J.D. Salinger and the Movies

by Kimberly Lindbergs | February 1, 2010

Categories | Movie Reviews, Books, Rants & Raves, Peter Sellers

“I believe everything and I believe nothing.” - Inspector Clouseau

Since J.D. Salinger’s death many film critics like Dana Stevens have enjoyed quoting from Salinger’s seminal work The Catcher in the Rye where the fictional character of Holden Caulfield proclaims “If there’s one thing I hate, it’s the movies.” The quote has become a jumping-off point for film critics who have used the line to help explain why Salinger didn’t want Catcher in the Rye turned into a film, but they’re sadly mistaken when they also assume that the author of Catcher in the Rye didn’t like movies.

In Joyce Maynard’s memoir At Home in the World she discusses her lengthy relationship with J.D. Salinger and makes it clear that movies played a rather large part in the author’s life. In the book (originally published in 1998) Maynard explains that Salinger loved watching movies and talking about them in great detail. He seemed to enjoy debating a film’s merits and faults. In one of the books most fascinating passages Maynard details Salinger’s viewing habits.

“Although we were talking regularly on the phone now, the letters continue. He writes about the movies he loves best - he loves movies, not films - and how, some years back, he got himself a 16mm projector so he could watch old prints of movies he loves, right there in the living room with his children: The Thirty-Nine Steps, The Thin Man, The Lady Vanishes, Lost Horizon. As much contempt as Jerry conveys about nearly everything being produced in the current world of film, theater, art and literature, he holds an attitude of tenderness and occasional reverence for what came out of the thirties - the years when he was close to the age that I am now. With the exception of a handful of movies - From Here to Eternity, The Pink Panther - his favorite movies were made long before I was born.”
- Joyce Maynard on J.D. Salinger in “At Home in the World: A Memoir”

This brief passage indicates that Salinger had more than a passing interest in the movies. He obviously enjoyed writing about them and watching them enough to purchase a 16mm projector. Salinger seemed to like Hitchcock’s early work and the writer even found room in his heart for one of my favorite comedies, The Pink Panther (1963). Simply put, Salinger liked the movies but he had particular tastes and preferred older films.

Film critics who continue to parrot the idea that J.D. Salinger didn’t like movies are doing Salinger and their readers a great disservice. If you don’t know a thing about the author’s movie viewing habits you shouldn’t write about them. Period. Besides Dana Stevens assuming that Salinger must have hated the movies in the same way she thinks his fictional character did, I’ve come across this same ridiculous assumption repeated by people like Ron Reed of Filmwell who feels that “J.D. Salinger doesn’t appear to have been much of a movie fan.” and Dave at MovieSet who proclaims that he’s got “… a dossier on stuff I know about Jerome David Salinger and his literary work: 1) Salinger hates movies.” and then there’s Michael Dance at MovieCultist who has written a piece simply titled “J.D. Salinger: The Man Who Hated Movies.”

Willful ignorance shouldn’t become a staple of film criticism. Do a little research before you write or stick to the old adage, “Write what you know.”

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Me Loana. You Tumak.

by Kimberly Lindbergs | November 25, 2009

Categories | Movie Reviews, Books, British Cinema, Actresses, Hammer Horror, Hammer Glamour, Raquel Welch

Raquel Welch in One Million Years B.C. (1966)

I love Raquel Welch. She’s not a great actress but she did appear in some good films and when she’s given the right material to work with she can be very funny. I’ve always thought that Raquel’s natural appeal as a comedic actress had been overlooked due to her overwhelming sex appeal. There’s just no getting around the fact that Raquel Welch is gorgeous but she also has a great sense of humor that often seemed to be ignored by critics who couldn’t see past her incredible beauty. Of course Raquel Welch never let them. Her publicity stills continually presented the actress as a sexy film siren. Glamour (or glamor!) was obviously in Raquel’s blood and she had no intention of letting anyone forget it. And although she showed some dramatic skill in films such as Hannie Caulder (1972) and The Last of Sheila (1973), I personally think she really shined in comedies like Bedazzled (1967), Fathom (1967), Myra Breckinridge (1970) and The Three Musketeers (1973). Could she have become the Lucille Ball of her day? That’s doubtful but I often wonder what direction Raquel’s career would have taken if she had focused her attention on making funny movies and developing her comedic abilities.

Raquel Welch became an international star after appearing in the Hammer film One Million Years B.C. (1966). The movie was a remake of the 1940 Hal Roach film One Million B.C. that was nominated for two Oscars for its special effects and musical score. Hammer’s remake didn’t get any Oscar nominations but it was the studio’s most commercially successful film and featured some terrific special effects by Ray Harryhausen and a good score composed by Mario Nascimbene. But a large part of the film’s success was due to its female star. Hammer launched one of the most widely seen ad campaigns in the studio’s history for One Million Years B.C. and it paid off. Posters and publicity stills from the film featuring a fur bikini clad Raquel circulated around the globe appearing in countless magazines and newspapers. To this day Raquel Welch is one of the most widely recognized film stars in the world thanks to Hammer’s publicity blitz.

