Here’s one minute of sound effects from various Three Stooges movies. The fact that somebody actually contemplated doing this idiotic project and then willfully executed it is hilariously impressive to me. Props to them. I can’t exactly say that it will make you want to watch a Stooges short, but
What was the purpose of this wonderful clip of Don Rickles roasting Clint Eastwood on the set of ‘Kelly’s Heroes’? Was it for TV? For the wrap party perhaps? (I prefer to think the latter). Rickles actually makes Clint double over with laughter at one point–something never previously seen before,
Here’s a five minute clip (made for TV I guess?) of Alfred Hitchcock giving us a little lesson in ‘cinematics’. The interviewer is Fletcher Markle who was largely known as a prestige dramatic radio producer/director of the 1940s. Hitch comes across as the hip professor who all the kids in
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=p0Nu93kB-Y0 Here’s a very well-done tribute-doc to my favorite Hitchcock film ‘Notorious’ (I know I’m far from alone in this opinion–it’s the one that, in my opinion, is much more emotional, better scripted and capable of being revisited than many others). Misleadingly titled ‘The Making Of…’ it’s more of a
Here’s a nifty little doc about Alfred Hitchcock’s 1941 semi-masterwork ‘Suspicion’ starring Cary Grant and Joan Fontaine who won an Oscar for her role as the deeply suspicious wife who suspects her husband of planning on murdering her. Much has been made over the years about the ending of this
For a good part of the 1930s and the first part of the 1940s Jack Benny’s radio show sponsor was Jello. Of course, the single-sponsor years required that the name of the program was the product and so the unlikely title became ‘The Jello Program Starring Jack Benny’. What an
Johnny Carson’s longtime comedy hero was Jack Benny. And while their styles were entirely different, they did share one very specific thing. Jello was Benny’s signature advertiser through the 1930s and early 1940s and somehow Carson wound up doing a Jello commercial on a 1957 program he hosted. Here, Johnny
On Saturday the 12th of February the Directors Guild of America presented a tribute to the late, great Melvin Van Peebles. A distinguished roster of filmmakers participated on the panel, including Michael Mann, Reginald Hudlin, Michael Schultz, Mario Van Peebles (naturally) and others. It was an invigorating look at Van
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=7jqWC6ENShc Who’d a thunk? He’s good too! Let’s consider this a week of videos featuring people singing skillfully who really ought not to be singing at all (see previous post). Next up is Earl Holliman…
In 2002, my new friend Peter Bogdanovich and I decided to make a CD of songs from the American popular songbook. We both loved the standards from the 30s/40s/50s and Peter was, believe it or not, a pretty good singer. We’d been getting together at my apartment for the past