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Movies 'Til Dawn BLOG

DESILU-CULVER STUDIOS FROM THE AIR

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=zPLhQl9ZLrM The Culver studio was originally created by silent movie pioneer Thomas H. Ince and has operated under a multitude of names: Ince Studio (1918-1925), De Mille Studios (1925–1928), Pathé Studios (1928–1931), RKO-Pathé Studios (1931–1935), Selznick International Pictures (1935–1956), Desilu-Culver Studios (1956–1970), Culver City Studios (1970–1977), and Laird International Studios (1977–1986).Through all these

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August 26, 2022 No Comments

MGM STUDIO LOT–A VIEW FROM 1925

Here is an extraordinary find. It’s a forty minute silent doc (no music either–just ghostly silence) detailing the inner workings of the MGM studio lot in 1925. We see images of the lot in its silent heyday, with tours of the exterior, views of the interior stages, lots of groupings

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August 25, 2022 No Comments

FAREWELL MGM (STUFF)

In 1970 James Aubrey, the new and much hated head of MGM, ordered an auction to be held of all of Metro’s old props, costumes and souvenirs of former sets. The event was loudly objected to in Hollywood but in the end the objectors didn’t really make any difference; Debbie

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August 24, 2022 No Comments

THE FOX LOT IN 1967

Yesterday I posted a doc on the creation of Century City, which rose atop the rubble of the former 20th Century Fox ‘ranch’ portion of the lot, which was sold in the early 60s to developers to cover the cost overruns on the Fox epic ‘Cleopatra’. A few years later,

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August 23, 2022 No Comments

BOB NEWHART–(What’s fair, Mr. Doubleday?)

Every day after school in 6th grade I came home and hit the record shelf for the comedy album du jour. Thus far we’ve dipped into two of my favorites, Allan Sherman and the ‘2000 Year Old Man’. But it was Bob Newhart’s ‘Button Down Mind’ and ‘Button Down Mind

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August 18, 2022 No Comments

MEL BROOKS CARL REINER/1967

I mentioned my love of comedy LPs yesterday and naturally one of the most important ones on my parents shelf was ‘The 2000 Year Old Man’. The genius (I think) of the routine is that if you attempt to explain the mysterious evolution of life it turns out to be

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August 17, 2022 No Comments

ALLAN SHERMAN + HERMAN’S HERMITS

Here’s a clip from a variety show called ‘Fanfare’ of Allan Sherman and Peter Noone of Herman’s Hermits doing a little lyric-swapping routine using Sherman’s sequel to his ‘Hello Muddah Hello Faddah’ song. (There’s a fun clip somewhere that I can’t find of Sherman on another variety show introducing that

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August 16, 2022 No Comments

ALLAN SHERMAN &TOO MUCH INFO ON ‘CRAZY DOWNTOWN’

The beloved Allan Sherman actually was a thoroughly depressed screwed-up man and his biography, ‘Overweight Sensation’, is so depressing that I haven’t watched/seen/thought of Sherman since I read it a few years ago. Today I’m breaking that self-imposed sanction with this delightful clip of Sherman singing ‘Crazy Downtown’, his parody

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August 15, 2022 No Comments

SATURDAY MORNING STOOGEFEST

Here’s ‘Fright Night’ (1947), Shemp’s first Stooge short in the Columbia years iteration of the Stooges. It takes a certain kind of low-budget brilliance to make a fight film that doesn’t actually show a boxing match. (Shemp gets batted about the ring a little bit but its inside the gym

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August 13, 2022 No Comments

FOSSE V. RALL: A DUEL IN DANCE

Let us close this Greenwich Village obsessed week with a little dancing. This is the magnificent duet between Bob Fosse and the great (and unsung) Tommy Rall from the 1955 musical version of ‘My Sister Eileen’. What has this to do with the Village? Well, the story is set there.

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August 12, 2022 No Comments

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