The New Biographical Dictionary of Film: Completely Updated and Expanded (317 page)

Jack Palance
(Vladimir Palanuik—proceed with caution, since there are a handful of versions of his true name) (1919–2006), b. Lattimer, Pennsylvania
The son of Russian immigrants. He studied journalism at the universities of North Carolina and Stanford, was a boxer, and then a member of the U.S. air corps. On active service, his face was badly burned, so plastic surgery added to the taut strain of his features.

Writing for radio led him to stage acting, including work on Broadway with Elia Kazan, who cast him as the plague-carrying criminal in
Panic in the Streets
(50) (in which he was credited as Walter Jack Palance). After Milestone’s
Halls of Montezuma
(50), he made his best-known appearance, as Stark Wilson, the hired gun, in
Shane
(53, George Stevens). His Slav looks always pointed Palance at exotic or sinister parts—
Sudden Fear
(52, David Miller) and
Sign of the Pagan
(54, Douglas Sirk)—but Robert Aldrich saw that the same face might appear sensitive and nerve-racked: thus he played the movie star in
The Big Knife
(55), the doomed officer in
Attack!
(56), and in
Ten Seconds to Hell
(59).

His work usually carried a unique note of repressed hysteria:
Second Chance
(53, Rudolph Maté); as Jack the Ripper in
Man in the Attic
(53, Hugo Fregonese);
Kiss of Fire
(55, Joseph M. Newman);
I Died a Thousand Times
(55, Stuart Heisler), a remake of
High Sierra;
as twin brothers, changing places in Sing Sing in
House of Numbers
(57, Russell Rouse); as the father in
The Lonely Man
(57, Henry Levin).

But Palance was too unsettling to last as a star, and from about 1960 he worked as much in Europe as in America, giving several distinctive performances, happiest when most free to indulge in flamboyant menace:
The Mongols
(61, André de Toth and Riccardo Freda);
Barabbas
(62, Richard Fleischer); in manic charge of a little red book and a snarling red Maserati as the producer in Godard’s
Contempt
(63); the Mexican in Brooks’s
The Professionals
(66); as a crazy Edgar Allan Poe enthusiast in
The Torture Garden
(67, Freddie Francis); as Castro in Fleischer’s
Che!
(69); as a lawman in
They Came to Rob Las Vegas
(69, Antonio Isasi); as the father in Frankenheimer’s
The Horsemen
(70); and as the sidekick in
Monte Walsh
(70, William Fraker).

A word is in order for his TV
Dr. Jekyll and Mr. Hyde
(72, Charles Jarrott), without obvious makeup effects, but the two personae frighteningly alike. That proved again how disturbing Palance can be when under restraint. In the movies he increasingly gave himself up to satanic laughter and teeth-baring:
Justine: Le Disavventure della Virtu
(68, Jess Franco);
The Desperadoes
(69, Levin);
Vamos a Matar, Companeros!
(70, Sergio Corbucci);
Si Puo Fare … Amigo
(71, Maurizio Lucidi);
Chato’s Land
(71, Michael Winner);
Oklahoma Crude
(73, Stanley Kramer);
Te Deum
(73, Enzo G. Castellani);
Craze
(73, Francis);
Dracula
(73, Dan Curtis); and
The Cop in Blue Jeans
(76, Bruno Corbucci).

Since then, he has been all over the place:
Portrait of a Hitman
(77, Allan J. Buckhantz);
One-Man Jury
(78, Charles Martin);
Angels’ Brigade
(79, Greydon Clark);
The Shape of Things to Come
(79, George McCowan);
Cocaine Cowboys
(79, Ulli Lommel);
The Last Ride of the Dalton Gang
(79, Dan Curtis);
The Ivory Ape
(80, Tom Kotani);
Hawk the Slayer
(80, Terry Marcel);
Without Warning
(80, Clark);
Alone in the Dark
(82, Jack Sholder)—in which he costars with Donald Pleasence—some films are like rainbows, best seen from a great distance; a cameo in
Gor
(88, Fritz Kiersch); suddenly reclaimed by class for
Bagdad Cafe
(88, Percy Adlon);
Young Guns
(88, Christopher Cain); the wicked priest amid the swords and sorcery of
Outlaw of Gor
(89, John Cardos);
Batman
(89, Tim Burton); and
Tango and Cash
(89, Andrei Konchalovsky).

