SHE MADE COOL HAND LUKE LOSE HIS COOL

Reviewing my Blog stats below is an encore presentation of my most popular Blog post to date.

Below is a great clip from the great movie [amazon_textlink asin=’B00UGPWQS8′ text=’Cool Hand Luke’ template=’ProductLink’ store=’sixtiescinema-20′ marketplace=’US’ link_id=’0ec273b8-c127-11e8-b3f4-094c3dbd7245′] (1967) starring [amazon_textlink asin=’B001EBV0MG’ text=’Paul Newman’ template=’ProductLink’ store=’sixtiescinema-20′ marketplace=’US’ link_id=’4434b479-c127-11e8-8480-e75ad49a6b68′] and [amazon_textlink asin=’1557837821′ text=’George Kennedy’ template=’ProductLink’ store=’sixtiescinema-20′ marketplace=’US’ link_id=’5875a448-c127-11e8-858b-fba931c15bbe’] highlighting [amazon_textlink asin=’B00F109T10′ text=’Lalo Schifrin’ template=’ProductLink’ store=’sixtiescinema-20′ marketplace=’US’ link_id=’679e8fa4-c127-11e8-8480-e75ad49a6b68′]’s classic musical score.

The girl who washes the car and gets the chain gang all hot and bothered is Fantasy Femme [amazon_textlink asin=’B0007R4T08′ text=’Joy Harmon ‘ template=’ProductLink’ store=’sixtiescinema-20′ marketplace=’US’ link_id=’88f4f471-c127-11e8-8fcf-21cfe1b53c80′]in her most memorable role though she doesn’t utter a word.

jul 224Joy Harmon began her show business career as a teenage extra in The Man Who Came to Dinner (1956).  Her curvaceous figure, measuring 41-22-36, was her ticket to Broadway in the comedy Make Me Laugh starring Sam Levene in 1958 as the comic foil to the comedian.  On television the popular pin-up (who also posed for numerous men’s magazines except Playboy because she wouldn’t go topless) became a favorite of such talk show hosts as Steve Allen and Gary Moore who spun as many double-entendres as possible at Joy’s expense and, of course, comparisons to Jayne Mansfield were inevitable.  In between variety show appearances, she found time to make her film debut as a tough chain-smoking broad in the juvenile rock-and-roll flick, Let’s Rock (1958) starring, of all people, Julius LaRosa.

Hollywood soon beckoned and Harmon became a regular on the short-lived Tell It to Groucho in 1962.  On the big and small screens, Harmon was so adept at playing the dizzy bugged-eyed blonde with the giggly laugh that she became typecast.  Minor movie roles in [amazon_textlink asin=’B005IX3C4A’ text=’Mad Dog Coll’ template=’ProductLink’ store=’sixtiescinema-20′ marketplace=’US’ link_id=’b491f647-c127-11e8-ab27-a5f0d6c4c244′] (1962), [amazon_textlink asin=’B0024396DI’ text=’Under the Yum Yum Tree’ template=’ProductLink’ store=’sixtiescinema-20′ marketplace=’US’ link_id=’cf4dae2b-c127-11e8-a8df-4b0c208f1c3b’] (1963), [amazon_textlink asin=’B07DXSK4ZG’ text=’Young Dillinger’ template=’ProductLink’ store=’sixtiescinema-20′ marketplace=’US’ link_id=’dfa5cb62-c127-11e8-aee9-8152a25ab8e2′] (1965), and [amazon_textlink asin=’B06ZZFRD3M’ text=’The Loved One’ template=’ProductLink’ store=’sixtiescinema-20′ marketplace=’US’ link_id=’f08fa0c5-c127-11e8-be47-b7cb16c256d5′] (1965) led to lead roles as a teenage delinquent in [amazon_textlink asin=’B00005AUK5′ text=’Village of the Giants ‘ template=’ProductLink’ store=’sixtiescinema-20′ marketplace=’US’ link_id=’ffd67527-c127-11e8-8549-474d32d53c22′](1965) opposite Beau Bridges and a beach denizen in Hawaii mixed up in robbery in One Way Wahine (1965).  Even when playing bad girls, audiences could not help but love Joy due to her effervescent personality and the innocence she brought to all her characters.  This quality is undoubtedly why she was hired for her most infamous role in Cool Hand Luke (1967).

