THE BIRTHDAY LETTER 

My mother’s greatest fear during the 1950s was strangely not an atomic bomb being dropped on our modest suburban home, but rather the thought of my spilling Welch’s Grape Juice on our beige wall-to-wall carpet. Even her immense terror of snakes—which caused her to bolt near hysterically from the room when I would gleefully point out shots of pythons and boa constrictors during viewings of TV’s Sheena of the Jungle or Jungle Jim—paled in comparison. I will never forget the expression of abject terror that would wash tidal wave-like over her face when she spied me moving through the kitchen with a bottle of Welch’s in my mitts. “Stay in that kitchen, Bruce! She would scream out. “You just can’t get that stuff out!!!”

To be fair she was also afraid of polio, certainly no laughing matter. This dreadful disease had been around for years but hit its high mark of destruction in the 1940s and early 1950s. As scientists struggled to come up with a cure via vaccine there were many rumors and postulations about the cause of the disease, stagnant water and colds being related in the public’s mind to the onslaught of the virus. Because of this, mothers everywhere were intent on keeping their offspring dry, not always the easiest of tasks as kids came in and out of the house, particularly in snow country. Being raised in California I was not too affected by this business, but my brother Bryan, seven years older and initially reared in the Midwest, tells tales of my mother ripping off his sweaters and jackets umpteen times a day as he went about the business of being a kid and playing outdoors. Finally, of course, doctors Salk and Sabine came up with cures, the first in the form of a series of much dreaded shots (I can still see my old family doctor nodding at his nurse—who stood ominously in back of me so I couldn’t see what she was up to—to prepare the injection, and my father holding me steady while I tried to escape from his clutches and the harpoon-like syringe coming my way) and later the most welcomed sugar cubes.

Still, despite all the publicity about polio and prevention in those days I only knew of one kid who had contracted the disease. His name was Jerry and he showed up one day when I was in second grade. The years have dulled most of my memories of Jerry except that he had dark, rather greasy hair, always wore short sleeve yellow shirts with brown suspenders, and, of course, had braces on his legs.

It is one of the oddest psychological quirks of the human species that because of ignorance, discomfort or just plain unreasonable fear, the people who deserve the most compassion and understanding from their fellow men often receive the least. This is particularly true in the world of children where a lack of experience in things, not to mention mainlining on many of the biases and prejudices of their own parents, make them acutely vulnerable to the irrational and prejudicial.  Frankly, my friends and I didn’t know what to do or think about poor Jerry with his braces and constant struggle to maneuver himself around. He couldn’t play dodge ball, do the things we did after school and besides he had a certain unpleasant attitude. Our response therefore was to ignore him, to shut him out. It is one of those things—some call them psychic canker sores—that still cause discomfort when you chance to reflect upon them later in life. Somehow they never quite go away. And probably shouldn’t.

So when I watch the first season’s The Birthday Letter and watch Isa Ashdown as Cathy Williams sitting alone at home talking to her only friend, her doll, with those braces strapped to her legs, I always reflect for a moment on Jerry and our horrific treatment of him. We aren’t exactly told that Cathy has polio, only that she is crippled, but it really doesn’t matter. I does strike me as odd now that her mother (Virginia Carroll) leaves Cathy, a crippled child, all by herself, but I guess ya gotta put food on the table somehow.

Cathy, however, is a resilient and intelligent kid who gets fed up sitting around waiting for her mother (no dad in the picture) so when she learns that a local county fair is going to be held she writes Superman in care of the Daily Planet and asks that he take her there so she can enjoy the various rides. Lois (Phyllis Coates) gets wind of this and with editor Perry White’s (John Hamilton) support tries to set up a special party for Cathy and to somehow get the word to Superman. Clark Kent, hearing this, tells Lois not to worry. Superman has never let them down, he reminds her.

Everything would have probably proceeded hunky-dory except that a criminal named Cusak (Paul Marion), involved in a counterfeit scheme, makes a phone call to one of his confederates but dials the wrong number and gets Cathy instead. He has just imparted some vital information to her regarding an upcoming meeting when he is murdered in the phone booth. Innocent Cathy just thinks it’s a wrong number and hangs up. Unknown to her, French criminals Marcel Duval (Maurice Marsac) and Marie (Nan Boardman) need to know what was relayed during the aborted phone call and when they manage to find out that it was Cathy who took the call they set out to get the information from her at any cost.

All of this sets in play the unfortunate introduction of their brainless associate Slugger played by John Doucette (why do otherwise intelligent criminals so often have moronic assistants who ultimately destroy their plans?). Doucette was a great face on early TV, one of my favorites of that period, in fact. He was versatile and effective in nearly all his roles. A great exception, however, was in this episode. I have no way of knowing whether it was part of the original script by Dennis Copper or the usually dependable director Lee Sholem, but the actor overdoes the part of a punch drunk ex fighter to such a staggering extent that it completely negates the pathos that could have been created in the concept of a brutal man gone wrong who is redeemed by a small child. Instead we have one humungous slice of ham that you could barely fit into a Jimmy Dean warehouse. Particularly painful is a scene where Slugger, pretending to be Superman (the real one is later blamed for the crime), kidnaps Cathy. It is one of the worst over-the-top performances in all of TAOS, but again I suspect it wasn’t Doucette’s idea or fault. Yet ironically, this show, for all the silliness of the Slugger character, is also one of the most controversial when near its conclusion a heartless Marcel and Marie remove the poor child’s braces so she won’t be able to go for help. This moment, coupled with the brutal murder of Cusak, was just the sort of stuff future sponsor Kellogg’s wanted nothing to do with and would soon be removed from the show.

In the end the whole crime angle is connected out to some stolen counterfeit bank plates (kept at the Lambert Electric Engineering Company, if you’re interested) which Superman retrieves from an acid bath after (again) almost giving himself away as Kent:

“This is a job for Superman…I mean I’ve got to find him!” he exclaims in a near panic as he heads for an exit.

The best part of the show for me is the conclusion when Superman—who finds her in her apartment reading a Superman comic—flies Cathy over Metropolis. He can’t cure her (as he does the blind girl Ann in the later Around the World with Superman) but he takes her on the equivalent of a rollercoaster and Farris Wheel of her very own. Whether scripted or not, there is something particularly warm and spontaneous about these few minutes that never fails to get to me. The child seems absolutely thrilled by the experience and concludes with what always appears like an unrehearsed kiss on the Man of Steel’s cheek with George Reeves nearly glowing in response. I have to admit that on a few low days in my life I have watched this episode until the end and then re-played those final two minutes several times.

Some fifty years later I now wonder if my old school mate Jerry ever watched this episode wishing Superman could have flown him through the skies.

December 2008

THE STOLEN COSTUME

By Bruce Dettman

Whatever their faults—and I would be lying if I didn’t admit that they had their share—my late parents were generous with my brother and I, and not just in the weekly allowances we received (provided the lawns were mowed, the cars washed, the trash burned, the garage cleaned, etc.), or the gifts we were given at Christmas and on our birthdays, but in the time they spent with us. My father, although not a professional carpenter, knew his way around a woodshop and often spent his precious Saturdays building things for us. In particular I recall him creating a wonderful shield with the drawing of a fire-breathing dragon on it when I was going through a brief knight in shining armor period (I think this lasted about two weeks before Zorro took over). To his credit—and to my mother’s as well—they went the extra mile for their kids. This even included my dad escorting me to the monthly Cub Scout meetings at the local elementary school which I know he loathed and which forced him to give up his beloved beginning-of-the-weekend martinis and a chance to stay up late on the couch watching old movies (hopefully with his two favorite female movie stars Ava Gardner and Maureen O’Hara).

But of all the gifts I was bought or the things that were built for me in that wonderful garage, the one thing that eclipsed all others was my fourth grade Halloween costume, my Superman suit. I had wanted to ‘Trick or Treat’ as Superman for years but in my backyard recreations of the Man of Steel’s exploits I had been content, like most of my contemporaries, with a towel tied around my neck. This just wouldn’t do for Halloween, however, and yet I was not crazy about the Superman costumes they sold in stores. The manufactures of these outfits just hadn’t gotten the look right. What it looked like was a costume and I wanted something more realistic, something as close to what George Reeves wore as I could possibly get. It was obviously time for my father to put down his martini shaker and his Time Magazine and for my mother to hold off pasting stamps in her S&H Green Stamps booklets and help me out on this thing.

And they did just that.

My mother went to J.C. Penny’s and returned with some long underwear in my size. My father then dyed them the proper shade of blue. This completed, he took them out to his shop where he had made a stencil of Superman’s “S” emblem and traced this on the fabric. For the Man of Steel’s trunks we used a red swimming suit which when coupled with an old yellow belt of a neighbor’s was perfect for around my waist. My boots were long red stockings which my mother sewed leather soles on. Finally, she cut and sewed a red cape for me and once again my father stenciled on the “S.” As soon as the paint was dry I was set. Nothing in my mind had ever been so grand.

My wearing it, of course, did not end at Halloween. That was just the beginning.  From that time on the suit was never far from me. In fact, it was usually worn beneath my street clothes. On one occasion I tried to bring it to school under my jeans and shirt but somehow Mrs. Tootle, my fourth grade teacher, busted me and warned that I’d be in big trouble if I wore it to class again. No matter. School might be out, but in addition to wearing it when I was at a play I had it on beneath my sports coat and slacks when my parents and I went out to dinner, to visit their friends or to other events. I was even busted once by my brother, when I wore it to relative’s wedding, mainly because I also put on my glasses to attend and these were normally only for reading purposes. He peaked under my shirt, laughed and just shook his head in that ‘God, my squirt of a kid brother is such a little moron’ look that I had come to know so well but at least he didn’t say a word to my mom or dad.

Eventually, of course, I grew out of the suit, both physically and in terms of what I was doing in my life. There was always a place in my heart and memory for Superman but he was no longer the center of my existence as he had once been. The years rolled by and the suit was at first relegated to a corner of my close closet and eventually my mother retrieved it for dusting purposes. What I wouldn’t give to have saved it for posterity.

The suit, not mine but Superman’s, is of course the main focus of The Stolen Costume from the first season of TAOS. Based on a script from the Superman radio series with a television adaptation by Ben Peter Freeman and directed by Lee Sholem, this is the story of a petty thief nicknamed T-Ball (Norman Budd) who while pursued by the police breaks into Clark Kent’s apartment and inadvertently stumbles upon the secret closet where the reporter keeps his Superman duds when not wearing them. As it turns out, as part of an insurance policy requirement at the Daily Planet, Clark has to have a doctor’s physical and obviously cannot have on the suit at this time. Don’t ask me why a doctor wouldn’t find something unusual about the reporter’s “super” body during the examination. In any case, the wounded T-Ball takes the outfit to his two underworld pals Connie (Veda Ann Borg) and Ace (Dan Seymour) before dying. Ace thinks the costume is a phony but Connie believes it’s the real McCoy, particularly after she tries unsuccessfully to cut and burn it. The cigar chopping Ace is a bit slow on the uptake but when she explains to him that everyone figures that Superman has a secret alter ego he buys into her theory that at the moment he’s being “the other guy.” All they now have to do is find out who the “other guy” is and blackmail him.

Meanwhile Kent has returned home to discover that his irreplaceable suit is gone. Near frantic he contacts a private detective pal named Candy (Frank Jenks) but there’s a problem, a big one.  The reporter wants his pal to help find the suit but he can’t tell him what he’s supposed to be looking for. From this point on most of the dialog between them sounds like an Abbott and Costello routine:

“And they took something. I want to find out who it was and get it back.”

“Get what back?”

“I can’t tell you.”

“Why not?”

“I just can’t, Candy!”

Poor Candy. It isn’t bad enough that he’s been given an impossible job to do or that he’s nearly blown up by a bomb rigged by the charming Connie and Ace, but then the two get it into their noggins that he is actually the Man of Steel despite Connie’s hardly brilliant observation that “He [Candy] don’t look like Superman to me but I guess when he gets the costume on he looks different.”

Kent gets wind of this, realizes that Candy is in danger but can’t save the day in his working duds so he races over to his apartment in his reporter civvies, breaks down the door and knocks his friend cold before he knows what’s going on.

Unruffled, Ace and  Connie still think they’re holding the winning hand and try to blackmail Kent but he’s having nothing to do with it (“I don’t make deals. Save your breath.”)

He does, however, have to do something about them.  But what exactly?

