Pat O'Brien's Midsummer "Eye-Opener"

Quaker Brand Puffed Rice Ad

When I first came across the above advertisment from 1936 for Quaker Brand Puffed Rice featuring Hollywood actor, Pat O'Brien, and his "Midsummer 'Eye-Opener'" breakfast, I thought this hearty morning meal actually sounds pretty tasty. What I didn't expect was how hard it would be to find the Quaker Puffed Rice! I visited a few Los Angeles area grocery stores and none carried the product. There were many other kinds of Quaker products, but no puffed rice. I remembered seeing the boxes when I was younger, so I knew it existed during my lifetime and wasn't just some bygone breakfast treat from my grandparents generation. After a quick search online I found that I could buy 10 boxes for $40 on Amazon, but I wasn't ready to make that kind of commitment to the puffed rice. 

I then came across a piece on the Mr. Breakfast website explaining the background of the Quaker Puffed Rice which also had a comments section with many contributors asking where the puffed rice cereal went? According to commenters, there is no Quaker Puffed Rice in New Jersey, Indiana, and Southern California. Have you recently seen this cereal anywhere? An interesting tidbit: according to the website Quaker Puffed Rice was introduced in 1909, but was first seen by the public "at the St. Louis World's Fair of 1904, when eight bronze cannons exploded rice over the heads of a huge crowd. When rice kernels are heated under high pressure and exposed to steam, the kernels expand rapidly. You might even say they explode. The result is puffed rice."

My version of the "Midsummer Eye-Opener" breakfast.

Not to be defeated, I made my own version of the Midsummer Eye-Opener breakfast. Rather than using puffed rice, I substituted another Quaker product, "Corn Bran Crunch" toasted cereal. Here's how the advertisment describes the meal:

"THESE torrid days when appetites need coaxing you'll give three cheers for Pat O'Brien's favorite breakfast. For an appetite-arousing starter, honeydew melon, right off the ice. Then comes a happy combination - crisp, crunchy Quaker Puffed Rice [I used Quaker Corn Bran Crunch] with juicy fresh peaches. And bacon on toasted English muffin is as quick and easy to serve as the coffee. Your grocer features this Hollywood breakfast. Serve it to your family tomorrow."

O'Brien and Bogart in the film China Clipper.

The advertisement came out in 1936, the same year O'Brien was starring in the Warner Bros. action film China Clipper. O'Brien plays a former WWI ace pilot who, inspired by Charles Lindbergh's crossing of the Atlantic, attempts to create a trans-Pacific airline. A young Humphrey Bogart who was still working his way up to stardom co-stars as O'Brien's partner. This is one film that I'm hoping the Warner Archive will release on DVD. You can watch some clips from the film on TCM.com.

Robby enjoying the Midsummer Eye-Opener.

One of the things I find funny about the advertisment is its emphasis on digestibility as one of the selling points. "Quaker Puffed Rice [is] readily digestible" it says in one part and in another, "speedy digestibility is important to busy people in these high-tension times." Was digestibility a food marketing buzz word at the time like the way "fat-free" or "gluten-free" is used today? I own another advertisment for doughnuts from 1938 that has a slogan that goes, "Different, Delicious, Digestible, Doughnuts." I've seen some other food ads from the 1930s that also highlight how the food is digestible.

Pat O'Brien shares his favorite breakfast. Do you know what your favorite classic Hollywood actor/actress enjoys for breakfast?

Move Over, Darling (1963) - Film Locations

Move Over, Darling (1963) is a remake of the unfinished Marilyn Monroe and Dean Martin film, Something's Got to Give (1962), which was a remake of the Cary Grant and Irene Dunne film, My Favorite Wife. With Something's Got to Give, Monroe was fired from the film and was to be replaced by actress Lee Remick; however, Dean Martin had final approval of his leading lady and refused to work with anyone other than Monroe. 20th Century Fox rehired Monroe, but tragically she died before the film was completed and the movie was abandoned. Fox, which was struggling financially, decided to reuse many of the sets that were built for Something's Got to Give and produced a new film that followed more closely the original story of My Favorite Wife, with Doris Day and James Garner starring. That film became Move Over, Darling.

