In its seasonal spin on Charles Dickens' "A Christmas Carol," the episode of Bewitched that first aired on this night in 1967, "Humbug Not to Be Spoken Here," was set on Christmas Eve, and Darrin (Dick York) and Samantha (Elizabeth Montgomery) were preparing for Christmas.
But Darrin was torn. He had to meet with a client, a Scrooge–like sort who insisted on meeting with the folks at the advertising agency even though it was Christmas Eve. In his own words, Christmas was just another day. He was far more concerned with marketing his line of instant soups, and he insisted that Darrin come up with a campaign idea by that night or he would take his business elsewhere.
But Darrin refused so Mr. Mortimer (Charles Lane) made good on his promise.
And Samantha decided that a nocturnal visit, a la the ghosts in Dickens' classic, would be just the thing to convince miserly Mr. Mortimer that Santa Claus existed and that Christmas wasn't humbug but rather something to be celebrated.
So with the help of her witchcraft and her inside connections (she was personally acquainted with Santa Claus), Samantha visited Mr. Mortimer that night and took him to the North Pole, where he met Santa and saw the elves' workshop.
When their journey was over, Mr. Mortimer found himself back in his own bed.
The next morning he paid a visit to Darrin and Samantha. Darrin and Larry (David White) had both tried to play Santa for Tabitha (Erin Murphy) but had not impressed her. Then Mr. Mortimer arrived with a Christmas gift — a case of Mortimer's Instant Soups.
That didn't particularly impress her, either.
But Mr. Mortimer wasn't all business on that Christmas morning. In the spirit of the season, he ate some fruitcake and drank some eggnog.
Lane lived a long life (he was more than 100 years old when he died) and enjoyed a long career as a character actor. Mr. Mortimer wasn't his only miserly character, either. He played many such characters, most notably a mean railroad executive on Petticoat Junction and a character who was hired by Milburn Drysdale on The Beverly Hillbillies to run the hillbillies off from a business suite they had rented in Drysdale's bank building.
The episode wasn't a unique spin on "A Christmas Carol," but its message was still timeless, and Lane may have been just the one to make it work. His characters could have given lessons to Scrooge.
"If one place is as good as any other, it's high time we decided. Otherwise when we get there, we won't know we've arrived."
Doctor Dolittle (Rex Harrison)
For most people living today, I suppose, the mention of "Doctor Dolittle" brings to mind images of Eddie Murphy in the 1998 movie that went by that title and was often labeled a remake of the movie that made its debut 50 years ago today.
In fact, though, the movie that was released in 1998 was merely inspired by the books by Hugh Lofting; very little of the material from the original books was used in either of Murphy's "Doctor Dolittle" movies.
The movie that marks the 50th anniversary of its American premiere today (it premiered in England a week earlier), however, was a more faithful telling of Lofting's stories — well, three of them, anyway. Lofting wrote nearly two dozen Doctor Dolittle books.
In the 1967 version Doctor Dolittle was played by Rex Harrison. He was a physician in Victorian England who had treated humans but shifted to treating animals — and lived with a veritable menagerie. His sister once served as his housekeeper, but as the animal population in the house grew, she delivered an ultimatum: Either he got rid of the animals, or she would leave. He chose the animals.
Doctor Dolittle claimed he could talk to the animals — and he did. Movie audiences saw him carrying on conversations with the parrot. (The parrot's voice was supplied by talented voice actress Ginny Tyler.)
Ostensibly Lofting's books were written for children, but there was a decidedly adult angle to the movie's dialogue. For example:
"I speak over 2,000 languages," the parrot told Doctor Dolittle, "including Dodo and Unicorn."
"Unicorn?" Doctor Dolittle asked.
"I had a classical education," the parrot replied.
Movie audiences in 1967 first saw Doctor Dolittle when Anthony Newley's character and his young friend brought a sick duck to see the doctor.
Then, when he was treating a horse, Doctor Dolittle offended the horse's owner, and he was scolded for it by the owner's niece (Samantha Eggar).
The horse's owner and his niece went on to play more prominent roles in the movie.
A friend of Doctor Dolittle's sent him a rare pushme–pullyou — a creature that looked like a llama with heads at both ends of its body — and the doctor took it to a circus (Richard Attenborough played the ringmaster), where it became the main attraction. At the circus the doctor made friends with a seal that longed to be reunited with her husband at the North Pole, and he tried to help her escape, dressing her in a woman's clothes. Fishermen observed the doctor tossing the clothed seal into the water and believed he had murdered a woman.
They had him arrested; the judge in the trial was the horse's owner.
Although the doctor was acquitted, the judge insisted on sentencing him to a lunatic asylum. His animal friends saved him, and they set sail in search of the Great Pink Sea Snail.
It turned out that Eggar had stowed away on board, and in making her case to be permitted to stay, Eggar's character proclaimed, "I promise to ask for no special privileges."
"I promise to grant none," Doctor Dolittle replied.
They decided their destination would be Sea Star Island, a floating island that was determined to be in the Atlantic Ocean at that time.
Well, that led to other adventures for the travelers — and probably contributed to the verdict of sneak preview audiences that it was too long. Trying to compress three children's books into a single movie was a bit ambitious. Cuts were subsequently made, but even at its final 2½–hour running time, it was probably still too long.
The movie ran into production problems that, in hindsight, probably were predictable — and many may have been nothing more than legends. For example, there were stories that a goat ate a script and a parrot learned how to yell "Cut!"
But there was no disputing the evidence of the bottom line. The movie made about $9 million at the box office; it cost $17 million to make.
There could be many reasons for that. Personally, I have always wondered if the fact that musicals' popularity was on the wane in the late 1960s could explain why "Doctor Dolittle" fared so poorly.
Nevertheless the studio launched an unprecedented campaign for Oscar recognition and was rewarded with nine nominations, including Best Picture. It even won two — for Best Song ("Talk to the Animals") and Best Special Visual Effects.
"Well, I suppose Lust and Gluttony really have to be rather near the bathroom."
Stanley (Dudley Moore)
Every generation has its sex symbol, and Raquel Welch was the sex symbol for mine — at least when I was a boy.
Her appeal had long been eclipsed by others when I got older — but she was 27 and still in her peak years when she appeared in a British Faustian comedy, "Bedazzled," that premiered on this day in 1967.
Well, she played a character named Lust. That should tell you everything you really need to know.
