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Warm 99th Birthday Wishes to this Ghoulishly Gorgeous Canadian Bomb Shell. Now (Sadly) Only With Us In Spirit, On Screen, and In Narrative. Christened, Peggy Yvonne Middleton: 1922. Vancouver, Canada.

This seems like an unnecessary response, unless you're a fan of cutting off your nose to spite your face. No one will notice if you stop watching, in any case--it will not make a "statement" that anyone would hear. The more obvious solution would be to either begin watching only a few minutes after the listed start time, or (if you have any concern about possibly missing the beginning of the film itself), simply mute the TV during the intros. I assume that, like most viewers, you don't always listen to those anyway. Of course, if you're recording a film and watching it later, just fast forward through the intro. Whenever I visit a museum exhibit, I always appreciate whatever explanatory notes happen to be posted on the wall, giving historical context to the artworks in question. Of course, I'm always free to either read or ignore those if I'm not interested or don't want to take the time. By comparison, the potentially annoying thing about any TCM intros you don't like is that (at least if you're watching "live") they do take time. So just employ one of the strategies listed above. Also, keep in mind that TCM is in a no-win situation here. If they say nothing, by continuing to show these films they are seen as giving tacit approval to the notion that blackface is still an acceptable form of entertainment. The cynical view is that they are simply "covering their a**" by mentioning the problem at all. But by taking the extra step of acknowledging the problematic aspects of these films, they're presumably also attempting to forestall any future efforts at censoring them--an outcome I doubt many TCM viewers would welcome. Finally, I would add that expecting any channel to conform to your exact specifications and preferences 24 hours a day, especially one that is commercial-free, is simply not realistic. These historical framing devices are aimed primarily at viewers who might lack the breadth of viewing experience you apparently have. Overall, your post has the tone (and effect) of someone asking those whippersnappers to get off his damn lawn. Except it's not (only) your lawn.

Mr. Karger, it is not necessary to "warn" us about "characters in Black faces," as during your intro to "Yankee Doodle Dandy." We're, generally, a mature-adult, well-adapted viewing audience who grew up watching classic films. Personally, I have never found it "uncomfortable" or offensive to watch characters in Black faces, nor has any member of our local classic film club. Watching classic movies is, purely, entertainment. So, please, Mr. Karger, [we] hope you DO NOT make it a regular practice of lecturing us regarding social, racial or moral issues, again. Next, you'll be "warning" us about LGBT, ethnic cartoon characters, Charlie Chan, Benito Juarez (characters portrait by non-ethnic actors), etc. We are not adolescents, Mr. Karger, and you are not old enough to lecture us. We are fully capable of, consciously, acknowledging [for ourselves] "where we've been and how far we've come." Don't spoil it for us! Mr. Karger, you are wrong. It is NOT uncomfortable to watch "characters in Black faces", but it is uncomfortable to hear you lecture us on morality. Should TCM hosts not refrain from lecturing us about racial depictions and such, I will not hesitate to stop watching the channel, permanently. That's why Robert Osborne was such a great host--- He never made his audience feel uncomfortable. No more warnings, please! Ed, 25-Year TCM Fan.

Men: 1879 Victor Sjöström 1887 James Finlayson 1905 Eddie “Rochester” Anderson 1908 Fred MacMurray (from the "MacMurray method") 1913 Alan Ladd 1913 Anthony Quayle 1927 Peter Falk 1947 Sam Neill 1957 Stephen Fry 1972 Idris Elba Women: 1907 Faye Wray 1916 Margaret Lockwood 1931 Haya Harareet 1940 Anna Karina 1947 Barbara Bach 1952 Angela Cartwright 1958 Jennifer Tilly 1964 Maggie Cheung 1976 Carice van Houten 1980 Michelle Williams

Fredric March Van Johnson Peter Sellers Adam West Larry Hagman Hugh Grant Michael Jackson Richard Gere Mel Ferrer Richard Attenborough

We don't agree with you.

Cameron Diaz Salma Hayek Colin Firth Bill Murray Claudette Colbert Greta Garbo Ingrid Bergman Lauren Bacall Vera Miles Gene Kelly Charles Boyer Sean Connery

You use the term "we" but you are only one person. You were not elected to represent some "we" group, right? While I don't need these so called warning they don't make me feel "uncomfortable". Thus I just ignore them. Oh, and to practice cancel culture by boycotting TCM is ironic. I believe it is foolish as well (since I go to TCM for the films and not the host talk), but to each his own.

