Jaclyn Smith’s Diva Vu

Published August 28, 2024 by biggayhorrorfan

If the marketers back in the day had any sense, 1985’s Déjà Vu would have been renamed Diva Vu and they would have circulated ads for it in all of that era’s top gay magazines. For this is the rare film that features (extremely complicated) acting legend Shelley Winters locking lips with a bewigged Jaclyn Smith, fairly fresh off her 5-year run as the glamourous, self-sufficient Kelly Garrett on Charlie’s Angels. Throw in a regal Claire Bloom, costumed with refined elegance and dripping with purely evil joie de veuve, & you have a minor gothic horror that is a perfect fit for those of a certain age and a particular preference.

Plotwise here, we find a successful novelist named Michael (Nigel Terry) becoming fascinated by a long dead ballerina named Maggie (Smith). While doing research on her, he becomes convinced that he and Brooke (also Smith), his American actress fiancée, are the reincarnated versions of Maggie and her lover. His encounters with a Russian psychic/hypnotist named Olga (Winters), an eccentric woman who claims to have known Maggie well, seem to reinforce this belief. But when Michael begins receiving threatening letters and spooky answering machine messages from Eleanor (Bloom), Maggie’s decades-deceased mother, he knows he is either losing his mind or that something sinister is afoot. Of course, when Brooke surprises him with a visit, during a break in filming her latest project, his deadliest fears become reality, and a fiery showdown is assured for all involved.

Lushly directed by Anthony B. Richmond, the cinematographer of such modern classics as Don’t Look Down and The Man Who Fell to Earth, the project’s biggest flaws seem to reside in it’s editing. There are times when the characters’ odd actions, specifically with Winters’ Olga, are not fully addressed, resulting in some awkward storyline issues. As the film reaches it’s end, it almost feels as if scenes are missing, as well, especially in reference to the deadly transformation of Smith’s Brooke. Otherwise, in one particularly amusing moment, a very naked Terry suddenly grows a pair of bright blue speedo-underwear — without even lifting a leg!!

But the true joy here is watching the leading ladies tear up the scenery. Smith, whose speaking voice already feels like a knife on velvet, is especially effective as Brooke descends into pure evil. Meanwhile, Winters and Bloom are simply dreamy in whatever situation that the trio of screenwriters slip them into. Whether Winters is demanding a vodka from an unwilling host or Bloom is coolly accessing a rival, their screentime is pure, queer heart capturing gold.

Until the next time, SWEET love and pink GRUE, Big Gay Horror Fan!

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Sapphic Angels

Published September 28, 2022 by biggayhorrorfan

The Angels in Chains episode of the eternally fresh Charlie’s Angels gave mid-70s television viewers a mild taste of lesbian subculture. There the energy was all jail-yard female power plays & aggressive correction officers, one even emphatically played by cult goddess Mary Woronov, the cinema’s supreme manipulator of androgynous tension! Two years later, the production team upped the femme-on-femme ante even more. Drenched in pink, Angels in Springtime, which takes place at the beginning of this glamorous detective outing’s third season, is perhaps the most Sapphic entry in that original Angels oeuvre.

Taking place at an exclusive health spa for well-to-do women and guest starring the magnificent Mercedes McCambridge during her coarsest prison matron years, this episode finds the plucky trio menaced not only by McCambridge’s ego-soaked Norma, an ex-actress, but by a needle wielding psychiatrist (Joan Hotchkis) & a sumo wrestling masseuse (Nancy Parsons), as well. That the psychiatrist’s interest in the romantic adventures of Jaclyn Smith’s Kelly seems more profound than just the plot line’s blackmail purposes Is due, almost exclusively, to the silkily seductive way that Hotchkis operates as an actress. The way she expresses the character’s interest in Smith, posing as a well-to-do mistress here, definitely seems more than just casually criminal. Meanwhile, Parsons’ Zora might try to kill Cheryl Ladd’s perkily masquerading Chris through wet towel mummification…but this is seemingly only because she didn’t have a sweaty dildo and a gag ball nearby to help her perform that duty instead.

Of course, McCambridge, the diabolical heart of the episode, is definitely frightening the horses here, as well. Despite her character’s humorous mention of many ex-husbands, you know what two options she would choose in the kill-fuck-marry categories when dealing with any of Charlie’s finest, frilliest best.