(Side note here: "Bedazzled" combined elements that could be seen in past and future projects. It reminded me of a Twilight Zone episode that first aired seven years earlier and a movie that was in theaters more than 30 years later.)
But she wasn't the object of Dudley Moore's affections when the movie began. Moore's character, a short–order cook, was smitten with a waitress (Eleanor Bron) with whom he worked. And he earnestly prayed for the courage to approach her.
Observing all this was the Devil (Peter Cook), who struck a deal with Moore for his soul. In exchange, Moore received seven wishes.
There were some inside jokes that mostly Britons would get. For example, after acquiring Moore's soul, Cook asked him what his first wish would be. Did he want to be prime minister? Then Cook corrected himself: "No, I've made that deal already."
Actually, Moore's wishes all involved winning the waitress, but the Devil kept manipulating things to make the wishes fail.
Well, the waitress might not have been terribly responsive, but Lust certainly was, visiting Moore in his bedroom and shucking her dress, revealing red bra and panties she wore underneath. Raquel often wore revealing clothes and underclothes — but I don't think she ever revealed much beyond that — in her movies.
If she had been the sex symbol for a later generation, she might have. But not at that time.
That tricky Devil really had it in for Moore, though. He made him squander his wishes, then cheated him out of the last one by claiming that the first "wish" had been one Moore made at the Devil's urging — to prove he really was the Devil.
That left Moore having to spend the rest of his existence in the form of his last wish — in Moore's case, that was as a nun.
And at a farewell party for Moore, Raquel was a go–go dancer.
Actually, it was a rather small part for Raquel. Not many lines. Not much screen time. I guess she was mostly eye candy.
As the story required personifications of the Seven Deadly Sins, someone had to play Lust. And who better than the sex symbol of the day? But I really thought that Lust would figure more prominently in this kind of story.
Anyway, Moore had the last laugh, reacquiring his soul and returning to his old life as a short–order cook with the same crush on the waitress — but determined to get no more help from the Devil.
"Bedazzled" was underrated by the critics of the day, but it had a wry sense of humor that seems to gain admirers with the passage of time.
"Sgt. Pepper's Lonely Hearts Club Band" hit the music stores six months earlier, and it was still making headlines on this day in 1967 when "Magical Mystery Tour" was released.
But so were other songs the Beatles had written and recorded but had not yet released on an album — like "All You Need Is Love" and "Baby You're a Rich Man," which were released as the two sides of a single six weeks after the "Sgt. Pepper" album.
The Beatles were constantly experimenting with sounds and recording techniques. They rose to prominence with no real long–term expectations and therefore felt free to go wherever their interests took them. I saw an interview with Ringo Starr from around the time the Beatles made their first appearance on The Ed Sullivan Show, and he said he hoped the group would be successful enough that he could use his earnings to invest in a beauty shop in London. Neither he nor the other Beatles would have believed it if they had been told their recordings would still be influencing popular music half a century later.
Anyway, following the completion of "Sgt. Pepper," Paul McCartney had a brainstorm. He wanted to create an extemporaneous film about the Beatles and their music. "Ordinary" people (including the Beatles) would travel on a bus and have magical adventures.
The project yielded a 52–minute movie that was aired on the BBC the day after Christmas and was so savaged by the critics that it has been seldom seen since.
It also produced six new Beatles songs — not enough by themselves to make an entire album. Capitol Records rounded out the album by including five previously non–album singles.
As always, the music was good. In fact, for many observers, it was the music that salvaged the entire project. The film had no script and no real direction.
Still in the context of what had come before — and what was yet to come — "Magical Mystery Tour" was exactly what it seemed to be, a hodge–podge of songs consisting of a brief soundtrack and a group of songs that had been released as singles within the previous year.
As I say, though, the music was good. George Harrison was bursting with creativity that would reach full flower a few years later when he released his triple–album solo effort "All Things Must Pass." In 1967, though, he was still a member of the Beatles and getting a handful of spots on albums that were largely dominated by Lennon–McCartney compositions.
Nevertheless, Harrison contributed "Blue Jay Way" and shared credit with John Lennon, McCartney and Starr on the instrumental "Flying."
Yes, the music was good, but the album and film were disjointed. It wasn't surprising that both got mixed reviews.
It richly deserves its place in the Beatles discography. But it doesn't flow seamlessly in the Beatles' musical timeline.
It is often said — and justifiably, too — that 1939 was the greatest year for movies.
And it was.
But the runnerup on that list has to be 1967. It produced "Bonnie and Clyde," "The Graduate," "Guess Who's Coming to Dinner," "In Cold Blood," "In the Heat of the Night" and so many others — and then, on this day, two months before the end of the year, the hits just kept on coming.
On this day in 1967 America first watched "Cool Hand Luke" on its movie screens.
And, while it is hard to single out one performance from all the performances in his career, Paul Newman's work as the nonconformist Luke may well have been his best.
Luke was a cool customer, all right, just like the tagline for the movie said — "He was a cool customer ... until the law made it hot for him!"
He was a member of a Southern chain gang who absolutely would not give in to authority. It was a trait he paid for, frequently.
His fellow prisoners admired that quality.
"You're an original," George Kennedy, who won Best Supporting Actor, told him at one point. "That's what you are!"
The audience learned fairly early just how much of a nonconformist Luke was. In the service he had been awarded a bronze star and became a sergeant — but was a private when he was discharged.
The men all seemed drawn to Luke. They looked up to him. He was a hero to them. He wasn't comfortable in that role, though. It wasn't one he sought. After all, it required him to live up to others' expectations, and he was still trying to find his own way.
The prison staff took every opportunity to break Luke, even putting him in solitary after his mother had died.
The guard who put him in solitary tried to justify it by saying, "Sorry, Luke. Just doin' my job. You gotta appreciate that."
Defiant as ever, Luke replied, "Callin' it your job don't make it right, Boss."
The prisoners called everyone on the staff boss, but I guess the only true boss was Strother Martin, who played the Captain — and uttered the line that everyone always remembers from that movie: "What we have here is failure to communicate."
And the scene everyone always remembers — well, all the guys for sure — is the one in which actress Joy Harmon, known only as The Girl (Kennedy's character called her Lucille), washed a car in full view of the spellbound prisoners.
