I was looking through my handy-dandy pop culture calendar for something to write about for TV Tuesday this week and realized something I already knew: almost all of the classic, beloved television series made their debuts in the month of September. Of course, this is because for years and years September was the "start" of the "new" television season. New series would just naturally make their debuts in the month of September. All of the series that did not first appear at this time are those that were delayed for one reason or other such as I LOVE LUCY (Oct 15, 1951), THE TWILIGHT ZONE (Oct 2, 1959), SCRUBS (Oct 2, 2001), and SMALLVILLE (Oct 16, 2001) or were "mid-season replacement" shows, such as BATMAN (January 12, 1966), THE JEFFERSONS (January 18, 1975), and HILL STREET BLUES (Jan 15, 1981).
So to commemorate all of the great TV shows that were born in the month of September, here are a few of my favorites. I hope yours are here, too!
Angela Cartwright was one of my favorite television stars while I was growing up. I first knew her from Lost in Space, and then when I was in my mid-teens I saw her on The Sound of Music. I saw her a few times on Make Room For Daddy (The Danny Thomas Show) a few years later, but that was never one of my favorites.
Angela was born on Sept 9, 1952. Which means today she is an amazing 61 years old. However, I'm sure that in most people's minds she will always be the precocious Linda from Make Room For Daddy, or the adorable Brigitta from The Sound of Music, orthe perky and sexy Penny Robinson from Lost in Space.
I'm also sure that I'm not the only one who thought of her as one of my first crushes. You see, I have two older sisters, just like Will Robinson (Bill Mumy). One of them is dark, and one of them is blonde. So I definitely liked both of them. And Penny seemed the more level-headed and adventurous of the two girls; Judy (Marta Kristen) was more "grown up." After I got older I came to appreciate all three of the Robinson kids, and the actors portraying them.
Some of the best Lost in Space episodes revolved around the character of Penny Robinson. Do you remember "All That Glitters," where Dr. Smith can turn everything he touches into platinum? How about "The Magic Mirror," where Penny befriends a young J. Michael Pollard in another dimension? "The Galaxy Gift" and "The Golden Man" shows us how pure yet just Penny is. And of course "My Friend Mr. Nobody" is the episode where Penny befriends a spirit that nobody believes exists besides her!Sure, most of the Lost in Space episodes centered around the adults, but if an episode had a specific "fantasy" element to it, Penny was usually involved.
I read a few years ago that in the third season of the show the producer, Irwin Allen, asked Angela to cut her hair. She refused, and they came up with a hairnet that she would wear in most of the later episodes. Allen evidently wanted her to "look" younger than she really was, and thought shorter hair would do that. As a fan of long, beautiful hair, Angela, I thank you. :-)
Angela has been a professional photographer for several years now.
She also attends science fiction and pop culture conventions to meet and greet her many fans. However,
it looks like she stays mostly on the West Coast. So if you are like me and don't live near California, I recommend you go to
her homepage www.angela-cartwright.com and order an autographed photo from her directly. Now I just have to decide which of her many great photos I want to order!
In the meantime, thank you Angela for so many hours of entertainment. I hope you have a great day!
Happy Birthday, Angela Cartwright!
as Brigitta Von Trapp from The Sound of Music
with LiS "mother" June Lockhart and "sister" Marta Kristen
with Verda the Android from season 2
Penny isn't fooled by the frog's outer ugliness in "The Golden Man"
early 3rd season episode with long hair....
...later 3rd season episode where her hair is "up"
And because today is "Music Monday" here on FRIENDS OF JUSTICE, we'll end with Angela singing with her Von Trapp Family "My Favorite Things" from The Sound of Music...appropriately, as that movie and Lost in Space and Angela Cartwright herself are three of MY favorite things!
On September 8, 1973 The Super Friends, a show that changed my life, made its debut on ABC-TV.
When I first saw The Super Friends, which consisted of Superman, Wonder Woman, Batman, Robin, and Aquaman, I was floored. I think I had seen the Filmation Superman, Batman, and Aquaman cartoons by then. If not, then I knew of them. I had definitely seen the George Reeves Superman and Adam West Batman television shows. However, with this series I came to the eye-opening realization that all of these characters existed in the same universe! If you grew up only watching George Reeves or Adam West, you wouldn't know there were any other super-heroes in their worlds, let a lone a group of them like the Justice League (or Justice Society). They had been totally independent and isolated characters.
