04-01-2020, 09:37 PM
15722
Re: Leisurely Scribbles (part 5)
Originally Posted by
spitfire
->
You talking about Hybolock Jack.
No way Danno, Hybolock Jack was the crane operator, hydraulics were a doddle to him.
Talking Pictures show mostly old British made films and there were quite a lot of them made during the 50’s and 60’s, in the cinema they were nearly always the “little picture” to back up the main feature, the film makers, usually Cohen and Levy, had the same old reliable collection of actors that we had become familiar with, Terence Morgan, Bill Owen, Jimmy Handley, Billy Whitelaw, Thora Hurd, Hazel court, Peggy Mount, and Irish actors, Cyril Cusack, Eddie Byrne, Dermot Morgan, Noel Purcell, and a couple of American lads, I can never remember their names, who probably settled in Britain after the war or were hounded out of Hollywood by the McCarthy committee.
Sam Wanamaker came to Britain in 1950 and stayed because, in his own words
“In 1950 I went to England to do a play, and around that time the whole McCarthy witch-hunting era had taken hold in Hollywood—so I just stayed in Britain... I knew that because I had worked with actors who had problems in Hollywood, I might have difficulties ”
His daughter Zoe Wanamaker plays “Mrs Oliver” to perfection in the Hercule Poirot series.
There were so many actors working in British films in the 50’s that it’s hard to recall them all. All good enjoyable films even to this day, well for me anyway.
I have only one complaint about these lovable films and that is the really terrible singers and songs they featured in the night club scenes, and there was always a night club scene in the murder and robbery stories, all the gang leaders seemed to own night clubs back then, it’s as if it was compulsory to include these ear scourging songs and singers that nobody ever heard before and never heard again, methinks they were all relations of Cohen and Levy being given their big break, I read that film producers are often pestered by talentless nieces and nephews to stick them into one of their productions and I’d well believe it, that probably explains how there are so many crappy young actors around today.
There is however one saloon song that I liked in an American film, it was on Spike TV only a few days ago, a western called “Flaming Feather”, 10 minutes into the film the lady singer sings a song about a jilted woman, the opening line goes “There’s no rings on her fingers, her rings are all under her eyes”, that made me laugh, I know it’s no laughing matter for the woman, but it’s so clever. It goes on “He met her on the ferry, the ferry, he said that they would marry, marry, then he went his merry way”
Some would call him a stinker of the first order, others might call it having your cake and eating it, so young ladies beware, never let a strange man kiss you on the ferry, or anywhere else, well not until you know where he lives anyway.
Sean Connery and Jill Ireland looking the life and soul of the party in “Hell Drivers” 1957. I think he improved greatly with age, he always looked awkward to me as a young man, nervous, not confident enough, then when he got the hang of it there was no stopping him.