One Million Years B.C. is a highly entertaining fantasy film that takes place in a prehistoric world inhabited by dinosaur monsters and cave people. In the film Raquel Welch plays a young woman named “Loana the Fair One” who is part of the Shell People tribe. Loana falls in love with a man called Tumak (John Richardson) from the Rock People tribe and together the two would-be lovebirds are forced to fight for the survival of themselves and their love in a harsh world that seems determined to destroy them both. The film plays out like some kind of prehistoric retelling of Shakespeare’s Romeo & Juliet but the great special effects and nonstop action help make One Million Years B.C. one of Hammer’s most exciting and enjoyable movies.

Raquel Welch was given very little dialogue in One Million Years B.C. so she’s forced to use her body language and facial expressions to let the audience know what her character is feeling throughout the course of the film. This may sound like an easy task but it’s not and Raquel does a nice job of working with a limited vocabulary. She’s commendable in a film that doesn’t require much from her and she brings a warm sensitivity to a role that could have easily become forgettable in another actresses’ hands. Of course she also looks amazing in the movie and manages to inject lots of glamour into the rocky barren landscape of One Million Years B.C..

In 2010 Raquel Welch will be celebrating her 70th birthday and she’s kick-starting the year with the publication of her self-penned memoirs titled The Secrets of Timeless Appeal. The book is currently scheduled to be released in January of next year and focuses on her struggle to age gracefully in Hollywood where actresses are often put out to pasture before age 40. In the book Raquel supposedly opens up about being typecast as a “sex symbol” as well as her plastic surgery, struggles with aging and menopause. She also offers up beauty tips and health advice. It’s rumored that the actress might divulge intimate details about her romantic flings with other actors including Warren Beatty and Richard Burton as well as musician Alice Cooper but we’ll have to wait until January 2010 to find out.

One Million Years B.C. is available on DVD and currently selling at Amazon for just $6.99. You can also pre-order Raquel Welch’s upcoming autobiography The Secrets of Timeless Appeal at Amazon for $17.79.

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The Glamour of Hammer

by Kimberly Lindbergs | November 24, 2009

Categories | Books, British Cinema, Actresses, Hammer Horror, Hammer Glamour

Hammer Glamour cover girl Madeline Smith

Hammer horror films were an essential part of my childhood and one of my favorite things about Hammer films was the glamorous female stars. While growing up I thought that the women in Hammer movies were incredibly beautiful and I still do. Big hair and big busts seemed to be one of the studios regular requirements but many of the gorgeous women who appeared in Hammer films also knew how to act. These curvaceous ladies could play naive and innocent victims in one film and bloodthirsty ferocious killers in the next. They broke rules, pushed boundaries and kept up with their male costars even when given secondary roles and third billing. Now there’s a book that gives these women the star treatment that they’ve long deserved.

In September Titan Books released Marcus Hearn’s fabulous tribute to Hammer’s female stars entitled Hammer Glamour: Classic Images from the Hammer Archives. The term “Hammer Glamour” has been used by Hammer fans for decades but Hearn’s book is the first book that I know of that focuses solely on Hammer’s female stars. This lush coffee table collection contains over 150 pages and features profiles as well as interviews with many of the actresses who had prominent and lessor known roles in Hammer movies. The book is beautifully put together and the actresses are smartly presented in alphabetical order, which makes for easy referencing. It also includes an informative introduction by the author and a helpful index of Hammer film titles that corresponds with the actresses mentioned in the book. Hammer Glamour is a real treat for horror fans and makes a great companion to author Marcus Hearn’s previous book, The Hammer Story. Together both of Kearn’s informative texts offer new and seasoned Hammer fans a fascinating look at “The Studio That Dripped Blood.”

One of the most enjoyable aspects of Hammer Glamour is reading what the actresses have to say about their experiences working with the studio. Many of them have a great sense of humor about their work. They also express a real fondness for their co-stars and film crew. Actor Peter Cushing is often singled out for his generous behavior and good nature. It’s obvious that he was beloved by those who knew him and befriended him during his lifetime.

Top: Janette Scott and Pauline Peart
Bottom: Yutte Stensgaard and Valerie Gaunt

Finding background information about these actresses wasn’t always easy and Marcus Hearn clearly had to go out of his way to compile the profiles and interviews for Hammer Glamour. I really appreciate the author’s extraordinary efforts because the book provides Hammer fans with an unprecedented look at some of the studio’s most fascinating stars. It also contains many rare photos that I’ve never seen before and I can almost guarantee that even the most avid Hammer fans will find some surprises in Hammer Glamour.

My only complaint is that I wish the book was bigger. I think the publishers could have easily added an additional 150 pages and I’m sure it would have still found an eager audience. I’d love to see Marcus Hearn and Titan Books publish a future expanded volume of Hammer Glamour that provided even more information about the women included in the book and offered lengthier profiles of the actresses who were left out or given scant attention. I’d also love to see more photographs showcased as well since I can never get enough Hammer Glamour eye-candy.

