While I primarily focus on films in this blog, every once and a while something in another form comes up that I find interesting and relevant to the topics discussed here, so I'll throw those in. That is the case in this weeks entry.
In 1962, one of the most popular TV Series in the United States was Route 66. Now, this is not the typical show you'd be expecting to see in a blog like this. It followed the adventures of Tod Styles (Martin Milner) and Buzz Murdock (George Maharis) as they travel the country in a Chevy Corvette and get into various misadventures along the way. It was an early anthology series, where each story was stand alone, with only Buzz and Tod as the connecting feature. This afforded them the ability to do any sort of story they wanted, provided that they could fit the two principle characters into it. In many ways, it almost mimics the more modern series Supernatural, but without the horror elements.
The third season's sixth episode brings them to Chicago in the story titled 'Lizard's Leg and Owlet's Wing.'
Readers may note that title is a phrase used by the three witches in Shakespeare's Macbeth. This is deliberate, and we find out why even before the main characters appear on screen. It opened with a hunchback, reaching out apparently to menace a young boy sleeping in bed. Very quickly you find out however, that there is no menace here. It is none other that Lon Chaney Jr, in full hunchback makeup (no doubt an homage to one of his late father's most famous roles.) and he is visiting his grandson, who is enthusiastic about the makeup. Their scene is interrupted when Chaney is reminded that he has a teleconference he is late for.
I was amused by this early reference to telecommuting. Even 50 years ago, working remotely was becoming an accepted thing.
His meeting turns out to be with two other horror greats, Peter Lorre and Boris Karloff. Lorre and Chaney are trying to engage Karloff in a new film project, but Karloff is resistant. He believes 'the old ways' of horror are now passé, and thinks they should update and become more modern. Lorre and Chaney argue that the old ways are just as effective as ever. They agree to meet in Chicago to argue out the details in person, but Karloff insists they do so anonymously so as not to draw attention to themselves. He suggests book rooms at the hotel in the name of some benevolent society and use assumed names.. (not very CLEVER names, it must be noted.... Peter Lorre becomes 'Mr. Retep', Karloff becomes 'Mr. Sirob', and Chaney is 'Mr. Nol.')
Then we switch to Chicago where Tod and Buzz have just been given jobs as 'Liaison executives' for various convention groups at the hotel. Buzz is thrilled to be assigned as liaison to a convention of young Executive Secretaries that are meeting there, while a less thrilled Tod is given to 'The Society for the Preservation of the Gerenuk"... which he doesn't realize yet, but is the fictional society the horror actors have created to meet under.
The show has some truly cringeworthy examples of early 60s sexism, while curiously, at the same time, giving voice to genuine women's issues at the time. There is actual discussion of the disparity in pay, and an early call for 'Equal pay for equal work.' On the downside, most of the women are treated like they are all sort of superficial and shallow, and faint at the slightest provocation, and there is one subplot of one particular secretary who is in love with her boss and heartbroken at his inattention which is especially annoying.
However, any scene in which the horror icons appear is a delight, and Peter Lorre in particular is given some hilariously deadpan scenes which shouldn't, by rights, be funny, but actually are because of of his wonderful delivery. I couldn't help but laugh as he earnestly explains to Tod what a 'gerenuk' is and why its so important to preserve them. (A gerenuk, incidentally, is a kind of African antelope which was on the verge of extinction. Lorre gives the grave warning 'If it can happen to the gerenuk, it can happen to US!")
Lon Chaney (having dropped the Jr.) gets to have a great deal of fun dressing in various elaborate costumes throughout the episode, rarely appearing when NOT in a disguise. It nice to see him back in action as the hunchback, the mummy, and the wolf man again. He seems to be having a ball through the whole episode, running around scaring secretaries until they faint. He meets his match in the lovesick secretary however, who doesn't appear to notice his wolfman makeup at all, and even gives him a kiss on the cheek... which causes him such despair he starts sobbing.
Karloff, on the other hand, maintains great dignity, as befits horror royalty such as himself. He very quickly solves the lovelorn secretary's problems, as soon as he becomes aware of them, and gently disapproves of the antics of Lorre and Chaney for much of the time. So great is his screen presence that he doesn't really HAVE to act to command the screen, he just has to stand there and you instantly pay attention to him. Only at the very end, he dons a version of his famous Frankenstein's monster makeup... its a version more simplified than the Universal films version, but its rather nice to see him in costume again.
There are some extremely funny moments in the episode. Peter Lorre clinically analyzing the reactions of the secretaries to Chaney in wolfman makeup while Tod furiously takes notes is particularly noteworthy, especially his indignation when one of the women faints after seeing HIM sans any makeup at at. "I'm a little insulted...." he sulks in the way only Peter Lorre can.
As an additional note for horror fans... The lawyer Karloff insists be present at the meeting, Mrs. Baxter, is played by Martita Hunt. who was just coming off her own horror performance as Baroness Meinster in Hammer's The Brides of Dracula in 1960. She has less to do, but she does get to be very unimpressed by Lon Chaney's theatrics and is almost as deadpan in her delivery as Peter Lorre.
All in all, a great deal of fun for horror fans.
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