The following frame enlargements from Cecil B. DeMille’s The Greatest Show on Earth show some of the wild/exotic animals that appear in the train wreck sequence. Since these scenes were all filmed on a Hollywood soundstage, it would have been more convenient for DeMille to use Los Angeles-based animals, along with their trainers and handlers. Roger Smith should be able to provide us with more information on the people who supplied the animals and/or who appear with them on-screen. |
Monday, June 03, 2013
DeMille In Action! #1 (From Eric Beheim)
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3 comments:
The young daughter of one of DeMille’s associates once referred to him as “Cecil B. DeMolish.”
This is the Curtis cage that Thayer identified as # 29 on the 1938 Hagenbeck-Wallace. Three of these old cages were used in the wreck scene.
Anyone interested in these should read Thayer in the Nov-Dec 1971 Bandwagon and Potter in the January-February 1973 issue.
I love the "DeMolish" monicker. The girl was right. Look at how C.B. got Victor Mature to slay the lion and tear down the temple, and look at Charlton Heston smashing the 10 Commandments on the Golden Calf.
As many of us know, Louis Goebel had the 1938 Hagenbeck-Wallace equipment at the Compound, when Howard Y. Bary went broke with the show in Los Angeles. Along with all the other remnants of shows Goebel acquired, he did a land office business in renting circus equipment to Hollywood. DeMille's artists certainly flashed up these cages, just to DeMolish them again.
As for giving IDs, this lioness was told to me to be Luna, from a Dick McGraw act. I can't see who that is still jammed at the door.
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