The DU Lounge
Related: Culture Forums, Support ForumsTCM Thurs MORNING, & Thursday NIGHT:
6:30 AM -- A Funny Thing Happened on the Way to the Forum (1966)
1h 39m | Musical | TV-PG
Madcap musical set in ancient Rome, where a clever slave connives to win his freedom.
Director: Richard Lester
Cast: Zero Mostel, Phil Silvers, Buster Keaton
Winner of an Oscar for Best Music, Scoring of Music, Adaptation or Treatment -- Ken Thorne
Even before it was released, producer Melvin Frank announced a sequel called "A Funny Thing Happened on the Way to the Guillotine". It never went any further than development stage.
8:30 AM -- Exodus (1960)
3h 40m | Epic | TV-PG
A young Israeli activist fights to set up a homeland for his people.
Director: Otto Preminger
Cast: Paul Newman, Eva Marie Saint, Ralph Richardson
Winner of an Oscar for Best Music, Scoring of a Dramatic or Comedy Picture -- Ernest Gold
Nominee for Oscars for Best Actor in a Supporting Role -- Sal Mineo, and Best Cinematography, Color -- Sam Leavitt
Producer and director Otto Preminger helped to end the stigma of the Hollywood blacklist by hiring Dalton Trumbo to adapt the screenplay for this movie, before Trumbo was hired for Spartacus (1960).
12:30 PM -- It's a Mad, Mad, Mad, Mad World (1963)
3h 12m | Comedy | TV-PG
After witnessing a fatal car crash, a group of motorists race across California to find a hidden stash of loot.
Director: Stanley Kramer
Cast: Spencer Tracy, Milton Berle, Sid Caesar
Winner of an Oscar for Best Effects, Sound Effects -- Walter Elliott
Nominee for Oscars for Best Cinematography, Color -- Ernest Laszlo, Best Sound -- Gordon Sawyer (Samuel Goldwyn SSD), Best Film Editing -- Frederic Knudtson, Robert C. Jones and Gene Fowler Jr., Best Music, Original Song -- Ernest Gold (music) and Mack David (lyrics) for the song "It's a Mad Mad Mad Mad World", and Best Music, Score - Substantially Original -- Ernest Gold
Jack Benny's cameo role was originally offered to Stan Laurel, but Laurel turned it down. When his best friend and partner Oliver Hardy died in 1957, he pledged never to perform again. He kept that promise for the rest of his life. By the time this happened, a long shot of the character had already been filmed with a stand-in wearing Laurel's trademark bowler hat. This is why Benny is seen wearing a bowler hat despite his never having worn one as part of his regular work.
Thursday NIGHT:
8:00 PM -- The Producers (1967)
1h 28m | Comedy | TV-14
A Broadway producer decides to get rich by creating the biggest flop of his career.
Director: Mel Brooks
Cast: Zero Mostel, Gene Wilder, Dick Shawn
Winner of an Oscar for Best Writing, Story and Screenplay - Written Directly for the Screen -- Mel Brooks
Nominee for an Oscar for Best Actor in a Supporting Role -- Gene Wilder
The original Swedish title for the film was a direct translation of the original title, Producenterna (The Producers). The film didn't arouse much interest from the public. This changed when the title was replaced by "Det våras för Hitler" (Springtime for Hitler). Then the film became an instant smash. All subsequent Mel Brooks films then got Swedish title starting with "Det våras för..." e.g. "Det våras för Frankenstein" (Young Frankenstein (1974))/ ..."Sherriffen" (Blazing Saddles (1974)) / ..."Galningarna" (High Anxiety (1977) et cetera except for Brooks' two last films, which received the Swedish titles "Robin Hood: Karlar i trikåer" (Robin Hood: Men in Tights (1993)) and "Dracula - Död men lycklig" (Dracula: Dead and Loving It (1995); literally "Dracula - Dead but Happy" ).
9:45 PM -- Tom Jones (1963)
2h 11m | Comedy | TV-14
In this adaptation of Henry Fielding's novel, a country boy in 18th-century England becomes a playboy.
Director: Tony Richardson
Cast: Albert Finney, Susannah York, Hugh Griffith
Winner of Oscars for Best Director -- Tony Richardson, Best Writing, Screenplay Based on Material from Another Medium -- John Osborne, Best Music, Score - Substantially Original -- John Addison, and Best Picture
Nominee for Oscars for Best Actor in a Leading Role -- Albert Finney, Best Actor in a Supporting Role -- Hugh Griffith, Best Actress in a Supporting Role -- Diane Cilento, Best Actress in a Supporting Role -- Edith Evans, Best Actress in a Supporting Role -- Joyce Redman, and Best Art Direction-Set Decoration, Color -- Ralph W. Brinton, Edward Marshall, Jocelyn Herbert and Josie MacAvin
As an undergraduate art students, Jeffrey Boam, later the author of screenplays like Innerspace, Indiana Jones and The Last Crusade, and Lethal Weapon 2 and 3, thought this one of the best screenplays ever written, an opinion he held well into his own career. But when he met Tony Richardson and expressed that admiration to him, Boam was confused by the uncomfortable, even disturbed response Richardson gave him. Boam didn't have the advantage of knowing about Richardson's conviction that the film was a failed execution that got lucky with audiences.
12:00 AM -- Splendor in the Grass (1961)
2h 4m | Drama | TV-14
Set in the 1920s, two midwest teenagers fall in love, are frightened by their physical desires.
Director: Elia Kazan
Cast: Natalie Wood, Warren Beatty, Pat Hingle
Winner of an Oscar for Best Writing, Story and Screenplay - Written Directly for the Screen -- William Inge
Nominee for an Oscar for Best Actress in a Leading Role -- Natalie Wood
Right before shooting was set to begin, Pat Hingle suffered devastating injuries when he accidentally fell 54 feet down an elevator shaft in his apartment building. It would take Hingle over a year to fully recover from the accident. In the meantime, however, he decided to go ahead and do the film - he would simply incorporate his limp into the character. "I broke everything," Hingle said later. "I landed upright, so I broke hips and knees and ankles and ribs, and that sort of thing. That lurching walk that Ace Stamper has - that was as good as I could walk."
Mad_Dem_X
(9,522 posts)Zero Mostel and Gene Wilder are hysterical. The whole cast is terrific.