Here now we have what is probably the most controversial moment in the history of TAOS, how Superman deals with Connie and Ace, the only people in the world (besides Ma Kent) who know his true identity. As he says, he hasn’t figured out a permanent solution just as yet (regrettably the amnesia formula from the final season’s The Big Forget hasn’t been created yet) so, since he can’t allow them to run their mouths, he must take temporary steps to silence them. His solution is to fly them to a remote, snow-covered mountain top from which there is no escape but which has a cabin for them to stay in. He warns them not to try and get away and flies off promising to return soon with more supplies.

Of course Ace and Connie want nothing to do with this place (Superman, they figure, is not going to return despite his promises) and waste no time in trying to escape. Back in Metropolis Superman had warned them to bring some warm clothing in preparation for their trip but they don’t seem to have counted on such severe conditions and certainly not the prospect of some mountain climbing on a steep and snow-covered mountain.  Connie in fact is wearing high heel shoes, not exactly Sir Edmund Hillary gear. Ace climbs down first and is successful for a moment but then it’s Connie’s turn and that’s the ballgame. No screams though. Guess even producer Bob Maxwell vetoed that.

As a kid I recall finding this scene not only startling but slightly traumatic. It certainly wasn’t what I expected and left me with an odd sort of uneasy feeling, not because someone had died on the show—murders were common during that first season—but because Superman was somewhat complicit in their deaths. Even though Ace and Connie had discovered his secret identity and were certainly crooks themselves did he have a right to strand them on a mountaintop where escape was impossible? Wouldn’t he have known they would have tried the impossible and died for their efforts? What about innocent until proven guilty?

It’s a question the Superman community has grappled with for years and which Freeman’s script stays clear of addressing. What did Superman really think about all of this? Did his ethical principles take a backseat for once as he weighed the possibilities and made a decision based on what was better in the long run for the world? Or did he truly think Ace and Connie would wait for the TV dinners, sleeping bags and subscription to the Book of The Month Club that he was going to bring them?

It’s hard to say—hard then, hard now.

April 2009

THE UNKNOWN PEOPLE

by Bruce Dettman

I’ve been involved in a couple of mob-related situations in my life, but the one which most reminds me of the unruly scenes from the first season’s The Unknown People—due primarily to the less than stellar makeup of the charming citizenry of  the town of Silsby—happened when I was in my early teens.

A close buddy and I were walking home one night from the local library when we passed the meeting hall of a certain notorious right wing extremist group where a rather large gathering was making quite a ruckus. My friend came from a family of very vocal liberals and progressives, and he had been brought up to despise this certain organization. He could also be a bit of a lose canon at times and had a tendency to stick his nose out regardless of the possible repercussions. In any case, before I knew what was going on, he had stepped into the smoke-marinated hall and given them quite a colorful earful. In those bygone days, kids were not only expected to respect adults but to fear them as well and the idea of physically confronting anyone over the age of 21 was pretty unheard of. I was incredibly shocked by what had come out of his mouth and was anxious to get as far away from that place as I could, especially when I turned to see that at least twenty grown-ups had emptied out into the street and with angry faces and loud threatening voices—much like the villagers in those old Universal Frankenstein movies with their blazing torches going after the monster—were running after us. Needless to say, we did not stick around to discuss politics.  My buddy shot off in one direction and I another. I specifically recall easily scaling a particularly high cyclone fence that had challenged me on numerous occasions in the past and finally ending up next to a large storage shed behind the local mortuary. There, for at least half hour, trying to breathe as silently as I could, I remained in the comforting shadows trying my best not to think about those empty (I hoped) coffins just a few feet away while at the same time listening for any sounds of these terrifying men and women who continued to prowl around the neighborhood intent upon discovering our lairs. To this day, I’m not really certain what they would have done if they’d have caught us, but it was one of the most unsettling experiences of my youth and I was never so relieved as when I finally crept towards the city creek—which I fortunately knew every inch of—and carefully made my way home.

Believe me, mobs are no fun, particularly when it’s your scent that they’re after. 

As most everyone knows, the first season’s The Unknown People was actually a re-edited version of the 1951 feature film Superman and the Mole Men, a big screen pilot sendoff for the TV series The Adventures of Superman which would introduce audiences to George Reeves as The Man of Steel and Phyllis Coates as intrepid newswoman Lois Lane. When the series was sold, the decision was made to break it down into two parts and air it as a two-parter at mid-season. In addition to some necessary editing and trimming due to television time restraints  ( i.e. commercial breaks), it was also decided to replace the weak theatrical score by Darrel Calker with the more evocative and effective library music that had been used all along that first year.  Produced by the team of Robert Maxwell and Bernard Luber, the director in charge was Lee Sholem with a screenplay credited to Richard Fielding (Maxwell) from a story idea by the show’s future producer Witney Ellsworth.

In keeping in fashion with the post World war II interest in science-fiction, Ellsworth decided to introduce a fantasy element into his scenario, in some ways ironic given that for the most part in the future series Superman’s challenges—unlike those in his comic book alternative life—would be totally terrestrial and of the homegrown variety, at least in the early seasons.  In any case, Superman’s adversaries here, if they can even be called that, are creatures from the center of the Earth who climb to the surface when Selsby’s deepest mining excavation disturbs their world.  The creatures are not initially hostile, however (unlike nearly every other sci-fi invader of that era portrayed on the screen), just curious about this other world, but their strange appearance (they are portrayed by bald-plated midgets decked out in furry bodies which resemble carpet scraps pasted over them) frightens the locals who, led by one particularly nasty hothead Luke Benson (played by one-time black listed actor and future  drama coach Jeff Corey) decide, after several misconstrued incidents involving the Mole Men, to track them down and kill them. This lynch mob portrait of small town America, particularly reflecting as it does the witch hunt mentality of the McCarthy era, is hardly a flattering one. This certainly isn’t Mayberry. From the town hospital administrator (Frank Reicher who earlier in his career confronted both King Kong and the Mummy, succumbing to the later) to the town barber the entire citizenry wants nothing better than to get their hands on these benevolent beings and “string them up.”  There is only one problem, Superman.

There is little material of an introductory nature to prepare audiences for the screen’s newest versions of Kent/Superman and Lois. They simply drive up the dusty road to the drilling site (owned by the National Oil Company, in case anyone is interested) and the story unfolds. It only takes about one second to realize that Lois is not your average tagalong gal. She has a mind of her own and quite a tongue as well. She has no interest in being stuck out in the boonies (“At least I can say I’ve seen Silsby. Big deal”) covering what seems to her a nothing story and pretty much lets everyone know it (“This is just ducky!”). It is also pretty obvious that Clark and she are old sparring partners and that more often than not she comes away the victor in these verbal frays.

Things further heat up, however, when that evening the night watchman (J. Farrell MacDonald) is found dead from what is first thought to be a heart attack but which is actually the result of being frightened to death by the sight of two of the furry creatures from the center of the Earth. Lois’ cool also evaporates when she too gets a gander at this twosome which also marks the first time audiences get to hear her unique and unforgettable scream.  Lois is taken home but Clark, whose suspicions are initially raised when he notes all the discarded expensive  drilling equipment and hangs around with the mine’s general manager Bill Corrigan (Walter Reed) who finally divulges that he initially closed the operation down because the drill bit had brought up microorganisms that seem to be contaminated by radium. Now, however, it is obvious that other life forms have also come from the center of the earth.

The creatures are more frightened than anything and take off for the town where they climb through the window of a house and attempt to play with a child (Beverly Washburn) but the mother enters the room—demonstrating a pretty fair set of vocal chords herself—and once again the Mole Men are on the run. This time, however they are being hunted by most of Silsby’s charming community led by the rabid Benson who discovers what has gone on in the house and sets out to destroy what he thinks are dangerous invaders. It should be noted here that according to the original script, the child was actually supposed to have been Benson’s daughter but this part of the storyline was for some reason nixed. I had always wondered watching the episode as a kid why Benson simply bolts into the house where the little girl lived without even knocking.

The rest of the show is mostly taken up by Benson and the mob’s relentless search for the Molemen. No matter how many times they are halted or lectured by Superman, (like some other first season characters, no one seem to recognize him or to know about his powers and subsequently they attack him in various ways: fists, bullets etc.) they persist in their venomous desire to catch and destroy the creatures, even, as one gadfly suggests, by hanging them.

At one point, as the creatures move across the top of a dam, Benson and the boys use them for target practice and bring down one of them. This incidentally, is the only time in the film where we actually see Superman fly, a none too impressive piece of animation not unlike that employed in the Kirk Alyn Columbia serials. The other moments of flight are depicted from the perspective of Superman looking down at the distances he is soaring over. Must have been a bit disappointing to all the kids who paid their dimes and nickels to go to this in expectation of seeing the Man of Steel moving above the clouds, but I guess budget restraints and/or an ability to get anything in the can that looked believable were prohibitive factors. Nonetheless, there are a few good takeoffs, one particularly that comes to mind is when Lois and Superman are next to Benson’s house and he realizes the creatures are in danger and shoots into space. It is believable and nearly flawless in execution. Not so the landing which takes place a few seconds later where he descends, nearly Peter Pan-like, amongst Benson and his flunkies.

If ever the character of Superman could be viewed as a no-nonsense avenger, it is in this film. He swoops down not only to physically halt the mob-like actions of the crowd but to disperse verbal warnings (“Stop acting like Nazi storm troopers”). Since their response is to mindlessly attack him—despite their having witnessed with their own eyes numerous examples of his invulnerability—he decides he has no other choice but to disarm them which he does, all but Benson who eventually is nearly done in by the Mole Men’s advanced weapon (a crudely customized vacuum cleaner) until Superman deflects the lethal rays thereby saving the repentant agitator.

The show closes with Superman taking the tint invaders back to the drill site and watching them climb back to their world. Seconds later, an explosion occurs which will seals in the Mole Men for good causing Lois to abandon her cynicism for a moment to get philosophical.

“It’s almost as if they’re saying, you live your lives and we’ll live ours.”

As mentioned earlier, Lois is Lois from the first line, recognizable for what she is, tough, cynical and not endowed with a great deal of patience with other people who get in her way (“Oh he’s just a fool”). By the same token, Clark Kent that is hardly the soft-spoken Casper-milquetoast of the comic strip, comic books, radio series, animated shorts or Columbia serials. Reeves’ Kent is what one would expect from a big city reporter whose daily beat centers around gangsters, murderers, and every sort of crime. He too is tough and willing to take control if the need arises. Lois might scoff at him at times; challenge his manhood (“He’s scared to death. It’s pitiful”) and try to put him in his place, but he stays right in there as a commanding presence save on those occasions when he has little choice but to duck out in order to get to those blue tights and save the day. This is a radical departure from the Clark Kent of earlier days. Some pundits have criticized this. Kirk Alyn himself was quoted as knocking the fact that there was no real difference between the way Kent and Superman were played but I have always disagree with this, feeling that a big city newsman would have to be aggressive and confident to do his job. In any case, aside from a few moments when his alter ego is called for, Reeves plays the reporter as a seasoned and resourceful character, likable too. The chemistry with Lois is terrific—one would think watching them that Coates and he had perfected their heated back and forth banter for years but this was their first outing—and their scenes together are just wonderful.

With science fiction film growing in popularity after the war combined with Superman’s unearthly powers, it’s no surprise that it was decided to introduce something more bizarre and other worldly for him to go up against rather than the racketeers and gangsters that he would face in the subsequent series. Nonetheless, time restriction and a minuscule budget made the Mole Men rather pathetic and hardly worthy adversaries for the Man of Steel. Of course, they don’t turn out to be adversaries at all, but their minuscule size and rather silly—certainly not frightening—appearance could have been improved upon with just a bit of effort. Then in the opening scenes at least the suggestion of menace could have been created. Even as a child these guys didn’t bother me much. 

Of course, the real monsters of The Unknown People are the citizens of Silsby who reflect the monstrous and unreasonable lengths humankind will often to go to preserve and protect their own little worlds. No matter who or what is injured in the process.

Regrettably, in the real world, there is no Superman to do anything about this.

