Creature from the Black Lagoon
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:36:00
and look down 50ft or 60ft or whatever,
and try to figure out what was going on.

:36:05
He sketched out the way
he wanted each shot to be shot,

:36:08
but Welbourne said
he couldn't work that way.

:36:10
Havens, floating on the surface,
couldn't see what was at the bottom,

:36:14
and sketched things
that weren't even there,

:36:16
and Welbourne said all he could do was
take advantage of what was down there.

:36:21
So Bill Alland's idea was,
he'd put on scuba gear and he'd go down,

:36:24
and maybe that would kind of
shame Havens into doing it.

:36:27
So Alland dove down 50 feet, where
they had underwater light platforms

:36:31
and all kinds of stuff set up, and watched
Scotty Welbourne doing his thing.

:36:35
Then Alland came up and told Havens
"Either you go down there,

:36:38
see what he's doing and work with him,
or just get out of the way."

:36:41
And Havens said OK, fine,
he'd just get out of the way.

:36:44
So, according to Alland,
even though the credits say

:36:47
"Underwater sequences
directed by James C Havens",

:36:50
Alland says "He didn't have a damn thing
to do with what went on underwater."

:36:54
"Scotty Welbourne directed
the underwater stuff."

:36:57
Ricou Browning also remembers
the situation with Havens,

:37:00
but doesn't tell the story the same way.
He said it wasn't that Havens was afraid,

:37:05
it's just that he wasn't capable -
he wasn't trained to go underwater.

:37:08
According to Ricou, "Havens got in an
inner tube and put on a face mask

:37:12
and watched, as much as he could,
what was going on."

:37:15
"He depended a great deal on Scotty,
and Scotty was a sharp character."

:37:19
"And Havens just kind of left it
to him and us to do our thing."

:37:22
"He would watch,
and comment now and then."

:37:26
I asked Ricou, I said "In a perfect world,
:37:28
should the credits say 'Underwater
scenes directed by James Havens'

:37:32
or 'Underwater scenes directed
by Scotty Welbourne'?"

:37:34
And he answered "I would just say
a combination of people."

:37:37
"I would give Havens credit."
:37:40
The guy who filmed the out-of-water
scenes was no slouch -

:37:43
a guy named William Snyder,
who'd been around for years,

:37:46
photographed a lot of pictures and had
three Oscar nominations in the 1940s:

:37:50
Aloma of the South Seas, The Loves
of Carmen and Jolson Sings Again.

:37:54
After Creature he worked a lot
at Walt Disney Studios.

:37:57
He also shot The Conqueror, the
John Wayne Genghis Khan movie,


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