Bring Back Kate Warner!

Today marks the 10th anniversary of the introduction of one of my favorite TV characters of all time, the imperiled heroine Kate Warner (played by Australian actress Sarah Wynter) in Season 2 of "24."  She was originally conceived as a potential love interest for the series' protagonist Jack Bauer (Kiefer Sutherland), and debuted on the premiere episode of the second season, which aired October 29, 2002.  Throughout that season, Kate was the "true blue" good girl who often rose to the occasion and aided Jack in accomplishing his mission.  At the time, I was very intrigued with the character because I felt she quietly, and effectively, reflected the naivete, strength, and resolve of the American public, both before and after September 11th, an accomplishment that far surpassed her original conception as a mere romantic foil.

Kate Warner was introduced during the second season of “24” as the show’s new leading lady after her predecessor—Jack’s wife, Teri Bauer (Leslie Hope)—was murdered in the finale of the previous season.  She was the attractive daughter of millionaire industrialist Bob Warner (John Terry) who, as the season opened, was helping her younger sister, Marie (Laura Harris), prepare for her wedding.  Unlike the introduction of other new characters in subsequent seasons of "24," that I sometimes felt were shoved down our throats, the producers in Season 2 wisely eased Kate into the fabric of the series by having her do only two or three scenes in each of her first few episodes until she was firmly established into the plot.  

During Season 2, Kate suspects her sister Marie’s fiancée Reza of being involved with terrorists; learns that her father really works for the CIA; inadvertently gets her father arrested on suspicion of treason; is kidnapped by terrorists and tortured for information; is rescued by Jack Bauer and accompanies him on his day-long quest to prevent the detonation of a nuclear bomb in Los Angeles; enters a Mosque disguised as a worshipper, and without backup, to ID a suspect; helps Jack interrogate another suspect in Arabic; learns her own sister Marie (and not Reza) is actually the one who is in cahoots with the terrorists and almost gets killed by her; is asked to help retrieve evidence to prevent a war; gets locked in a car trunk after being traded by Jack with one of the villains in order to secure vital information; is almost killed by thugs while retrieving a computer chip with vital data; takes a quick bubble bath; and rescues Jack’s hapless daughter Kim Bauer from another dire situation in time for the penultimate scene where she reunites this estranged father and daughter for the Season’s finale (which takes place moments after witnessing another father-daughter relationship—her own father and sister—split apart forever).  

Sarah Wynter made Kate’s reactions, as the show’s resident civilian, to the events swirling about her believable and compelling, and became one of TV’s most underrated heroines.  I didn't see her as a mere plot device--I was always curious what would happen next to her character and was enthralled at the arc that the writers had created for her.  I disagreed with TV Guide’s Matt Roush when he stated that Kate is a “thankless” character that the show would be better off without.  In his hilarious Washington Post article, “Run, Kim, Run!,” Hank Steuver sarcastically quipped that the hapless teenage Kim Bauer “was us” because “Without meaning to, she has come to represent the vapidity and naive innocence of a Britney Nation caught up in something deadly serious, with only her wits and the occasional visibility of her nipples to save her."  From a less cynical perspective, it was really Kate, and not Kim, who better symbolizes civilian America in the face of adversity.  The early episodes of Season 2 depicted Kate as an intelligent, well-educated young woman so consumed by her own family’s personal problems that she fails to recognize the larger global implications of the events swirling on about her.  After she has been kidnapped and tortured for information, instead of shriveling in fear, Kate summoned up reservoirs of strength and courage in an effort to face danger and evil head on.  She could be forgiven at times for being wimpy (she was not a federal agent or law enforcement officer, after all) because her resolve never wavered even when it was clear she was not a stereotypical action heroine.  

By the end of the day, Kate experienced so much horror and violence that she came to the difficult, but inevitable, conclusion that the evils of the world cannot be easily rationalized.  At first disbelieving that her sister willingly aided the terrorists, Kate comes around by the time of the season finale when she returns to CTU in time to moderate a confrontation between her father and the apprehended Marie.  Separated behind a wall of glass, Marie Warner refuses to answer her father’s desperate pleas (“There MUST be a reason”) to explain her acts of treason.  Kate says simply, “There is no reason, Dad…Trust me…She’s not going to give you any answers.  She can’t.  At least nothing that we could ever understand.”  According to Salon.com’s Charles Taylor, “Kate speaks the truth (her father’s) good, rational liberalism cannot countenance…the pain of that scene is not that Marie has accepted madness, but that (Kate), having been through hell herself, having escaped torture and then death at the hands of her sister, is now in a position to understand the presence of the irrational at work.”  

