PMcreative

01/07/2024

12/05/2024

Finally made it to Twin Lights!

08/04/2024

Marked safe from the eclipse! 🕶️

18/11/2023

02/04/2023

Oh no! Lol!

22/03/2023

21/03/2023

In the winter and early spring of 1977, the production team at the Valjean facility (Van Nuys) began blowing up models in the parking lot.

09/09/2022

The Kids in the Hall comedian reflects on his royal muse.

30/05/2022

Jack Benny: "There are only five real people in Hollywood. Everybody else is Mel Blanc."

Originally, the sound of the Maxwell car on Jack Benny's radio show was a pre-recorded sound effect on a phonograph record. However, during a live broadcast, Blanc noticed that the record player was not turned on for the crucial moment when the effect was supposed to play. He quickly grabbed the microphone and improvised the sounds himself, to the utter delight of the studio audience. Benny made it part of the program from then on and gave Blanc much larger roles to play in the show.
The sound Bugs Bunny makes while munching a carrot is actually Blanc munching on a carrot. He tried using celery, raw potatoes, and a lot of other things, but only a carrot would make that carrot crunching sound. According to Noel Blanc, Mel's son, Mel was not in fact allergic to carrots as was previously thought by many. People who worked in the sound studios believed this because they would see Mel spitting out the carrot after taking a bite. Mel did this because he could not speak with the carrot in his mouth and that was the only reason he spat it out.

Originally, voice artists were not given screen credit on animated cartoons. After he was turned down for a raise by tight-fisted producer Leon Schlesinger, Blanc suggested they add his name as Vocal Characterizationist to the credits as a compromise and omitted the name of any other voice actor that worked on the cartoon. Not only did it give greater recognition to voice artists from then on, it helped to bring Blanc to the public eye and quickly brought him more work in radio.

On January 24, 1961, Blanc was in a near-fatal car accident while many of the shows that required his services, most importantly "The Flintstones," were still in production. He did the voices of his characters in both his home bed and his hospital bed, in a full body cast and with all his "Flintstones" co-stars and recording equipment crowded into the same room.

While in a coma after the accident, doctors unsuccessfully tried to get Mel to talk. Finally, a doctor, who was also a huge fan of his cartoon characters, asked Mel "Bugs? Bugs Bunny? Are you there?" In Bugs Bunny's voice, Mel responded "What's up, Doc?". After talking with several other characters, they eventually lead Mel out of his coma.(IMDb)

Happy Birthday, Mel Blanc!

19/05/2022

1993’s Jurassic Park had 63 VFX shots. In 1997, Starship Troopers made headlines for having almost 500. Today’s blockbusters routinely have over 2,000 VFX shots — and far less time to complete them. - Inverse

VFX workers are struggling to get by. Speaking to Inverse, four visual effects veterans describe an industry marred by brutal deadlines, slashed budgets, mass layoffs, and industry-wide burnout.

27/04/2022

08/04/2022

Here is the official video for 'Hey Hey Rise Up', Pink Floyd’s new Ukraine fundraiser feat Andriy Khlyvnyuk of Boombox. Stream / download at http://pinkfloyd...

12/02/2022

After graduating from high school in 1938, the 6'4", 200-lb. Forrest Tucker played semi-pro football in the Washington, DC, area. He also enlisted in the National Guard and was assigned to a cavalry unit in Ft. Myers, Virginia. He started at the top when he entered the movies, in a supporting role in William Wyler's "The Westerner" (1940) opposite Gary Cooper and Walter Brennan, who won his third Oscar for portraying Judge Roy Bean in the picture. He got the role during his 1939 vacation from the Gayety Theatre, which shut down due to the District of Columbia's horrible summers in the days before air conditioning was common. He was signed to the part in the Wyler picture, which required a big fellow with enough presence for a fight scene with the 6'3" superstar Cooper.

Tucker served as an enlisted man in the Army during the war, being discharged as a second lieutenant in 1945. He returned to Columbia and resumed his acting career with an appearance in the classic film "The Yearling" (1946). He signed with Republic Pictures in 1948, which brought him one of his greatest roles, that of the Marine corporal bearing a grudge against gung-ho sergeant John Wayne in "Sands of Iwo Jima" (1949). At Republic Tucker was top-billed in many of the "B' pictures in the action and western genres the studio was famous for. In 1958 he broke out of action/western pictures and played Beauregard Burnside to Rosalind Russell's "Auntie Mame" (1958), which showed that Tucker was capable of performing in light comedy.

However, it was television that provided Tucker with his most famous role: scheming cavalry sergeant Morgan O'Rourke in "F Troop." Ably supported by Larry Storch, Ken Berry and James Hampton, Tucker showed a flair for comedy and he and Storch had great chemistry, but the series was canceled after only two seasons. Following "F Troop," Tucker returned to films in supporting parts (having a good turn as the villain in the John Wayne western "Chisum" (1970)) and character leads ("The Wild McCullochs" (1975)). (IMDb)

Happy Birthday, Forrest Tucker!

14/12/2021

Despite the fact that Patty Duke had played Helen Keller in the play "The Miracle Worker", she almost did not get the part in the 1962 film. The reason was that Duke, 15 years old at the time, was too old to portray a seven-year-old girl, but after Anne Bancroft was cast as Anne Sullivan, Duke was chosen to play Helen in the movie. When Duke won the Oscar for Best Supporting Actress she became the youngest actor to win a competitive Academy Award. This record stood for eleven years until Tatum O'Neal broke it in 1974 for her role in "Paper Moon" (1973).