Minor complaint aside, Marcus Hearn’s Hammer Glamour is truly a feast for the senses and it should find a place in every serious Hammer fan’s library. I suspect that anyone who is interested in British film history might also find Hammer Glamour worth reading because the book indirectly provides a unique and occasionally troubling look at what it was like to work as an actress within the British film industry during the late 1950s, ’60s and ’70s.

Hammer Glamour retails for $29.95 but it’s currently on sale at Amazon for just $19.77. I really can’t recommend the book enough so if you’re looking for the perfect holiday gift for a friend or yourself I suggest picking up a copy of Marcus Hearn’s book. For more information about Hammer Glamour visit the official Titan Book site: Hammer Glamour

I also recommend a visit to Holger Haase’s fabulous World of Hammer Glamour fan site.

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Portable Grindhouse: The Lost Art of the VHS

by Kimberly Lindbergs | November 19, 2009

Categories | News, Books

I grew up in the video age and I’m still in awe of the technology that first allowed me to watch thousands of movies in the privacy of my own home. Call me sentimental and nostalgic, but when I first got wind of Jacques Boyreau’s upcoming book Portable Grindhouse: The Lost Art of the VHS Box it made me giddy with excitement. From the publisher (Fantagraphics) site:

“Harken back to those thrilling days of yesteryear when the advent of rental videos astonished the movie-going consumer who could only feed his addiction by going to the theater or watching chopped up movies in between commercials on TV. Like vinyl, here is the revenge of another analog cast-off: the VHS is once again insinuating itself into American culture, and this book celebrates the anarchic design art of those early VHS boxes.”

The design of the book is fantastic and Fantagraphics recently released a video that showcases the book’s impressive design that I’ve posted below:

Author Jacques BoyreauIf is responsible for one of my favorite film poster books, Trash: The Graphic Genius of Xploitation Movie Posters, so I suspect Portable Grindhouse: The Lost Art of the VHS will be just as good. If you want to know more about the book I recommend visiting Fantagraphics website where you can pre-order yourself a copy.

Many thanks to Cat for making me aware of the book!

Bonus Material:
- Read About My First VHS Purchase

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Monster Baby Tales

by Kimberly Lindbergs | August 27, 2009

Categories | Books, Horror, Hammer Horror, Bob Wilkins, Oliver Reed

There are few things in life that I love more than old books and I’ve tried to hang onto just about every book that I’ve ever bought or been given as a gift. Since I’m currently in the process of moving and trying to sort out a lifetime’s worth of stuff that I’ve managed to amass over the years, I’ve been unearthing some of my old childhood books. Some of these books are old horror film books such as the aptly named Monster Movie Game book.

Monster Movie Game was written by Bay Area horror film host John Stanley along with Mal Whyte. It was originally published in 1974 and I’m not exactly sure how I ended up with a copy of it, but I think it might have been sold to kids at my school a year or two after it’s initial release (’75 or ‘76) through the Scholastic Book Club. Whatever the case may be, I’ve managed to keep my copy of the Monster Movie Game book for many years and it’s undoubtedly one of the first film related books that I owned. Monster Movie Game is a very slim paperback with only 64 pages, but it’s jam-packed with lots of questions and answers about various monster movies and illustrated with great black and white photos.

The She Creature (1956) and Curse of the Werewolf (1961)
from the Monster Movie Game book

The cover of the Monster Movie Game book terrified me when I was a kid. It features a large photo from King Kong (1933) of the giant ape holding a frightened Fay Wray while he fights off a large pterodactyl dinosaur. Some of my earliest nightmares involved giant monsters like King Kong as well as ferocious dinosaurs so I suspect that the book’s cover is to blame for many of my bad dreams. Thankfully I didn’t let my fear of King Kong on the book’s cover deter me from savoring every one of its 64 pages. I spent countless hours staring at the photos it contained and ruminating over the questions it asked of its readers. The book introduced me to many movie monsters that I was unfamiliar with at the time such as the frightening She Creature from the 1956 film of the same name and it also featured many of favorite monsters like the Wolfman as portrayed by Oliver Reed in Hammer’s Curse of the Werewolf (1961).

After coming across my old copy of the Monster Movie Game book recently I thought it would be fun to share a few pages from it complete with my wrong answers and misspelled words. Occasionally I did manage to correctly identify a photo or film title, but for the most part my answers were always wrong. But you can’t blame an eight nine year old kid for trying! My spelling hasn’t improved much, but I definitely know more about monster movies now and I’m sure I have the Monster Movie Game book to partly thank for that.

Wrong answers! I was obviously trying to spell out Transylvania here but gave up early and just went with Tran. but Lugosi’s native country is actually Hungary. I have no idea why I thought “Call me the Count” was the first thing Dracula said to Renfield, but it does have a nice ring to it. The correct answer was of course “I am… Dracula. I bid you welcome.”

Semi right answer, but bad spelling. As I mentioned previously, my spelling hasn’t improved all that much since I was a kid, but I think my answer deserves an A for Effort. “Modusa” should have been spelled “Medusa” and the photo is actually a picture from the 1964 Hammer film The Gorgon. Gorgons were mythical Greek monsters and the most well-known Gorgon was called Medusa so my answer wasn’t too off-base.

