Every year in late February and early March, at the South Pole research station, the last flight leaves and the last sun sets. Neither will return for months. How do you mark such an occasion? With a horror film festival, of course.
Author Ayn Rand wrote a play about a murder trial. Audience members were invited to play the jury and determine the end of the play – thus creating one of the first choose-your-own-adventure plots in history.
In a 1939 short film, Porky Pig swears in the funniest way possible. It was not seen by the public until the 1970s.
Have you ever had a boss who just had to contribute to your project in order to prove their worth? There’s an easy way to counteract that: just add a duck.
Meet Disney’s seven other dwarfs: Baldy, Burpy, Puffy, Snoopy, Nifty, Thrifty, and Awful.
The first 360-degree film was recorded for the 1900 Paris Exposition. It recreated the experience of rising in a hot air balloon, but the film probably never played for a real audience because of technical difficulties.
The Emeco 1006 Navy chair was originally designed to survive a torpedo hit. In continuous production since 1944, it has found a second life as the go-to chair for interrogation scenes in film.
In the era of silent film it was common to have live piano or organ accompanying the show. In Japan, they had people as well – specially trained to provide narration, translation, poetry, and commentary for the films on the screen.
Some of the most inspired cartoonists of the 21st century all started off in a single studio space in Brooklyn: Pizza Island.
June Foray was the voice of Granny (the owner of Tweety Bird) in the Looney Tunes cartoons, Cindy Lou Who in How the Grinch Stole Christmas, and Magica De Spell in Duck Tales. And she was also on Richard Nixon’s Enemies List.
Samuel Beckett’s famous play Waiting for Godot attracts famous actors who want to do something interesting on stage, and this has led to some powerful pairings. Mel Gibson and Geoffrey Rush. Ian McKellen and Patrick Stewart. Nathan Lane and John Goodman. But perhaps the most star-studded cast happened in 1988.
Whenever a villain appeared on the old Batman TV series, the scene was not level, but was shot on an angle, as if the viewer’s head is tilted to the side. The term for this is a “Dutch angle” – and it has nothing to do with the Dutch.
Since the 19th century, the “most significant and worthy” actor in the German-speaking theatre world carries the Iffland-Ring.
