20,000 vinyl LPs 375: The Philadelphia Experiment & Michael Paré

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Kenneth Wannberg ~ The Philadelphia Experiment

vinyl LP front cover detail

 cover photo by 

photo of album cover by Styrous®

Today, October 9, is the birthday of American actor Michael Paré; he starred in three of my favorite movies; two rock & roll films, Eddie and the Cruisers (1983) and Streets of Fire (1984), and a great Sci-Fi film, The Philadelphia Experiment (1984).         

 

 

Kenneth Wannberg ~ The Philadelphia Experiment

vinyl LP front cover

 cover photo by 

photo of album cover by Styrous®

 

       

It is actual fact that during the two world wars of the twentieth century, German submarines would torpedo transport ships and sink them. In an attempt to avoid this, both the United States and Britain created camouflaged "dazzle" ships (link below).     

 

 

USS West Mahomet - 1918 

photographer unknown

 

The Philadelphia Experiment is based on an urban legend some believe to have actually happened. The legend involves an experiment conducted by the U. S. Navy during WWII in 1943 to render a destroyer escort, the USS Eldridge, invisible to radar, however, a malfunction causes the ship to disappear with disastrous consequences. The film is a recreation of this event and its consequences (link below).     

 

 

USS Eldridge - ca 1944
 photo: US Navy

 

 

The film score is, of course, very dark and sinister and the special effects are quite remarkable, although the result of the experiment is extremely creepy!   

Paré was born on October 9, 1958, in Brooklyn, New York and was a fan of James Dean, Marlon Brando, Montgomery Clift, Paul Newman, and Robert Mitchum, and felt he was "a kindred spirit" to them. He was working as a chef in New York City when he met talent agent Yvette Bikoff, who convinced him to try acting. In the early 1980s, he studied acting under Uta Hagen.         

                        

   

Tracklist:
       
Side 1:

        

A1 - The Experiment
A2 - The Eldridge Remains
A3 - David Confronts The Past
A4 - The Vortex And Escape
A5 - Tender Moment
A6 - The Doctor Reflects
A7 - The Chase

       
Side 2:
       
B1 - Storming The Compound
B2 - Fugitives In Love
B3 - Decision
B4 - David's Father
B5 - Fate Of The Vortex
B6 - David Makes A Choice / End Title
       
Companies, etc.
       
    Recorded At – Abbey Road Studios
       
Credits:
       
    Composed By, Conductor – Ken Wannberg
    Edited By [Music Editor] – John R. Harris
    Orchestrated By – Albert Woodbury
    Performer – National Philharmonic Orchestra Of London*
    Producer – Ken Wannberg, Len Engel
    Recorded By – Eric Tomlinson
    Remix – Len Engel
       
Notes:
       
Contempo Recording CO, Los Angeles
Original Music Recorded at Abbey Road Studios, London

        

Ken Wannberg – The Philadelphia Experiment (Original Soundtrack)
Label:    Rhino Records (2) – RNSP 306
Format:    Vinyl, LP, Album
Country: US
Released: 1984
Genre:    Electronic, Stage & Screen
Style:    Soundtrack, Modern Classical

       

         

Viewfinder links:        

        

Marlon Brando         

Montgomery Clift               

Dazzle Ships      

James Dean         

Uta Hagen       

Robert Mitchum        

Paul Newman        

Michael Paré        

        

Net links:        

         

The Philadelphia Experiment        

        

YouTube links:        

        

The Philadelphia Experiment (film score)        

Manfred Mann's Earth Band - 

      The Runner (Theme From The Philadelphia Experiment)   

The Philadelphia Experiment (full movie)        

         

        

        

        

Styrous® ~ Wednesday, October 9, 2024       
       

 

 

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Bruce Conner ~ photographer & so much more

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Bruce Conner     
date & photographer unknown           
     
       

      

Bruce Conner was an American artist who was born in McPherson, Kansas, on November 18, 1933; he worked with assemblage, film, drawing, sculpture, painting, collage, and photography. I could have put him in any of those categories but it is his photography that I love, so, here he is.         

 

In 1959, Conner founded what he called the Rat Bastard Protective Association. Its members included Jay DeFeo, Michael McClure (with whom Conner attended school in Wichita), Manuel Neri, Joan Brown, Wally Hedrick, Wallace Berman, Jess Collins, Carlos Villa and George Herms. Conner coined the name as a play on 'Scavengers Protective Society'.         

