Hollywood
Hollywood is a neighborhood in the central region of Los Angeles, notable as the home of the U. S. film industry, including several of its historic studios. Its name has come to be a shorthand reference for the people associated with it. Hollywood was incorporated as a municipality in 1903, it was consolidated with the city of Los Angeles in 1910 and soon thereafter, a prominent film industry emerged becoming the most recognizable film industry in the world. In 1853, one adobe hut stood in Nopalera, named for the Mexican Nopal cactus indigenous to the area. By 1870, an agricultural community flourished; the area was known as the Cahuenga Valley, after the pass in the Santa Monica Mountains to the north. According to the diary of H. J. Whitley known as the "Father of Hollywood", on his honeymoon in 1886 he stood at the top of the hill looking out over the valley. Along came a Chinese man in a wagon carrying wood; the man bowed. The Chinese man was asked what he was doing and replied, "I holly-wood," meaning'hauling wood.'
H. J. Whitley decided to name his new town Hollywood. "Holly" would represent England and "wood" would represent his Scottish heritage. Whitley had started over 100 towns across the western United States. Whitley arranged to buy the 480 acres E. C. Hurd ranch, they shook hands on the deal. Whitley shared his plans for the new town with General Harrison Gray Otis, publisher of the Los Angeles Times, Ivar Weid, a prominent businessman in the area. Daeida Wilcox learned of the name Hollywood from Ivar Weid, her neighbor in Holly Canyon and a prominent investor and friend of Whitley's, she recommended the same name to Harvey. H. Wilcox, who had purchased 120 acres on February 1, 1887, it wasn't until August 1887 Wilcox decided to use that name and filed with the Los Angeles County Recorder's office on a deed and parcel map of the property. The early real-estate boom busted at the end of that year. By 1900, the region had a post office, newspaper and two markets. Los Angeles, with a population of 102,479 lay 10 miles east through the vineyards, barley fields, citrus groves.
A single-track streetcar line ran down the middle of Prospect Avenue from it, but service was infrequent and the trip took two hours. The old citrus fruit-packing house was converted into a livery stable, improving transportation for the inhabitants of Hollywood; the Hollywood Hotel was opened in 1902 by H. J. Whitley, a president of the Los Pacific Boulevard and Development Company. Having acquired the Hurd ranch and subdivided it, Whitley built the hotel to attract land buyers. Flanking the west side of Highland Avenue, the structure fronted on Prospect Avenue, still a dusty, unpaved road, was graded and graveled; the hotel was to become internationally known and was the center of the civic and social life and home of the stars for many years. Whitley's company sold one of the early residential areas, the Ocean View Tract. Whitley did much to promote the area, he paid thousands of dollars for electric lighting, including bringing electricity and building a bank, as well as a road into the Cahuenga Pass.
The lighting ran for several blocks down Prospect Avenue. Whitley's land was centered on Highland Avenue, his 1918 development, Whitley Heights, was named for him. Hollywood was incorporated as a municipality on November 14, 1903, by a vote of 88 for and 77 against. On January 30, 1904, the voters in Hollywood decided, by a vote of 113 to 96, for the banishment of liquor in the city, except when it was being sold for medicinal purposes. Neither hotels nor restaurants were allowed to serve liquor before or after meals. In 1910, the city voted for merger with Los Angeles in order to secure an adequate water supply and to gain access to the L. A. sewer system. With annexation, the name of Prospect Avenue changed to Hollywood Boulevard and all the street numbers were changed. By 1912, major motion-picture companies had set up production in Los Angeles. In the early 1900s, most motion picture patents were held by Thomas Edison's Motion Picture Patents Company in New Jersey, filmmakers were sued to stop their productions.
To escape this, filmmakers began moving out west to Los Angeles, where attempts to enforce Edison's patents were easier to evade. The weather was ideal and there was quick access to various settings. Los Angeles became the capital of the film industry in the United States; the mountains and low land prices made Hollywood a good place to establish film studios. Director D. W. Griffith was the first to make a motion picture in Hollywood, his 17-minute short film In Old California was filmed for the Biograph Company. Although Hollywood banned movie theaters—of which it had none—before annexation that year, Los Angeles had no such restriction; the first film by a Hollywood studio, Nestor Motion Picture Company, was shot on October 26, 1911. The H. J. Whitley home was used as its set, the unnamed movie was filmed in the middle of their groves at the corner of Whitley Avenue and Hollywood Boulevard; the first studio in Hollywood, the Nestor Company, was established by the New Jersey–based Centaur Company in a roadhouse at 6121 Sunset Boulevard, in October 1911.