After September 8, I knew that this was not the case.
Thanks to The Super Friends I hunted down actual comic books with these characters. I found my first Justice League of America comic-book and promptly subscribed, never ever missing another issue. From there entire universes of imagination were opened up for me. I've been reading comics and watching super-hero cartoons for the forty years since.
Although Wendy and Marvin were nobody's favorites, they were of their time. Scooby-Doo, Funky Phantom, Speed Buggy, Captain Caveman, etc ALL had young adult protagonist, for example. After they left we were given super-hero sidekicks who were, at the very least, more logical than two kids and a dog. The first season of SF begat The Wonder Twins, The Legion of Doom, Global Guardians, and, arguably, The Super Powers action figure collection. Each of those promulgated in-numerous after effects on their own. If The Super Friends had not been a success, do you really think we would have had all of the super-hero goodness we have now? So in a sense, we can credit The Super Friends with the flame that eventually became our entire Super Hero Pop Cultural Phenomenon. And just like the comic book JLA has been given credit for helping to create the Marvel Universe (Marvel's publisher saw the success of the JLA and told Stan Lee to create something similar; he came up with The Fantastic Four), The Super Friends can be credited with creating the environment where Spider-Man and His Amazing Friends, The Fantastic Four, The Hulk, and all the other Marvel projects from the Seventies onward could find success.
Sure, there is a dark side to this story. The idea that Aquaman is useless outside of water can be traced back to millions of kids growing up watching him not do anything important in later Super Friends seasons. However, in the first season he was always ALWAYS portrayed as viable and important. In fact, in several episodes he saves the lives of his fellow members. So unfortunately it was the laziness of later writers that made Aquaman into an "also-ran." Besides, his notoriety is a two-headed sword: is it better to be known as a very specifically powered (possibly useless) character, or not to be known at all? I'm not going to argue this point, but it is something to think about.
In the meantime, I'm off to watch an episode or two of The Super Friends in my Super Friends t-shirt. Have a great day! Here's the opening sequence, and watching it today still gives me goose bumps. Hell yeah, Super Friends!! :-)
I don't think I can say anything about Gone With The Wind that somebody hasn't already said. So how about if I just throw out a few random facts and opinions and see it that is interesting to anybody.
Margaret Mitchell only wrote one novel, and Gone With The Wind was it. She was living off of the rewards of this work, contemplating her follow-up, when she was killed in a car accident in 1949.
Gone With The Wind is probably one of the best known movies of all times. Even if you haven't seen it (and I doubt how many people under 30 have seen it unless they're movie fans) you have heard of it.
I think it's generally forgotten that the movie starts with these words: There was a land of cavaliers and cotton fields called the Old South....Here in this pretty world Gallantry took its last bow...Here was the last ever to be seen of Knights and their Ladies Fair, of Master and of Slave...Look for it only in books, for it is no more than a dream remembered....a civilization gone with the wind...
So, okay....romanticize the South much? I may be a child of my time, but I find this pretty offensive. For sure if you look for the racism it is here. Moving on....
The slow and tranquil introduction to Tara and to the neighboring Wilkes' estate Twelve Oaks proves a painful comparison when, ninety minutes later the same scenes are shown but now the land is no longer green, the sky isn't blue, and the houses are destroyed. The symbolism is strong in these scenes.
Speaking of strong scenes, the Atlanta station scene where Scarlett is looking for the doctor and she walks through hundreds and hundreds of wounded men...wow! This isn't a computer graphic, people. This is real Hollywood magic. It's a terrifically filmed scene. Epic.
However, the Seige of Atlanta, where the majority of the city is burned to the
ground, is *not* as well filmed as the injured at the station is. While
some of the scenes are obviously real, some of them seem to be
photo-shopped together. The drama of the actors seems true, but the
backgrounds sometimes seem fake.
Speaking of the actors, the cast is universally wonderful except for...and the women may disagree....what is it about Leslie Howard as Ashley!? What the heck is the appeal here? To me he is a whiner and a bland, lifeless man of straw. Blech! I don't know if it's the actor, or the role, or both, but I totally don't see the appeal of this guy. Sadly, Leslie Howard was killed in 1943 when the airplane he was riding in was shot down by Nazis.
Vivien Leigh won Best Actress for her work here, and she absolutely
deserves it. She carries this movie, from virginal and silly Scarlett in
the first hour to wretched and sad Scarlett in the middle, to older and
wiser Scarlett by the end. It truly is an unforgettable performance. She owns every scene she is in, and she totally holds her own with her terrific co-stars, which is saying something.