Day and Garner do not disappoint in this silly screwball comedy.  In the film, Ellen Arden (Day) and Nicholas Arden (Garner) are a happy married couple with two infant daughters living in Los Angeles. While on a flight traveling over the South Pacific, their plane goes down. Garner survives the crash but Day's body cannot be found. Five years later Garner is ready to move on with his life and he remarries the young and attractive Bianca Steele (Polly Bergen). Amazingly, it turns out that Day had survived the flight and was living on an island with another man who survived the crash. Day is rescued by the Navy and brought back to Los Angeles where she learns that her husband has left for Monterey to go on a honeymoon with his new wife. Day goes to Monterey where she surprises Garner, who is shocked to see her alive. Garner has a predicament. Does he go back to his wife that he has not seen for five years and has gone on believing was dead? And how does he break the news to his new wife?

In the beginning of the film Garner and Bergen are seen driving from Los Angeles up the Pacific Coast Highway to Monterey. They are on their way to the fictional Monterey Inn hotel for their honeymoon. Along the way, they pass the landmark Mugu Rock, not too far from the city of Oxnard.

Garner and Bergen drive pass Mugu Rock.

Mugu Rock on the Pacific Coast Highway near Oxnard.

The fictional "Monterey Inn" where Garner goes for his honeymoon.

After Garner learns that his first wife is still alive, he thinks up an excuse to head back home to Los Angeles. Garner's home is located at the corner of Wyton Drive and S. Mapleton Drive in the posh Holmby Hills neighborhood. In the screen comparisons below, taken from different points in the film, show the entrance of the home and the house from different angles. It appears that the house seen in the film must have been demolished, as now a massive mansion stands where the modest sized home seen in the movie once stood.

Doris Day arrives at the home on Wyton Drive.

Looking down Wyton Drive from S. Mapleton Drive.

The home as seen in the film looking down Mapleton Dr.

Looking down S. Mapleton Dr. at the intersection of Wyton Dr.

Day walks up the driveway from the Wyton Drive entrance.

A huge mansion now stands at the corner of Wyton and Mapleton.

Later in the film Garner wants to find out who the man is that Day has spent the last five years with living on an island. He learns that the man is staying at the Beverly Hills Hotel, located at 9461 West Sunset Boulevard. Garner scouts out the hotel and then arranges to have lunch with Day by the hotel pool, where Day's companion of the last five years has been staying.

Garner spots the man at the Beverly Hills Hotel pool.

The pool as it appears today. (c) Oyster.com

Day and Garner have lunch by the hotel pool.

The pool as it looks now. Photo credit: BeverlyHillsHotel.com

Day and Garner at the Beverly Hills Hotel pool.

When Day learns why Garner brought her to the Beverly Hills Hotel she storms out and drives off like a maniac. Garner runs to the valet, hitches a cab and follows after her. They drive through a car dealership in Santa Monica and then through a car wash at Pico Boulevard and S. Beverly Glen Boulevard.

Day races off from the Beverly Hills Hotel.

The Beverly Hills Hotel as it appears today.

Day and Garner drive through a Porsche dealership on

Wilshire Boulevard at East 20th St. in Santa Monica.

The car dealership is now the site of a Walgreens.

Looking down Wilshire at 20th St. Santa Monica.

The dealership side entrance on 20th Street. The 

Lighthouse Church steeple can be seen in background.

Looking down 20th Street. The Lighthouse Church

building can still be seen on the right.

Day drives pass a car wash on Pico Blvd at S. Beverly Glen.

The Car Wash is still in business nearly 5 decades later.

Day rounds the corner of Pico and Beverly Glen.

St. Timothy's Catholic Church is in the background.

