Tonight, from 1976, we have The Paul Lynde Halloween Special.
In this special, actor and comedian Paul Lynde celebrates Halloween with Betty White, KISS, Donny and Marie Osmond, Florence Henderson, Billy Barty, Margaret Hamilton (the original Wicked Witch of the West), and I’m going to guess a mountain of cocaine that was probably sitting backstage.
This special is definitely a product of a very certain era in America’s cultural history.
In 1978, KISS appeared to have it all. The band was famous for both their makeup and their anthemic stadium rock. They had just released not only a new studio album but also four solo albums. They had starred in their own Marvel comic and gained notoriety for supposedly allowing their blood to mixed in with the comic’s ink. Teenagers loved KISS and parents and religious leaders feared that the band’s name stood for Knights In Satan’s Service. KISS had everything except for motion picture stardom.
KISS Meets The Phantom Of The Park was supposed to change that. The film starred Anthony Zerbe as Abner Devereaux, an engineer and an expert at animatronics who loses his job at Magic Mountain and seeks revenge by using robot versions of KISS to drive the audience of their concert to riot. Fortunately, the real members of KISS are not just rock stars but also alien beings who descend from the heavens and shoot lightning bolts from their eyes. (Gene Simmons can breathe fire.) The real KISS isn’t going to allow their fan to be manipulated by a robot version of the band, which leads to a battle between KISS and the robots that protect Abner’s underground lair.
KISS Meets The Phantom of the Park aired on NBC on October 28th, 1978. It was later given a theatrical release in Europe, where it was re-edited and retitled Attack of the Phantom. Since then, it has become a very difficult film to see. (On Amazon, old VHS copies go for several hundred dollars.) One reason why the movie is so hard to see is because the members of the KISS hated the movie and felt that they were portrayed as being clowns instead of super heroes. Even though the members of the band have since mellowed out about the film (with Gene Simmons suggesting it should be viewed on a double bill with Plan 9 From Outer Space), KISS Meets The Phantom Of The Park is still a film that is more talked about than actually watched.
While looking for clips of the movie on YouTube, I came across an upload of the entire film. The only problem was that all of the dialogue was dubbed into German and that’s not a language that I speak. Still, figuring that you have to take your opportunities when they’re available, I decided to watch. I figured that the dialogue might not actually be that important and it wasn’t. I was able to follow the plot just fine. (The only weird thing about watching the move in German was listening to the members of the band speak in something other than a New York accent.) Fortunately, there’s actually more singing than talking in Kiss Meets The Phantom Of The Park and the songs are untouched and in English. KISS plays Magic Mountain in the film and they actually performed a real concert for filming. Those are real fans of the band going crazy whenever Gene Simmons sticks out his tongue.
The movie itself is definitely a product of its time and not meant to be taken seriously. The members of KISS are both aliens that descend from the heavens and rock musicians and they are never seen without their makeup. Even when they’re hanging out at a hotel pool, they are in full costume and they’re wearing their makeup. When the members of the band enter the Phantom’s underground lab, they have to fight a series of very 70s robots, including some that know karate and two who have lightsabers. For better or worse, it’s a very silly move that epitomizes an era. The special effects are cheesy, the members of the band often look straight at the camera, and the rest of the cast does what they can with what they’ve been given. Anthony Zerbe plays the Phantom with a hint of empathy while Deborah Ryan is the ingenue who searched for her missing boyfriend while Beth plays on the soundtrack. Keep an eye out for Brion James, playing a security guard.
Overall, the band probably would have been smarter to just release a concert film but then the rest of us wouldn’t have the fun of watching Paul Stanley face off against a robot version of Bruce Lee. KISS Meets The Phantom of The Park is worth watching at least once, even in German!
Welcome to Retro Television Reviews, a feature where we review some of our favorite and least favorite shows of the past! On Wednesdays, I will be reviewing the original Love Boat, which aired on ABC from 1977 to 1986! The series can be streamed on Paramount Plus!
This week, the second season begins with a super-sized episode!
Episodes 2.1 & 2.2 “Marooned / The Search / Issac’s Holiday”
(Dir by Paul Stanley, originally aired on September 16th, 1978)
The second season of The Love Boat started with double-sized episode, promising twice the romance, twice the comedy, and twice the running time!
