The Late Great Cliff Robertson

He was Rod Brown of the Rocket Rangers, Charlie Gordon, and Uncle Ben Parker. He won both an Oscar and an Emmy. Cliff Robertson was a versatile actor with a long career in film, on television, and the stage. He died today, 10 September 2011, the day after his 88th birthday.

Clifford Robertson was born in Los Angeles, California on 9 September 1923. He attended Antioch College in Yellow Springs, Ohio. For a time he worked as a journalist.

Cliff Robertson made his film debut in 1943 in We've Never Been Licked and appeared the same year in Corvette K-225. He made his television debut in an episode of Short Short Dramas. He played the lead in the Saturday morning space opera Rod Brown of the Rocket Rangers. Throughout the Fifties he appeared in such shows as Hallmark Hall of Fame, Armstrong Circle Theatre, Robert Montgomery Presents, Kraft Theatre, Wagon Train, Westinghouse Desliu Playhouse, Playhouse 90, The Dick Powell Theatre, The United States Steel Hour, and The Untouchables. He appeared in such films as Picnic (1956), Autumn Leaves (1956), The Girl Most Likely  (1958), The Naked and The Dead (1958), and Gidget (1959).  On Broadway he appeared in the productions Late Love, Orpheus Descending, and The Wisteria Trees.

In the Sixties he appeared in such films as All in a Night's Work (1961), The Big Show (1961), Underworld U.S.A. (1961), My Six Lives (1962), The Interns (1962), PT 109 (1963, in which he played Lt. John F. Kennedy), Sunday in New York (1963), The Best Man (1964), Masquerade (1965), The Honey Pot (1967), The Devil's Bridgade (1967), and Charly (1968--for which he won the Oscar for Best Actor). On television he appeared in the recurring role of the villain Shame on Batman. He also appeared in the shows Bus Stop, Ben Casey, The Twilight Zone, The Outer Limits, Suspense, The Red Skelton Hour, Bob Hope Presents The Chrysler Theatre, and Bracken's World.

In the Seventies Mr. Robertson appeared in such films as J. W. Coop (1971), The Great Northfield Minnesota Raid (1972), Man on a Swing (1974), Three Days of the Condor (1975), Midway (1976), and The Pilot (1980). He appeared on television in the mini-series Washington Behind Closed Doors. In the Eighties Cliff Robertson appeared in such films as Star 80 (1983), Class (1983), Brainstorm (1983), Shaker Run (1986), and Malone (1987). On television he was a regular on Falcon Crest. From the Nineties into the Naughts he appeared in such films as Wild Hearts Can't Be Broken (1991), Wind (1992), Renaissance Man (1994), Escape From LA (1996), Spider-Man (2002), and Riding the Bullet (2004). He appeared on television on The Outer Limits.

Cliff Robertson was a versatile actor whom I believe was always underrated. While his name may not be as recognisable as some of his contemporaries, I think there can be no argument that he was a great actor capable of playing nearly any role set before him. This can be seen in the role for which he won an Oscar, that of Charlie Gordon in Charly. The movie deals with a mentally challenged man who undergoes treatment which transforms him into a genius. Mr. Robertson was convincing as both the sweet, but mentally challenged Charlie and as the not so sweet, genius version of Charlie. Despite the leap in intelligence, it was easy to believe it was the same character because of Mr. Robertson's performance. Indeed, throughout his career he played a number of different roles, from surfer dude The Big Kahuna in Gidget to Cole Younger in The Great Northfield Minnesota Raid to Ben Parker in the Spider-Man movies. Cliff Robertson played a wide array of characters and was convincing every time. Few actors had his range.