Best response! This has to be my most creative answer. According to the Monster Movie Game book the correct answer was “He uncontrollably grew at the rate of ten feet a day. Mentally broken, he went on a rampage of murder and destruction before finally being destroyed.” There was no way I could have answered that question correctly when I was a kid, but I think my own answer of “He grew and was ugly” is just as effective. Maybe even more so since it cuts right to the truth. The Amazing Colossal Man (1957) did grow and his appearance and behavior definitely turned ugly!

While I was hunting around online for information about the Monster Movie Game book I was surprised to come across this great clip of the book’s author John Stanley along with fellow horror host Bob Wilkins, film critic George Tashman (I love you, Clark Gable: Male sex symbols of the silver screen), Cinema Shop owner and future writer Daniel Faris (Grindhouse: The Forbidden World of “Adults Only” Cinema) and public relations man Alvin Gunthertz on a special episode of Creature Features called “The Bob Wilkins Super Horror Show” from 1974. Longtime Cinebeats’ readers know that I have very fond memories of watching Bob Wilkins on Creature Features when I was a kid as well as John Stanley so I was thrilled to discover this short clip on Youtube. I wish this clip was a little longer, but it looks like Dan Faris was going to easily win the Monster Movie Game quiz.

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Being Hal Ashby

by Kimberly Lindbergs | July 31, 2009

Categories | Books, Directors, American Cinema, Hal Ashby

Hal Ashby on the set of Harold and Maude (1971)

With the exception of Martin Scorsese, Robert Altman and John Cassavetes, I can’t think of many other directors who have had more influence on modern American cinema in recent years than Hal Ashby. And yet, Ashby’s name still remains relatively unknown among the general film-going public. This seems partially due to the fact that all of the other directors I mentioned have been the subject of many books and formal studies. But since his early death in 1988 at age 59, Ashby’s troubled life has remained the stuff of Hollywood legend.

Thankfully that’s all changed with the release of Nick Dawson’s new book Being Hal Ashby: Life of a Hollywood Rebel recently published by the University of Kentucky Press. This fascinating account of the life and death of Hal Ashby is the first biography written about the director and it’s an important as well as informative read.

Hal Ashby is often remembered for his rebellious spirit, drug addiction and outsider status in Hollywood during the ‘70s. But Being Hal Ashby debunks a lot of the myths that have surrounded the director for years. It also sheds light on the creative choices Ashby made throughout his career without sensationalizing the darker aspects of his life. I really appreciated the tone of Nick Dawson’s book since it shied away from the tabloid style of so many other current biographies. The writer’s self-assured and thoughtful approach to his subject is really refreshing.

The ’70s proved to be an extremely productive decade for many Hollywood filmmakers, but few directors had such an incredible run of first-rate movies throughout the ’70s as Hal Ashby. In contrast to some of his more somber contemporaries, Ashby’s films managed to reflect the underlying anxiety felt in post-’60s America while still celebrating the country’s boundless optimism. Between 1970 and 1971 Hal Ashby directed The Landlord (1971), Harold and Maude (1971), The Last Detail (1973), Shampoo (1975), Bound for Glory (1976), Coming Home (1978) and Being There (1979). But before becoming one of the decade’s greatest filmmakers, Ashby was an Oscar winning editor who worked on some of the best films of the ‘60s including The Children’s Hour (1961), The Cincinnati Kid (1965), The Loved One (1965), The Russians Are Coming the Russians Are Coming (1966), In the Heat of the Night (1967) and The Thomas Crown Affair (1968).

Being Hal Ashby provides readers with a well-rounded examination of Ashby’s career and doesn’t bypass the films he continued to make into the ‘80s before succumbing to the cancer that finally killed him. It’s obvious that Nick Dawson has a deep appreciation of the director’s work and his enthusiasm is contagious. After finishing Being Hal Ashby I was inspired to seek out some of the director’s later films such as Lookin’ to Get Out (1982) and 8 Million Ways to Die (1986) that I may have dismissed in the past. I suspect that I’ll now view them with new appreciation and respect. When a book inspires me to reevaluate my own opinions about a filmmaker’s career, it’s well worth recommending.

Being Hal Ashby: Life of a Hollywood Rebel retails for $37.50, but you can currently purchase copies of the book at Amazon for just $30. Whether you’re a fan of Hal Ashby and his films or just interested in what Hollywood was like in the ‘70s; Being Hal Ashby makes for some great summer reading.

