The Twilight Zone:
Unlocking
The Door To
A Television Classic
By Martin
Grams, Jr.
OTR
Publishing, 2008
798 Pages
Reviewed by
Bruce Dettman
The Twilight
Zone has become much more than simply the title of a TV show. It has
morphed into an intricate and indelible part of our culture’s language
and dialog. It is indelibly seared into our collective consciousness as
a kind of convenient mental short cut, a quick mechanism to instantly
convey a state of unreality, the strange flip side of the predictable
and certain, a topsy-turvy nowhere land where anything can happen to
anyone at anytime.
Yet once it really was
just a show, a black and white half hour anthology series aired by the
CBS network on Friday nights and which dealt with fantastic themes.
While many would label it a science-fiction series, in truth it rarely
presented truly hard-core sci-fi concepts relying instead on tales of
the ironic and bizarre.
Television in its early
years was the home of numerous anthology productions. Some—like
Playhouse 90, Climax and The U.S. Steel Hour—were presented
live from New York. Others were filmed in Hollywood. The new media of TV
was a magnet for young writers, directors and actors. It ate up and
devoured talent. It was ravenous and insatiable. And, contrary to memory
and media myth, it wasn’t all good.
Rod Serling, the creator
of The Twilight Zone, himself began to feel devoured. He
contributed numerous teleplays during what some have dubbed the
Golden Age of Television, most largely forgotten today, but a few,
such as Requiem for a Heavyweight and Patterns, are
still remembered.
One of the main reasons
why Serling abandoned his freelance status and went on to create and
supervise The Twilight Zone was the issue of control. Too often
his work, as well as many others from that generation of TV writers,
people like Reginald Rose and
Paddy Chyevsky, had seen
their creations compromised, violated and brazenly altered by producers
at the behest of sponsors displeased with aspects of the script (a
character smoking a pipe when the show’s sponsor was a cigarette
company, a black character upsetting a southern network affiliate etc).
Serling hated this sort
of mindless meddling but was also smart enough to know that if he was
going to get around network censorship he would have to tackle the
problem in a different way. His solution was to mask the social and
political issues he wished to tackle as a writer under the guise of
fantasy and science-fiction. For instance, instead of dealing with
earth-bound racism which might offend or make the networks and sponsors
uneasy and ready to bolt, Sterling would cloak his message within the
context of a tale of encroaching Martians. For the most part the
networks and censors never caught on.
The Twilight Zone
ran for five seasons both in a half and full hour format although the
cream of the crop—and the best remembered shows—were of the 30 minute
variety. It featured stories by many talented writers including Ray
Bradbury, Harlan Ellison, Reginald Rose, Earl Hamner Jr. and Richard
Matheson in addition to tales by Serling himself.
While there were a few
clinkers here and there, most of the stories, in addition to being
thought provoking and thematically intriguing, were well directed and
performed. Few people who watched The Twilight Zone in its
initial run—and later in syndication—don’t still have their own favorite
episodes, the plots of which they would never forget.
There was The
Monsters on Maple Street, homage to paranoia cloaked in the story of
a neighborhood’s growing fear of spacemen, Eye of the Beholder,
about prejudice based on appearance, Serling’s own favorite the poignant
Walking Distance which told of a man’s opportunity to visit the
unchanged hometown of his youth.
The series also boasted
great guest stars, some new faces like Robert Redford, Anne Francis,
Jack Klugman, Jack Warden and William Shatner—others old pros such as
Franchot Tone, Burgess Meredith, Gladys Cooper, John Dehner, Lee Marvin
and Gig Young.
If there is anything to
criticize in Martin Grams’ incredibly impressive Twilight Zone:
Unlocking the Door to A Television Classic, it is the astounding
size and voluminous nature of the text. Grams, who in the past has
written a number of impressive works on various other old TV and radio
shows, has done more than his homework on this subject, he has gone for
his full doctorate in Twilight Zone history. Within the nearly 800 pages
his phenomenal research has managed to reveal just about every fact,
both major and trivial, that could be gleaned about the show, from
budgetary breakdowns to contract disputes. For the average reader, even
the average fan of the show, wading through this Goliath-like tome could
easily be a daunting enterprise. It is best served not as a casual read
but rather as the ultimate reference guide to the series, a volume to be
consulted after watching an episode or digested slowly and methodically.
Whichever, Grams’ book
should be considered an exhaustible and definitive look at one of
television’s most memorable and best remembered series. After fifty
years The Twilight Zone still remains not only a beloved and
revered production but a kind of benchmark, a stand-alone and highly
unique achievement that continues to resonate and influence.
Martin Grams recognizes
this and has created with his brilliantly executed book a worthy salute
to the achievement that was The Twilight Zone, one all fans of
the show will surely embrace with great enthusiasm and appreciation.
August 2010
The
Legendary Lydecker Brothers:
The Godfathers of Special
Effects
Jan Alan Henderson
Bifulco
Books
2010
Review
by Bruce Dettman
It is pretty much a
given among the shrinking number of film fans who reserve a special
place in their aging hearts for the long absent screen form known as the
serial or cliffhanger, that Republic Studios made far and away the best
products this genre had to offer. Lukewarm competition came from other
film companies such as Columbia, Universal and certain independent
outfits, but it was not competition in the same way that Joe Frazier was
competition for Muhammad Ali, Mickey Mantle was competition for Roger
Maris or even Rita Hayworth was competition for Ava Gardner. Columbia
might have had its champions, undemanding fans who exalted such clumsily
fashioned chapterplays as Batman or The Phantom, but those
in the know understood that it was Republic who turned out the
sturdiest, most action-filled, best conceived and executed serials. They
excelled not only in directorial expertise (the superb team of William
Witney and John English plus Fred Brannon and Spencer Bennet) but in
overall look, art direction, photography, pacing, acting, stunt
work—thanks to the brilliant athletics of Yakima Cannut, Tom Steele,
Dale Van Sickle, Dave Sharpe, Fred Graham and many others—not to mention
the all important area that truly defines the genre, the final
cliffhanger seconds of each chapter, the exploding oil derricks,
flooding caves, cars careening off perilous cliffs, boats igniting at
sea. Conceiving of such dramatic moments, whether aquatic, pyrotechnical
or man-made (rooms designed like wine presses with humans as victims,
etc), is one thing. Executing said moments is quite another.
Luckily for both the
studio and the fans, however, brothers Theodore and Howard Lydecker were
on the payroll and brought with them a simply staggering ability to
create on the screen any sort of mayhem that the scripts for Republic’s
huge output of serials called for. Working with large size models of
buildings, ships, planes, the exotic and commonplace, this duo of
siblings fashioned an amazing array of visual effects that was the icing
on the cake to the many fans of the cliffhanger form, a fact that in
some unfortunate ways contributed to their expertise being sometimes
taken for granted. Author and film historian Jan Alan Henderson has
rectified this situation, however, with the publication of his splendid
book The Lydeckers: The Godfathers of Special Effects, an
homage to the lives and careers of these two remarkable creators of
celluloid illusion.