Well I hope the 'refresh' will not have the effect of an Ex-Lax on me...

Reading the opening post brought a smile. I don't laugh enough and that was funny. 😀 → Hey, TCM, I wanna see mor films with Irmgard Bergmen, Bella Lewgozti, Mevloin Duglass, etc do you peepul running TCM unnderstand whut Im' tryinG to say? Your failing in your misshun to eddukate vieiwers on klassic flims! You big dum dummyheads! Iam so dissapointed in you fore doign this to me! U peepul suck! Signed, a REAlly po'd vieiwer from Great Hump, Wyoming (P.S. Im' canselling my sbuscirption to TCM rite now! U wont' get a sent (cent) form me now or forever! Well I was a loya L fan until u screwed it up! I'm so angrey rite now i could eat bullets for brkeafust! Screw yu!) 😊

Agreed. While the show does make some references to current 1970s events and personalities, on the whole, it is a timeless show and not dated. The issues and themes presented in the show were present in 1970 and are present now. For the most part, TMTMS focused on the relationships between people, which will always be a modern topic. I remember when I discovered TMTMS as a 10-11 year old in 1994-1995 and loved it. While some of the themes might have been lost to a 5th-6th grader, I still loved it. I loved all the characters, especially Mary, Rhoda and Lou. Even though I wasn't old enough to have watched the show when it was first run, it was one of the shows I grew up watching. TMTMS is my second favorite show after "I Love Lucy."

My favorite Roddy McDowall bad guy role is the despicable money-hungry nephew in the NIGHT GALLERY pilot, the first tale called THE CEMETARY who (SPOILER ALERT)..... speeds up the death of his elderly uncle (George Macready) in order to get his mitts on his fortune....only the nephew ends up being tormented to his own grave when he starts seeing the painting of a cemetery where his uncle is buried changing with his uncle rising from his coffin and knocking on the door. Very spooky tale with a very chilling ending, and McDowall made a great heel in that one.

The site has an A-Z list for the TCM section: Currently there are 114 rows of 5 films each so there are actually around 570+ films to choose from right now. From this small example you can see how much of it is Criterion titles.

John Mellencamp's film on his tour in 2000 dropped today on TCM's YouTube channel. Interesting choice. The companion album was also released today. Apparently he's going to be a guest programmer next month, per this article. http://www.gratefulweb.com/articles/john-mellencamp-release-good-samaritan-tour-2000-live-album

Really, after watching so many episodes the only complaint I have to make about the series is that it had a hard time bringing some of these long running stories (1895, 1970 parallel time, The Leviathons) to a fully satisfying conclusion.

Ergo your own?

The Eddy Duchin Story was one of the sleeper box office hits of 1956. Based upon the poster below Columbia was placing an emphasis upon the romantic aspects of its story in order to sell the film. Kim Novak, a Columbia contract player, got a big push in the advertising. Victoria Shaw, on the other hand, who was in probably in the film about as much as Kim, barely got a mention. Not a surprise, really, since Shaw was not a budding star like Kim. Nor was she, to the best of my knowledge, under contract to the studio.

The Republican Party lost its way with Trump. It became a bunch of hate-spewing extremists. As a result, more moderate conservatives were forced to become independent or else switch over to the other side and become moderate liberals. But that's another story.

Wrong year of the films; wrong plot descriptions; wrong actor's names... What's going on with TCM. Just saw the plot description for Anna Karenina with Greta Garbo lisiting Freddie Bartholomew as Count Vronsky instead of Frederick March! How many times have the years of 1930s films been listed as 2000 something. Looked at the profile for Lee Patrick, character actress in many films such as Maltese Falcon, Mildred Pierce and played Topper's wife on the TV show. In the profile they kept refering to Ms. Patrick as "he" and "him". I wrote to TCM about that over a year ago and they seem to have corrected that although the pictures of Ms.. Patrick are those of Lee Tracey, a male actor! Also the little synopsis of the various movie plots has been wrong, wrong, wrong on numerous occasions. Case in point: Ben Mankowitz's description of Desk Set recently stating that Spencer Tracey's character was going to install a computer with the intention of replacing workers in the research department. Not true! That was never his intention and he states that in the movie! Even the noir guy recently gave the wrong plot for one of the movies. There is so much more. TCM has gotten sloppy, sloppy, sloppy. TCM needs new quality control people and fast. I'm looking for a new career so TCM get in touch and I'll show you how it should be done.

