All those grand, Hitch leading ladies still live: Day, Novak, Marie Saint, Hedren, Andrews, Miles.
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Yes..that's quite a list. Interesting that most of the key Hitchcock men are gone. Eva Marie lost her NXNW co-stars in the 80's -- 1984(James Mason) and 1986(Cary Grant.) Henry Fonda died in the early 80's. James Stewart -- who looked so prematurely elderly on screen...made it to 1997, I believe. Even the fairly recent superstar(all things considered) Paul Newman is gone.
But Sean Connery lives. And Bruce Dern. And William Devane. A few Hitchcock guys still with us.
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Precisely because there are so many of them, and we know for sure that esp. Day and Andrews passings will be genuine cultural earthquakes - both were *ridiculously* famous in their times - the actual end of Hitchcock's era still *feels* to me like it's far off. But maybe I'm crazy.
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No, you're not crazy. That's a lot of ladies and it will take awhile to lose them all. Which is a good thing.
Last year I visited Carmel and had a drink in Doris Day's hotel in the small downtown. I think it is called the Cypress Inn. In the bar, you notice a few things: dogs everywhere of all sizes, all around you(behaved and on leashes) -- Doris maintains the hotel as "pet friendly." And there are posters from her movies all around you (including "The Man Who Knew Too Much" and -- well, some movie I went to as a baby, I'm told. And they added a TV showing DVDs of her films; I came in at the end of "Jumbo" and walked out on the beginning of the terrible "Caprice"(Doris does Bond -- with Richard Harris as her embarrassed looking love interest.)
Still, Doris was "all around me" in that hotel of hers, very much expected to walk in at any moment. The bar restaurant is called "Terry's Restaurant" I believe -- after her son, Terry Melcher, now dead himself and (OT to the OT....) Charlie Manson's REAL target, the owner of the house where renter Sharon Tate was killed.
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ecarle (14979)
5 years ago
Helmond had a crucial role as a plastic-surgery disaster mom in Brazil (1985).
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I have not seen Brazil(and I know I should; well, I finally saw Blume in Love!) but I've sure seen a photo of Helmond with her face stretched super-wide. Weird. Unforgettable.
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She's good (and to me almost unrecognizable) in her small role in Family Plot too. Not sure what Hitch and Lehman were thinking with having her kick over that tombstone tho'! It always makes me laugh at the film, feels like something out of High Anxiety, I'm afraid.
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...and it ended up in the TV commercial for the movie, with Hitchcock inserted to show mock woe at Helmond. I think in the movie, its the "final proof" that Eddie Shoebridge's grave is a fake. But, like with a few things in Family Plot, the tone seems a little too silly for Hitch at his Vertigo/Psycho best.
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It's funny too: Soap was *huge* in its first couple of seasons, so most of the key actors from it are really imprinted on me from it, and I think Soap's success did damage some careers. One actor in particular, Richard Mulligan (?) played a mugging dope on the show and I'm pretty sure did only those kinds of roles afterwards. Later I'd see him as Custer in Little Big Man (1970) and realize he was in fact a great, Oscar-worthy-type actor and that Soap's success probably helped trap him in low comedy.
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True about Mulligan. In Bill Holden's final movie -- Blake Edwards' too-broad Hollywood spoof, SOB(1981) -- Holden and Robert Preston are real cool guys -- but Mulligan(as a sucesssful director, unbelievable) does that mugging dope thing(he's unwatchable) and Robert Webber gives us an over-anxious flibbergibbet. Its like "two versus two" on the good acting/bad acting scale. Mulligan spends the whole movie trying to kill himself, and tragedy does occur...but you care nothing about this guy.
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swanstep (2616)
5 years ago
But Sean Connery lives. And Bruce Dern. And William Devane. A few Hitchcock guys still with us.
Don't forget 104-year old, born in 1914, stormin' Norman Lloyd (who also worked with Welles and Renoir - he's a one-man history of 20C film)!
Veronica Cartwright is probably the youngest ex-Hitchcockian at 69.
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ecarle (14979)
5 years ago
Don't forget 104-year old, born in 1914, stormin' Norman Lloyd (who also worked with Welles and Renoir - he's a one-man history of 20C film)!
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He's in a class by himself, isn't he? He was in a movie or two at 100...maybe older.
Its tough, I suppose to live PAST 100....but why not?
Hitch(two movies, one with very famous scene for him -- then the TV series), Welles, Renoir. "St Elsewhere"(where he played "the old guy" 30 years ago!)
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Veronica Cartwright is probably the youngest ex-Hitchcockian at 69.
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Likely. A "child star" when she worked for Hitch. I assume Jerry the Beaver Mathers is older....and still with us, too.
Hitch worked with a lot of actors....I suppose he's got a ready supply still with us.
Meanwhile, back at Psycho: the irony that the star -- and youngest of the five leads -- Anthony Perkins, died first among the leads and fairly young at 60, in 1992. then Balsam in 1996, then Leigh in 2003 , then Gavin (last year). Vera Miles and Pat Hitchocck(90?) still with us. And by my calculations, the first Psycho actor to pass after its 1960 release was Frank Albertson(Cassidy) , in 1964. I think that's why Albertson rather stands out in the film as "unique." The other actors worked for decades after Psycho. Not him.
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