the crime drama and some of the BEST tales of terror & the supernatural!
Joey– “I'm glad to see that you enjoyed working with him {Boris} on the show THRILLER"¦ It was not only ahead of it's time, and I’m not just trying to impress you, it IS actors like yourself and the quality and the true passion that you brought that helped make the show a very special body of work. It's so nice to hear that you enjoyed the experience behind the scenes as well"¦ It is one of my favorite classic anthology series. I can re-watch it over and over because it's so compelling and well done!”
Audrey- “I feel very fortunate to have been working when the film industry was still relatively small and run by creative producers, writers and directors who had the studio solidly behind them, and not by financial conglomerates for whom film making was just one more way to make money. Boris could just call up his favorite film colleagues to work on Thriller, and that made it a wonderful experience. Film making today is a more complicated business with so much more emphasis on the business side and on ratings. We told stories because we were passionate about them. I'm not sure that passion is the same any more.”
“I watched some Thrillers last month after my daughter first saw your website. They are creepy even for someone who acted in them. It was such a well-done, well-made show.”
“Thriller is such a gem that it would be wonderful if you wrote more about it. It does not get the attention it deserves. Boris really considered it his masterpiece of so much talent in each episode.”
Joey-“I laughed out loud, at your comment that Thriller was “even creepy for someone who acted in them.” I suppose it would be creepy, and I often wonder how the atmosphere of the set and the narrative might influence a performance just by the suggestion of the story and the set design! And the musical score is yet another defining element of the show. Jerry Goldsmith, Pete Rugolo and Mort Stevens’ music is so extraordinary! Moody and evocative. Jerry Goldsmith's score for The Hollow Watcher is just incredible, it added to the emotionally nuanced scenes you had as the stirring character of Meg secretly married to the conniving Sean McClory in The Hollow Watcher. I will be covering very soon, your two other fantastic appearances in Hay-Fork and Bill-Hook and The Prediction.”
Audrey- “Boris would love to know you think of him as Grandpa Boris. He had a huge heart and I do so love remembering how kind and gentle he was. I am so grateful to have been one of the lucky few who worked with him.”
On working with Barbara Stanwyck & starring in the classic hit TITANIC (1953)
Audrey- “My other most cherished project was Titanic. I worked with Barbara Stanwyck and Clifton Webb. Clifton was a little bit like snobbish and mostly kept to himself, but he was very funny with a sharp wit. Barbara Stanwyck was a dream "“ the ultimate pro, always prepared to act and ready to help the rest of us.”
Joey-“I loved your performance in Separate Tables! It's obvious you were having fun and it was a lovely and playful characterization. As well as pretty modern which I loved! Did it send Rod Taylor running back to the Time Machine because you were such a strong and confident gal"¦”
Audrey -“Another favorite role of mine was "Separate Tables" with David Niven, Burt Lancaster, Rita Hayworth and Deborah Kerr. It was such a fun little film. We rehearsed for 3 weeks and shot it in sequence, which was very unusual. Niven was a wonderful, funny man, a great raconteur. It was great to just sit quietly in a chair and listen to his wicked sense of humor. Rita was incredibly nervous during filming and was literally shaking. We all had to be quiet to help her get over it. She was such a sweet person, but I think she was having health problems by then.”
Joey-“You were wonderful in Separate Tables! The old gossips like Glady's Cooper (who –from her performance in Now Voyager, I wouldn't want to be my Grandma or mother for that matter!) I adore her as an actress though"¦ and Cathleen Nesbit they were hilarious as they watched nosily at your goings on with Rod Taylor"¦ you both brought a very nice bit of comedic lightness to the underlying sad tone of Deborah Kerr and David Niven's characters.”
Audrey –“Now I might have to watch Separate Tables again.”
On ELSA LANCHESTER-Â
I did wonder if The Girls of Pleasure Island co-star Elsa Lanchester had left an impression on Audrey Dalton, a seemingly feisty character I wondered if she had experienced anything memorable acting in her first feature film along side of another of my favorite actresses.
Audrey- “I don’t remember a lot about Elsa Lanchester. When we filmed “The Girls of Pleasure Island” it was on the Paramount backlot and I remember she always had a camera with her. She was an avid photographer and she had a wonderful sense of humor.”
On WILLIAM CASTLE and Mr. Sardonicus!