I warned you of: Fluffy (1965). You then watched it. I warned you of: King of Thieves (2018). You now say that you wish to watch it. It appears obvious that you do not wish my help or advice. Go ahead and watch: Mutant Vampire Zombies from the 'Hood! (2008), Curse of the Pink Panties (2007) or Blubberella (2011) for all I care! 😉

Jack Palance would have matched the actual looks of Duchin better than Power but then the producers would have had to cast someone other than Kim Novak to avoid the "no way a gal that looks like this would be with some guy that looks like that!". PS: The point being that casting is done to fill the seats and not to be representative of the actual characters. E.g. look at the posters for the film. Clearly they were designed to highlight this beautiful couple.

Wow. One of my step sisters had one that also included a reel-to-reel tape recorder/player. Looked a block long! Sepiatone

You really have a maso streak. First Fluffy and now King of Thieves. What is going on over there?

If you have a smart TV, then you likely have the Watch TCM app on it. You can search for it through your TV's search interface. As an example, my Roku TV has the Watch TCM app. You can install it and then have access to it on your TV. One other option is to cast it from your laptop, desktop or tablet to your smart TV. Details depend on your computer's operating system and brand of TV.

What's happening here is that conservative viewers don't like being lectured by hosts who represent liberal media.

The Tender Trap - Frank sings - The Tender Trap Donald O'Connor

Strange but I was @ to post on TEDS. It’s forever tied in my memory with a childhood trip to NYC for the first time. Right after, my mom took me to see this great movie. Tyrone so dark and Kim so blonde made a beautiful team along w scenes from Central Park. Besides that Tyrone is remarkable in his piano fingering skills going above and beyond in this part. His touching scenes w his neglected son as well as that sweet child during the war again shows his acting skills. It still is one of my favorite Power performances

He was just on Noir Alley recently in Guilty Bystander 1950 playing the character Mace.

It isn't?!!? It's been uncomfortable as heck for me for years, ever since I was a child, long before there was a TCM. I can remember thinking way back in TCM's early years, "Wow, I can't believe they just air these movies without saying anything about the blackface at all."

Didn't know that. Of course it was a popular program back in the day. Yeah, I'm sure she took it to heart and was an enthusiastic viewer, maybe letting a few cuss words fly now and then. I'm just imagining Bette going on the program and getting a promise that Joan Crawford would never be on it in lieu of her salary. Not that Mother Goddam would ever do such a thing.

Since we haven’t heard a new prompt I’m just posting the song I’m listening to now — “Leap Frog” by Les Brown, used most famously in THE NUTTY PROFESSOR next another song that starts with L

Lisa Gerritsen appeared as Bess Lindstrom, the daughter of Phyllis and (the never seen) Lars Lindstrom in 10 episodes.

That was one strange casting choice. I can't complain though, because Dennis Patrick was always enjoyable to watch, especially as the slimy Jason McGuire.

One of the weird things about Dark Shadows is having Dennis Patrick play both Joan Bennett's long-lost husband, which I saw as those episodes unfolded, and, as I discovered from seeing the early episodes, the man who was blackmailing Joan Bennett for, as she thought, killing her husband.

Cornered (1945)

THE KID FROM SPAIN (1932)

Germany Year Zero 1948

Goodbye Again is based on a novel by Francoise Sagan--the French title is Aimez-vous Brahms?, which explains the use of Brahms as theme music for the movie. Ideally, a woman would like something better than either Montand or Perkins. Sagan also wrote the novels Bonjour Tristesse and A Certain Smile. Rossellini seemed to cast Bergman as unhappy wives. Although Bergman left Hollywood for what she thought would be better roles with Rossellini, to my mind he never gave her a role as good as the ones she had in Casablanca, Gaslight, Notorious, and Saratoga Trunk. The wife in Stromboli has reason to be unhappy, and this is my favorite of the four Bergman/Rossellini collaborations. I believe we are supposed to find her characters in Viaggio in Italia and Europa '51 sympathetic, but I do not. Fear is a European film noir, basically the same kind of film Joan Crawford was playing in America.

I've always loved Suzy Parker. I wish she had done more films. I guess my favorite is Ten North Frederick. She does an amazing job and I swear, it's the only time Gary Cooper seemed even remotely human in a film. They had great chemistry.

Yes, I did notice John Amos is still with us. I would call him the 7th most main character of TMTMS. Betty White is 98, I think. God bless her. She was like, 18-19 yrs old, when Charlie Watts was born.