Henderson brings not
only his impressive knowledge of film and film-making to the subject but
infuses the story of the Lydeckers—who worked on all manner of feature
films in addition to their celebrated stint at Republic with
cliffhangers—with his own fascinating, insightful and often amusing
experiences as a movie-mad kid growing up in the shadows of the
Hollywood studios.
This is mainly uncharted
territory and Henderson, who has made a study of the Lydeckers for many
years, is just the man for the task. Permitted access to family records,
scrapbooks and with a long time association with several Lydecker
descendents who have provided him with much heretofore unknown
information, he unfolds the history of the brothers and their
association with filmdom in a most entertaining and insightful manner.
Icing on the cake is
provided by hundreds of photographs chronicling the extensive and
time-consuming work that went on in the preparation of the effects that
so elevated the movies they worked on, from their remarkable studio
models of buildings and the methods employed to destroy them to their
aerial manipulation of figures such as Captain Marvel and Rocketman who
would both realistically soar through the skies thanks to the Lydecker’s
inventiveness and ingenuity.
With so many books
produced over the years devoted to the study and history of film—and of
late so much renewed interest in the behind the scenes technical work in
the field of genre films such as science-fiction, horror and fantasy—it
is amazing that so little has been written on the Brothers Lydecker.
But to his credit, Jan
Henderson has done something about this oversight and impressively
filled in this lacuna with Lydeckers: The God Fathers of Special
Effects.
August 2010
The Have Gun Will Travel Companion
By
Martin Grimes, Jr. and Les Rayburn
OTR
Publishing, 2000
Review
by Bruce Dettman
On September 14, 1957
the face of the television western changed with the Saturday night debut
of a new western series, Have Gun Will Travel. This was a
sagebrush show like no other, featuring a unique character totally
removed from any other who rode what critic Gary Yoggy has called “the
video range”. The main figure went only by the name of Paladin, and in
what would be one of the great weddings of a character with an actor,
was portrayed by the late Richard Boone.
Paladin lived in the
Carlton Hotel in San Francisco where he was often attended to by the
management’s employee, a young Chinese man called “Hey Boy” who Paladin
considered a friend and who he helped out on occasion. He dressed the
part of a gentleman of means, enjoyed the company of the city’s elite,
smoked the finest cigars, imbibed the best liquor, was fond of quoting
Shakespeare, Keats and Shelly, regularly took in the theatre and the
opera, dated scores of beautiful woman and lastly, made his living with
his gun. Although Paladin would often insist that he wasn’t simply a
paid killer for hire but rather an agent called upon to deal with—and
hopefully find a solution for—a myriad of problems plaguing people, the
fact is that nearly every week this solution involved the custom-made,
perfectly balanced, steel blue revolver that he kept in a holster with a
chess knight embossed on the leather. During work assignments, most of
which took place out in the frontier wilds, Paladin dressed all in black
(in the first season he also sported a white tie that was later
dispensed with) and carried a business card that read “Have Gun Will
Travel”, hence the show’s title.
Over the years certain
biographical tidbits turned up about the character, that he was from a
rich east coast family, that he had attended West Point, that he had
gotten into trouble as a gambler and eventually took up his mantle as
Paladin after meeting a man called “Smoke” (also played by Boone sans
the trademark Paladin mustache). Still, Paladin remained mostly a
mystery. While he signed on for fairly traditional western jobs dealing
with range wars, rampaging outlaws, dangerous killers and thieves, he
also took time out to help the members of the Chinese community working
for a railroad, a lonely teacher trying to teach her class correct
history in the face of local opposition, even, on one occasion, the
writer Oscar Wilde. Paladin hated injustice, bullies, hypocrites and
those who preyed on the weak and vulnerable. He was fast on the draw,
good with his fists and a cagey adversary.
In short, there was no
other character on TV of that era, western or not, as unique as Richard
Boone’s Paladin.
In The Have Gun Will
Travel Companion, Marvin Grams and Les Rayburn have put together a
terrific guidebook to all facets of this fascinating series.
While they trace the
entire video history of the show, the book is more than simply an
episodic survey of its four-year run on CBS.
Grams and Rayburn have
done their homework impressively in assembling the engrossing total
story of all the ingredients, personalities and work that slowly
coalesced into the popular program.
The reader learns of the
embryonic seeds from which Have Gun Will Travel grew, about show
creators Sam Rolfe and Herb Meadow, about how western star Randolph
Scott was the first choice to portray Paladin and how the TV series
spawned a later radio version starring the great character actor John
Dehner.
The authors also attempt
to unravel the often convoluted claims (and subsequent legal wrangling)
surrounding a suit brought against the show’s producers by a man named
Victor DeCosta who charged that he was the one who years earlier had
actually created the character of Paladin.
A biographical portrait
is provided of star Richard Boone which traces his career from his
earlier work in films and first TV series (Medic) through his
Have Gun Will Travel years and beyond to later movie and television
roles up to his death in 1981.
In addition, Grams and
Rayburn have included not only a complete episode guide of the show (and
the radio series) with complete cast and credits, but have included,
when possible, fascinating tid-bits about the makings of many of the
individual programs.
For fans of TV westerns
in general and Have Gun Will Travel in particular this is a must-
have volume.
June 2010
Signs and Wonders
by Michael J Bifulco
A novel
set during a progressive period of ancient Egypt that tells the story of
how an oppressed population of slaves began their struggle for freedom
and eventually became a great nation. Sound familiar?
The ancient story of the first struggle between tyranny and liberty. Are
men the property of the state, or are they free to live by God’s
law? The same struggle continues today.
We are all being watched. Whether we as individuals realize it, care to
admit the possibility, or accept it on faith, the existence of a
higher power shapes the way we live. Since ancient times, the story of
Moses has survived the generations. It was known and understood by the
participants of the first continental congress, and it was a major
influence to the men who created the Constitution of the United States.
They knew the only way a civilized society can survive in peace and
freedom is to abide by the
concept that all are equal under the law: The Ten Commandments.
To
order send $22.95 check or money order:
Mike Bifulco
1708 Simmons N.E.
Grand Rapids, MI 49505
OR contact Mike at:
mjbbooks5@comcast.net
(**Word of advice: If you
send by check, it will take three weeks to clear. All money orders are
processed immediately.)
Also found at
Amazon.com
THE
INVADERS
James Rosin
Autumn Road
Company, 2010
Review by Bruce Dettman
The 1960s were an
intensely active time for U.F.O.s. While Project Blue Book, the official
government agency created to study the phenomenon, was winding down its
investigation—closing its doors in 1970—civilian organizations like
NICAP (National Investigations Committee on Aerial Phenomenon) and APRO
(Aerial Phenomenon Research Organization) were launching vigorous
membership drives in an attempt to keep Flying Saucers in the news. It
wasn’t hard. There were scads of reported sightings appearing nearly
daily in newspapers as well as being described in many best-selling
books detailing such things as inexplicable cattle mutilations and
first-person accounts of individuals who claimed to have been whisked
away by aliens. In one instance the government’s response to such
phenomena was that what people had actually seen was not alien craft at
all but rather something called swamp gas. This explanation became
fodder for stand-up comedians and political cartoonists with swamp gas
assuming a new role as a metaphor for government cover-ups, a popular
subject for discussion since the JKF assassination.