The corner of Pico and S. Beverly Glen Blvd.

Garner follows Day passed an apartment building

behind the car wash.

The apartment building on S. Beverly Glen near Pico Blvd.

Move Over, Darling gets many added laughs from a hilarious supporting cast including Thelma Ritter, Fred Clark, Don Knotts, and Edgar Buchanan. The film has been released on DVD as both a stand alone disc and also as part of 20th Century Fox's 75th Anniversary Studio Classics quad sets. In the quad set the three other films included are, O. Henry's Full House, On The Riviera, and Rally 'Round The Flag, Boys!.

Royal Caribbean hosts world`s largest Travel Agency Appreciation Day

ROYAL CARIBBEAN hosts world’s largest 

travel agency appreciation day

Loyal to You Always emphasises past, present and future dedication to travel partners

 Dubai, 6^thJune 2012: Royal Caribbean Cruises Ltd is demonstrating its loyalty to travel agents by holding the world’s largest travel agency appreciation day today, June 6^th. Loyal to You Always is the company’s way of recognising the valuable role travel agents play while highlighting the ongoing support structure Royal Caribbean has in place.

Loyal to You Always is part of Royal Caribbean’s year-round campaign to provide support, training and loyalty to travel agents around the world. In the Middle East, the company provides regional support through its hub in Dubai.

Lakshmi Durai, Executive Director Middle East, said Royal Caribbean Arabia had been providing support, training and assistance in the region for more than 17 years. “We have a number of initiatives and programmes that show our loyalty to travel agents, which helps them not only sell more cruises and increase their profits, but build valuable relationships.

“We offer the travel agents the opportunity to visit the ships when they are in Dubai, so they get to see what a cruise holiday is all about. Every year, we take them on board for the Seminar at Sea to give them a firsthand experience of a cruise holiday, which helps the agents to sell Royal Caribbean cruise products effectively. We also have a very interactive online training programme called Cruising for Excellence, which helps our travel partners to learn more about our cruises and what we offer.”

In addition, the sales team in the Dubai representative office offers one-to-one training and presentations for travel agents throughout the year and provides ongoing reservation support through its help desk.

Ms Durai said Loyal to You Always would enable the company to emphasise its support structure and loyalty to travel agents, while also offering them bonus commission to book cruises on Thursday, June 7^th.  “Loyal to You Always is built on four principles: personal interaction and support; valuable resources that get results; increasing profits for travel agents; and award-winning travel agent education and development programmes,” she said.

Recognising the valuable role travel agents play in the company’s success, Loyal to You Always offers agents up to US$100 in bonus commission per stateroom for cruises aboard Royal Caribbean International, Celebrity Cruises and Azamara Club Cruises.

With Royal Caribbean’s ongoing fleetwide revitalisation and enhancements, the cruise line is helping to drive customer demand and superior guest satisfaction, which reinforces client loyalty and repeat business. Royal Caribbean is investing more than US$100 million over the next five years on its internal reservation system and automation tools to help travel agents sell cruises more easily and service their clients more effectively by leveraging the latest technologies.

Jack Benny Wants a 110 Free Disneyland Tickets

Comedian Jack Benny was famous for being a cheapskate. True to his image, in this hilarious video, Benny visits Walt Disney at his office to try and score 110 free tickets to the Disneyland theme park. Instead of taking the cast and crew of his television show out to dinner, Benny wants to treat them to a trip to Disneyland. Walt thinks this is a great idea, but this is before Benny mentions that he wants the tickets for free. Benny reminds Walt that he gave him 4 complimentary tickets to his television show. Walt reminds Benny that that was 9 years ago.

The best part of the video is at the very end. In exchange for the free tickets, Benny explains to Walt that on his television show they have a foreign actress guest star, and that they are going to make a foreign style film. Benny mentions that he is going to rewrite the whole sketch so that it has a "Disney approach." Walt is skeptical of Benny's idea, but Walt knew better than anyone how publicity on television was a great way to promote his upcoming films and theme park attractions.

