TCM Schedule for Friday, June 25, 2021 -- Primetime Theme: Starring Jane Russell

In the daylight hours, TCM is in the middle of a crime wave, looking for the Big Score. Then in prime time, TCM is celebrating the 100th birthday of Jane Russell. TCM has an interesting interview with a Russell biographer named Christina Rice, at https://www.tcm.com/archives/Movie%20News/article/021385 Enjoy!


7:00 AM -- Hot Rod Gang (1958)
1h 11m | Drama | TV-PG
A young man enters a rock band to raise money so he can enter a big drag race.
Director: Lew Landers
Cast: John Ashley, Jody Fair, Gene Vincent

Considered, along with its sequel Ghost of Dragstrip Hollow, the forerunner to the Beach Party films of the 1960s, establishing the archetype of up-front comedies for teenagers and employing the tried and true formula of a popular trend coupled with romance and music. Hot Rod Gang screenwriter Lou Rusoff went on to pen the script for the first Beach Party film.


8:30 AM -- Teen-Age Crime Wave (1955)
1h 17m | Crime | TV-PG
Juvenile delinquents pull a young innocent into their crime spree.
Director: Fred F. Sears
Cast: Tommy Cook, Mollie McCart, Sue England

An advertising campaign tried to promote Molly McCart's short haircut as the next fashion, but it failed to catch on.


10:00 AM -- I Died a Thousand Times (1955)
1h 49m | Crime | TV-PG
An ex-con dreaming of one last heist faces dissension within his gang.
Director: Stuart Heisler
Cast: Jack Palance, Shelley Winters, Lori Nelson

Remake of High Sierra (1941) with Jack Palance playing the Humphrey Bogart role of Roy Earle.


12:00 PM -- Jack of Diamonds (1967)
1h 48m | Suspense/Mystery | TV-PG
A glamorous jewel thief tries to go straight.
Director: Don Taylor
Cast: George Hamilton, Joseph Cotten, Marie Laforêt

George Hamilton was able to demand and receive $100,000.00 for this film. He was at this time considered a hot commodity due in part to the fact that he was dating the president's daughter.


2:00 PM -- The Thief Who Came to Dinner (1973)
1h 45m | Romance | TV-PG
A jewel thief worms his way into Texas society.
Director: Bud Yorkin
Cast: Ryan O'Neal, Warren Oates, Jacqueline Bisset

The plaza where Webster and Dave have their final confrontation at the film's conclusion is the same used in Conquest of the Planet of the Apes (1972) for the battle between the ape forces and the human forces.


4:00 PM -- Catlow (1971)
1h 41m | Western | TV-PG
An outlaw tries to highjack a muletrain loaded with two million dollars in gold.
Director: Sam Wanamaker
Cast: Yul Brynner, Richard Crenna, Leonard Nimoy

Leonard Nimoy mentioned this film in both of his autobiographies because it gave him a chance to break away from his role as Spock on Star Trek: The Original Series (1966). He mentioned that the time he made the film was one of the happiest of his life, even though his part was rather brief.


5:45 PM -- The Law and the Lab (1956)
8m | Crime | TV-G
This short film focuses on the job of a lab technician and forensic detail.
Director: Frances Dinsmoor
Cast: Bob Hite


6:00 PM -- The League of Gentlemen (1960)
1h 56m | Crime | TV-14
An ex-colonel blackmails a group of officers into helping him rob a bank.
Director: Basil Dearden
Cast: Jack Hawkins, Nigel Patrick, Roger Livesey

A notable early portrayal of gay characters, although mostly heavily hinted at. The actors at the theatre are extremely campy, and one of the bank robbers appears to have left the Army possibly due to his sexuality.



WHAT'S ON TONIGHT: PRIMETIME THEME -- STARRING JANE RUSSELL



8:00 PM -- The Outlaw (1943)
2h 3m | Western | TV-PG
Billy the Kid and Doc Holliday fight over possession of a stallion and a sultry Mexican girl.
Director: Howard Hughes
Cast: Jack Beutel, Thomas Mitchell, Jane Russell

Once they'd found Jane Russell, Howard Hughes and his aircraft engineers designed a special cantilevered bra to enhance the appearance of her bust. She never wore it, but this movie was the reason the famous bra was designed.


10:15 PM -- The Paleface (1948)
1h 31m | Comedy | TV-G
An inept dentist must rescue his outlaw wife from the Indians.
Director: Norman Z. McLeod
Cast: Bob Hope, Jane Russell, Robert Armstrong

Winner of an Oscar for Best Music, Original Song -- Jay Livingston and Ray Evans for the song "Buttons and Bows"

Though the story here is fictional, there was a real dentist who called himself 'Painless' - 'Painless Parker'. Edgar Parker was a dentist who struggled to run a street dental business, and so he took his practice on the road. He worked in the 1890s, in the era of 'amusement'. Inspired by P.T. Barnum, he had a horse-drawn office, show girls and buglers. Parker promised that he could extract a rotten tooth painlessly for 50 cents. If the extraction was not painless, he would give the customer $5.00. Parker had a band that he used to attract people to his office. The band also served to distract the patients and to drown out any moans of pain emitted from the patients. Patients were served with a cup of whiskey or a solution of cocaine (called 'hydrocaine'). Parker is said to have legally changed his first name to 'Painless' to avoid charges of false advertising.


12:00 AM -- His Kind of Woman (1951)
2h 2m | Suspense/Mystery | TV-PG
A deported gangster causes problems for guests at a Mexican resort.
Director: John Farrow
Cast: Robert Mitchum, Jane Russell, Vincent Price

Lee Van Cleef was cast as the crime kingpin before Hughes suddenly decided he wanted Raymond Burr in the role. All of Ferraro's scenes had to be re-shot with Burr - yet another reason the film took so long to make and went way over budget.


2:15 AM -- Lunatics: a Love Story (1991)
1h 27m | Comedy
A delusional paranoid man falls in love with a naive country girl.
Director: Josh Becker
Cast: Ted Raimi, Deborah Foreman, Bruce Campbell

Bruce Campbell (Ray) also plays the Brain Surgeon who appears in Hank's nightmares and also voices Mikhail Gorbachev, who appears on the cover of Tempo magazine, although the lips of Gorbachev are actually those of Josh Becker.


4:00 AM -- Making Mr. Right (1987)
1h 40m | Comedy | TV-14
A space-bound scientist hires a woman to teach his robot about human behavior.
Director: Susan Seidelman
Cast: John Malkovich, Ann Magnuson, Glenne Headly

John Malkovich, Glenne Headly, and Laurie Metcalf, have been acting together since the late-'70s as members of Chicago's Steppenwolf Theatre Company.


5:45 AM -- R.F.D. Greenwich Village (1969)
10m | Short | TV-G
A couple tours around New York in this promotional short for corduroy clothing.
Director: No Director Available
Cast: Stanley Blacker, Evan Picone