  

After Kate was written out of the series, Jack Bauer was paired with romantic interests who were either connected to the DoD (Kim Raver's Audrey Raines) or was a Federal Agent (Annie Wersching's Renee Walker).  Kate’s absence left the show without a civilian outsider, who is not connected with the President’s inner circle or the Government, for the audience to identify with.  Kate remains, in the eyes of the series fans, one of the more controversial characters.  She was either loved or despised.  There was no middle ground on this issue.  Kate is as despised by some "24" fans as Tanya Roberts's Stacey Sutton in "A View to a Kill (1985) is despised by Bond movie fans.  Some fans were irritated by the character's inexperience and naivete because she was not a trained Federal agent with field experience.  Others felt Sarah Wynter's performance was stilted and complained bitterly about her facial expressions, which included a pensive frown and furrowed brow that I acknowledge was unflattering at times.  On the other hand, people like me enjoyed the subdued humanity that Wynter brought to the character.  Even if her facial expressions seemed unattractive at times, it just made her seem REAL.  It demonstrated to me that the otherwise beautiful and attractive Wynter was more concerned about bringing authenticity to her work as Kate than about her appearance.  Kate's lack of romantic chemistry with Jack was made up by the fact that Sutherland and Wynter had a genuine brother-sister rapport on-screen.  I liked the friendship that developed between their characters that season.  At the very least, I think Kate deserved better than being short shrifted in her send-off with simply a brief telephone scene in Season 3’s premiere episode.  Since then, Sarah Wynter followed-up her promising work on “24” by focusing more on her family life after she married Details magazine editor Dan Peres and had three sons.  I thought Wynter was a real up and comer when I became acquainted with her work 10 years ago, and I still hope she will have further opportunities to show what she's capable of.  

A couple of years ago, when “24” was filming its 7^th season in Washington, DC, I ran into the production crew of the series filming scenes near the Navy Memorial.  I recognized Executive Producer/Director Jon Cassar on the street between takes.  During an appropriate moment, I approached Mr. Cassar and said “There’s a question I’ve been wanting to ask you for almost 5 years now.  Why won’t you bring back Kate Warner, not even for just one episode?”  Mr. Cassar seemed incredulous and said “You LIKED Kate Warner?!”  I assured him that many fans of the show, especially people in Washington, DC, liked the character.  I guess my inquiry intrigued him, as he asked me to walk with him as he was directing the crew to set up the next shot.  We debated the whole Kate Warner issue for maybe about 10 or 15 minutes.  He said that the show’s producers concluded that Sarah Wynter simply didn’t have great romantic chemistry with Kiefer Sutherland, which contributed to her character’s departure.  I argued that the character should have been brought back, not as his girlfriend, but as a loyal and supportive friend who believed in him and was willing to help him at all costs.  He at least acknowledged that aspect of the character.  At the end of our conversation he said, “OK, dude, I never thought of her as anything more than his girlfriend, but for you I’ll do it.  I’ll bring her back.”   
 

Cassar left the series after that season, so Kate never had a chance to return to the series before it was finally cancelled.  (It's also possible that Cassar was insincere when he said he'd bring Kate back, just to appease me.)  Perhaps it’s just as well Kate never returned.  “24” had a bad history of regarding its characters as mere plot devices whose motivations and personalities could be changed on the whims of its lazy writers in a cheap effort to shock its audience.  And at least Kate didn't get killed or have her life ruined by being involved with Jack Bauer, like his other leading ladies were.  I would have hated to see Kate come back under those circumstances.  Kate had a character and story arc that remained consistent.  I like to think of Kate Warner as one of the few characters on “24” who was never compromised or ruined by its writers and producers. 

Charlie Chan and the Case of the Monogram Pictures Mysteries

 
Being of Asian ethnicity, I was highly aware of the Charlie Chan mystery movies of the 1930s and 1940s more by reputation than by actual viewing while I was growing up.  They simply weren't airing them as often on television in the 1970s and 1980s when I was a kid, probably due to concerns over political correctness.  I have seen many documentaries about the depictions of Asians in Hollywood, and the Chan series is often derided as ranking among the nadir of portrayals of Asians in cinema.  Thanks to YouTube, I've had an opportunity to catch up with these movies and make my own assessment of them.

The reason why the Chan films remain a troublesome issue is the fact that he was, after all, portrayed by Caucasian actors (first Warner Oland, then Sidney Toler, and then Roland Winters) who all played the role in a stereotypically stilted speaking style.  I have found that I am personally not offended by the series because I recognize that it had good intentions--it meant to portray an Asian character who was smart, respected by the community and by the world at-large not just by Caucasians but by all other ethnic groups as well, and who always brought the story to a resolution.  He was never a passive or subservient character standing by the sidelines.  It's just too bad that he wasn't played by an actual Asian actor--even though I hate political correctness, I acknowledge that this is a major caveat that has caused the series to remain controversial to this day.  

