Regarding David Savage's report earlier today on our web site about tomorrow's New York City screening of The Poseidon Adventure hosted by drag queen Hedda Lettuce, comes Retro columnist Tom Lisanti's perspective:
Drag legend Hedda Lettuce hosts a tribute screening to the granddaddy of all disaster movies ThePoseidon Adventure (1972) this Saturday night, January 24, 10 P.M. at Clearview Chelsea Theatres on 23rd Street and 8th Avenue in New York. Forget the atrocious remakes, this is the one to see!
Â
As everyone knows by now it is New Year's Eve on the SS Poseidon when just after the stroke of midnight a huge tidal wave causes the ship to go topsy turvy and a small band of survivors must climb, crawl, swim their way to the bottom now the top of the ship. Hip preacher Gene Hackman leads to safety a ragtag band of stereotypes including tough talking cop Ernest Borgnine and his foul-mouthed ex-prostitute panties-wearing only wife Stella Stevens; an old Jewish couple Shelley Winters and Jack Albertson; helpless hippie singer Carol Lynley; lonely bachelor Red Buttons; injured steward Roddy McDowall; and two kids Pamela Sue Martin and Eric Shea. The fun of course is that most don't make it.
. I saw this movie at the Westbury Drive-in on Long Island for my 12th birthday on May 11, 1973. The movie was such a hit that it was still playing theatres 5 months after it opened in December 1972. I was totally mesmerized by this movie. What stayed with me for days that turned to weeks that turned to years was the scene of the ship turning upside down and the lovely Carol Lynley bedecked in hot pants and go-go boots as Nonnie. For some reason I identified with her most because of all the survivors she couldn't swim (I am a weak swimmer myself) and showed the most fear as I imagined I would in such a situation.Â
.
I interviewed Carol Lynley about the movie and it seems her on screen fear was not all acting:Â
“The only way to describe working on The Poseidon Adventure is hellish. I spent close to four months dripping wet wearing the same dirty clothes. To make matters even worse, I have a tremendous fear of heights. I had it all my life. I usually get very dizzy and throw up. Not attractive. I even went to Sugarloaf Mountain in Rio to try to conquer it. Usually a stunt double is used but in The Poseidon Adventure I had to do all my stunts myself. We would shoot the scenes high up on the catwalks or ladders and when the director would yell ‘cut’ all the other actors would climb down except me. Gene Hackman’s brother was working on the film as a stunt coordinator and he would have to climb up and help me down!â€Â
If the phrase Barbara, please! means something special to you and you live in New York, most likely you’ve attended at least once the weekly Clearview Classics series at Chelsea’s Clearview Cinemas, hosted by New York’s own, reigning “Queen of Green,†drag performer and comic chanteuse Hedda Lettuce. If not, you have no excuse. Mark your calendars now. Screening twice on Thursday nights and once on Saturdays, and attended by a congregation of fanatical members who can recite every word of Mommie Dearest, Torch Song, Airport ’75, Earthquake, or Xanadu at will, Clearview Classics has been the main home of “Lettuce†for eight years now. Every week she packs in a crowd for her hilarious pre-movie show in which she warms up the crowd (not that they need it) with songs (which she sings herself), key scene re-enactments with audience members, special guests and, if you should be so unfortunate, identification of “virgins†– mousy first-timers who have never seen Valley of the Dolls or its ilk and are dragged mercilessly into the spotlight.Â
(NOTE: THIS IS A REVISED POSTING OF THE REVIEW. DUE TO A TECHNICAL PROBLEM, THE ORIGINAL POSTING WAS INCOMPLETE)
JOHN PHILIP LAW: DIABOLIK ANGEL
By Carlos Aguilar & Anita Hass
Foreword by Ray Harryhausen
Scifiworld/Quatermass         240 pages Â
€35.00                                                            Â
Review by John Exshaw
Towards the end of John Phillip Law: Diabolik Angel, authors Carlos Aguilar and Anita Haas describe their book as “an unfinished workâ€, anticipating, as they did, further films in the strange career of an actor best remembered for playing the black-clad super-criminal in Mario Bava’s Danger: Diabolik (1968), the blind angel, Pygar, in Roger Vadim’s Barbarella (1968), and the turbaned hero of The Golden Voyage of Sinbad (1973). Sadly, as it turned out, Diabolik Angel will stand instead as the last word on Law, who died of cancer at the age of 70 in May of last year, during the final stages of the book’s preparation.