There was a void left in the cinematic role of anti–hero when James Dean died. Newman, who was nominated for Best Actor (and would have been a better choice than the winner, Rod Steiger), stepped forward to fill that void along with Warren Beatty and Steve McQueen.
A persuasive case can be made that each man proved himself worthy of being Dean's heir as the anti–hero, but Newman's body of work was the most convincing.
And "Cool Hand Luke" was his best work, signaling the true return of the anti–hero.
"Merlyn told me once: Never be too disturbed if you don't understand what a woman is thinking. They don't do it often."
King Arthur (Richard Harris)
"Camelot," which premiered 50 years ago today, was hindered from the start by the movie's times.
A few years earlier, in an interview, former first lady Jackie Kennedy equated her husband's presidency to Camelot. The recording of the songs from the musical had been one of his favorites, she told historian Theodore H. White, saying that she wanted her husband to be remembered by the standards of Camelot — "well–meaning, fallibly human but ultimately idealistic."
I don't know if that is how people, more than 50 years after the president's assassination, think of the Kennedy years, but the connection didn't exist when he was assassinated in 1963. At that time, "Camelot" was a successful Broadway musical, but most Americans had probably never seen it.
That probably wasn't important, though. As film critic Roger Ebert pointed out in his review of the movie, "Camelot never really existed, so everybody can invent his own."
Ebert also pointed out that Richard Harris and Vanessa Redgrave were "just about the best King Arthur and Queen Guenevere I can imagine."
As I say, most Americans had probably never seen the musical, but lots of folks saw the movie. It was the 11th highest–grossing movie of 1967 — but, ironically, the theatrical rentals were insufficient to show a profit. I guess the rental charge was so high many theaters had trouble making the money back on ticket sales — of which there obviously were many.
After all, it cleared more than $31 million at the box office, which is a lot of money today but was an awful lot of money in 1967. Clearly, the public was interested in it — an interest that could be explained, in part, by how much airplay songs from the musical had received, and, again in part, by the star power of the cast.
But I think it was probably fueled mostly by the link between the story and the slain president — and all the emotions that stirred up. Oh, sure, there were some who were drawn by the music — which received an Oscar — but I have long believed most of the interest stemmed from Jackie Kennedy's interview.
Incidentally "Camelot" won a couple of other Oscars, too, but none for acting. In fact, none of the actors were even nominated.
While the music might have been inspirational for a Kennedy legacy, it probably was best for Kennedy's admirers not to pay close attention to the details of the story — which featured a love triangle that involved the king, the queen and Sir Lancelot (Franco Nero).
Given the stories about the president, his brother and Marilyn Monroe, that might not have gone over well if it had been discussed at any length.
I have long believed that Jackie Kennedy, like Priscilla Presley, was responsible for much of her husband's public image after his death.
Anyway ...
I'll not spend time and space discussing the story — which was already rich with ironies before the theatrical rentals failed to turn a profit — because I think most of us already know the story of King Arthur and his knights of the Round Table.
What I will say, though, is that some of those things that you might not necessarily notice in other films — like costume design and art direction — you will notice in "Camelot." The Academy certainly did, rewarding both with Oscars.
"Don't let it be forgot
That once there was a spot
For one brief shining moment
That was known as Camelot."
"A woman like you does more damage than she can conceivably imagine."
Francis (Terence Stamp)
Nearly everyone I know would tell you that I always recommend reading a book before watching its movie version. It has always been an article of faith with me that a book is better than any movie that is based on it.
But there are exceptions to every rule, and "Far From the Madding Crowd," which premiered in Britain on this day in 1967 (and opened in theaters across the United States two days later), was an exception to that rule. At least, in my opinion.
It followed Thomas Hardy's 1874 novel pretty closely. Well, I thought so. In some ways, it may even have been better than the book (albeit somewhat condensed in places). I know others who feel that way.
But I also know others who think the movie is inferior to the book, which some people think was his best. There are plausible arguments to be made on both sides.
So I just want to make a couple of observations on this, the 50th anniversary of the movie's debut.
First, Julie Christie had been making movies for several years but was still in her 20s when she made "Far From the Madding Crowd." She played Bathsheba, a beautiful but vexing woman who inherited a prosperous farm and found herself the object of the affections of three very different men.
Christie's performance was splendid and deserving of an Oscar nomination, but it didn't receive one. Must have been hard to get one of the five Best Actress nominations that year with Katharine Hepburn ("Guess Who's Coming to Dinner"), Audrey Hepburn ("Wait Until Dark"), Anne Bancroft ("The Graduate") and Faye Dunaway ("Bonnie and Clyde") turning in award–worthy performances that year.
(Katharine Hepburn was the winner, by the way.)
In a talented cast, Christie stood out — and that's saying something when the three men who pursued her were played by Peter Finch, Alan Bates and Terence Stamp.
The other thing that stood out was the sweeping cinematography that so beautifully captured the countryside where the story took place. It was gorgeous, and each time I have watched this movie I have seen something new to admire. The cinematography deserved an Oscar nomination, too.
But the only Oscar nomination that "Far From the Madding Crowd" received was for Best Original Music Score, honoring the work of British composer Richard Rodney Bennett, but Elmer Bernstein took home the trophy for his work on "Thoroughly Modern Millie."
Oscar nominations are like inductions into halls of fame, though. Some are deserved; some are not. It's really a matter of personal preference and bias.
And cinematography is not something I usually get worked up about.
But the cinematography in "Far From the Madding Crowd" truly was exceptional.
One of my colleagues at work is a member of the Millennial generation.
She is also a big fan of Audrey Hepburn, who died before my co–worker was born. I learned of her fondness for Hepburn last year when she told me how she dressed like Audrey Hepburn in "Breakfast at Tiffany's" for a costume party given by the youth group at her church.
I asked a perfectly reasonable question: Did anyone know who she was pretending to be?
Her answer surprised me: Yes!
In fact, she said, just about everyone knew who she was.
I have always admired Hepburn, too, and I think one of the primary reasons for her appeal is that it wasn't really possible to pigeonhole her. She was an extraordinarily versatile actress who could do many things well. Even so she never seemed like the sort of star who would appeal to the Millennials.
At least that was my take on it. I stand corrected.
One of the best examples of her versatility was the British movie that made its debut on this day in 1967 — "Two for the Road" — which starred another versatile thespian, Albert Finney. They made an appealing on–screen couple.