Cool Hand Luke examines life for men on a chain gang in a Southern prison camp.  The immensely entertaining social drama stars Paul Newman as a loner who refuses to conform to society’s rules and George Kennedy, who won an Oscar for his performance as one of Newman’s fellow prisoners.  On paper, Joy’s part seemed innocuous enough—a pretty girl washes her car while shackled prisoners of a chain gang peer on.  Recalling the audition Joy says, “I had this agent named Leon Lance who was around forever in Hollywood.  He got me the interview for Cool Hand Luke and told me that I had to wear a bikini for it.  Paul Newman, Stuart Rosenberg [the director], and somebody else were there.  I remember Paul Newman said to me, ‘Gosh, you have the bluest eyes!’  They just talked to me and that was it.  It was a small part with no lines but I wanted to work with Newman so when they offered it to me I accepted.”

Joy1Cool Hand Luke was filmed in Stockton, California.  None of the actors were allowed to bring their wives or girlfriends to the set because Stuart Rosenberg wanted his actors to have the feel for what it would be like to work on a chain gang without female contact.  When they finally saw a woman their reactions would be believable and not “acting.”  After arriving on location, Joy was sequestered at the hotel for two days and never saw anyone.  They kept her away from all the actors until filming began.  With Newman, Kennedy, and the rest of the chain gang entranced, Harmon washes her car like she’s making love to a man.  While Kennedy dubs her his innocent “Lucille,” Newman realizes she is just a tease and knows exactly what she is doing by getting the prisoners excited.  “Stuart Rosenberg was so sensitive and took time to work with me,” recalls Joy fondly.  “I didn’t even have a line but he just wanted everything motivated with a thought behind it.  He was an actor’s director—more concerned with the actors than the lighting or anything else.  He kept talking with me and it was like a bonding kind of thing, which is why I was able to release all that energy in that scene.

“Stuart was very specific and knew exactly what he wanted,” continues Joy.  “I guess you can tell that by the way the scene comes off—but I didn’t realize it.  And I don’t think I even realized it right after I did it.  There were a lot of things he made me do a certain way—soaping the windows, holding the hose— that had a two-way meaning.  He would tell me to look different ways and we kept shooting it over and over again.  I just figured I was washing the car.  I’ve always been naïve and innocent.  I was acting and not trying to be sexy.”

JoyAll of Rosenberg’s work paid off as the scene is unforgettable and is truly one of the sixties’ most provocative moments.  Joy, clad in a tatty housedress with her cleavage clearly on display, holds the nozzle of the hose suggestively, squeezes the soap from the sponge and drenches her dress, and presses her bounteous bosom on the passenger-side window as she washes the roof putting on quite a tantalizing show for the frustrated prisoners.  “I never had any inclination that this would be such a memorable role,” says Joy.  “Except for being in a movie with Paul Newman, I never expected this part to be so notable and get the reaction it did.  After seeing it at the premiere I was a bit embarrassed.  Of all the things I’ve done people know me most from this film.”

Unfortunately for movie audiences Joy never capitalized on the notoriety that the film brought her.  After the movie was released she met film editor Jeff Gourson and they wed.  American International Pictures wanted to sign Joy to a contract beginning with the lead role in The Young Animals (1968) but she declined as she was happy juggling bit roles ([amazon_textlink asin=’B0006SSPZS’ text=’A Guide for the Married Man’ template=’ProductLink’ store=’sixtiescinema-20′ marketplace=’US’ link_id=’3a593ebc-c128-11e8-bf84-5714c022ba5e’], Angel in My Pocket, Norwood) with her new marriage.

Harmon continued acting mostly on television in such series as Love, American Style and The Odd Couple until 1973 when she retired to raise her children.  Her only foray back into show business was doing voiceover work in her husband’s hit TV series Quantum Leap.  Today that girl from Cool Hand Luke has her own business called Aunt Joy’s Cakes.  While she was acting Joy’s bosoms weren’t the only treats she brought to the set as she also shared her delicious homemade cakes and cookies with cast and crew.  In the nineties, she began supplying her niece’s coffee shop with her desserts and then saw her business quickly expand to include all the major movie studios.  She now has a web site and you can order Joy’s baked goods online at Aunt Joy’s Cakes.