Due, in part, to his association with such iconic, but necessarily two-dimensional, characters as Diabolik and Sinbad, Law himself remained something of a screen enigma, a somewhat remote, otherworldly presence whose own personality was seldom discernable in the roles he played. His best non-fantasy performances – as the naïve Russian submariner in The Russians Are Coming! The Russians Are Coming! (1965), the haunted protagonist of Death Rides a Horse (1967), the object of Rod Steiger’s affections in The Sergeant (1968), and the deadly but anachronistic knight of the air in Von Richthofen and Brown (1971, a.k.a. The Red Baron) – were sufficiently compelling and varied (though united by a certain innocence) to suggest that Law would become a leading character star of the 1970s. And yet somehow such status eluded him.
Reflecting on this, Law remarked, “A lot of people have told me that I had all the qualities to be a big star, one of the biggest of my generation. Like Robert Redford and Warren Beatty, who are both the same age as me, and both started at the same time. But the point is that I never wanted to be a star, I wanted to be an actor, and that isn’t the same thing. Besides, there was always the problem of my height [6’5â€]: I was too tall to play somebody’s son, and too baby-faced to look like someone’s father. That’s why they almost always gave me roles of special characters, like comic book heroes, and historical figures.â€
Combined with that, as Aguilar and Haas make clear, Law “came across few projects that suited his peculiarities [and] without a doubt . . . made some bad and irreversible mistakes.†The latter included turning down the Jon Voight part in Midnight Cowboy (on his agent’s advice) and that of Jack Nicholson in Easy Rider (due to a schedule conflict). In addition to rejecting films which he should, in retrospect, have accepted, Law also displayed a spectacular talent for picking those best avoided, such as Otto Preminger’s late-period duds, Hurry Sundown (1967) and Skidoo (1968), the soporific The Hawaiians (1970), the conspicuously flaccid The Love Machine (1971), and that byword for self-indulgence and ill-discipline, Dennis Hopper’s The Last Movie (also 1971), a title that would prove all too prophetic with respect to Law’s standing as a Hollywood star.
In 1969, the year he missed out on both Midnight Cowboy and Easy Rider, Law also suffered the indignity of being replaced in the cast of The Gypsy Moths, following a parachute accident in which he was injured, and a poor relationship with his co-stars: “The atmosphere was terrible. Burt Lancaster was the star... a very egotistical man, who didn’t help anybody while shooting. . . . He couldn’t stand me, I suppose it was because I was taller than him. I can’t think of any other reason. Then there was Gene Hackman, another difficult person who is always trying to steal the show. Good actor, but not a good person. And the director, John Frankenheimer was always drunk before noon. . . .†Aeronautical accidents were to feature again in Law’s career two years later, when, during the shooting of Roger Corman’s Von Richthofen and Brown, several stunt flyers were killed.
Cinema Retro columnist David Savage takes a look at Hollywood's most dubious career achievement.
.
Elizabeth Berkley in Showgirls: the film that inspired Whoopi Goldberg to say she hadn't seen this many poles abused since WWII.
In
the run-up to this year’s Razzie nominations, to be announced Wednesday,
January 21st for 2008’s “honorees†for the worst achievements in
moviemaking, the longlist buzz is already getting press. If it’s any
indication, 2008 must have been a stink-bomb banner year for movies as it’s
rare for the press to report on the worst movies of the year just-passed, before the nominations are even
announced.
Among
the films emerging as leading contenders for 2008’s gold-plated raspberry
statuette -- always bestowed on the eve of the “other†gold-plated statuette
ceremony -- are: The Love Guru, Mike
Myers’ laughless Bollywood debacle; Speed
Racer, Disaster Movie, The Day the Earth Stood Still (the 2009
“reimaginingâ€), High School Musical 3,
The Hottie & The Nottie (starring
Paris Hilton in a brave, human-like performance) Postal (director Uwe Boll’s “best film to dateâ€), The Happening and Meet Dave, starring Eddie Murphy as Eddie Murphy.