Recommended Links:
- You can read an excerpt from Being Hal Ashby at the Film In Focus Website
- Being Hal Ashby @ Twitter offers news & updates about the book

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10 Questions with Shane Briant

by Kimberly Lindbergs | May 4, 2009

Categories | Books, Actors, British Cinema, Hammer Horror, Interviews, Featured, Gay Interest, Shane Briant

The talented British’ born actor Shane Briant made his screen debut in the Hammer horror film Demons of the Mind. Since then he’s gone on to appear in over 60 films and television productions including Straight On Till Morning (1972), The Picture of Dorian Gray (1973), The Mackintosh Man (1973), Captain Kronos: Vampire Hunter (1974), Frankenstein and the Monster from Hell (1974), The Naked Civil Servant (1975) and Lady Chatterley’s Lover (1981). Currently Briant is focusing his attention on writing and he has recently completed a psychological thriller called Worst Nightmares that will be released in the US on May 12th. I’ve admired his film work for many years so I was thrilled to get the opportunity to ask Shane Briant a few questions via an email exchange about his early movies and current writing projects.

Cinebeats: Your first starring role was in the 1972 Hammer horror film Demons of the Mind directed by Peter Sykes where you played the disturbed brother of Gillian Hills. Thanks to the impressive cast, which also included Manfred Mann vocalist Paul Jones, Demons of the Mind seemed to be an early attempt by Hammer to try and attract a younger and possibly more “happening” audience. I personally think the film is very effective and rather daring for its time due to its subject matter. How did you get the part?

Shane Briant: I’d just finished playing the role of a ‘damaged’ youth in Children of the Wolf at the Apollo Theatre in London’s West End with Yvonne Mitchell and Sheelagh Cullen. It was a three-gander. I was nominated for the London Theatre Critics Award for Best Newcomer that year. So in some respects I was ‘hot’. That’s when Michael Carreras signed me to a two-year contract with Hammer films. Demons of the Mind was the first film.

Cinebeats: After making Demons of the Mind you starred in the unusual Hammer thriller Straight On Till Morning, which also featured the accomplished British actress Rita Tushingham and was directed by the talented filmmaker Peter Collinson. Your performance in the film as a deeply disturbed young man is very impressive. I suspect that it was a demanding role. Did you do any research in order to flesh out your character?

Shane Briant: There wasn’t any research I could do. If I’d been a dentist I would have researched how dentists work but being a psychopath, there’s not much specific info. So I just tried to be normal and yet appear weird. Maybe that’s me?

Cinebeats: In 1973 you played Dorian Gray in a made-for-TV version of Oscar Wilde’s classic story The Picture of Dorian Gray. It’s one of my favorite adaptations and you did a terrific job of capturing the decadent elegance found in Wilde’s character. You seemed to really enjoy yourself in that role. Was it a challenge to play such a notable and notorious character like Dorian Gray?

Shane Briant: Not really since there had only been one version before me – that of Hurd Hatfield. He actually came to visit us on set. He was pretty cool. Not overly friendly. What I thought might be interesting is to get away from Hurd’s performance. It had very obvious gay overtones. Though I kept a bit of the bisexual qualities of the character in, I think mine was very different from his. The script was very loosely based on Wilde’s book anyway so I stuck to the script as much as possible. Glenn Jordan is a master director. He’s won at least 7 Emmy’s – that says it all. Nigel Davenport was the most fun actor I have ever worked with. Hugely funny and a great technician.

Cinebeats: After making The Picture of Dorian Gray you took a break from horror and appeared in John Huston’s 1973 spy thriller The Makintosh Man alongside James Mason, Ian Bannen, Dominique Sanda and the recently deceased Paul Newman. Your role is rather small and I wish you had been given a bit more to do in the film, but you’re very memorable as James Mason’s evil henchman Cox. Can you tell me a little bit about your experiences working with the Oscar winning director as well as the impressive cast on that film?

Shane Briant: I had a much larger part initially. But when I arrived on set in Malta I was told they were now re-writing the script day by day and I’d get the ‘pages’ at midnight every night. This was a huge disappointment to me. The fact of the matter was that Huston had just made a film that was very special to him (Fat City) and The Mackintosh Man was, as far as every one of the stars (as well as Huston) was concerned, simply a money-spinner to be finished before Christmas so everyone could go on holiday. That’s why it was perhaps one of Paul Newman’s least spectacular films. Newman was a delightful man. Very friendly, very real and modest. He always ate with the crew and when we arrived he got up from his lunch and walked to the three of us English actors, held out his hand and said “Hi. I’m Paul Newman. Welcome to the set." Playing scenes with him was wonderful. Oh, and….his eyes were spectacular. When he looked you in the eyes, you become a rabbit looking at a mongoose. I was intensely sad to hear he died. His charity work was wonderful. I got to know James Mason a bit, but not Sanda.

Cinebeats: You returned to Hammer studios again a year later and made two more movies with them. The terrific Terrence Fisher film Frankenstein and the Monster from Hell with Peter Cushing and the excellent vampire thriller Captain Kronos - Vampire Hunter. You were very good in both films and I’ve read interviews where you’ve mentioned that playing Simon Helder in Frankenstein and the Monster from Hell was your favorite Hammer role. It seems like you were destined to become the next big Hammer star following in the footsteps of Peter Cushing and Christopher Lee. I suspect that you would have if the studio hadn’t decided to slow it’s output down to a crawl after 1974 and finally stopped producing films altogether in 1979. Did you have any desire to continue making films with Hammer?