Into this controversy
came television producer Quinn Martin. His well-known Q-M Productions
had been responsible for a host of extremely popular productions such as
The F.B.I., Twelve O’clock High and most significantly The
Fugitive. The latter, dealing with a man wrongly accused of a
killing he did not commit, was extraordinarily popular with fans, not
only because of star David Jansen’s sensitive and moving performance as
the protagonist Dr. Richard Kimble, but because the concept of a man on
the run battling against establishment figures unwilling to believe him
resonated with fans around the world. There were other Fugitive copycat
shows as well such as Run for Your Life and Blue Coronet,
even a parody called Run, Buddy, Run!
But The Invaders
would take the concept to new heights, interstellar ones.
For the record, Martin
did not create the show. That was the work of a gifted writer named
Larry Cohen who had earlier delivered scripts for such shows as
Checkmate, Arrest and Trial, The Defenders and The U.S. Steel
Hour. He came up with his idea for the series and network executives
bit. But after his initial involvement, as often happens in the world of
television, he lost creative control and went onto other things. It was
subsequently Quinn Martin who took the video ball and ran with it.
The Invaders was
based around the concept of an architect named David Vincent (the
“Vincent” coming from Vincent Price, an actor Cohen admired) who one
evening driving home spots a flying saucer hovering above him. Further
investigation alerts him to the fact that this craft, as well as many
others, have traveled to Earth for the specific reason of conquering it,
and moreover that many of these aliens -- who appear physically like
earthlings except for one finger on their hand being crooked and that
when they die they completely burn up—have been able to integrate
themselves into American society, some in positions of high authority.
Vincent realizes that he has to do something about this but there is a
hitch, a big one. No one will believe him. No one!
This does not curtail
Vincent’s resolve to be heard, however, and for two seasons he turns his
back on his career, his friends, his former life, in a concentrated
effort to expose the aliens. In the second season, however, he hooks up
with other earthlings who are also aware of the existence of the
invaders. The introduction of these supporters of his cause removed some
of the individual angst that viewers had come to associate with
Vincent’s one man plight and was not viewed as a good move by most fans
of the show.
Starring as Vincent was
Roy Thinnes. The blonde, handsome and very intense actor, who had also
appeared earlier in the TV series The Long Hot Summer, was a good
choice for the part even though a few critics thought him a bit too
humorless and stiff. But after all he was playing a character trying to
save the earth from total oblivion. Not that much time left in the day
for whoopee cushions and one-liners. Thinnes is excellent as Vincent
handling both the dramatic moments and physical demands of the show with
impressive aplomb.
April 2010
SUPERGIRLS
By Mike Madrid
Exterminating Angel Press
2009
Reviewed by Bruce
Dettman
The first super heroine
to come to my attention was Mary Marvel. Mary, the twin sister of the
celebrated Captain Marvel who for a while gave Superman more than a run
for his money in the popularity stakes among comic book fans. I was too
young to have seen Mary’s debut in 1942, but I had a friend, a comic
book collector like myself at the time, whose older brother had given
him a copy of a Captain Marvel Family comic which featured Mary.
The idea of a female super hero was a real revelation to me. The only
action heroine I was familiar with was TV’s Sheena as played by the
physically impressive Irish McCalla. At that point I did not know that
Sheena had once had her own comic book or that there had been a host of
Sheena clones such as Nyoka, Tiger Girl and Judy of the Jungle. I only
knew I liked her in that skimpy jungle outfit. Later I would be
introduced to Wonder Woman who had made her print debut in 1941 but she
didn’t interest me much. There was also Superman’s cousin, the somewhat
bland Supergirl, and the motorcycle riding Bat Woman.
Although the 1940s
produced some of the best known super heroes of all time (The Flash,
Green Lantern, Hawkman etc.) it was also a period when a number of
female heroines made their debut. Many of these were created to help out
with the war effort, others just dealt with home-grown crime. They were
given different backgrounds, powers and costumes but the one thing they
had in common was for the most part they didn’t last long. Once the
fight against the Axis powers was over so were many of their
crime-fighting careers and characters like Phantom Lady, Spider Widow,
Miss Fury, Black Cat and the Blonde Phantom have, aside for the rare
comic book historian who has searched out these bygone heroines, been
largely forgotten.
Super heroines would
re-emerge with some momentum as Marvel Comics began to dominate comic
sales in addition to bringing more sophisticated plotlines and
motivation to their stable of characters. Manhunter, She Hulk, Black
Canary, Storm, Ms. Marvel, Dazzler and Electra were only some of the new
and more realized distaff newcomers to the scene, characters which
pushed the envelope and re-defined the Super Girls in many ways. But it
was always somewhat of an uphill battle, in the largely male universe of
super heroes, to develop female characters that resonated and had
lasting power with comic book readers.
In Supergirls,
Mike Madrid, a San Francisco-based writer, has done an impressive job of
weaving together the often crazy-quilt like history of these comic
heroines, not always an easy assignment given the roller coaster ride
many of these characters have taken over the last sixty odd years. As
times and society have changed—and with them perspectives about women
and femininity—likewise the women in comics have undergone substantial
alteration and modification, something Madrid, who has a witty and
engaging style in addition to a great historical knowledge of comics,
understands and lays out in a most entertaining manner. In many ways,
tracking the history of these super heroines presents a parallel look at
the varied travels real women have navigated over the last half century.
A case in point is the aforementioned Wonder Woman whose character and
storyline have, due to attempts to keep her current with the times, gone
through a myriad of often drastic changes since her creation nearly
seventy years ago.
Madrid has fashioned a
great romp of a read in Supergirls. For the die-hard comic book
collector it’s a must purchase but even for those not overly familiar
with the comic book world it is still a lively and enjoyable reading
experience.
If I have any complaint about the book it would be
its lack of illustrations, something that a work like this cries out
for. Madrid, however, has solved this problem with the creation of a web
site where curious readers can go to take a gander at the many
fascinating characters he describes in his text. Find this at
http://www.heaven4heroes.com
December 2009
QUINCY
M.E.
Reviewed by
Bruce Dettman
Long
before there was CSI or BONES or any of the modern police shows where
the cops rely heavily on forensic pathology in their quest to find those
responsible for crimes there was Quincy M.E. an NBC
production which premiered in 1976, ran for seven seasons and starred as
the brilliant but chronically stubborn—some might say cranky—coroner the
versatile actor Jack Klugman.