 

 

 

 

Beach Blanket Homo: Gay Moments in ‘60s Beach Movies

The Sixties beach movie craze began with Gidget (1959) starring Sandra Dee and James Darren, a fictionalized look at teenager Kathy Kohner’s surfing escapades in Malibu during the mid-fifties. It was groundbreaking as the movie contributed to the mass influx of surfers to the beaches of Malibu and started a series of surf-themed films such as Gidget Goes Hawaiian with Deborah Walley stepping into Dee’s surfer role and Ride the Wild Surf with Fabian, Shelley Fabares, and Tab Hunter.

The surf movie soon morphed into the beach-party film, whose heyday was from 1963 through 1965, where surfing was only used as a backdrop to fanciful teenage beach adventures. Beach Party from AIP starring Frankie Avalon and Annette Funicello launched the duo in Muscle Beach Party, Bikini Beach, Beach Blanket Bingo, and How to Stuff a Wild Bikini. Soon other studios were releasing their own Beach Party rivals such as Surf Party with Bobby Vinton and Pat Morrow, For Those Who Think Young with James Darren and Pamela Tiffin, and Beach Ball with Edd Byrnes and Chris Noel. Some films varied from the formula by shifting the locale to a lake A Swingin’ Summer, a haunted house The Ghost in the Invisible Bikini, or the ski slopes Ski Party, Winter a-Go-Go, and Wild Wild Winter. These movies for the most part followed a successful simple formula—start with attractive swimsuit clad teenagers twisting on the sand, add a dash of surfing (or ski) footage, mix in romantic misunderstandings, stir in popular musical performers, add aging comedians for comic relief, and whisk in villainous bikers or predatory adults.


Gay subtext crept into a few of the beach-party movies giving these films camp appeal today. Discounting the obvious fact that these sand-and-surf epics were titillation for homosexual men of the time, as good looking shirtless movie hunks such as Jody McCrea, Fabian, Aron Kincaid, James Stacy, and Peter Brown frolic on the sand in swim trunks or the slopes in tight ski pants. Or that gay actors such as Tab Hunter, Tommy Kirk, and Paul Lynde appeared in these movies, there were other factors that probably were not obvious back in the Sixties. Either a director or screenwriter may have tried to slip in with a wink and a nudge to the homosexual community in an unassuming way that made it past the oblivious producers and censors.

The most obvious example is Muscle Beach Party (1964) featuring a clean-cut group of surfers versus a cult of bodybuilders headed by Don Rickle’s Jack Fanny. During the Fifties and Sixties, the public automatically associated bodybuilding with homosexuality because muscle men of the time appeared as objects of desire wearing posing briefs or sometimes nothing at all in physique magazines whose readers were mostly gay men. Writing on the subject, film historian Joan Ormond commented, “Homosexuality in this era was regarded as potentially more damaging to society as the wild antics of surfers.” Hence, the bodybuilders of Muscle Beach Party are seen as the bad guys along the lines of Eric Von Zipper’s motorcycle gang of Beach Party as they are out to corrupt the youth of America.

Though handsome Fabian, Tab Hunter, and Peter Brown pursue beach babes when not in the water in Ride the Wild Surf (1964), there is a strong “homo-erotic undercurrent” throughout. The scenes of these shirtless surfers bonding or comforting each other while tackling the huge waves of Waimea Bay have become gay porn staples. Supposed swinging bachelors Paul Lynde and Woody Woodbury in For Those Who Think Young (1964) come off like two bickering old queens rather than swinging playboys as they frolic on the shore with the surfer crowd headed by James Darren. They even sneak in a Paul Lynde quip while he’s holding two large-sized hot dogs. Keeping with the wiener symbolism, the scene of boyish surfer boy Mike Nader (later “Dex Dexter” on TV’s Dynasty) inserting a frankfurter into the mouth of equally blonde Johnny Fain in Beach Blanket Bingo while Donna Loren sings about an unrequited love is certainly an eyebrow raiser. How to Stuff a Wild Bikini (1965) went a step further with one of the nameless surfers more interested in his books than girls resulting in raised eyebrows and innuendo that he prefers boys whenever he makes a comment. And finally in The Ghost in the Invisible Bikini (1966) while Deborah Wally sleeps alone in a double-size bed, Tommy Kirk shares his with Aron Kincaid.