Shane Briant: I did Captain Kronos because there was nothing else for me to do at Hammer and they’d paid for a two-year contract. It wasn’t, I think, a very good film, and I had very little to do in it. It was around then that Hammer started to wind down as a force in the industry so I went and did other things. I wouldn’t have wanted to do just horror films anyway. Mind you, I wouldn’t mind doing another one now – that’d be fun!

Cinebeats: At the end of the ‘70s you seemed to be working non-stop and appeared in many critically acclaimed television productions including the controversial 1975 film adaptation of Quentin Crisp’s autobiography The Naked Civil Servant. Quentin Crisp is a fascinating character and one of the most well known gay icons in Britain. Britain, like most of the world, wasn’t particularly gay friendly in 1975 and even today there’s still a lot of controversy surrounding gay rights. I personally think The Naked Civil Servant is impressive for the way it celebrates individuality and uses humor to examine the effects of discrimination. What prompted you to take on the flamboyant role of Norma in The Naked Civil Servant and was it a difficult film to make?

Shane Briant: I was offered a cameo by Jack Gold. I knew all my scenes would be with John Hurt. Of course I did it. It was fun to really go over the top. Gold actually insisted we did, but the other two ‘girls’ didn’t go as far as Jack wanted. I just let go and had fun. John was great to work with – inspirational. What an actor!

Cinebeats: You’ve continued to act and have appeared in a lot of worthwhile movies including Lady Chatterley’s Lover (1981), Hawk the Slayer (1980), The Lighthorsemen (1987) Grievous Bodily Harm (1988) and Till There Was You (1990) as well as many popular television productions. Are there any performances that you’re particularly proud of?

Shane Briant: The Picture of Dorian Gray and Lady Chatterley’s Lover I think. And quite a lot of the TV stuff over the years. Oh and Farscape Episode: Eat Me (2001).

Cinebeats: You currently seem to be focusing a lot of your attention on writing. Besides fiction you recently wrote the script for the award winning short film A Message from Fallujah (2005), which you also appeared in. When did you start writing and do you find it more rewarding than acting?

Shane Briant: I started writing as an exercise in 1994 when I was contracted to go to Europe on a children’s TV series called Mission Top Secret. I’d been changing my scripts for thirty years so I thought why not see if you can write a novel. So I wrote one day by day as we made our way around Europe. The story started in Spain, moved to Switzerland, then went to Germany, France and finally Poland. I made up a story that fitted. Simple. When I got back I showed it to an agent who showed it to Harper Collins who just happened to be looking for some home grown spy novels. I was lucky. I’ve never stopped. Worst Nightmares is my debut in America. It’s my best work and very dark and thrilling. Not many people who have read it haven’t been taken aback by it’s style. It’s VERY different to other books. Think ‘Dorian Gray’ meets ‘Hannibal Lector’.

Cinebeats: I haven’t had the opportunity to read Worst Nightmares, but the premise sounds intriguing. According to the book’s official site worstnightmares.net it involves a "disturbed killer known as the Dream Healer who seduces his victims into revealing their deepest fears, and then kills them with this knowledge." How did you come up with the idea for the book and was it tough to write?

Shane Briant: I had often wondered how it’s possible that ordinary people will share their most intimate secrets with total strangers on the Internet. They will go to dating sites and reveal all their most secret fears and aspirations. I always thought this very dangerous. After all, what were the people the other end of the cyber beam actually like? So I invented the Dream Healer. People with terrifying nightmares go to his frightening website in the belief that he will cure them of their phobias. Instead he tracks down these unfortunate people and abducts them. Then he realizes their worst nightmares in real time. Amped up a hundred fold. Scary!

Cinebeats: Do you have any writing or acting plans for the future that you’d like to share? Any upcoming projects that you’re particularly excited about?

Shane Briant: I’ve just finished writing the sequel. It’s called Worst Nightmares 2 – The Game. It continues from the last page of Worst Nightmares. I can’t reveal much because your readers won’t yet have read Worst Nightmares but it’s even darker and more….unusual, I think.

Shane Briant will be signing copies of Worst Nightmares later this month in New York at the Book Expo America (BEA). He also blogs and can be found on Twitter.

For more information about Shane Briant’s latest book please visit worstnightmares.net. I also recommend reading Holger Haase’s review of Worst Nightmares at the Hammer and Beyond blog. And you can find more information about Shane Briant at this informative tribute site: Shane Briant.

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Party Tips from Phyllis Diller

by Kimberly Lindbergs | December 31, 2008

Categories | Books, Rants & Raves, Comedies, Actresses

Over the Christmas holidays I made an attempt to do some baking. When my mother was alive we’d spend a week in the kitchen cooking before Christmas, but I was just her assistant and unfortunately I never really learned how to function on my own in a kitchen. I burnt the first batch of cookies I made this year and the second batch I made tasted awful. I thought that watching every episode of Anthony Bourdain’s No Reservations over the last couple of years would improve my cooking abilities. Obviously I was wrong. All Bourdain’s terrific show has done is make me want to travel more and eat at fabulous restaurants. Besides my dislike of cooking, I also hate cleaning. The sad truth is that l’ll never be the domestic goddess that my mother, grandmothers and great grandmothers were. This isn’t something I’m particularly proud of. It’s just fact.

