:44:00
He said Carlson envisioned himself
an actor, writer, producer, director.
:44:03
And Carlson was all those things
at various times, by the way.
:44:06
Fox said it was sad. Carlson was
a good-looking guy, he was bright,
:44:10
he was quite well read in many areas,
but the moment Carlson thought
:44:13
somebody else was in authority,
he'd tell that person how to do his job.
:44:16
According to Fox, "Carlson was used to
being the intellectual limelight."
:44:20
"He did not like to share it with
someone who was, in his opinion,
:44:23
lesser than he."
:44:26
Incidentally, Richard Denning,
who's out to bag the creature,
:44:29
certainly did know his way around
boats and nets and traps.
:44:32
When Denning got back
from serving in World War II,
:44:35
he, like a lot of other young actors
who'd had their careers interrupted,
:44:39
had a hell of a hard time
getting it started again.
:44:41
He and his actress wife Evelyn Ankers
had used all their savings,
:44:44
so they moved into
a house trailer at Paradise Cove,
:44:47
and he set up 100 lobster traps.
Denning had always loved the water
:44:51
and boats, so I guess this was
almost second nature to him.
:44:54
He had a rowboat -
he couldn't afford an outboard -
:44:56
and he would row the traps out in
the evenings and collect them at dawn.
:45:00
The Dennings lived on lobster
and sold lobster,
:45:03
and years later, when he and Ankers
looked back at that time,
:45:05
they realised those were
their happiest times.
:45:09
Then Denning got work playing Lucille
Ball's husband on the radio show
:45:11
that was later changed for TV
into I Love Lucy,
:45:14
he started starring in B-movies again
and he let the lobster business go.
:45:18
He died in 1998,
and Richard Carlson died in 1977.
:45:26
The Rita was a real boat out on
Park Lake on the Universal back lot,
:45:30
but some scenes on the Rita were
shot indoors on a duplicate Rita,
:45:33
on Universal's process stage.
:45:35
The scenes at the beginning, of
Richard Denning firing the spear gun,
:45:38
were shot indoors with the jungle
projected on a screen behind them.
:45:42
And this eerie nocturnal scene here was
shot on the process stage, at about 9am.
:45:47
The scenes in the creature's grotto were
also shot on a set on the process stage.
:45:58
Here's Ben Chapman,
about to climb onto the boat.