August 2008

THE MONKEY MYSTERY

My mother and father never knew anything about Mitch and his friends which upon reflection was probably a good thing. Even in the 1950s world I grew up in where parents didn’t spot Jack the Ripper or Charles Manson on every street corner and where most kids were fairly free to roam in all directions after school—provided, of course, that we showed up on time for dinner—they probably wouldn’t have appreciated knowing that several times a year I made contact with a certain group of gentlemen of leisure, then also known—so as not to be confused with the homeless of today—as tramps or hobos. (My mother once had me in stitches by telling my niece, a new mother at the time, that when I was growing up she always knew where I was). Mitch was the titular head of this small group—perhaps due to the fact that he carried a monkey named Homer with him—who occasionally stopped off in my California hometown and took advantage of a nice picturesque area overlooking the town’s main high school. Not only did this spot have a large comfortable grassy area to sleep upon, but also offered a beautiful creek for water and a wooded area for shade. Best of all for their purposes it was so off the beaten path that few visited it save kids like my pals and I who were hiking up to a nearby reservoir in search of alligator lizards when we made their acquaintance. At first we were pretty cautious about them (that parental admonishment of never talking to strangers was indelibly tattooed on our brains) but we were undeniably curious too. They eventually invited into their camp, asked us lots of questions about our town, whether we like school etc. and we in turn badgered them for stories about life on the road. Not long after this some not so subtle requests for helping them with their provisions began, requests we were only too happy to help them out with. I recall going home and lifting some bread, peanut butter, slices of bologna, a few cigarettes from my mother’s pack of Kent’s and even several ounces of my father’s scotch (a special request from Mitch) which I stored in old medicine prescription bottles. The scotch was particularly important because when I added that to my stash he would smile, take a swig of the stuff and let me take Homer on my shoulder. Homer wasn’t a particularly attractive Monkey. He was lacking hair on his one shoulder and top of his head, he could have used an orthodontist (and a few breath mints) and wasn’t particularly friendly, but still the novelty of having a monkey sit on my shoulder was too much too pass on even if I really didn’t trust the little bugger.

I know there are lots of people who think Monkeys are incredibly adorable (Tarzan, Sheena and Jungle Jim, for instance) and obviously this also includes Clark and Lois in the first season’s THE MONKEY MYSTERY when they are strolling down the street and happen upon an organ grinder (predictably named Tony and played by Michael Vallon) who not only entertains the neighborhood kids with his music and the antics of his monkey Peppy (who is decked out in a Superman outfit) but who moonlights as a kind of courier getting messages to a couple of criminal agents Crane and Max ( Harry Lewis and Bill Challee). They are working with a certain government (always unnamed in 50s shows but the Cold War audience certainly didn’t need to be hit over the head to realize who this was, right?!). For a penny the hardworking Peppy hands back the payer a fortune on a slip of paper but  this time he  bungles the job and instead gives the unsuspecting Lois the note intended for the devious twosome and which concerns the arrival of Maria (Allene Roberts), the daughter of Jan Moleska (Fred Essler)  a murdered European freedom fighter and scientist whose fate has been depicted in a short prolog set in Central Europe (although looking a lot like Moose Island  to me) where the doomed scientist gives his offspring his secret formula hidden in a locket with instructions to get it to the President of the United States or it could mean “the end of freedom on Earth.” Naturally Lois, smelling a scoop, hides the information from Clark and heads out to meet the train and the inventor’s offspring, but in doing so finds that Maria has been attacked and knocked unconscious and that she is soon the recipient of the same brutal treatment. Thanks to Jimmy, who finds the original note in Lois’ office, Clark/Superman puts two and two together and flies to the rescue (leaving behind a particularly annoyed Perry White). There’s luckily a doctor on board the train (the ubiquitous Steven Carr) and Lois and Maria will survive. Still the missing locket, which the Man of Steel now realizes, must contain a formula for a defense against the atomic bomb, must be located.  It’s back to Metropolis and a plan to catch the spies but things go a bit array and not only is Jimmy nearly done in but Peppy almost bites the bullet (literally). Superman saves both though (coming through a window in a beautifully executed maneuver that is clearly George Reeves and not a stuntman), Peppy gets a banana and the nation is safe. Not certain about that protection from the A-Bomb though.

This show, written by Ben Peter Freeman and Doris Gilbert and directed by Tommy Carr, is gritty, dark (despite the monkey antics) and perhaps due to the Cold War trappings, full of permissible violence even if most of it occurs off screen (two women beaten, a an organ grinder knifed to death, the torture and execution of the scientist). No wonder the Kelloggs folks began to wonder about the suitability of the show for kids. We loved it, of course, but who was listening to us?

December 2007

CRIME WAVE

I am pleased to report that my ties to organized crime have been non-existent save for a one-time and totally unexpected meeting with a bodyguard and (reportedly) mob hit man named Sid when I was visiting Hollywood a few years ago trying (unsuccessfully) to pitch a script idea. Sid was approximately as broad as Wyoming, somewhat resembled the late actor Aldo Ray, and wore heavy black leather gloves in the 90 degree heat. Having been coached to talk football with him (the only subject he fancied other than his career choice), we chatted about the L.A. Rams for a few seconds and that was that. We did not keep in touch.

Having originally come from a small town not far from Chicago, the one time hub of mobster activity during the 1920s and 30s, my parents had a few unsavory run-ins of their own. As a school girl, my mother lived only blocks away from the site of the St. Valentine’s Day Massacre in the windy city and never forgot walking home from school and passing all the police and onlookers that infamous day. My father’s uncle, a cabbie, had part of his jaw shot off in something called the Yellow Taxi War, and when they were older and dating, my parents used to lift a few with Al Capone’s cousin who owned a tavern just out of the city. My mother remarked on more than one occasion that he was a very nice guy. Naturally, I later used this against her if I had too many beers in my college days and she began to criticize my bad habits (“Well, excuse me, Mom. At least I didn’t go out drinking with the Capone family”).

Crime Wave, the first season’s last show, is a bit of a hodgepodge that probably shouldn’t work as well as it does but thanks to Tommy Carr’s spirited direction, the dexterous (and underrated) editing of Al Joseph and Ben Peter Freeman’s energetic, if occasionally nonsensical script, the show is a highly enjoyable roller coaster of a ride. Not pausing for a second once the opening credits have rolled, we are instantly vaulted into a feverishly paced montage heightened by dramatic narration depicting rampant crime in Metropolis. The clips used to illustrate this lawlessness are culled from both earlier action-filled moments from the series itself (The Mind Machine, No Holds Barred, Night of Terror etc) as well as selected scenes lifted from old B movies (veteran character actor Lane Chandler can be spotted in one of these). If any show in the first year raised the provincial/commercial hackles of the folks at Kelloggs it would certainly be Crime Wave. Scene after scene depict not only visual mayhem of every kind, but also the screams and cries of the victims including a guy purposely crushed by an on-coming truck. No wonder several of the more gruesome and suggestive moments of the violent content was later trimmed from the circulating prints. This was rough stuff and about as far removed from the later Mr. Zero and Joey as Jethro Bodine from Sophocles.

Inspector Henderson and his force don’t seem up to the task of curbing the crime spree. Superman, “The First Citizen of Metropolis,” volunteers to get down and dirty with the criminal element that has all but run amok. Backed not only by the political muscle of the Daily Planet but by prominent attorney Walter Canby (the deliciously smooth John Eldredge) and his citizens committee, Superman sets out to “declare war on the racketeers.” As described by radio/TV announcer Carlton Avery (played by Bill Kennedy whose voice curiously changes depending on whether he is facing or looking away from the camera) Superman is “like an avenging angel sweeping all before him.” Borrowing from the F.B.I. in creating his own public enemy list (contrary to popular belief, the Bureau did not initiate this practice until 1950) the Man of Steel goes after the likes of “Big” Ed Bullock, Bill “Shortcake” Mitchell and Mike “The Crusher” Dana as he methodically works his way up the list of twelve to the top man, the unknown Mr. Big.

It comes as no great surprise (not even when I was five or six years old) that Mr. Big is none other than the respectable Mr. Walter Canby, one of the coolest and most unruffled adversaries Superman would ever face on TV. Even in the face of the single-minded Man of Steel devoting himself  to uncovering his identity, Canby calmly reassures his minions (Phil Van Zandt and Al Eban) that “We’re gonna kill him!” Before this can happen, however, Canby has Sally (Barbara Fuller), the one female member of the gang, follow and take film of certain known associates of Superman , people like Lois (“Who’s the doll?”), Inspector Henderson (“crummy copper”), and Clarke Kent (“Big sweetheart”). In following the latter—and speaking of uncovering identities—Sally’s camera trails Clark dashing into an alley followed by the sudden appearance of Superman. This is definitely food for thought.

“Wait a minute. Run that again,” Canby demands.

“I thought you’d like that one,” Sally glibly responds.

“Ok”, that’s enough,” he says after viewing the footage a second time. “We’re in business.”

Well, perhaps so, but oddly—some might even say amazingly—this issue of Clark becoming Superman never is broached after this. Canby apparently only has one thing on his mind, to lure Superman out to Dover Cliff near Willow Falls and place him in an electric flytrap as conceived by an unnamed professor (actor Joe Mell who a few years later would help Whit Bissell turn Michael Landon into the title creature in I Was A Teenage Werewolf). Who Superman might actually be seems of little if any importance to him.

I have to admit that as a kid I wasn’t really concerned about Superman’s identity being discovered as much as I was worried about his getting hurt or even killed even though I was fairly positive he couldn’t really be injured (Kryptonite was a season away). And yet, when he entered that locked room and fell victim to that blizzard of Electrical shards (and I must say he put a lot into his bogus death scene) I had a few disquieting doubts about his survival (even though I couldn’t quite fathom why he hadn’t just broken through the doors or walls. A question Superman would later ask Canby and his cohorts—who if they have an answer are more interesting in bolting from a very pissed off Superman than in sticking around and chatting).

The closing line is one of the series’ most memorable with the Man of Steel bringing a visibly roughed up Canby back to the Daily Planet offices and with a startled Perry, Lois and Jimmy listening announced that “There isn’t a number one crime boss in metropolis anymore.”

It’s a tough and uncompromising ending to one of the toughest and most uncompromising of shows. And I think, one of the best. This is also all Superman’s show—and some might think his finest hour—with the regulars not having much screen time allowing instead the Man of Steel to take full center stage.

Only one question remains. What about Sally and even more important, what about that film?

October 2007

The Mind Machine

July 2007

CASE OF THE TALKATIVE DUMMY

By Bruce Dettman

Ventriloquists seem to be a dying breed these days, but in the 1950s they were a staple of television seen regularly on variety shows, commercials, and sometimes even headlining their own series. On the national scene there were the big names: Edgar Bergen with Charlie McCarthy and Mortimer Snerd, Senore Wenches, Paul Winchell with Jerry Mahoney and Knucklehead Smiff, Jimmy Nelson with Danny O’Day and wooden canine Farfel and Shari Lewis with Lamb Chop. While I liked all of these—well, in truth I wasn’t all that nuts about Sherri and Lamb Chop (a bit too sweet for my tastes)—my real preference was for the kiddie show hosts who were featured in my video neck of the woods, the San Francisco Bay Area. We only got four channels then, but the stations were saturated with ventriloquists and their entertaining dummies. Just a few of these included Mr. Bob who gave us the Three Stooges and was joined by his pals Lester the Lion, Leroy the Dragon and Happy, the Boy, Skipper Sedley and his dummy King Fuddel (I once met the King and up close he didn’t look quite as pristine—shaking his hand was like pumping dry rot and his face was lined with spider web-like cracks). The most bizarre of all Fireman Frank (aka “Skinny in the Pit”) who hung out with Dynamo Dudley (a robot) and Carl the Carrot (complete with sunglasses and beret). Remember, this was a San Francisco station.

Ventriloquists and their sometimes bizarre duplicitous relationships with their dummies could also be on the creepy side, a fact often exploited in both film and television in such macabre exercises as the British horror anthology Dead of Night, Masquerade with Anthony Hopkins and The Twilight Zone.

Not surprising then, given the high visibility and popularity of ventriloquists that the first season of TAOS would build an episode around one, the result being The Case of the Talkative Dummy.

Things start out innocently enough with Lois (Phyllis Coates) and Clark taking Jimmy out for his birthday to the Gaiety Theatre where they have box seats to see the act of Marco and Freddy. For the record, Lois looks mighty fetching in her basic black and pearls and even Jimmy has dropped the bow tie for the occasion. Clark, however, is in his tried and true working suit. Perhaps there’s something special about it which precludes him wearing regular clothes. In the later comics, it folded into a pouch in his cape but who knows.

Lois looks sharp all right, but so is her tongue. Right off the bat she’s got the barbs waiting for Clark who innocently remarks to Jimmy that:

“A guy’s birthday only comes once a year.”

“Now there’s a sharp observation.” Ouch.

Judging by both her barbed banter and her rolling eyes, Lois is obviously not having a very good time. Things get no better when Marco (Syd Sailor) and his dummy Freddie show up on stage with an act that is even tired and corny by 1950 standards. You couldn’t prove it by Jimmy, who seems to be having the time of his life. Clark meanwhile is also all smiles, mostly noting with glee as Lois winces at every bad joke. Then something odd happens. Freddie seems to be going off on his own tangent with no help from the visually flustered and confused Marco who eventually terminates the act. Someone else is obviously putting words in the dummy’s mouth and Lois and Clark want to figure out just who it is.

