January 6, 2021

 

The presence of Movie Cowboy great Tom Mix in my neighborhood of Edendale, now known as Silver Lake, is of great importance to me. From my living room, I can oversee the strip mall that is 365 Whole Foods, and that property used to be Tom Mix’s film studio. I’m a firm believer that there are spirits from that era and beyond that lives on that property. Tom Mix died in a car accident, and he was 60-years old. These days that is still considered young, but a man who spent a great majority of his life on a horse named “Tony the Wonder Horse” and did his own stunts. An excellent shot with a pistol, Mix was the real deal. 

Like America itself, Mix had the talent to make a new identity for himself. He enlisted in the Army during the Spanish-American War. Tom went AWOL when he married his first wife, Grace Allin. That marriage was annulled after a year, and a few years later, he married Olive Stokes in 1909. Mix rode in President Theodore Roosevelt’s parade with horsemen, who some were former Rough Riders. Years later, with the help of Hollywood publicists, Mix suggests that Mix himself was a Rough Rider. 

Tom Mix joined up with the Miller Brothers 101 Ranch, which was a large ranching business. The ranch had its touring Wild West show, and Mix was part of the spectacle. His horse riding skills, using the rope, and pistol-shooting came handy as he turned into an entertainer.  It was around this time that my German Grandmother as a teenager, joined the Mix Wild West Show and toured America and Cuba. Mix started to make films in Edendale (Silver Lake) and made over 100 films for the production house Selig Polyscope Company. And here is where the presence of his being comes into my life. 

I have an 8mm print of “The Cowboy Millionaire” (1909). I play it on his birthday at least three times while looking out the window simultaneously, imagining the scenes from the film are happening down below. The gunfight specifically between Mix and the bad guys made an impression on my imagination. With the images of the movie burning in my brain, I go out and put on a large white cowboy hat and a toy pistol and a gun belt around my waist. I reenact the scene in my head (and heart) from the film as I look over the property that was once owned by Tom Mix. 

June 1, 2014

June 1, 2014

Oddly enough, I don’t own “Sargent Pepper’s Lonely Heart’s Club Band” album.  Yet, without a doubt, it is one album that made a significant change in my life.  Around March of 1967, my father received a large envelope that was addressed from London.  He wasn’t home at the time, but I made telephone contact with Wallace letting him know that he got mail from the United Kingdom.  Over the phone, he asked me to open the envelope to let him know what was inside the mail.   What came out was a black and white photograph and a letter, addressed to Wallace.  It was a very formal business letter and it came from Brian Epstein, who I knew at the time was the manager of The Beatles.   There was no specific information in the letter, but just asking my father to sign it, and then mail it back.  It also made a comment about receiving money as well, but it was in pounds, and being 11 or 12 years old at the time, it didn’t make sense to me.  Neither did the photograph that came with the letter.  My first impression was an image of a funeral, with all the people at the ceremony facing the camera.  The image was in black and white, and the picture had a flatness to it, like nothing stands out, except the whole picture itself.  Thinking back on it now, it reminds me of a Kabuki stage. 

  I have been to the Kabuki at least twice, and what impressed me was the lighting and staging of the narrative didn’t make any of the actors to stand out from the rest of the production or even sets.  Everything fit perfectly, and was in unison with the narrative, the acting, the lighting and sets.  All of it was equivalent to each other and none stood out.  Rarely have I seen something like that on a stage or even in a picture.  So thinking back and looking at this black and white image, I couldn’t focus on one thing.  I had to take the whole picture in front of me, and it demanded my attention from the very first glance.  Especially when my dad asked me what the picture was.  I told him that I wasn't sure what it was.  We then talked about something else, but my thoughts and eyes were on the image in front of me, and I was barely paying attention to the conversation.  When all of sudden, I realized that at least four of the guys in the photograph, were The Beatles.  Why I didn't recognize them right away was due to their outfits, which were turn-of-the-century marching costuming.  That, plus they all had facial hair, and John Lennon was wearing spectacles.  It is difficult to believe, due to the Internet and instant news we have now, but in 1967, the news and images came around slower.  The last time I saw a picture of the fab four, was them dressed in "Revolver" era clothing.  They still looked like The Beatles during that time, but here on this picture, they looked like different men to me.  The photograph didn't yell out the fab four to me, and at that age, I was a huge fan of The Beatles. 