Hattie
McDaniel won Best Supporting Actress as Mammie. This was deserving, but in 1939 USA it was also quite surprising. McDaniel has several
wonderful scenes, especially her give-and-take scenes with Clark Gable.
Her work at the end, as their marriage crumbles, is amazing. She was the
first African-American ever to be nominated and the first to win an acting Oscar. Watch for her if you watch this film; you'll be able to see just how good she is. She's a marvel.
By the way, when my wife first saw Hattie McDaniel she said she looked like Konishiki, the sumo wrestler from the 1980s. What do you think?
Clark Gable, of course, has the
unenviable role of trying to portray a man in love pretending not to be
in love; he does a great job, but I guess the Academy thought they had
already given him an Oscar, so passed him over. Compared to Ashley, Rhett Butler is All Man. Maybe that's the point? He does a great job baiting and switching with Scarlett, and when his heart actually does break it's a sad sight indeed. Everyone remembers his last scene, but it's the build up TO that scene that makes the movie unforgettable.
Olivia DeHaviland was also nominated for Best Supporting Actress as Melanie. Throughout the film she is the moral heart of the story, just as Leigh as Scarlett is the catalyst for so much of the action. Her character is so wonderful that she is almost too good to be true; she seems at times to be a caricature. It's to DeHaviland's talent that she never quite crosses that line. Melanie seems to bridge the classes as well as the races; she makes a genuine effort to be good to Belle, the Atlanta prostitute, unlike all others in her society. In the same way that Scarlett doesn't recognize what she has with Rhett until it is too late, Scarlett doesn't realize just how important Melanie is to her, either. Melanie, of course, sees through Rhett's bluster and Scarlett's walls and does all she can to help keep them together.
Two more odd comments about the cast. Another familiar face, that of Dr. Meade, belongs to veteran character actor Harry
Davenport. With this film, he managed to be in three Best Picture films
in a row: Life and Times of Emile Zola (as a corrupt French Army officer), You Can't Take It With You (as a judge), and Gone With The Wind. He is also well-known as "Grandpa" in Meet Me In St. Louis and as Nick's father in The Thin Man Goes Home. He's one of my favorites, and it was fun to see him in such a large supporting role here. Recognize him?
Thomas Mitchell, who portrays Scarlett's father, won Best
Supporting Actor this year. However, he didn't win it for his role in Gone With The Wind; he won
for his work as the alcoholic doctor in Stagecoach. How odd is that?
Anyway, back to the movie. According to the narration, after the war is over, "another vicious invader....the carpet bagger"
arrives. I guess we can tell where our sympathy is supposed to be.
It isn't a coincidence that Rhett (red) falls in love with Scarlett (red). Colors are important to this film, and I understand why it was filmed in color. Scarlett's sexiest dress is her red one; before she wears red, the local prostitute Belle Watkins is the only woman shown wearing that color. The petticoats that Mamie receives from Rhett are red, too. Scarlett's bed-coat is red. The famous dress that Scarlett makes from curtains in order to woo Rhett post-war is a beautiful green. Their daughter's name is Bonnie Blue. And black for mourning is worn over and over again. And of course gray and blue soldiers populate the entire story.
The best part of this film, for me, is the last half when it centers most on Scarlett and Rhett. Can anyone watch this movie and not realize just how much these two star-crossed lovers do in fact love each other? I will give you just one example to remind you if you haven't seen the film recently: Scarlett thinks she is getting fat after she has her daughter, so tells Rhett she wants a separate bed room. He, however, thinks this is because she is still in love with Ashley. This type of mis-communication tarnishes their entire relationship. The most dramatic moments of the film are between Rhett and Scarlett as they try desperately to show or hide how much they actually care for each other. By the end, when they have to deal with the death of Bonnie and then the death of Melanie, it is just too much for their strained love to stand. That's what makes this an epic tragedy.
I was afraid of watching this movie because it is SO long. However,
after the first half ("The War") is over, the second half
(Reconstruction and Rhett & Scarlett's marriage) flies by. If you
don't have time watch the whole thing, I recommend just watching the
second disk. It's that great a movie that you'll enjoy even just watching half of it.