The whole thing turns out to be part of a series of armored car heists rigged by the company’s very own president Harry Green (Pierre Watkins, Perry White in the Columbia serials).  Tris Coffin is along as the red herring Davis and the second string henchman is Philip Pine (who appeared with Coffin in the same season’s Mystery of the Broken Statues). The details for the secret routes the company changes daily is supplied by Watkin’s co-hort Pine, another with ventriloquist skills, who transmits the information through the dummy Freddie for the robbers in the audience to hear. Seems a rather clumsy and complicated means of getting things done (haven’t they ever heard of a telephone?). But Dennis Cooper and Lee Backman’s script is ok as is Tommy Carr’s steady direction.

Reportedly, this was the first show that Jack Larson filmed so it’s of added interest to watch his performance. His first scene is where he’s imprisoned in a safe and lowered out a window (sweating heavily in the process—I can imagine what those early day studio lights were like)—supported only by a pretty feeble rope that breaks on the way down. This would have ended the cub reporter’s life except that Kent spots the scenario from blocks away in Lois car and races as Superman to the rescue. Why Lois doesn’t find it odd that Clark spotted Jim through a locked safe is never explained. In any case, good thing that safe wasn’t made of lead. Inspector Henderson (Robert Shayne) has a larger part than usual part in this particular episode—It too must have been one of his earliest appearances—and seems very stuff and extremely obstinate (pigheaded might be a better description). He does have a particularly good line when watching with Lois as Kent dashes off with little explanation she asks him where Clark is always running off to.

“I don’t know. Maybe he runs into an alley, takes off his glasses and turns into Superman.”

Well, of course this is exactly what he does as well as figuring out the scheme and nabbing all the guilty parties.

Proving once again that Superman is no dummy.

March 2007

RESCUE

By Bruce Dettman

I don’t know where the brunt of the blame should go, Edgar Allan Poe or Dr. Viraldi. Poe probably came along later in my adolescence with his famous chilling tale “Premature Burial” and the terrifying notion of being placed in a coffin and interred under the earth while still alive. I ran into Dr. Viraldi a few years earlier when I was about five. While racing through a bowl of Campbell’s tomato soup I somehow managed in my haste to bite off and swallow the end of a plastic spoon. We were relatively new in California at the time and still without a family physician and someone, I think it was a neighbor, had recommended this particular sawbones to my parents. My mother rushed me to his office (people were more hesitant about going to the emergency ward of a hospital in those days) and with her remaining in the waiting room I was led alone into his examining area and told to climb up on the table where Viraldi began poking and prodding me. Apparently I was not remaining still enough for him so he eventually strapped me down so I couldn’t move then seconds later left the room to take a call that had come in for him. He also switched off the light on his way out thereby leaving me alone and unable to move in what was rapidly becoming for me a very terrifying darkness. I immediately started crying and even howling not long after that. I made such a ruckus that my mother ran in, saw what was going on and took me out of there never to return. I don’t know for certain if that one incident triggered my fear of closed places but it sure didn’t help it. And by the way, for the record, no one ever found that spoon.

Fortunately, for Lois (Phyllis Coates) she doesn’t seem to suffer from claustrophobia. A good thing for her in the first season episode of TAOS titled Rescue (directed by Tommy Carr), since she eventually finds herself trapped and partially buried in a mine cave-in. Monroe Manning’s script has her on assignment in the town of Carbide, Penn. (Pop. 3356/Elevation 844) to do a story on the possibility of a new proposed tunnel constituting a danger to the city. Dropped off by Clark, who then drives onto Washington and a failed attempt to get a story out of some uncooperative politician, Lois is not the least pleased about her latest story and wastes no time or energy venting her displeasure at the prospect of doing nothing but “tramping around coal mines.”  Clark is hardly sympathetic and enjoys ribbing her. “Maybe you’ll find a diamond,” he wisecracks.

Meanwhile an old stubborn geezer named Pop Polgase (Houseley Stevenson Sr.) has his own ideas about the project. Despite warnings not to go ahead with his own private tunnel, does just that with the result being he’s the victim of a cave-in and the target of a rescue mission.

Rescue is an episode that really shows us what Lois is made of and provides a great part for the always-attractive Coates (who was never more independent, stubborn or unmoved by the suggestions of others). Upon hearing of the old man’s plight she instantly grabs a miners uniform and helmet from a line shack wall and after calling the copy editor at the Daily Planet (his name is Walt, if you’re interested and the number is Metropolis 60500) heads out to do something about it. What’s interesting here is that Lois doesn’t seem to be interjecting herself into the rescue operations to get a headline story, but rather, impatient with what she construes as the slow poke approach of the emergency crew (24 hours, is the estimated time it will take to reach the man according to Inspector D.K. Sherman, played by Fred Sherman who would later show up in The Deserted Village), decides it is up to her to rescue him herself (“Well, I’m going in there!”).

It doesn’t prove to be a good idea, however, and Lois is pretty soon in the same situation as good old Pop. Worse actually. This is most likely due to her causing further vibrations by her entrance and later attempts to free him. More timbers and rocks have fallen making their plight even graver. Pop’s somewhat of a defeatist and suggests giving up but that’s not Lois’ style (“Wait and do nothing? Not me!”). And she doesn’t.

While all of this is going on Clark is getting nowhere in Washington, D.C. except sharing banter with the Planet’s capital correspondent (Milt Kibbee) who reflects sarcastically that “Taxes are going up and Congress is viewing the situation with alarm.” Touches like this, reflecting the real world, are always a nice addition in the first year episodes. Clark takes a rain check on making a pit stop at the local Press Club and decides instead to pickup Lois on his way back. He misses the bundled newspapers deposited on a curb which headline Lois and Pops’ plight, and when he’s having car trouble and has to get out and manually rev the engine, he doesn’t hear the radio announcer’s voice (which sounds suspiciously like actor Walter Reed from The Unknown People) describing the potentially tragic scenario in Carbide (apparently super hearing can be turned on and off like those X-ray peepers, probably a good thing when you think about it).

By the time Kent has arrived at the sight of the rescue operation gas has begun to flood the tunnel and both Lois and Pop begin to suffer its dire effects. Clark doesn’t have a clue what’s going on until one of the miners (Edmund Cobb, a staple villain in hundreds of B westerns who would also later show up in The Deserted Village) explains things to him. With no time for polite exits, Clark, with everyone watching him, runs off around the corner of some boulders  (in the process doing something rather quirky, for some reason lifting and setting his hat back on his head) then changes into Superman and flies across the sky, landing at the mouth of the cave. There’s a great sequence here as the Man of Steel hurries through the tunnel frantically pushing aside everything in his path until he reaches and frees the twosome.

Later, recovering from her ordeal Lois, joined by Clark, has a last comment for the reporter who offers to drive her back to Metropolis.

“And Clark, Superman finally took me out.” It’s my favorite closing line of the series.

No Jimmy or Perry in this one but the no-nonsense, not to be deterred and feisty Coates doesn’t need any backup. She’s more than capable of taking care of things on her own.

For awhile there you even have to wonder if she’ll need Superman.

December 2006

THE HAUNTED LIGHTHOUSE

 by Bruce Dettman

As long as I can remember, I have wanted to spend a night in a lighthouse.

For the record, the first time I ever saw or even heard of a lighthouse was in the 1953 monster film The Beast From 20,000 Fathoms, based only remotely on a Ray Bradbury tale “The Foghorn.” The title creature, lured out of the depths by the blinking beacon, attacks and mangles a lighthouse (in the story the monster thinks the lighthouse might be a possible mate). Since then, however, I have always been curious about these shaft-like edifices standing remote and lonely at the water’s edge, intrigued by their allure, and attraction and have visited as many of them as possible when traveling in coastal areas.

In the first season’s The Haunted Lighthouse we don’t really get to glimpse much of the one situated on Moose Island off the coast of Maine where Jimmy Olsen has been invited by his widowed Aunt Louisa (whose husband Captain Horn died some twenty years earlier) to spend a vacation. We are given a few distant shots of the place, both at night and during the day, and Jim does approach it once—only to have his entrance curtailed by a knife thrown in his general direction—but that’s about it, despite the tantalizing episode title which seems to suggest that it will be featured more prominently in the plot.

Personally, if I was Jimmy, I would have turned right around and headed back for Metropolis after about one night spent on old Moose Island. Sure, it might be enjoyable to spend a day exploring the rocky terrain—even if Jimmy has never appeared as the nature lover type to me, more of a hot dog and ballgame kind of guy—but otherwise for companionship he’s pretty much limited to  his old Aunt, who he has not seen since he was a baby, a shy deaf mute servant girl (Allene Roberts, later in The Whistling Bird) and his cousin Chris who has the personality of a rabid pit bull and threatens Jim at every turn. Then toss in the directionless and haunting cry of what sounds to be someone in danger (“Help me! I’m drowning!”) which Jimmy hears every time he is off by himself and that’s about everything the place has to offer. Some vacation! Of course, nothing is really as it seems in this episode. A certain Mrs. Carmody (Sara Padden) and her son Chris (Jimmy Ogg), the latter in league with some smugglers who use the lighthouse to bring in their stolen goods, have kept the real Aunt Louisa (Effie Laird)* prisoner while they impersonate her and Jim’s real cousin Chris who is away in the service (what a coincidence both women have sons named Chris, convenient too). Clark Kent, hearing Jimmy’s tale during a phone conversation, catches on pretty quickly that something isn’t kosher on the island and in what has to be one of the oddest flying sequences in the series’ history (without the aid of DVD slowdown I would have had one hell of a time figuring out, given the peculiar angle and framing of the shot, just exactly what I was watching) Superman joins Jimmy to straighten things out. It takes a bit of time, however, and before the whole thing is over the young reporter gets himself beat up and knocked out by the phony Chris and Mack (William Challee), his partner in crime. Left to drown by the incoming sea, Superman arrives just in time to save him and to (off screen) release the real and quite resilient Aunt Louisa who, with pistol in hand, has a fine old time holding both Mrs. Carmody and her offspring until the Coast Guard authorities (led by all purpose TAOS actor Steve Carr) arrive. She’s also mighty impressed by the Man of Steel (“Where’s that handsome Superman?” she asks Jimmy) and in addition, seems to be one—if not the only—person in the history of the show to note a resemblance between Clark and Superman (“Why he’s handsome too. As a matter of fact he looks….”) which sends Kent in hurriedly ducking in the opposite direction.

The Haunted Lighthouse was an early entry in the first season and it’s a dandy. It’s really all a showcase for Jack Larson who as usual handles the assignment masterfully. In other less capable hands the role of Jimmy could come off as embarrassingly naïve, even silly, but Larson makes him a believable and vulnerable innocent who we genuinely like and feel concern and empathy for. We share in his growing anxiety and later fear which, because of the sincerity of his performance, seems legitimate to us. The episode is a great showcase for the actor. He was never better in the series and that’s saying a lot.

Atmosphere has a lot to do with the success of this particular show and director Tommy Carr and writer Eugene Solow, wishing to establish the mysterious  aspect of the story while highlighting the forlorn and isolated local of Moose Island with its fog marinated landscape and precarious cliffs and jutting rocks, jump start things with a highly evocative and haunting opening narration by George Reeves in which, against stock footage of the angry swelling sea and rugged coast (and with the first year music never more effective at creating mood) he sets the stage for the story. I’ve always wondered if this narration was in the first version of the script or whether it was a late addition, something the writer/director came up with when they were not satisfied with the original opening of Jimmy just arriving on the island. Regardless of which, it’s a great touch and Reeves flat, unemotional delivery is excellent.

The Haunted Lighthouse, much like many other first year offerings, is a tidy little B thriller, condensed into a half hour. Even without Superman it would be, thanks to Larson’s efforts, Carr’s taut direction and the supporting players (including the unbilled Peter Parrot), engrossing and highly memorable.

* The end credits, by the way, incorrectly list Maude Prickett (who would later show up in The Deserted Village) as being cast as Aunt Louisa. Whether Ms. Prickett was originally cast in the part and had to be replaced at the last moment—to late to re-write the credits—has never been positively established.

