HAPPY BIRTHDAY TO MELVYN HAYES : THE YOUNG FRANKENSTEIN OF 1957!

JOIN US IN WISHING MELVYN HAYES a VERY Happy Birthday today. Melvyn was born today January 11th 1935, and since 1950 when he was "disappearing twice daily for £4 per week" performing the indian rope trick in Maskelyne's Mysteries at the Comedy Theatre in London! A very long and accomplished career on stage, tv and the big screen. Melvyn is quite an institution in the UK, having appeared in many TV dramas, soaps and comedy shows, the most successful probably being 'It Aint Half Hot Mum' in the 1970's. The show is now banished to 'Room 101' at the BBC, being considered like many shows from that era, quite UN-PC... you decide?

MELVYN WORKED WITH Peter Cushing as the young Baron Frankenstein in Cushing's first film for Hammer, 'The Curse of Frankenstein' (1957) he appeared as Daft Jamie in the brilliant 'Flesh and the Fiends' (1960) and with Cushing in 'Violent Playground' (1958) His last appearance with Peter was in the doomed 'A Touch of the Sun' in 1979 with Oliver Reed..

HAYES, MCCALLUM and ONE OTHER Brit comedian, in the middle! Can you name him?

A VERSATILE ACTOR, who stays young at 84, who will no doubt be having a real knees up and party as we wish him, Many Happy Returns Today 😉 Happy Birthday Melvyn and many more to come!

HAPPY BIRTHDAY YOUNG VICTOR : MELVYN HAYES

JOIN US IN WISHING MELVYN HAYES a VERY Happy Birthday today. Melvyn was born today January 11th 1935, and since 1950 when he was "disappearing twice daily for £4 per week" performing the indian rope trick in Maskelyne's Mysteries at the Comedy Theatre in London! A very long and accomplished career on stage, tv and the big screen. Melvyn is quite an institution in the UK, having appeared in many TV dramas, soaps and comedy shows, the most successful probably being 'It Aint Half Hot Mum' in the 1970's. The show is now banished to 'Room 101' at the BBC, being considered like many shows from that era, quite UN-PC... you decide?

MELVYN WORKED WITH Peter Cushing as the young Baron Frankenstein in Cushing's first film for Hammer, 'The Curse of Frankenstein' (1957) he appeared as Daft Jamie in the brilliant 'Flesh and the Fiends' (1960) and with Cushing in 'Violent Playground' (1958) His last appearance with Peter was in the doomed 'A Touch of the Sun' in 1979 with Oliver Reed..see our PCAS YOUTUBE CHANNEL. A versatile actor, who stays young at 83, who will no doubt be having a real knees up and party as we wish him, Many Happy Returns Today 😉 Happy Birthday Melvyn and many more to come 🙂

ABOVE: IN CASE YOU MISSED IT. HERE'S MELVYN SHARING A GREAT ANECDOTE ABOUT MEETING HIS FELLOW CAST MEMBER, CHRISTOPHER LEE. . .

REMEMBER! IF YOU LIKE what you see here at our website, you'll  love our daily themed posts at our PCAS FACEBOOK FAN PAGE.  Just click that blue LINK and click LIKE when you get there, and help us . . Keep The Memory Alive!. The Peter Cushing Appreciation Society website, facebook fan page and youtube channel are managed, edited and written by Marcus Brooks, PCAS coordinator since 1979. PCAS is based in the UK and USA     

 

#GIMMETHEGIFWEDNESDAY: EYEBALLS VANISHING VAMPS BODY SNATCHERS AND TARKIN!

#Gimmethegifwednesday:(when you send in YOUR requests for clips and GIFS of your favorite Cushing shots or scenes!) FOR TOM PARRY: EYES RIGHT! This is a wonderful shot from Hammer films, The Revenge of Frankenstein (1958) with Peter Cushing returning as the Baron, assisted by Francis Mathews.These eyeballs were created by Les Bowie. Even though Hammer did not have a true resident effects department, Les Bowie was the man who would turn his hand, like make up artist Roy Ashton, to make the most incredible from the most basic every day, 'house-hold' items.

