Wonderland Burlesque's Let's All Go To The Movies: Hollywood Outsiders

Wonderland Burlesque's

Let's All Go To The Movies

Hollywood Outsiders

You see them standing there, on the edge of the crowd of adoring fans. Or, perhaps they're a cog in the wheel, part of an industry which routinely chews people up, spits them out, only to pick them up off the ground to resume chewing.

It's not easy being green.

And it's not easy standing on the fringe in a land as opulent as Tinsletown.

Today, we take a look the Hollywood Outsiders. Oh, no, these are not the mavericks of the industry, more like the flotsam and jetsam.

They're the ones that try. They're the ones drawn in. Or they're the ones whose path collides with that of the establishment, only to be crushed; cases where the dream factory becomes a nightmare.

Let's dig in!

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 Stand-In 

(1937)

An efficiency expert, who believes everything can be reduced to mathematics, is sent by the bank he works for to Hollywood to see whether Colossal Pictures is a good investment or if they should sell it off at a huge loss. He soon learns that the ways of Hollywood  doesn't fit his formulaic mindset. What he finds is chicanery and romance, but ultimately he decides to help to save the studio.

Based on Clarence Budington Kelland's story of the same name, which was originally published as a six-part serial in The Saturday Evening Post from February 13 - March 20, 1937, this screwball comedy was directed by Tay Garnett and stars Leslie Howard, Joan Blondell and Humphrey Bogart.  

When the film was originally released, the names of Leslie Howard and Joan Blondell were above the title, and the name of Humphrey Bogart, who played a supporting role, was below. When it was re-released in 1948, Howard had been dead for five years, and Bogart was riding the crest of the wave, so the billing was re-arranged and Bogart was now top billed.

Joan Blondell, after working on the 1937 film The Perfect Specimen for Warner Bros. Pictures, was cast in this film by United Artists as part of a studio talent swap. She reportedly enjoyed working on the film, as she had previously worked with Bogart on the 1932 film Three on a Match and the 1936 film Bullets or Ballots. She once said of Bogart, "He wasn't a man one ever felt close to - nobody did. But I liked him."

Shortly after production wrapped, Blondell was hospitalized for neuritis and exhaustion.

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The Youngest Profession

(1943)

A pair of young girls who are best friends are autograph hounds spending most of their day bumping into, and having tea, with the likes of Greer Garson and Walter Pidgeon. Based on misinformation from a meddling old-maid governess, one of them also devotes some time to working on the no-problem marriage of her parents to the extent of hiring the strong man from a side show to pay attention to her mother in order to make her father jealous, despite the good advice received from Walter Pidgeon.

Based on a short story series and book written by Lillian Day, this lighthearted comedy was directed by Edward Buzzell, and stars Virginia Weidler, Edward Arnold, John Carroll, Scotty Beckett, and Agnes Moorehead. It also contains cameo appearances by Greer Garson, Lana Turner, William Powell, Walter Pidgeon, and Robert Taylor.

MGM purchased the rights to the novel in 1940, intending to star Judy Garland, but she was deemed too old by the time production was ready, so Virginia Weidler was cast instead.

This film was a success at the box office, earning MGM a profit of $583,000 according to studio records.

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The Party

(1968)

Blocked from Hollywood after unwittingly levelling the set of a famous director's latest war epic, a bumbling Indian actor can kiss his brief career in the movie industry goodbye. Having burned his bridges, the hapless fellow instead mistakenly receives an invitation to the director's exclusive dinner soiree at his magnificent, high-tech mansion. As the invited intruder merrily rubs shoulders with the Hollywood elite, the host's hand-picked guests who are unaware of the mistake. the Indian actor has his first-ever sip of alcohol and simply picks up where he left off on the set, causing chaos and mayhem. Yes... a night to remember.  

This comedy was directed by Blake Edwards, and stars Peter Sellers and Claudine Longet. It has a very loose structure, and essentially serves as a series of set ups for Sellers to put his  improvisational skills to use.

This film was improvised from a 56-page outline. Each scene was shot in sequence and built upon the previous scene. To aid in this experiment, the film's producers had a video-camera tube attached to the Panavision camera and connected to an Ampex studio videotape machine, allowing the actors and crew to review what they had just filmed. According to an article in Daily Variety this was one of the first productions to use a video camera in this matter. This eliminated the time and expense of developing the film and showing the "rushes" the following day. The cost of this new technology was $1,100 per day, but director Edwards said the system saved the production many times that amount by avoiding costly resets and re-shoots on following days.