Just one problem. That seemingly picture–perfect marriage was imploding.
As Roger Ebert observed in his review of the movie, "Love is ever so much more satisfactory in the movies where every other kiss is framed by a sunset, and people are always running toward each other in slow motion, their arms outstretched, while in the background the tide comes in, or goes out, or keeps busy, anyway."
Just about every married couple I know would tell you that isn't what marriage is really like.
That is what courtship is like. That's what going together (or whatever they call it these days) is like.
But when you say "I do," you're saying "I do" to a whole lot of stuff that is not mentioned directly in your vows — like the fact that you will have to work on keeping that spark of romance alive more often and in more ways than you think.
Some marriages can overcome that. Some can't.
That was the subtext of the story, and it was far from certain which way this couple would go. They had their two–seater transported to Northwestern France, and they took off on a road trip to the southeastern corner of the country. Finney played a successful architect, and they planned to participate in a celebration of the completion of a client's project.
The road through France was one they had traveled before, and the current road trip gave them the opportunity to reflect on events in their lives and examine where life had taken them since they met.
It was an intriguing story–telling technique, but the memories weren't always pleasant. There were moments of infidelity on both sides.
If you happen to catch this one on TV, look for Jacqueline Bisset in one of her early roles.
And listen for the title song, "Two for the Road," which was written by Henry Mancini. It wasn't nominated for an Oscar, unlike many of his other songs, but Mancini said it was his personal favorite.
In fact, the movie was all but ignored by the Oscars, receiving only one nomination, even though Ebert was adamant that "Two for the Road" was one of the best movies of 1967.
I thought it was a well–told story, balancing comedy and drama in that poignant way that real life does. To some viewers, the end may seem to be an unrealistic compromise in which the two remain together in spite of all that has passed before.
And there may be something to that.
But director Stanley Donen treated it differently than your typical Hollywood happy ending. He had Hepburn and Finney cross the French border into Italy, something they had never done before.
They symbolically turned the page and began a new chapter, traveling into unexplored territory.
"Well, Cinderella, I was beginning to think you'd never come for your shoe."
Mal Reese (John Vernon)
1967 was a rough year for crime films.
Any crime film that was in the theaters in the same year as "Bonnie and Clyde" almost had to take a backseat.
There were lots of other crime films that year — both fiction (most notably "Cool Hand Luke" although there was also "Wait Until Dark") and nonfiction (i.e., "In Cold Blood") stories — that are remembered by film buffs today, but "Bonnie and Clyde" really sucked up most of the oxygen in the room at the time and continues to demand a lot of the attention.
Consequently, a pretty good crime film like "Point Blank," which made its debut on this day in 1967, was forgotten practically from the start. It was far from a box–office smash, and today it is a hidden gem that you will seldom find shown on television. If you want to watch it, you may have to buy the DVD.
Which may not be such a bad idea. The movie was declared "culturally, historically or aesthetically significant" by the Library of Congress and chosen for preservation in its National Film Registry last year. My guess would be that was the first time that many people ever heard of it.
It got good reviews when it was released half a century ago and deservedly so. But "Bonnie and Clyde" (which was selected for the National Film Registry in 1992) had been in theaters only a couple of weeks when "Point Blank" premiered so it was all but ignored by the moviegoing public.
Timing, as they say, is everything.
If you ever saw "Animal House," you must remember John Vernon. He played Dean Wormer.
But more than a decade earlier, Vernon played a character who teamed up with Lee Marvin in "Point Blank" to steal a lot of money from a courier for a gambling operation — then he double–crossed Marvin, shooting him and leaving him to die. He took the money and Marvin's wife with him.
But Marvin didn't die, and he recovered with the help of a perplexing character played by Keenan Wynn. A few years after being shot he popped up to take revenge, aided by his sister–in–law (Angie Dickinson), and get his money (an objective he mentioned several times). Carroll O'Connor had a supporting role in the years before he found fame as TV's Archie Bunker.
Part of his revenge involved killing Vernon's character in a particularly brutal way.
I guess the moral of that story is — if you're going to kill people, don't wound them and then leave, assuming they will die. Finish the job. Don't leave the ultimate witness still breathing.
If you do, in keeping with Murphy's law, they will survive, and, at the very least, they will identify you.
At the very worst, well, they will do something like what Marvin's character did. As I say, it wasn't pretty.
But I suppose it is true what they say — No one ever went broke underestimating the intelligence of criminals.
Even in the movies.
That brings me to one more point.
Film critic Roger Ebert had a few questions of his own, most of which seemed to deal with plot logic. But, in the mostly make believe world of the movies, it is not wise to expect too much logic.
Still, if you like suspense thrillers, "Point Blank" is pretty good. As I say, it was ignored at the time — but it has come to be regarded as one of the best of its kind in the '60s.
When one thinks of any of the greatest people in any walk of life, it can seem — in hindsight — that they had a sort of historical inevitability. But such people seldom, if ever, achieve their success with no help from anyone.
Sadly, many of the people who are most responsible for others' successes are not recognized for what they accomplished.
It's hard to imagine, for example, where the Beatles would have been without Brian Epstein, who never performed with the Beatles and was probably largely unknown, even by the Beatles' fans at the height of Beatlemania.
They might well have reached the heights they reached, anyway. But it almost certainly would have taken longer to get there — much longer — if he hadn't been around to manage them. And there are those who believe that if the Beatles' implosion as a band was inevitable, it was hastened by Epstein's absence.
In the early '60s it was Epstein's faith in the Beatles and what he believed they could be that led to a contract with producer George Martin in May 1962 — and the hits started coming in bunches. "Please Please Me." "Love Me Do." "P.S. I Love You."
And that was just in 1962. There were many more hit songs to come.
And many hit albums, too, including "Sgt. Pepper's Lonely Hearts Club Band," arguably the greatest album ever recorded. It had been in music stores only three months when Epstein was found dead in his bedroom in London on this day in 1967.
There is a pretty good case to be made that Epstein left enormous footprints on the world's cultural landscape. He first saw the Beatles at the now–legendary Cavern Club in November 1961 and became their manager shortly thereafter. With his experience in sales and promotions Epstein took the Beatles in hand and made them presentable by the standards of the day, and they became major hits in the U.K.
The time would come when the Beatles would rewrite those standards, but by heeding Epstein's initial counsel of conformity they were able to get their feet in the door. From that point, their success positioned them to have that kind of influence.