If that wasn’t bad enough, I’m also a terrible party host as well as a terrible party guest. I find myself usually struck dumb at parties, which means I drink too much in an attempt to entertain myself. Board games have become popular at parties again, but they bore me to tears whenever I’m forced into playing them. No matter how wild the party guests may think they are, conversations often revolve around jobs, babies, home ownership and cooking when you’re my age. These are all topics that make my eyes glaze over when I want to have a good time. Popular movies are also discussed at parties that I’ve never seen and have no desire to see. Want to talk about Jess Franco’s films, Klaus Kinski’s acting, Japanese toys, Mid-Century design, Byron’s poetry or Evelyn Waugh’s prose? Invite me to your party! On the other hand, if you want to discuss the best way to make polenta, sports of any kind or the latest Adam Sandler comedy, please forgive me when I suddenly come down with a nasty cold just hours before your party starts.

So why am I telling you all this? Because it explains why I enjoy Phyllis Diller’s 1966 book Housekeeping Hints so much! This funny book was a gift last year from fellow Flickr user Mjlaff and I can’t thank her enough. Since I received a brand new sparkling Epson scanner for my birthday, I thought I’d share some of Phyllis Diller’s timely wisdom with you all. If you’re planning a big party tonight to celebrate the New Year, you won’t want to miss reading some of Diller’s selected housekeeping tips and party planning tricks. Like me, Phyllis Diller shuns the Cult of Domesticity and she also has a wicked sense of humor. So without further ado, here’s some helpful party tips from one of the leading pioneers of stand-up comedy accompanied by some wonderful illustrations by artist Susan Perl.

Shopping Made Easy:

- “Spot a domestic looking woman in the supermarket and copy what she’s got in her grocery cart.”

- “Don’t buy products that advertise that even a child can use them. Theses failures have a greater sting.”

- “Pick up a cook book at a rummage sale so you have one that looks used.”

- “Above all, don’t feel you’re lying when you use the term ‘home-baked’ if the bakery is in town.”

Dial M for Messy:

- “Always have a lot of souvenirs around from far off places, even if you’ve just sent for them from a mail order house. It will give the impression of being a world traveler who hasn’t been home long enough to have thoroughly cleaned the house.”

- “Blame a lot of things - like soiled wallpaper, greasy walls, and a dirty basement - on the previous owners (or renters), even if you’ve lived there for 25 years.”

- “Do not have company when the sunlight is streaming through the windows. Everything shows up. Entertain at night or close the drapes and break the cord.”

- “No matter what anyone drops behind the couch, don’t let them retrieve it, whether it’s a wrist watch or a diamond ring. Offer to replace it. What’s money when compared to your ruined reputation?”

The Hostess with the Leastest:

- “No matter what time your guests arrive, pretend they’re early, so naturally you’re not ready for them.”

- “Discuss religion and politics at your dinner party so people get into heated arguments and don’t notice what they’re eating. They may also think that the arguing caused their indigestion.”

- “Never serve meals on time. The starving eat anything.”

- “You can easily find yourself in a group of women exchanging recipes and discussing knitting patterns. The only safe way to avoid this is to drift over to a group of men. If they’re exchanging recipes and discussing knitting patterns, leave the party.”

Happy New Year!

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Burton’s First Encounter with Taylor

by Kimberly Lindbergs | September 13, 2008

Categories | Books, Actors, Actresses, Elizabeth Taylor, Richard Burton

I recently stumbled across this fascinating description of Richard Burton’s first meeting with Elizabeth Taylor written by Burton himself and borrowed from his book Meeting Mrs. Jenkins (1966). I enjoyed reading it so much that I just had to share it. Not only is it an amazing read but it’s also a great showcase for Burton’s wicked sense of humor and his wonderful way with words. Besides acting, directing and producing, Richard Burton was also an avid writer and he kept journals for most of his adult life.

“It was my first time in California and my first visit to a swank house. There were quite a lot of people in and around the pool, all suntanned and all drinking the Sunday morning liveners – Bloody Marys, boilermakers, highballs, iced beer. I knew some of the people and was introduced to the others. Wet brown arms reached out of the pool and shook my hand. The people were all friendly, and they called me Dick immediately. I asked if they would please call me Richard – Dick, I said, made me feel like a symbol of some kind. They laughed, some of them. It was, of course, Sunday morning and I was nervous.

I was enjoying this small social triumph, but then a girl sitting on the other side of the pool lowered her book, took off her sunglasses and looked at me. She was so extraordinarily beautiful that I nearly laughed out loud. I didn’t, of course, which was just as well. The girl was not, and, quite clearly, was not going to be laughing back. I had an idea that, finding nothing of interest, she was looking right through me and was examining the texture of the wall behind. If there was a flaw in the sandstone, I knew she’d find it and probe it right to the pith. I fancied that if she chose so, the house would eventually collapse.