 
But I find that what redeems them is the fact that all the other Asian roles in the series are in-fact played by Asian actors.  In the Chan films I've seen so far, the other Asian actors play their roles with intelligence and, in the cases of the portrayals of Chan's many sons (played variously by Keye Luke, Victor Sen Yung or Benson Fong), they are allowed to have different facets of personalities on display.  They weren't just one-dimensionally stoic, they could be humorous, heroic, and romantic.  Even though the Chinese aspects of these characters are often highlighted and accentuated by the screenwriters, I think it's still preferable to the current politically correct portrayal of Asians in cinema and television, which tends to cast Asian actors into thankless roles as doctors or lawyers who make no significant contribution to the plot but are meant to fill some sort of casting quota.  Or even worse, casting Asian actors in roles with American or European-sounding last names, as if their Asian heritage was totally superfluous or expendable.  The Charlie Chan series remain fascinating because the racial aspects of these films contain both troubling as well as positive nuances.  On the one hand, they perpetuate the stereotype of the saintly wise, Confucius-quoting Chinese male who speaks in metaphors in an unnaturally stilted manner.  On the other hand, the series often refutes the conspiracy-laden "Yellow Peril" cultural stereotypes that regarded Asians with contempt, distrust and suspicion.  

 
One entry of the series, "The Trap" (1947) even calls attention to this cultural distrust of Asians when one of the characters, the hysterically pathetic blonde showgirl Clementine (Rita Quigley), accuses her female Asian colleague San Toy (Barbara Jean Wong) of murder simply because one of the victims had been strangled by a silk bathrobe cord, which the script alleges is a murder technique favored by the Chinese.  San Toy never wilts under the pressure of these false accusations:  She calmly and admirably confronts her accusers and is the one who calls in Charlie Chan to solve the mystery.  In particular with "The Trap," a film presumably written, produced, and directed by Caucasians, it is the Caucasian characters who are unflatteringly portrayed as emotional, hysterical, devious, manipulative, unintelligent, and vengeful.  It highlights how Asians and other ethnicities are arguably not treated any worse, or any differently, in the Chan series than the Caucasians.  

 
"The Trap" was one of the later Chan mysteries made at the Poverty Row grade-B studio, Monogram Pictures, after the original studio 20th Century-Fox ended their series of Chan films in 1942 (purportedly due to concerns of American audiences not being interested in watching an Asian hero on-screen after the Japanese attack on Pearl Harbor).  I actually prefer the Monogram Chan Films because of the addition of the gifted comedic African American actor Mantan Moreland as Chan's right-hand man/chauffeur Birmingham Brown to the ensemble.  Moreland himself is a controversial figure in cinema history, as some people have accused his style of comedy and on-screen image as being racist and unflattering towards African Americans.  While I acknowledge and can respect such concerns, I admit that I am a great fan of Mantan Moreland and I have personally found that his characters are often self-aware, street-smart, and sympathetic despite their apparent lack of sophistication or refinement.  In the storylines, I feel that the Chans regard Birmingham not as a servant, but as a valued member of their team.  I enjoy watching the genuine friendship and easy chemistry & camaraderie between Moreland's Birmingham Brown, Chan's various sons, and Chan himself.  They are great together.  

Monogram acknowledged Moreland's contribution to their films by often giving him equal billing in the credits and advertisements as the Caucasian actors.  In the Chan films, Moreland almost always received second- or third-place billing in the credits and he remained a mainstay of the series even after Sidney Toler died and was replaced by Roland Winters.  Even though the Chan films are not perfect by any stretch of the imagination, they are still notable when you consider how rare it is to find films in classic Hollywood cinema where characters of different ethnicities (including Asians, African Americans and Caucasians) are all sharing screen-time playing significant roles, and working together in a spirit of friendship and cooperation, to accomplish a common purpose. 

My Flight with Paul Wellstone (1944-2002)

This morning I read that it was the 10th anniversary of the death of Minnesota Democratic Senator Paul Wellstone in a tragic plane crash that also took the life of his wife and one of his children, as well as members of his staff and the plane's pilot.  You normally won't find me discussing anything remotely to do with politics on this blog, but I'll make an exception in his case.  I met him on an airline flight from Washington, DC to the West Coast in January 2001.  I had come to DC for a couple of days looking for work.  I was not successful in this endeavor and was returning to Los Angeles with my tail between my legs.  I noticed the gentleman sitting next to me in Coach looked familiar, but I couldn't place him at first.  Finally, I realized that I was sitting next to Senator Wellstone. 

