7/4/22
Newsletter31
The Ass Crack of Dawn
In the mid-1940s Orson Welles tried to get a film made at Walt Disney studios. Very quickly Welles and Disney began to butt heads. Finally, Disney fired Welles, saying, “This lot isn’t big enough for two geniuses.” From then on Welles only referred to Disney as, “that fucking Nazi.”
Victor Killian was a tall, thin character actor with a resonant low voice. Killian was in so many movies in the ‘30s and 40’s he was ubiquitous. In the mid-1970s he played the grandfather on the hit TV show, “Mary Hartman, Mary Hartman,” and finally achieved a modicum of fame. In 1978 I was strolling up Hollywood Blvd. and walking toward me was Victor Killian in his 80s, wearing sunglasses. I said, “Excuse me, Mr. Killian, but I just saw you as the cop in ‘Boy’s Town’ with Mickey Rooney and Spencer Tracy last night on TV.” He nodded, and said, “Yep, I made eight pictures with Mickey Rooney and six with Spencer Tracy.” I said, “You had a terrific part in Howard Hawks’ ‘Only Angels Have Wings’ with Cary Grant.” He nodded again, “Yep, that was my best part,” then he went into Musso & Frank Grill. He didn’t say goodbye or anything.
I saw Charlton Heston three times in one week in 1981. I went to a screening on Easter of “The Greatest Story Ever Told” at the Egyptian Theater, and Heston introduced the film. He played John the Baptist, they shot in the Colorado River, and he told a funny story about how the water was so cold that it made all the actors look like they’d just seen God. Then I was on the bus going west on Sunset Blvd. The bus stopped at a light and Charlton Heston pulled up right next to me in a slightly subdued gold Rolls Royce. Then my buddies Sam Raimi, Bruce Campbell and Rob Tapert came to Hollywood for the very first time. We were walking up Hollywood Blvd, just crossing Highland, and Bruce said, “I want to see a movie star.” I said, “You never see movie stars on Hollywood Blvd.” Just then Charlton Heston came walking past. In the middle of Highland Ave. Bruce turned around, thrust out his hand, and said, “Mr. Heston, good to meet you.” Heston paused for a second, swung around, shook Bruce’s hand and said, “Good meeting you, too,” and kept going. I never saw movie stars on Hollywood Blvd, and I lived there for years – except Victor Killian, but does that count?
In Cancun in the ‘70s my father met Robert Mitchum on the beach. My dad, having no idea who he was, stopped him and asked, “Did you go to Central High in Detroit?” Mitchum said no.
When I first started seeing CE and BCE instead of BC and AD, I remember thinking, “What kind of revisionist crap is this?” Well, it was actually started over 200 years ago by the Jews. Both “Before Christ” and “Anno Domini” (the year of our Lord) just didn’t fly with rabbis. The fact that the Jewish calendar was in the 5,000s, and only used by the Jews, meant they had to use the Christian calendar or miss all of their appointments.
And as a final note on Christianity, Romans did not use cross-shaped wooden frames to crucify people; they used the T-shape, which was certainly easier to construct.
Streaking light illuminates the sky. Hello today.