Winter a-Go-Go (1965), a beach party in the snow, has the obligatory scantily clad ski babes and their horny tight pants wearing boyfriends, which you’d expect to find in this type of film. But what makes the movie especially interesting and an undiscovered camp classic is that it arguably introduces the first major ambiguous gay character to appear in a beach-party type movie. The role of Roger that screenwriter Bob Kanter created for himself is the asexual best friend of socialite Janine (Jill Donohue). Though he travels with her and her friend Dori (Judy Parker) there is no evidence of any current or past romance with either gal. During the course of the film Janine sets her sights on Danny (James Stacy) and Jeff (William Wellman, Jr.) but winds up reuniting with tough guy Burt (Anthony Hayes). Dori makes goo-goo eyes at Frankie (Tom Nardini) throughout the film. Poor Roger—if he is not running to Jeff and Danny for protection from the bullying Burt he just sits there drinking his cokes making catty comments about the proceedings.

Of course, you couldn’t have a beach movie without putting some of the actors in women’s clothes. Scenes of guys dressed in drag dominated three movies. The Girls on the Beach (1965), Martin West, Aron Kincaid, and Steve Rogers make glamorous college girls complete with lip-gloss, false eyelashes, and mascara as they don some coeds’ frocks to sneak out of a sorority house. In Beach Ball (1965) Kincaid was back to wearing a dress (though he was not as fabulous looking as in his prior movie) along with Edd Byrnes, Don Edmonds and Robert Logan as they try to avoid the police at a music fair. And best of all Ski Party (1965), a sort of Some Like It Hot for the teenage crowd, had Frankie Avalon and Dwayne Hickman disguise themselves as British lasses “Jane” and “Nora”, respectively, to infiltrate the opposite sex to learn what women are looking for in a man. In the process, suave Aron Kincaid as ladies man Freddie falls for Hickman’s female persona. At first Hickman finds it annoying but when his girlfriend (Yvonne Craig) keeps giving him grief, he decides to turn back into “Nora” and go out with Freddie because he knows “how to treat a girl.” I bet he does.

HAPPY BELATED BIRTHDAY

To my friend and former 1960s starlet Gail Gerber (1937-2014). Gail lives on her in beach and Elvis movies and her award-winning memoir Trippin’ with Terry Southern: What I Think I Remember. We miss you Gail!

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Coming in 2015!

 

PTBlogPamela Tiffin: Hollywood to Rome, 1961-1974 pays tribute to the stunning beauty that is Pamela Tiffin. Critics adored her. James Cagney hailed her “remarkable flair for comedy.” Turner Classic Movies dubbed her “Hollywood’s favorite air-headed ingénue in the Sixties.” Yet super stardom evaded her due to contractual obligations and self-imposed exiles in New York and then Rome, though she remains a cult Sixties icon to this day.

Dark-haired Pamela Tiffin debuted in 1961’s Summer and Smoke adapted from the Tennessee Williams play. She then emerged as a scene-stealing comedienne in Billy Wilder’s classic satire One, Two, Three with Cagney, before she became the teen queen of teenage camp in State Fair; Come Fly with Me; two with James Darren – For Those Who Think Young & The Lively Set; and The Pleasure Seekers. After landing a sexy adult role opposite Paul Newman in Harper where the bikini-cad Tiffin jiggled the diving board into Sixties cinema infamy, she went blonde and ran away to Italy. There she starred in sex comedies including Kiss the Other Sheik; The Blonde in the Blue Movie; and The Archangel; a giallo The Fifth Cord, and the western Deaf Smith & Johnny Ears. During her career, her leading men also included Laurence Harvey, Bobby Darin,Tony Franciosa, Burt Lancaster, Marcello Mastroianni, Nino Manfredi, Vittorio Gassman, Peter Ustinov, Franco Nero, and Anthony Quinn.

Not a biography, this book is a career retrospective of Pamela Tiffin’s movies plus TV and stage appearances. Interviewees (including Hugh O’Brian, Lada Edmund, Jr., Carole Wells, Tim Zinnemann, Martin West, Jed Curtis, Eldon Quick, Peter Gonzales, and Larry Hankin) provide a behind-the-scenes look of some of her most popular movies listed above and The Hallelujah Trail; Straziami, ma di baci saziami; and Viva Max. Plus noted film historians Dean Brierly, Roberto Curti, Howard Hughes, and Paolo Mereghetti weigh in on Pamela Tiffin’s place in cinematic history.

 

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