Cliff Michel Moore: Ginger Rogers Interview (1968)

Source:Recording Singer– Hollywood Babydoll and comedian Ginger Rogers, being interviewed by Cliff Michel Moore, in 1968.

Source:The Daily Review  

“In the last post, I mentioned something about a 1968 interview Ginger did with Cliff Michelmore. Lucky for us, it’s available on YouTube and I’ve embedded it below.

It’s quite a fun interview to watch. Ginger was in her late 50’s by then, but she still looked as gorgeous as ever. She spoke very comfortably and confidently about her life and career, and it is just a nice look at how she saw herself. The interview was done at her California house, so perhaps this contributed to how comfortable she felt. Also, she’s quite a storyteller, too. It’s definitely not boring to hear her speak.

Here are some of the highlights that are definitely good reasons to check out the video:

Ginger fixing up an ice cream soda for Michelmore is the most adorable thing you’ll ever see. We know by now she’s crazy about ice cream soda, but in this she also said that she liked it with “lots of chocolates”. Her kid-like personality shines through in this part.

Ginger considered herself a good business woman, but didn’t see money as the most important. She said, “I don’t want material things. I want those things that are needful in life, but not necessarily the most valuable according to dollars and cents.”

Ginger discussed her relationship with Fred Astaire, noting that “we’re very definite about what we like and we dislike”.

Ginger recounted the time she reunited with Astaire during the 1967 Oscar ceremony, where they did a little dance before walking to the podium to announce a winner. This is the part that compels me to say that Ginger is a good storyteller. She looked and sounded so excited to tell Michelmore about every little detail.

Ginger talked about how influential her mother, Lela, was to her and defended that Lela didn’t push her around like a typical “stage mother” does.

Ginger spoke about her love of painting and how she could lose hours and days just to paint.” 

Source:The Daily Review– Hollywood Babydoll and Comedian Ginger Rogers, being interviewed by Cliff Michel Moore, in 1968.

From Recording Singer 

I’ve always thought at least since I started becoming pretty familiar with her career, that Ginger Rogers is one of the cutest and funniest actress’s and perhaps women of all-time.

Ginger was so quick-witted and always had perfect comedic timing whether she was off script, like in this interview, or on script. And even when she was on script she was very adept at adding her own humor to lines and scenes.

If you ever see the movie Monkey Business from Howard Hawkes where she plays Cary Grant’s wife in that movie, they were an incredible comedy team in that movie. And I believe a lot of that had to do with them always being on the same page when it came to the wisecracks and physical comedy. She was the cutest woman in that movie that had Marilyn Monroe in it.

I love women who can make me go: ‘Aw! you’re so cute!’ But who can also make me laugh and she was very adept at both. She was an actress who was a hell of a dancer, who could sing, but also give a great comedic performance all in the same role.

Had Marilyn Monroe lived a natural life in years, maybe we’re talking about her the same way we’re talking about Ginger today. Someone who could sing, dance, act, make you laugh, looked great and everything else. That was Ginger Rogers, but she did it for a whole career.

Ginger was always as cute as baby physically, but always had the intelligence and maturity of a great woman. Someone who didn’t need money to be happy, but made a lot of it anyway, because she so good at what she did. And is one of the best entertainers we’ve ever produced.

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History Channel: The Manson Family Murders

Source:Lana Hodges– A look at the world of Helter Skelter?

“The first victims fell on August 9, 1969, at the home Roman Polanski had rented located at 10050 Cielo Drive in Benedict Canyon, an area just north of Beverly Hills.”

From Lana Hodges

This photo is from a 2009 History Channel documentary about Charles Manson and his Manson Family Cult, which was really a hippie crime family, that operated in Los Angeles in the late 1960s and into the 1970s.

Source:The Daily Press– A Manson Family documentary.

From the History Channel

Charles Manson had the perfect group to do his evil deeds (so to speak). Because his group was similar to him in the sense that they didn’t seem to fit in very well in mainstream society. Even though Manson’s soldiers all came from solid middle class backgrounds and could’ve all ended going to college before they went to prison for their murders. But instead ended up with Charlie Manson, because they felt for some reason that their families no longer wanted them.

Charlie, had just gotten out of prison for the last time, in 1967-68 and ends up in the San Francisco area. And meets up with these very young women and Tex Watson, in their late teens. And sees that they are lost and offers them his love and takes them in. And they embraced him and the Manson Crime Family is formed as a result.

You can also see this post on Blogger.

