The weekly roundup of reviews, interviews, and other citations of (often, though not always) underappreciated examples of the dramatic and related arts; for the first time, not one but two citations of an auction, as well (and two defenses of Hallmark Channel programming; I don't disagree). As always, please let me know if I've missed your or anyone else's contribution this week in comments... thanks.

Anne Billson: Godzilla (1998 film); Movietalk: "Blockbusters"

In a World...

Anonymous: Carnal Knowledge; In a World...; 4 films that all happen in a single location each (two Hitchcocks, neither Rope); Kid Brother (Harold Lloyd)

Benjamin Poole: Daemos Rising

Bhob Stewart: "The Monkey Business Illusion"; "Beat Memories: The Photographs of Allen Ginsberg"; The Firesign Theater and I Think We're All Bozos on this Bus; Stan Freberg on The Dick Cavett Show; Six Feet Under finale; Moebius painting

The Big Broadcast, 26 June 2016:

7 p.m. Yours Truly, Johnny Dollar
“The Callicles Matter” Parts 3 and 4 (CBS, Original airdates May 2 and May 3, 1956)
7:30 p.m. Burns And Allen
“George Wants To Kick Meredith Willson Out” (NBC, Original airdate January 24, 1946)
8 p.m. Gunsmoke
“Bull” (CBS, Original airdate November 3, 1957)
8:30 p.m. The Stan Freberg Show
“The Musical Sheep” (CBS, Original airdate July 14, 1957)
9 p.m. The Adventures of Philip Marlowe
“The Red Wind” (NBC, Original airdate June 17, 1947)
9:30 p.m. Suspense
"A Friend To Alexander" (CBS, Original airdate June 15, 1944)
10 p.m. Lux Radio Theater
“Captain Blood” (CBS, Original airdate February 22, 1937)

Casino Royale

Bill Crider: Casino Royale (2006 film) [trailer]

Brian Arnold: Wham-O ads

B. V. Lawson: Media Murder

Chuck Esola: The Eyes of Annie Jones

Classic Movie Salon: this week viewing/discussing God's Little Acre--join if you'd like

Colin McGuigan: Murder by Decree

Comedy Film Nerds: Wayne Federman

Cult TV: Doctor Who: "The War Machines"

Cynthia Fuchs: Tickled; Zero Days

David Cramner: The Americano; Hombre

David Vineyard: Appointment with Danger

Elgin Bleecker: In the Heat of the Night (1967 film)

Elizabeth Foxwell: Illegal

Eric Hillis: Ivan's Children

Gary Deane: Fugitive Lady (aka La strada buie); Nightmare in Chicago (one possible NSFW image in this post)

George Kelley: Mystery Woman

"Gilligan Newton-John": Escape from Galaxy 3; Princess Warrior; Wonder Woman: "The Deadly Toys"

How Did This Get Made?: Simply Irresistible

Iba Dawson: 100 must-see films

Ivan G. Shreve, Jr.: Let Freedom Ring; Merry Wives of Reno; Rogue's Gallery (1945 radio)

Jack Seabrook: Alfred Hitchcock Presents: "Mrs. Herman and Mrs. Fenimore"

Jackie Kashian: Ivan Van Norman and Andy Ashcraft on zombies in popular culture, Role-Playing Games (RPGs) and otherwise ; The Band Wagon; Holiday

Jackie Kashian and Laurie Kilmartin: The Jackie and Laurie Show

Jacqueline T. Lynch: Dive Bomber

James Reasoner: In the Heart of the Sea

Janet Varney: Connie Chung

J.D. Lafrance: The Parallax View

Jerry House: Phantom Ship aka The Mystery of the Marie Celeste; TED Talks: "Talking to Strangers"

Los tallos amargos

John Grant: A Taste of Evil

John Scoleri: Dark Shadows Before I Die: the episodes reviewed

Jonathan Lewis: Vera Cruz; Ski Troop Patrol

K. A. Laity: "The Lost Library of John Dee"; Death of a Scoundrel

You're the Worst

Karen Hannsberry: TCM Film Festival: Los tallos amargos; Shanghai Express; The Conversation; some of Karen's least-favored actors

Ken Levine: "comedy in theory"; The Late Show exploitation

Tokyo Story

Kliph Nesteroff: Orson Bean

Kristina Dijan: Late Spring; Early Summer; Tokyo Story

Laura G.: Marine Raiders; Crack-Up; Dinky; The Affairs of Susan; TCM September; Murder, She Baked: A Chocolate Chip Cookie Mystery

Lesley Gaspar: Dr. Jekyll and Mr. Hyde (1931 film)

Lindsey: The Bachelor (1999 film)

Lucy Brown: Curtain Call

Sisters; apparently, the steambath opening for
every early episode was a clammy drag to film.

