Monday, September 10, 2018

FILM #2


Posted by Chic Silber at 9/10/2018 12:41:00 AM

4 comments:

Chic Silber said...


I've never been much of

a movie goer so I haven't

seen most of these but

the titles are familiar

Dumbo & La Strada were

among my several dozen

10 September, 2018 01:15
Roger Smith said...

Eddie Dullem told me what he would call "the vile details" of this 1956 entry.

Joanne Dru, a rather 2nd tier actress, conducted herself as the great movie queen, and very vocally disdained having to work with "these circus people". Producer Hal Wallis ordered her to hit her marks, work the script, and keep her comments to herself, or catch the next bus back to Hollywood. Ms. Dru huffily complied.

Wallis took one look at Paramount's idea of circus clowns, and called them "god-awful Halloween clowns". He sent them away, and held clown shots until the Beatty alley returned from winter dates, so he could shoot real circus clowns. Jerry Lewis later wrote that Beatty's clowns befriended him and gave him working pointers on his film role.

Paramount agreed to pay Beatty for the use of his circus, which was returned to the same fairgrounds lot in Phoenix on which was shot his Warner Bros. film, RING OF FEAR. But the studio balked at paying for the Beatty name, so they renamed their circus as CLYDE BRENT CIRCUS, and paid to paint that title on the wagons, then to re-paint the show as Beatty had it. When I got to Jungleland, we still had 3 of the CLYDE BRENT wagons, but they soon were donated away by Louis Goebel.

Jerry Lewis, as Jerico the Clown, did a comedy bit around the arena, with Chet Juszyk actually handling the Jungleland lions, and a comic actor playing the "lion tamer". If you look closely, you see the lions supposedly working, with the arena man-door standing open. Beatty himself did not appear in the film.

Dean Martin demanded his first song come earlier in the film than in the script, and re-working of the scene was scheduled to accommodate him. It was during this production that Martin and Lewis began to realize their time as a team was to end. I had seen them in person at the State Fair Music Hall, in Dallas,in the early '50s, when they were at the height of their fame. They were a sensation. This picture was their last work together, and both went on to successful solo careers.

Somehow, the film was later re-released under the title of JERICO THE CLOWN.

10 September, 2018 20:34
Paul Gutheil said...

Roger, Roger, Thank You, Thank You !!!

And thanks Chic for keeping things going.

11 September, 2018 14:31
Chic Silber said...


VistaVision was Paramount's

version of wide screen format

It utilized an anamorphic lens

very similar to CinemaScope

Both the cameras & projectors

required these same lenses

11 September, 2018 23:12

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