My
personal favorite for Worst Movie of 2008 is the unbearably PC remake of The Women (which I wrote about last
March), Diane English’s 12-years-in-the-making update to the 1939 ensemble classic.
Think of it as WE network’s answer to the furs-and-cigarettes 1930s. Yoga mats
replace chaise lounges, chai lattes replace gin-and-tonics, and
self-empowerment bromides replace catty ripostes. Comic actresses with genius
timing like Candice Bergen, Cloris Leachman and Debra Messing all went to waste
in this ill-conceived mess.
But
since the Razzies were created in 1980, the award itself has gained the patina
of respect over the last two decades. Earning a golden raspberry has become its
own singular honor, so delicious is the “badâ€Â
publicity created by being part of a B-movie which, if the participants
are lucky enough, will pass from critics’ wrath to (hopefully) ripen over time
to the esteemed “so bad it’s good†Hall of Shame.  Witness Showgirls,
Mommie Dearest, Battlefield Earth, Howard the
Duck, et al. Elizabeth Berkley of Showgirls
thought she may have committed career suicide after the 1995 movie opened to
incredulous laughter, but now is firmly enthroned as B-movie royalty, in the
tradition of Valley of the Dolls’
Patty Duke.
But
perhaps most importantly, the award winners who show enough self-lampooning humor
to show up at the ceremonies to hold the “fruit of their labors†are usually
rewarded with more affection and respect by the public and press for being so
game.
The
best example was Halle Berry’s hilarious acceptance speech at 2005’s Razzies
for her performance in Catwoman. (“I
want to thank the writers…thank you for thinking this was a good idea…â€)
I
wonder, though: Has any actor or filmmaker ever won a Razzie on Oscar Eve and
then won an Academy Award the next night for the same film? I asked the founder
of The Razzies, John Wilson.
“No
one's ever won both awards in a
single weekend for the exact same
achievement,â€
said Wilson, “but we have had five instances of some overlap:
Â
For 1980,
James Coco
was BOTH an Oscar and a Razzie nominee for his
supporting
performance in Only When I Laugh.
For 1983,
Amy Irving
was BOTH an Oscar and a Razzie nominee for her
supporting
performance (as Barbra Streisand’s “wifeâ€) in Yentl.Â
For
1988, Tom Cruise
starred in both that year’s Worst Picture “winnerâ€
(Cocktail) and that year’s Best Picture
winner (Rain Man).
For 1992,
Alan Mencken
“won†both a WORST Song Razzie (for a song
from
Newsies) and a Best Song Oscar (for a
song from Aladdin)Â in one
weekend.Â
For 1997,
screenwriter Brian
Helgeland “won†both a WORST Screenplay Razzie
(for
Kevin Costner’s Postman) and a BEST
Screenplay Oscar (for L.A.Â
Confidential) in one
weekend.Â
Â
For
all things Razzie, go to www.razzies.com.
Special thanks to John Wilson, head RazzBerry for his contribution to this
article.
“Hi, I’m Plenty,†said Lana Wood to
Sean Connery’s James Bond at the gaming tables of Las Vegas in Diamonds Are Forever (1971). “Plenty O’Toole.â€Â Glancing at her cleavage, Bond wittily
deadpanned, “But of course you are.â€Â
With this small exchange audiences were introduced to one of the most
popular Bond girls to ever hit the screen.Â
As Plenty, Lana Wood was finally able to step out of the shadow of her
sister Natalie Wood. On screen for only
a few scenes, she almost steals the movie with her amusing performance and
remains forever remembered for this role.Â
“Isn’t that bizarre,†exclaims Wood with a laugh. “I’m only in the movie for three
minutes!Â
Lana Wood was born Svetlana Zacharenko
Gurdin in Santa Monica, California. She
followed her older sister into the acting profession and made her film debut at
eight years old in John Ford’s classic western The Searchers (1956). Wood
received good notices and went on to appear in a few television dramas with
Jack Lemmon and Charlton Heston, among others.Â
But unlike Natalie, Lana didn’t want to act as a child and she waited
until she was eighteen before re-starting her career with an episode of Dr. Kildare. More alluring and voluptuous than Natalie, Lana
found herself typed cast in sexpot roles.Â
After playing a coed in The Girls
on the Beach (1965), Wood was signed to play sexy Eula Harker in the
short-lived soap opera The Long, Hot
Summer (1965-66). When the series
was cancelled midway through its first season, 20th Century-Fox immediately
moved Lana Wood into their hit soap opera Peyton
Place. As Sandy Webber, a slinky
temptress from the wrong side of the tracks, Wood was an immediate hit with the
viewers and played the role for close to two years.