Four major film companies – Paramount, Warner Bros. RKO, Columbia – had studios in Hollywood, as did several minor companies and rental studios. In the 1920s, Hollywood was the fifth-largest industry in the nation. By the 1930s, Hollywood studios became vertically integrated, as production and exhibition was controlled by these companies, enabling Hollywood to produce 600 films per year. H
Incredibly Strange Films
RE/Search No. 10: Incredibly Strange Films is a book about American underground and other films. It was guest edited by Jim Morton, with associate editor Boyd Rice, in the RE/Search series edited by V. Vale and Andrea Juno published in 1985 and expanded in 1986. Among the subjects covered are the work of filmmakers Russ Meyer, Herschell Gordon Lewis, Frank Henenlotter, Larry Cohen, Doris Wishman, David F. Friedman, Ed Wood, Radley Metzger, Joseph W. Sarno, Ray Dennis Steckler, Ted V. Mikels, Dick Bakalyan, genres such as women in prison film, mondo films, exploitation films, beach party films, Santo films, educational films, LSD films, juvenile delinquent films, biker films, sexploitation films, it includes essays on Young Playthings, Wizard of Gore, God Told Me To, Blast of Silence, Daughter of Horror, Spider Baby, George Romero. The book was published in the US in Britain by Plexus. RE/Search No. 10: Incredibly Strange Films. San Francisco: RE/Search Publications, 1986. ISBN 0-940642-09-3. Strange Films.
London: Plexus, n.d. ISBN 0-85965-161-4. RE/Search No. 10: Incredibly Strange Films, researchpubs.com. Audio interview with co-editor Jim Morton
Shelley Berman
Sheldon Leonard Berman was an American comedian, writer, teacher and poet. In his comedic career, Berman was awarded three gold records and he won the first Grammy Award for a spoken comedy recording in 1959, he played Larry David's father on Curb Your Enthusiasm, a role for which he received a 2008 Emmy Award nomination. He taught humor writing at the University of Southern California for more than 20 years. Berman was born in the son of Irene and Nathan Berman, he was Jewish. He served in the Navy during World War II, he enrolled in Chicago's Goodman Theatre as a drama student. There he met fellow student Sarah Herman, his acting career began with an acting company in Illinois. Leaving Woodstock in 1949, Shelley and Sarah made their way to New York City.. He studied acting at HB Studio To make ends meet, Berman found employment as a social director, cab driver, speech teacher, assistant manager of a drug store, a dance instructor at Arthur Murray Dance Studios. Berman found work as a sketch writer for The Steve Allen Plymouth Show.
Berman began as a straight actor, receiving his training at the Goodman Theatre in Chicago, honing his acting skills in stock companies in and around Chicago and New York City. In the mid-1950s, he became a member of Chicago's Compass Players, which evolved into The Second City. While performing improvised sketches with Compass, Berman began to develop solo pieces employing an imaginary telephone to take the place of an onstage partner. In 1957, Berman was hired as a comedian at Mister Kelly's in Chicago, which led to other nightclub bookings, a recording contract with Verve Records, his comedy albums earned him three gold records and he won the first Grammy Award for a spoken comedy recording. Berman appeared on all of the major variety shows of the day, he starred on Broadway in A Family Affair and continued with stage work in The Odd Couple, Damn Yankees, Where's Charley?, Fiddler on the Roof, Two by Two, I'm Not Rappaport, La Cage aux Folles, The Prisoner of Second Avenue and Guys & Dolls.
