Led by Ray McKinley, famed drummer for Glenn Miller’s Army Air Force Band
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Babalu by Señor Babalu
A Sensational Vocal and Dance Performance!
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I Remember You
Lorraine and Ragnon
Lorraine’s husband and dance partner, Roy Ragnon, died in a plane crash during a WW II USO tour. Lorraine suffered very serious injuries from that same crash, and made an heroic comeback as a singer and comedienne, thus performing without her husband at the New York premier of Never Say Goodbye. This crash was depicted in the Susan Hayward film, With a Song in My Heart.
“The film V for Vendetta is a wonderful mix of Phantom of the Opera, Errol Flynn, and the Count of Monte Cristo, combined with modern day reaction to government overreach.”
“V is a beautiful spectacle of a film, with heavy doses of Shakespeare and Errol Flynn…”
“V is an anti-hero character … with an endearing Errol Flynn like persona.”
“V is dashing and sympathetic, like an anarchist Errol Flynn.”
“The film does a phenomenal job of insinuating flippant Errol Flynn…”
Sidney Skolsky Presents
Watching Them Make Pictures
Errol Flynn, Olivia de Havilland, Claude Rains, and a crowd of extras are getting ready to play a scene for the picture, Robin Hood.
The setting is Nottingham Castle in England, and a feast is about to take place. Errol Flynn is Robin Hood, and Claude Rains is Prince John. The extras, dressed as knights, stand out in their shining armor. Director Mike Curtiz seems out of place, wearing trousers and a sweater.
Dirctor Curtiz gives the signal that he is ready. The cameras are turning. Robin Hood Flynn, lugging a deer, walks toward the banquet table. Here Prince John, with meats and wines before him, is entertaining. Robin Hood Flynn offers him the deer for the feast.
It is then that Prince John interrupts the scene and becomes Claude Rains.
He says to Curtiz, “Mike, I forgot to tell you something. I’ve been doing some research on the part. And according to history, Prince John was a vegetarian, and he never drank wine.”
Miss de Havilland and Mr. Rathbone, standing at the banquet table, are amazed, but say that history is history.
But this doesn’t stop director Curtiz. He says: “We need this big scene for the picture. In the movies we don’t make historical pictures, we make history.”
But it’s a great excuse to steal a kiss from Olivia!
December 1, 1938
Los Angeles Examiner
Behind the Makeup
By Erskine Johnson
ON THE SETS: EXTERIOR — PRAIRIE — MODESTO, CALIF.
Errol Flynn and Olivia de Havilland ride to the top of a low ride and pull their horses to a halt. Their eyes travel over the countryside. Flynn, making his debut as a Western hero in Dodge City, lifts his arm, points off into the distance.
“See that herd of buffalo grazing so peacefully over there?” he says to Miss De Havilland.
She nods and her eyes follow his outstretched hand. Then she breaks into an involuntary giggle, spoiling the scene.
Flynn’s “herd of buffalo” is a lone, tired looking cow.
But when the picture is completed, the cow will be a real herd of buffalo. A camera crew traveled all the way to Oklahoma to photograph one of the few remaining herds of the animals that made the nickel famous. There aren’t any in California.
Ronald Reagan: He is an actor who is interested in the welfare of actors and in their position in the industry. He has advanced from a supporting player to a leading man. He is always to know what pictures are being made at his studio, and when hears of any he likes, he makes a bid for it. He is very pleased that he is no longer told they wanted Errol Flynn for a certain picture, but that they are going to give it to him.
It was just announced that Star Wars Episode IX, will be released in December. Though the “final chapter of the Star Wars saga”, Errol’s inspiration on the series has been profound, from the very start, as confirmed by the quotes below.
Lucas and Spielberg
“If one man defines the era of swashbuckling Hollywood action that George Lucas and Steven Spielberg (used as a model) it’s Errol Flynn.”
Harrison Ford/Hans Solo
“Ford’s Han Solo is a watershed creation … a conscious throwback —you can see Errol Flynn’s lightness there …”
Billy Dee Williams/Lando Calrissian
“I patterned Lando after actors I saw when I was a boy, like Errol Flynn and all those swashbucklers. I always liked those bigger-than-life characters.”
“Lando is fun-loving, kind of roguish. He was a swashbuckling character, kind of an Errol Flynn. I wanted to make the character bigger than life.”
Samuel K. Jackson/Mace Windu
“Errol Flynn films he watched as a boy informed his role in Star Wars.”
“What I love about ‘Star Wars’ is that it’s your basic Errol Flynn movie, but it’s science fiction,”
“For me, it was the ’70’s Errol Flynn movie. And as a kid I’d always wanted to be … that swash-buckling pirate, you know — jumping over stuff and getting busy that way. And all of a sudden we got some space buccaneers.”
Alden Ehrenreich/Hans Solo in Solo: A Star Wars Story
“Ehreneich channels a young Errol Flynn as this galaxy’s favorite rogue.”
Carrie Fisher
“Not only all this, but we find Olivia de Havilland as Maid Marian, sporting that imperious hauteur and even Princess Leia’s hairdo long before they were fashionable.”
Light-Saber Duels
Errol Flynn’s charming scoundrel may be closer in character to Han Solo than Luke Skywalker, but his acrobatic swordplay – especially the famous fight with Basil Rathbone – became a crucial touchstone for the latter’s saber choreography. Bob Anderson was a fencing choreographer and double for both Flynn (in the 50s) and for Star Wars.
John Williams
The composer of this matinee favourite was one Erich Wolfgang Korngold, from whom John Williams derived a brassy, fanfare-rich approach to orchestration and even a theme or two – Korngold’s score for King’s Row (1942) was used as a temp track while Lucas was cutting Star Wars together.