It is often said that Ed Sullivan gave the Beatles to the world. But that isn't entirely true. Sullivan gave the Beatles to America, launching the British invasion, which could be seen as the same thing as giving them to the world. Then, as now, America was the ground zero of global communication, and anything that was a hit here was sure to have ripple effects all over the planet.
But the invasion might never have happened if Epstein hadn't taken over as their manager.
And yet today, 50 years after Epstein's accidental death, caused by a combination of alcohol and an overdose of sleeping pills, he is forgotten by most — a real Nowhere Man.
But perhaps not entirely. He finally received a spot in the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame in Cleveland in 2014, more than a quarter of a century after the band he discovered was inducted and at least 10 years since each Beatle (with the exception of Ringo Starr) was inducted as an individual performer.
Most people living today probably have no memory of Jayne Mansfield.
In her day, she was a sex symbol — not as accomplished as Marilyn Monroe but certainly more endowed. And, by this time in 1967, Monroe had been dead for nearly five years. Mansfield had the sex symbol spotlight virtually to herself.
It was 50 years ago today — around 2:30 in the morning — that Mansfield died in a car crash in Slidell, Louisiana, less than 20 miles north–northwest of New Orleans, where Mansfield was to appear on TV station WDSU's ground–breaking Midday show.
Mansfield made two appearances at a supper club in Biloxi, Mississippi, the night of June 28, then she and five others — her boyfriend, her three children and their 20–year–old driver — began the trip to New Orleans around midnight.
The car crashed into the rear of a tractor/trailer that had slowed down behind a truck spraying mosquito fogger. The driver of the car couldn't see the tractor/trailer because it was shrouded in the mosquito fogger. The three adults in the front were killed immediately. The three children, who were sleeping in the back, escaped with minor injuries.
Mansfield was before my time, but her death became notorious. I can remember talking about it with my friends on the playground of my elementary school. I don't remember how the subject came up. One of us probably heard our parents talking about it.
Anyway, we knew the most notorious part of the story — that she was decapitated in the collision. That was an urban legend that began with pictures showing Mansfield's blonde wig in the wreckage. I have heard that she was wearing the wig at the time of the crash so there may have been parts of her scalp and strands of her real hair in the wig, but the official cause of death was given as a crushed skull, not decapitation.
Monroe's appearance as Playboy's first centerfold got the magazine off the ground in December 1953, but Mansfield's appearance as the centerfold in February 1955 gave it a real shot in the arm — as did her other appearances in the magazine (more than 30 of them).
Actually, it was a very modest pose by modern standards, but it created quite a stir in 1955.
Mansfield cultivated the role of sex symbol in a way that Monroe never did. Janet Jackson's "wardrobe malfunction" had nothing on Mansfield. Her clothes were forever falling off in public or there would be strategic bursts at the seams or she would wear low–cut dresses with no bra.
In fact, it was during a promotion for a movie ("Underwater!") that Mansfield deliberately wore a bikini that was too small. When she dove into the pool, the top came off — and attracted Playboy's attention.
But in death, Mansfield did make a contribution to the betterment of mankind. The National Highway Traffic Safety Administration recommended installing underride guards on all tractor/trailers. The objective of the underride guard is to provide a little protection for passenger cars that collide with a tractor/trailer from behind.
"I reckon the folks'd be a sight happier if I died like a soldier. Can't say I would."
Samson Posey (Clint Walker)
I've been fortunate. I've never had to fight in a war.
When I was a kid, I guess I expected to be in a war. The war in Vietnam had been raging as far back as I could remember, and as I got older, I guess I assumed that my time to go would come in due course. I never really thought twice about it. But the war ended well before I turned 18.
If I had been in a war, though, I would probably assume that, if command wanted to attempt a truly extreme mission, they would want really extreme people to carry it out — you know, murderers, rapists and the like.
"The Dirty Dozen," which premiered 50 years ago today, was about such a mission — and such a unit.
In advance of the D–Day invasion, a select unit of the Army's worst was assembled for a special mission — to assault a chateau that was hosting a meeting of high–ranking German officers. By eliminating these officers, the Nazis' ability to react to the invasion of Normandy would be severely thwarted.
It was a hazardous mission, but these men were regarded as expendable. At best they had been convicted of crimes for which they had been given sentences of at least 20 years. Nearly half had been given death sentences.
If they succeeded in their objective, those who survived would be pardoned and returned to active duty, but few were expected to survive, successful or not. Their commander (Lee Marvin) repeatedly reminded them during their training that most of them would not be returning.
And that was OK, too.
After all, if they died in this mission, they would die a soldier's death. On the other hand, if their death sentences were carried out, they would die by hanging — definitely not a soldier's death. Hanging is typically regarded as a criminal's death.
And in the meantime they would have to be fed, clothed and sheltered for who knew how long.
Of course, one would be just as dead either way. It was the method of death that would pass the final judgment on the life. Everything else was incidental.
At the time of its release some people criticized the violence in "The Dirty Dozen," and a pretty good case could be made that it was excessively violent, needlessly so, particularly at the end. But isn't that the nature of war? Isn't war — all war whatever one may think of the rationale for it — excessively violent, needlessly so?
When you get right down to it, war is messy, and the people who fight in wars don't always play by the generally accepted rules.
"The Dirty Dozen" had an all–star cast, but some of the performers were more memorable than others — like Donald Sutherland and Jim Brown and Telly Savalas — and Ernest Borgnine, who played the officer who appointed Marvin and Bronson and provided them with the list of convicts they would train.
You know, the violence probably was a little over the line, but, as I say, war is messy, and the mission wasn't carried out by a Sunday school class.
A seemingly impossible mission calls for incorrigible people to carry it out.
"I don't know how to answer you except to say that I teach you truths. My truths. Yeah, and it is kinda scary, dealing with the truth. Scary and dangerous."
Mark Thackeray (Sidney Poitier)
Not everyone is fortunate enough to have a truly great teacher.
"To Sir With Love," which premiered on this day in 1967, was the story of a truly great teacher — who, in the mold of many truly great teachers, did not start out to become a teacher at all. Sidney Poitier played the teacher who was sidetracked — temporarily — from his goal of becoming an engineer. He had applied for an engineering position but had heard nothing; acting on the conviction that one must have a job, he applied for work as a teacher in the slums of East London — and got the job.