I said Hello to him and was surprised to find that he was friendly and accessible.  He didn't seem to mind that I interrupted him reviewing the documents he brought on the flight to read, and actually seemed to welcome the company.  Now that I've worked in Washington, DC for several years, I can legitimately state that Wellstone's demeanor was as far from "DC" as you could imagine.  He was not fancy or ostentatious in his attire at all.  I recall he wore a plain dress shirt and tie and slacks that looked like it came off the rack in the department store.  It wasn't nearly as elegant or refined as the suits that is de rigueur for lawyers, lobbyists and elected officials in this town.  There is nothing wrong with dressing well--I like to dress in nice clothes for work everyday--but it was clear he wasn't trying to impress people with his appearance. 

What I remember the most was his kindness and sincerity and genuine modesty.  He did not seem like someone who was impressed with himself.  Now that I know more about his career in the Senate, all of these qualities helped epitomize what it truly means to be a public servant.  He asked what I was doing in Washington, DC.  I told him I was looking for work, but unsuccessful at it.  To my surprise, he asked if there was anything he could do to help me.  At the time, I considered myself much more conservative than I do now (I'm more of a moderate these days) and I remember saying "I'm not sure I'm the person you would want to help, because I think I'm on the other end of the political spectrum from you."  That didn't seem to deter him, because he still offered to help regardless of my political leanings at the time.  Senator Wellstone did not seem to be a judgmental person at all.  I remember he asked where I was from.  I told him I was from Los Angeles.  To my surprise, he talked about how he enjoyed his visits to Southern California through the years.  As someone who normally has people from the Mid-West or East Coast tell me how much they hate my hometown, I was pleased to see that the Senator didn't let popular opinion dictate his reactions to things.

When I learned of Senator Wellstone's death, I was actually on my way to visit DC again to check out law schools, which eventually led me to move the nation's capital and build a life and career here.  He had left a positive impression on me and so his death hit me hard.  He always seemed like someone who was real:  his sincerity and lack of pretense made him come across vulnerable and human.  Even though I only spent several hours with him on that flight, it was enough for me to come away feeling he was a genuinely good person. 

The Forgotten Prince

Growing up a big movie/TV buff, there was one actor who was always a favorite of mine, but I am ashamed to admit that I did not rhapsodize about him the way I would others.  In a sense, I sort of took him for granted, even though he was one of our finest and most underrated actors ever, but I always sincerely enjoyed his work.  I recently rediscovered William Prince while watching him in the underrated screwball comedy "Pillow to Post" (1945) starring Ida Lupino and Sydney Greenstreet.  Lupino plays a flaky heiress who takes on a sales job with her father's oil rig company in an effort to help contribute to the war effort after her father's regular salesman has left for the frontlines.  She finds, while traveling from town-to-town that the only way she can get a room for the night at local motels is if she pretends to be a military spouse.  She persuades hapless Army Lieutenant Prince to help sign in with her at the motor court where she has been promised a room, but complications ensue when Prince's commanding officer (Greenstreet) happens to live in the same motor court.  In an effort to avoid being court-martialed, Prince and Lupino must continue the ruse of being married as their little white lie spirals out of control.

Prince made this film during his brief tenure under contract at Warner Brothers during the 1940s after Warners discovered him while he was appearing in The Eve of St. Mark on Broadway.  He had already appeared in several Broadway plays by that point, including productions of "Hamlet," "King Henry IV, Part I," and "Ah, Wilderness!"  Many of Prince's roles at Warner Brothers cast him in roles that reflected how the country was currently at war.  He officially debuted on-screen in the featured role of Pills, the athiest ship's pharmacist who unexpectedly finds religious faith, in the classic submarine drama "Destination Tokyo" (1943) starring Cary Grant.  He next appeared as Andrea King's sailor husband, who discovers while on leave from the Navy that his wife did not remain faithful to him, in Warners's touching homefront drama "The Very Thought of You" (1944).  Prince cameo'd as himself volunteering at the "Hollywood Canteen" (1944)--he appears very briefly in the Andrews Sisters musical number "Gettin' Corns for My Country," wearing an apron and carrying a tray filled with milk bottles while serving GI Dane Clark.  Prince was the ill-fated high school history teacher from Schenectady, Lt. Sid Jacobs, tortured to death by Japanese soldiers, in Raoul Walsh's "Objective, Burma!" (1945) starring Errol Flynn.  Prince's face is off-screen when Flynn finds his dying character, but his voice effectively conveyed Lt. Jacob's anguish and pain that the scene has always been sad and touching.

After playing mostly serious roles, it was refreshing to see Prince display his comedic chops in "Pillow to Post."  He is absolutely hilarious as the hapless Army Lieutenant whose military career is threatened by Lupino's scatterbrained heiress.  Unlike many of his other Warner Brothers films, Prince actually gets to be the leading man in this film, winning the girl at the end, and doesn't have to play second-fiddle to Cary Grant or Errol Flynn.  He and the surprisingly hilarious Ida Lupino have great chemistry together.  I particularly like the humorous way Prince gets embarrassed and awkward while watching Lupino adjust her stockings getting dressed in the morning.  Prince's wide-eyed and nervous reactions to the events un-spooling around him adds to the hilarity of the film.  He isn't just playing the stuffy straight-man in this underrated comedy.  It would have been nice to have seen them paired together in more comedies at Warner Brothers.  For those who are now curious about the movie, you can watch it on YouTube here.

