Tag Archives: Balladeer’s Blog

BURT LANCASTER’S SWASHBUCKLER MOVIES

Hollywood legend Burt Lancaster starred in several big-name films. Early in his career he played the hero in a few swashbuckler movies.

THE FLAME AND THE ARROW (1950) – In 1100s Lombardy, evil Count Ulrich (Frank Allenby) rules on behalf of Emperor Frederick the First. Ulrich abuses his power and even takes the unfaithful wife of Dardo Bartoli (Burt Lancaster) into his own court as one of his mistresses. This drives archer and swordsman Dardo into opposition against him.   

One day Dardo shows off by shooting Count Ulrich’s prized hunting hawk out of the sky with an arrow. The Count has his men try capturing our hero, but his son Rudi helps him escape only to wind up a prisoner in Ulrich’s household where he is reunited with his mother.

Dardo now goes all out against the Count, leading rebels both high born and low in Robin Hood style banditry against Ulrich from an old Roman fortress in the hills. At one point Dardo and his allies abduct Count Ulrich’s niece Anne (Virginia Mayo) in hopes of exchanging her for Rudi. The Count instead captures Dardo’s father and several other villagers, threatening to kill them all unless the rebel and outlaw surrenders. Continue reading

12 Comments

Filed under opinion

B-MOVIE HOSTESS: THE OLD LADY OF NIGHTMARE ALLEY (1957-1958)

THE OLD LADY OF NIGHTMARE ALLEY was the character who hosted the film show Nightmare! on KTLA in Los Angeles. She was played by the elderly actress Ottola Nesmith, who started in Silent Films in 1915 and appeared in over 100 movies, including Invisible Ghost with Bela Lugosi.

Nightmare! ran from October 1st, 1957 to October 7th, 1958. KTLA aired the program Tuesday nights at 9:30pm and produced 53 episodes. The show’s director was Loring d’Usseau, one of Nesmith’s sons, who was surprised to learn he would be directing his own mother (see below right).

Ottola’s Movie Hostess character The Old Lady eschewed the sex appeal approach of predecessors like Vampira and instead employed a memorable gimmick, albeit one which once got herself and KTLA in legal trouble.

The Old Lady was a deranged woman who claimed to be a fallen movie starlet living in a tiny apartment on Nightmare Alley with only her victrola and doll Boris to keep her company. She was like Sunset Boulevard‘s Norma Desmond on steroids and also had qualities of the Arsenic and Old Lace murderesses as well as the future Baby Jane.

(Yet the Los Angeles Times called her “pixielike.”) Continue reading

12 Comments

Filed under Bad and weird movies, Movie Hosts

OZIDI EPIC OF NIGERIA: PART SIX

FOR PART ONE CLICK HERE. FOR PART TWO CLICK HERE. FOR PART THREE CLICK HERE. FOR PART FOUR CLICK HERE. FOR PART FIVE CLICK HERE.

PART SIX – Corresponding with the one-day hiatus from the story tellers and singers performing the Ozidi Epic, our hero has been sleeping after slaying Badoba. Tall Badoba was the latest of his father’s killers to meet their end at the hands of Ozidi the Younger. Only the leader of the murderers remained – Ofe.

At the end of the previous installment, cowardly and treacherous Ofe had fled Orua in hopes of escaping Ozidi’s wrath. Overnight, however, he realized that Ozidi would never abandon his revenge quest because he had to slay every single one of his father’s killers in order to free Ozidi the Elder’s spirit from the deadlands limbo in which it was imprisoned.

Ofe glumly returned to Orua and sought shelter in his home. Meanwhile, at the home of Ozidi’s uncle King Temugedege, the mentally unfit ruler installed as a puppet by the murderers of Ozidi the Elder, it was time for Ozidi the Younger to wake up.

Our hero’s mother Orea and his sorceress grandmother Oreame fed him breakfast until he was full. Then it was time once again to go into action, so Ozidi reached down his throat and pulled out of his mouth his sword made of lightning, his battle clothing, his musicians and attendants plus his spear and other weapons. He pulled out his monkey and lizard, too.

As Ozidi walked Ado, the capitol of Orua, the people all grabbed their children and fled into the jungle to avoid being caught in the fallout of the battle between Ozidi and Ofe. Continue reading

14 Comments

Filed under Mythology

FORGOTTEN TELEVISION: THE NEW ODD COUPLE (1982-1983)

THE NEW ODD COUPLE (1982-1983) – This sitcom was a reboot of the 1970-1975 series, now starring former Barney Miller co-star Ron Glass as obsessively tidy photographer Felix Unger and former Sanford & Son co-star Demond Wilson as pathologically sloppy sports reporter Oscar Madison. Coincidentally, Glass had made guest appearances on two Sanford & Son episodes in the 1970s.

