In honor of the upcoming new NBC-TV series Aquarius starring David Duchovny as an LA detective investigating a hippie cult led by Charles Manson in 1967 Los Angeles, I thought I’d pay tribute to some of my favorite Sixties Starlets in their memorable hippie roles:
1. Salli Sachse in The Trip (1967)
Directed by Roger Corman, The Trip follows a TV commercial director (Peter Fonda ) who takes an LSD trip to grasp something from his inner nature as a way to deal with his problematic personal life. Sachse plays a sexy blonde named Glenn who meets Fonda a few hours before his trip. While under the influence of LSD, Fonda imagines Salli with a painted face and dressed in a wild bikini as she accompanies him on his psychedelic journey. She becomes the ultimate LSD freakout girl.
2. Mimsy Farmer in Riot on Sunset Strip (1967)
Mimsy Farmer plays a staid high school girl named Andy who hails from a broken home and takes up with the drug-taking crowd. She was described in the press book as “a real swinger, who took her first ‘trip’…all the way to Hell and back!” All the ingredients were present—hippies, LSD, protestors, free love, mod fashions, police brutality— to make Riot on Sunset Strip a camp classic of the alienated youth movie genre. Farmer’s LSD induced dance is a real trip!
3. Hilarie Thompson in Model Shop (1969)
Though Hilarie Thompson played many a hippie role on film and TV, her cameo as a hitchhiking hippie in Jacques Demy’s Model Shop (1969)was a standout. In Demy’s tribute to Los Angeles and its youth culture, Gary Lockwood played an alienated twenty-six year old architect waiting to be drafted and facing an overdue car payment. During the course of a twenty-four hour period, he rebuffs his grasping starlet girlfriend (Alexandra Hay) who wants to get married; photographs a beautiful French woman (Anouk Aimée) who works as a model, posing semi-nude for amateur photographers; and gives a lift to a hippie (Thompson) hitching a ride. OF all her hippie roles, Thompson’s most realistic,
4. Tisha Sterling in Coogan’s Bluff
Tisha Sterling gives a star making performance as a duplicitous hippie in the stylish detective film Coogan’s Bluff starring Clint Eastwood as a remote Arizona deputy who heads to New York City to extradite her fugitive boyfriend Don Stroud. While waiting for Stroud to recover from a bad LSD trip, Eastwood butts heads with feisty Sterling who helps Stroud escape. Not caring that she is a chick, Clint roughs her up to find where he is hiding. In retaliation, she leads him to a pool hall where Stroud’s cronies beat him up. The film climaxes high on the bluffs of the Cloisters (my current stomping grounds) where Stoud and Sterling get their comeuppance.
5. Carol Lynley in The Poseidon Adventure
Over the years The Poseidon Adventure has built up a devoted cult following with legions of fans. One of their film favorites is the hot pants, go-go booted-clad hippie singer Nonnie Parry. This is surprising since the character isn’t over-the-top like combative Det. Mike Rogo; his foul-mouthed ex-prostitute wife Linda; overweight Jewish grandma Belle Rosen; or bombastic hero/preacher Reverend Scott. Credit goes to actress Carol Lynley for giving a very effective, understated performance as the terrified Nonnie, who almost goes into a state of shock after the capsizing of the SS Poseidon making the audience feel empathy for her plight. It was by far not Lynley’s most demanding role, but remains her most beloved and remembered.
Read more about these Sixties Starlets in my books:
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I look forward to this series, and hope it will be a James Ellroy-esque dark portrait of LA at the end of the 1960’s. The conceit of Manson’s gang being infiltrated well before Helter Skelter sounds more fiction than fact, but it might be an entertaining story. I suspect that the series will be either really good, or really bad.
What I DON’T want to see in it are obvious anachronisms, such as people high-fiving each other, and I hope the screenplay is devoid of modern clichés like “I just can’t wrap my head around people being that evil.” Nothing ruins a period piece faster than obvious anachronisms. I hope the script wasn’t written by a 22 year old who has no sense of the 1960’s.
Now, in a totally unrelated note, Strand will finally be releasing a Blu-ray of PSYCHO BEACH PARTY, in August. Time to toss those old non-anamorphic DVDs.
I found the series rather slow especially the Manson scenes. Actor has no charisma. The detectives especially the young hip one, are more interesting. Great music though.
Anchor Bay has acquired the series for release on Blu-ray and DVD. They are promising that this will be the fully uncut version, as opposed to the version airing on NBC. There will be some bonus content, as well.
Thanks am enjoying but not enough to buy the series.
Nudity might improve it. Last week, I liked the scene in which Manson and some of the girls were going to do some recording out of doors. Manson was so excited that he dropped his normal persona and seemed like a kid about to fulfill his dream. I thought the actor playing Manson was very good in that scene.
Yes, I too thought last week was better. The actor playing Manson though still for me doesn’t have that weird charisma needed to make it believable that these girls would foolishly follow him. The bisexual angle is actually intriguing if that was true about him. Still like the young hip detective and the female cop best.
Manson spent a lot of his life in prison, so I found the bisexual angle to be believable.