Associate producer Ken Wales nearly drowned during filming, after stuntman Dick Crockett shoved him into the foam-filled swimming pool as a joke. No one had told either man that the foam was actually designed for use by firefighters and absorbed oxygen in order to help put out fires, meaning that Wales couldn't breathe even when he was above the water. He had to be rescued by a couple of stagehands.

This film was also hugely popular in India. The late Indian Prime Minister Indira Gandhi was a fan and was very fond of repeating one of Sellars's lines: "In India we don't think who we are, we know who we are!"

 

This was one of Elvis Presley's favorite films.

When the wrap party was held at MGM, pieces of the sets were sold off to those in attendance. Peter Sellers bought a barbecue grill and Harold Mirisch purchased patio furniture.

The protagonist Hrundi Bakshi was influenced by two of Sellers' earlier characters: the Indian doctor Ahmed el Kabir in The Millionairess (1960) and Inspector Clouseau in The Pink Panther series. Peter Sellers is cast as a South Asian and appears in darkened face make-up. Such casting would not be permitted now because it would be viewed as disrespectful to South Asians and a matter of cultural misappropriation.

Longet was married to American singer and television entertainer Andy Williams from 1961 until 1975. She has maintained a private profile since 1977, following her conviction for negligent homicide in connection with the shooting death of her boyfriend, former Olympic skier Spider Sabich. Williams publicly supported Longet throughout the trial, paid for her legal defense team, and escorted her to and from the courthouse. Asked later about his unwavering support of his ex-wife, Williams said, "She is the mother of my children and we never stopped being friends. We just didn't want to be married anymore."

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Targets

(1968)

A vintage horror-movie star, who feels he should retire because his films pale in light of the day-to-day world has to offer, crosses paths with an average suburban man who has snapped and gone on a killing spree.   

This crime thriller was directed by Peter Bogdanovich in his theatrical directorial debut, and stars Tim O'Kelly, Boris Karloff, Nancy Hsueh, Bogdanovich, James Brown, Arthur Peterson and Sandy Baron.

Producer Roger Corman told  Bogdanovich he could make any film he wanted to, on two conditions: he had to use stock footage from the film The Terror (1963), and he had to hire Boris Karloff for two days (Karloff was under contract and owed Corman those two days). Karloff was so impressed with the script that he refused pay for any shooting time over his contracted two days. He ended up working for a total of five days on the film.

As the film includes extracts from Roger Corman's 1963 film The Terror, Corman suggested Bogdanovich that the little-known actor who appeared opposite Karloff in that film should also appear in this one, perhaps in the role of the killer. Bogdanovich turned down the idea - too bad for him - the young actor later became world famous shortly after this film first appeared: he was Jack Nicholson.

The story that Byron Orlok tells in the film of the servant fleeing from death is W. Somerset Maugham's short story The Appointment in Samara. Reportedly, Karloff, who was ill at the time, nailed the telling of the story in a single take and received a standing ovation from everyone on the set.

This served as Karloff's final appearance in a major American film.

The film was shot in 25 days and production was completed in December of 1967. Due to its controversial nature, Paramount Pictures was worried that  the film would be controversial in the wake of the recent assassinations of Martin Luther King and Senator Robert F. Kennedy, so they added a pro-gun control message to the beginning of its theatrical prints, over the strenuous objections of Bogdanovich.

Although the character Karloff plays and the actor himself are both horror film legends, the similarities between the two are very few. Both are respected and iconic British actors known for their roles in horror films, but while the character is embittered with the film industry and wants to retire, Karloff never retired and was always grateful for his success in the film industry. Also, while the character seems regretful of his status as a horror actor, Karloff was in fact very proud of his legacy, and was particularly proud of his most famous role in film, the Frankenstein Monster.

The house in which Tim O'Kelly's clean-cut character lives with his happy family in the film is given a surreal look thanks to  the cartoonish colors of the walls in each room, and the strange lack of doorknobs on many of the interior doors. The sparse wall decorations and the smallness of the rooms gives the house a claustrophobic feel. Bogdanovich did all this to reflect the warped fairy-tale nature of the deranged young shooter's life.

The first credited feature film for production designer and writer Polly Platt, who was married to Bogdanovich at the time.