John Schuck played Murray the Cop, Bart Braverman was Roy and Christopher Joy was Speed. The Pigeon Sisters were portrayed by Sheila Anderson and Ronalda Douglas.

Due to a writer’s strike at the time, eight episodes of The New Odd Couple were flat-out remakes of original Odd Couple installments. That prevented the new series from developing its own way and contributed to falling ratings and the show’s cancellation after just 18 episodes.

THOSE EPISODES:

THE IDES OF APRIL (Oct 29th, 1982) – Felix must go down to the IRS office to correct a computer error. While there, he accidentally lets slip Oscar’s tax cheating. Oscar gets audited, but Felix manages to get his roommate through the ordeal successfully. ESTHER ROLLE guest starred.

THE HUSTLER (Nov 5th) – Oscar helps Felix raise money for his amateur theater troupe via a Casino Night party. It’s a success, but then Oscar risks losing all the winnings playing pool against a hustler. It was Trivia Heaven for viewers as guest stars included Al Molinaro (the original Murray the Cop), Florida Friebus playing her Bob Newhart Show character Mrs. Bakerman, Ian Wolfe as Mr. Bakerman and Ben Powers from The Jeffersons as Side Pocket Sidney. Continue reading

8 Comments

Filed under Forgotten Television

FOOL KILLER PART SEVENTY-THREE: JULY 1914

Balladeer’s Blog continues its examination of the many facets of Fool Killer lore. FOR PART ONE, INCLUDING THE HISTORICAL CONTEXT IN THE 1850s, CLICK HERE.

PART 73 – Some of the Fool Killer’s targets on both sides of the aisle in the July of 1914 edition of James Larkin Pearson’s version of the folk figure.

*** Former Republican President Theodore Roosevelt for the media blitz accompanying his hunting trip to South America. Pearson and his Fool Killer liked Theodore as president but he was tired of the media circus surrounding every move of Roosevelt’s post-presidency life.

*** The federal government, for allowing starvation inside the U.S. while sending out millions to feed people overseas.

*** Tycoon John D. Rockefeller, Jr. for trying to distract from his slaughter of miners and their women and children in Ludlow back in April by teaching Sunday School and doing charitable work to help prostitutes find another way of life. The jokes that were made about the kind of “work” that Rockefeller was doing with the Red Light Ladies should be obvious.

*** Treasury Secretary William McAdoo, who had pushed for the reintroduction of the Income Tax the previous year. Pearson, though a self-confessed socialist, did not meet the 2026 definition of socialism because he opposed income taxes as a blow against the working class and not the wealthy.

*** Democrat President Woodrow Wilson, whom he blamed for destroying the U.S. economy. Continue reading

10 Comments

Filed under opinion

ANCIENT GREEK COMEDY: MARIKAS (C 421 B.C.)

EupolisBalladeer’s Blog presents another look at an ancient Greek Comedy. This time around it’s one written by Eupolis who – along with Aristophanes and Cratinus – was one of the Big Three of Attic Old Comedy.

MARIKAS (c 421 B.C.) – This was the second comedy to emerge in the new subgenre of Attic Old Comedy called “the Demagogue Comedy”. Aristophanes led the way a few years earlier with The Knights, his comedy attacking the politician Cleon. The play Marikas finds Eupolis attacking the demagogue Hyperbolus, whose reputation for character assassination by way of overstatement lives on in our language by way of the word “hyperbole”.  

As with most ancient Greek comedies Marikas has survived only in fragmentary form. Those fragments, along with contemporary references in surviving works, provide what is known about the play. Marikas, the title character, was used by Eupolis to represent the politician Hyperbolus the same way Aristophanes had used the Paphlagonian to represent Cleon in The Knights.

The ancient Greek comedies made a point of breaking the fourth wall on a regular basis (despite the way so many people have convinced themselves that that is a “postmodern” development) and Marikas opened up with a character assuring the audience that the play they were about to see was NOT just a rehashing of The Knights. Continue reading

20 Comments

Filed under Ancient Greek Comedy

PEACEMAKER BEFORE D.C. COMICS OWNED THE CHARACTER

This weekend’s light-hearted, escapist superhero post from Balladeer’s Blog will look at the Charlton Comics hero Peacemaker BEFORE DC Comics bought him and changed him. 