Berman's voice was used as the inspiration for the voice of the Hanna-Barbera cartoon character Fibber Fox, performed by Daws Butler. Berman portrayed the role of Mendel Sorkin in an episode of CBS's Rawhide. Berman performed both comedic and dramatic roles on television, including appearances on episodes of The Twilight Zone, Peter Gunn, The Mary Tyler Moore Show, Adam-12, Emergency!, Night Court, MacGyver, L. A. Law, Walker, Texas Ranger, The King of Queens, Grey's Anatomy, Boston Legal,'’Lizzie McGuire’'Hannah Montana, CSI: NY and the revived Hawaii Five-0, he had a recurring role on the short-lived sitcom Walter & Emily. From 2002 to 2009, Berman appeared as Larry David's aged father on Curb Your Enthusiasm, a role for which he received a 2008 Emmy Award nomination. Among Berman's film credits are Dementia, The Best Man, Divorce American Style, Every Home Should Have One, Beware! The Blob, Rented Lips, Teen Witch, The Last Producer, Meet the Fockers, The Holiday, You Don't Mess with the Zohan.
Berman wrote three books and Dirtys, A Hotel Is a Place... and Up in the Air With Shelley Berman, two plays, several television pilot scripts, numerous poems. In 2013, he released his collection of poetry. For over 20 years, Berman was a lecturer in humor writing in the Master of Professional Writing program at the University of Southern California, he was a teacher for the Improv Olympics program. Berman married Sarah Herman on April 19, 1947; the two met. In the mid-1960s, Berman and wife Sarah adopted son Joshua and daughter Rachel; the Bermans were planning Joshua's bar mitzvah. Joshua died on October 29, 1977 at age 12. Berman and his wife were both enthusiastic supporters of the Motion Picture and Television Fund, a charitable organization that offers assistance and care to those in the motion picture and television industries with limited or no resources, contributed their time and resources to the benefit of the facilities and the residents. In the 1980s, the Chamber of Commerce in Canoga Park, California selected Berman to be one of the celebrities to serve a term as honorary mayor of Canoga Park.
In a 2012 podcast interview with Marc Maron, Berman alleged that comedian Bob Newhart plagiarized his improvisational telephone routine style, describing its genesis and saying it was a "very special technique that couldn't be imitated. It could be stolen, and it was." He continued, "I was coming to work at night and a guy stopped his car, passed me by, said'Hey, Shelley! There's a guy stole your act!'" When asked by Maron if it was done maliciously, Berman replied, "Maliciously? He wouldn't do it maliciously. Nobody does that, but he did it to make a living. And he became a star."Berman added, "I thought it was a rotten thing to do. I thought the agents who sold him — I thought they were just as guilty as everybody else. But, my God, to go into a town and do my show, the critics saying that I borrowed some stuff from Newhart..."When asked in interviews abou
Horror film
A horror film is a film that seeks to elicit fear. Inspired by literature from authors like Edgar Allan Poe, Bram Stoker, Mary Shelley, horror has existed as a film genre for more than a century; the macabre and the supernatural are frequent themes. Horror may overlap with the fantasy, supernatural fiction, thriller genres. Horror films aim to evoke viewers' nightmares, fears and terror of the unknown. Plots with in the horror genre involve the intrusion of an evil force, event, or personage into the everyday world. Prevalent elements include ghosts, extraterrestrials, werewolves, Satanism, evil clowns, torture, vicious animals, evil witches, zombies, psychopaths, ecological or man-made disasters, serial killers; some sub-genres of horror film include low-budget horror, action horror, comedy horror, body horror, disaster horror, found footage, holiday horror, horror drama, psychological horror, science fiction horror, supernatural horror, gothic horror, natural horror, zombie horror, disaster films, first-person horror, teen horror.
The first depiction of the supernatural on screen appear in several of the short silent films created by the French pioneer filmmaker Georges Méliès in the late 1890s. The best known of these early supernatural-based works is the 3-minute short film Le Manoir du Diable known in English as The Haunted Castle or The House of the Devil; the film is sometimes credited as being the first horror film. In The Haunted Castle, a mischievous devil appears inside a medieval castle and harasses the visitors. Méliès' other popular horror film is La Caverne maudite, which translates to "the accursed cave"; the film known for its English title The Cave of the Demons, tells the story of a woman stumbling over a cave, populated by the spirits and skeletons of people who died there. Méliès would make other short films that historians consider now as horror-comedies. Une nuit terrible, which translates to A Terrible Night, tells a story of a man who tries to get a good night's sleep but ends up wrestling a giant spider.
