Richard (left) and Randy between takes on The Texas 27 Film Vault.
THE FORTIETH ANNIVERSARY YEAR OF THE TEXAS 27 FILM VAULT CONTINUES! On February 9th, 1985 this pre-MST3K bad movie show debuted and ran for a few years. When it went off the air Joe Bob’s Drive-In began airing from the same studio formerly used by T27FV.
This Dallas Double Feature originally aired: Saturday May 10th, 1986 from 10:30pm to 2:30am. Broadcast throughout Texas and Oklahoma.
A behind the scenes photo of Laurie Savino, who held the rank of Mystery Clip Technician in the Film Vault Corps.
Film Vault Lore: Usually The Texas 27 Film Vault ran 2 1/2 hours, from 10:30pm to 1am, and would feature machine-gun toting Randy Clower and Richard Malmos presenting episodes of old Republic serials followed by a cult movie.
On this night Randy, Richard, Tex, Joe “The Hypnotic Eye” Riley, Laurie Savino and the rest of the Film Vault Corps (“the few … the proud … the sarcastic”) presented a special called The Dallas Double Feature. The episode dispensed with a serial and showed (and mocked) two films made in Texas, one by Larry Buchanan and the other by Russ Marker.
Tommy Kirk’s Greatest Moment
MARS NEEDS WOMEN (1967) – Texas’ Larry Buchanan is partially known for low-budget remakes of many AIP schlock films, from Zontar the Thing from Venus (a remake of It Conquered The World), to Attack of the the (sic) Eye Creatures (a remake of Invasion of the Saucermen) and others.
Mars Needs Women sports many scenes beloved by all of us bad movie geeks. Think of the army translating a message from space with the tech saying “Sir … the message reads three words … Mars … Needs … Women.” Continue reading
THE TELEVISION GHOST (1931-1933) – As astonishing at it may seem, there were actually some regularly televised programs on pioneering channels like W2XAB beginning in 1931. Comparatively few people actually had the mechanical television sets of that period when the whole enterprise was highly experimental. Newspaper listings offer most of what little information survives about the broadcasts.
The Television Ghost ran 15 minutes and starred George Kelting as the Ghost with Bill Schudt as an announcer and narrator. The show’s Halloween Episode of 1931 was nicely hyped with a reference to some primitive television special effects magic. 
Watching President Trump cleaning up the cesspool of corruption in our political establishment reminds me of a much larger version of the cleanup in New York City’s police department in the 1970s following Frank Serpico’s revelations. 
For another comparison remember the real-life efforts of prosecutors Giovanni Falcone and Paolo Borsellino as they tried to end organized crime’s control of Sicily’s governmental figures. They were eventually assassinated after years of having the entire corrupt system against them. The non-fiction book Excellent Cadavers is a great way to familiarize yourself with them. 
Even worse, Trump has made some unforced errors and lapsed into foolish distractions like the whole “51st State” nonsense with Canada. He’s still a de facto Third Party President and given the unreliability of A LOT of Congressional Republicans massive betrayal could come at any time. 
MOTOR PIRATES (1906) American release title The Modern Pirates – This British action short was directed by England’s monumentally underrated silent film director Arthur Melbourne Cooper. Motor Pirates clocks in at under 9 minutes but crams quite a bit into that runtime. 
The Motor Pirates drive their vehicle on to a country estate where they employ its front-end “suction feature” to vacuum up several chickens. Four men of the estate come out with guns blazing to stop the crooks, but they shoot down their victims, leaving three dead and one barely clinging to life as they drive off. 
DOWN GOES NUMBER ONE – This game pitted the LSU-SHREVEPORT PILOTS (Riverboat Pilots) against their guests, the nation’s number 1 team – the LSU-ALEXANDRIA GENERALS. The Pilots were up 38-31 at the Half before defeating the Generals by a final count of 101-96. Twenty-seven points from Tahjae Hill led LSU-Shreveport.
NAIL-BITER – The INDIANA UNIVERSITY-EAST RED WOLVES took it on the road against the UNIVERSITY OF RIO GRANDE RED STORM. The Red Storm had eked out a 30-29 edge by Halftime, but an equally hard-fought 2nd Half ended in a 63-62 Red Wolves win. Antuane Allen led Indiana University-East with 24 points. 
MS. MARVEL Vol 1 #11 (Nov 1977) 
THE FORTIETH ANNIVERSARY YEAR OF THE TEXAS 27 FILM VAULT CONTINUES! In the middle 1980s/ Way down on Level 31 came this pre-MST3K show about bad and campy movies. Film Vault Technicians 1st Class Richard Malmos and Randy Clower hosted the show along with their friend and cocreator Ken Miller as Tex plus Laurie Savino as the Film Vault Corps’ Mystery Clip Technician. 
QUEEN OF BLOOD (1966) 
BIG HAWAII (1977) – From a promising pilot movie to “poof” it’s canceled – that’s the story of and that’s the glory of Big Hawaii. I’ve rarely seen such a pronounced overhaul from a pilot movie to the resulting series. 
BIG HAWAII: DANGER IN PARADISE (May 12th, 1977) – The creative team came so close to changing the future of 1970s prime time programming by getting the jump on Dallas, which did not come out until 1978. The network suits or somebody chickened out after this powerhouse pilot movie. 
JOHN DEHNER, forever remembered as the voice of Paladin on the Have Gun Will Travel radio western, played Barrett Fears, patriarch of the Fears family and a veteran power player in what would soon become Jock Ewing fashion. 
INA BALIN as Barrett’s second wife Marla embodied the older-but-still-hot female character that would soon define a genre. Think Joan Collins and Linda Evans on Dynasty, Abby Dalton, Susan Sullivan and many more on Falcon Crest, Barbara Rush and Stella Stevens on Flamingo Road, Katharine Ross on The Colbys plus a few others I’m probably forgetting. 
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