 

He and his wife were living in Massachusetts in 1963, when John F. Kennedy was assassinated. Conner filmed the television coverage of the event and edited and re-edited the footage with stock footage into another meditation on violence which he titled Report. The film was issued several times as it was re-edited.    

He was an active force in the San Francisco counterculture of the mid-1960s as a collaborator in light shows at the legendary Family Dog at the Avalon Ballroom. He also made a number of short films in the mid-1960s in addition to Report and Vivian. These include Ten Second Film (1965), an advertisement for the New York Film Festival that was rejected as being "too fast;" Breakaway (1966), featuring music sung by and danced to by Toni Basil . . .         

 

 

Bruce Conner ~ Breakaway - 1966
Toni Basil film still

 

 

. . .  The White Rose (1967), documenting the removal of the magnum opus by fellow artist Jay DeFeo from her San Francisco apartment, with Sketches of Spain by Miles Davis as the soundtrack; and Looking for Mushrooms (1967), a three-minute color wild ride with Tomorrow Never Knows by The Beatles as the soundtrack. (In 1996 he created a longer version of the film, setting it to music by Terry Riley). 

 

Conner was among the first to use pop music for film soundtracks. His films are now considered to be the precursors of the music video genre. They have inspired other filmmakers, such as Conner's friend Dennis Hopper, who said, “Bruce’s movies changed my entire concept of editing. In fact, much of the editing of Easy Rider came directly from watching Bruce’s films." In 1966, Hopper invited Conner to the location shoot for Cool Hand Luke which starred Paul Newman; the artist shot the proceedings in 8mm, revisiting this footage in 2004 to create his film Luke.      

Conner photographed many of the punk bands in San Francisco. During the 1970s he focused on drawing and photography, including many photos of the late 1970s West Coast punk rock scene. His 1978 film used Mongoloid by Devo as a soundtrack.     

    

The Bruce Conner papers are held by the Bancroft Library at the University of California, Berkeley. Conner's 1976 film short, Crossroads, was preserved by the Academy Film Archive, in conjunction with the Pacific Film Archive, in 1995. The film features 37 minutes of extreme slow-motion replays of the July 25, 1946, Operation Crossroads Baker  underwater nuclear test at Bikini Atoll in the Pacific. The event was captured for research purposes by five hundred cameras stationed on unmanned planes, high-altitude aircraft, boats near the blast, and from more distant points on land around the Atoll. The location was selected in part because the network of islands formed an almost complete ellipse around the detonation site, allowing for a comprehensive documentation of the event from numerous angles.   

 

 

Bikini nuclear blast - July 25, 1946  
 photographer unknown

 

 

The documentary film featured music by electronic artist Patrick Gleeson and minimalist composer, Terry Riley.     

     

Bruce Conner had twice announced his own death as a conceptual art event or prank; he died on Monday, July 7, 2008, of natural causes, the last survivor of the Bay Area Beat era art scene.      
     

From 2016 to 2017, the San Francisco Museum of Modern Art featured an exhibition of Conner's multimedia work entitled, It's All True, which was derived from a letter that the Conner wrote to his friend, collaborator and art collector, Paula Kirkeby, in 2000, listing the many ways he had been characterized in the media (link below).     
     
     
     
     
      

Viewfinder links:       

         

Toni Basil        

all things Beatles             

Bruce Conner        

Miles Davis         

Jay DeFeo                      

Devo         

Patrick Gleeson          

Dennis Hopper           

John Fitzgerald Kennedy        

Michael McClure        

Terry Riley        

     
Net links:       

        

Academia ~ Bruce Conner        

The Brooklyn Rail ~ Tribute to Bruce Conner        

Bruce Conner ~ Crossroads        

KQED ~ Artist who Twice Declared Himself Dead        

LA Times ~ Conner worked in assemblage, film, sculpture         

The New Yorker ~ Bruce Conner’s Crusade of Reinvention        

NY Times ~ Bruce Conner, SF Artist With 1950s Beat Roots dies    

SF Gate ~ Prolific Beat era artist Bruce Conner dies        

SFMOMA ~ It's All True         

Smithsonian ~ Bruce Conner papers        

University of Chicago ~ Bruce Conner’s thinking of you        
     
YouTube links:       

         

Atomcentral ~ Crossroads Baker         

Bruce Conner -   

          Atomic bomb (edit)      

          Breakaway (documentary)     

          Mongoloid           

          A Movie (documentary)        

          It’s All True  

Museum of Contemporary Art ~ Bruce Conner: Mongoloid documentary   

        

        

        

        
        

        
        
        
        
        
        
Styrous® ~ Thursday, November 18, 2021        
        

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Photography

Photographers
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Paul Newman articles/mentions

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Jeremiah Johnson ~ Robert Redford @ 80  

Smiley Lewis ~ Shame, Shame, Shame      

Tales of Tomorrow & Sergei Prokofiev  

     
     
     
     
     
     
     

Paul Newman - 1954

publicity photo

     

     

     

      

     

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Movie Articles 

Movie People 

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Tales of Tomorrow & Sergei Prokofiev

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In the early fifties my family bought a TV from Montgomery Wards and I remember watching television on Guy Place.     