His other film, L'auberge ensorcelée, or The Bewitched Inn, features a story of a hotel guest getting pranked and tormented by an unseen presence. In 1897, the accomplished American photographer-turned director George Albert Smith created The X-Ray Fiend, a horror-comedy that came out a mere two years after x-rays were invented; the film shows a couple of skeletons courting each other. An audience full of people unaccustomed to the idea would have found it frightening and otherworldly; the next year, Smith created the short film Photographing a Ghost, considered a precursor to the paranormal investigation subgenre. The film portrays three men attempting to photograph a ghost, only to fail time and again as the ghost eludes the men and throws chairs at them. Japan made early forays into the horror genre. In 1898, a Japanese film company called Konishi Honten released two horror films both written by Ejiro Hatta. Though there are no records of the cast, crew, or plot of Bake Jizo, it was based on the Japanese legend of Jizo statues, believed to provide safety and protection to children.
The presence of the word bake—which can be translated to "spook," "ghost," or "phantom"—may imply a haunted or possessed statue. Spanish filmmaker Segundo de Chomón, regarded as one of the most significant silent film directors, was popular for his frequent camera tricks and optical illusions, an innovation that contributed to the popularity of trick films in the period, his famous works include Satan at Play. The Selig Polyscope Company in the United States produced one of the first film adaptations of a horror-based novel. In 1908, the company released Mr. Hyde, now a lost film, it is based on Robert Louis Stevenson's classic gothic novella Strange Case of Dr Jekyll and Mr Hyde, published 15 years prior, about a man who transforms between two contrasting personas. Georges Méliès liked adapting the Faust legend into his films. In fact, the French filmmaker produced at least six variations of the German legend of the man who made a pact with the devil. Among his notable Faust films include Faust aux enfers, known for its English title The Damnation of Faust, or Faust in Hell.
It is the filmmaker's third film adaptation of the Faust legend. In it, Méliès took inspiration from Hector Berlioz's Faust opera, but it pays less attention to the story and more to the special effects that represent a tour of hell; the film takes advantage of stage machinery techniques and features special effects such as pyrotechnics, substitution
Bruno VeSota
Bruno William Ve Sota was an American character actor and producer who, between 1945 and 1974, appeared in hundreds of television episodes and over 50 feature films. He is remembered for prominent supporting roles in 15 Roger Corman films as well as for having directed three low budget exploitation features: Female Jungle, The Brain Eaters and Invasion of the Star Creatures. A native of Chicago, VeSota entered Chicago television in 1945 writing many teleplays for WBKB-TV such as an adaption of Edgar Allan Poe's "The Tell-Tale Heart". In 1948 he moved to WGN-TV as a local version of Orson Welles. VeSota was one of the directors of They Stand Accused, "television's first live dramatic courtroom series", which ran on WGN-TV before it expanded to national distribution first on CBS and on DuMont, he made his big-screen debut in 1953 with appearances in The Wild One. He is best remembered for appearances in science fiction films in the fifties and early sixties such as Dementia, Attack of the Giant Leeches, The Wasp Woman and The Wild World of Batwoman, directed a few such as Female Jungle, The Brain Eaters and Invasion of the Star Creatures.
In the 1960s he played the barman in a number of episodes of Bonanza. Following a heart attack, Bruno VeSota died in Los Angeles in 1976, in at the age of 54. Bruno VeSota on IMDb
Marni Nixon
Margaret Nixon McEathron, known professionally as Marni Nixon, was an American soprano and ghost singer for featured actresses in movie musicals. She is now well known as the real singing voices of the leading actresses in several musical films, including Deborah Kerr in The King and I, Natalie Wood in West Side Story, Audrey Hepburn in My Fair Lady, although this was concealed at the time from audiences. Besides her voice work in films, Nixon's varied career included some film roles of her own, opera, musicals on Broadway and elsewhere throughout the United States, concerts with major symphony orchestras, recordings. Born in Altadena, California, to Charles Nixon and Margaret Elsa McEathron, Nixon was a child film actress who played the violin and began singing at an early age in choruses, including performing solos with the Roger Wagner Chorale, she went on to study singing and opera with, among others, Vera Schwarz, Carl Ebert, Boris Goldovsky and Sarah Caldwell. In 1947, having adopted the stage name "Marni Nixon", she made her Hollywood Bowl solo debut in Carmina Burana with the Los Angeles Philharmonic under conductor Leopold Stokowski.