Gone With The Wind
*Academy Award Best Picture 1939*
Produced by David O. Selznick
Directed by Victor Fleming
Screenplay by Sydney Howard
based on the book by Margaret Mitchell
according to the voice-over, this sounds like it was created for a 1960 re-release
Also Nominated:
(in alphabetical order)
Dark Victory
Goodbye Mr. Chips
Love Affair
Mr. Smith Goes To Washington
Ninotchka
Of Mice And Men
Stagecoach
The Wizard of OZ
Wuthering Heights
When I was in high school my social studies teacher told me that it is often said that 1939 was the best year Hollywood ever had. I've never forgotten that. This year I recognize all of the nominees, even if I haven't seen all of them. Let's start with The Wizard of OZ. I think I read that this is the motion picture that has been seen by more people all over the world than any other? Stagecoach is often called the movie that "made" John Wayne; it's a classic John Ford western that everyone should see at least once. I have seen Goodbye Mr Chips, both the original and the musical remake in the late Sixties with Peter O'Toole and Petula Clark. It's a good movie; Robert Donat beat Clark Gable to win Best Actor for it. Love Affair with Irene Dunne and Charles Boyer was remade twenty years later and became more famous as An Affair To Remember with Cary Grant and Deborah Kerr. Mr. Smith Goes To Washington is a film by Frank Capra with down-home honest boy James Stewart fighting corrupt politician Claude Rains. I think I saw Of Mice And Men, with Burgess Meredith and Lon Chaney, Jr in high school. Likewise, I seem to recall seeing a crazed Laurence Olivier in Wuthering Heights, but it might have been something else. Ninotchka features Greta Garbo and Melvin Douglas; as I read the plot summary I feel as if I have seen it, but I don't recall it being all that interesting. Dark Victory features Bette Davis, but I am pretty sure I never saw it.
When I was a kid I used to watch Lost in Space. I loved the show of the Robinson family trying to survive the dangers of space. I liked all of the characters except Dr. Smith, but my favorite character was probably The Robot. As a kid I didn't know if this was a real robot, or an actor, or what. I was fascinated by him/it, which I'm sure is what producer Irwin Allen wanted.
When I got older I realized that The Robot (he was never given a name) was actually portrayed by TWO men: Bob May was the man inside, moving the head and hands, and Dick Tufield was the voice. By the time I found this out I had figured that it couldn't be a real robot; I had seen Star Wars and knew that C-3P0 and R2-D2 were portrayed by British actors. Still, it was a bit of a let-down. I *wanted* The Robot to BE a robot. And that is probably why Irwin Allen never gave Bob May or Dick Tufield on-screen credit, even as extras or support staff. That's kind of crappy, even for an illusion.
Bob May was born on September 4, 1939. He was an actor and stuntman well-known around Hollywood when he went to producer Irwin Allen about the part of The Robot. The "suit" had already been designed by production designer Robert Kinoshita ( the same designer who had created Robby the Robot for Forbidden Planet in 1956). According to May, when he was able to get into and out of the suit in front of Allen, he was given the job. He expected to be the voice of the Robot, as well, and was evidently saddened when he learned that he had been dubbed. Still, in several episodes (such as "The Ghost Planet", I believe) his voice can be heard.
Bob May died on January 18, 2009.
Happy Birthday, Bob May!
Bob May (left), Dick Tufield (right)
Several cast members on an All-Star Family Feud Special in the mid-70s
Bob May in the suit with Bill Mumy for the Lost in Space Special in 1998
Bob May with the rest of the cast at a convention appearance
This is the opening line of the Temptations' 1972 super-hit, Papa Was A Rolling Stone. It was written by Norman Whitfield and Barrett Strong and originally recorded by another Motown group called The Undisputed Truth. It got as high as number 63 on The Hot One Hundred four months before the Tempts' version was released. Their version went Gold and all the way to the top, becoming their fourth Number One Hit in December 1972. (The Undisputed Truth is most famous for their 1971 hit, Smiling Faces.)
By this point both Eddie Kendricks and Paul Williams had left the group. They were replaced by Damon Harris (tenor) and Richard Street (low tenor), who join Melvin Franklin (bass), Otis Williams (tenor), and Dennis Edwards (lead). Edwards hated the song when he first heard it because his father, a preacher, actually *had* died on September 3. He was over-ruled and eventually came to like the song, an undisputed classic of 1970s R&B.
And every year when I realize that today is the 3rd of September, I hear this song in my head. Hopefully so will you. :-)