October 2006

THE EVIL THREE

By Bruce Dettman

Back in the 1950s when I crossed the country with my parents in our two-toned Buick Special (later a Chevy Impala) on the way to visit relatives on the East Coast, it could often be a pretty grueling experience for a bored and hyperactive kid. My father and mother up in the front seat, listening to Vic Damone or Patti Page on the radio, expected me to behave and keep my chatter to a minimum (and to be fair, just how many times could they be expected to tolerate my cinematic lectures on the likes of Attack of the 50 Foot Woman or Teenagers From Outer Space). Things could get pretty darn dull, particularly since I got carsick if I read anything, even my beloved comic books. There was, however, one element that made my backseat Hell just a bit more palatable and that was my Superman figure. This brightly colored, well-sculpted replica of the Man of Steel was made out of light but durable plastic and had originally been designed to be propelled into the sky with a tightly strung rubber band.  Early on, however, I found that Superman was getting too beat up when he crashed back to Earth on concrete sidewalks or roads (not to mention an occasion when my dog, who disliked anything sky born, got to him before I could) so I put him to other uses. The main use being to hold him up against the backseat window of the car and pretend he was flying across the ever changing terrain. In this way my plastic Superman and I passed the hours soaring above America. We flew past Mount Rushmore, the Little Big Horn, the wheat fields of Kansas, the skylines of New York and Chicago, the Badlands of New Mexico and the majestic Sierras. We flew against the shores of the Atlantic and Pacific Oceans, the Rocky Mountains and the plains of Texas. Quite frankly, without him I don’t know what I would have done. We were quite a team.

It was also during these trips that we often stayed in some rather odd places. The highways in those days were not littered with as many attractive motels as they are today. While my mother was a sticker for nice and respectable lodgings (she would thoroughly inspect the beds before we got in them) there were occasions due to storms or intense heat or just road weariness when we had to settle for digs not exactly four star quality.

Nothing, however, was quite as bad at the Bayou Hotel outside of Beaver Falls where Jimmy Olsen and Perry White, off for a weekend of fishing, have elected to stay for the night (White doesn’t like night driving and I guess doesn’t trust Jimmy behind the wheel). The Editor hasn’t managed to catch any fish but the cub reporter has caught both a bevy of mosquitoes and White’s wrath as he whines and complains about almost everything (“You call this fun??!!”). Obviously the great outdoors are not exactly Jimmy’s cup of tea and you have to wonder why the fishing-loving editor brought him along in the first place. The scene plays out very well though and there is terrific rapport between the actors. His gruffness and impatience aside, it is obvious that White harbors great fatherly affection for the cub reporter. This is John Hamilton and Jack Larson at their best with an engaging chemistry that I only wish had been put to more use with other shows centering on the twosome away from the office.

Little does the twosome realize what they’re in for on this recreational getaway but thanks to Ben Freeman’s dark, taut, fast-moving and quirky script they will learn soon enough. White remembers the Bayou as a quality establishment from several years back but things have changed drastically. The original owner, George Taylor, is reported to have drowned, but has actually been the victim of a brutal murder (apparently starved to death, his skeletal remains—this grotesque moment cut from later airings of the show—still shackled to a wall in the hotel basement by nephew Macey (Rhys Williams) who continues to search for his uncle’s fortune. Also in league with Macey—at least when they’re not trying to kill each other with swords and fists—is Colonel Brand (Jonathan Hale). Rounding out this charming trio is Elsa (Cecil Elliot), a marginally nutty (or one might say marginally sane) crippled woman who knows the location of the money but won’t divulge it.

Obviously the last thing the Colonel and Macey want around are prying guests. Seeing that Jimmy is ripe for discouragement they decide to scare him off with suggestions that the hotel is haunted. In order to achieve this, Macey disguises himself as the dead uncle and repeatedly exposes himself to the terrified youth. For the record, the individual playing the ghostly figure is neither Williams or Hale but rather the uncredited actor whose likeness is seen in a framed portrait at the beginning of the episode. Perry, of course, believes nothing of this—although he does smell a story and calls Clark on his car phone to have him check the records of George Taylor’s supposed drowning death (White’s number, by the way, is MX39162 and wasn’t it amazing in the 1950s to actually see a car equipped with a phone!!). He doesn’t believe any of Jimmy’s nonsense—at least not until Jimmy and he go exploring and run into the aforementioned skeleton plus the murderous team of Taylor and Brand. There’s a short scuffle here and for once the aging editor gets to mix it up a bit even though he’s quickly clobbered, as is Jim. They might have ended up as dead as the George Taylor, skewered by brand’s cutlass, but the old lady intervenes and won’t put up with any further killing and holds off the vicious twosome (“Murderers!” she wails).  Later as Perry and Jimmy try and make an exit they too are held at bay by the pistol packing octogenarian who reveals the whole story of the murder and the reason behind it and asks for their help.  Perry and a less than enthusiastic Jimmy decide to check out the tale and do indeed find the money behind a (fairly obvious) boulder in the basement. But Macey comes upon them and in one of the first year’s most talked about scenes—one that would also disappear for many years—takes a cue from Richard Widmark in the classic film noir Kiss of Death and pushes the wheelchair bound old lady down the basement stairs which also lays Perry and Jim unconscious. By this time, Clark has grown concerned and decides to investigate as Superman and a more no-nonsense, impatient and angry Man of Steel could seldom be found on the series. The Colonel—who as is often the case with characters during the first season, doesn’t seem to know who Superman is—first takes him on a wild goose chase, then uses his sword on his impenetrable shoulders but is tossed aside like a rag doll for his efforts. Macey attempts to shoot him with a shotgun and when that gets him nowhere tries a wrestling move but the Man of Steel will have none of it (“Tell me where they are or I’ll break every bone in your body” he says—and means it). This is the first season’s darker, avenging angel Superman and he’s great to watch in action.

Director Tommy Carr gives the actor free reign to vent his anger and (hardly) pulls any punches. This is a tight, hard-edged little mystery, offbeat and nourish in execution and content, with no leg room for niceties or polite restraint. It is also one terrific ride for the viewer. I love it.

Ultimately, Perry, Jimmy and the old Lady are found more or less in tact and Macey and the Colonel escorted away by the police. Superman offers to fly them home but White, probably wisely, decides they have had enough excitement for the day and declines the offer, much to Jimmy’s disappointment.

In retrospect, the thought of a scene depicting Superman in flight holding onto White and Jimmy just might make even a wheel-chaired woman shooting down a flight of stairs seem a bit tame by comparison.

September 2006

THE HUMAN BOMB

By Bruce Dettman

One fine spring day during my less than stellar college career a fellow student decided, for reasons never quite clear (although there were rumors of a romance that had gone sour), to take a suicide leap off one of the tallest buildings on campus—only three stories, if I recall right. At the time, I was attempting to chat up an actress in the drama department who looked a little bit like a young Linda Darnell (and getting absolutely nowhere in the process) when everyone around us started to race over to the site of the leap. The guy didn’t make a big production about it. He said nothing, made no significant gesture—he just jumped. There wasn’t even enough time for the local press to show up.  The Darnell look-alive and I were just in time to see him land and roll. He didn’t die but he did break a kneecap and leg. It could have been my imagination, but at the time, I could have sworn some campus wit in the large crowd said something like “Now there’s a guy who could have used Superman.” It was then that I recalled the first year episode The Human Bomb in which not only Lois Lane but Jimmy Olsen could well have been the victims of a significant plunge from the Daily Planet building.

The fine character actor Trevor Bardette plays “Bet a Million” Butler, an unsavory fellow who is known city-wide to make wagers on just about anything. Bardette logged a long career of film and TV parts going back to the late 1930s, but I will personally always recall him as Old Man Clanton, a semi-regular character on Hugh O’Brien’s The Life and Legend of Wyatt Earp, for several seasons until his character died in a hail of bullets fired by some Mexican banditos.

In the story Butler, hanging out at the Metropolis City Club, makes a $100,000 bet with a crony named Conway played by Lou Krugman (of Andy’s Gang fame) that he can control Superman for thirty minutes. One wonders if the plan he eventually puts into action occurs to him at this exact instant or whether he can’t resist the challenge and manages to come up with his plan later. Whichever, what he does come up with is that he will strap some dynamite to himself, visit the Daily Planet, handcuff himself to Lois Lane (Phyllis Coates) and demand that Superman sit tight for half an hour—while a couple of his stooges rob the Metropolis Museum—and do nothing to intervene or he will detonate the explosive.  Interestingly enough, when Lois realizes the danger she is in she first thinks of going to Clark Kent for help, an odd request since she is continually lambasting the reporter for his timidity. Despite protests from Jimmy Olsen, Butler eventually leads Lois out on the building ledge where she sheds her shoes, which fall to the pavement below and are found by Clark (a very similar scene would occur decades later in the first Christopher Reeves Superman film) who, of course, rushes up to see what’s going on. By the way, if you look closely you will notice in the Daily Planet offices the first Miss Bachrach (played by Almira Sessions) walking briskly by in the background although unlike her part in Night of Terror she has no dialogue. This time the Planet receptionist is played by Ailene Towne who was Lara in Superman on Earth (as well as Commando Cody’s secretary in the serial Radar Men from the Moon).

Clark, who angrily responds to Jimmy’s urging that he locate Superman with “Do you think that I can turn Superman on and off like a faucet?” knows he needs to disappear so he accuses the Planet—and by extension Perry White—of creating this whole scenario as a publicity stunt, says he wants nothing to do with it and vamooses in order to re-appear as Superman. By this time, Lois is understandably growing impatient and suggests that the Man of Steel might not appear but Butler disagrees. “Superman seems to show up when you’re in trouble…It may even be that he’s fond of you.” The look on Phyllis Coates face when reacting to this line is worth the whole price of admission.

In any case, Butler might have a plan but the Man of Steel is pretty quick in the brain department too and quickly hatches his own scheme to counter the cocky criminal. Telling the human bomb that it makers him nervous to see Lois in such predicament (“It makes you nervous!” she responds incredulously) he goes back into the office where he promises to stay visible to Butler. By this time the cops have shown up led by Inspector Hill (Marshall Reed, an actor I most remember for his regular appearances in the 1950s cop show The Lineup (aka: San Francisco Beat). This was a one shot deal for Hill. Apparently Inspector Henderson was off on another assignment that day (although most Superman fans are now aware that actor Robert Shayne was at the point of this shooting having troubles with the government during the Hollywood witch hunts of that period, the details are a bit sketchy). Superman switches places with the policeman so that only a shadow can be seen, records his own voice on a tape recorder (“No comment until the time limit is up”) and exits to round up the Museum thieves (note Reeve’s priceless double-take as he picks up the one petite cook and carries him away). The problem is that Lois is still out on that ledge with the wacko. Jimmy decides to do something about this after first calling his girlfriend Miriam in case a final good-bye is necessary. It isn’t, of course. The Cub reporter does show a lot of guts by going out on the ledge and confronting Butler with the truth of the ruse. But after the infuriated criminal takes the handcuffs off Lois and she is free to get back into the Daily Planet, Jim, with golf club in hand ups the ante too much and gets into a physical confrontation with Butler who with homicidal intent steps on Jim’s ledge-gripping hands which causes the young reporter to plummet into space only to be caught by Superman on his return to the office. Hill and another Officer Reilly (played by Dennis Moore, once an active serial hero in cliffhangers likes The Purple Monster Strikes) bring in Butler and Lois gets a chance to give him a dandy of a slap. Lois thanks Jimmy and White tells him there might be a raise in it for him.

Let’s hope so.

Thanks to Mike Goldman for the photos!!

August 2006

DESERTED VILLAGE

By Bruce Dettman

Usually in the days of early television we learned little about the background of our favorite characters on our favorite shows. Occasionally the writers would throw us an informational bone (Ward Clever had a brother and grew up on a farm, Howdy Doody had a twin brother “Double” Duty, Chester Goode also had a sibling called Magus who, much to the deputy’s chagrin, came to Dodge on occasion), but for the most part we were left pretty much in the dark with these figures seeming to have little in the way of pasts. This was also certainly true to TAOS where over the years we only gleaned a few scant facts about our beloved inhabitants of Metropolis. For instance, we knew that Jimmy lived with his mother and had an Aunt Louise. We knew Inspector Henderson had a son named Ray and that Perry White had a nephew named Chris who was a test pilot. We knew the most about Clark Kent, his real named Kal-El, his real parents Jor-El and Lara, his adoptive parents, Sarah and Eben and where he was born, the planet Krypton. And then there was Lois (Phyllis Coates) who we gather the most personal history from in the first year episode The Deserted Village written by Dick Hamilton and Ben Freeman  This, like the same year’s Haunted Lighthouse (both directed by Tommy Carr), has an overall spooky and highly eerie feel to it. Almost all of it takes place in what seems to have been Lois’ hometown, Clifton by the Sea, which Clark later characterizes as “a mighty fine place” but which I have to say looks a bit on the dreary and forlorn side.