I Love The Eddy Duchin Story, thought Tyrone gave such a good performance. He was so convincing playing the piano, ( of course he didn'treally play) I read he practiced for months and that showed. I thought Rex Thompson as Peter Duchin, gave an excellent perforance. He was also so good in All Mine To Give .Loved the music, especially loved the NY location shots. such an enjoyable film and I wish TCM would show it again, it's been awhile.

ESCAPADE IN JAPAN (1957)

Last night I watched the 1941 version of DR. JEKYLL AND MR. HYDE starring Spencer Tracy, Lana Turner and Ingrid Bergman. All I can say is I could not take my eyes of Lana Turner. She was 19-21 years old. Wow...simply wow. The movie was....well...it was Dr. Jekyll and Mr. Hyde. The story is the story. But Lana Turner was a real movie star. All of them were, but she just owned the camera....the screen.

King of Thieves (2018) An aging crook comes out of retirement for one last big job. This movie broke new ground for me! I had never before had even a hint of a whisper of a suggestion that a Michael Caine caper movie might be insipid, boring and a complete waste of time. I would likely have laughed at the idea. But here it is. This movie takes the true story of men with one foot in the grave who stage the most monumental burglary in London history and turns it into an episode of: The Bickersons. The "Afterschool Movie" production values did not help. The editor and director needed a deft hand to present one of the most daring thefts of all time as a plodding exercise with all the tension and thrill of watching the gurgling of a clogged drain. Michael Caine is a particular favorite of mine but he is here with poor makeup acting as if his underwear is heavily starched and he is in his tenth consecutive day of constipation. The same might be said of his emotional range as it is obvious he can not give a The rest of the cast have stellar reputations also but one would never guess it from these performances. 1.6/23

whew, had to come up for air from the DARK SHADOWS binge-a-thon I've been on for a while. All nine seasons of PERRY MASON are on imdb tv, with waaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaay fewer commercials than there are on PLUTO (which also shows PERRY MASON re-runs, only you can't choose which ones.) man, TV Producers and writers in the 50s/60s really thought a hell of a lot more of the intelligence of the average viewer than now, these are some LABYRINTHINE, INTRICATE stories that would have, on occasion, I imagine even RAYMOND CHANDLER scratching his head. For "straight" episodes- I recommend THE CASE OF THE NEBULOUS NEPHEW, which has a great twist at the end not related to the ID of the murderer, and THE CASE OF THE DEADLY VERDICT, which guest stars a surprisingly haggard JULIE ADAMS as a woman whose case Perry loses and who goes on death row. but the one I think I enjoyed the most was THE CASE OF CONSTANT DOYLE, which was one of FOUR GUEST STAR EPISODES in SEASON SIX (1963) done for the series when RAYMOND BURR was in the hospital for a month. MISS BETTE DAVIS steps in wearing a mink and a hard-front wig and proceeds to TEAR IT UP as a widowed lady lawyer named CONSTANT DOYLE who is working on a murder case wherein it seems her late husband was involved in a swindle. in all honesty, this episode could have been expanded into a feature film, and it has some wonderful things to say about being a WOMAN LAWYER. Sadly, it did not end up turning into a series of its own, although I would wager there was talk of it at the time.

There appear to be some Saratoga Trunk fans here. I have always found this film a slow moving disappointment, with Ingrid Bergman's character increasingly getting on my nerves. And the film seems to go on forever. On the positive side, though, the film has exceedingly handsome production values (that opening New Orleans street set is an eye popping atmospheric wonder), Bergman and Gary Cooper have genuine chemistry (it's fun watching Coop as Col. Clint Maroon, the closest he ever came to playing a Rhett Butler type) and a lush, romantic musical score by Max Steiner (one of his best). But the screenplay just drags this film down for me. In the final analysis, I just don't care about Cleo Dulaine and all her duplicitous ploys, and I wish that Col. Clint had found the time to push a cake or pie in her smiling, pretty face. The film sure was big box office, though, when it was released in late 1945 at a time when neither Bergman nor Cooper could do anything wrong as far as the movie going public was concerned. The two stars, by the way, began an affair while making For Whom the Bell Tolls which they continued through this production, as well. I guess that has something to do with all that chemistry between them popping off the screen.

I thought your Mom was not only beautiful and classy in it but also gave a most convincing performance in Ten North Frederick as part of a May-December affair with Gary Cooper. She had great chemistry with the actor. I assume this may have been one of her favourite roles since she received good reviews for her work here working with a movie legend.

FIVE CAME BACK (1939) Next: Drumming

HOT WATER (1924)