And he encountered a classroom of the most sullen, rebellious students imaginable.
It took awhile, but they finally warmed up to each other — enough that Poitier's character rightly concluded that the education his students required couldn't be found in books. They needed discipline and survival skills they weren't learning at home.
So he implemented a new method for education in his classroom. He and the students would treat each other as adults with the proper respect.
He realized that his students also needed self–respect when he came to school one day and found that a used sanitary napkin had been burned in the fireplace. That was when he did something he had pledged not to do. He lost his temper.
"I am sick of your foul language, your crude behavior and your sluttish manner," he told the girls in his class. "There are certain things a decent woman keeps private, and only a filthy slut would have done this and those who stood by and encouraged her are just as bad. I don't care who's responsible — you're all to blame. Now, I am going to leave this room for five minutes by which time that disgusting object had better be removed and the windows opened to clear away the stench. If you must play these filthy games, do them in your homes, and not in my classroom!"
That was the inspiration for his new system. It was successful at first as Poitier shared his wisdom about, as he put it, "life, survival, love, death, sex, marriage, rebellion."
If you have never seen the movie, there are several noteworthy quotes from this section that you might want to post in your office or wherever they can be most inspirational to you. One of my favorites is this one: "I believe one should fight for what one believes. Provided one is absolutely sure one is absolutely right."
But Poitier lost the support of many of his students over his handling of a confrontation between a student and a gym teacher.
In retaliation, they did not invite him to the class dance — nor would they accept his contribution toward the purchase of a wreath for the funeral of the mother of one of the students.
As the school year drew to a close, Poitier's character received an engineering job offer. He had applied for the job before taking the teaching position so he had been waiting for nearly a year.
And he won back his students' admiration when he beat the class ringleader in a boxing match, then recommended that the student teach the younger pupils how to box when school resumed. He was invited to the dance, where the students presented him with a gift. Poitier got choked up and left the room without telling the students that he was planning to take the engineering job he had craved all year.
While he was away from the group, he realized that he had unfinished work as a teacher and tore up the job offer letter.
It was a good movie and, coming from a family of educators, I like movies that tell about influential teachers. They get little enough credit for all the things they do.
But every time I watch "To Sir With Love," it seems strange to me that, given the time when the movie was made, race was virtually a nonissue in it. Perhaps things were different in England in 1967, but America was seeing race riots from coast to coast. It got worse less than a year later when Martin Luther King Jr. was assassinated in Memphis.
Racial conflict was really percolating in America in the '60s, but, as I say, maybe it was different in England.
There have been many movies about influential teachers, but few, if any, others have had their theme songs reach No. 1 on the pop charts. Scottish singer Lulu made her movie debut as one of Poitier's students and reached the top of the charts with "To Sir, With Love" in the fall of 1967.
Additional music for the movie was provided by The Mindbenders, a popular British group of the time. Ironically, considering the fact that the Beatles had released "Sgt. Pepper's Lonely Hearts Club Band" about two weeks earlier, an album that contained the song "Getting Better" with the refrain "It's getting better all the time," a Mindbenders' song from "To Sir With Love" told audiences that things were getting harder.
I doubt that there was any collaboration between the two. If there had been, I'm sure we would have heard something about it in the last half century. I'm sure it was a coincidence that two songs that were so similar and yet so contradictory were unveiled at nearly the same time.
The movie was directed by James Clavell, whose real claim to fame was as a novelist, but he had a flair for directing, too. He just didn't do it too often.
Lomax (Kirk Douglas):Do you always wear a gun over your underwear?
Taw Jackson (John Wayne):Just lately.
The war wagon concept dates back hundreds of years — to the Middle Ages when heavily armored wagons were used as both offensive and defensive weapons.
Their usefulness on the battlefield waned as the weaponry and tactics of war evolved. Perhaps it was inevitable, given how many horses it must have required to haul those things around. They weren't exactly your standard stagecoaches.
But apparently they found another use later on — as the forerunners to the armored car in which all sorts of things of value have been transported from one place to another over the years.
And the name of the western that premiered on this day in 1967, "The War Wagon," referred to an armored (and armed) wagon that carried a shipment of gold. The shipment belonged to a mine owner who had framed a rancher (John Wayne). The rancher ended up in prison, and the miner confiscated his land — then found gold on it.
The rancher's prison sentence was reduced for good behavior, and he returned to his old stomping grounds with the intention of robbing the miner of a shipment of that gold.
To assist him in this endeavor, he recruited a man (Kirk Douglas) who shot him several years earlier. Kennan Wynn played another one of Wayne's recruits as did Howard Keel.
It probably goes without saying that Wayne had scores to settle with both the miner who framed him and took his land and the man who shot him. That's a ticklish situation, to put it mildly. But Wayne managed to tiptoe delicately through the minefield.
When you've got apparent scores to settle with both your enemies and your allies, you don't have a lot of margin for error.
Wayne and Douglas had a kind of a friendly competition going on, though. At one point, after they had confronted and gunned down two bad guys (one of whom was Bruce Dern), Douglas remarked, "Mine hit the ground first."
To which Wayne replied, "Mine was taller."
The rest of the movie was about the caper — the attempt to get away with all that gold. And, while I usually try to find some moral or lesson in a movie or TV episode about which I am writing, I can't think of one for "The War Wagon." It was just good entertainment.
I know Wayne made westerns that were humorous as well as westerns that were dramatic. Most, I would say, would be categorized among the latter. That represented most of my exposure to the Duke, anyway.
But "The War Wagon" was different. It leaned more toward humorous, with Wayne's character more bemused than indignant about his circumstances — and I have always found that refreshing.
"I've been imitated so well I've heard people copy my mistakes."
Jimi Hendrix
In the history of recorded music, there may have been a debut album that was more influential and more dazzling than Jimi Hendrix's "Are You Experienced" — but I don't know what it was.
And from that relatively limited subset, fewer still could be said to have altered the popular music landscape, but "Are You Experienced" did.
"Are You Experienced" hit music stores 50 years ago today. Its most recognizable track, by far, has to be "Purple Haze," which Rolling Stone said possessed "one of the unforgettable opening riffs in rock: a ferocious, stomping guitar march, scarred with fuzz and built around the dissonant 'devil's interval' of the tritone. And it launched not one but two revolutions: late–'60s psychedelia and the unprecedented genius of Jimi Hendrix."
