Well, dear readers, I am sitting here like so much nauseous fish, listening to the final two discs in the new 7-CD Bernard Herrmann on Phase 4 box, which contains his film music albums on Phase 4. These albums were like manna from heaven when they came out because the Herrmann composed scores, save for just two or three, had never before been on record. It was the first time we could hear that incredible main title for North by Northwest or a suite from Psycho and The Trouble with Harry and Marnie. Then the follow-up album had Jane Eyre and Citizen Kane and The Devil and Daniel Webster. Then came the fantasy stuff, two albums of that – The Seventh Voyage of Sinbad, Journey to the Center of the Earth, Fahrenheit 451, The Day the Earth Stood Still, Jason and the Argonauts, The Three Worlds of Gulliver and more. And then he did a Shakespeare film music album with Shostakovich, Walton, and Rozsa scores, followed by a British Film Music album with scores by Arthur Bliss, Arthur Benjamin, Walton, and more. And then, his second to last score before passing away was one of the last Phase 4 albums, the soundtrack to Obsession. All these are in this box with their original jacket art. The new remasters are slightly better than what we’ve had on CD – not huge, but a bit more clarity, better low and high end, that kind of thing. Unlike many Phase 4 albums, distortion is not an issue except for the loud parts of Jane Eyre and Journey to the Center of the Earth, so that’s a good thing. On the Stokowski recordings, the distortion is constant and truly annoying. Anyway, it’s a wonderful set and I’ve been enjoying it all evening. Prior to that, I did manage to watch a motion picture on Blu-ray, which probably exacerbated my nausea since I loathed just about every second of it. I’d tried to watch it three years ago but didn’t get very far in. This time I made it all the way. The film is Altered States, directed by Ken Russell, and written (under a pseudonym) by Paddy Chayefsky, based on his novel. It’s certainly well directed in the Russell excess style – he and Chayefsky argued constantly, and Chayefsky finally left the film – but the performances are all fine, save for one. This was William Hurt’s first film and it’s an auspicious debut. The female lead is Blair Brown, and she’s very good, too. They both have been directed to speed through the dialogue, so it’s very hard to understand what they’re saying. This was also Drew Barrymore’s first film, made just before she filmed E.T. And there’s a VERY young John Larroquette, too. The bum performance, at least for me, was given by Bob Balaban, one of many such performances. As I’ve said before, he’s a fussy actor, a busy actor, and I just don’t care for that stuff. He was fine in Midnight Cowboy in his brief appearance, and his best work was in Close Encounters of the Third Kind, but everything subsequent to that is just not for me. The film is photographed nicely, but I found it very silly, the effects are good and gross, too, but in the end, if I want to see a movie on this subject (or part of it), I’ll take The Mind Benders. And, as you know, I can’t stand drug films, and this is about mind-bending drugs like acid and worse. In the end, it adds up to zero, and the final thirty seconds are simply ludicrous, or they were for me. Many people love the film.
Yesterday was kind of Friday the thirteenth. Being Friday the thirteenth, I got exactly two hours of sleep and could not fall asleep again, hence why I am currently a sleepy man. So, I just did stuff on the computer, then had to shave and shower and have a lunch with Sami and her mom. I hadn’t seen Sami in a year – amazing. She looks great and seems very happy and we had a splendid time. I had taquitos and a beef taco, and we shared chili con queso dip. I’m thinking this nausea’s coming from the taquitos, which were weird, or the two hours of sleep. After lunch, I came home, did more stuff on the computer, went and picked up a package, came home, watched the movie, and then listened to seven Bernard Herrmann albums, which was a nice way to end the evening. Well, I didn’t quite end the evening that way, no, I went to newspapers.com and found some incredible stuff. I mean, INCREDIBLE stuff. Let’s start with the two MOST incredible things.