For the sketch, Benny rewrites Walt's latest film, Mary Poppins, so that it has an Italian feel. Benny has his guest star, foreign actress Elke Sommer, playing a sexy Italian Mary Poppins. In the sketch, Benny, made up to look Italian with a big dark mustache asks Sommer what she wants for lunch. She responds with, "cheese" and then goes on to sing in the tune of "Supercalifragilisticexpialidocious" the words, "mozzarella, provolone, parmesan, ricotta." Sommer, Benny, and two young Italian looking kids then break out in song singing about cheese. I will never be able to watch Mary Poppins again without thinking of cheese. 

Walt Disney and Jack Benny

To be fair, in real life Benny was not the tightwad persona he created, but he was so good at playing up the image for laughs.

Visiting Old Hollywood at Forest Lawn Cemetery

The entrance to Forest Lawn Memorial Park, Glendale, Ca

For a Memorial Day weekend activity my wife and I took our two month old daughter Hazel to visit some classic Hollywood stars at Forest Lawn Memorial Park in Glendale, California. This cemetery, established in 1906, is one of my favorite locations in the Los Angeles area. For an area that can sometimes feel too brown, dusty and dry Forest Lawn is a nice little escape into rolling green hills, trees, large water fountains, and flowers. As far as cemeteries are concerned, Forest Lawn is gorgeous. There are also the added sites of art exhibits, buildings modeled after old world architecture, and spectacular views looking over Glendale and out to downtown Los Angeles. On this visit though, we had one specific destination inside the cemetery grounds in mind; the Freedom Mausoleum and the Court of Freedom.

Looking towards the Freedom Mausoleum

There are many different areas around the cemetery, each with a distinct name, and the Freedom Mausoleum and Court of Freedom are located near the back of the cemetery grounds at the top of one of the winding hills. There are several old Hollywood celebrities that can be found in this area including Chico Marx, Gummo Marx, Clara Bow, George Burns and wife Gracie Allen, Nat King Cole, Alan Ladd, Spencer Tracy, Errol Flynn and Walt Disney to name a few.

Walt Disney's garden is to the left of the Freedom Mausoleum.

Our first visit was to a garden located just to the left of the Freedom Mausoleum entrance. There is a short stone wall with a little gate. If you open the gate and look up at the wall that is often covered by trees and large plants you will see a plaque with the names of Walt Disney, his wife Lillian, his daughter Sharon and her husband Robert Brown. Unfortunately, when we mentioned Disney to Hazel, she was expecting rides. She was a bit disappointed. 

"No rides, Daddy? Just a plaque with some names?"

We then went inside the Freedom Mausoleum to visit the husband/wife comedy team, George Burns and Gracie Allen.  Their crypt reads, "Together Again." Gracie died in 1964 and Burns didn't pass away until 1996 - thirty-two years later! George Burns loved Gracie and missed her very much after she passed away. For a very entertaining and funny read about their relationship, I recommend the book Gracie: A Love Story, written by George Burns.

The following is an excerpt from the book:

Gracie died in 1964, and I still go to Forest Lawn Cemetery once a month to see her. I stand in front of her marble monument and tell her everything that's going on in my life. I told her I was writing this book about her, for instance; evidently she didn't mind, she didn't say anything. When the television program "60 Minutes" did a segment about me, I took their crew to Forest Lawn. "Imagine that, Googie," I told Gracie. "After all this time we're working together again." I don't know if she hears me, but I know that after speaking to her, I feel better.

Gracie Allen and George Burns. "Together Again."

A crypt next to George and Gracie is another couple where the husband long outlived the wife: Gene Raymond and Jeanette MacDonald. MacDonald passed away in 1965 and Raymond didn't go until 1998! Their crypt reads "Beloved Husband" and "Beloved Wife."