You can also see this post at FRS FreeState, on WordPress.

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The Who: Join Together

Source:The Who– Join Together live at The Fillmore East in New York in 1968.

“The Who – Live At The Fillmore East 1968 out now! Check it out:The Fillmore.”

From The Who 

I’m not a big fan of The Who, but I like this song a lot. TLC (or The Learning Channel) had a reality TV series in the mid 2000s called Making It. And one of the episodes was about a young woman who wanted to make it as a rock singer and this is one of the songs that she performed as a cover for The Who and they got The Who to perform with her in front of a live audience. She was very good and they still had it almost 40 years after this song came out and they performed at The Fillmore, Great song.

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20th Century Fox: Lady in Cement (1968) ‘Raquel Welch: Bikini Slideshow’

Source:20th Century Fox– Raquel Welch swimsuit edition.

Source:The Daily Press

“Raquel Welch Bikini Slideshow Lady In Cement 1968.”

From Mark Blue 

“During an ocean dive, Miami gumshoe Tony Rome (Frank Sinatra) finds a woman’s body with her feet encased in a concrete block and sets out to solve the murder case.”

Source:20th Century Fox– Hollywood Goddess Raquel Welch: Swimsuit Edition.

From IMDB

“Tony Rome (Frank Sinatra) is a Miami based detective who while diving in the ocean finds the body of a young woman. He is hired by Waldo Gronsky (Dan Blocker) to find her killer. Tony has to sift through a stack of suspects, plus trying to elude the Police. Written by Kelly.”

Source:IMDB– Lady in Cement poster.

From IMDB

Here you can see Hollywood Goddess Raquel Welch in the pool in her bikini, as well as out of the pool in her bikini, with The Chairman of the Board Frank Sinatra as just an innocent spectator. Raquel is a good actress and I believe an excellent comedian as well, but let’s face it: her Goddess features and voice are always the the first things that people (perhaps especially guys) notice about her.

Lady in Cement is actually a very good movie. Very funny as Frank Sinatra movies tend to be, because he was a very good comedic actor with a very good off the cuff sense of humor. This movie also has a lot of good action scenes in it as well and a hell of a cast.

But take Raquel out of this movie and they would have to replace her with another goddess who if she isn’t as hot, sexy and adorable as Raquel, she would have to at least be in her ballpark.

Someone like Jill St. John who was in the first Tony Rome movie. (Any guesses on what the first Tony Rome movie was called) An actress like Raquel Welch brings guys to movies by herself. Because she’s so hot and sexy and adorable and that voice and yet she can also act as well.

Raquel and Frank are twenty-five years apart in real-life and perhaps in this movie as well. And yet the Raquel character Kit, is attracted to Tony Rome, because he’s Frank Sinatra. Well, actually because Tony Rome is a very charming intelligent funny smart-ass, who is very good at his job.

Rome is attracted to Kit as well, because, as if you don’t know the answers to that! But he needs her for the case he’s working on and she knows men that might have something to do with the murder he’s investigating. If not did the murder themselves and he uses her to get to them, as well as please himself.

Kit also tries to use Rome to get him to investigate someone else, with Rome telling her: “When I want it, I’m not going to trade for it.” With Kit calling Tony a bastard. You can tell that they’re very attracted to each other in this movie, but that Rome has a job to do and that is what he concentrates on. And it’s a very entertaining movie.

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Bob Parker: CBS News- 1968: A Year That Changed America

Source:Bob Parker– from CBS News’s 1978 documentary about the year 1968.

Source:The Daily Press

“1968 A Year that Changed America with Harry Reasoner. A look back on the year 1968, produced by CBS News in 1978.”

From Bob Parker

“Time Magazine January 11 1988 1968 The Year That Shaped a Generation ”

Source:Amazon– TIME Magazine’s cover about the year 1968.

From Amazon

I think one thing that separates America and makes us stronger than anyone else is that we can go through a year like 1968 and get through it and survive it and still remain one country. Unlike other countries that tend to go through such division between the people and their government and overall establishment of the country in one year and you see them come apart. With the government falling and perhaps even leading to some type of civil war. Egypt comes to mind pretty fast and what is going on in Syria and Venezuela right now are other good examples.

Having said all of that, it’s hard to find anything good about 1968 other than maybe the music and the fact that we started to get along better as far as race relations. Where racism and other types of bigotry started to really go out of style. And bigots were left to hide their bigotry or pay serious prices for it. But other than that 1968 was one big disaster after another. A year full of violence with murders and assassinations, the President of the United States deciding not to even bother running for reelection because there were so many people who literally hated him in both parties.