When I was young, perhaps nine, I wanted to see a movie called Omar Khayyam, which was playing at a movie theater on Wilshire Boulevard in the Miracle Mile, call the Ritz. My mother had regaled us kids with the story of how she was injured there because they’d been sold out and had to put her in a folding chair, which had folded and caused her to topple to the ground. She tried to make it seem like it was dangerous to go there, which is why I’d never been. But I wanted to see Omar Khayyam and there was no dissuading me from taking my chances at a matinee that I doubted would be full. She told me the story again and I didn’t care. And I saw it without incident. I’d always assumed this had happened in the early 1950s. Well, no, it happened in 1935, before she’d met my father. How do I know this? Because I searched her maiden name on newspapers.com and found that the Los Angeles Times thought it newsworthy, because she’d sued the Ritz and won. And here it is, complete with a photo. I’m not sure I’ve ever seen a photo of her quite this young.
Isn’t that mind-boggling? The other day, I was searching and searching to see when the movie Wichita had played the Dome Theater in Ocean Park. I knew I’d seen it there, close by where my grandparents lived. I found when it opened, but it wasn’t at the Dome, and I searched and searched and could find no evidence that it ever played there. The closest theater that I found was the Fox Venice. Could I be that off? Thankfully, the answer is no, because I searched the title specifically and found it. Here’s the living proof.
In the first Kritzer book, I talk about the grandpa that I actually liked – my father’s father, Grandpa Sam (as he’s called in the book). As I wrote, he used to take me to the Picfair when I was five to see serials and movies, he knew I loved Commando Cody’s Rocket Jacket, and he often talked about how we might make one. In the book, he does, but in life it was just a dream. And I talk about when he died in 1956, how I was awakened by my mother wailing in the kitchen. I got up to see what it was about and that was the first time I actually knew and cared about someone who died. I didn’t even really know what it meant, other than I wouldn’t be seeing him again. Here’s the obituary.
Also, in the Kritzer book I talk about how my father’s restaurant got its name, but with Kritzer instead of Kimmel. In the book, the restaurant is called the Erro and at some point I find out that the story we’ve always been told about how the name came to be wasn’t true and that the initials stood for ERnie (what I named him in the book – real name, Eddie) and the RO stood for the first two letters of his first wife’s name. That was all true save for the name changes for the book. My mother forbade him to ever mention this other wife and in actuality I didn’t find out the real story until the 1970s. But in searching my father’s restaurant, whose real name was the Kiru, I found some restaurant column, where he told this wacky, totally made-up story of how the restaurant had gotten its name. It was colorful, kind of an Arabian Nights thing. Well, this columnist found out the real story and amusingly called him out on it – and I found it.
Crazy, no? One of the first things I found when searching his restaurant was some crazy story from 1957, that a bomb had gone off in the back of the restaurant, outside the rear door where the parking lot was. There were no suspects or anything. But I found a subsequent story from a few years later that posited who was responsible and why it was done. Is that not wacky? Well, it gets wackier because who they think did it was the one and only notorious gangster, Mickey Cohen. The reason? Well, my father’s business partner testified against him at his trial. And who was that? One Morris Orloff. Yes, the father of our very own Penny Orloff.
Finally, I’ve never been able to find any information about a restaurant my father had something to do with in Culver City. We went there several times – it was “The Home of the Planked Hamburger Steak” and called The Dover House. I never really knew where it was. Well, I found it and it was right next to MGM on Washington Boulevard. In fact, that location is now a modern office building for Sony. But I didn’t know that he was the host there in its early days – you know, host/owner. Here’s a little advert and story.
Today, I’ll be up when I’m up, I’ll do whatever needs doing, including finalizing the show order and beginning to write commentary. I’ll hopefully pick up some packages, I’ll eat, but mostly I really need to rest and relax and hopefully I’ll have caught up on some of the missing sleep.
Tomorrow is more of the same, and then we begin the busy week leading up to the Group Rep cabaret benefit.
Well, dear readers, I must take the day, I must do the things I do, I must, for example, be up when I’m up, do whatever needs doing, finalize the show order, write commentary, hopefully pick up some packages, eat, and then watch, listen, and relax. Today’s topic of discussion: Have you ever sued someone and prevailed? Let’s have loads of lovely postings, shall we, whilst I hit the road to dreamland, what with being a sleepy man.