CELEBRATING PETER CUSHING BIRTHDAY TODAY! COMPETITIONS AND MUCH MORE!

TODAY HERE AT THE PCASUK WEBSITE AND AT THE FACEBOOK PCASUK FAN PAGE we mark and celebrate the #BIRTHDAY of one Peter Wilton Cushing OBE born today May 26th 1913 😀😊 Lots of opportunities for posts, a quicky COMPETITION, a MAJOR COMPETITION and a MOVIE this evening! So there will be TWO posts here at the website today! Meanwhile . . .

HERE IS A LITTLE SOMETHING to think on today, BUT only today as this a QUICKY COMPETITION that closes 6AM GMT TOMORROW (Wednesday)! Here is YOUR chance to bag yourself a prize, marking Peter Cushing Birthday today. Back in the 60's, 70's and 80's it was a regular task to post and pass on any gifts that arrived for PC for his birthday. It was a busy time. Sadly, this is something we no longer have to do. But back in the day, many loved to shower Peter with gifts. There were many who never missed his birthday. Aftershave, chocolates, books, cufflinks, ties, teddy bears all with cards, notes or letters! 

BUT TODAY ..It's something in our PCASAEU 😃 (Peter Cushing Appreciation Society Alternative and Expanding Universe!! 😊😂) we can do 😂😉 So here is the deal, think of a IMAGINATIVE and INTERESTING gift you could have sent PC on his birthday, back in 1959!! There are no boundaries, it's a bit of fun! YOU could bag yourself a prize for your suggestion! Just post your BIRTHDAY PRESENT SUGGESTION on the thread today at the Facebook PCASUK Fan Page, BEFORE 6am GMT tomorrow! Have Fun and Good Luck!  Our PCASUK MAJOR PC BIRTHDAY COMPETITION will be posted here later today. So, keep your EYES peeled and remember, get IN or miss OUT! 😉 See you LATER - Marcus

THE FINAL QUESTION IN THE 'FIVE QUESTIONS PCASUK COMPETITION!

QUESTION FIVE: HOW MANY FEATURE FILMS DID PETER CUSHING AND CHRISTOPHER LEE APPEAR IN TOGETHER... 'THEY SHARED SCENES ON THE SCREEN TOGETHER'... FOR HAMMER FILMS AND AMICUS FILMS AND WHAT WERE THEIR TITLES??

AND SO, here we are! Question FIVE, the final question in our 'FIVE QUESTIONS' PCASUK COMPETITION. I hope you have read the last four questions, posted every day, over the past four days? Now READ CAREFULLY .... What you do next? We now need you to send YOUR answer to THIS question today AND the last FOUR QUESTIONS, to us here at our EMAIL: petercushingpcasgmail.com OR you can send them and enter at our FACEBOOK PCASUK FAN PAGE !  

ANY ANSWERS posted in the message box below or on any of the other posts, will be deleted and counted as void. Once you have sent us your FIVE answers, sit back...and wait for the draw of us pulling out the ONE lucky winner's name, who wins the prize of a our SIGNED, full colour, framed photograph of Christopher Lee as Dracula in Dracula AD 1972! ALL ANSWERS MUST BE IN BY FRIDAY 30th NOVEMBER 2018. The winners name will be posted and shared here the following day on Saturday 1st December 2018! So you have quite a few days to study the questions and send in your FIVE ANSWERS entry 😊 It's been a great competition to be part of, I wish you the VERY best of luck 😀You can NOW send us all FIVE of your answers 😀😃 Marcus 

ABOVE: THE PRIZE AND THE START OF PROMOTION FOR THE 'FIVE QUESTIONS COMPETITION' FROM TUESDAY 20TH OF NOVEMBER 2018'

NEWS: THE ZOO GANG COMES REMASTERED TO BLU RAY!

SOME GREAT NEWS for fans of some of PETER CUSHING's television work! CUSHING appeared in an episode of the ITC series called 'THE ZOO GANG' back in 1974. In THE COUNTERFEIT TRAP, CUSHING plays Judge Gautie and appears with the very neat cast of usual's who play the GANG, John Mills, Brian Keith, Lili Palmer and Barry Morse... the majority CUSHING had experience of working with in previous productions, from Amicus films to Sherlock Holmes! THIS is a GREAT release.

THE VISUAL QUALITY OF THE BLU RAY REMASTER LOOKS EXCEPTIONAL!

 

MANY OF US have been waiting for a REMASTER and BLU RAY of this series for a LONG time. MANY thanks to NETWORKS for doing a splendid job again. Below is the SPEC on the release. It seems almost like a LIMITED release as far as availability of copies is concerned, so if you WANT that copy, I wouldn't be hanging around placing your ORDER.

WHO ARE THE ZOO GANG?

