“Forgotten Hollywood”- What’s in a Name…

Posted on August 27, 2018 by raideoman1 | No Comments

Manny P. here…

“`William Shakespeare once surmised in Romeo and Juliet: A rose by any other name would smell as sweet. Character names in cinema are one of the many delights when a scribe places pen to paper. Here are three iconic examples of screenplay creations with names that resonate in motion pictures…

~ ERIC VON ZIPPER – Beach Party series were a vehicle for Frankie Avalon and Annette Funicello, and an acquired taste from the mind of Samuel Z. Arkoff at American International Pictures. These series of flicks that featured scantily-dressed all-American young adults, and collections of character actors put in dumb situations, including Buster Keaton, Don Rickles, Boris Karloff, Bob Cummings, Morey Amsterdam, Buddy Hackett,  Keenan Wynn, Paul Lynde,  and Mickey Rooney. Most successful of the cameos was Harvey Lembeck, a loony guy on screen. Plus, he was immensely talented.

“`He portrayed the head of a motorcycle gang who was the antithesis of the surfer heroes. The Von Zipper character was a parody of Marlon Brando’s role in The Wild One. Lembeck made these beach movies palatable.

~ PUSSY GALORE – James Bond films pushed the hedonistic envelope. The villain’s moll in  Goldfinger had a name that might cause one to blush when uttered. Honor Blackman assumed the role with confidence.  Her appearance coincided with The Beatles British Invasion and an end of youthful innocence after the assassination of President John F. Kennedy.

“`Amazingly, Galore first was mentioned in the 1959 novel written by Ian Fleming. Easily, the most famous Bond Girl name, censors almost cut it from Goldfinger.

~ LIBERTY VALANCE – John Ford had a passion for the grandeur of frontier life.  In The Man Who Shot Liberty Valance, the producer and director adapted the screenplay from a short story, with one major stroke… the characters were given splashy names, such as Ransom Stoddard, Tom Doniphon, Dutton Peabody, Link Appleyard, and Cassius Starbuckle.

“`Liberty Valance is the illustrious center of this sagebrush saga; the villain played by Lee Marvin. His character inspired a 1962 hit tune performed by Gene Pitney. It was written by Burt Bacharach and Hal David.

~ ~ ~

“`Honorable mentions: Eulalie Mackechnie Shinn (Hermione Gingold in The Music Man), and  Ratso Rizzo (Dustin Hoffman in Midnight Cowboy).

Until next time>                               “never forget”

This entry was posted on Monday, August 27th, 2018 at 12:01 am and is filed under Blog by Manny Pacheco. You can follow any comments to this post through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.


Bookmark this post:
Digg Del.icio.us Reddit Furl Google Bookmarks StumbleUpon Windows Live Technorati Yahoo MyWeb



Leave a Reply

You must be logged in to post a comment.