#walter wanger

[citizenscreen]

Producer Walter Wanger was #botd in 1894, pictured with his wife Joan Bennett at a press reception at Claridges, London, 1954.

[thepopculturearchivist]

What if? MOTION PICTURE HERALD, November 16, 1946

[oldshowbiz]

Riot in Cell Block 11 (1954) was made because Walter Wanger fired a pistol into the testicles of agent Jennings Lang. Walter Wanger’s wife, Joan Bennett, had been having an affair with Jennings Lang. The film producer Walter Mirisch expalins:

 “Walter, depressed and infuriated by all these developments, accosted Joan and Jennings Lang in a parking lot adjacent to the MCA agency office where Lang was employed. In a fit of temper, he fired a gun and shot Lang in the groin. Walter was arrested, and Lang was taken to a hospital. A huge scandal erupted ... Walter was arraigned and finally sentenced to four months in prison… 

“While Walter was in jail, I showed him some scripts that I had been preparing ... When he emerged from four months in prison, he was so appalled at the conditions he saw there that he immediately wanted to do a picture that would call attention to the need for prison reform. It was out of this experience that he developed the original script for Riot in Cell Block 11.”

[moviesiveseenandwanttoremember]

Walter Wanger’s, “Invasion of the Body Snatchers,” February 5, 1956.

[screamscenepodcast]

They're here! And you're next!! Your deadicated hosts enter 1956 with INVASION OF THE BODY SNATCHERS from director Don Siegel and producer Walter Wanger, based on the Jack Finney novel.

The film is often viewed with a Cold War, Red Scare lens, but is it really Communism we're supposed to be afraid of?

Context setting 00:00; Synopsis 43:38; Discussion 1:00:33; Ranking 1:35:49

[thinkingimages]

Invasion of the Body Snatchers (1956)

[norashelley]

[dweemeister]

How 'Cleopatra' Nearly Sank Fox

By Susan King

April 3, 2001

(Los Angeles Times) -- Martin Landau couldn’t believe his eyes. Entering the makeup trailer one morning on the infamous 1963 epic “Cleopatra,” he was surprised to see star Elizabeth Taylor sitting there. Only Landau and Richard Burton were scheduled to work that day.

“I said, ‘Good morning,’ ” recalls Landau, who played Rufio in the movie. “Then I went back to the bulletin board outside to look at the call sheet and then went back into makeup a little puzzled. What was she doing there that early?”

Landau got his answer a few minutes later when Burton, who played Marc Antony, swaggered in. “I am sitting in a chair facing a mirror and she was sitting behind me,” says Landau. “He walked in and walked up to her and kissed her--a big kiss. And then he moved up and sat in the chair next to me and said, ‘Good morning.’ I said to myself, ‘Oh, my God.’ ”

The much-publicized affair between the married Taylor and Burton was just one of the many difficulties and scandals that surrounded the making of “Cleopatra"--the most expensive movie of its day.