PEACEMAKER

Secret Identity: Christopher Smith

First Appearance: Fightin’ 5 #40 (November 1966)

Origin: American diplomat and scientist Christopher Smith was a noted pacifist in his public persona but was secretly affiliated with the Pax Institute’s covert operations arm in Geneva, Switzerland.

When peaceful solutions to an international situation hit a dead end, Smith donned the costume of his alter ego Peacemaker, who used violence against global dictators and other aggressors to nip potentially larger conflicts in the bud. 

This hero’s adventures were every bit as focused on Cold War situations as early Marvel Comics stories were in Iron Man and the The Hulk

Powers: Peacemaker was in peak physical condition and was a master of armed and unarmed combat. He designed and tested his own weapons in his secret “Peace Palace” lair in the Swiss Alps. Peacemaker’s action outfit included body armor, a jetpack for flight, plus a helmet for protection AND for radio communication. This hero’s weapons included his powered laser gun and the sonic beams shot from his helmet.

Comment: Peacemaker was the model for the Comedian in Watchmen, but the original Charlton version was neither the violent maniac of Watchmen nor the buffoonish character from recent movies and television shows.

FIGHTIN’ FIVE Vol 1 #40 (Nov 1966)

Title: Introducing the Peacemaker

Villain: Emil Bork, Arms Dealer

Synopsis: Diplomat Christopher Smith is in his car in Geneva, Switzerland being briefed about international arms dealer Emil Bork by his secretary Miss Blair. The weapons merchant has agents in two fictional South American countries egging on their war so that Bork can make more and more money. Two agents of Bork try to kill Smith and Blair but fail.   

The following day Christopher attends an embassy dinner in Geneva, at which Bork and Smith needle each other. Smith dons his Peacemaker outfit and assembles his weapons, then flies out to Bork’s mansion in the Alps. Bork’s private army tries to kill Peacemaker but he outfights them all.

He then interrogates a defeated mercenary and learns that Emil has just flown off for South America to exacerbate the war between the two nations he is profiting from. Our hero flies off after Bork’s overhead jet but the villain fires a missile at him. Peacemaker damages it with his laser but the missile still goes off with him in the blast range.    Continue reading

10 Comments

Filed under Superheroes

SUPREME COURT JUSTICE THOMAS JOHNSON

Previously, Balladeer’s Blog examined the first six Justices of the U.S. Supreme Court when six was the full roster on that court. Here is a look at the 7th Justice, appointed by George Washington to fill the vacancy of Associate Justice John Rutledge, who resigned.

ASSOCIATE JUSTICE THOMAS JOHNSON

Served: September 19th, 1791 – January 16th, 1793. (Resigned over poor health.)

Brethren on the Court: Chief Justice John Jay. Associate Justices William Cushing, James Wilson, John Blair and James Iredell.

Some Highlights: Johnson served the least amount of time out of all Supreme Court Justices ever. He wrote the Court’s decision in Georgia v Brailsford (1792) which established that the Supreme Court had jurisdiction over suits and cases involving states. Riding his Circuit, Johnson heard the initial trial in Ware v Hylton, which dragged on for years and wasn’t settled until long after Thomas had left the Court. Continue reading

6 Comments

Filed under Neglected History

ANCIENT SCIENCE FICTION: SIX THOUSAND YEARS HENCE (1891)

SIX THOUSAND YEARS HENCE (1891) – Written by Milton W. Ramsey. Regular readers of Balladeer’s Blog may remember that I’m usually enthusiastic about these works of “ancient” science fiction and look for any bright spots. In this novel’s case that is very, very difficult. For a book written in 1891 it seems more like an 1820s piece.

The central character is General Morton, a former military man who has become incredibly wealthy through a land deal. One night he starts tracking an odd dot in space with his telescope. The object turns out to be a wandering planet that is headed for the Earth.

In the event, the planet throws Earth’s moon out of orbit and into the sun. It does not collide with our planet but it comes close enough to capture General Morton’s city in its gravity and drags the metropolis out into space with it. And you ain’t seen nothin’ yet in terms of this book’s WTF attempts at “science.”

As the rogue planet drags the city behind it, the individual buildings in it form a long “tail”. The people inside those buildings stay alive by keeping the doors and windows shut so that they have air to breathe inside. Continue reading

12 Comments

Filed under Ancient Science Fiction

THREE NEW COLLEGES LAUNCH SPORTS TEAMS IN THE NJCAA

The NJCAA (National Junior College Athletic Association) accepted three new sports teams which will begin competing this fall. Here are the three:

Institution: VALLEY FORGE MILITARY COLLEGE

Team Name: TROJANS

Location: Wayne, Pennsylvania

*** Continue reading

8 Comments

Filed under college sports, Cool names and cool logos