But the influence of "Are You Experienced" went far beyond a single song and continues today. In addition to "Purple Haze," three other songs from the album — "Foxey Lady," "Hey Joe" and "The Wind Cries Mary" — made Rolling Stone's list of the top 500 songs of all time.
In rating "Are You Experienced" No. 15 in its Top 500 albums of all time, Rolling Stone wrote that "Hendrix made soul music for inner space."
"Are You Experienced" was one of the earliest albums in my collection, and I still listen to it from time to time. Lately, in anticipation of this milestone anniversary, I've been listening to it a lot more, and a question keeps popping into my head:
How can an album that is now half a century old still sound as cutting edge, as visionary as "Are You Experienced" does?
I guess that was the special genius of Jimi Hendrix.
And by the way, unlike some modern artists (i.e., Kanye West) Hendrix never would have called himself a genius.
"I don't consider myself to be the best," he said, "and I don't like compliments. They distract me."
Business Insider proclaimed Star Trek"arguably the greatest science–fiction television series of all time" in an article last September that ranked the top 13 episodes of the original series.
"The City on the Edge of Forever," which premiered on this night in 1967, ranked No. 2 on that list.
Now, I am not a Star Trek fan — although I have several friends who are, and most of them would probably tell you that "The City on the Edge of Forever" was the best episode Star Trek ever aired.
It is one of the few Star Trek episodes I have seen from start to finish. Whether you rank it first or second, it was a remarkable episode — and certainly not the kind of thing one expects from a sci–fi series — although, perhaps, given the time travel angle of the episode, it is the kind of thing one would expect.
Either way, Star Trek did a beautiful job with that theme — and its co–theme of alternate reality.
Viewers probably didn't know what they were in for when the episode began. It started routinely enough, I suppose. Chief Medical Officer McCoy (DeForest Kelley) was treating a crew member (George Takei) who had been injured as the Enterprise passed through time distortions surrounding an unexplored planet when he accidentally injected himself with an overdose of a drug he had been using to revive the crew member. An overdose in a human could be lethal; in this case it caused delusions. McCoy fled to the ship's transporter room and beamed himself to the planet. Capt. Kirk (William Shatner), Spock (Leonard Nimoy) and others followed him to the planet, where they found a glowing stone that was responsible for the time distortions.
A voice from the stone told the crew that it was the Guardian of Forever, a portal to any place and time. About that time McCoy dove into the portal — and the search party was suddenly cut off from the Enterprise. The Guardian informed the crew that McCoy's action had altered the past. The Enterprise and the Federation did not exist.
Kirk and Spock tried to follow McCoy into the past and attempt to repair the damage to the timeline, the extent of which they did not know. They found themselves in Depression–era New York City and encountered a woman (Joan Collins) who ran a mission there. Having arrived there shortly before McCoy, they worked for Collins while they waited for him — and Kirk began to fall in love with her.
Meanwhile, McCoy arrived and was taken in by Collins. Spock, who had been doing the best he could to build the computer aid to access the information in his tricorder, which he had been using to record the Guardian's data when McCoy made his escape, had discovered that Collins was supposed to have died in a traffic accident, but McCoy had prevented the accident, causing the rip in the fabric of time. Permitted to live, Collins began a pacifist movement that postponed the United States' entry into World War II. As a result, the Nazis were the first to acquire nuclear weapons and went on to win the war.
I guess you would call that unanticipated consequences.
To repair the timeline, it was necessary for Collins to die in an accident. How that comes to pass is something everyone should see for themselves.
I will, however, offer one observation.
When Keeler died — in an automobile accident, as had, ironically, been preordained — a now back to normal McCoy attempted to save her but was stopped by Kirk. He turned on Kirk and in exasperation said, "You deliberately stopped me! I could have saved her. Do you know what you just did?"
The grief–stricken Kirk could find no comfort in the knowledge that history had been restored.
There was a certain sameness to Elvis Presley's movies. A prime example is "Double Trouble," which premiered on this day in 1967.
Now, you know when you watch an Elvis movie that you aren't going to be watching something that was nominated for an Oscar for anything — even the music, which was the reason for it all.
But the movies and the music didn't always fall as short of the mark as they did with "Double Trouble."
There was a symbiotic relationship between Elvis' records and movies. Elvis movies existed primarily to promote Elvis' latest records — and, since just about anything with Elvis' name on it was guaranteed to make money, there doesn't seem to have been much thought given to many of the albums he made or the films that were made to promote them.
One could say many things about Elvis Presley, but one thing you could say about him that would encounter virtually no dissent would be the assertion that Elvis did not record concept or theme albums.
The main concern seems to have been to grind it out as quickly as possible and move on to the next one. In many years, Elvis made two, three, even four movies.
Plot? What plot? Plots were flimsy at best. Sometimes they were (ostensibly) dramatic stories, and sometimes they were (again, ostensibly) comedies. "Double Trouble" was a comedy. Ostensibly.
He had an attractive co–star (Annette Day). His co–stars were always attractive, though. The story was set in Europe, but Elvis' movies were set all over the world. They say it's good to be King.
There were better Elvis movies. Most of them, in fact.
Elvis made more than 30 movies, three of them in 1967, which was probably his weakest year on the big screen.
"Double Trouble" was arguably the weakest of the three. The soundtrack album the movie spawned was clearly the weakest of the three that hit music stores that year.
Nevertheless, the movie was the No. 58 moneymaker at the box office, and Presley's album reached No. 47 on the Billboard charts despite the absence of any true hits.
As I say, anything with Elvis' name on it made money.
But ...
If you see "Double Trouble" listed in your TV listings, do yourself a favor.
I have several Bob Dylan albums on CD today, but when I was a teenager the first vinyl Dylan recording I ever owned was his first greatest hits collection, which hit the music stores 50 years ago today.
It had been in stores for many years by the time I added it to my collection, but I knew I would like it before I ever played it. I was familiar with every song on it.
Lots of folks must have felt the same way. Dylan has released more than three dozen albums in his remarkable career. The greatest hits collection that arrived in music stores on this day in 1967 is his top–selling album.
Perhaps it set a standard in my impressionable mind for all greatest hits albums to come — a standard that no other greatest hits album could hope to match, although I will admit that one or two have come close.