Lois—even more obstinate and feisty than usual—along with Clark has wound up here after not being able to contact Mrs. Tazey (Maudie Prickett), the nurse who we are informed helped raise her. Otherwise we hear nothing of Lois’ youth, parents or siblings, if any, only that she used to play at the home of the local sawbones Doc Jessup (Fred Sherman). Aside from a few others, the druggist Peter Godfrey (perennial western bad guy Edmund Cobb who also had a small role in Rescue) and his son Alvin (Malcolm Mealey from the earlier No Holds Barred episode) everyone else seems to have deserted Clifton except for Ms. Tazey who eventually turns up safe and sound (secretly carrying a handgun in her flower basket and explaining to everyone that as a child Lois always had a “weak chest”), and the doctor who hides a revolver and gas mask in his office desk drawer. Doc also has a dog named Ranger, an Irish setter who only makes a cameo appearance before being killed by a gas bomb delivered by a strange man in what appears to be either a fire or anti-contamination suit. I can’t recall if the murder of the dog upset me as a child, but I suspect it did since I watched most of these shows with my own mutt at my side.

In any case, it is this strange man who has driven just about everyone out of Clifton although those who haven’t fled make no reference to him and deny there’s anything wrong in their community. It’s therefore pretty much left to Clark to do some digging around – literally, as it turns out – and find out what’s behind all this intrigue although keeping Lois out of things seems even more difficult for him than solving the mystery, not that the identity of the guilty parties is much of one. Reeves also gets a chance to showcase his athleticism as he takes off on a fast run and effortlessly hurdles a fence.

It’s the rich atmosphere of The Deserted Village, the claustrophobic nature of the place and the effective use its quirky cast of characters that makes the episode so effective and fun to watch. That, and Clark and Lois going at each other, of course.

May 2006

MYSTERY IN WAX

By Bruce Dettman

When I visited London a few years ago, I was regrettably unable to get in to see Madame Tussaud’s Wax Museum. The line for tickets was nearly a block long so as a compromise I elected to visit nearby Baker Street and the Sherlock Holmes Museum where I paid seven euros to watch a snooty guide point at a picture of Raymond Massey as Holmes and tell the assembled crowd that it was Peter Cushing. I was sorry to miss out on Tusaad’s, however, not only because it is famous the world over for having the greatest assortment of wax effigies, but because as with so many others, the dark side of these figures has always intrigued me. Forget the replicas of Marilyn, Winston, and J.F.K. Get me to Lizzie Borden, Jack the Ripper, Rasputin and John Wilkes Booth ASAP. Hollywood, of course, has long been interested in the subject dating back as far as German director Paul Leni’s silent Waxworks then continuing through such memorable cinematic exercises as Mystery of the Wax Museum and the later remake House of Wax with Vincent Price. What the allure of these waxen replicas is might be the province of the psychologist, but there is no doubt that even in our high tech world wax museums continued to pull ‘em in.

Madame Selena (played by the gloriously over-the-top Myra McKinney who chews enough scenery to get balsa wood poisoning) in the first season’s Mystery in Wax episode calls her establishment “Madame Selena’s Museum of Wax Art” which, if you’re interested, is located a 919 West Boulevard in Metropolis. Apparently, the notion that there is no such thing as bad publicity strikes a real entrepreneurial chord with Madame because she decides to elevate interest in her exhibits by predicting the deaths of certain prominent Metropolis citizens. She actually kidnaps—with the help of Andrew, her dim-witted Casper Milktoast of a husband—(Oscar Levant look-alike Lester Sharpe) and imprisons them in her private dungeon. She makes wax replicas of her victims which bring in the paying public (TAOS budget couldn’t afford actual wax replicas to be fashioned so they made up the actors employing what looks like talcum powder to produce the waxen effect). Her third target is Perry White who does not take kindly to her prophetic threats (“Before my paper is through with you I’m going to have you run out of town!”) Instead, however, Perry is drugged, his suicide faked and imprisoned along with the others. Inspector Henderson hints that perhaps White was inebriated which draws fire from Clark (“Perry White was never drunk a day in his life!”). Lois meanwhile can’t stop crying over the Chief’s death (no Jimmy in this one) but Clark smells a rat and decides to investigate. This gives Lois an idea so she dries her tears and goes over to the museum and hides after it formally closes. Sneaking around she stumbles upon the basement dungeon but is discovered crouching under a table and subdued with the help of some chloroform by Madame Selena (I personally have a bit of trouble thinking Phyllis Coats’ tough as nails Lois couldn’t handle this desiccated old shrew) and tossed into one of the jail cells next to Perry. By this time, Kent and Henderson show up at the door and demand to look around. Clark’s X-Ray peepers alerts him to the fact that something rotten is going on downstairs so he fakes a poor shoe tying job while Henderson goes on without him and changes into Superman. There is a rather odd development here as far as logical plotting is concerned when Selena and Andrew take Henderson down into the basement to see their “private” museum. I know Selena is nuttier than a Christmas fruitcake but does she really not think Henderson will object to a group of missing Metropolis citizens imprisoned in cages? Before he can say anything, however, Selena, seeing Superman freeing her human exhibits, charges the Man of Steel. He hands her off to Henderson, subdues Andrew, and frees Perry and Lois.

There’s lots of lapses of logic in this episode and Superman never once takes to the skies but I like it anyway. Maybe it’s that crazy Madame Selena or Lois showing a more human side when she thinks the Chief is dead. Or maybe it’s just that wax museum.

March 2006

SUPERMAN ON EARTH

By Bruce Dettman

The mythology of Superman rather than being a static business has continued to be a work in progress almost since Jerry Siegel and Joe Shuster first created The Man of Steel back in the late 1930s. Comic book and strip, film, cartoon, radio, theatre and television would all eventually contribute to the incrementally changing face of the character with each succeeding decade seeming to redefine his persona and history. In one version of the story the baby Kal-El, rocketed to Earth from the dying planet Krypton by his parents Jor-El and Lara, lands and is taken to an orphanage by the Kents where he is later adopted by the couple. Later versions would omit the orphanage angle altogether. Also the Kents would go through various name changes: Martha and Jonathan, Eben and Sarah etc. Eventually Clark would leave his boyhood town of Smallville and once in Metropolis reveal himself as Superman. The creation of Superboy would derail this whole sequence of events. Now we have the popular show Smallville, a kind of variation on the mythos. Who knows what the future for the character will be?

The first year episode Superman on Earth delivered a straightforward and entertaining depiction of the origin of the character. The script by non-de-plume Richard Fielding (actually producer Robert Maxwell and future producer Whitney Ellsworth) and directed by Thomas Carr incorporates most of the familiar story and characters into a compact half hour.

Perennial announcer and quiz show host Jack Narz gets the ball running with a voice over depicting a shot of the cosmos and describing the planet Kryton as being the home of a race of Superman and women who have attained physical and intellectual perfection. This has always confused me a bit. Does this mean that all the inhabitants of the planet are possessed of Super powers? From what we see of them it doesn’t seem so. As a matter of fact, given the inappropriate way the governing council reacts to scientist Jor-El’s (Robert Rockwell wearing one of the costumes from the old Buster Crabbe Flash Gordon serials) prediction of impending doom for the planet, they seem highly emotional, pig-headed and infantile. I always have a bit of a problem with Rockwell in this role—even though he was a good actor and would later star in his own western The Man From Blackhawk—due to the fact that around this same time he also played and made such a strong impression as Eve Arden’s incredibly obtuse and clueless boyfriend Mr. Bointon in the classic Our Miss Brooks TV series). In any case, Jor-el’s words are not heeded, particularly by Kogan played with nasty vigor by solid character actor Stuart Randall (who would later turn up as a regular on the TV western Laramie). The sound of internal eruptions—which they attribute to nothing more serious than thunder—really gets the assembled body guffawing so Jor-El gives up on this group and finds wife Lara (Aline Towne who spent twelve chapters helping out Commando Cody in the Republic serial Radar Men From the Moon). Only enough time to get their baby Kal-El into the rocket and shoot it on its way to Earth before Kryton is blown to smithereens. Special effects being what they were in those days, particularly on the small tube, this footage of the infant’s journey isn’t the most impressive interplanetary journey ever filmed, but this sort of thing has never bothered me. Having been raised on early TV which provided a steady diet of old films, I had more in common with my parents’ generation of movie effects and easily and uncritically accepted more limited and marginal cinema magic.

Eben and Sarah Kent (Tom Fadden and Frances Morris) just happen to be driving along a country road and after the rocket hits the earth pull the unharmed baby to safety. I will always recall Fadden, by the way, as having played the avuncular pod Uncle Ira in 1956 Invasion of the Body Snatchers). They decide to raise the infant, call it Clark and the years begin to pass by. After seeing a teenage, angst-ridden Clark (Joel Nestler) befuddled by his powers, we come up to 1951 when Eben dies and Clark leaves home for Metropolis. Odd, since he does not wear glasses in Smallville, that the citizens of that community don’t recognize Superman when he makes his existence known to the rest of the world.

Clark, now in his familiar suit, hat and glasses decides to become a reporter at the Daily Planet. Thanks to Perry White being in an even fowler mood than usual, he has no luck getting past the receptionist Miss Bachrach (Dani Nolan who certainly bears no resemblance to the Miss Bachrach we later meet in Night of Terror) even though by the steamy look the attractive brunette gives him, she likes what she sees in the strapping Kent. Jimmy and Lois are hanging around White’s office (on the 28^th floor) and when Kent enters by way of walking on the outside ledge Lois wastes no time in sizing him up as a possible professional rival and the dirty looks begin. No time for nasty quips here though since news reaches them that a man (Dabbs Greer in the first of three appearances on the show) is hanging for his life from an errant blimp. Clark makes a deal with White that if he gets the story ahead of everyone else he’ll earn his reporter’s stripes. White thinks he’s “crazy” but humors Kent. Meanwhile Lois and Jimmy are driving to intercept the dirigible but Jimmy doesn’t want to speed and Lois strangely agrees (hard to believe big city reporters on their way to an important story would care about a traffic ticket). Dabbs can’t hold his grip on the dangling rope and plummets towards the ground but Superman, making his first appearance, intercepts the falling man. Back at the Daily Planet Perry rewards Clark with the job, Lois fumes and the first of what would be hundreds of interrogations starts. Just how did Clark accomplish everything he did ahead of all those other reporters?

“Maybe I’m a Superman,” he answers through a warm smile.

And for five more wonderful years he would be just that.

February 2006

NO HOLDS BARRED

By Bruce Dettman 

I used to believe professional wrestling was on the up and up. By age ten, however, I began to realize that the chances of a two hundred and fifty pound guy dropping on someone else’s neck with minimal damage were highly unlikely.  This didn’t stop a bunch of my pals and me from once attending a local series of matches at a TV station in Oakland. All our favorites were on hand: Ray “The Crippler” Stevens, Pepper Gomez, “Flying” Red Bastein, the Sheik and Ray “Thunder” Stern. In person, the moves, throws and punches even looked more suspect than on TV, but we didn’t care and screamed our lungs out. The card girl was a luscious and curvy local girl in a one-piece bathing suit and high heels. We liked her too. In those days, of course, wrestling was a regional business, not the over-inflated cable monolith it grew to be under slime ball Vince McMahon. Every area had a champion and key players. Like a lot of things in the past, life was easier and less complicated then, even for wrestlers. I remember once when I was in high school a bunch of us went out for a bite after a night basketball game. Halfway through our meal we noticed that Ray Stevens was sitting nearby at a table chowing down on some fried chicken and potato salad and taking gulps of beer from a mug approximately the size of Montana. For a joke we began to throw some “pencil neck” references in his direction (his favorite on-air description of both his opponents and the fans) until he finally looked up through weary eyes and told us to “knock it off.” Ray was fat and past his prime by then but we decided to do what he said anyway. Still, on our way out he shook all of our hands and called us pencil necks for good measure.