Quincy M.E., the
subject of author Jim Rosin’s latest book of TV history, was initially
telecast as part of NBC’s Sunday Mystery Movie, a rotating series
which also featured on alternating weeks Columbo, McMillan and Wife
and McCloud but got its own berth after only four episodes had
been aired and subsequently began to air as a regular weekly series on
February 4, 1977.
Although the brainchild
of producer writer Lou Shaw and producer Glen Larson it was Klugman,
fresh from a major success on the long-running Odd Couple series,
who truly established the thematic guidelines and aesthetic vision for
the direction of the series. While the network was mostly interested in
a cop show which just happened to have a forensic pathologist in the
lead, the star was intent on tackling serious social, medical and moral
issues, a fact which led to many heated and contentious battles with
studio brass, writers and directors. But Klugman—who could often be
just as confrontational and adamant as the character he played—stuck to
his creative guns and forged an often powerful and evocative series
which was willing to take head-on many controversial topics heretofore
considered off limits to series TV such as child abuse, autism, rape
victims, incest, environmental pollution, illegal sale of prescription
drugs, alcoholism and drug addition.
The show which boasted
excellent scripts became a popular and critical success and attracted
many of Hollywood’s most talented performers including Van Johnson, Jane
Wyatt, Kim Stanley, Carolyn Jones, James Gregory, Craig Stevens, Robert
Webber, Martin Balsam, Dane Clark, Robert Loggia, Edd Byrnes, Henry
Darrow, John Dehner, Charles Aidman, Elisha Cook Jr., Carol Cook and
Marshal Thompson and many, many more.
Jim Rosin, who of late
has made a career out of researching and writing about classic TV shows
of the past including Wagon Train, Naked City, Adventures in Paradise
and Route 66 is in a particularly unique position to tell the
story of Quincy M.E. since he acted as both a writer,
contributing stories and teleplays to the show, as well as appearing in
several episodes.
Included with numerous
interviews of important individuals in the show’s history, both in front
and behind the camera, are several photo sections, a complete episode
guide and biographies of many of the key players that made Quincy,
M.E. such a memorable show.
December 2009
NAKED CITY: THE TELEVISION SERIES
By
James Rosin
Autumn Road
Company
2008
Review by Bruce Dettman
For years Hollywood
crime movies spent little if any time on the criminal’s point of view,
the only exception being when the good guy was framed and we had to
watch as he went through the motions of outsmarting the law until he
could finally establish his innocence.
For the most part,
Tinsel Town crime was about getting the villains not about how they got
that way. The heroes were maverick private eyes or tough cops who put in
long hours, were only nominally paid for their efforts and yet never
strayed from their objectives of nailing those murderers, robbers and
con men that inflicted the great cities like a virus. These malcontents
when played by actors like Dan Dureya, Lee Marvin, Jack Elam or Lee Van
Cleef could be fun to watch, often more interesting than their heroic
counterparts, but they rarely were given significant back stories or
histories explaining what made them tick.
The romance of the cops
and robbers game—if it could be called that—was pretty much removed
thanks to DRAGNET created, produced and starring Jack Webb. The show,
which originally premiered on radio in the late 1940s and then went to
television, told the hard-edged, procedural and no-nonsense story of the
daily work of ordinary police to apprehend criminals. Webb had
absolutely no interest in the reasons behind why the killers, thieves
and kidnappers behaved as they did. His only interest was in detective
Joe Friday and his various partners getting their men and locking them
up.
In its day DRAGNET was
considered the ultimate in authenticity with its no-nonsense approach to
crime. Eventually, however, its single-edged slant began to wear a bit
thin, particularly when TV was growing up and attracting a lot of first
class writers and film-makers who were intent on probing deeper into
social pathology and psychology of humankind.
One of these was Herbert
Leonard, an independent television producer (The Adventures of Rin
Tin Tin, Rescue 8 and Circus Boy) who envisioned a weekly cop
show which would explore more than just the predictable hunt and capture
of criminals. His inspiration for this was the 1948 film Naked City,
a documentary-styled crime drama actually filmed in the streets of New
York and starring Barry Fitzgerald and Don Taylor as the police officers
out after a sadistic killer. Leonard approached Screen Gems with the
concept and a green light was given for writer Sterling Silliphant to
produce a pilot script.
Naked City, a
half hour show, premiered on September 30, 1958. It starred John
McIntire (who would later replace Ward Bond on Wagon Train) and
James Franciscus (Mr. Novak) in the same roles introduced in the
film. It was a radical move to actually film a TV show on location—it
had never been done before—and presented many unique problems and
challenges for the film makers. McIntire eventually grew tired of the
rigors of filming in New York and quit the show (his character was
killed off in a car crash) and replaced by Horace McMahon. The show
later went off the air for about a year but returned in 1960 in an hour
format with a new lead, Paul Burke as Detective Adam Flint, replacing
Franciscus.
The extended length of
this version allowed the writers to broaden their scope and to expand
their storylines. This was no longer just a show about crime, criminals
and the means that went into apprehending them. Stories explored in
greater depth the root causes of crime and the often bizarre and
circuitous routes which could prompt individuals to be led astray.
The show was gritty,
edgy and smart and shooting on the real streets of Manhattan almost made
you think you could smell the asphalt.
The show attracted some
of the best actors in the business including Lee J. Cobb, Claude Rains,
Burgess Meredith, Eddie Albert, Geraldine Fitzgerald, Robert Loggia,
William Shatner, Jack Lord, Jack Warden, Jo Van Fleet, Martin Balsam,
David Jansen, Carroll O’Connor, Jan Sterling, Dennis Hopper, Robert
Webber, Hume Cronyn, George C. Scott, Jack Klugman, Walter Matheau, Ruth
Roman and dozens more.
Another aspect of the
show which gave it added dimension was the relationship between Flint
and his struggling actress girl friend Libby Kingston portrayed by the
gifted Nancy Malone. The chemistry between these two was terrific and
always felt very genuine, very real and brought further realism to the
stories and characters.
Media historian and
author Jim Rosin, already the author of a series of books documenting
the television history of a number of important video productions (Wagon
Train, Route 66, Adventures in Paradise), has once again risen to
the occasion with this effort. The story of this ground-breaking series
is told through the voices of many of those intimately involved in the
production including the late Paul Burke who only recently passed sway.
In addition, the book is full of wonderful photographs and also includes
a complete listing and description of each episode.
Thanks once again to Jim
Rosin for exploring and documenting another classic TV show.
October 2009
CANYON
OF DREAMS
The Magic and Music of Laurel Canyon
by Harvey Kubernik
Internet
info:
Canyon of Dreams or at Barnes and Noble Bookstores
For well
over a century, Hollywood has been a favorite destination for travelers
from all over the world. With weather that replicates almost every
environment world wide, the Southern California locale has many
attractions to please and mystify young and old. One such landmark is
Laurel Canyon. This landmark has been essayed in many recent tomes, but
the entire history has often eluded writers, journalists, and
historians. It’s not that these scribes have offered substandard work;
it’s that none of them until now have captured the panoramic scope and
depth of this topographical wonder.