Indeed, from a casting standpoint alone, it could easily be surmised that one of the show’s producers was a closeted, gay movie buff. Joining McCambridge & Parsons, best known for her dementedly villainous actions in (cult classic) Motel Hell, are film noir diva Marie Windsor and future horror queen Bobbie Bresee (Mausoleum, Evil Spawn). That Windsor, regally hoisting a cigarette holder as a prop, plays Eve La Deux, a board treading rival of McCambridge’s, is almost worth the price of admission alone for the show’s many queer fans. Her dramatic performance in the opening scene is, indeed, the starting point of an evening filled with both subtle and emphatic alternative delights.

Until the next time, SWEET love and pink GRUE, Big Gay Horror Fan!

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Hopelessly Devoted To: Gretchen Wyler

Published November 22, 2021 by biggayhorrorfan

A year after Shirley MacLaine rocketeered to stardom, due to replacing an ailing Carol Haney in the original Broadway production of Pajama Game, the vibrant Gretchen Wyler (1932 – 2007) accomplished almost exactly the same thing with Cole Porter’s Silk Stockings. Wyler attacked the role of movie star Janice Clayton with such virtuoso power that she was promoted from second understudy to lead, almost overnight.

Nicely, this led this leggy wonder into to a distinguished career, full of stage and television efforts, including multiple stints on a variety of soap operas and situation comedies. Interestingly, for someone who often used her sex appeal as a vibrant component of her performing arsenal, one of her significant nighttime credits was as a guest star on Haunted Angels, a third season episode of the classic detective show that brought about the creation of the term “jiggle TV,” Charlie’s Angels.

Perhaps the most accomplished of several Angels’ plotlines that included horror genre elements, this venture found Wyler’s well-to-do Clare Rossmore requesting assistance from America’s favorite femme investigators due to the seeming ghostly reappearance of her long dead nephew. Adding to the gothic allure, Rossmore’s philanthropic countenance manifests itself in the form of a psychic research institute, an appropriate setting for a supernaturally charged murder to occur.

Of course, all is not as it seems, and as truths are revealed, Agatha Christie style, Wyler nestles nicely into an agreeable chemistry with David Doyle’s ever faithful Bosley. While this story features a rare, fun pairing between Kate Jackson’s Sabrina and Cheryl Ladd’s Kris, it is Doyle, a musical stage veteran himself, and Wyler who truly charm with a rare ease and joy.

Until the next time, SWEET love and pink GRUE, Big Gay Horror Fan!

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Great Performances in Horror: Dinah Shore

Published April 25, 2021 by biggayhorrorfan

Okay, okay…it’s not necessarily a great performance per se, but the affable Dinah Shore definitely adds a sunny and unique presence to the 1979 TV Terror Death Car on the Freeway. Nicely, her take on helpful tennis pro Lynn Bernheimer also ties in a bit with the lesbian community as it references the famed singer-actress’ athletic ties and her (in namesake) involvement with The Dinah, a queer woman’s golfing event and music celebration.

With this particular outing, though, Shore’s Bernheimer is more concerned with a specific divinity in danger as opposed to a Sapphic sisterhood as a whole. Here, Shelley Hack, in the same year that she joined Charlie’s Angels as the ultra efficient Tiffany Welles, plays an ambitious news anchor named Jan who believes that her coverage of a vehicular based serial killer may be her ticket to the big time. Fighting disbelief from her peers and sexism from up on high, she revels in the support that Shore’s character, one of the titular marauder’s first intended victims, unilaterally gives her. Indeed, with warm southern twang fully intact, the former Frances Rose* pops up several times to add pertinent details to the puzzle that Hack is slowly solving. Shore’s natural, feministic glow invigorates Hack’s portrayal and when the younger woman finally goes after the killer, fender to fender, it is not surprising due to the atmospheric tutelage that she has received.

Directed by famed stunt coordinator Hal Needham, Death Car ultimately doesn’t have the stylistic tension of Duel, the famed Steven Spielberg piece about a maniacal trucker, but there are a number of shackle raising chases involving such familiar horror faces as Dallas’ Morgan Brittany (The Initiation of Sarah, Sundown: The Vampire in Retreat), Tara Buckman (Silent Night, Deadly Night, Night Killer) and Nancy Stephens (Halloween, Halloween H20).