And that is just about the domestic scene in America, but then you go to the Vietnam War itself with Americans finally figuring out that we are not just losing the war, but it is probably lost. And we started seeing all of those dead American soldiers coming home from it.

I guess one good thing about 1968 is that Americans finally woke up and figured out that their government not only doesn’t always tell the truth, but they even lie to their people. The Johnson Administration saying that they were making progress in Vietnam when they knew the opposite was true and that Communist Vietnam was getting stronger.

1968 represents the 1960s as well as it could possibly be. A year of revolution, protest, violence, people coming together from multiple races to be part of the same movement. Where millions of Americans became free to be themselves and no long feel like they had to live a certain way of life in order to fit in or even be good people.

1968 was a shakeup of the entire United States and perhaps was something that the country needed. Even with all the violence and the lost of lives in that decade so Americans would know about the problems in the country, but also what could be done about them. And what also makes us great as a country which is our freedom and diversity.

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Passionate Patriots: ‘1968 DNC Nightmare in Chicago’

Source:Passionate Patriots– A look at Mayor Richard Daley’s Chicago. 

Source:FRS FreeState

“Chaos before Hubert Humphrey’s nomination sets the modern standard for a harmful convention.” 

From Democratic Media 

“Chaos before Hubert Humphrey’s nomination sets the modern standard for a harmful convention.”

“In the wake of the April 4 assassination of Martin Luther King Jr., Black communities rose up in more than 100 cities and towns. Opposition to the Vietnam War, which would ultimately claim millions of lives in Southeast Asia, grew, as did U.S. casualties. Of the more than 58,000 Americans who died from 1956 to 1975, more than 14,000 were killed in 1968. In April of that year, police savagely attacked anti-war protesters in Berkeley, Calif., and Chicago, giving the country a preview of what was to come August 26 – 29, when the Democratic Party held its national convention in Chicago.” 

Source:In These Times– chaos in Richard Daley’s Chicago.

From In These Times 

The Democratic Party cost themselves the presidential election of 1968 and a chance to win the White House for a third straight time and 8-10 presidential elections, going back to 1932 with FDR. To go along with another Democratic Congress because of how divided they were on the Vietnam War.

A lot of that can be blamed on President Johnson’s handling of the Vietnam War, but this can also be blamed on the Far-Left flank of the Democratic Party that was anti-war, period. Even when we are attacked and they can take their anti-war feelings too extreme at times, as we saw with the 1968 riots at the Democratic Convention.

The New-Left in the Democratic Party doesn’t deserve all the blame here. The Chicago Police didn’t do a very good job of handling the situation either. And of course Richard Nixon being the master politician that he was, jumped all over on the Democratic division and moved himself to be a unity candidate. Which of course he wasn’t.

By the time President Nixon left office in August of 1974, America if anything was even more divided. 1968 was a crazy year with a lot of bad for the country with some good in it. But all bad for the Democratic Party.

A year where President Johnson announced he wasn’t running for reelection as President because of how unpopular he was. But even had he run for reelection, he would’ve had a very hard time getting renominated by a party that had moved away from him. And had moved into an anti-war socialist direction. That wanted to bring all of our troops home from Vietnam and use that money to build the country.

1968 was also a crazy year for Democrats who once they moved away from LBJ, the Far-Left flank of the party went searching for their own candidate to take on the GOP in the fall. First it was Senator Eugene McCarthy until Senator Robert Kennedy declared his candidacy for President. Then they threw all of their support behind him up until he was assassinated in June of 68. And then of the party went behind Vice President Hubert Humphrey, the establishment wing of the party.

But some New-Left support went back to Senator McCarthy, as well as Senator George McGovern. Another candidate from the Far-Left flank of the party. As it turned out even though 1968 might have looked like a fluke, it clearly wasn’t. Because in 1972 Democrats had similar issues. They were disorganized, didn’t have a clear leader with more divisive presidential primary’s and once again the Far-Left flank deciding who the Democratic presidential nominee would be Senator George McGovern taking on an establishment GOP Candidate President Nixon and losing 49 States in a landslide.

When the Democratic Party is united it tends to win and do very well. Because it’s bigger than the Republican Party and represents more people in the country. But when it’s divided like it was in 68, 72, 80 and 84, it loses very bad. Because a faction of their party doesn’t show up to the polls to vote.

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