In
Canyon of Dreams (The Magic and Music of Laurel Canyon), Harvey
Kubernik has presented the first complete oral and visual history of the
Canyon of Laurel. Beginning at the beginning, Kubernik traces the
Canyon’s winding legacy from its pile of rocks genesis to its present
day splendor. Through the memories and minds of L.A. scenesters such as
Van Dyke Parks, Richie Hayward, Jack Larson, Graham Nash, Miss Pamela
Des Barres, Michelle Phillips, Nurit Wilde, Mark Volman, Richie Furay,
Glen Campbell, John Densmore, Bobby Womack, and Roger McGuinn, to name a
few, Kubernik paints the most accurate word portrait of life and times
in Laurel Canyon.
Frames
with mostly previously unseen photographs, many snapped by legendary
rock photographer Henry Diltz (who also is a musician in his own right),
Canyon of Dreams is as pleasing visually as it is in the literary
sense, and will provide hours of pleasure. For those who haven’t lived
in the gypsy canyon, this beautiful coffee table book is the closest
thing to it.
A
must-have for fans of the L.A. music scene. From Sterling Publishing.
Reviewed
by George DeLoro
October 2009
Capes,
Crooks and Cliffhangers
By John
Petty and Grey Smith
Ivy Press
2009
Review by Bruce Dettman
In Capes, Crooks and Cliffhangers the
writing team of John Petty and Gray Smith have succeeded in putting
together an impressively lavish and visually stunning celebration of the
motion picture serial.
Subtitled Heroic Serial Posters of the Golden
Age, the book is designed not only to provide graphic
representations of many of the most colorful and artistically exciting
serial posters available but to suggest the best means possible of
procuring these highly valued collectables. However, Capes, Crooks
and Cliffhangers is much more than this, a real eight course feast
for both the ardent fan of serials and for those attempting to educate
themselves on a cinema form which has not been in active production for
over fifty years.
Although the motion picture serial got its start in
the early days of the silent film with such efforts as What Happened
to Mary and The Perils of Pauline, it was the later talkie
chapter plays produced at Universal, Mascot, Columbia and most
importantly Republic Studios which refined and popularized the form.
Each week the kids of America, not to mention a lot of adults, shelled
out their dimes to see a fifteen minute installment of the latest
cliffhanger.
In the early 1950s the breakdown of the old
Hollywood studio system, various anti- monopoly laws eliminating
studio-owned theatres and most important, the rise in popularity of
television, all conspired to ring the death knoll on the motion picture
serial, but not before some twenty years worth of matinee excitement,
thrills and adventure for the serial lovers of America. Such titles as
The Adventures of Captain Marvel, The Phantom, Flash Gordon, Spy
Smasher, The Crimson Ghost, King of the Rocketmen, Dick Tracy, The
Shadow and dozens more kept audiences on the edge of their
seats as they waited each week to find out how the hero or heroine
managed to escape a flaming cave, a fall over a cliff or an exploding
automobile.
In addition to providing serial histories of such
characters as Superman, Captain America, Dick Tracy, Flash Gordon, Buck
Rogers, Tarzan, The Phantom, Captain Marvel, Zorro, Rocketman, The Lone
Ranger and many more, authors Petty and Smith have included valuable
tips on procuring and collecting poster art from these productions. The
colorful reproductions which accompany the text are absolutely beautiful
and a real mouth-watering visual feast for fans of poster art in general
and devotees of cliffhangers in particular.
Capes, Crooks and Cliffhangers,
although not really a definitive or totally comprehensive history of the
motion picture serial, is a total delight. The text, which includes
sidebar biographies on many leading serial stars, is both fun and
informative and manages to infect the reader with the unbridled and
simple joy that was once the great movie cliffhanger.
In addition, our own Noel Neill, who appeared in a
number of serials in addition to her ground-breaking role of Lois Lane
opposite Kirk Alyn in Columbia’s two Superman serials, provides a lively
and entertaining introduction.
Top marks all around.
September 2009
FLIGHTS OF FANTASY
By Michael J. Hayde
Bear Manor Media, 2009
Review by Bruce
Dettman
Christmas came early for
Superman fans this year in the form of ace writer and incomparable
researcher Michael Hayde’s stunningly impressive work Flights of
Fantasy: The Unauthorized But True Story of Radio and TV’s Adventures of
Superman.
While this reviewer
usually balks at using the over used term definitive, it would
difficult if not impossible to conjure up a more appropriate word to
describe Hayde’s terrific effort.
Unlike so many books on
cinema and television where lazy authors simply pass down the same
familiar anecdotal information from one book to another, Hayde, a
tireless and dedicated media historian, went back to many original
sources to put together the complete story of the radio and first TV
Superman series.
While Hayde references
earlier incarnations of the character beginning with his appearances in
the comics as created in 1938 by Joe Schuster and Jerry Siegel, later in
the Fleisher cartoons and even later yet still in the two Columbia
serials starring Kirk Alyn as the Man of Steel, it is his chief goal and
commitment to explain and document the connecting tissues between the
immensely popular radio series starring Bud Collyer, which premiered in
1940, and the early TV series The Adventures of Superman
featuring George Reeves. To some degree this is uncharted territory
since most writers who have told the Superman story in the past have
usually approached the radio series as a totally distinct and separate
entity completely unrelated to the later more familiar TV incarnation.
However, this is anything but true. Not only did the Superman of the
radio series with his tough, nearly vigilante approach to society’s
miscreants resemble the Reeves’ first year performance, but many of the
faces behind the camera such as writer/producer Robert Maxwell and comic
book executive Witney Ellsworth (who would follow Maxwell as the TV
show’s producer) were involved in both projects. Even various radio
scripts were dusted off and re-tooled for television. The connections,
particularly in the early days of the TV effort, were numerous, but it
took Hayde to really document and connect the dots and he does this
superbly.
In addition to
chronicling both shows, Hayde has secured many of the original
television scripts and reprinted numerous scenes from certain episodes
that were re-vamped to alter motivation or in some cases to tone down or
modify lines that were not really appropriate for the character or
situations. This is fascinating stuff that even the most rabid Superman
fan is unlikely to have ever seen before.
Hayde spent years
putting Flights of Fantasy together, interviewing individuals
both in front of and behind the camera, hunting down arcane bits of
documentation pertaining to both shows and the results couldn’t be more
satisfying and impressive.
In addition, the author
has provided complete episode guides for both the radio and TV series.
This is a terrific read
and a wonderful accomplishment and the book many Superman fans have
waited for years to become available.
Great thanks to Michael
Hayde for his tireless research and superb execution of this fascinating
material.
