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Current mood:  cheerful
Been a little lax in copying over my Fred Sez blogs lately, so here's two at once--dig in, MySpacers!!
Boris Sure Is Bad Enough
Last night, I went on another one of
my VHS
fishing expeditions--I came across
an eight
hour tape that simply had "Dick
Tracy
Meets Gruesome" scrawled on it.
I popped it into the VCR, and then
went about
discovering what else was recorded
there.
Made up entirely of Turner Classic
Movie
material from 2003, the aforementioned
Gould
meets "Ghoul" programmer
led things
off, followed by "West Of Shanghai",
"The Raven", "The Black
Cat",
"Freaks", and "M".
Boris
Karloff was the featured star of the
first
four films (the two Poe flavored flicks
i
saw long, long ago, the other two not
at
all), "Freaks" I actually
remember
watching shortly after taping it off
TCM,
mostly to satisfy a decades old curiosity,
and "M" I've yet to see.
But just to keep things simple, I decided
to start at the beginning and scope
out Karloff's
1947 performance as Gruesome. He receives
top-billing over Ralph Byrd's Dick
Tracy,and
he truly deserves it. Not only is he
afforded
substantial screen time (something
that was
not always the case when tuning into
a lesser
forties' Karloff or Lugosi vehicle),
but
he's far a more interesting character
as
well!! Truth is, I'd never seen a Tracy
film
before (save for the Warren Beatty
update).
After several earlier serials starring
Byrd,
this was the last of four feature films
(the
initial pair starring Morgan Conway),
though
Byrd would be back in 1950 to film
39 episodes
of a "Dick Tracy" TV program,
and
would've filmed more if he hadn't died
suddenly
of a heart attack (yes, I've been doing
my
internet homework!). From what I've
been
able to gather, contemporary critics
found
this last Tracy film, while enjoyable,
more
cartoonishly campy than the three that
preceded
it. Was it the appearance of Dr. A.
Tomic
that did it, or was it his comely assistant,
professor
I.M. Learned? Beats me, but
for
an alleged chuckle-fest, the final
half of
this thing features enough indiscriminate
homicide to pass for an episode of
"24"!!
And of course, Boris is right in the
thick
of it all!! (Naturally, he gets his
eventually--gosh,
is that a spoiler, or simply a foregone
conclusion?--but
wait'll you see HOW he's dispatched!!
Not
exactly cricket, Dick...
(Trivia note: Tarzan of the (near)
future,
Lex Barker, has the unbilled role of
an ambulance
driver who gets slugged in the flick's
final
minutes--gee, you can hardly recognize
the
guy with his shirt on!!)
And you CAN share in all the fun, thanks
to YouTube!! Yup, it's another in our ever-popular
series of "First Fred watches it on
tape, then he passes it along to YOU via
the YouTube!" blog entries. It's in
six parts, and runs a total of 65 minutes.
Watch for the scene where, as the police
are rapidly closing in, the big boss asks
Gruesome to look after and protect his lady
friend for him, prompting Boris to smile
and answer reassuringly. What happens next
AIN'T for the faint of heart, lemme tell
ya!
Anyway, enjoy! I did!!
Dick Tracy Meets Gruesome Part 1
Dick Tracy Meets Gruesome Part 2
Dick Tracy Meets Gruesome Part 3
Dick Tracy Meets Gruesome Part 4
Dick Tracy Meets Gruesome Part 5
Dick Tracy Meets Gruesome Part 6
Oh, Mother--Times Two
Thanks to the internet, one of my favorite
things to do after watching a movie or an
old--or even not all that old--TV show is
to Google the names of the various supporting
actors and actresses seen in the end credits,
cuz you never know what you're gonna find.
Take, for instance, the case of Irene Tedrow.
That's exactly what i did after watching
her in the pivotal--yet peripheral--role
of Congresswoman Geddes in one of my very
favorite episodes of "The Mary Tyler
Moore Show", "The Dinner Party".
That's the one, you might recall, where Mary
throws a disastrous dinner-party for her
Congresswoman friend, a party where there's
more guests than portions of food (Rhoda
unexpectedly brings along a pre-Fonz Henry
Winkler as her date). Most memorable is the
moment when a hungry Lou Grant casually takes
what amounts to two full portions, only to
have to put half of it back at Mary's panicky
behest!! Funny, funny scene!!
So anyway, following the cat's final meow,
I checked out Irene Tedrow's imdb page. Some impressive credits there, but I found
a pair that would be of particular interest
to the comics fans amongst us (which is pretty
much all of you, I'm guessing).
In 1975, Ms. Tedrow essayed the role of Martha
Kent in the TV adaptation of the quasi-hit
Broadway show, "It's A Bird, It's A
Plane, It's Superman!".
A few years later, in 1978, on the short-lived
Nicholas Hammond "Spider-Man' program.
she played Aunt May!!
That's right, folks--this lady holds the
unique distinction of being the ONLY actress
to play the adoptive mother-figure to both
Superman AND Spider-Man on the tube!! Now
THAT'S an internet era factoid if ever I
saw one!!
Y'know, if only Bill Dozier hadn't jettisoned
the role of Martha Wayne on the old "Batman"
show. Who knows? Maybe Irene Tedrow coulda
qualified for a triple-header!!
8:00 PM
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