Alas, it wasn't to be.  Prince's Hollywood movie career never quite took off, and he returned to Broadway within four years to star in the hit "John Loves Mary" with Nina Foch.  The remainder of his 1940s film output included the Busby Berkeley comedy "Cindarella Jones" (1946) with Joan Leslie; the film noirs "Shadow of a Woman" (1946) and "Dead Reckoning" (1947); Edgar G. Ulmer's off-beat musical drama "Carnegie Hall" (1947), where he had another rare leading role playing a musician torn between his mother's desire to be a classical music pianist, and a jazz musician; reunited with Lupino (though not playing her leading man) in the western "Lust for Gold" (1949); and playing the bland Christian opposite Jose Ferrer's Oscar-winning performance in "Cyrano De Bergerac" (1950).  Prince's role in "Cyrano" is generally considered his best screen role, but I still prefer him in "Pillow to Post," where his character is less inherently colorless and he has more to do.

Prince spent most of the 1950s and 1960s based in New York, and enjoyed a very prestigious and successful career appearing on Broadway, live TV anthology dramas, and daytime soaps.  His rare movie role during this time was the lead in William Castle's suspense thriller "Macabre" (1958).  Some of Prince's most notable Broadway productions during this time included "As You Like It" with Katharine Hepburn, originating the role of Christopher Isherwood in "I Am a Camera," "Mary, Mary," "The Ballad of the Sad Cafe," and "The Little Foxes" opposite Anne Bancroft.  Later on, however, he enjoyed a career renaissance when his movie and TV appearances picked up steam in the 1970s thanks to roles in "The Stepford Wives" (1975), Alfred Hitchcock's final film "Family Plot" (1976), Sidney Lumet's "Network" (1976), "The Gauntlet" (1977) with Clint Eastwood, and many others.  He also distinguished countless TV movies and miniseries including "Sybil" (1976), "Captains and the Kings" (1976), "Gideon's Trumpet" (1980), and "War and Remembrance" (1988) playing Admiral Chester Nimitz.

William Prince was an excellent character actor who helped enhance everything he was ever in.  He always had decent parts but, as a fan of his work, I wish he was given more showy roles on the big or small screen where he could truly distinguish himself.  It was likely that it was on the Broadway stage that he was given the opportunities to demonstrate what he was capable of.  To this day, he is still a bit of a mystery figure in the history of TV and movies.  Prince rarely gave interviews, so one has no clue what his real-life persona was truly like, or what he thought of his career.  In addition, Prince's name is rarely mentioned in interviews conducted with his colleagues, adding to the mystery of who he was.  Internet searches of his name inevitably turn up references to Prince William of England, and not to "William Prince" the actor.  I wrote him a fan letter when I was still in High School in the late 1980s.  I received in the mail a few weeks later a short note and a picture, which was not autographed.  I think, because Mr. Prince was such a busy character actor at the time, he may have forgotten to sign the photo before he mailed it.  Because his response to my letter was so short, that made him even more mysterious to me.

Nevertheless, even though very little has been written about him, Prince always remained an interesting, accessible actor which is why I believe he is worthy of rediscovery.  He never came across as an affected "thee-uh-tah" actor.  Because he worked so much in films and TV in his later years, more than making up for his abbreviated tenure as a leading man at Warner Brothers in the 1940s, I choose to believe that Prince was not a typical Broadway stage elitist who looked down his nose at his brief opportunity as a Hollywood leading man.  I'd like to believe he enjoyed his Warners tenure and that he was content with his impressive accomplishments as an actor.  He certainly had a career that most aspiring actors would envy.

The Shrewd, "Street Smart" Ann Rutherford

Noah called her back sooner than we expected.

I am referencing a running joke that the late actress, and my friend, Ann Rutherford always made about her incredible vitality and longevity.  She often joked that she came over with Noah on the Ark and that, until Noah called for her to come home, she intended to live life to the fullest, but that she didn't expect him to come calling for her for another 30 years, at least!  Unfortunately, for the rest of us, 30 years came too quickly.  She passed away on Monday at age 91. 