September 2009
FLIGHTS OF
FANTASY: The Unauthorized but True Story of Radio & TV's
Adventures of Superman can be ordered at
bearmanormedia.com
For more
information about this book, go to
http://geocities.com/MikeH0714/
ROUTE
66
By James Rosin
Autumn Road Company
2007
Review by Bruce
Dettman
The lure of the open
road, much like the attraction of the sea to earlier generations, gained
a real foothold in the American consciousness during the mid twentieth
century. The romantic notion of casting aside all materialistic
possessions and needs and setting off on a personal journey of
self-discovery along the asphalt tributaries of the country was
reflected in films (Sullivans’s Travels), songs (King of the
Road), books (the cult classic On The Road By Jack Kerouac)
and as the 1950s drew to a close, on the highly popular and
ground-breaking TV series Route 66.
Route 66, which
debuted October 7, 1960, was the combined brainchild of producer Herbert
B. Leonard and writer Stirling Silliphant who over lunch one day came up
with the unique concept of two young men with distinctly different
backgrounds traveling around the country together. A pilot was filmed
using a relatively new face, George Maharis, and was integrated into
Leonard’s other network series Naked City, but it didn’t make
much of an impression. Consequently Silliphant tried again with a new
pilot that paired Maharis with veteran actor Martin Milner (Robert
Redford had also been up for the role but the producers preferred
Milner) and this time the networks bit.
In the show Maharis
portrayed the tough and mercurial Buz Murdock, a former resident of New
York’s infamous Hell’s Kitchen, while Milner was given the less showier
role of Todd Stiles, the privileged yet level-headed son of a wealthy
industrialist whose death and business ruin has left Todd with only one
possession, a shiny new Corvette. Despite their obvious differences the
two men decide to take off across America to find not only adventures
but perhaps themselves as well.
One of the many things
that separated Route 66 from other TV shows of the period was the
fact that it was filmed on location much like Leonard’s Naked City,
the difference being that while that groundbreaking series was shot on
the streets of New York, Route 66 went all over the country to
create authenticity for its eclectic stories. America was not quite the
homogenized place fifty years ago that it has become since and this
allowed the writers to have Bud and Todd venture into specific little
community pockets with characters who reflected their distinct cultural,
racial, political and social attitudes and biases. Quite often the two
young men were merely the conduits for the action, the catalysts whose
presence fueled conflicts between the other characters. Other times they
were central to the stories. The writing was edgy and adult, the plots
solid and compelling. It was a rare gem in the days when the majority of
TV was taken up by westerns and private eye shows.
Maharis and Milner were
as different away from the camera as they were in front of it but they
had real chemistry. Maharis became something of a teen idol in those
pre-Beatle days and even tried his hand at a singing career, but
Route 66 only succeeded as well as it did because of both men, equal
partners in providing the strong core of the show. When Maharis was
forced to leave the series after several seasons due to a serious
illness he was replaced by actor Glenn Corbett as Viet Nam veteran
Lincoln Chase. It was still a good show but the special Maharis-Milner
connection was gone.
Route 66 was an
immediate hit. It boasted strong guest casts which included both old
pros and up-and-coming performers. Some of those who appeared on the
series included Ed Asner, E.G. Marshall, Suzanne Pleshette, Charles
McGraw, Inger Stevens, Leslie Neilsen, Lee Marvin, Anne Francis, Jack
Lord, Michael Rennie, Dorothy Malone, Ben Johnson, Walter Mathau, Robert
Duvall and Darren McGavin.
Author James Rosin,
already the highly respected author of many books on popular and media
culture including works on such series as Wagon Train, Naked City
and Quincy, has provided an entertaining and vastly informative
history of the show. Rosin has not only created a fascinating and
well-researched glimpse of the making of the series but interviewed many
of those performers and behind-the-scenes individuals whose immense
contribution to Route 66 helped make it one of the most memorable
television shows of all time.
August 2009
REEL
TEARS
The
Beverly Washburn Story
By Beverly
Washburn and Donald Vaughn
Bear Manor
Books, 2009
Review by Bruce Dettman
The child movie star, often abused by the ravenous
studio system, exploited by parents and the industry, psychologically
battered, self-destructive and unable to adjust when fame and attention
begin to recede and bank accounts dry up, is as much a cliché as
anything Tinsel town ever laid bare on the big screen. However, like
most clichés it has a foundation in truth, in this case, a lot of it.
Hollywood history is littered with the carcasses of
many a child performer who either never made it to adulthood or if they
did weren’t prepared for the challenge of real life. A list of such
individuals would be a long one, from early juvenile performers such as
Carl “Alfalfa” Switzer (of Our Gang fame) and the very talented
Bobby Driscoll up through modern TV performers like Rusty Hamer, Anissa
Jones and Dana Plato, screen lore is replete with a sad and wasteful
tally of youthful talents who withered much too early on the vine.
There are, of course, notable exceptions to this
grim scenario, a prime example being Beverly Washburn, one of the
busiest child actors of the 1950s and early 60s who honed a steady and
impressive list of credits and, as they say, lived to tell about it.
In Reel Tears (the double-edged title
referencing the youthful Beverly’s uncanny and industry-wide reputation
for being able to shed realistic tears at a directorial drop of the hat)
Beverly recounts her early years as a busy child actress in such films
as Old Yeller, Shane, The Greatest Show On Earth, The Juggler, The
Lone Ranger, The Killer That Stalked New York, Here Comes The Groom
and, of course, Superman and the Mole Men. She was also busy on
the small tube with appearances on Wagon Train, Thriller,
Science-Fiction Theatre, Zane Gray Theatre and The New Loretta
Young Show, to mention just a few.
During these years she worked with some of the
truly memorable figures of the period including Jack Benny (probably her
favorite), Lou Costello, Barbara Stanwyck, Dorothy McGuire, Anne Baxter,
Loretta Young, Kirk Douglas and Alan Ladd and she provides wonderful
tidbits about these performers and her experiences both behind and in
front of the camera.
But there is more to Reel Tears than
simply tales of a child, later a juvenile performer, working in movies
and on television. It is in many ways two books fused into one, the
story of a performer and the story of a survivor. Beverly is both.
The second half of the book, and just as compelling
as the first, tells how Beverly was forced to adjust to a world where
parts were few and adult demands and responsibilities were many. It is
the chronicle of coping with tragedy, rejection and life’s many
disappointments and pitfalls without a scintilla of self-pity or
complaint. Mostly it is a book about dealing with what has to be dealt
with and moving on.
Perhaps some writers wouldn’t be able to get away
with this but Beverly Washburn does. There is a wonderful modesty and
honesty inherent in her simple telling which comes across on every page
and which resonates with great sincerity, conviction and truth.
Reel Tears is very real, very
heartfelt and genuine, just like the lady herself.
August 2009
ADVENTURES IN PARADISE
By James Rosin
Autumn Road Company
2009
Reviewed by Bruce
Dettman
In
the fall of 1959 the ABC network introduced a new series to their weekly
lineup. It was called Adventures in Paradise. The show, based on
a concept by bestselling author James Michener, starred a relatively
unknown actor named Gardner McKay in the role of Adam Troy, a Korean War
veteran who roams the South Pacific in his schooner The Tiki
seeking out adventure and in the process getting into some sticky
situations and meeting a lot of colorful people. Adventures would
run for three seasons and ninety-one episodes before the much
beleaguered Gardner opted to bow out.
