Swithin

I find this so depressing. If an Oscar series MUST be done, there could have been so many imaginative ways to go, to show rarely seen films that have been nominated. For example, King of the Zombies was nominated for best music score in 1942! There's a wealth of interesting nominees that have never been shown on TCM, or that have only been shown rarely.

*Top Billed wrote: "Because the Oscars are held every year, we can expect the 31 Days of Oscar on TCM every year."* I don't think that your conclusion needs to follow (and I certainly don't think it SHOULD follow). We don't have to expect an Oscar series every year, unless TCM is under some obligation to the industry to do that. I do know, as someone who has produced more than 100 programs a year -- live and on film and tape -- that nothing is easier than recycling and putting the same product in a different series into which it also fits. I expect more creativity from TCM, and we're not getting it in this year's Oscar series.

"CITIZENS!!!... Vote..." Blanche Yurka as Madame De Farge in A Tale of Two Cities (1935)

My response after a very cursory glance at the Oscar schedule: ho-hum. Do they have to do this every year? I wish TCM would show The Day of the Locust, a film that, due to its excellence and subject matter, cries out to be shown on TCM. And it was nominated for two Oscars.

The cultural institution I worked for was rented by the National Board of Review for its awards presentation, 1982 I think it was. I was assigned to James Cagney. Another colleague was assigned to help his wife. The paparazzi were intolerable, desperate to get to Cagney. Lauren Bacall shouted at them, "Why don't you leave him alone, he's an old man!" I have a photograph taken with Cagney and Mona Washbourne, who also received an award that year. I also helped Myrna Loy put her books on that night.

I had the great pleasure to be James Cagney's bodyguard on a cold winter evening in 1982. He was frail by then but charming and so kind.

Blore is brilliant. I guess my favorite scene of his might be the "silent...to the grave... and even beyond!!" scene in The Lady Eve, and of course that phone scene. But if you want to see one of his odder roles -- really a kind of surreal version of his usual roles -- check out Shanghai Gesture, in which he plays Madame Gin Sling's money manager.

I understand your thoughts about Julie. The thing about her, at least based on my impressions, is that she's one of those actresses who have done film and tv to "support" their theater habit. She LOVES doing theater. Although I think she's pretty much retired now, she was also one of those few remaining actresses who even loved touring with plays, after many stars of her stature stopped doing that.

Robert Morley's son, the late Sheridan Morley, was a friend and colleague of mine on a few projects. He once got me a gig which was very meaningful to me. I asked Burgess Meredith to write something for a brochure I was working on, related to a series of programs I was producing (and related to something in Burgess' theatrical past). He wrote a great remembrance. In response to my thank-you note, he sent me a present: a CD he had made of Songs of the Gold Rush (unrelated to the project I was working on). And last but not least, I worked with the wonderful Julie Harris on a program. She is considered, I think, the First Lady of the American Theater, and, TopBilled, not to get back to our old discussion, but I don't think of her as a character actor!

Nice list! I've had personal connections to three actors on the November list and look forward to the photos and quotes.

Pallette was one of the greats. I love his line in The Bridge Came C.O.D. He's a very rich man, running to catch a plane that he's hired, and suddenly he stops and says: "What am I running for? I have 40 million dollars!" Also love him in The Lady Eve, and just about everything else.

Who doesn't love Edna May Oliver? I'd love to see a long tribute, with scenes from Pride and Prejudice, David Copperfield, A Tale of Two Cities, Little Women, Cimarron, and perhaps one of her greatest, Drums Along the Mohawk, as well as full screenings of her starring films.

*Grave of the Vampire* (1972). Bad vampire rapes woman in graveyard, infant suckles blood from his mother's breast, grows up to be good vampire, who want to stop his father's wicked ways. Of course, there are sympathetic vampires, like Dracula's Daughter, but she's hardly benign!

I think there are commercials -- I vaguely remember that from a previous visit. I stay in the same flat with the same cable system each time, so my experiences are consistent. But I'll check when I have time, I'm sort of busy. . I do know that one of the TCM channels here is called TCM-HD and starts at 8pm. The other seems to run all day. But they seem more like Fox, with a few films shown repeatedly throughout the day. More soon.

I'm in London for a while, where tonight TCM is showing Urban Cowboy and Blown Away (several times). I'm on the Sky cable system, I don't know if other UK systems have other TCMs, but I doubt it. The TCM here is not very good. Edited by: Swithin on Oct 24, 2012 7:07 PM

I love Oscar Homolka. Wonderful as Uncle Chris -- although he didn't win the Supporting Actor Oscar (he was nominated). He was even good in Mr. Sardonicus.

Easy question. Brazil, directed by Terry Gilliam. The worst piece of overrated *&%@ that ever was. Highly touted by film dilettantes, I saw the long version, in the UK, before twenty minutes was cut! Gilliam is ok in small bits -- his Monty Python animations. But not as a feature film maker. He churns out gobs of cliched art direction and passes it off as cinema.

That's it, Lavender. A great lesser Boris Karloff film. Your thread.

Sorry, no. I used Tyburn as a metaphor/word clue; movie doesn't actually have anything to do with the place, specifically.

The sensation-seeking Tyburn villagers would not have got their expected thrill from this chap.

Calcutta ?

Bombay Talkie ?

Once a ghoul, always a ghoul: the doyen of ghoulish hosts http://www.nytimes.com/2012/10/21/nyregion/john-zacherle-94-ex-television-horror-movie-host-can-still-play-the-ghoul.html

Yes, the team that I thought was their best actually didn't win the pennant, and it was when the Braves moved to Atlanta. Late 1960s. But I still thought they were an incredible team, better for hitting than pitching, though, despite a few good pitchers.

If you don't know who the copyright holder is for a photo that is probably not in the public domain, it might be ok to use it if you can show that you've made an honest attempt to search for the copyright owner. Most professional photos have photographers' names on them, and the photos houses and libraries around the world do keep track of the estates. But when you've tried and tried, and can demonstrate that you've tried, then you might be able to use it. But all of this is more crucial in situations where the use can't be so quickly reversed. On the Internet, a rights holder can say "take it down." In print, or incorporated into a video, that can't be done. I often had to get photo rights for brochures and would try to negotiate with the rights holder, since the institution I worked for was non-profit. Most photographers were very generous. Eileen Darby, the great Broadway photographer, told me that I could use the photo in question if I gave her a Toblerone chocolate bar! But when the rights devolve to heirs, or corporations have purchased them, or the big photo houses, that's not so easy. Though many heirs have been quite generous. Kim Hunter's daughter allowed me very generous use of a video of Kim, shot when Kim appeared on a program I produced. Like mother, like daughter. Kim Hunter was one of the kindest artists I ever met. Here's something about Eileen Darby: http://www.nytimes.com/2004/04/13/business/eileen-darby-87-photographer-of-noted-broadway-shows.html