Four veterans of the French Resistance, reunited nearly thirty years after the war, join forces to meet adventure, danger and excitement in this hit series based on Paul Gallico's best-selling novel. Starring Brian Keith, John Mills, Lilli Palmer and Barry Morse, The Zoo Gang has been newly remastered in HD from the original 35mm film elements for this Blu-ray edition – it has certainly never looked better!

FIVE FRENCH Resistance fighters, known by their animal-based code names (the Wolf, the Tiger, the Elephant, the Leopard and the Fox) fought during World War II. Their efforts came to a stop when one of their number, Claude Roget (the Wolf) was betrayed to the Gestapo by a contact called Boucher. In their interrogation, one of their number Roget, who as the husband of Manouche (the Leopard) was shot dead before her eyes.

THIRTY YEARS LATER, Thomas Devon (the Elephant) spots Boucher (who was going under the name Rosch) in his shop. The surviving members of the Zoo Gang drop what they are doing and rendezvous for vengeance. The series follows the adventures of the remaining gang of four resistance fighters reunited 30 years later to scam habitual con artists and criminals in order to take their money and use it for good causes. Despite their ages, they put their skills and experience to use to raise enough money to construct a hospital in the memory of Claude. The gang is (reluctantly) aided by the son of Manouche and Claude, an inspector in the French police.

THE SERIES is set on the French Riviera in Nice. Guest stars included Philip Madoc, Peter Cushing and Jacqueline Pearce. Roger Delgado, best known for his role as Doctor Who villain The Master also appeared although he died in a car crash prior to transmission.
 
SPECIAL FEATURES:

60 second trailers for each episode

Commercial Break Bumpers

Damaged section (from The Counterfeit Trap)  

THIS IS CUSHING'S EPISODE

Monochrome Mute Takes (from The Twisted Cross)

Monochrome and Colour Mute Title Sequence Offcuts
 

FIND OUT ALL YOU NEED RIGHT HERE! 

  

GIF WEDNESDAY! PACKED WITH PC ON THE FIDDLE: SHERLOCK : THE GHOUL AND A SLICED ROBIN HOOD : CLIPS AND WHOLE MOVIES

#CUSHINGGIFWEDNESDAY! LOTS OF COMMENTS and messages posted to me here and at our PCAS YOUTUBE CHANNEL these past few weeks on PETER CUSHING in THE GHOUL. EVEN interest in the music that Cushing's character DR LAWRENCE plays to Veronica Carlson's Daphne! Cushing did quite a convincing job, of faking playing, and there have been quite a few times where he has had to do the 'FIDDLE' visually, but I don't ever recall him doing so with a piano, which almost the most common musical fake up on screen ! HOW MANY can YOU THINK OF?

PETER CUSHING as SHERLOCK HOLMES in the BBC version of 'THE BLUE CARBUNCLE'

ABOVE THE ENTIRE CUSHING 'THE BLUE CARBUNCLE ' EPISODE 

from the BBC series in 1968

MUCH OF THE SOURCE MATERIAL FOR OUR WEEKLY GIFS, CAN BE FOUND IN THE ENTIRE UPLOADS OF THE PETER CUSHING FILMS AT OUR PCAS YOUTUBE CHANNEL!

JUST CLICK HERE  and be ENTERTAINED for HOURS! Please support us too and PLEASE SUBSCRIBE!
 

IT'S A GREAT PITY that both PETER CUSHING and DAVID WARNER only got to share such a short time together in a film, FROM BEYOND THE GRAVE. You can see in that scene, how they both had a chemistry, that complemented each other. IF they could have shared another film together, WHICH TITLE one would you choose?? Here nearing the end of  WARNER'S story in one of Amicus portmanteau movies, his poor character Edward Charlton in THE GATE CRASHER loses his will to find the 'figure' in the mirror, but sadly knows nothing of his own fate....   

CUSHING and WARNER in their very entertaining scene

together in FROM BEYOND THE GRAVE

FIND OUT MORE about the Amicus film FROM BEYOND THE GRAVE and other films that PETER CUSHING made with the company through out his career, at THIS excellent EIGHT PART serial on THE AMICUS FILMS OF PETER CUSHING. PART SIX covers FROM BEYOND THE GRAVE and several others from the period of time, including MADHOUSE with VINCENT PRICE! AS usual it's just a click away, RIGHT HERE!

HERE IS SOMETHING EXTRA CONNECTED TO 'FROM BEYOND THE GRAVE' . . MANY THANKS TO ROBIN MCDONALD who provided us with two great items for our #TOOCOOLTUESDAY posts a little while ago, you may have missed.... This artwork was produced as a in joke among the crew of Amicus films 'From Beyond The Grave' with Peter Cushing..the artwork was pinned to the clapper-board during some of the shooting! Robin McDonald, was a clapper operator on many of Peter's films.