Given that most of
television during this era was taken up by a plethora of formula
westerns and detective shows, Adventures was a fairly unique
series, one that relied more on solid story-telling and
characterizations than action and physical conflict. Some of Hollywood’s
best actors made appearances on the show including – to name just a few
–Julie Newmar, Agnes Moorehead, Martin Landau, Hans Conried, Thomas
Mitchell, Buddy Ebsen, George Hamilton, Elsa Lancaster and Carroll
O’Connor.
Solidly produced with an
impressive behind-the-scenes company (including executive producers
Dominic Dunne and William Self) and (in later seasons) beautiful
on-location filming,
Adventures
in Paradise was a memorable and impressive accomplishment. Although
not warmly welcomed by critics, the show, which included wonderful music
courtesy of ace film and television composer Lionel Newman, earned good
ratings and would undoubtedly have gone on for more seasons had not
McKay, the recipient of much abuse at the hands of reviewers plus a
rigorous schedule that he eventually came to resent, pulled the plug.
Jim Rosin, as with his
earlier books on shows such as Route 66, Naked City and Wagon
Train, has explored and documented the history of this series and in
the process included interviews with many of the those once involved,
both behind and in front of the camera. A complete episode guide and
biographical material on cast and crew is also provided.
For fans who recall with
fondness Adventures In Paradise and have occasionally wondered
about this mostly forgotten show this book provides an
entertaining journey back and is well worth the wait.
June 2009
SUPERMAN VS. HOLLYWOOD
By
Jake Rossen
Chicago
Review Press
$16.95
Review
by Bruce Dettman
To a large degree Jake Rossen’s recently published
SUPERMAN VERSES HOLLYWOOD charts the same basic course as Bruce
Scivally’s SUPERMAN ON FILM, TELEVISION, RADIO AND BROADWAY released
last autumn. In their own fashion both authors attempt to trace and
document the history of the Superman character from his seminal comic
book days up to through his most recent incarnations on TV’s
Smallville and Brian Singer’s big screen adaptation Superman
Returns.
The differences in the books are twofold, tone and
detail, with Scivally’s work being the more reverential and nostalgic
but lacking some of Rossen’s level of research and documentation.
As far as tone is concerned—and this is
particularly of importance to the followers of this web page—a certain
glibness and sarcasm often comes through when Rossen is discussing his
subject. I found this to be particularly true in his account of the
creation and making of TAOS. There is nothing downright mean-spirited or
incendiary exactly, but rather a sort of shadowy condescension and
veiled disapproval which often creeps into the writing. He constantly
harps and makes disparaging comments on the dated aspects of the series
and its small budget while rarely if ever coming to terms with its
lasting charm, sincerity and engaging performances of the
principles—Reeves, Coates, Neill, Larson, Hamilton and Shayne—which not
only made it one of the most fondly recalled series of early television
but one which continues to resonate with audiences worldwide.
Factual errors creep in as well. For instance, he
cites the fact that in the Columbia serials Kirk Alyn as Superman never
used a stunt double which, based on several production stills taken at
the time, is simply not true. He says that in TAOS Lois (Coates) was
accidentally knocked out by a stuntman (it was actor Frank Richards) and
he also repeats the erroneous story of a considerable amount of George’s
From Here to Eternity footage being excised by studio heads due
to Reeves’ association with the comic book character.
As in Scivally’s book, TAOS does not really receive
the extent of coverage that lesser but more recent Superman projects do.
In my opinion, this is a glaring slight since it really was TAOS—not the
serials or Fleisher cartoons or the popular radio series or even the
comic books (directed as they were towards a juvenile audience)—with its
massive appeal to people of all ages and brought into homes worldwide
via the new medium of television that made the character such a cultural
icon.
Rossen is a good writer and as somewhat of a
Hollywood insider has done his research, particularly regarding events
during the Christopher Reeves period as well as later attempts, most of
them bungled and ill-advised, to get a new Superman franchise up and
running again following the failure of the disappointing SUPERMAN IV,
the final and delayed result being 2007’s SUPERMAN RETURNS which opened
to mixed reviews and lower box office returns than hoped for. He also
touches briefly on the controversial film HOLLYWOODLAND and provides a
more or less accurate account of the history and failure of this project
although omitting references to early developmental influences by other
key figures this reviewer is personally aware of who had a more accurate
movie about George Reeves in mind.
As the title of the book suggests, this is not only
a book about Superman but one in which the famous character is utilized
to showcase how Hollywood writers, producers and directors deal with a
successful long-running property, not always in a constructive or
attractive manner. This was particularly evidenced several years after
Chris Reeve’s final Superman movie was released when various Tinsel Town
moguls got into the picture in an attempt to create new storylines and
even to blatantly (some might say sacrilegiously) re-vamp the Man of
Steel’s mythological persona, some of these concepts absolutely
ludicrous and totally at odds with the character and his history. It is
often the story of Hollywood back-stabbing, misrepresentation,
horrendous judgment and downright stupid decision-making. In the end,
compared to some of the abusive suffered at the hands of Hollywood,
Superman’s confrontations with the likes of Brainiac, Bizarro and Lex
Luther were child’s play.
Rossen’s work, like Scivally’s, although flawed and
somewhat deficient in its coverage of TAOS, is certainly deserving of a
place on any Superman fan’s bookshelf, if nothing else for the totality
of its coverage and insight into the behind-the scenes machinations that
were always at work during the 70 year history of this wonderful and
ever evolving character.
January 2008
Superman on Film,
Television, Radio and Broadway

Book by
Bruce Scivally
Mcfarland Publishers, 2007
Reviewed by Bruce Dettman
Nearly from his inception in 1938, the product of
the fertile imaginations of two daydreaming Cincinnati teenagers, Jerry
Siegel and Joe Shuster, the character of Superman, one of the most
recognizable icons in pop culture, has been showcased in a wide variety
of mediums which have—in some instances minimally, other times more
extensively—served to stretch, redefine and expand upon the initial
mythos and fictional parameters of the character. It was only a couple
of years after his comic book debut that the Man of Steel was alive and
well and featured on an immensely popular national radio hookup starring
Bud Collier (which would also introduce such later perennial ingredients
of the Superman legend as Daily Planet Editor Perry White, Jimmy Olsen
and Kryptonite) followed two years later by his stellar incarnation in a
series of brilliant Paramount animated shorts created by the Max
Fleisher Studios. Next would be the bargain basement cliffhangers of
Columbia Studio’s Sam Katzman starring Kirk Alyn which would in turn
give rise to the phenomenally popular long-running TV series starring
George Reeves. Other incarnations would follow including additional
cartoons, a Broadway production, the tremendously successful big screen
versions starring Christopher Reeve, other TV series which explored the
Superman theme including Superboy, Lois and Clark and the current
trend-setting Smallville as well as what could be a new major
franchise with newcomer Brandon Routh in the lead role.
