I chlorophyll, kind boon of Earthly hearts,
Make oxygen and victuals of delight;
Dioxide of carbon, the rate of six parts,
Water equivalent, and some source of light,
Behold a plant's leaves or its branches of green,
A veritable vegetable factory,
Bountiful proof of blossom and bean
For both sense of taste and olfactory!
And were it nor for this forging food,
Succeeding such sweet inflorescence,
The word would have been a world without wood;
As 't happens 'neath Sol's incandescence:
From 6H2O and 6C02 pass
C6H12O6 plus 602 gas!

By Stephen Schochet

orgofhlly@aol.com
COPYRIGHT: ©2004 by Hollywood Stories. All rights reserved

As the filmmakers who worked on Mel Gibson's The Passion Of The Christ (2004) found out, Biblical Movies can often have a profound effect on their participants. During the production of The King Of Kings(1927) actor HB Warner who was playing Jesus one day walked out of his tent in full costume. While waiting to shoot his scene he sat in a chair
with a racing form, a bottle of booze and then lit up a cigarette. Director Cecil B. De Mille watched in dismay as a visiting photographer snapped an unflattering picture of his Messiah. "Come back here you!" De Mille gave chase but was unable to catch the shutterbug. Waving his riding crop angrily he turned to face Warner. "We can't have any bad publicity on this film HB. You need to behave yourself, damn you!" When the actor rose out of his chair he had transformed into his screen character. With proud dignity he asked," Do you realize who you are talking to Mr. De Mille?"

By Stephen Schochet

A recent Hollywood rumor was that Tobey Maguire injured his back during the making of Seabiscuit (2003) doing horseback riding scenes, making him unable to star in the sequel to Spider-Man. Although it turned out to be false, he rode a mechanical horse in the film, many actors have had close calls working with horses.

One example was Michael Caine, whose first movie Zulu (1964) required him to ride a horse after a hunting expedition, which after several embarrassing takes almost bought his career to a premature end. "I thought you said you had riding lessons!" said the angry director. "I did!" said the beleaguered star. "And the first thing I learned was I never wanted to ride one of these bloody things again!"

'Twas the night before Christmas, when all through the supply house,
Not a creature was stirring, not even a pipe mouse;
The orders were made in the office with care,
In hopes that St. Customer soon would be there;
The workers were ready all snug in their beds,
While visions of giant sales danced in their heads;
And the supplies were ready, the plants all so lush,
The owners had settled in for the great new year rush;
Then out on the lot there arose such a clatter,
They sprang from their seats to see what was the matter.

By Stephen Schochet

The movie industry has always had its share of nasty characters. During the making of The Island Of Dr. Moreau (1996), Val Kilmer ruined a co-stars close-up by putting out his cigarette in the cameraman's arm. On the set of Treasure Island (1934) Wallace Beery
was accidentally shot in the foot by Jackie Cooper with a prop gun. The powder burns caused him to scream bloody murder, and the film crew who hated him burst into applause. While directing a dramatic
scene in Dr. Jekyll And Mr. Hyde (1941), Victor Fleming twisted Lana Turner's arm behind her back to get her to cry in front of the camera. But the man in Hollywood who was most famous for being mean
was a juggler, comedian and writer named William Claude Dukenfield (1880-1946), later shortened to W.C. Fields.

By Stephen Schochet

Warren Beatty once observed," That if you get married in Hollywood, you should always do it before noon. That way if doesn't work out, you don't kill your evening." But in 1925 Walt Disney, still getting
his feet wet in Tinseltown was not interested in pampered starlets. His eye was on a employee of his named Lillian Bounds, originally from Lewiston, Idaho who worked for him as ink paint girl making
fifteen dollars a week. She reminded him of the hard working girls he knew growing up in Missouri. For her part she found him charming, the way he grew a mustache to look older in business meetings, and how he refused to call on her until he could afford a new suit.

By Stephen Schochet

Filmmakers have found the horror genre to be a potentially low budget, high profit way of breaking into the business. Standing in a long line at a hardware store, Tobe Hooper imagined taking a chainsaw off the wall and cutting his way to the front, inspiring his creation of The Texas Chainsaw Massacre (1974). George Romero found a local
butcher in Pittsburgh to finance and provide blood and guts for his zombie thriller Night Of The Living Dead (1968). Wes Craven combined a nasty bully named Freddy that he knew in grade school with a
frightening old hobo he saw hanging around his Cleveland neighborhood to create the dream killer Freddy Krueger for A Nightmare On Elm
Street (1984).

By Stephen Schochet

During the silent era it was thought a waste of money to make a movie with more than one star. Personalities like Charlie Chaplin, Harold Lloyd and Buster Keaton were considered potent enough box
office on their own. But with dwindling attendance during the great depression MGM decided to feature Hollywood's first all star ensemble cast in Grand Hotel (1932) starring the mammoth egos of Joan
Crawford, Wallace Beery, John Barrymore and Greta Garbo. The director Edmund Goulding was unable to let Joan Crawford and Garbo have any scenes together for fear they might try to upstage each other. Although she complimented her Swedish co-star's beauty, Crawford hated Garbo's demands that she get top billing. Knowing that Greta hated tardiness and Marlene Dietrich, Crawford was
constantly late and played Dietrich's records loudly on the set.

Crawford had another classic encounter with rival Bette Davis on the set of Whatever Happened to Baby Jane (1962).

by Stephen Schochet

Writers are often are greatly surprised or disappointed by how their work is changed when it is adapted for the big screen. When Irwin Shaw's World War II novel The Young Lions was shot in Paris in 1958, the Nazi character was played by Marlon Brando. Ever the method actor, Brando provoked an uproar by strutting around town in his SS uniform, even going into restaurants to dine. The thirty three year old star was unsure if the Parisians ripping his clothes were doing it out of adulation or disdain. Like most actors Brando wanted to be loved and he took his concern to Shaw that the Nazi be made sympathetic. "You just don't understand the character", Brando told the amazed writer. "It's my character," replied Shaw. "Not anymore", replied the actor.