Gene Raymond and Jeanette MacDonald

Next we headed back outside the mausoleum and walked out front to the Garden of Everlasting Peace. Inside this garden courtyard is one of my favorite actors, and in the minds of many, one of the greatest American actors to have ever lived, Mr. Spencer Tracy.

Garden of Everlasting Peace

Spencer Tracy passed away on June 10, 1967 at the age of 67. A requiem  mass was held at Immaculate Heart of Mary Catholic Church in East Hollywood on Monday, June 12, not too far from Forest Lawn in Glendale. According to the recent biography, Spencer Tracy, by James Curtis, "serving as active pallbearers were George Cukor, Stanley Kramer, Bill Self, Frank Sinatra, Jimmy Stewart, John Ford, Garson Kanin, and Abe Lastfogel. Numbered among the honorary pallbearers were Edward G. Robinson, Lew Douglas, Robert Taylor, Larry Weingarten, Benny Thau, Tim Durant, R. J. Wagner, Loyal Davis, Chester Erskine, Harold Bumby, Chuck Sligh, Jack Benny, George Burns, Mike Romanoff, and Senator George Murphy." A smaller and private graveside ceremony followed the large celebrity attended mass.

A gated garden plot for Spencer Tracy.

The marble tablet only reads "Tracy."

Unless you know where you're looking, finding some of the celebrity grave sites can be difficult. Forest Lawn is a massive cemetery. However, if you can make your way to the Freedom Mausoleum, you will be able to find quite a few recognizable names both inside and around the grounds outside.

Inside the Script eBooks, More Than Just a Screenplay

With the new "Inside the Script" eBooks from Warner Bros. film fans can read classic movie scripts like North By Northwest or Casablanca and also delve deeper into the making of the film with supplemental chapters on the film's development and production. The eBooks will include items like costume sketches, on-set photographs, production notes, and storyboards with internal links that immediately take you from the scene to the additional content. I have yet to read one of these new eBooks but I love the concept. I think I may start out with one of my favorite films, North By Northwest, but I would like to see one done for the film Sunset Boulevard (but that one will probably require approval by Paramount).  Other eBooks in the series include the epic Ben Hur with Charlton Heston and An American in Paris with Gene Kelly and Leslie Caron.

The eBooks are available for Kindle, Nook by Barnes and Noble, and iBookstore and the cost is $9.99 per eBook.

Have you tried one of these new Inside the Script eBooks? What film script would you most like to see get the Inside the Script treatment?

Wedding & Romance at Sea!

Wedding is one of the most important & memorable event in everyone’s life. A cruise ship is a perfect location for a memorable wedding. Cruise weddings can take place onboard in a public room, a lounge or Wedding Chapel on the ship or on a romantic shore such as a beach, a glacier or any other destination of guest’s choice. Your can choose to have the wedding in one of the ports & then sail off on a honeymoon!
Most of the major cruise lines offer different wedding packages for different budgets and wedding party sizes. The Cruise lines now have a variety of services to help your guests plan a shipboard or shore side ceremony which could be combined with a romantic cruise honeymoon.

Planning a cruise wedding is very simple & hassle free. The major cruise lines have dedicated wedding coordinators to help with all arrangements including floral arrangements, table linens, photography, music, cake and special menus to make your wedding a unique event. Some will even help the guests to obtain wedding licenses or provide invitations and thank you notes. In addition, the coordinators also handle all the extras from tuxedo rental to hair and spa appointments. The Cruise Wedding experience will make your wedding extra special. Being the most exciting time of life, the guests can relax enjoying the activities onboard the cruise ship, while the wedding coordinator takes care of every details of this special day.
An onboard wedding can be a great value as well. The price range of a shipboard wedding is just like one ashore ranging from a few hundred dollars to thousands. You need to consult the cruise specialists to select the best package. The options of arranging Cruise Weddings are endless. With Cruise Weddings you can be sure that your dreams will fit well into your budget.