'Dracula ashes from talcum powder, fullers earth and sawdust!', or how about... 'Dracula's last breath supplied by a bicycle inner tube from a Tyre, deflated and inflated by blowing down a rubber tube from a tropical fish tank, hidden under Dracula's costume!' It certainly opens your EYES to what could be achievable, with some imagination and a box of bits and bobs. Bowie went on to establish his own very successful special effects department Bowie Films, which worked in tv and all manner of big blockbuster films through the 1960's and 70s.....

#GIMMETHEGIFWEDNESDAY:Like or not, which ever side you are on regarding the #TARKIN #CGI debate... there are a LOT of supporters, and here at PCAS we still get requests for info about almost everyday..This GIF has been requested by 'Tarkins Puppy' ..whoever that maybe?? . But, here it is, as requested... is a interesting shot of Cushing's CGI creation to ponder over...maybe?

#GIMMETHEGIFWEDNESDAY: Peter Cushing here as Van Helsing, giving the check of the vitals of one poor Bob, boyfriend of Caroline Munro's Laura, in 'just add four decades of watching, and eventually, you WILL like it' #DRACULAAD1972 . The character of BOB, is one of many that appears in a Hammer film, and vanishes or falls foul of a fate, that somehow falls through a plot hole. Bob is discovered in the graveyard of the desecrated St Bartok's church. He's a dead as a dodo, but how he got that way, isn't explained in the plot. But we donned our deerstalker, and not only found how Bob-bobbed-out, but also photographic evidence, how! See our panel below. Royston Harris, THIS is for you!

#GIMMETHEGIFWEDNESDAY: If you compile a list of what you would personally consider to be  five titles from the Peter Cushing filmography, chances are, if you have had the opportunity to see it, FLESH AND THE FIENDS (Mania USA) would be somewhere in that list. It IS a classic. With it's mini budget, produced in a time of many bigger and more expensively promoted movies doing the rounds, this film got passed over by the cinema going public, and slipped quietly away, until television threw it a afterlife-life line, it made regular appearances on late night and afternoon tv slots, and found the audiences that should have seen it back in the day. 

Startlingly dramatic, dark and emotive. The direction of the underappreciated John Gilling, brings out the best in Peter Cushing as Dr Knox, and a quite superb supporting cast of Donald Pleasence and George Rose as Burke and Hare, body-snatchers, Billy Whitelaw and Renne Houston. Even Melvyn Hayes, just three years after appearing in Curse of Frankenstein, manages to play a poor unfortunate, without resorting to scenery-chewing or cliches. Not seen it? It's still out there to purchase, very reasonably. We did try to share it with you at our YT channel, but Youtube threatened to tear our archive down, if we so much as uploaded a flicker of it. We do try. Go see now. THIS GIF was for NICOLAS JACOBS! Fast huh?

That's it for this week. REMEMBER if you would like to request a great Cushing GIF, choose a scene, shot  or moment that doesn't contain dialogue. GIF's by their nature are muted non audio short clips , that play in rotation.

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GIF GALLERY WEDNESDAY IS GIMMETHEGIFWEDNESDAY

SO HERE WE ARE... with our SECOND #GIMMETHEGIFWEDNESDAY! Keep those requests a-comingand we will do our best to, find that clip and make that gif!  What makes a great gif? Here are two of the things to consider when choosing your gif, the best gifs are a short section of film with no dialogue...remember a gif plays without any audio. Maybe some thing that has high drama or action... a gif can be only 5 to 12 seconds long...

GIFS below are from 'Flesh and the fiends', for Bella Podtetenieff. 'Horror Express'  for Tom Boulton and 'Legend of the Werewolf' for Lexi Conroy.