AGAIN, MANY THANKS to Robin McDonald . .  who sent us his much treasured cards from Peter Cushing, to share with you. Peter DID so very much love his cuppa tea!!!

BARBARA MURRAY who sadly only died quite recently in September 2014, was an actress who SHOULD have appeared in MORE work of the THRILLER AND SUSPENSE kind with AMICUS or Hammer films. Sadly, she never did. MURRAY was very famous for her TV work and few films. She looks like the kind of actress that BOTH film companies would have employed, but apart from a role as Enid Jason in segment 4 "Wish You Were Here" in AMICUS 'TALES FROM THE CRYPT' it all passed her by. 


RICHARD GREEN  who plays her VICTIM Husband, Ralph Jason, . . . a role that PETER CUSHING was originally going to play in the film, NOT ARTHUR GRIMSDYKE, for which he just about stole the whole film and won much respect and an award for... and the late Roy Dotrice, who sadly left us last year, as her lover. It's a bit of a GORY-STORY, this one for Amicus, considering producer's MILTON SUBOTSKY dislike of any inclusion of BLOOD or sex in his scripts and finished films. BUT Barbara does good and Richard Greene, who also worked with PETER CUSHING in Hammer films, SWORD OF SHERWOOD FOREST, in his famous Robin Hood role . .dies, wonderfully!

SWORD OF SHERWOOD FOREST, was one the CUSHING FILMS that made the GREAT list of TOP FIVE PETER CUSHING NON HORROR MOVIES... TO FIND OUT what titles made the OTHER FOUR  CLICK HERE! 

#DRACULAAD1972, is slowly starting to get the respect and interest it maybe should have received on it's release SOOO MANY years ago, by Hammer films. We have relentlessly posted about it in FEATURES and GALLERIES since we first arrived on the net back in 2010. There is ONE particular scene, that we have dug around in for a LONG time. The DEATH OF BOB. For those of you, those of you not so familiar with the character played by, PHILLIP MILLER, Bob was a bit of limp boyfriend of CAROLINE MUNRO"S character LAURA BELLOWS. Bob was a kind of hip but sensible version of  FRED from the epic children's cartoon series SCOOBY DOO, but unlike Fred...DIES! It's not long before he too, falls under the spell of Christopher Lee's DRACULA and those two pointy teeth, until he is found denim's creased and he lifeless in the cemetery of St Bartolph's Church, by PETER CUSHING'S,  Professor Lorrimer Van Helsing. BUT HOW he got there OR died was never explained in the film. It was only when studying some CONTACT SHEETS in the PCAS archive, that we came across the solution . . . READ BELOW! What FUN!

ABOVE: COME WITH US in a GREAT BEHIND THE SCENES DOCUMENTARY on the MAKING of DRACULA AD 1972, in this upload from our PCAS YOUTUBE CHANNEL!

 AND TO WRAP WITH FOR THIS WEEK: HERE is a GREAT PCAS CAROLINE MUNRO Dracula AD 1972 and EARTH'S CORE GALLERY! RIGHT HERE CLICK!

LOST IN THE FOG! MOMENT OF TERROR MONDAY : PETER CUSHING

#MOMENTOFTERROR MONDAY! ONE OUR MOST POPULAR uploads on our PCAS YOU TUBE CHANNEL is any uploads from the Peter Cushing Tyburn film 'THE GHOUL' considering how unpopular the film appears to have been for so many years, I find it typical of how FACEBOOK works and well this website and YOUTUBE works. So often, over the many years of managing the PCAS FACEBOOK FAN PAGE, an often vague and really quite unsupported opinion was posted by a member of the public AGAINST a certain Hammer film or indeed CUSHING film. Within a few hours, that opinion would influence so many other posts and comments, that if challenged would go very quiet. Happily, the once negative Facebook tide about this film slowly started to change direction too in the last two years, before we parted ways with Facebook last month.

PERSONALLY, I'VE FOUND if you look down the 92 films in Peter Cushing's filmography, and look for roles the like of Dr Lawrence in THE GHOUL you won't find many. . . Cushing played many evil characters, whose reputation was either formed by other appearances in past productions like Frankenstein. The likes of roles like Sir John Rowan in 'Corruption' and Dr Nararoff in 'The Gorgon' too . . were motivated by the progress of medicine. The Ghoul's Dr Lawrence is different. In this scene, where we first meet Lawrence, we see a man who is cautious, with good reason, and helpful . . with intentions. What makes his performance so interesting and entertaining also is, for the first time, Cushing also brought in emotional factors from his own personal life. It presents us with a much more credible character. Crushed by grief and driven by a most horrendous secret. 