As you may have already read from most of her obituaries, Ann Rutherford was a contract player at MGM and 20^th Century-Fox in the 1930s and 1940s.  She was best known for playing Polly Benedict in a dozen entries of the “Andy Hardy” series opposite Mickey Rooney, as well as playing Careen O’Hara, Scarlett’s kind and level-headed younger sister, in “Gone with the Wind” (1939).  I became friends with Ann while researching  a book I am still working on about the Hollywood Canteen during WWII.  It was a servicemen's nightclub where the movie stars of the era entertained and danced with military personnel who were in Los Angeles before being deployed overseas.  Ann was listed on Wikipedia as one of the movie stars who entertained there.  So I wrote to her to ask if I could interview her about it.  She called me on the phone after she received my letter.  It turns out Wikipedia was wrong (surprise, surprise!), she did not volunteer at the Canteen.  But she did extensively tour the country selling War bonds and visiting military installations to entertain the troops.  I still interviewed her because I felt her anecdotes about selling War bonds and visiting military installations would be relevant, and they were.  She had great anecdotes and insights about WWII and how Hollywood responded to the war effort.  We stayed good friends as a result.  She introduced me to her friends such as Anne Jeffreys, Joan Leslie, and Faye McKenzie who I also interviewed about their WWII memories volunteering at the Canteen.  I would look her up when I visited Los Angeles, and I spent time with her when she was visiting the Williamsburg Film Festival in the Spring of 2011, and we talked on the phone frequently.  When I think of it now, it amazes me how we became fast friends and she was just an incredibly positive, encouraging person.

Many of the write-ups and obituaries, I am happy to say, are very respectful, but only one managed to capture what I feel was the essence of Ann Rutherford.  In Adam Bernstein’s well-researched and well-written essay on Ann in the June 13, 2012 issue of the  Washington Post, Bernstein cites her business acumen and shrewdness in dealing with the studio bosses at MGM.  Bernstein hits the nail right on the head.  She was an incredibly intelligent and shrewd person, and her native street smarts allowed her to survive and thrive in the jungle known as Hollywood.  She never suffered fools gladly and knew how to take care of herself and her finances (which many actors and actresses, I am sorry to say, do not know how to do).  I learned a lot from her about being a business professional, and how one must diligently explore all opportunities that are presented to them in life.  She told me how, between making movies at MGM, she would do magazine and newspaper interviews and radio shows because she realized that doing publicity was important in helping to maintain a career.  She felt networking was as important, if not more so, than the actual work as an actress because she realized that, if people don't know who you are, they won't pay money to see you in a movie. 

She was never pretentious and never copped an "artsy" attitude as an actress, even though she did a lot of fine work and was as accomplished an actress as any of her peers—she worked in theatre, movies, radio and television during her career.  She had no patience for pretentious “thespians” who thought they were too good for Hollywood or the responsibilities that came with working in the movies.  (Believe you me, there are plenty of them and I can think of one particular pretentious actress, for example…but I’ll save that for another time!)  I think Ann lacked any sort of pretentions because she knew how fortunate she was to have broken into the business and she wasn’t hindered by false pride and false humility the way other actors and actresses, who openly disdained the dictates of the classic Hollywood studio system, were.  Having been brought up during the Great Depression and living through WWII, Ann never had a sense of entitlement or elitism.  She knew that striving for success was what regular people hoped to achieve for themselves, and was nothing to be ashamed of.  I think she felt that everybody owed it to themselves to fulfill their goals and aspirations, no matter what it was.  This had to do with the fact that she never lost touch with the "common man."  As far as she was concerned, she was part of the "common folk" and never pretended to be better than they were. 

There's a story she told that took place when she was a young teenager.  She and a bunch of kids in the neighborhood built a boat and sailed to Catalina.  She had packed sandwiches for lunch and when they were far from shore, the calking of the boat came loose because it hadn't dried, and the boat started sinking and capsized.  She remembered seeing her sandwiches unwrapping from their paper and sinking to the bottom of the ocean.  She and her friends clung to the side of the boat until she saw a ship from far in the distance.  It was the USS Arizona, and its crew spotted her and her friends and rescued them and later, towed their little boat back to shore.  Years later, when the Japanese attack on Pearl Harbor occurred, she was deeply affected because that ship had saved her life.  But she told the story very matter-of-factly, with very little drama or emotion, and I think her calm reaction to that day reflects her survival instincts were already intact from an early age.

Ann appreciated the fan letters and interest in her career, especially when it came to discussing "Gone with the Wind."  She was indeed deeply proud of "The Wind," as she would call it, and felt like she was both the book and the movie's cultural ambassador at times.  But, even though she had a healthy appreciation for her past, she lived very much in the present.  She was always active, going out to social events, seeing friends, traveling, staying engaged in the world.  (Ann would always joke about “going dancing in the streets together!” whenever she described planning a get-together with any of her friends.)  At her home, there were no mementos from her career displayed anywhere, just photos of her family and friends in the living room.  She valued the close relationship she had with her daughter Gloria, her grandsons, and her stepdaughter Debbie.  She told me once that she got married and started a family after Louis B. Mayer sold her MGM contract to 20^th Century-Fox, where she was miserable.  She found the atmosphere at Fox to be oppressive, and studio head Darryl Zanuck did nothing for her career—he cast her in thankless roles in B movies, and loaned her out constantly to other studios.  She decided that, since she had little control over the direction of her movie career, it was time for her to focus on her personal life.  This was a woman who always made proactive choices in her life. 