Nixon's career in film started in 1948 when she sang the voices of the angels heard by Ingrid Bergman in Joan of Arc. The same year, she did her first dubbing work when she provided Margaret O'Brien's singing voice in 1948's Big City and 1949's The Secret Garden, she sang for Jeanne Crain in Cheaper by the Dozen and dubbed Marilyn Monroe's high notes in "Diamonds Are a Girl's Best Friend" in Gentlemen Prefer Blondes. In 1953, she sang for Ida Lupino in Jennifer. Nixon appeared on Broadway in 1954 in The Girl in Pink Tights. In 1956, she worked with Deborah Kerr to supply the star's singing voice for the film version of Rodgers and Hammerstein's The King and I and the next year she again worked with Kerr to dub her voice in An Affair to Remember; that year, she sang for Sophia Loren in Boy on a Dolphin. In 1960, she had an on-screen chorus role in Can-Can. In 1961's West Side Story, the studio kept her work on the film a secret from the actress, Nixon dubbed Rita Moreno's singing in the film's "Tonight" quintet.
She asked the film's producers for, but did not receive, any direct royalties from her work on the film, but Leonard Bernstein contractually gave her 1/4 of one percent of his personal royalties from it. In 1962, she sang Wood's high notes in Gypsy. For My Fair Lady in 1964, she again worked with the female lead of the film, Audrey Hepburn, to perform the songs of Hepburn's character Eliza; because of her uncredited dubbing work in these films, Time magazine called her "The Ghostess with the Mostest". Nixon made guest appearances with Leonard Bernstein's Young People's Concerts, including in 1960, singing "Improvisation sur Mallarmé I" from Pli selon pli by Pierre Boulez, on April 9, 1961, in a program entitled "Folk Music in the Concert Hall", singing three "Songs of the Auvergne" by Joseph Canteloube. Before My Fair Lady was released in theatres in 1964, Nixon played Eliza in a revival of the musical at New York City Center. Nixon's first onscreen appearance was as Sister Sophia in the 1965 film The Sound of Music.
In the DVD commentary to the film, director Robert Wise comments that audiences were able to see the woman whose voice they knew so well. In 1967, she was the singing voice of Princess Serena in a live action and animated version of Jack and the Beanstalk on NBC. In the 1960s, but earlier and Nixon made concert appearances, specializing in contemporary music as a soloist with the New York Philharmonic, gave recitals at Carnegie Hall, Alice Tully Hall and Town Hall in New York City. Nixon taught at the California Institute of the Arts in Santa Clarita from 1969 to 1971 and joined the faculty of the Music Academy of the West, Santa Barbara, in 1980, where she taught for many years. In the late 1970s and early 1980s, she hosted a children's television show in Seattle on KOMO-TV channel 4 called Boomerang, winning four Emmy Awards as best actress, made numerous other television appearances on variety shows and as a guest star in prime time series. Nixon's opera repertory included Zerbinetta in Ariadne auf Naxos, Susanna in The Marriage of Figaro, both Blonde and Konstanze in Die Entführung aus dem Serail, Violetta in La traviata, the title role in La Périchole and Philine in Mignon.
Her opera credits included performances at Los Angeles Opera, Seattle Opera, San Francisco Opera and the Tanglewood Music Festival among others. In addition to giving recitals, she appeared as an oratorio and concert soloist with the New York Philharmonic under Leonard Bernstein, the Los Angeles Philharmonic, the Cleveland Orchestra, Toronto Symphony Orchestra, the London Symphony Orchestra and the Israel Philharmonic Orchestra among others. Nixon toured with Liberace and Victor Borge and in her own cabaret shows. On stage, in 1984, she originated the role of Edna Off-Broadway in Taking My Turn, composed by Gary William Friedman, receiving a nomination for a Drama Desk Award, she originated the role of Sadie McKibben in Opal, she had a 1997 film role as Aunt Alice in I Think I Do. Under her own name, beginning in the 1980s, Nixon recorded songs by Jerome Kern, George Gershwin and various classical composers, she was nominated for two Grammy Awards for Best Classical Performance, Vocal Soloist, one for her Schönberg album and one for her Copland album.
In the 1998 Disney film Mulan, Nixon was the singing voice of "Grandmother Fa". She returned to the stage, touring the United States as Fraulein Schneider in Cabaret in 1997–1998, she sang on more than 50 soundtrac
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