Even today I will look at that CD and think to myself that it is the perfect collection of Dylan's early music. (Two other volumes of his greatest hits have been released, but even three volumes — and one was a double album — weren't comprehensive accounts of Dylan's career.)
I mentioned that once to my friend Brady, who is probably Dylan's greatest admirer among my friends, and he seemed kind of amused by that. Maybe he could think of a song or two that he felt should have been included — he didn't say — but I can't. I still think it is a perfect collection of Dylan's best from the '60s — and I say that knowing that "John Wesley Harding" and "Nasvhille Skyline" had not yet been released.
Apparently, I am not the only person who feels that way about this album. Stephen Thomas Erlewine of Allmusic.com wrote that "[a]t just 10 songs, it's a little brief" — if you're familiar with recordings from the '60s, you know that was probably unavoidable since most songs tended to be two, three, at most four minutes long most of the time. Yes, it is a little brief by modern standards — just under 40 minutes.
"[B]ut that's actually not a bad thing," Erlewine wrote, "since this provides a nice sampler for the curious and casual listener."
Indeed it does. If I was going to introduce someone to Dylan, the "Greatest Hits" album would be the first album I would recommend. I would tell my friend that he/she should listen to individual Dylan albums, not just a greatest hits package, but the greatest hits album would be a good starting point.
Chances are that, like me, that person already would be familiar with every song on the album. It wasn't just a document of the early years of Dylan's career — although it certainly was that. It was a time capsule, a collection of the most socially relevant songs of probably the most socially explosive time in our history (which was still unfolding when the album first arrived in music stores). Songs like "Blowin' in the Wind," "The Times They Are A–Changin'," "Mr. Tambourine Man" and "Just Like a Woman" punctuate the album. They form the soundtrack of their time.
The soundtrack of the '60s.
Oh, sure, you could throw in some other songs by other artists to get a true soundtrack for the '60s — but you can find a lot of it on this one album. The selections are like next–generation versions of "This Land Is Your Land."
My favorites from the album are probably "Like A Rolling Stone" and "Subterranean Homesick Blues."
That reminds me of a story.
From time to time in my life, I have taught journalism to students in four–year and two–year colleges. A few years ago, I was in the classroom a few minutes before the start of a class, and some of my students were there as well. One of them asked me what my favorite rap song was. I kid you not.
I told him that the closest thing to rap in my collection was Dylan singing "Subterranean Homesick Blues."
A girl in the class piped up. "That's the original rap song!"
I was impressed that she knew the song, considering that it was recorded about 30 years before she was born.
"You get an A!" I told her. Then I looked at the other students. "See how easy it is?" I asked.
In fact, that girl did receive an A in that class. But it wasn't because of what she said that day. She was a good student and deserved the grade she got.
On this night in 1967 the United States and the Soviet Union were engaged in a great space race. Their international competition to see who could get to the moon first was constantly in the news, and both countries were inclined to jealously guard their information about everything anyway, not just space exploration, although that was high on the list.
Well, that is what I have heard. My memories of the space race are not as clear as they would be if I had been older so I was unaware of any cloak–and–dagger stuff that might have been going on. It really wouldn't surprise me, though, given the atmosphere of fear and suspicion in those Cold War days. Even at my tender age, I was aware of that much. The race was with the Russians, and it had implications that went far beyond space and the moon. The Russians couldn't be permitted to know any of our secrets, even if those secrets meant nothing to national security in the long run.
I guess I always assumed that the Russian people were subjected to the same kind of propaganda that the Americans were. Considering the nature of the Soviet government, it was probably likely.
So it wasn't hard for audiences to accept the national security angle to the episode of Gilligan's Island that first aired 50 years ago tonight, "It's a Bird, It's a Plane." They were conditioned to it.
When the episode began, an experimental jet pack had fallen overboard from a naval ship and drifted to the island, where Gilligan (Bob Denver) discovered it in the lagoon.
Gilligan recognized the resemblance to a pack worn by fictional space traveler Buck Rogers. The Professor (Russell Johnson) recognized the potential the pack had to be their long–sought rescue.
The mere fact that the jet pack was missing was enough for the frantic folks back on the mainland to launch a massive search of the area. This had happened before during the series' three–year run. Amazingly no one ever came across Gilligan's little island during one of those searches when — presumably — no stone (metaphorically speaking) would be left unturned.
Initially the idea on the island was that someone would strap on the jet pack and fly to Hawaii, but the Professor wanted to evaluate the matter first. While he was doing that, both the Howells (Jim Backus, Natalie Schafer) and the girls (Dawn Wells, Tina Louise) tried to trick Gilligan into strapping on the jet pack and taking off.
The efforts were thwarted, though. The Professor had come up with a plan that wasn't as dangerous as having one of the castaways fly over the ocean to Hawaii. They would construct a dummy to precise height and weight specifications, strap on the jet pack and aim it at the right trajectory to fly to Hawaii with a note attached to it alerting the authorities to their location.
But Gilligan accidentally wound up riding the dummy through the jungle and burning up most of the fuel. There was enough left for maybe a 15–minute flight.
And then the castaways were given a reason to use it for that purpose.
The search ships would be in their area the next day — according to the radio (which, remarkably, always started reporting on precisely whatever the castaways wanted to hear about the minute they switched on the radio). It was decided that someone would take that 15–minute flight to draw the ships' attention.
What remained was to choose who would take the flight. They needed to undergo a test to see who was least likely to become dizzy and light–headed.
So all four men climbed into a cylindrical contraption that could be made to spin when someone rode a stationary bicycle to generate power. When they emerged, Gilligan was the only one who wasn't dizzy or light–headed so he was chosen to fly when the search party was in the area.
The Skipper (Alan Hale Jr.) had an explanation for that. Gilligan, he said, was "dizzy and light–headed all the time — he's just used to it."
So Gilligan piloted the jet pack — with the radio hanging around his neck so he could hear news reports. And he did hear one — the sighting of a UFO from one of the search ships. Not realizing that the report was actually the sighting of Gilligan, he ducked into a cloud — and created an unexpected shower. The Navy called off the search.
I got my bachelor's degree in journalism from the University of Arkansas, and I got my master's degree in journalism from the University of North Texas. Most of my adult life has been dedicated to writing and editing in one form or another. Most recently I have taught writing (news and developmental) as an adjunct journalism professor at Richland College, where I advise the student newspaper staff. Go, Thunderducks!