Significantly, Shore, whose music has been used in various episodes of American Horror Story, Fear the Walking Dead and The Vampire Diaries, continued to appear in unusual and cult-centric projects for the rest of her career. Many youngsters learned of her through her participation in a holiday episode of Pee Wee’s Playhouse and she, gladly, welcomed such alt-culture, heavy duty guests as Iggy Pop, David Bowie, Andy Kaufman and Tina Turner on her various talk shows over the years, as well.

*Frances Rose was the name that Shore was given at birth.

Until the next time, SWEET love and pink GRUE, Big Gay Horror Fan!

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Va-Va-Villainess: Janis Paige

Published December 12, 2020 by biggayhorrorfan

Whether it’s a glossy MGM musical like Silk Stockings or a detective show where she plays a bedraggled housing project alcoholic, the divine Janis Paige always gives her all. This eclectic nature has brought her to Broadway, where she was in the original cast of the beloved Pajama Game, variety shows, where she excelled in dozens of intricately choreographed production numbers, and eventually to the ecstatic criminal bounties of Charlie’s Angels.

Here as part of the ensemble of the third season Angels Ahoy episode, Paige vibrantly enacts Joan Sayers, a personable widow who catches the eye of David Doyle. Doyle, as series’ regular Bosley, is busy helping his beautiful cohorts investigate a shipboard murder, but he gladly takes a little time out for romance with this beautiful stranger.

Of course, warning signals go off for audience members when it is casually revealed that Sayers has buried four husbands. Indeed, a late-night costume party ultimately reveals that this friendly cruise goer is the most accomplished of black widow murderers. Ever the pro though, Paige believably connects with Doyle’s congenial creation here and the sorrow she feels upon the revelation of her dirty (and very dangerous) secret allows a bit of sympathy to register on her behalf.

Nicely, decades after this episode first aired, Paige is still allowing her charms to be appreciated by the world. At 98, she performs occasionally at cabarets across the country and has recently released her very highly praised memoir, Reading Between the Lines.

Until the next time, SWEET love and pink GRUE, Big Gay Horror Fan!

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Music to Make Horror Movies By: Ida Lupino

Published March 17, 2019 by biggayhorrorfan

ida-lupino food of the gods

Fierce and independent, Ida Lupino was the only female director working in Hollywood for many years. She was just as memorable in front of the camera, establishing herself as a prime example of the tough hearted film noir broad.

As was typical of many women in that genre, she played nightclub singers in both The Man I Love, the inspiration for Martin Scorsese’s New York, New York, and the atmosphere soaked Roadhouse, which had absolutely nothing to do with the Patrick Swayze cheese-fest of later years. Although dubbed in the former, she was able to display her own smoky, mood soaked voice in the latter.

Not expectedly in her fading years, Lupino found herself battling off gigantic feathered foes in Food of the Gods and Ernest Borgnine’s horned cult leader in The Devil’s Rain. Her last role was of a magnificent Norma Desmond take-off in an early episode of Charlie’s Angels, a fitting finale for one of the grand queens of the cinema.

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Until the next time, SWEET love and pink GRUE, Big Gay Horror Fan!

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Cesar Romero in Charlies Angels

Published June 29, 2018 by biggayhorrorfan

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This Pride Month we are exploring some of the many projects of the distinguished and eclectic Cesar Romero. Best known for his comic villainy on the ‘60s television version of Batman, Romero opened up about his homosexuality toward the end of his life. His many credits include such horror offerings as Two on a Guillotine, Mortuary Academy and Night Gallery.

While his guest appearances on such shows as Batman, Get Smart and Bewitched were of the more tongue-in-cheek variety, Cesar Romero’s work as haunted bandleader Elton Mills on an episode of Charlie’s Angels is actually filled with a poetic sadness and a sentimental trail of angst. Cesar CA2

Here, on the fourth season entry entitled Dancin’ Angels, Romero’s faded superstar interacts softly with Jaclyn Smith’s sympathetic Kelly Garrett. Investigating the murder of a participant of an old fashioned ballroom dance contest, Smith’s Garrett is shocked to discover, after several distinguished and extremely gentle conversations, that Romero’s Mills has a darker side.