Ronald Lewis, Audrey Dalton and Guy Rolfe in William Castle’s macabre Gothic masterpiece Mr. Sardonicus (1961)
I read William Castle's bio and it was quite a hell of a read! The stories about his childhood are wild. Like Audrey said, “he is a legend for good reason”, and Mr. Sardonicus (1961) is quite a macabre masterpiece in so many ways. Castle was considered a master of Bally-Hoo but he truly had an eye for creating weird spaces and stories. Although considered low budget, it doesn't matter to so many of us, because he left a legacy and Audrey Dalton is part of that"¦
Joey-“I imagine working with William Castle on Mr. Sardonicus, there must have been a great deal of creepy moments because of that horrific mask that Guy Rolfe wore! and Oskar Homolka and his awful leeches, horrid man"¦ (the character not the actor of course!) I hope it was as enjoyable working with William Castle as it was with Grandpa Boris. You were wonderful in the film!”
Audrey-“Bill Castle was another incredible director I was fortunate to get to work with. He’s a legend for good reason; I don’t think I have ever met someone so creative and driven about his work. You are right that the mask that Guy wore in Mr. Sardonicus was chilling. I have not seen that film in years but I can see that image as clearly as if it were yesterday.”
Audrey– “I noticed you wrote a bit about Beverly Garland. She was such a dear friend of mine. She was in Pretty Poison with Noel Black who just passed away last year.  Bev died years ago and even though she remained active in the Scarecrow and Mrs King for so long, she loved acting in “B” films the most.”
Joey-“I am a big fan of Beverly Garland! I think she was a versatile and extremely accessible actress! Just wonderful to watch. Even her outre cool 1950’s police show DECOY: Police Woman!"¦ Of course she'll always be beloved for her ‘B’ movies with Roger Corman.
It's so wonderful to hear that you both were good friends. I'm sorry she's gone. So many wonderful people we've lost. It’s so great to know that she enjoyed being known as a "B" movie actress in addition to her other incredible body of work. I loved her in director Noel Black’s Pretty Poison (1968). I forgot that she played the psychopathic Sue Ann Stepaneck’s (Tuesday Weld’s) mom!”
Beverly Garland not only exuded a gutsy streak in every role she took, she shared the notable distinction of starring in one of Boris Karloff’s THRILLER episodes called Knock-Three-One-Two co-starring with the wonderful character actor Joe Maross who has a gambling problem and will be beaten to a pulp if he doesn’t pay his bookie. So he enlists the help of a psychopathic lady killer to murder his wife Beverly for her tightly held purse and large savings account!
On ED NELSON– Like the wonderful Audrey Dalton, Ed Nelson exudes an inner light and sort of tangible kindness.
Joey– “One very endearing thing that happened in August 2014 after Ed Nelson passed away, when I wrote a little something about the ubiquitous actor, his son wrote to me in particular to thank me for saying such nice things about his dad. It's ironic Ed worked on several of Boris Karloff’s THRILLERs too! When he had passed on, I hoped he knew how many fans he had and could have had the opportunity to enjoy a nice tribute from me for all the work he had done.”
Ed Nelson and Linda Watkins in The Cheaters episode of Boris Karloff’s anthology television show Thriller!
I just watched the 70s television show Police Woman with Angie Dickinson as Pepper Anderson "”Audrey Dalton starred in the episode called “Shoefly.” It was so nice to see her playing the wife of actor Ed Nelson, since they both starred in several roles of Thriller! and the chemistry between them was very genuine. And I told her so, and did ask about him.
Ed Nelson plays Lieutenant John Hess married to the loving Rose in Police Woman episode ‘Shoefly” 1974
Audrey–“I did know Ed Nelson quite well, by the way. We lost touch over the years, but during the time we were first filming Killers in Paradise and then again while filming Police Woman. He was a kind man and very smart. And he was a very busy actor.”
COMING SOON: Boris Karloff’s anthology television show THRILLERÂ featuring Audrey Dalton in 2 memorable & evocative episodes– HAY -FORK and BILL-HOOKÂ and THE PREDICTION!
Audrey Dalton in Hay-Fork and Bill-Hook shown here with Doris Lloyd as Mother Evans. There’s witchcraft afoot in the Welsh moors.
Audrey- “Your website brings back wonderful memories and I have enjoyed reading it so very much. It is such a treasure.”
Joey- With all my sincerest gratitude and ever lasting admiration, it’s been one of the greatest thrills of my life, speaking to you, the amazing Audrey Dalton!
Just one more thing!… Columbo IS the quintessential detective, the David against the Goliath that is social class, that ‘droll’ ever pecking duck in his rumpled raincoat waiting to pounce-that “sly elf sitting under his toadstool”-Gene Barry – “always going for the jugular’ -Lee Grant always methodically pushing for the truth even when he respects the murderer but not the crime… Aurora at Once Upon a Screen gives an eloquent tribute to that brilliant with no first name… Columbo & the wonderful Peter Falk who brought him to life
 