Martin Edwards: Felixstowe Book Festival

Marty McKee: Three the Hard Way

Mathew Paust: The Moth: "The Apron Strings of Savannah"

Mildred Perkins: Plants vs. Zombies

Mitchell Hadley: TV Guide, 29 June 1968; Of Black America: "Black History: Lost, Stolen or Strayed"; Minneapolis/St. Paul tv, 2 July 1968

Noel Vera: Anomalisa

Patricia Abbott: Sisters (1990s NBC-TV series)

Patricia Nolan-Hall: The Bishop Misbehaves

Paul Brazill: If...

Randy Johnson: Mystery Street

Raquel Stecher: Profiles in History Auction

Rick: The War of the Worlds (1953 film); why aren't US film buffs more interested in foreign film?

Rod Lott: The Nightmare (2015 documentary); Five Golden Dragons; The Gorilla Gang; Chosen Survivors

Ron Scheer: Thelonious Monk: Straight, No Chaser

"Rupert Pupkin": Underrated films of 1976

Ruth Kerr: It's a Great Feeling

"Sarah Jane": Underrated films of 1986

"Salome Wilde": High Anxiety; Richard Widmark; Border Incident; Strange Illusion; The Scarf; Night World; Not as a Stranger; Black Friday

Scott A. Cupp: American Pop

Sergio Angelini: Not a Well Woman; Philip Marlowe (BBC Radio 4)

Stacia Jones: Profiles in History Auction

Stacie Ponder: Alucarda; Nude for Satan (some NSFW imagery, arguably in both)

Stephen Bowie: Mannix

Steve Lewis: Stop Me Before I Kill!

Television Obscurities: US Fall TV schedule, 2000

Theresa Brown: Devil's Doorway

Victoria Loomes: The Charge of the Light Brigade

Vienna: Sudden Fear; the ruby slippers of The Wizard of Oz (1939)

Bill's citation of Casino Royale got me thinking about the hodgepodge parody film of the mid 1960s, which has aspects that I enjoy, even if Tracy Reed is shockingly underused in the cuts I've seen (Joanna Pettit does what she can to make up for that, among the other cast). Which sent me down a web hole for (the British) Tracy Reed...best remembered, obviously, for Dr. Strangelove, where she was the only woman in the film, and as she noted in this brief interview, played all her role in a bikini (aside from a still of her as a Playboy centerfold draped with a copy of Foreign Affairs magazine, as multilevel if still blatant visual pun as one could want...hmmm. wonder if that's part of Terry Southern's contribution, or if Kubrick came up with that himself...).

'Dr. Strangelove' and the Single Woman

July 10, 1994|ANNE BERGMAN (Los Angeles Times)

When asked if she has fond memories of working on Stanley Kubrick's "Dr. Strangelove," Tracy Reed emphatically responds, "Oh yes, lots!"

But Reed, who played "Miss Foreign Affairs," Gen. Buck Turgidson's comely secretary, concedes, in a phone call from London, that there were times on the set that were "very alarming."

"I was the only woman in it and I was wearing a bikini the whole time," Reed remembers, and when Kubrick decided to open the set to the press, "there were all these reporters staring at me. It was dreadful."

Reed landed the part after she met Kubrick with some friends at dinner. "We chatted," she says, "and he asked me to do it."

Despite overexposing her to the media, Reed says Kubrick was "wonderful." George C. Scott, who played Gen. Turgidson, was "a darling, absolutely sweet," and the film's star, Peter Sellers, was "a sad man who never quite knew who he really was."

Although just 22 when "Dr. Strangelove" was produced, Reed disputes original press material claiming the film is "introducing Tracy Reed as 'Miss Foreign Affairs.' "

"That's ridiculous," she says. "I've been in the movies all of my life!"

The stepdaughter of British director Sir Carol Reed and the daughter of actress Penelope Dudley Ward, Reed actually made her film debut at the age of 6 months, co-starring with her mother and Laurence Olivier in "The Demi-Paradise."

And after "Dr. Strangelove," Reed continued to appear in British comedies--"there were so many I can't remember"--working again with Sellers in "A Shot in the Dark," until she began turning down parts to raise a family.

Now 52, Reed has three daughters, ages 34, 21 and 20. She works as a broker for a British gourmet foods company, for whom she "travels the whole of Ireland," trying to encourage grocery stores to carry the company's products.

Reed got the job, she explains, by "pure chance," after deciding she wanted to remain in West Cork, Ireland, where she had recently bought a house. "I just rang them and asked if they needed someone to help them export to Ireland," she says. "They agreed and I had a job."

She says she's sometimes recognized as "Miss Foreign Affairs" when "Dr. Strangelove" has "just been on television," and is delighted to hear that the film is being re-released in the United States, where she hopes a lot of people see it.

But more important, she says with a laugh, "I hope we all get paid again."