He won the supporting actor Oscar in
City Slickers
(91, Ron Underwood), though he was more entertaining receiving the award than in the film. Then he was in
Radio Flyer
(92, Richard Donner);
Salmonberries
(92, Adlon);
Cops & Robbersons
(94, Michael Ritchie);
City Slickers II
(94, Paul Weiland); and a whole bunch of television stuff.

Eugene Pallette
(1889–1954), b. Winfield, Kansas
Though we lack his Mercutio, his Beau Geste, and his Oliver Twist, we have so much. Indeed, in the IMDb list of credits, Eugene Pallette has over 240—to which, let me add that in 1946 (when he was only fifty-seven) he retired because of illness and fear of the world (more of this anon). Grant that his first year of screen acting seems to have been 1913, he made something like seven films a year at a trot. It hardly needs to be said that these pages are printed on especially sturdy stock to take the extra loads of Mr. Pallette, the most endearing and oblivious of the screen’s fat people.

He was a lean Union soldier in
Birth of a Nation
(15, D. W. Griffith) and Prosper Latour in the Huguenot episode of
Intolerance
(16, Griffith). A little later he was in
Alias Jimmy Valentine
(20, Edmund Mortimer and Arthur Ripley); Aramis (not Porthos) in
The Three Musketeers
(21, Fred Niblo)—George Siegmann was Porthos;
To the Last Man
(23, Victor Fleming);
North of Hudson Bay
(23, John Ford);
The Wolf Man
(24, Mortimer); in some Laurel and Hardy shorts;
The Light of Western Stars
(25, William K. Howard);
Mantrap
(26, Fleming);
Chicago
(27, Frank Urson);
His Private Life
(28, Frank Tuttle);
The Dummy
(29, Robert Milton);
The Canary Murder Case
(29, Malcolm St. Clair and Tuttle);
The Love Parade
(29, Ernst Lubitsch);
The Virginian
(29, Fleming).

Pallette was growing larger, but that wasn’t what made him. Sound revealed one of the great voices of the screen—basso profundo, gravel-strained, low-down, yet dainty too. When he spoke he became enchanting:
The Sea God
(30, George Abbott);
The Playboy of Paris
(30, Ludwig Berger)—a Maurice Chevalier film;
It Pays to Advertise
(31, Frank Tuttle); the Duke of Bilgewater in
Huckleberry Finn
(31, Norman Taurog); and fantastic value for every growl and sigh in
Shanghai Express
(32, Josef von Sternberg);
The Half-Naked Truth
(32, Gregory La Cava).

He was in
The Kennel Murder Case
(33, Michael Curtiz);
Bordertown
(35, Archie Mayo);
Steamboat Round the Bend
(35, Ford);
The Ghost Goes West
(35, René Clair);
The Golden Arrow
(36, Alfred E. Green); magnificent as Bullock in
My Man Godfrey
(36, La Cava); with Shirley Temple in
Stowaway
(36, William A. Seiter);
Topper
(37, Norman Z. McLeod);
One Hundred Men and a Girl
(37, Henry Koster); as Friar Tuck in
The Adventures of Robin Hood
(38, Curtiz and William Keighley);
Mr. Smith Goes to Washington
(39, Frank Capra);
First Love
(39, Koster);
Young Tom Edison
(40, Taurog);
The Mark of Zorro
(40, Rouben Mamoulian).

Then comes his masterpiece: as Horace Pike, head of the ale that made Yale, in
The Lady Eve
(41, Preston Sturges). Other people do very well in that film, too, but the grace of it all allows the feeling that it is truly a Pallette picture, tiptoeing downstairs on “For tonight we’ll merry, merry be.”

He worked on through the war years:
The Bride Came C.O.D
. (41, Keighley);
Appointment for Love
(41, Seiter);
The Male Animal
(42, Elliott Nugent); Nicely Nicely Johnson in
The Big Street
(42, Irving Reis); Charles Boyer’s butler in
Tales of Manhattan
(42, Julien Duvivier);
It Ain’t Hay
(43, Erle C. Kenton)—an Abbott and Costello picture;
Heaven Can Wait
(43, Lubitsch);
The Gang’s All Here
(43, Busby Berkeley);
Pin Up Girl
(44, Bruce Humberstone);
Step Lively
(44, Tim Whelan);
The Cheaters
(45, Joseph Kane);
Suspense
(46, Tuttle).

