Stuff I like
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| Frederic March |
Frederic March starred in such classics as Dr. Jekyll and Mr. Hyde (for which he won an Academy Award for Best Actor in 1931), Anna Karenina (1935) and the original version of A Star is Born (1937).
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| Dr. Jekyll and Mr. Hyde |
His career spanned nearly 50 years until his passing in 1975.
The most recent remake of A Star is Born starring Bradley Cooper and Lady Gaga premiered on August 31st, 2018.
Coincidentally, Frederic March was born on August 31st, 1897.
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| Biago Anthony Gazzara |
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| On stage... |
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| ...and television |
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| Road House (1989) |
On August 27th, 1971 Let’s Scare Jessica to Death premiered in NYC.
This psychological slow burn had a great score and easily held my attention for the full 89 minutes.
That’s saying something since the internet ate my brain.
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| Mariclare Costello and Zohra Lampert |
Yvette Vickers was born on August 26th, 1928 in Kansas City, Missouri.
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| Vickers in Attack of the 50 ft. Woman |
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| with Sally Kellerman |
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| Yvette Vickers (1928-2010) |
It’s been exactly 42 years to the day since Lucio Fulci released this beast on the world.
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| Zombi v Shark |
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| The ol’ Beach Theater |
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| P.J. Soles and the Ramones |
Filmed on location in Los Angeles at the defunct Mount Carmel high school.
They actually blew up the school at the end of the movie.
It doesn’t get much more rock n’ roll than that.
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| Mary Woronov and special effects artist Rob Bottin as Ms. Mouse |
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| Rock and Roll High School (1979) with Rob Bottin |
The Ramones Last Show 8/6/1996
Also on this date:
Steve Guttenberg born in 1958
Bolaji Badejo was born in Lagos, Nigeria on August 23rd, 1953.
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| Alien (1979) |
I was thinking...
Cindy Williams has some cult cred.
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| Williams in Drive, He Said |
Jack Nicholson’s 1971 directorial debut Drive, He Said.
Beware! The Blob was Larry Hagman’s campy 1973 sequel to The Blob from 1958.
Psychological horror from 1973 The Killing Kind by director Curtis Harrington.
Also in ‘73 was George Lucas’ American Graffiti. She later auditioned for Princess Leah.
Let’s all take a moment to imagine that alternate reality.
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| Francis Ford Coppola’s The Conversation (1974) with Frederic Forrest |
The cult comedy The First Nudie Musical from 1976 received a lot of play on Cinemax in its earliest days. I remember dad getting pissed because Shirley didn’t get naked in it.
It’s...
An Alien parody musical starring Leslie Nielsen.
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| aka Naked Space |
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| Laverne and Shirley (1976-1983) with Michael McKean, Penny Marshall, David Lander and Leslie Easterbrook |
Cindy Williams, born August 22nd, 1947.
Also on this date:
The Texas Chainsaw Massacre Part 2 was released in 1986
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| An American Werewolf in London (1981) |
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| Jenny Agutter and David Naughton |
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| Rik Mayall as 2nd Chess Player, Uncredited Bar Patron and Brian Glover as Chess Player |
John Landis wrote the first draft of the script over a decade before but it was shelved until he earned some clout.
Still producers were concerned that the script was too funny to be this or too scary to be that.
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| John Landis |
Rick Baker won the first Academy Award given for best makeup in 1982.
He beat out Stan Winston who was nominated for his makeup work in Heartbeeps. Heartbeeps stars Bernadette Peters and Andy Kaufman (in his last movie appearance) as romantic robots.
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| Rick Baker’s award winning effects |
David Naughton might have lost his sweet gig with Dr. Pepper because he showed too much ass in the movie.
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| From the Dr. Pepper archives |
Legend has it that cast and crew danced around Naughton, while he was still in full werewolf makeup, singing:
“I’m a werewolf. You’re a werewolf. Wouldn’t you like to be a werewolf, too?”
I met him once on the set of a movie that never quite saw the light of day. He seemed very gracious for a guy who's probably been hearing the same things over and over again from adoring fans for the past 40 years.
Another one from the early days of cable.
Released theatrically on this date in 1982 it didn’t find its popularity until it began broadcasting endlessly on HBO, TNT AND TBS.
It was played so often that there was a joke that HBO stood for
“Hey, Beastmaster’s on”
and TBS was
“The Beastmaster Station”.
It stars Marc Singer, Tanya Roberts, John Amos and Rip Fucking Torn.
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| Marc Singer and Tanya Roberts |
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| John Amos |
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| Rip Fucking Torn |
Directed by Phantasm mastermind Don Coscarelli, The Beastmaster slowly faded into obscurity...
...until last year when Coscarelli announced that he and producer/ co-writer Paul Pepperman had reacquired the rights to the movie and were interested in shopping a possible reboot.
They are also actively seeking the original film print for restoration.
Also on this date:
Mark Borchardt was born in 1966
Happy Birthday to Gene Roddenberry born August 19th, 1921.
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| Gene Roddenberry |
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| Jonathan Frakes |
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| Betsy Palmer (1958) |
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| I’ve Got a Secret |