WHAT HELPS here too is, every cast member is very good too. John Hurt's Tom Rawling's is every females nightmare. Creepy, lusty and dangerous. The despite Rawling's totally unattractive and frightening drive, the fatal physical horror and terror will be cranked up and is really yet to come. Here in this five minute clip . . we see the traps set, the lies shared and what appears to be the charity of a new friend... become many moments of terror . . .

PCAS LEAVES FACEBOOK AFTER ALMOST TEN SUCCESSFUL YEARS WITH OVER 33 THOUSAND FAN FOLLOWERS

ABOVE: THE FACEBOOK BANNER

MY APOLOGIES about this website not having an updated post here for the past three days. LOTS of problems have risen at FACEBOOK and OUR FACEBOOK PAGE FAN PAGE. You may or may not know, that FACEBOOK in the last few days has changed things and have made huge implications on any FAN page or GROUP that is popular on FACEBOOK...and has a HUGE following. Like us! Recently, ALL pages are only allowed ONE POST or less to be seen on a news feed per day. EVEN if you are a FOLLOWER or MEMBER of that page. NOW, you have to RESET your news feed and what would be seen there. MOST people have no idea how that is actually physically done OR why they would WANT to do it. So, those issues have in fact, KILLED and ISOLATED ALL our posts on facebook. The solution also is to PAY FACEBOOK anyway from TWENTY POUNDS to THIRTY POUNDS or more, so THEY will promote your posts, for followers to see your posts. We have NEVER had to do that and have ALWAYS had an excellent following, extremely friendly visitors and Cushing fans DAILY, seeing and commenting on our three daily posts. NOT NOW. If we want that, we will HAVE TO PAY or MAKE people change their feeds....not going to happen. We have almost 35 THOUSAND followers there, but over the last two years. facebook has hidden them, their likes, and OUR posts from them. SO... enough is enough. 

ABOVE: THE WEBSITE BANNER

PCAS will exist now, in the way it has been most popular HERE at this website, for the last SIX YEARS. Just THIS WEBSITE, TWITTER and our very much liked PCAS YOUTUBE CHANNEL! Now without facebook to update, this website will be daily updated, with video feed clips, competitions, prizes, rare photographs and interviews..it will all this website will be THE PCAS base! The Facebook PCAS Fan Page, isn't closing just yet, lots to do, and a whole week at some point to thank everyone for their friendships, supports, making our Facebook PCAS Page, one of the most popular and friendly facebook pages for people who LOVE Hammer films, Peter Cushing and have helped very generously to help make the PAGE a HUGE success over the last EIGHT YEARS!

ANY QUESTIONS, PLEASE FEEL FREE TO EMAIL US!  you can contact me at our PCAS email: petercushingpcas@gmail.com

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

CUSHING'S DAILY WALKS : FANCY MEETING YOU HERE! : CAN YOU IDENTIFY THIS MAN?

#TOOCOOLTUESDAY How cool is this? Here's a photograph that was passed onto me over Christmas. As you know, Peter Cushing's walks through his home town were often opportunities for visiting fans to bump into Peter and have a chat, but also Peter had many friends in the town, he would meet on the street or beach, during his daily jaunt. One of these were the Hewlett family. Many UK followers here will I am sure recognise Donald from the extremely popular 1970's BBC tv comedy series, 'It Ain't Half Hot, Mum', in which he played Colonel Charles Reynolds 🙂 Peter was very good friends with the family. This photograph was taken on the beach just outside Peter's own front door 🙂 Did any of you ever 'bump' into Peter on the beach at WHITSTABLE? Do tell . . .

#TOOCOOLTUESDAY! OVER THE YEARS I have seen lots of strange and wonderful illustrations on VHS and DVD covers, that grace the covers of Cushing films. But this one would be sure to make any Hammer fan, raise their eyebrows! Both Peter Cushing and Christopher Lee star in the film, contained in the box . . . but Lee certainly doesn't appear as Dracula, neither does Cushing play Baron Frankenstein. The image of Dracula has been lifted from the 'Satanic Rites of Dracula' (1973) press kit. Cushing's up to his elbows in Kensington Gore pic, comes from Hammer films, 1969 'Frankenstein Must Be Destroyed' . .  along with Simon Ward who plays, the Baron's assistant Karl. . . and no, Ward doesn't make an appearance in 'Cuerpos Vivientes' either! It's certainly not the worst of bungled Cushing film covers and there are more to come . . .    

#WHOISTHAT? MICHAEL ANDREWS popped onto the PCASUK FACEBOOK FAN PAGE  today, and set you all this puzzler. Andrew asks: 'Does anybody recognise the gentlemen below? He has a certain Cushing look about him. He does actually have a connection with Hammer films!' If you can put a name to that face, we'd be pleased if you too can pop over to the PCAS Facebook Page and provide the answer!

 

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