It was as a twelve year old that Duke got to meet Ms. Keller while performing in the play. Duke remembered the day: “I was 12 years old and an actress, Katherine Cornell, was a neighbor of Helen Keller's. She came to see the play 'The Miracle Worker' on opening night and said 'Would you like to meet Helen Keller?' I was tempted to say "No I am busy" but I didn't! So she arranged it. I went to Miss Keller's house in Arcan Ridge, Connecticut. We had the most delightful day! It was awesome to watch her come down the stairs in her beautiful blue dress. She never touched the railing. She had a thread on the opposite wall and she would put her pinky on that thread and walk down the stairs in such a stately manner. After the great stately walk down the stairs, she became like a giddy girl! We had the best time. We must have spent the whole day there. She was eager to know how much I loved playing her. She wanted to come to the show but she had recently lost her second 'Annie Sullivan', Polly. She was in mourning so she didn't want to leave her house. But our meeting was truly magical, mystical. I treasure those moments." (Wikipedia/IMDb/TheShowbizWizard)

Happy Birthday, Helen Keller!

16/11/2021

On this date in 1977, "Close Encounters of the Third Kind" was released.

The film's origins can be traced to director Steven Spielberg's childhood, when he and his father watched a meteor shower in New Jersey. At the age of 18, Spielberg completed the full-length science fiction film "Firelight." Many scenes from "Firelight" were incorporated in "Close Encounters" on a shot-for-shot basis. In 1970, he wrote a short story entitled "Experiences" about a lovers' lane in a Midwestern farming community and the "light show" a group of teenagers see in the night sky.

In late 1973, after completing work on "The Sugarland Express" (1974), Spielberg developed a deal with Columbia Pictures for a science-fiction film. Spielberg first considered doing a documentary or low-budget feature film about people who believed in UFOs. He decided "a film that depended on state of the art technology couldn't be made for $2.5 million." Borrowing a phrase from the ending of "The Thing from Another World" (1951), he retitled the film "Watch the Skies," and pitched the concept to Willard Huyck and Gloria Katz. Katz remembered: "It had flying saucers from outer space landing on Robertson Boulevard [in West Hollywood, California]. I go, 'Steve, that's the worst idea I ever heard.'" Spielberg brought Paul Schrader to write the script in December 1973 with principal photography to begin in late 1974. To discuss the script, Spielberg visited the home where Schrader lived with his brother Leonard. However, Spielberg started work on "Jaws" (1975) in 1974, pushing "Watch the Skies" back.

With the financial and critical success of "Jaws," Spielberg was able to negotiate a vast amount of creative control from Columbia, including the right to make the film any way he wanted. Schrader turned in his script, which Spielberg called "one of the most embarrassing screenplays ever professionally turned in to a major film studio or director" and "a terribly guilt-ridden story not about UFOs at all." Titled "Kingdom Come," the script's protagonist was a 45-year-old Air Force officer named Paul Van Owen. "[His] job for the government is to ridicule and debunk flying saucers." Schrader continued: "One day he has an encounter. He goes to the government, threatening to blow the lid off to the public. Instead, he and the government spend 15 years trying to make contact."

Spielberg and Schrader experienced creative differences, hiring John Hill to rewrite. At one point, the main character was a police officer. Spielberg "[found] it hard to identify with men in uniform. I wanted to have Mr. Everyday Regular Fella." Spielberg rejected the Schrader/Hill script during post-production on "Jaws," reflecting that "they wanted to make it like a James Bond adventure." Hal Barwood and Matthew Robbins, friends of Spielberg, suggested the plot device of a kidnapped child. Spielberg then began to write the script. The song "When You Wish upon a Star" from "Pinocchio" (1940) influenced Spielberg's writing style. "I hung my story on the mood the song created, the way it affected me personally." During pre-production, the title was changed from "Kingdom Come" to "Close Encounters of the Third Kind." (Wikipedia)

13/11/2021

16/10/2021

On this date in 1966, "A Funny Thing Happened on the Way to the Forum" was released in the United States.

Although the musical had originally been written with Phil Silvers in mind (but he turned it down because he couldn't wear his glasses, and feared an on-stage accident), Zero Mostel starred on Broadway as Pseudolus, and Richard Lester was his choice to direct the film version. Other directors who were considered included Charlie Chaplin, Orson Welles, and Mike Nichols. It was filmed at the Samuel Bronston Studios in Madrid, Spain, and on location around that city, on an estimated budget of $2 million.

Silver was involved in the film, playing the character of Marcus Lycus. During filming, he locked himself in his trailer and refused to come out. Lester asked Jon Pertwee to step into the role, as he already played the part on stage. Once Silvers heard he had been replaced, he came out of his trailer, bursting with new enthusiasm for the project. He had to go without his trademark glasses for this movie, as Lester did not want any historical anachronisms. Pertwee was given the tiny role of Crassus as compensation.

Jack Gilford was also re-creating his stage role, as Hysterium, and there are other connections to the Broadway production. Tony Walton, who designed the production, including the costumes, was also the designer of the Broadway show. For Walton, who was married to Julie Andrews from 1959 to 1967, "Forum" came at the beginning of both his film and stage careers: it was his second Broadway production, and his third film - he had designed costumes for "Mary Poppins" in 1964, and did the overall production design of "Fahrenheit 451" in 1966.

Forum is remarkable as one of the few films in which Buster Keaton appeared where he employed a double. Keaton was suffering from terminal cancer at the time – a fact of which he was not aware – and Mick Dillon stood-in for him for the running sequences. However, Buster performed the pratfall after running into a tree in the chase sequence near the end of the film himself, as no one could properly imitate his pratfalls. (Wikipedia/IMDb)