Posts by Gino Sassani

Bud Abbott and Lou Costello began their career completely by accident. Bud Abbott had tried his hand at doing the straight-man bit with limited success. One night in 1931 he was working as a cashier for a vaudeville company when Lou Costello's partner came down with an illness. The performer needed a stand-in, and Bud Abbott filled in for the night. It was a temporary gig, to be sure. A temporary gig that happened to last 25 years. The two continued to work together on stage. While the team certainly reused a ton of the classic routines of the era, there was something unique and clever about the duo. The natural way in which they fell into each other's lines was a rare sight, indeed. They eventually stood out for their ingenious word play, culminating in one of the most famous comic routines in history, Who's On First.

The pair next took their act to the airwaves -- radio airwaves, that is. They became a staple in the medium and eventually the highest paid performers in that industry. Films weren't really much of an option at first. They were still mostly silent, and while comedy thrived in that era, Abbott and Costello's brand of humor just would not have worked. But when sound became more economical and standard, the boys were thrown into the pictures. In 1940 they would star in a film called One Night In The Tropics. They would continue to make films for the next 14 years at an incredible pace. They made several films a year and were soon financing Universal studios with their output and box office income. Perhaps their most famous films were the monsters movies where Universal teamed their new moneymaker with the one before. In Abbott And Costello Meet Frankenstein, Bela Lugosi and Lon Chaney, Jr. would both reprise their famous Dracula and Wolf Man characters to the delight of fans of both franchises. Boris Karloff considered himself too old to don the heavy boots of the titular monster, which was played by Glenn Strange, who had performed the role in both House films. So he was still a legitimate part of the horror film cycle. The boys would get their chance to face Karloff later, not once, but twice.

"Deep in the heart of the Amazon, the Butler family was exploring an uncharted river canyon. Suddenly caught up in a violent whirlpool, they were propelled through an underground cavern and flung into a hostile world of prehistoric creatures, a world that time forgot. Now, befriended by a family of cave dwellers, each day is an adventure in survival for the Butlers in The Valley Of The Dinosaurs".

If you were a child in the 1970's, you'll remember that there was no time like Saturday morning. It was a race to be the first kid up, if you had siblings. I had to be the first to the new cereal box to root out the prize. After a big bowl of sugar it was time to plant yourself in front of the television until about noon, when the news programs took over. For those handful of hours, however, a kid could be transported into the ultimate fantasy world. There were superheroes and lost worlds to explore. One such show was The Valley Of The Dinosaurs.