(Subsequently, this episode was split in two for syndication, hence the double numbering.)
Among the passengers on this cruise is none other than Isaac Washington (Ted Lange)! The Love Boat’s iconic bartender has decided to spend his vacation where he works and he’s bought a ticket to sail on the Pacific Princess. It might seem strange to want to spend your vacation at the office but in Isaac’s case, I can see the appeal. As we saw during the first season, no one works harder than Isaac. He somehow always manages to be behind every single bar on the ship and it often appears that he’s the only bartender on the boat! To top it off, he’s always on call. He’s earned a vacation and he’s earned the right to be served for once. From the minute Isaac boards the boat, he’s playfully asking the crew to do things for him and none of them mind because he’s their friend Isaac. One of the key reasons why The Love Boat worked was that the friendships between the members of the crew felt very real. As such, there’s never any doubt that Isaac would want to spend his vacation with Gopher, Doc, and Julie.
(Interestingly enough, the Captain doesn’t seem to realize that Isaac’s on the boat until Isaac takes his seat at the captain’s table.)
Of course, there are some problems with Isaac’s vacation. Isaac quickly notices that the substitute bartender, Wally (played by Norm Crosby), is a bit sullen and not very knowledgeable about his drinks. As well, Isaac has lied to a passenger named Mara (Lola Falana), telling her that he’s a wealthy race car driver. Bitter old Wally just can’t wait to tell Mara the truth.
Even worse, when Captain Stubing goes to visit a nearby island, Deputy Captain Cunningham (Dick Martin) is left in charge and he quickly proves himself to be thoroughly incompetent. (The show makes a point of assuring viewers that Cunningham actually works for a different cruise line and is just training on the Pacific Princess.) Cunningham ignores the news that a hurricane is on the way. When the hurricane hits, it’s falls on Isaac to take charge and make sure the passengers are safe. Of course, to do this, he has to admit that he’s not a race car driver. He’s just a bartender who, in a just world, would probably be a captain.
Meanwhile, Stubing, Doc, Gopher, Julie, and a group of passengers (Avery Schreiber, Barbi Benton, Edie Adams, and Audra Lindley) are all being held captive on that nearby island. Their captor is an eccentric hermit named David Crothers (played by John Astin, who was often cast as eccentric hermits). David has a gun, one that later turns out to be full of not bullets but dirt. Unfortunately, the hurricane that threatens the Pacific Princess also maroons everyone else on the island and they have to wait for someone to rescue them. Injured by a falling tree, Gopher spends his time deliriously speaking to imaginary women in foreign accents. Doc, for once, actually gets to do some medical stuff and assures everyone that Gopher will be fine. Interestingly enough, no one seems to be that worried about being captured by a crazed hermit. Perhaps that’s because John Astin is just too naturally friendly to be viewed as a threat.
Finally, Jeannie Carter (Donna Mills) is on the boat because she’s been told that one of the passengers is her long-lost mother. Soap opera actor Mike Adler (David Birney) offers Jeannie the moral and emotional (and romantic) support to confront the woman but the woman (Laraine Day) turns out to be Mike’s mother as well! Agck!
The 2nd season premiers, with its mix of melodrama, broad comedy, romance, and hurricane-strength winds, is pretty much exactly what most viewers would want out of a show like The Love Boat. Isaac gets to save the day while John Astin hams it up and David Birney, Donna Milles, and Laraine Day wring every emotion that they can out of their soap opera-style storyline. It’s a fun and undemanding show, one that gets by on its breezy style and the likable chemistry between the cast.
This episode is also important because it was the second episode (after the first season’s supersized episode) in which the opening credits featured video images of the guest stars as well as their names. This would continue in every subsequent episode and eventually become of the show’s trademarks.
Next week: Julie’s parents board the boat!
Shy Beth (Shirley Knight) is now to the city and still struggling to make friends. Fortunately, her friend Janet gets her a nice corporate job. Unfortunately, Janet then vanishes and Beth discovers that her co-workers are more than just office workers, I won’t spoil the twist, since the title of this episode already did that.
