6/12/22
Newsletter #9
It’s 4:42 AM and still black as midnight.
Real names: Edward G. Robinson’s real name was Emmanuel Goldenberg, John Garfield was Jules Garfinkle, Kirk Douglas was Issur Danielovitch Demsky, Joan Crawford was Lucille Le Sueur.
Western film director Budd Boetticher, who made a streak of very good cheap westerns with Randolph Scott, married actress, Debra Paget. Debra Paget, whose real name was Debra Lee Griffen, was married to Boetticher for 22 days, then married the nephew Madame Chiang Kai-Shek.
Jesus Christ was born in 4 BC and died on 26 AD. That means Jesus was born for years before he was born, and he died 26 years after he died.
Speaking of Jews, when the white supremacists marched through Charlottesville holding tiki torches, they chanted, “Jews won’t replace us.” Firstly, I’ll bet none of those folks ever met a Jew; secondly, there are so few Jews in the world – 0.2% of the world’s population – that there aren’t enough of us to replace you. And even if there were, we wouldn’t take your jobs; we don’t want them.
The great movie director Michael Curtiz, who won an Oscar for “Casablanca,” was really named Mikhail Kertez, was from Hungary, and began directing movies in Europe in 1911. Ina film in 1913 he cast a fellow Hungarian, Bela Lugosi, in his first movie. Curtiz’s last movie was “The Commancheros” with John Wayne and Lee Marvin. He died before the end of production and Duke completed the film.
“Neither snow nor rain nor heat nor gloom of night stays these couriers from the swift completion of their appointed rounds” is the slogan of the United States Postal Service. But it originally comes from the Persian mail system of 550 BC.
In 1979 when I was 21 and my sister Pam was 18, we were sitting on the floor of her bedroom listening to Donna Summer’s brand new version of “MacArthur Park.” Pam’s hand suddenly shot out, turned off the stereo, and she asked accusingly, “What did you just say?” I hemmed and hawed because I had no idea what the lyric was. I offered, “Shiny stickers in the trees?” Pam said, “No, it’s ‘Old men playing Chinese checkers by the trees.” I’m still embarrassed.
Cinematographer Leon Shamroy, nominated for eighteen Oscars and winner of four, was renowned for being a short-tempered, loud-mouthed asshole. He started in the silent movies in the early 1920s, and his last film in 1968 was “Planet of the Apes.” Leon Shamroy was the cinematographer on “Cleopatra” in 1963 with Elizabeth Taylor that was the most expensive movie ever made at the time. The biggest scene in the movie is Cleopatra’s entrance into the coliseum. There are thousands of extras, a gigantic stone throne for Cleopatra pulled by muscular Nubians, acrobats, musicians, etc. It took from 6:00 AM until 5:00 PM to get the scene prepared to shoot. Finally, director-writer Joseph Mankiewicz turned expectantly to his cinematographer, Leon Shamroy, to find out his approach. Shamroy looked at the sky with a little round blue filter, then said, “The light sucks, I won’t shoot it,” and walked away. That was a wrap for that day.
Two screenwriters in Hollywood are talking. One says, “My agent came to my house last night, raped my wife, shit on the floor, then wiped his ass with my curtains.” The other screenwriter asks, “Your agent comes to your house?”
The sky is light, but the sun has yet to rise.
To infinity, and beyond!