The film's sequence with the sniper shooting people in cars driving on a freeway from the top of an oil storage tank was loosely inspired by the trues story of the Highway 101 sniper attack. On April 25, 1965, a 16-year-old alienated youth, named Michael Andrew Clark, shot at motorists from a hilltop along Highway 101 just south of Orcutt, California, killing three and injuring 10 others before committing suicide. Prior to the shooting spree, Clark left behind a note vowing to make his parents "die a thousand times in court" for his actions, and he was right; a lawsuit was brought against Clark's parents by two of the victim's families for mistreating and not raising their son well, and negligence for allowing Clark access to the hunting rifle used for the shooting spree.

The crimes  in the film were also based partially on those of real-life mass murderer Charles Whitman. In 1966, Whitman, a seemingly normal married man from a good family, killed his wife and mother at home before going to the observation tower at the University of Texas in Austin, where he launched into an extensive shooting spree on the streets below. Whitman ended up killing 17 people and wounding 31 before being shot dead by the police.

At the time this film was made (from November 1967 to December 1967), Boris Karloff was 80 years old and in very poor health, suffering from emphysema along with rheumatoid arthritis. He had only half of one lung and spent the time between takes in a wheelchair with an oxygen mask on. He also wore braces on both legs and had difficulty standing or walking without his cane - the weakness of his legs is visible in some scenes in the film. Fortunately, Karloff lived long enough to view the completed film, as well as enjoy the well-deserved accolades he received for this performance.

Initially a box-office bomb, it was, at the time of its release and still, a critics favorite.

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The Day Of The Locust

(1975)

Life's flotsam and jetsam turn up at late 1930s Hollywoodland's door, once more, in this insightful tale of wannabes and desperadoes. An artist who has inspirations to become noticed meets a blonde bombshell would-be actress, and is immediately smitten. But she has other ideas. She has another romantic victim in her sights, as cruelty and loneliness take new meaning. Soon, all three are slowly sucked into the Hollywood system of sycophants, diggers and parasites, sucking life from others as a way of life, their very souls are slowly depleted, leaving hollow husks in its wake.

Based on Nathaniel West's novel of the same name, which was published in 1939. this satirical historical drama was directed by John Schlesinger and stars Donald Sutherland, Karen Black, William Atherton, Burgess Meredith, Richard Dysart, John Hillerman and Geraldine Page.

Peter Bogdanovich was offered the chance to direct. He declined.

Jane Fonda, Goldie Hawn, and Jill Clayburgh all turned down the role which Karen Black would play. Sally Struthers campaigned for the role.

Schlesinger considered Raquel Welch for the female lead, but eventually decided that she was "just too gorgeous". His conception of the role would appear to have differed from the presentation of the character in the original novel, where Faye is a girl in her late teens.  Black was in her mid-30s when she played the role.

Dustin Hoffman was briefly attached. Although Donald Sutherland has top billing in the credits and posters, he doesn't appear until roughly 40 minutes into the film. Similarly, the prominently billed Burgess Meredith only appears in the first half of the movie.

Veteran actors Red Skelton, James Cagney and Eddie Albert were considered as possibilities for key roles in the film, most likely in the role played by Burgess Meredith.

Malcolm McDowell was asked to play a major role.

Geraldine Page replaced Betty Field, who died shortly before filming began, in the role of the radio evangelist.

Karen Black claims behind-the-scenes gossip stemming from this production ruined her career. She said of it, "That was not a fun experience, making that film. It was just horrible. I wish quite heartily I'd never made it, because I'd have had a much longer career in Hollywood. It was a very troubled production, and I became the scapegoat that everyone blamed. People kept getting sick, getting fired, and it was just a horror, an absolute horror. Seven months. There were all these rumors that people made up... and I wound up being the center of it. Poor [William] Atherton walked off and didn't do the final scene, because he couldn't take it anymore."

The film had a seven-month shooting schedule. It began filming in the autumn of 1973, and was not shown publicly until the spring of 1975. In the end, the film lost a lot of money.

Using diffusion filters and camera angles that often let sunlight deflect off of characters and objects within the frame, this film is considered by some one of the most uniquely photographed of the 1970s, and Conrad L. Hall received one of its two Oscar nominations, his for Best Cinematography.

Burgess Meredith was nominated as Best Supporting Actor.

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And that's all for now.

Tune in next time...

Same place, same channel.

Nothing To Lose - Claudine Longet

from the 1968 motion The Party