Her best friend was actress Anne Jeffreys.  The two were inseparable and were great fun to be around.  They often traveled together, went to shows and premieres in town together, and always made sure they were color-coordinated in the elegant clothes and fashions they wore to events.  But, most importantly, they really looked out for each other and cared deeply for one another.  It is appropriate that Jeffreys was the one who was by Ann’s bedside when she passed away at home on Monday.  I am glad Jeffreys was there for Ann at the end. 

Turner Classic Movies plans to honor Ann on July 3^rd with a 10-movie marathon that day.  It climaxes that evening with an airing of “Gone with the Wind.”  I think Ann would have appreciated that.  She once told me that all she ever wanted was to work in this wonderful industry—Hollywood--that had allowed her to be a part of it, and not take anything away from anybody.  The evidence indicates she accomplished all of that and much, much more.

A Universal Centennial

I was reminded that earlier this week was the 100th anniversary of the founding of Universal Pictures.  I make note of it because, ever since I was a child, Universal has always been my favorite of the major Hollywood studios.  My interest in Universal started because of the fact that the Universal Studios Tour was an attraction that always held a great mystique for me.  Everytime we went on the studio tour, I had a wonderful time, imagining all of the movies and TV shows that were shot there.  But it wasn't just that alone.  It had to do with the fact that Universal made most of my favorite movies and TV shows throughout the years.  I could sit here and recite the 1930s and 1940 horror classics that I used to record on our family VCR from KTLA Channel 5's "Movies 'til Dawn" during Junior High School.  I could discuss how much I enjoyed the Deanna Durbin musicals that I discovered on KDOC Channel 56.  I could describe how much I enjoyed the "Airport" disaster movies of the 1970s.  Or I could discuss how "Dragnet" and "Adam-12" reruns made my hometown of Los Angeles seem like it was the most exciting city in the world.

I grew to love Universal movies and shows so much that I can immediately recognize the sets and building facades on sight.  I can also recognize a particular staircase that appeared in countless productions.  I think it was called the "Notre Dame" staircase and was originally constructed for their silent production of "The Hunchback of Notre Dame."  I saw it used often in many Universal horror films, including "The Wolf Man" (1941) and "Night Monster" (1942) and saw it as recently as the 1980s in a "Murder, She Wrote" episode.  It would be repainted or redressed for each production it appeared in, but I always knew it was the same staircase.

Sometimes Universal's detractors criticize the studio for how it became mostly a television studio by the 1960s through the 1980s and that the quality of its feature films during that time often looked like it was made-for-television.  I won't dispute that argument because I often felt it myself.  It may not have been a studio that promoted individuality in terms of its directors during that time, but I would argue that it had an identifiable branding as a studio so that a Universal Picture couldn't be mistaken for a movie from any other studio.

In college, I had a summer internship at Universal and I truly enjoyed being there everyday.  I had chills going down my spine in realizing that I was standing where many of my favorite movies and shows were made.  Whenever I visit Universal Studios Tour, I still get that feeling.  It is nice how some things that were a big deal since childhood still have an effect on you when you are an adult.

Tanya Roberts' first film "The Last Victim"

 
The other night, I discovered on YouTube a rare 1975 film called "The Last Victim" starring Tanya Roberts in her acting debut.  It is a gritty suspense/horror film that was directed by Jim Sotos and written and produced by Henry Scarpelli, an esteemed artist responsible for the "Archie" comic book series.  "The Last Victim" spends its running time cutting back and forth between two characters.  The first one is Carl (Ron Max), a garage mechanic who is also a serial rapist/killer of young women in the areas surrounding Staten Island and Verona, New Jersey.  The scenes featuring Carl attacking women are truly disturbing and I skimmed through those sections.  Perhaps the movie came across a bit too believable so that those scenes were more unsettling than expected.

The second, much more compelling, character is Nancy (Tanya Roberts), a modest, low-key suburban housewife with two children, a nice home, and a successful husband who has turned emotionally distant to her.  She is, in essence, the title character of the film--the last victim.  Throughout much of the running time, we see Nancy going about her business running errands, preparing meals for her family, picking up and dropping her children off at school, bringing the family car to the service station, and feeling a bit stifled by her lonely existence as her husband Peter (Brian Freilino) has clearly taken her for granted and begun neglecting her.  Unbeknownst to her, Carl has become obsessed with Nancy and starts stalking her at all hours, calling her on the phone and hanging up, and the audience begins to dread what he has in-mind for her.  In the last 30 minutes of the film, while Peter is away on a business trip and her children are at school, Nancy is terrorized and held hostage by Carl when he breaks into her house.

