Sixties Posts

HOLLYWOOD 1969

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If you are like me and can’t wait for this summer’s Once Upon a Time in Hollywood from director Quentin Tarantino and starring Brad Pitt, Leonardo DiCaprio, and Margot Robbie as Sharon Tate, then get a jump and read what is was like being a working actress in 1960s Hollywood directly from the mouths of such lovely actresses who lived through it such as Pamela Tiffin, Diane McBain,  Salli Sachse, Lana Wood, Celeste Yarnall, Francine York, Deanna Lund, Irene Tsu, Marlyn Mason, Donna Loren, Hilarie Thompson, Sue Ane Langdon, Carole Wells, Beverly Washburn, Anne Randall, Victoria Carroll, Corinne Cole, Bobbie Shaw, Valerie Starrett, Diane Bond, Darlene Tompkins, Quinn O’Hara, Nancy Czar, Lada Edmund, Jr., Maggie Thrett, plus many more in my various books from McFarland and Company and BearManor Media.

50 Years Ago Today…

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one of my favorite 1960’s movies Model Shop opened. Director Jacques Demy’s sumptuously filmed paean to Los Angeles starring tight jean clad Gary Lockwood as a drafted architect spending his last day of freedom before army duty & the women he encounters. Anouk Aimee (of A Man and a Woman fame) as a mysterious French model he becomes infatuated with. Baby doll blonde Alexandra Hay as his grasping starlet girlfriend. Hilarie Thompson as a hitchhiking hippie. And Anne Randall as the model shop’s receptionist. LA never looked more inviting and Anne talks making the movie in my McFarland book Glamour Girls of Sixties Hollywood.

ELVIS BIRTHDAY WEEK

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I am a bit late on this , but with all the Elvis movie marathons I thought I would share my top 5 1960s Elvis movies. My ranking as changed over the last few years and I know I will get grief over this but as of today my favorites stand as:

  1. Paradise, Hawaiian Style (high flying Elvis, gorgeous Hawaiian scenery, catchy songs, Marianna Hill, Irene Tsu, Suzanna Leigh, and a bevy of even more beauties, what more can you ask for?)
  2. Roustabout (Elvis as a tight black jean clad biker meets carny owner Barbara Stanwyck in a rousing carnival setting backed by Joan Freeman and Sue Ane Langdon, ‘nough said.)
  3. Girl Happy (The title says it all with Elvis and his combo on Spring Break in Fort Lauderdale where the girls are: Shelley Fabares, Mary Ann Mobley, Chris Noel, Lyn Edgington, Gail Gerber, Nancy Czar, Pamela Curran.)
  4. Kid Galahad (Elvis goes dramatic to excellent affect as a returning G.I. who becomes a sparring partner at a boxing camp run by Gig Young. Guess who wins the big fight and gets the girl, Joan Blackman, by fadeout?)
  5. Kissin’ Cousins (An amusing hillbilly hoedown with not one but two Elvi as a brunette service man and his brainadled blonde cousin whose family owns mountain land that those varmit government types want to buy. With Yvonne Craig and Pamela Austin as barefootin’ Daisy Maes dark-haired Elvis cannot seem to be able to choose. Best scene is watching Elvis wrestle himself.)

Honorable Mention: Blue Hawaii; Clambake; Easy Come, Easy Go