Just Another Reminder for the Margaret Lockwood Blogathon

This is just another reminder that I am hosting a blogathon on 15 September 2011 in honour of Margaret Lockwood's 95th birthday. If you want to take part, just leave me a comment on this blog or email me. Your blog post on Maggie can be anything: a post on some particular aspect of her career; a post on a particular movie; or you can simply do a blog of nothing but pictures. Anyhow, for those who are taking part, here is a banner you can use on your blog posts

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Why Rory Williams is One of My Favourite Doctor Who Companions

When many people name their favourites of The Doctor's companions from Doctor Who, one might hear "Sarah Jane Smith," "Brigadier Lethbridge-Stewart," or the more recent "Rose Tyler." All three of these number among my favourites of The Doctor's companions (Rose is my favourite, Sarah Jane a very close number two), but I would also have to include one of The Doctor's current companions, Rory Williams, in my list of favourites. In fact, while I like Amy Pond, given a choice between Amy staying with The Doctor and Rory staying with The Doctor, Amy would be the one to leave.

There is a simple reason for me, and I suspect most other men, to like Rory. The simple fact is that of The Doctor's many companions, he is probably the most like the average guy. Rory is clumsy. He can be insecure. He can be jealous of Amy's relationship with The Doctor. And yet Rory is not a total loser, just as a the average guy is not necessarily a total  loser. When Rory was introduced in the episode "The Eleventh Hour" as Amy's "sort of boyfriend," he was rightfully suspicious about the coma patients in the hospital at which he worked. He later helped Amy evacuate the hospital and lent The Doctor his cell phone with which The Doctor used to create a computer virus to attract the jailers of the escaped Prisoner Zero, the villain of the episode.

Of course, in "The Eleventh Hour," as in much of the series, Rory is a bit henpecked by Amy. This is hardly a sign that he lacks backbone, however, as Rory is a fairly brave individual. In "The Vampires of Venice" he actually challenged the Saturnynian Francesco in order to defend Amy. In "Amy's Choice" he actually stepped between Amy and a creature (in the form of an old lady) that spewed some sort of acidic venom. One might attribute these acts of bravery to Rory simply defending the woman he loves, but as the series progressed it seems Rory was capable of courage when it came to defending others as well. In "Cold Blood" Rory blocked a shot meant for The Doctor, an act which resulted not only in his death, but in being erased from existence as well.

This brings us to another point about Rory: short of The Doctor himself, I think he has died more times than any character on Doctor Who. Rory would be killed temporarily, or at least incapacitated, in at least six episodes ("Amy's Choice," "Cold Blood," "The Big Bang," "Day of the Moon," "The Curse of the Black Spot," and "The Doctor's Wife"). Rory does not remain dead, however, as he always comes back. After so many deaths one would think Rory would divorce Amy and abandon The Doctor, but instead he continues to adventure with them. Rory would then seem to be unwavering and unfaltering, almost unstoppable. Indeed, when Amy was preserved within the Pandorica (a prison box made to hold The Doctor), Rory (recreated as an Auton duplicate) guarded the box for 2000 years. This is not only a mark of Rory's perseverance, but also of just how much he loves Amy.

While Rory Williams has been played for comic relief quite often, then, he is hardly a buffoon or a coward. Indeed, Rory stands in sharp contrast to Rose Tyler's former boyfriend, Mickey Smith. While Mickey would improve throughout the run of Doctor Who, when we first meet him in "Rose" he was not exactly brave. In fact, at one point, Mickey even clung to Rose for protection. It is impossible seeing Rory clinging to Amy for protection. Indeed, the man literally took a blow for The Doctor.

To sum things up, Rory is both what the average guy really is and what the average guy wants to be. Like Rory most of us are hardly perfect. We can be clumsy. We can be jealous. We can be insecure. At the same time, however, Rory has qualities that the average guy really would like to have. He is brave. He is loyal. He is persistent. In some respects Rory could even be considered more heroic than The Doctor. The Doctor is over 900 years old and has a wealth of knowledge and advanced technology which he can fall back on.  Often all Rory has are his wits, his courage, and sheer determination. I suspect that there is a reason why The Doctor chose Rory as a companion beyond the fact that he was Amy's boyfriend. Quite simply, The Doctor saw in Rory the makings of a hero.