The next big shocker for me was finally seeing the image of my dad in this photograph.   Whatever our conversation was at that moment I interrupt him and told him that there is an image of him on this photo and it is with The Beatles.  Wallace wasn’t surprised or even curious at that point, he just wanted to continue with our conversation.  Eventually he told me to put the letter and photo on the table and he’ll look at it when he got home.   When he did come home, he did look at it, and realize that Epstein was asking permission to use his image for the upcoming Beatles album.  If memory serves me, there was no mention of the album being named “Sargent Pepper’s Lonely Hearts Club Band” in the letter, although clearly it is indicated in the photograph.   Due to the black and white image, I had a hard time seeing the word “Beatles” in a floral arrangement on the ground.  

Wallace put off signing the document and sending it, due not wanting to do it, but just had other concerns on his mind.  Epstein sent him at least two additional letters and I believe a telegram as well, begging him to sign off on the photo.   Wallace did, and sent it off, and that was it.  He received the payment which was very minimal - something like $5, and we didn’t receive a copy of the album.  Which was perfectly OK, because Wallace really didn’t think much about it at the time, and to be honest, he never brought it up afterwards it was released to the world. 

Now, what is interesting to me, is how much of that cover is around, and on all sorts of objects, such as key chains, posters, t-shirts, and so forth.   Of course, whenever I look at the picture, I think of my dad right away.  Also as I look around to see the black and white image of the cover, I think of the connection with all the other individuals in that photograph.  For instance, Wallace knew the artist Larry Bell, and was among the first people to publish William S. Burroughs’ excerpt of “Naked Lunch” in his journal “Semina.” His father who passed away when Wallace was very young, left him only two objects.  They were books, one was a short story collection by Oscar Wilde and the other book was by T.E. Lawrence’s (Lawrence of Arabia) “Seven Pillars of Wisdom.”   My grandmother Martha (my mom’s mother) used to work with cowboy actor and star Tom Mix at the 101 Ranch as a dancer, and Wallace met Terry Southern sometime in the early 1960s, and was a friend of Brian Jones of the Rolling Stones, who gets a mention on the Pepper cover as well.  Wallace also had a brief meeting with Bob Dylan and Lenny Bruce. 

Again, it is odd that I don’t actually own the album or the cover, except I do have the black and white image of the cover, with the additional face or two - but what’s even stranger to me is that I share a photograph with perhaps millions of people.  They have all looked at my father’s face, but it probably didn’t mean anything to them.  For me, it’s a bittersweet moment where my dad shared space with my favorite band at the time. 

May 6, 2014

May 6, 2014

When Orson Welles was working with the Mercury Theater in New York City, he was approached by the Hollywood producer Carl Laemmle to do a quickie b-movie western called “My Pal, the King.” The plot of the film, written by Welles, is about a boy, played by Mickey Rooney, who is a king from a European country who comes out west to meet real cowboys at a traveling circus.   Eventually hiding his identity he joins the circus.  Meanwhile, the count from that mysterious European country decides that he wants the king to disappear for good, so that he and his family can take over the country.

The casting was set by Laemmle, with Tom Mix playing the head of the circus, Hank Darnell playing his side-kick (who is actually a real cowboy who knew how to do rope tricks), and James Kirkwood, who worked on many films with Mary Pickford, and rumored to be a very close friend of Rudolf Valentino,  as the evil Count DeMar.   Welles brought in Rooney as the star, who early that year, saw him play Puck in Max Reinhardt’s film production of “A Midsummer Night’s Dream.”