In his new book Superman on Film, Television,
Radio and Broadway author/documentary-maker and cultural historian
Bruce Scivally has provided an overview of the history of the Man of
Steel in all mediums, not only tracing the meteoric rise in popularity
of the character and describing his ongoing transformation and cosmetic
alternations, but has touched upon those forces, social, political and
artistic, that often provided the impetus for these changes.
For readers of Glass House Presents, the
majority of who are dedicated fans of George Reeves and the 1950s
Adventures of Superman, the book is often somewhat of a mixed
blessing. While Scivally does a fine job in providing an entertaining
and engaging survey of the Superman saga, I suspect many will be
disappointed and frustrated that Reeves show is not covered in more
detail since a good argument could made for the fact that the series was
not only a defining moment for the character, but that in the collective
minds of a whole generation, George Reeves was the definitive Superman
and those weekly television episodes, reaching so many (as they continue
to do via cable and DVDS) probably more than anything else—certainly
more than the radio series, the serials or the Fleisher
cartoons—cemented the character’s reputation in the mind of the general
public at large. Scivally owes a huge debt to Gary Grossman’s
groundbreaking work from the 1970s, Superman From Serial to Cereal
which he draws from for his research, but in doing so he
occasionally repeats some of Grossman’s own errors which is
disconcerting and undermines the intent setting the record straight.
In addition, perhaps because Grossman spent so much of his text
detailing what went on in individual episodes, Scivally sidetracks much
discussion of these although he does often provide lengthy analysis of
standout efforts from later shows like Lois and Clark and
Smallville. Some attention to landmark episodes such as Panic In
The Sky or Superman In Exile, which braved new grounds for
the character, would have been a decided plus as would interviews with
personal not usually quoted such as writers and technical people still
alive. This reviewer would also have appreciated, particularly in a book
with such a hefty price tag, more in the way of illustrations and
photographs to visually showcase the historical development of Superman
throughout the decades.
These complaints aside, Scivally is to be
congratulated for applying his talents and energies to assimilating the
considerable pieces of the Superman story into one volume. Unlike
Grossman whose book pre-dated the most recent incarnations of the Man of
Steel, Scivally is able to present the full breath and range of the
character’s appearances right up to the present Brian Singer
mega-production and for this reason is extremely useful as a reference
tool and barometer showcasing the often circuitous paths that
distinguished the multi-faceted media career of our favorite pop
phenomenon.
November 2007
Truth, Justice, and the American Way
Expanded Version by Larry Ward
Review by
Alfred Walker
Open Letters,
Memos, Appreciations, and Apologies
re:
Truth, Justice, and the American Way: The Life and Times of Noel
Neill - The Original Lois Lane, Deluxe Expanded Edition (2006)
by Larry Thomas Ward
To Carl Glass,
my friend and publisher:
I'm letting you down big-time, pal. I agreed to review Noel Neill's
newly expanded biography for Glass House Presents, but
it's not going to happen. A "review" would suggest some semblance of
an impartial stance, perhaps a bit of objective distance from the
subject matter. You may be Miss Neill's Number One Fan
(self-proclaimed), but I hereby confess that I'm a Noel Neill Fan
101: basic issue, hooked since childhood, still buzzing from meeting
her three years ago and twice more since. As for Larry Ward, I count
him as a loyal friend and a key provider of sustenance and
enhancement to the legacy of The Adventures of Superman. So
Carl, my objectivity with this book charts at about a third of one
per cent. No way I can write a review. Sorry!
To My Basement,
the locale of my regular column for Glasshouse: You will not be seeing this book. It has its own
special shelf in the living room. You're just going to have to
content yourself with the boxes of comic books and that moth-eaten
Superman costume.
To Fans of Noel
Neill,
The Adventures
of Superman, and the Golden Age of Hollywood: This book is
must-have! Read that sentence several times.
Remember as a
kid, you'd scour the shelves at the public library for a paltry few
pictures of your favorite stars and shows? Well, growing up has
privileges and here's the payoff! Larry Ward has compiled a stunning
and overwhelming collection of images, many previously unpublished,
often courtesy of scrapbooks diligently compiled by Miss Neill's
parents. There are scores of pictures from 1940s Hollywood; page
after page of production shots and candids from The Adventures of
Superman (TAOS); and an amazing set of photos from George
Reeves' touring musical troupe. At or near the center of all of
these is, of course, the most lovely and effervescent Noel Neill.
Miss
Neill's long and remarkable career (to date) is chronicled here:
dance school standout, big band singer, film ingénue, serial star,
and TV icon. And that's the first half of the book. There are
150 more pages devoted to life after TAOS: the Christopher
Reeve film, the college tours, the Seinfeld webisode, and most
heartwarmingly, her present day interaction with the army of boomer
fans who, as kids, watched transfixed as she stood toe to toe with
Superman.
Many of those
fans came to meet Miss Neill at signings for the original edition of
her biography, published in 2003. We loved that book. This
book is that book on steroids. And whipped cream. With cherries on
top. Lots of cherries. Here is an astonishing collection of photos
from "The Private Side of Noel Neill" (have you ever seen her
husband?). Here is Lois Lane meeting Lois Lane (can you guess how
many Miss Neill has met? Check the pics!). And here is her 85th
birthday bash, replete with friends and fans from Lou "Hulk"
Ferrigno to Jon "Timmy" Provost.
Just as Larry
Ward knows that Miss Neill is the star of all their joint
appearances, so is the wisdom he employs with this book. He writes
admiringly and competently of his subject, all the while knowing
that the images are king in this tribute. Color photos abound, some
surely colorized but glorious nonetheless. Any of a dozen of these
online would command at the very least the cost of this handsome,
hardbound volume.
Is this the
final edition? Miss Neill continues on an open-ended tour. She's
seen major press coverage with the opening of Superman Returns.
And Larry reserves the right to cover her 90th birthday party.
So maybe you'll want to roll the dice and pass on one of the 120 or
so copies left at jimnolt.com
In response, I would only quote the usually soft-spoken Mr. Nolt
himself: Let this one slip through your fingers, and you'll be
kicking yourself for years to come.
To Larry Ward:
You,
sir, have an uncanny sense of what we fans like. You must be paying
attention at all those autograph sessions! I thank you for this
amazing, thoughtful offering. Your efforts count not only as a
wonderful act of much needed stewardship of the memory of TAOS, but
also as enrichment of the lives of so many who've met and visited
with Miss Neill, thanks to you.
And to Noel
Neill:
Your ongoing willingness to share your life with us excites and
informs. From you we learn there can be chapters unforeseen, with no
end in sight. We meet you with a thrill, then learn about your
journey with quiet awe. Thank you!
July 2006