In No Holds Barred the wrestling game is portrayed as crooked as well but from a different angle.  Mortimer Murray’s (the great Herb Vigran) stable of wrestlers is being tutored by an Indian swami named Ra (Tito Renaldo) who is teaching them lethal – and often crippling – moves to use on their opponents (the worst being something called “The Paralizer”). Ra has no idea that he is being exploited, only believing (rather naively, I must say) that Murray is protecting him from the federal police for some unstated violation and that his knowledge of the human body is never used for evil purposes by the unscrupulous promoter’s stable of muscle-headed grapplers including “Bad Luck” Brannigan (Richard Reeves) and the “Crusher” (Henry Kulky, later a regular on The Life of Riley and Voyage To The Bottom of the Sea). Perry White, apparently a big wrestling fan, is incensed by this athletic skullduggery (“I’m going to put a stop to it if it’s the last thing I do!”) and hires college wrestler Wayne Winchester (Malcolm Mealy, a former real-life college football star also of The Deserted Village) to investigate and see what he can learn. Wayne takes Lois (Phyllis Coates) to watch a bout but when Brannigan wins with the “Pulverizer” the impulsive Wayne jumps into the ring and challenges Brannigan to a match. While Lois and Perry think this a stupid and dangerous idea, Clark Kent backs Wayne with the opinion that he believes the young grappler can emerge the victor.  Lois is pretty upset about this (“Clark, I never want to see you again as long as I live.”) not realizing that Clark/Superman already suspects Murray’s mat goons of employing pressure points to beat and injure their opponents. Secretly visiting the gymnasium at night where Ram is held captive he has the Hindu show him the techniques he has taught Murray’s boys, the knowledge of which he then imparts to Wayne who uses poor Jimmy to practice counter holds on.  Lois is still steaming and in a conversation with White who tries to defend Kent says that no matter how right someone is one day they have to be wrong, it’s only human which sets up the editor for the response “Sometimes I wonder if Kent is Human” which is delivered in a wonderfully reflective way. Naturally when the night of the big match comes Wayne triumphs which cause Murray and the goons to return to the gym and torture Ram, who they believe has betrayed them, until the Man of Steels clears the deck with all the wrestlers. Exciting stuff.

Superman is still pretty much of a new entity in this one. Ram, admittedly not the brightest bulb on the tree, thinks he is a an actual genie and when the Daily Planet crew find out he’s saved the day White bellows “Superman again!” Clark, by the way, walks around his apartment in a robe over his street clothes. Must be pretty warm when you think he also has his Superman suit underneath both.

It’s a fun episode with a strong cast which also includes the always enjoyable Dick Elliot as honest promoter Sam Bleaker. Oddly, after Wayne wins the championship Jimmy, in the capacity as Winchester’s trainer, offers to talk terms with Bleaker who promises both of them millions. Apparently no deal could be arranged because we never hear of Jimmy’s wrestling affiliation again. Of course, we never hear of Wayne again either and apparently Lois eventually forgives Clark, until next week’s episode anyway.

December 2005

TREASURE OF THE INCAS

By Bruce Dettman

There is a scene in this first year episode, written by Howard Green and directed by Thomas Carr, where Jimmy and Lois, having traveled to Peru, are in the company of a certain Don Anselmo (the ubiquitous Steven Carr) driving across what appears to be a scorching desert in a convertible. Neither reporter seems to be enjoying him or herself very much and the terrain looks about as hospitable as Death Valley in August. Seeing this I was immediately reminded of my own family’s unpleasant experience with a topless 59 black Chevy Impala as we moved across California’s Mohave Desert in the summer of 1960. My late father was one of those history buffs who would gleefully go fifty miles out of his way to visit a historical marker no matter how insignificant the event. Just let him see that forty miles away Kit Carson had once tracked beavers or John C. Fremont had built an outhouse and we were off, our true destination totally forgotten. “Oh, stop your bellyaching!” he would demand of us. “Do you people realize the pioneers came across this country in wagon trains and they didn’t complain?” That summer with the temperature in the low hundreds and the top down (as I recall he didn’t appreciate my reminding him that “covered” wagons were called that because they had canvas overheads to provide protection from the elements) he was pursuing the sight of some minor event of yesteryear when I noted that my mother seemed to have fallen asleep, remarkable since just a second before she’d been complaining of the heat with great passion. “Don’t wake her,” my father instructed. Let her sleep.” So I didn’t. Problem was she wasn’t asleep at all. She had passed out from a heat stroke, a fact we didn’t realize until we reached our motel. A doctor was called and she was ok, but my father paid dearly for that desert side trip, I believe in the form of a rather handsome bracelet. We sold the Impala not long after this.

Oh yeah, but back to Lois and Jimmy. While they think they’re on a scenic drive of the Peruvian countryside (scenic if you like rock quarries) they’re actually being led astray by the duplicitous Anselmo who thinks these two American reporters are too noisy for their own good. Back in the States while attending an auction, Lois had been approached by a Professor Lara (Hal Gerard) and given a thousand bucks to bid on a certain tapestry (for the record, the unseen auctioneer name is Samuel Tabor). With her reporter’s antenna up and smelling a good story she goes ahead and purchases the item, but in the meantime Lara is murdered by a scar-faced guy named Pedro Mendoza (Leonard Penn). This creepy character follows Lois to her barren office (not a single thing on the walls), brains her with his gun and steals the tapestry.  From street level with his X-ray peepers Clark sees Lois supine on the floor. He dashes down a convenient alley with a beat cop watching his every move. However, when Superman appears and takes to the sky the uniformed officer only thinks it mildly interesting and that all-important two and two (which no one in Metropolis seems to posses) are never spliced together. Lois recovers (people in early TV have extremely hard noggins and are always getting pummeled by steel gun barrels with only marginal damage being done) and is able to talk Perry White into sending her to Peru (on Pan Am Airways) with Jim along as a bodyguard which I have to admit I find a strange move on White’s part since, let’s face it, Jimmy isn’t exactly a force to be reckoned with. We see their plane aloft and in the background hear the familiar sound of Superman in flight trailing behind. Hey, just because you can fly it doesn’t necessarily follow that you’re good at reading a map. So, after a few pieces of the puzzle are put together and we learn that the tapestry provides the secret to a buried treasure, we’re back to Lois and Jimmy and Don Anselmo on their mid-day drive. Once out in the country their Jekyll and Hyde guide orders them to get out of the car at gunpoint. Jimmy, always valiant but hardly Jack Dempsey with his dukes, tries to defend his beloved Miss Lane but as usual is the recipient of a well-aimed right hand. Lois, of course, doesn’t waste a minute in physically going after the mug but also lands flat on her keaster. Not to be deterred, the twosome follow the car to a cave where they are immediately captured and placed in chains until Superman arrives and you know the rest.

Lois seems particularly contemptuous of Clark in this episode, the barbs are fast and furious, so it’s no surprise that when they find him in Peru (“Jim when I’m in a hurry to get someplace I really fly”). Lois is extremely annoyed and does everything to keep him out of the investigation although I have to say that I sometimes think she protests too much, that underneath it all she just might like old Clark a bit more than she’s willing to let on. She also seems to get a real kick out of Jimmy. Keep your eye on her as she listens to his feeble attempts to converse in Spanish (“Jimmy, you’re wonderful”). She also gives Perry a big kiss. Yep, Lois is all over the map in this one and looks great to boot. Bad scenery or not, I wouldn’t mind being stuck in Peru with her, minus her bodyguard, of course.

December 2005

RIDDLE OF THE CHINESE JADE

By Bruce Dettman

For a time in the 1980s I lived only a stone’s throw from San Francisco’s Chinatown. During this period, I got to know the area fairly well, not just the well-traversed areas full of cheesy souvenir shops and Szechwan eateries, but the half-hidden neighborhood nooks and crannies as well. Returning to my North Beach apartment late at night, wishing to avoid tourist gridlock—and admittedly always exhibiting a penchant for out of the way nocturnal haunts—  I would slip down narrow back streets and dingy alleys, many of them unchanged from the days of the Tong Wars. It was not unusual on these treks to still glimpse sweatshops and peculiar things going on in dimly lit upstairs rooms. On one memorable occasion, however, I nearly walked right into the middle of a turf war between rival street gangs out to control the lucrative firecracker trade rife in the neighborhood. I was just half a block away from the action when the gunfire began. When the smoke cleared three young men were dead. It was last time I went in for nocturnal prowling in Chinatown.

The Chinatown in Riddle of the Chinese Jade seems a tamer, more benevolent sort of place. Remove the Asian population and it pretty much looks like every other location in Metropolis during that first year of TAOS, in other words, just another old RKO-Pathe Studio’s street scene, rather bleak and dark but benign.

Clark and Lois—on what must have seemed a tame assignment for them—have been sent to interview antique storeowner Lu Sung (Paul Burns who was also featured in the later “Star of Fate” episode) about his benevolent decision to donate the priceless Quan Yin Jade statue to the National Art Museum. Not so crazy about this idea is shop manager Harry Wong, in love with Lu Sung’s niece Lily, who believes the jade piece actually belongs to the girl and who brokers a deal with criminal John Greer to help steal it. 

This is another lean, tough and violent first year entry, just the sort of show the Kellogg’s folks must have cringed at.  Particularly nasty is a scene where the brutal Greer, who has just beat the tar out of Harry, sees Lily trying to escape with the jade, throws her to the couch, straddles her and strikes her several times in the kisser. Greer is portrayed by the British-born James Craven who appeared in numerous films during his career but who is known to genre films for his appearances in several cliffhangers including Captain Midnight, The Flying Disc Man From Mars and The Green Archer. It was Craven, in King of the Rocketmen, who as an aeronautical designer, created the famous jet pack later worn by Rocketman, Commando Cody and others. Craven did a lot of TV work in the 50s including playing Wyatt Earp on Stories From the Century. In serials, particularly under the direction of James Horne, he had a tendency to ham it up, but as Greer he is nicely menacing. My favorite moment is when he kidnaps Lois at gunpoint (Phyllis Coates, of course, never one to go gently into the night, earlier tries to take a swing at him with her purse) and is cornered in an alley by Superman. Apparently, Greer has absolutely no idea who the Man of Steel is and asks Lois about him.

“Who’s the guy in the circus suit?”

“That’s Superman”

“This time he’s not so super, is he?”

“Wait and see.”

As it turns out, Greer has about five seconds to wait and see before Superman lands in his face and (in a speeded up sequence) uses the criminal for a mid-day punching bag.

No Jimmy or Perry in this episode. Maybe they were off on one of Perry’s fishing trips that the cub reporter hated so much (and who, given events in The Evil Three, could blame him?). Henderson is on hand, however, and Ben Freeman’s script, up until the silly end where the copper lets Hong off scot-free (can you imagine how Greer would scream in court today about that?), makes the lawman unusually testy and confrontational, particularly with Kent (“I wouldn’t know bamboo dust from goober feathers!). Lily is Gloria Saunders who made something of a career out of playing exotic roles including a regular stint as the Dragon Lady on the TV version of Terry and the Pirates. And speaking of regular stints, Victor Sen Yung spent many seasons as Hop Sing on the long-running western Bonanza cooking for the Cartwright clan where, given Hoss’ appetite for anything not bolted to the floor, he might have appreciated Superman’s help in carrying in those huge platters.      

November 2005

CZAR OF THE UNDERWORLD

By Bruce Dettman

When I was growing up in the 1950s my father regularly took our family to Los Angeles.  At the time he worked for a major aluminum company that sponsored several TV shows (Maverick, for one) and it was often necessary for him to travel from our home in the Bay Area to Hollywood to provide technical expertise for the commercials. Once at a Warner Brothers’ studio luncheon he not only met the show’s star James Garner, but both Cheyenne’s Clint Walker and Bronco’s Ty Hardin yet somehow failed to get me any autographs, an unpardonable oversight that, to say the very least, cost him dearly for weeks to come. On these trips my parents would often disappear for sightseeing excursions (my mother undoubtedly canvassing the town for any sign of Lucille Ball, my father for Ava Gardner) leaving my poor older brother--who I’m sure would have rather been on his own looking for Sandra Dee or Tuesday Weld or someone--rather than watching over me. Even  back then the smog was ruinous and I recall my eyes burning terribly as he took me on afternoon walks down to Grauman’s Chinese Theatre (where I examined Roy Rogers’ boot marks in the cement) and Hollywood and Vine to hunt for celebrities. Occasionally during our wanderings we would get off the beaten track and roam various back streets. One time, as we crossed elevated train tracks, we saw below us a film crew staging what appeared to be a gun battle near some stationary freight cars. Naturally I thought it must be an episode of Dragnet--the only crime show I had been exposed to up to that point-- that they were shooting, but my brother was not so sure. To this day we have no idea what we were watching, but I still romantically cling to the notion that it was Jack Webb and Ben Alexander getting the upper hand on some nasty crooks.

Anyway, I was recently thinking back to all of this--in black and white images which is how I tend to recall certain aspects of my youth--as I watched Clark and Inspector Henderson heading out to Hollywood to get the goods on oily gang leader Luigi Dinelli in TAOS first season’s Czar of the Underworld.

