Universal Monsters - Part 3

Continuing with our Halloween-inspired "Universal Monsters"/"A Christmas Carol" thing, we sneak back to 1936 for "Dracula's Daughter."

The star of that film is Otto Kruger, whom we heard as Scrooge in that U.S. Navy "Joy to the World" AFRTS radio show from the mid-1950s!

Mr. Kruger's role in "Dracula's Daughter" is a bit unusual for him, as he's the hero/romantic lead and even has the two female leads fighting over him!

As I mentioned before, he was really good at playing suave villains hiding under an air of respectability. This kind of leads to being a good type for "mad scientist" roles in horror movies, but he only played that type of role a couple of times, including Universal's 1945 " The Jungle Captive."

This is more how I think of him, as he seems to be a respected scientist on the surface, but is secretly carrying out crazy experiments! He lends a much-needed sense of professionalism to this flick!

I think the only other time he got to play such a role was much later in 1958's "The Colossus of New York." Check out the awesome trailer on the IMDB:

"The Colossus of New York" (1958)

Fun!

You may recall that the host of that AFRTS show was Robert Paige, former Universal contractee. He had perhaps his best role ever in 1943's "Son of Dracula" and he makes the most of it:

Since no one's asking, I'll throw in my two cents on the unusual casting of Lon Chaney, Jr. as Dracula: I agree that he's not really right for the part, but I'm a fan and think it's cool that he got to play all of the classic monsters in one movie or another!

Universal Monsters - Part 2

We continue with the "Universal Monsters" film series and their connections to various adaptations of "A Christmas Carol" with 1940's "The Invisible Man Returns," the second in that series.

The title role in this one was played by Vincent Price, who was the host of the made-for-TV, awkwardly titled "The Christmas Carol" from 1949!

As with Claude Rains in the 1933 film, this was an early role for Vincent Price (his fourth movie) and we (SPOILER) also don't see his face until the last scene. And he looks really young when we do!

Vincent does a good job here in his first "horror" role, but he's not as over-the-top (in a good way) as he would be later in his career!

Top-billed in "The Invisible Man Returns" was British actor Sir Cedric Hardwicke, who also starred in 1942's "The Ghost of Frankenstein" for Universal. You would think that Sir Cedric would have had a "go" at Ebenezer Scrooge at some point during his long career, but apparently he did not! 

He did star in 1947's "The Life and Adventures of Nicholas Nickleby" for the Rank Studio, though, so that's something!

Universal Monsters - Part 1

Halloween is just a couple of weeks away, and if, like me, you enjoy watching the old "Universal Monsters" movies, you may be making connections between some of those movies and various adaptations of "A Christmas Carol."

For example, the great Claude Rains, who recorded a version of "A Christmas Carol" for Mercury Records in 1954, starred in a few of the monster movies earlier in his career.

In fact, his movie debut was in the title role of 1933's "The Invisible Man."

Rains gives a great performance in that film, which is all the more impressive since (SPOILER) you don't actually even see his face until the very end!

Since this was his first film, he doesn't get top-billing (as seen in the poster at the top), but later reissues emphasize his now-famous name:

I wonder where the little inset photo of a visible, pistol-packing Rains came from?

He also headlines a sort-of all-star cast in 1941's "The Wolf Man" (my favorite!), in which he portrays Sir John Talbot, the father of the lycanthropic Larry Talbot.

I hear/read all the time about the lack of a familial resemblance between Claude Rains and Lon Chaney, Jr., which can't be denied, but do cinematic families ever really look alike? And Rains lends a ton of gravitas to the proceedings, so I'm really glad he's there!

Rains had the title role (but was third-billed) in Universal's big 1942 remake of the "Phantom of the Opera":

I think this one is somewhat underrated. Modern viewers don't think it's monster-y enough, but you need to watch it as mid-1940s entertainment and not worry about how it fits into the whole "Universal Monsters" scene!

Of further note is that Universal actually dabbled a bit with Dickens adaptations back at that time, including "The Mystery of Edwin Drood" starring Claude Rains from 1935:

Universal also produced a version of "Great Expectations" in 1934:

Of even further note is that the adult Pip in that movie was portrayed by Phillips Holmes, who was the son of Taylor Holmes, the Scrooge from the 1949 TV version of "A Christmas Carol" hosted by Vincent Price!

It all comes back around!

Special Edition!

This particular edition not only has a fun cover, but it's formatted to be read more easily by those with dyslexia:

Pretty neat!

Galway!

The title of this 1986 Christmas album from RCA is "James Galway's Christmas Carol," which sounds like "Mister Magoo's Christmas Carol" or "Mickey's Christmas Carol." but, no, this is not an adaptation starring the Irish flutist as Scrooge:

There doesn't appear to be any direct relation to the Dickens work, but Galway's outfit does look Victorian and the music would not be out of place in an adaptation!

Let Topo Read!

Now that I think about it, I want Topo Gigio reading "Il Canto di Natale" to me!

Sorry, Julius LaRosa and Lou Monte!

Grumpy!

Here's an interesting ad from 1968:

Avis had a whole campaign showing how they got rid of "bugs" when you rented one of their cars:

The Grump bug even got his own coffee mug:

Make mine pumpkin spice, please!