Television: Rare & Well Done

It is with great pleasure that I announce that my book Television: Rare & Well Done: Essays on the Medium is now available. The book is a collection of essays on television I have written over the years, some gathered from A Shroud of Thoughts and one from elsewhere. Subjects covered in the book are the Golden Age of American television, TV Westerns, The Avengers, the Sixties spy craze, the Batman fad, and CBS's mass cancellation of rural shows in 1971.

It will be a few days before the book is available through Amazon, other online venues, and book stores, but one can buy it right now directly through Create Space. Just click on the image below.

Margaret Lockwood Blogathon Reminder

This is just a reminder that I am hosting a blogathon on 15 September 2011 in honour of Margaret Lockwood's 95th birthday. If you want to participate, just leave me a comment on this blog or email me. Your blog post on Maggie can be anything: a post on some particular aspect of her career; a post on a particular movie; or you can simply do a blog of nothing but pictures. Anyhow, for those who are participating, here is a banner you can use on your blog posts

In other news, I just want to let everyone know that Blogger did add a button for editing the html of one's template to their new interface. That having been said, I still think the new interface is less efficient than the old one. And that colour scheme does have to go!

The New Blogger Interface

Blogger was founded in 1999. Since that time the Blogger dashboard has seen only one major change, that in 2006. This included the ability to edit templates by dragging and dropping elements, as well as providing new options for web feeds. In 2009 a few more changes were introduced, including time stamping at the time of publication rather than the creation of the post (personally, I prefer the latter), the ability to edit links in Compose mode, and a brand new Preview dialogue. Over all, however, the Blogger dashboard has changed very little. That is until now.

Yesterday Blogger rolled out its new interface, which it is giving its members a chance to try out. In theory, at least, the new interface is supposed to be easier and more efficient to use than the old one. As is often the case, however, the new interface is actually neither easier to use nor is it necessarily more efficient than the old Blogger dashboard.

To show you an example of how much less efficient the new Blogger dashboard is than the old one, below is a screenshot of the old Blogger dashboard:

You will notice  that New Post, Edit Post, Comments, Settings, Design, Monetise, and Stats are all easily accessible by links, which are clearly visible. Below is the new Blogger dashboard.

You will notice that there are no links for New Post, Edit Post, Comments, Setting, et. al. These are accessible only by clicking the drop down menu by the little Post icon (the icon with a picture of a pencil). Now this seems neither easier nor more efficient to me for two reasons. First, it may not occur to everyone to click on the little drop down menu to find New Post, Comments, et. al. I was able to find it in about a minute, but I am not sure everyone is going to find it as quickly as I did. Second, it is just common sense to me that it is much faster to click on a link that is right there on the page than it is to click on a drop down menu, then click on the link. 

Of course, once one finds the links to New Post, Comments, Settings, et. al., the new Blogger interface isn't too much different from the old one. Below is a screen shot of the old Blogger interface after clicking on the Posts link.

Below is a screen shot of the new Blogger interface after one has clicked on the Posts link.

You'll notice the only real difference is that Posts, Comments, Settings, et. al. are now listed on the side rather than the top. To a degree this would seem to really make no difference, except for one thing. On the new interface one has to scroll down to see the entire list. On the old one they are all right there at the top.

So far my complaints about the new Blogger interface have been very minor. If these were my only objections to the new interface I would be willing to give it a chance, even if I feel it is harder and less efficient to use. That having been said, I do have two major complaints with the new interface. The first is the way templates are handled. As near as I can tell, there is no means by which one can edit the raw html of one's blog template. For someone with a customised blog template as myself, this makes editing one's template nearly impossible. This is a major oversight on Blogger's part and one that I hope they will correct. Much of what makes Blogger superior to some other blog hosting services is the sheer amount of customisation one can do to his or her blog template. 

