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.

CANDY GIRL

After Land of the Giants, my favorite show as a kid was Here Come the Brides. Strapping Robert Brown, sullen David Soul, and cute Bobby Sherman played the Bolton brothers ca. late 1800s who brought a number of single females to their logging town in the beautiful Pacific Northwest for the men to marry. One of those blushing brides-to-be was auburn-haired Bridget Hanley as Candy whom I adored. She was paired with Bobby Sherman and for a seven year old at the time made for the most romantic couple. Check out this tribute clip to the show on YouTube.

For some oddball reason, Bridget never appeared in movies at the time but she made guest appearances on all the top sitcoms and was a fixture on another fave of mine, Love, American Style appearing 5 times. Besides being a first-rate actress, Bridget had the best Sixties hairstyles of any starlet of the day. Today, she still acts, mainly on stage, and my friend Shaun is good buddies with her…lucky fellow!

STARLET MOVIE OF THE WEEK

Crank up the DV-R players as Turner Classic Movies is re-running on 5/24 at 1:30PM one of the best “3 Girls Looking for Romance Films” MGM’s Come Fly with Me (1963). In this charming piece of Sixties fluff, Dolores Hart, Lois Nettleton, and my fave Pamela Tiffin are airline hostesses working the NY Idlewild to Europe route out to snare themselves a man. Hart is a chain smoking gold digger duped by a con man, Tiffin the naive newbie who succumbs to the charms of playboy pilot Hugh O’Brian (pictured, woof!), and Nettleton is the level-headed one who stumbles into love with older tycoon Karl Malden. Beautifully filmed on location, this is one trip well worth taking for fans of Sixties Starlets.

Incidentally, this was Hart’s last movie before she quit Hollywood to become a cloistered nun. Per Pamela Tiffin, Dolores confided in her that she wanted to become a nun on the set and Pamela told me that she exclaimed, “‘Oh Dolores you don’t want to!’ Back then I didn’t understand her decision. Now I do.”