Legion of Demons aired on February 2nd, 1973 and it undoubtedly led to a lot of viewers saying, “I think they filmed that at my office!”
Enjoy!
During the month of October, we like to share classic episodes of horror-themed television. That was easier to do when we first started doing our annual October horrorthon here at the Shattered Lens because every single episode of the original, black-and-white Twilight Zone was available on YouTube. Sadly, that’s no longer the case.
However, there is some good news! Twilight Zone may be gone but there are other horror shows on YouTube! For instance, I’ve discovered that, in 1972, there was a horror anthology series that was originally called Ghost Story. It was produced by William Castle and each episode featured a different guest star having to deal with the supernatural.
The show made its debut on September 15th, 1972. In this episode, Sebastian Cabot (playing the role of the mysterious Winston Essex) introduces a story about the mortality and technology. Jason Robards and Stella Stevens are a married couple who discover that their television cannot only predict the future but that also one of them is going to die!
Enjoy the first episode of Ghost Story!
As you can tell from watching this video, this from the period of time where KISS was performing without their trademark makeup. All Hell’s Breakin’ Loose was their second single from the album Lick It Up and, while the video itself got some airplay on MTV, the song failed to chart in the U.S. Compared to their success in the 70s, KISS struggled through the 80s and the early 90s. Taking off the makeup and essentially looking like every other hard rock band that was around at that time did not help.
Today, All Hell’s Breakin’ Loose is best-remembered as the song in which Paul Stanley raps. The majority of the song was written by KISS’s then drummer, the late Eric Carr and Carr was initially not happy with the decision to have Stanley rap one of the verses. However, later, Carr said that Stanley rapping was actually what the song needed to distinguish itself from the rest of the album and that the rap was probably the reason why All Hell’s Breakin’ Loose was eventually released as a single.
The video is a hard rock fantasy, with the members of KISS walking around a burned-out city and running into criminals, circus performers, and, of course, barely dressed women. This was probably a video that KISS could only have made during the period when they weren’t wearing their makeup. The Demon and the Starchild would have looked out-of-place wandering around the city but Gene Simmons, Paul Stanley, Eric Carr, and Vinny Vincent fit right in.
In retrospect, it’s hard not to be amused that, back in the 70s and 80s, so many parents groups viewed KISS as being a threat to young minds. (There are people who still believe that KISS stands for Knights In Satan’s Service.) I would guess that few of those concerned parents actually listened to any of the music that they were so concerned about. Instead, they just saw songs with titles like All Hell’s Breakin’ Loose and jumped to their conclusions.
Enjoy!
Welcome to the American frontier. The time is the 1880s and men and women everywhere are heading out west in search of their fortune. While stowing away on a train, veteran cowboy Johnny Wade (Brian Keith) meets the naive Steve Hill (Gary Clarke) and becomes a mentor to the younger man. Johnny teaches Steve how to shoot a gun and, when they get off the train at Medicine Bow, Wyoming, they get jobs working on the ranch of Georgia Price (Geraldine Brooks). When Georgia and Johnny plot to overgraze the land, Steve must decide whether he’s with them or with a rival rancher, Judge Garth (Lee J. Cobb).
At the same time, Ben Justin (Charles Bronson) has arrived in town with his son, Will (Robert Random), and his new wife (Lois Nettleton). Ben is determined to start his own ranch but, because of his taciturn and stubborn personality, he alienates the Cattleman’s Association, which led by Judge Garth and Bear Suchette (George Kennedy). Will wants to help his father but Ben keeps pushing him away. It’s up to Judge Garth’s foreman, the Virginian (James Drury), to bring the family together.
Just like The Meanest Men In The West, The Bull of the West was created by editing together footage from two unrelated episodes of The Virginian. It works better for the Bull of the West because the two episodes had similar themes and the footage mixes together less awkwardly than it did in The Meanest Men In The West. But Bull of the West is still just a TV show edited into a movie. The main reason to see it is because of all the familiar western faces in the cast. Along with Bronson, Keith, Cobb, and Kennedy, keep an eye out for Ben Johnson, DeForest Kelley, and Clu Gulager.
Through the Shattered Lens 