Creature from the Black Lagoon
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:19:00
On the first day of shooting,
Tuesday October 6, 1953,

:19:03
the first shot was
the upcoming shot of the Rita

:19:06
squeezing its way through
the opening leading to the Black Lagoon,

:19:09
the paradise from which
no man has ever returned.

:19:12
So Jack Arnold lines up his first shot
on the first day of the movie, and...

:19:16
It's a blooper. What's that telephone pole
doing on the left-hand side of the screen?

:19:26
Much as I'd like to, there may not be time
to talk about all of the actors in Creature.

:19:30
I've got too much information here
about the production.

:19:33
But one I have to
talk about is Julie Adams.

:19:35
Other actresses made more
sci-fi movies in the '50s -

:19:38
Mara Corday, Beverly Garland,
Faith Domergue, dozens of others.

:19:41
Julie Adams just made the one.
But by appearing with the creature,

:19:44
the most recognisable
of '50s movie monsters,

:19:47
she jumped right to the front of the line.
She was born Betty May Adams in lowa,

:19:52
and she wanted to be an actress
from the days of grade-school plays.

:19:55
In California, to pursue her goal, she took
speech lessons to lose her lowa accent

:20:00
and played roles in cheap westerns
for a little company called Lippert,

:20:03
each of them made in less than a week.
At that point she was using her real name,

:20:08
but at Universal she became
Julia Adams, and then Julie Adams,

:20:11
and she co-starred in almost
two dozen movies there in the '50s.

:20:14
A famous sculptor said she possessed
the most perfect legs in the world,

:20:18
so Universal claimed they
insured her legs for $500,000.

:20:21
That's an old publicity trick
that went back to the '40s -

:20:24
Betty Grable's legs were insured
for a million. It's used today -

:20:27
just the other day, Jennifer Lopez
insured her legs for 400 million.

:20:31
Anyway, she had these great legs, never
seen in the western movies she made.

:20:36
Universal gave her
the bathing-suit lead in Creature.

:20:38
It instantly became her claim to fame, the
movie she's now best remembered for,

:20:42
which is a "distinction"
that she takes with humour.

:20:45
More humour at some times than others,
perhaps, but she's always a good sport.

:20:49
She worked a lot in TV, including The
Jimmy Stewart Show, as Jimmy's wife,

:20:53
Yancy Derringer, and a recurring part
on Murder, She Wrote.

:20:56
She's still in front of the cameras today,
:20:58
most recently in the documentary about
Creature which is at the end of this movie.


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