I must say for a so-called “mild-mannered reporter” Kent is pretty brazen when still in Metropolis he warns the gangster by phone how he and Henderson are going expose his criminal activities. This is certainly not the milquetoast reporter of the early comics but this fact has never bothered me. Since the Reeves’ characterization of Kent is the first I was ever acquainted with I’ve always accepted it with no problem or questions asked. Besides, I’ve always felt Christopher Reeve’s performance as Kent was over the top and a bit silly. I could never quite buy the idea of a big city reporter covering tough urban stories and being such an obvious wimp.

Kent and Henderson act as technical advisers as the film Czar of the Underworld is being shot. They are also around as the star is murdered while filming a scene (Steve Carr, brother of real-life director Tommy Carr, plays his sibling in the process of setting up the camera shot). This puts Kent and Henderson in direct conflict with Dinelli and, given his inflated reputation as a big mobster, his rather meager number of henchmen. One of these is Paul Fix who a few years later would have a steady role as Micah Torrence, the reformed drunk and ex-marshal who would redeem himself on The Rifleman. Fix was a long time actor (To Kill A Mockingbird, She Wore A Yellow Ribbon, The Bad Seed) and playwright who often worked with John Wayne (and even tutored him on occasion) Meanwhile the kingpin is played by Anthony Caruso who despite his equally long career which ranged from classics like The Asphalt Jungle to hundreds of TV shows and even an appearance with Laurel and Hardy I will always recall best getting his cheek carved up by Lex Barker in Tarzan and the Slave Girl.  Meanwhile while Henderson enjoys all the perks of a studio budget and seems to be having a good old time despite all the death and mayhem going on around him, Clark’s out investigating the case and as the Man of Steel confronting Dinelli in his apartment. I particularly like this scene because of how obvious it is that Superman is getting as much as enjoyment beating the stuffing out of Dinelli and his men as Henderson is with his free steak dinners (one is supposed to be for Clark).

I’m sure Lois and Jimmy, nowhere to be seen in this episode, weren’t too happy being excluded from this trip to Tinseltown (particularly Lois who would finally have had a chance to buy a new outfit), but Perry White shows up just long enough to verbally take Henderson’s head off over the telephone. Nonetheless, the Inspector continues to thoroughly enjoy himself. Seems the California sunshine and free meals really agree with him.  In any case, it’s nice to see Bob Shayne get a bit more time in front of the camera and have something more to do than clean up things after Superman saves the day.

I have to say that while I miss Lois and Jimmy, I rather like Clark and Henderson teaming up together. They make a good team and there is obviously some nice chemistry between the actors. I wish it would have happened more often.

September 2005

GHOST WOLF

by Bruce Dettman

I will never forget one late afternoon in the 1950s when my mother, never known for her humor or sarcasm, stood outside my locked bedroom door and bellowed with great conviction “No turning into a werewolf until your homework is done.”  I knew what she meant, of course. The whole house, which included my father, brother and three-legged dog, all knew. Simply put, I loved werewolves. I liked vampires and the Frankenstein monster and old Kharis the Mummy too (to be honest, I could take or leave the Invisible Man), but I reserved a special place in my heart for werewolves, specifically the Wolfman portrayed in five Universal horror films by Lon Chaney Jr. Anywhere, anytime I was in the mood I would find a mirror and focus on my adolescent mug while I scrunched my features, barred my canines, messed with my hair and began to growl. Aiding me in these transformations was my father’s Xmas gift of a portable tape recorder that I used to tape my favorite horror pictures. Now in these days of videos and DVDs (and who knows what else is around the corner) the idea of taping only the audio part of a movie might sound odd if not downright idiotic, but in those prehistoric days it offered up magical possibilities. I knew these films so well that I could sit in the dark and listen to the dialog and the great music by studio composers like Hans Salter, Charles Previn and Frank Skinner and let my imagination do the rest. Even better, I could crank up Salter’s very evocative transformation music that created the perfect mood when -- with the help of makeup wizard Jack Pierce and special effects magician John P. Fulton -- Chaney turned into his furry alter ego and pretend to be experiencing the same agonies of metamorphosis (thank goodness there was no shrink in the neighborhood). In any case, my poor mother finally got wise to the sounds of me gnashing my teeth and fighting my dog when she should have been hearing me struggling with fractions or diagramming sentences.

What all of this is leading up to is that The Ghost Wolf from the first season of TAOS was a bit of a letdown. There was no real werewolf in the story (as opposed to a Jimmy Olsen comic book I recall where the cub reporter actually grew whiskers and teeth and threatened Lois’ sister Lucy). From what I could see it wasn’t even a wolf, just a German shepherd with a bad dye job and a lousy disposition. Still, once my initial disappointment was over it became a favorite episode. In the first place, it’s always interesting to see the Daily Planet gang away from Metropolis for a change. Perry orders Clark, Lois and Jimmy out to see what’s going on at the Planet-owned Lone Pine Timber Company, run by Sam Garvin (played by Stanley Andrews best known for his later role as the Old Ranger, narrator on Death Valley Days for many, many years before Ronald Reagan took over and whose voice is inexplicably dubbed during his phone chats with Perry). Lois and Jimmy dress down for the occasion (Jimmy wearing what is possibly the ugliest mixing of plaid shirts and pants ever recorded on camera), but Clark decides to go into the woods with the same old suit. Also in the cast is the very attractive Jane Adams as the Ghost Wolf’s owner Barbette.  Adams was a solid and likable B actress in many programmers and serials. She was Vicki Vale in the 1949 cliffhanger Batman and Robin, acted opposite Rondo Hatton in The Brute Man and is probably best known for playing the doomed hunchback lab assistant in House of Dracula. Veteran bad guy Lou Krugman (also featured in The Human Bomb but who I will always remember most vividly from Andy’s Gang where he played the Maharaja) fills out the cast.

This is one of the few episodes where Clark actually says “Great Scott” which was trade line in the comics. There’s lots of fill with stock footage, most of lumberjacks and falling trees, but like most of the early episodes it’s pretty much action, action, action with director Lee Sholem quickly getting the audience into the thick of things. This was reportedly the show where George Reeves took a bad fall during a flying sequence, probably in the shot where Superman takes off to seed a cloud with electricity. Lois gets to scream twice and along with Jimmy almost gets par-boiled by a forest fire but the two are insulated from the heat by Superman’s cape (odd none of the trees are seen to be burnt).

By the way, according to this episode if you ever wish to phone the Daily Planet it’s Metropolis 60500.

July 2005

THE RUNAWAY ROBOT

By Bruce Dettman

Robots have come a long way since Czech novelist and playwright Karel Capek wrote R.U.R., the theatrical vehicle that introduced the species to the general public way back in 1920. As a kid, very little that was intended to frighten me up on the big (or little) screen succeeded, not vampires or werewolves, not mummies or even the big guy with the bolts and ultimate flat top, but for some reason, perhaps it was their complete lack of humanity, robots invariably got under my skin. Of course, we who came along in the pre-George Lucas era, weren’t overly demanding of our robots. I have to admit with some embarrassment that the famous Walking Water Heater made notorious in Republic serials, actually sent a few shivers up my adolescent spine when I first encountered him tangling with my boyhood hero the Copperhead in The Mysterious Dr. Satan, as did the scowling metallic menace in The Phantom Creeps with Bela Lugosi. To be honest, I didn’t even totally trust Tobor or even Robbie, although they were supposedly benevolent creations. The one robot, however, who never bothered me in the least was Hero from The Runaway Robot, part of the first year’s episodes of TAOS. It is, I think, a testimonial to the acting skills of Phyllis Coates as Lois Lane that she managed to register legitimate terror and fear at the sight of a creature that can best be described as an ungainly composite of the Tin Woodsman from The Wizard of Oz and Mr. Potato Head. Not only did Ms. Coates cower and emote with admirable believability given the silly appearance of her attacker, but she also managed several dynamite multi-octave screams as only she could (I rate her right up there with the late Fay Wray in the lung department).  But that was the way it was in those days. No matter what the premise, how cheap the special effects, how questionable the plot line the actors gave it their all, never had tongue in cheek or appeared to look down at the material. That’s what makes all these old shows so memorable and fun to look back at. They were always played straight. Nonetheless, Runaway Robot is certainly less serious in theme and execution than most of Robert Maxwell’s first year efforts. For one thing, despite their willingness to have Hero do away with both Lois and its scatterbrained inventor Horatio Hinkle (Lucien Littlefield), the trio of bad guys which includes Russell Johnson (years away from his role as the Professor on Gilligans’s Island), Dan Seymour (who would also show up on The Mind Machine and The Stolen Costume) and one of screendom’s greatest weasels John Harmon, are hard to take seriously and more closely resemble some of the series’ later miscreants than other first year bad guys who are rarely a laughing matter. Ironically, despite the lighter tone of the episode, it seems as though the entire cast is a bit on the testy and volatile side. Everyone seems to have gotten up on the wrong side of the bed for this one – Clark (“Superman’s not psychic, Jimmy!”), Perry, Lois – the whole gang just seem off their game.  Perhaps the next Daily Planet payday was too far off. Who knows?  Fortunately, they finally get to blow off a little steam at Inspector Henderson’s expense when the torch appliance from Hero’s dismantled carcass singes the detective’s behind (in Clark’s apartment at the Standish Arms). It’s a fun episode but not one of the first year’s best. Still I think an Emmy should have gone to Ms. Coates for that one scene alone.

Photos courtesy of George McGaffin

June 2005

NIGHT OF TERROR 

By Bruce Dettman

 You still remember them, what’s left of them anyway. The majority are in pretty bad shape, crumbling reminders of an older, nearly forgotten America when gas and hamburgers were cheap. They can often be glimpsed in the distance from modern highways, many long closed, others biding their time until they are torn down to make way for Walmarts or 7-11s. They went by different names, auto courts, travel courts and cabins. When you traveled across America  -- as my family did by car from Illinois to California in early 1950s  -- there were few good motels, mainly only in the bigger cities, so you often stayed in such places. They were usually ok, for the most part clean and well run. The big attraction in those days was TV in the rooms, some actually coin operated. Outside of this, for kids anyway, they were pretty boring. If you were lucky there might be a swing set on the front lawn near the office so you could swing away for hours while drinking Dr. Pepper or Hires Root Beer from the outdoor soda machine.  In Night of Terror Lois Lane, portrayed by TV’s first Lois, Phyllis Coates, stops for the night at the Restwell Tourist Cabins not far from the Canadian border. Lois is on vacation and you have to wonder where’s she heading. Lois worked too hard and I like to think she’s going to have a clandestine rendezvous with some guy in Montreal.  Anyway, she’s unlucky enough to wander smack dab into a dangerous situation. Hoodlums have been using the place to hide out fellow criminals who are then smuggled out of the country. When the husband and wife owners find uncover the scheme the man is murdered by two thugs. Lois and the woman are next in line. The woman is Ann Doran who had a long track record in films and TV. You can spot her in a Three Stooges short and later she was James Dean’s mother in Rebel Without a Cause. TAOS fans might be interested to know she played Dabbs Greer’s wife in the science-fiction film It The Terror From Beyond Space. Lois, never the most even-tempered of heroines as portrayed by Ms. Coates, doesn’t help matters by taking a swing at one of the criminals who reacts in kind. Phyllis was off her mark as the scene was staged and the actor, Frank Richards, actually knocked her out. I talked to Ms. Coats a few years back and she admitted it was all her fault. In any case, the other hit men are John Kellogg and Richard Benedict, both TAOS alumni. None of these guys are in the least squeamish about beating up women or killing them for that matter. This is a tough and mean episode. Remove Superman – and this is the case in many of the first year shows – and you still have a tidy little thriller. Meanwhile Clark is racing around the Daily Planet trying to figure out where Lois is. We meet Miss Backerack, the testy receptionist with her hair in a tight bun, and Oscar the janitor, and learn that Clark’s office is on the 28^th floor and that he has a drawing of what looks like the Golden Gate Bridge over his desk. Steve Carr, director Tommy’s brother, makes one of his numerous appearances in the first year of the show, this time as a travel agent. Jimmy gets to the cabins first which means that Clark and he will have to cancel the White Sox game they had made plans to see that night. Jimmy tries his best to defend the two women but it takes Superman ---and a very obvious stuntman – to save the day. Problem is “Mr Big”, referenced by the crooks as ordering the executions, is never caught. I guess even Superman has to occasionally settle for three out of four.

Photo from Serial to Cereal by Gary Grossman

May 2005

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