At that point, Pallette moved to Oregon. He feared a nuclear war and so he built himself a stronghold up in the forests and the mountains—a San Simeon for the Cold War mood. He entertained old Hollywood friends, with strong ale to chase away nightmares. But his death came before disaster.

Tony Palmer
, b. London, 1941
1966:
The Art of Conducting
(d);
Up the Theatre
(d). 1967:
Conceit
(d);
Benjamin Britten and His Festival
(d);
Burning Fiery Furnace
(d);
Corbusier
(d);
Twice a Fortnight
(TV series). 1968:
All My Loving
(d);
Cream Farewell
(d);
How It Is
(d). 1969:
The World of Peter Sellers
(d);
Rope Ladder to the Moon
(d). 1970:
Fairport Convention
(d);
Colosseum
(d);
Glad All Over
(d);
National Youth Theater
(d). 1971:
200 Motels; Brighton Breezy
(d);
Mahler 9
(d);
Ginger Baker in Africa
(d);
Birmingham
(d). 1972:
The Pursuit of Happiness
(d);
Bird on a Wire
(d);
The World of Liberace
(d). 1973:
The World of Hugh Hefner
(d);
International Youth Orchestra
(d). 1974:
Rory Gallagher—Irish Tour
(d);
The World of Miss World
(d);
Harriet
(TV series). 1975:
Tangerine Dream at Coventry Cathedral
(d);
All You Need Is Love
(d). 1976:
All This & World War II
(d). 1977:
The Wigan Casino
(d);
Biddu
(d);
The Edinburgh Festival
(d). 1978:
The Mighty Wurlitzer
(d);
The Edinburgh Festival Revisited
(d). 1979:
The Space Movie
(d);
Pride of Place
(d);
A Time There Was
(d). 1980:
First Edition
(d);
At the Haunted End of the Day
(d). 1981:
Death in Venice
(d). 1982:
Once, at a Border
(d). 1983:
Wagner
. 1984:
Primal Scream
(d);
Puccini
. 1985:
God Rot Tunbridge Wells
(d). 1986:
Mozart in Japan
(d). 1987:
Testimony; Callas
(d). 1988:
In from the Cold?
(d);
Dvorak in Love?
(d). 1989:
Hindemith: A Pilgrim’s Progress
(d);
The Children
. 1990:
Menuhin: A Family Portrait
(d). 1992:
I, Berlioz
(d). 1993:
The Symphony of Sorrowful Songs
(d). 1994:
A Short Film About Loving
(d). 1995:
England, My England
(d). 1996:
Brahms and the Little Singing Girls
(d);
The Fantastic World of Michael Crawford
(d). 1997:
Hail Bop!
(d);
Parsifal
(d). 1998:
The Harvest of Sorrow
(d);
The Kindness of Strangers
(d). 1999:
Valentina Igoshina Plays Chopin
(d);
The Strange Case of Delfina Potocka
. 2001:
Foreign Aids
(d). 2002:
Ladies & Gentlemen, Miss Renée Fleming
(d);
Hero: The Story of Bobby Moore
(d). 2003:
Towards the Unknown Region—Malcolm Arnold, A Story of Survival; John Osborne and the Gift of Friendship
(d). 2004:
Ivry Gitlis and the Great Tradition
(d). 2005:
The Adventures of Benjamin Schmid
(d);
Margot
(d). 2006:
The Salzburg Festival
(d). 2007:
O Thou Transcendent
(d). 2008:
O, Fortuna!
(d). 2009:
Vangelis and the Journey to Ithaka
(d).

No one could claim that Tony Palmer has been idle, or that he is a late developer. He should have been in this book long ago. As someone not living in Britain since 1975, I can argue that I missed seeing a lot of Palmer’s films as they played on television. Still, that is not excuse enough. So I am grateful to the work done by John C. Tibbetts in writing
All My Loving: the Films of Tony Palmer
, and for his kindness in lending me DVDs of programs I had missed. All of this leaves me in no better a state for making a tidy package of Tony Palmer. I could say he is obsessed with music, creativity, England, and the place of television—and all those claims are just. But nothing quite prepares the Palmer novice for the ferocity and daring and the intense subjective raptures of work that still have to be classified as “documentary.”