Guy Place, San Francisco, California

The living room would be jammed with the whole family, mom, Lucy, Ben, etc (links below). The adults would have the couch and chairs while us kids would sit on the floor. I was VERY near-sighted so I would sit directly under the TV which had a 16-inch screen; this was eNORmous for that time. 

1950-1959 Airline (Wards) 

(05WG-3039C)  16" console  

     

I have terrific memories of the shows we watched: I Love Lucy (of course), The Twilight Zone, etc. But my VERY first memory of watching was, Tales of Tomorrow. This show is forever burned in my memory.   
     
I recall the intro theme for the show vividly! It would raise the hairs on the back of my neck and what few hairs I had on my arms; it was years before I discovered who the composer was.

The theme music was written by the Russian composer, Sergei Prokofiev, for his 1938 ballet in four acts, Romeo and Juliet, Op. 64. The very short piece of music opens the segment, Montagues And Capulets (links below).      

Sergei Prokofiev - New York, 1918 

Tales of Tomorrow was an American anthology science fiction series that was performed and broadcast live, mistakes and all as hysterically related by lighting designer, Imero Fiorentino (link below). It had a cheesy electronic organ accompaniment at times (common for the period). It was aired on the ABC network from 1951 to 1953.  

The series covered stories such as Frankenstein, starring Lon Chaney, Jr., 20,000 Leagues Under the Sea starring Thomas Mitchell as Captain Nemo, and many other stories featuring a fantastic array of performers: Boris Karloff, Brian Keith, Lee J. Cobb, Veronica Lake, Rod Steiger, Bruce Cabot, Franchot Tone, Gene Lockhart, Walter Abel, Cloris Leachman, Leslie Nielsen, Paul Newman and many others (complete list @ link below).   

Tales of Tomorrow had many similarities to the later Twilight Zone which also covered one of the same stories (What You Need). In total it ran for eighty-five 30-minute episodes. It was called “the best science-fiction fare on TV today” by Paul Fairman, editor of If.

If magazine

    

The idea for this science fiction television series was developed by Theodore Sturgeon and Mort Abrahamson, together with the membership of the Science Fiction League of America. The original title was planned as Tomorrow is Yours. A deal was struck with photographer Richard Gordon and writer George Foley, giving the producers of the show first choice of any of the 2,000 short stories and 13 novels by the various members of the League.        

Tales of Tomorrow was the first dramatized showcase for several authors, Arthur C. Clarke; etc. Other early science fiction writers whose work was reflected in the series included Fredric Brown (The Last Man on Earth and Age of Peril), Philip Wylie (Blunder) who with Edwin Balmer wrote When Worlds Collide, C. M. Kornbluth (The Little Black Bag) and Stanley G. Weinbaum (The Miraculous Serum). The show was intended for adults; at the time, most science fiction productions were targeted to children. The producers wanted to blend mystery and science fiction, and emphasize fast pacing and suspense.

Tales of Tomorrow episodes, with ads included, were recorded on Kinescope which can be seen on YouTube (links below).              

             
      
       
              


Viewfinder links:      
       
Sergei Prokofiev
Bernard E. Simonson, Jr.       
Christine K. Simonson         
Lucy Cadena-Jazzux         
Television       
The Twilight Zone        
          
Net links:      
       
IMDb ~ full cast & writing credits             
Academy of Television ~ Lighting Director Imero Fiorentino interview   
Sci-Fi Wire ~ Remembering the first sci-fi anthology series    
   
YouTube links:      
       
Tales of Tomorrow  
              ~ intro theme music 
Sergei Prokofiev ~ Romeo And Juliet - Montagues And Capulets
              ~ The Crystal Egg ( H.G. Wells )  
              ~ What you need (1952)      
Tales of Tomorrow episodes                         

      

        

"Stuff happens!"

              ~ Imero Fiorentino 

         

To the family and especially Lucy!

 
        
          
Styrous® ~ Saturday, September 29, 2018      

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