sixties

HAPPY BIRTHDAY!

To one of the best villainous Bond Girls of all-time, Luciana Paluzzi (pictured) who was evil incarnate as the fast-driving assassin Fiona Volpe in Thunderball. Read a wonderful interview with her in the current issue of CinemaRetro, which includes my final installment on “Elvis and His Starlets.”

Birthday wishes also go out to Slaymate Linda Foster whose loaded bra almost does in Dean Martin’s super cool Matt Helm in The Ambushers. Read more about Linda in my upcoming new book, Glamour Girls in Sixties Hollywood.

THEATRE WORLD AWARDS

Tonight I attended the awards ceremony honoring the 12 Most Promising Newcomers as a guest of invitee Gail Gerber former 60s starlet who appeared in such films as The Girls on the Beach, Harum Scarum, and Village of the Giants. Though such presenters as Estelle Parsons, Barbara Cook, and Rosemary Harris presented awards to former American Idol contestant Fantasia, sitcom cast-off Johnny Galecki formerly of Roseanne, and other Broadway or Off-Broadway debuters, the best part of the night was the pictorial montage of photos of past award ceremonies. I literally got all misty-eyed seeing photos of my girls Carol Lynley and Pamela Tiffin when they were recepients of the Theatre World Award for respectively, The Potting Shed in 1957 and Dinner at Eight in 1966.

Bravo to co-producer Kati Meister for putting on a wonderful awards show! Click here to check out the web site.

SURF’S UP!

Rev up those DVRs, wax up them surfboards, and head out into the foam to catch a wave of beach movies. TCM leads off on Sunday 6/3 at 10AM with Don’t Make Waves (1967) a funny satire on Malibu living starring Tony Curtis, Sharon Tate, and bodybuilder Dave Draper. Then on 6/5 beginning at 6AM TCM offers a beach party marathon. First up, Frankie, Annette and the beach gang hit the surf in Beach Party (1963) followed by Bikini Beach (1964), and Beach Blanket Bingo (1965). Things take a more serious turn and the waves get bigger as competing surfers Fabian, Tab Hunter and Peter Brown try to Ride the Wild Surf (1964) while their gals Shelley Fabares, Susan Hart, and Barbara Eden cheer them on. Lastly, the original girl-midget Sandra Dee takes a crack at shooting the curl and creates a surfing phenomenon in Gidget (1959).

Switching over to the Fox Movie Channel, on 6/6 at 4pm surfer Michael Sarrazin, tennis hustler Tony Franciosa and jazz bum Bob Denver take The Sweet Ride (1968). The gals who come along include Jackie Bisset, Michele Carey, Lara Lindsay, and Corinna Tsopei. Read all about the latter three lovelies in my upcoming book, Glamour Girls of Sixties Hollywood.

HAPPY BIRTHDAY!

To Deanna Lund (pictured yesterday with Gary Conway and today still gorgeous). My favorite actress as a kid during the late Sixties was Deanna Lund. I just loved her on Land of the Giants where I thought she was the coolest chick ever with her mod mini-skirt outfits always standing up to the guys. She was feisty, adventurous, greedy, selfish, funny all the qualties needed to create an interesting character especially on a sci-fi TV show where the special effects usually over shadowed the actors.

I tried to watch Deanna Lund wherever she appeared. She was a regular (and co-producer) on the game show Stump the Stars where two teams of celebrities would play charades and I remember watchng her on The Hollywood Squares, The Art Linkletter Show, and Love, American Style. I always felt, and still do, that Deanna should have had a much bigger career in the Seventies and I lost tracked of her once Carol Lynley via The Poseidon Adventure entered my life. But I was right at the movie theater when I read that Deanna was cast as Jerry Lewis’ love interest in the comedy Hardly Working in 1981. I never met Deanna Lund in person but interviewed her by phone for my book Fantasy Femmes of Sixties Cinema. And she still remains one of my favorite actresses of all-time.