Laemmle gave Welles a strict budget to do the film, and mostly it was going to shot in New Mexico.  Everything was going perfectly fine, till Welles came up with the idea of telling the whole narrative through the eyes of the little King.  Not only that, but he wanted the camera to represent how the king sees the world at the time.  So in a lot of scenes you hear Rooney’s voice, but not his face or his body.  To add a certain amount of visual menace to the film, Welles hired Ernst Ludwig Kirchner, a German expressionist painter at the time.  He came up with the idea of painting the rocks in the New Mexico landscape black.   Which gave the environment an eerie almost Mars like look of the place. Welles didn’t want a naturalistic or place New Mexico in a realistic light whatsoever.  At the time, Welles was going through a period in his life when he was obsessing over the writings of Sigmund Freud.  He felt “My Pal, the King” should be told in a subjective style, than the original routine objective approach that was to be found in the script.

When Laemmle saw the rushes, he flipped. He took a train from Los Angeles to Sante Fe to fire Welles personally.   Once Welles was gone from the film set, Laemmle brought in the director Kurt Neumann, to finish off the film, using a new script by Thomas Crizer, who was employed with Harold Lloyd.   Welles, of course, was upset.  With the Mercury Theater, he was a king, and wasn’t was often treated in such a harsh manner.   He didn’t always want to think about it, but he must have realized that his vision will be for the rest of his life, a battle between how he sees the world, and how the world sees Orson Welles.

February 6, 2014

February 6, 2014

Today I just finished reading Audrey Wollen’s 'Erotics 2’ and was totally charmed by the book. I bought it at the Los Angeles Book Fair, an event put together by Printer Matter. For me, the only purpose for going was to get Audrey’s book. I was wishing I would see her at the fair, and have her sign my copy of the book, but alas, I missed her.

I think I first met Audrey when she was five or six years old. Lun*na and I were invited numerous times over to Peter Wollen and Lesile Dick’s home in Beverly Glen for dinner, and often we were entertained by Audrey. At the time, she was a very smart child, who appeared to be curious about the world. Now I believe Audrey is somewhere in her very early 20’s and she still appears to carry the same curiosity that made her such a remarkable child. Reading her first book I was struck with its sexuality, yet I was totally intrigued by how she wrote about her life. Or is it her life? I really don’t know the connection between reality and fiction. Nor do I really care, I am more interested in how the tale is told than anything else. And she can tell a tale quite well. 

After reading her book, I took a walk around Silver Lake, where eventually I ended up at the Silver Lake reservoir. There was a small crowd of people there, honoring Ronald Reagan due that today is his official holiday in California and Wisconsin. It seemed appropriate to me that the weather is so chilly, and when I think of Ron, a cold chill comes upon me quite violently, that I find myself shaking. Through out my life I made an effort to ignore Reagan, in fact, I was in Japan when he made his famous speech to demolish the Berlin Wall.

As soon as I got back from the walking trip, I had a meeting with Pierre Brice, a French actor who is going to act as Apache chief Winnetou in a German co-production based on a novel by Karl May. I was contracted to write a script, and immediately I started to research Tom Mix, who used to live in the Silver Lake area. In fact, he had a ranch, down the hill from me, which is now Ralphs supermarket. I was thinking of taking an older Tom Mix film “The Son of the Golden West” and using its plot for the Winnetou film. So far Pierre played this character seven times, so right now, everyone involved in this production feels like this will be the final film in the series. 

Writing an adventure tale or a Western is not all that difficult for me. I think what gives me a hand is that I don’t know a thing about the real West. The West to me is very much the TV shows like “Rawhide, ” “Walt Disney’s Zorro, ” and my personal fave “Wild Wild West.” In my mind I often think that the British TV series “The Avengers” is very much a Western. I don’t see a huge difference between James West and John Steed. Both characters are dandies, and they never seem to get dirty, even though they have numerous fighting scenes throughout their shows, they come off quite clean and hair in place. I dare to hope that life works out that way as well.

The one thing I am very proud of is that while writing the script I somehow added the fact that Winnetou is reading Audrey’s little book. Only the fans will pick up on this. Later tonight I will go over to a local bar to watch the Manchester United Football team. I believe they play a match with the Red Star Belgrade.