My second  big complaint with the new Blogger interface is that it is all done up in blinding, mind numbing, corporate white. As with most web sites that are done entirely in white, I find myself having to adjust the brightness on my monitor simply to be able to see (I happen to very sensitive to light). This is made even worse iin that some of the print (as you can see in the top image of the new Blogger dashboard) is a light grey, making it very hard to read! While I cannot say that my complaints about the new Blogger dashboard being harder and less efficient to use than the old one are major ones , I have a very big objection to the colour scheme of the new Blogger dashboard. Quite frankly, it is one of the worst colour schemes I have ever seen on a web site.

Now I do have to say that there are some good things about the new Blogger interface. There is a new Overview section, letting you know how much traffic you have had at your blog with a little graph, as well as the usual number of blog posts and number of followers a blog has. The new post editor also has a big advantage over the old one--it expands to fit one's post! For someone who can make very long blog posts like me, this is a veritable godsend (if only it wasn't all in white).  Another good thing about the new Blogger interface is that the post button is on nearly every single page, so that one can start a new post from almost anywhere on the new Blogger interface. This also seems to me like a handy thing to have.

Over all I cannot say this is a Facebook level overhaul where a good deal of functionality is lost. In many respects the new Blogger interface is not that much different from the old Blogger interface. The problem is that it seems to me that the new Blogger interface sacrifices too much in the way of ease of use and efficiency and far too much in terms of functionality with regards to blog templates. It also happens to be blindingly, mind numblingly, corporate white. I think the best course for Blogger right now is to simply incorporate the Overview section, the ability of the post editor to expand, and including a post button on every single page into the old Blogger dashboard. This would improve the old Blogger dashboard while not sacrificing ease of use or functionality.

UPDATE: I was just informed by someone that when you click on Template>Design, there is an HTML button beneath the screen shot of one's blog. I could have sworn it was not there yesterday! At any rate, it seems that it is possible to edit the HTML of one's template on the new Blogger interface. Of course, the new interface is still done up in blinding, mind numbing, corporate white!

TV Director Reza Badiyi Passes On

Reza Badiyi, who directed television shows ranging from Get Smart to Buffy the Vampire Slayer, passed on 20 August 2011 at the age of 81.

Mr. Badiyi was born in Arak, Iran on 17 April 1930. He studied acting at the Academy of Drama in Iran. He eventually switched from acting to cinematography, and then to making documentaries. Before moving to the United States in 1955, he had made 21 documentaries. His documentary Flood in Khuzestan caught the attention of the United States, who invited him to come to the U.S. to study filmmaking. He studied filmmaking at the Syracuse University, then went to work for industrial film company Calvin Co. in Kansas City, Missouri. There he met director Robert Altman. He was assistant camera on Mr. Altman's short "The Magic Bond (1955) and  an assistant director on Mr. Altman's feature film debut, The Delinquents in 1957.

Reza Badiyi went onto be an assistant director on Carnival of Souls (1962) and an associate producer on the movie Terror at Black Falls (1962) and the TV series Run, Buddy, Run. In 1967 he created the titles for legendary sitcom He & She. He would go onto create title sequences for The Good Guys, Mary Tyler Moore, and Hawaii Five-O. He would be best known in television for his directing. Indeed, according to the Director's Guild, Mr. Badiyi holds the record for directing the most hours of American television. Over the years he directed episodes of such shows as  Get Smart, Hawaii Five-O, The Doris Day Show, Mission: Impossible, The Magician, Mannix, Serpico, Man From Atlantis, Baretta, The Rockford Files, Hart to Hart, Falcon Crest, Jake and the Fatman, Dr. Quinn Medicine Woman, In the Heat of the Night, Star Trek: Deep Space Nine, Nowhere Man, La Femme Nikita, and Buffy the Vampire Slayer.

Reza Badiyi was not simply a prolific director in television, but a talented one as well. He was equally at home directing sitcoms as he was action adventure shows or dramas. In fact, in his long career he directed nearly every genre of television, from comedy to police drama to science fiction to horror. It was his skill as a director that allowed him to create the memorable title sequences to Hawaii Five-O and Mary Tyler Moore. Mr. Badiyi was a superior television director who paid more than usual attention to the camera work on the shows he directed.