After playing a swinging
bachelorette in For Singles Only
(1968) and a mini-skirted biker babe in Free
Grass (1969), Wood posed semi-nude for Playboy
magazine. Her pictorial appeared in the
April 1971 issue along accompanied by some of her poetry. These photos indirectly helped Wood land her
most famous role of Plenty O’Toole.  “I
didn’t have to audition per se for this role,†recalls Lana. “My dear friend [writer] Tom Mankiewicz told
me that Cubby Broccoli was looking for an actress to play this character named
Plenty O’Toole. Tom thought I would be
perfect for it. He asked me if I would
meet with Cubby. I said, ‘Absolutely!’ I was en route to do a movie called A Place Called Today in New York. Before leaving for that, I went in to chat
with Cubby who was adorable! I tried to
look as tall as humanly possible because Tom had told me that they were
thinking of Plenty O’Toole as this giant of a woman in every way. For me that wasn’t easy—I’m only five feet,
four inches—but those were the days of hot pants and really high heels. I
didn’t hear anything until I started filming the other picture. I was thrilled to get the part!â€
In Diamonds Are Forever (1971), secret agent James Bond (Sean Connery)
is assigned to pose as a diamond smuggler, leading him and jewel thief Tiffany
Case (Jill St. John), from Amsterdam to Las Vegas, in pursuit of fifty thousand
carats of diamonds. Bond meets bar girl
Plenty O’Toole and her cleavage at a crap tables in a Vegas casino. After introducing herself to Bond who has been
winning he takes her up to his room.Â
Their tryst is interrupted as thugs try to kill Bond and toss Plenty out
the fifteen-story window. (“We filmed
this at night. I was topless. The crowd got a nice view of me in nothing
but a pair of pale blue panties.â€)Â
Fortunately, Plenty lands in the hotel’s pool. Unfortunately, a short time later she is
discovered murdered and floating face down in Tiffany’s pool.
Lana strikes a cheesecake pose in the 1970s.
Remembering working with Sean
Connery, Lana remarks, “He is very charming and attentive. He was very relaxed and
was very easy to work with. As long as
we did things in a rapid pace so he could get out to golf then he was
fine. But I had no problems working with
Sean at all. Later on we heard that he
was battling with the producers during the shoot. If that was true it wasn’t in front of the
cast or crew.â€Â Lana also admits to
having a brief “interlude†with her sexy leading man.
With the special edition DVD
release, fans got to see a number of Wood’s scenes that were excised from the
final print due to “running time.â€Â One
shows the sexual attraction growing between Bond and Plenty as they dine before
going up to his hotel room and another featured Plenty sneaking back into
Bond’s room only to find him in bed with Tiffany. “I was flabbergasted that they cut all this
out,†exclaims Lana. “I didn’t even
realize it until I had come back from a world tour to promote the film. I went to the Grauman’s Chinese Theatre in
Hollywood to watch it with a friend because I was so busy I never had time to
see it. I literally bent over to get
some popcorn as the thugs threw me out the window and by the time I had
straightened up my character was dead. I
thought, ‘Wow, all of a sudden I have this little part.’ I actually asked why they cut most of my scenes
and I was told that they didn’t have much relevance to the plot.â€Â Not so.Â
These missing scenes finally explain how and why Plenty O’Toole is found
murdered in Tiffany Case’s swimming pool wearing her wig. The assassins mistook her for Tiffany and killed
her.Â
It was foolish to cut these scenes
and considering how much better Wood was in the movie than Jill St. John who clad
in an ill-fitting bikini throughout most of the movie gives a shrill
performance (though the overrated redhead incredulously keeps making the Top 10
Bond Girls of all-time polls), the producers probably kicked themselves for
shortening Wood’s screen time.
- Read more about Bond girls and
other spy chicks in Tom Lisanti’s Film
Fatales: Women in Espionage Films and Television, 1962-1973 (co-authored by Louis Paul) available at www.sixtiescinema.com. .