But even when threatening violence against one of America’s heavenliest creatures, Romero’s hurt and confusion ring paramount, making this one of the veteran performer’s most skilled and relatable portrayals.

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Until the next time, SWEET love and pink GRUE, Big Gay Horror Fan

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Brooke Bundy Fan Page

Published November 4, 2017 by biggayhorrorfan

Brooke Charlies

She played Elaine Parker, the mother that you love to hate, in the A Nightmare on Elm Street series, but true celluloid buffs know that the versatile Brooke Bundy played a wide variety of roles throughout her career. Like her doomed Diana on General Hospital, whose murder has long been considered one of the greatest crime mystery plotlines of the golden age of the soap operas, many of these credits took place on a variety of popular television shows.

Perhaps most notably, the first season of Charlie’s Angels found Bundy interacting with Farrah and crew as an ex-street walker turned Las Vegas chorus girl wanna-be. Her character, filled with both a sense of street smarts and sweetness by this layered performer, was even romanced here by David Doyle’s goofily lovable Bosley. Brooke Chips

Of course, Parker was not the only troubled mother in Bundy’s arsenal. Not as famously, perhaps, she played another matriarch on the final season of CHiPS. Here, as the emotionally unstable parent of a young girl played by Halloween’s Kyle Richards, she nicely shows a lot of subtlety and depth even though she is only featured in a couple of scenes. The quiet seriousness she adds also brings a bit of believability to this jump the shark episode that focuses on a space alien that is trying to bring Richards back to its home planet.

Brooke Circle of Fear

Bundy also appeared on a variety of interesting yet more obscure television shows, as well. A 1973 episode of Circle of Fear, an unusual and short lived horror anthology series, found her playing a member of an artists’ colony who is suddenly sucked into an ancient bottle by a vengeful group of pagan gods and goddesses. That same year, her sensible character was unable to save her man from the sensual lure of Lesley Ann Warren’s vampiric succubus on the Death on a Barge entry of Night Gallery, a vignette that was directed by none other than Star Trek’s most legendary Vulcan, Leonard Nimoy.

Nicely, now you can celebrate all of these interesting credits and so many more at Bundy’s recently created fan page: https://www.facebook.com/brookebundyfanpage/. Her activities, such as con appearances, will be noted there, as well.

So, as the shout of “Kristen!” whistles through your brain…until the next time, SWEET love and pink GRUE, Big Gay Horror Fan!

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Music to Make Horror Movies By: Barbi Benton

Published December 26, 2016 by biggayhorrorfan

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There are many ways that people get from Point A to Point B, but for those who wonder how Susan Jeremy wound up being threatened at that nefarious, under-populated medical institution in X-Ray (AKA Hospital Massacre), Brass Buttons, the number 5 song by that beleaguered horror heroine’s portrayer Barbi Benton, certainly won’t provide any clues.

Of course, this little country ditty, written by Bobby Borchera and Mack Vickery, does seem to take its inspiration from Benton’s physique and her years as a Playboy model. But why, oh, why didn’t the two ever write about her adventures filming Deathstalker or her days flirting with David Doyle’s Bosley on Charlie’s Angels? Now, that would really be a song!

Until the next time – SWEET love and pink GRUE, Big Gay Horror Fan!

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Music to Make Horror Movies By: Cheryl Ladd

Published November 27, 2016 by biggayhorrorfan

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She may be best known as the perkiest angel ever, but the heavenly Cheryl Ladd also lent her acting talents to such horror productions as Gary Sherman’s hidden gem Lisa and such interesting television offerings as Jekyll and Hyde, which found her co-starring opposite the irreplaceable Michael Caine, and The Haunting of Lisa (a theme there, h-m-m-m?).

Proving herself to be quite unstoppable, Ladd even gained a following as a warbler of tunes, releasing several albums, including one that yielded a minor hit, Think It Over. Meanwhile, as a veteran of several variety specials, Ladd, colorfully, covered Tropical Nights, on one such appearance. As the title song of a Liza Minnelli album, it may not contain an inkling of horror pedigree, but it surely applies, mightily, to the gay portion of this enterprise.

Currently, the divine Ladd is offering fun seasonal memorabilia at her website, www.cherylladd.com.

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Until the next time – SWEET love and pink GRUE, Big Gay Horror Fan!

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