The last act of the film is very sad and depressing to watch because, by that point, Roberts has created a very sympathetic, believable character in Nancy.  I had read about "The Last Victim" for years and, as much as I have always liked Tanya Roberts, I thought it odd that she was cast as a housewife when I knew she must have been only 20 years old when the film was shot.  I was skeptical as to whether she would be believable in the role.  Actually, Roberts gives probably the best performance, and has the most complex role, of her career in this modest little horror film.  She effectively conveys Nancy's sweet and meek nature so that, even before Carl breaks into her home, you are already rooting for her to break out of her unhappy, lonely existence.  In fact, all of the scenes depicting Nancy's family and homelife have a remarkably authentic feel, as if the audience is peering into the lives of their neighbors next door.  The believably mundane aspects of Nancy's suburban malaise existence makes her character easily much more compelling than the obvious and overt Carl serial-killer storyline.  Roberts plays Nancy in a low-key, natural style that never seems false.  Unlike the glamorous Tanya Roberts we would later come to know in "Charlie's Angels," "The Beastmaster" (1982), "Sheena" (1984) and "A View to a Kill" (1985), the Tanya Roberts of "The Last Victim" is pretty and attractive, but in a realistically modest manner.  Wearing an atypical page-boy haircut and demure clothes, Roberts brings dignity to the character even in the final act of the film when Carl terrorizes her.  In contrast to the other victims in "The Last Victim," Tanya Roberts's Nancy does no explicit nudity (except for a very brief shower scene), suggesting that the filmmakers were reserving their sense of propriety for her.  The final confrontation between Nancy and Carl is well-acted and suspenseful, as you have no confidence that Nancy will survive the encounter.  I found the final shot of the movie, a view of Nancy's house from across the street as her children return home from school, haunting and memorable.  Because we do not see or hear her children's reaction to the scene of horror they have walked into, the movie leaves you with an understanding that Nancy's family will be living with the ramifications of Carl's actions long after the credits have rolled.

"The Last Victim" is also available on YouTube in an alternate version entitled "Forced Entry."  This version was released on VHS in 1984, after Tanya Roberts and Nancy Allen, who has a small role as one of Carl's victims, had risen to prominence in the ensuing decade.  (Several years ago, Code Red DVD had announced that they were releasing a special edition DVD of this film with both "The Last Victim" and the "Forced Entry" versions to allow the viewers to compare them side-by-side.  Unfortunately, that DVD has still not seen the light of day.)  "Forced Entry" is a heavily doctored version of "The Last Victim" that botches whatever virtues the original had in its favor.  Obviously inspired by Martin Scorsese's "Taxi Driver" (released the year after "The Last Victim" was originally shot), the new "Forced Entry" version features ridiculous steam-of-consciousness narration illustrating Carl's rambling, psychotic thoughts; replaces the original music on "The Last Victim" soundtrack with a new score; reassembles the sequencing of the scenes to bring Tanya Roberts (who is mostly absent in the first 20 minutes of "The Last Victim" version) into prominence earlier in the story; removes the effectively chilling montage during the opening credits of black and white photos from real-life crime scenes (establishing the notion that the movie we are about to see is a case study of one of those types of crimes) accompanied by an ominous "doink doink" music that predates "Law & Order;" and tacks on a ridiculous epilogue depicting various characters in town narrating their thoughts about Carl and of the events that have transpired in the film (which dilutes the impact of the hauntingly ambiguous original ending).  They even have another actress narrating Nancy's role in the new epilogue, as Tanya Roberts was likely unavailable and unaffordable by that point in her career.

Probably the most unfortunate change in "Forced Entry" is the deletion of a sequence that existed in "The Last Victim" version where Nancy daydreams of happier times with her husband Peter.  While an effectively syrupy 1970s Karen Carpenter-type love song plays on the soundtrack, Nancy thinks back to times when she and Peter were still deeply in love and remembers moments when they took the children to the amusement park, went fishing with them, went on picnics, played in the yard, etc.  Deleting this sequence from "Forced Entry" removes Nancy's inner turmoil as we also lose any suggestion that her marriage is troubled, making her character less complex, more objectified and stylized, and unfairly tipping the scale of importance between characters in favor of the repulsive Carl.  Because Roberts is so sympathetic in the lead role, the sequence avoids being maudlin and allows the viewer to understand what Nancy has already lost in her marriage and deepens the sadness of "The Last Victim."  You begin to understand that Carl's reprehensible actions in the final act of the film did not cause the destruction of Nancy's family and existence.  Sadly, her home had already cracked long before he broke into it.