I smiled at her and, after a long moment, just as I felt my own smile turning into a cross-eyed grimace, she started slightly and smiled back. There was little friendliness in the smile. A new ice cube formed of its own accord in my Scotch-on-the-rocks.

She sipped some beer and went back to her book. I affected to become social with the others but out of the corner of my mind – while I played for the others the part of a poor miner’s son who was puzzled, but delighted by the attention these lovely people paid to him – I had her under close observation. She was, I decided, the most astonishingly self-contained, pulchritudinous, remote, removed, inaccessible woman I had ever seen. She spoke to no one. She looked at no one. She steadily kept on reading her book. Was she merely sullen? I wondered. I thought not. There was no trace of sulkiness in the divine face. She was a Mona Lisa type, I thought. In my business everyone is a type. She is older than the deck chair on which she sits, I thought headily, and she is famine, fire, destruction, and plague, she is the Dark Lady of the Sonnets, the on lie true begetter. She is a secret wrapped in an enigma inside a mystery, I thought with a mental man-to-man nod to Churchill. Her breasts were apocalyptic, they would topple empires down before they withered. Indeed, her body was a miracle of construction and the work of an engineer of genius. It needed nothing but itself. It was true art, I thought, executed in terms of itself. It was smitten by its own passion. I used to think things like that. I was not long down from Oxford and Walter Pater was still talked of and I read the art reviews in the quality weeklies without much caring about the art itself, and it was a Sunday morning in Bel Air, and I was nervous, and there was the Scotch-on-the-rocks.

Like Miniver Cheevy I kept on drinking and, in the heady flow of the attention I was getting, told story after story as the day boozed slowly on. I went in swimming once or twice. So did she, but, lamentably, always after I’d come out. She swam easily and gracefully as an Englishwoman would and not with the masculine drive and kick of most American girls. She was unquestionably gorgeous. I can think of no other word to describe a combination of plentitude, frugality, abundance, tightness. She was lavish. She was a dark unyielding largesse. She was, in short, too bloody much, and not only that, she was totally ignoring me. I became frustrated almost to screaming when I had finished a well-received and humorous story about the death of my grandfather and found that she was turned away in deep conversation with another woman. I think I tried to eavesdrop but was stayed by words like – Tony and Janet and Marlon and Sammy. She was not, obviously, talking about me.

Eventually, with half-seas-ed cunning and with all the nonchalance of a traffic jam, I worked my way to her side of the pool. She was describing – in words not normally written – what she thought of a producer at M.G.M. This was my first encounter with freedom of speech in the U.S.A., and it took my breath away. My brain throbbed; I almost sobered up. I was profoundly shocked. It was ripe stuff. I checked her again. There was no question about it. She was female. In America the women apparently had not only got the vote – they’d got the words to go with it.

I was somewhat puzzled and disturbed by the half-look she gave me as she uttered the enormities. Was she deliberately trying to shock me? Those huge violet-blue eyes (the biggest I’ve ever seen, outside those who have glandular trouble – thyroid, et cetera) had an odd glint in them. You couldn’t describe it as a twinkle…. Searchlights can not twinkle, they turn on and off and probe the heavens and so on.

Still I couldn’t be left out. I had to join in and say something. I didn’t reckon on the Scotch though. I didn’t reckon that it had warped my judgment and my sense of timing, my choice of occasion. With all the studied frenzy of Dutch courage I waded into the depths of those perilous eyes.

In my best chiffon-and-cut-glass Oxford accent I said: “You have a remarkable command of Olde-Englishe.”

There was a pause in which I realized with brilliant clarity the relativity of time. Aeons passed, civilizations came and went, brave men and cowards died in battles not yet fought, while those cosmic headlights examined my flawed personality. Every pockmark on my face became a crater of the moon. I reached up with a casual hand to cover up the right-cheeked evidence of my acne’d youth. Halfway up I realized my hand was just as ugly as my face and decided to leave the bloody thing and die instead. But while contemplating the various ways of suicide and having sensibly decided, since I had a good start, to drink myself to death, I was saved by her voice which said, “Don’t you use words like that at the Old Vic?”

“They do,” I said, “but I don’t. I come from a family and an attitude that believe such words are an indication of weakness in vocabulary and emptiness of mind…. Despite Jones’s writing that in times of acute shared agony and fear, as in trench warfare, obscenities repeated in certain patterns can at times become almost liturgical, almost poetic….” I ran out of gas.

There was another pause; more empires fell. Captains and kings and counsellors arrived and departed. She said three four-letter words. These were, I think, “Well! Well! Well!”

Somebody laughed uneasily. The girl had turned away. I had been dismissed. I felt as lonely as a muezzin, as a reluctant piano lesson on a Saturday afternoon, as the Last Post played on a cracked bugle.

I went home and somebody asked, when I told them where I’d been, what she was like. “Dark. Dark. Dark. Dark. She probably,” I said, “shaves.” To nobody in particular I observed that the human body is eighty percent water.”

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