Greeley Daily Tribune from Greeley, Colorado • Page 27

Sept. IT. (t'oio.) TIUHUNE 27 By NANCY ANDERSON Copley News Service HOLLYWOOD If the movie "The Naked Ape" intends to make the point man is little higher than a beast, it succeeds at least to a limited degree. The fact that it's on the screen at all says something about its producers. And, if it turns out to be popular, its acceptance will prove the general validity of its message.

The picture which has no plot has great trouble Finding its direction. Is it supposed to be a salacious comedy, political propaganda, an army hygiene film or animated graffiti at junior high school level? "Or is it a big put-on and a tax write-off for Hugh Hefner whose Playboy company backed it? I went to the world premiere, and I don't know. Its attempts at humor are of the latrine-wall variety and don't come off unless you get a belly laugh out of a urine specimen. (No joke, that was the subject of some of the film's rollicking hijinks.) If the above's not enough to keep you out of the theater, how about this? For no reason' related to other action on the screen, the camera zeros in on a station- wagon bumper festooned with stickers reading: 1 "If you love Jesus, honk." A nun steps from behind the car and blows her nose. In the same vein, the picture makes tasteless and shabby use of the children's hymn "Jesus Loves Me." Victoria Principal, unfortunately involved in this disaster, looks lovely and projects an attractive screen personality.

Otherwise, "The Naked Ape" is a dog deserving to be HOLLYWOOD HOTLINE The Naked Ape' headed for flop? a turkey. That's show biz talk for a box-office flop. Jay J. Armes, the private detective with hooks for hands who brought Devi Brando back from Mexico last year after he was reported to have been kidnaped, turned actor for an episode of "Hawaii Five-0" introducing the show's sixth season. In the segment, Armes played the villain, a double amputee who blames police for his maiming and is out to take revenge on all law-enforcement officers.

Armes, a bit of a showman when he was on the witness stand during a custody hearing connected with the Devi Brando incident, enjoyed his outing before cameras so much that he's looking forward to starring in a television series of his own. According to the private eye, Universal Studios producer Dick Zanuck is preparing a series to be based on Armes' own adventures with Armes himself playing the hero. On top of that, the handless detective is writing a book for Creation House, "My Best Secret Agent," in which he credits Christ with his success, is mulling book offers from two other publishers, and is keep- tabs on the staff of private investigators who call him "boss." Armes says he'd planned to become a surgeon before he lost his hands by catching a dynamite cap tossed in his direction when he was 12 years old. "Before the accident," he says, "I was the local fix-it-all for dogs and cats in our neighborhood. 1 had planned to study medicine, but after I lost my hands I realized some patients might be nervous about being operated on by a surgeon with hooks instead of fingers." Next Armes considered a career in law but concluded that was too sedentary.

So, at 19, he became a private detective. Marlon Brando called him into the search for Devi, Armes says, because he knew of his reputation. The actor paid Armes plus expenses for his three days work. Though, as a boy with hands, Armes never handled guns nor liked to hunt, he now claims to be a better marksman than the average police officer. He also says his handwriting's better than it was before the explosion.

He shoots rifles, pistols and occasionally one of his hooks. "I had a special hook made with a gun built in," he says. "I can fire it by flexing a muscle." In addition to all that, Armes pilots a plane, skydives, scuba dives and is a racing driver. Armes says he's looking forward to changing the image of the private eye through the series Zanuck's proposing. "I've spent years trying to change that image," the Texan maintains.

"Most people think a private investigator is a guy who keeps a bottle in the bottom drawer of his filing cabinet and who spends most of his time knocking down men and kissing girls. "Well, a certain amount of that can go on. "But I'd like to show that the private eye can be as respectable as anybody else. "I'm a private investigator who loves his wife, his children and his church." SAME SONGS Marlene keeps control and fans By GEORGE WALDO Copley News Service LONDON Wimbledon is a long way from the West End. But the audience that packs the theater down there nightly is strictly a London crowd.

Marlene Dietrich, at 70, or thereabouts, sings the same songs she's been singing for 30 years and her show is a study in total professionalism. She has Burl Bacharach arrangements, a 22-piece orchestra, and her own traveling claque that starts the bouquet-tossing at every curtain call. Relaxing (though that's something she never really does) at the flat of her only daughter, Maria Riva, in South Kensington, she says, "Technique and control are all that matter. "In every single bar of music, every single light that hits me, I know it and am able to control it. NKW CLASSIFICATION PUEBLO, Colo.

(AP) A racial classification required by Ihe Federal Equal i Commission lisls six classifications for racial-ethnic categories of employes. Rather Ihan check one of six classifications, 10 firemen on duty at a local fire station decided on a classification of their own: American. Had they filled out the form they would have listed Ihe 10 men on duty thus: two of Italian descent; two i Spanish surnames; two Slavic descent; one from Pakistan; one from East India; one from another' part of Europe and an American Indian. "In films there are too many people, too many tangibles. Here, on stage, I know whom to blame.

And I can be myself. Nobody cuts, dubs or edits me afterwards!" During her show, she stands there, in that same sequined dress of tiny pearls, swathed in acres of white fur. Like her friend the late Noel Coward, she puts a premium on crisp diction; like Garland, she suddenly puts a catch in her voice that can be heartbreaking; like Piaf, she knows exactly how a stage may be crossed. Her gestures are frozen, her complexion looks sculptured out of eggshells, and her lighting is a flattering amber. Like all the great singers, she has that gift of moulding the trite into something new, and thus an unlikely old vehicle like "My Blue Heaven" comes out moving and fresh.

She does new songs like "Go Away From My Window" and "Where Have All the Flowers Gone?" and old songs like "Lola" and "Falling in Love Again." She sings many songs in German, her first language. Born in Berlin, the daughter of an exacting father, brought to Hollywood by exacting director Josef Von Sternberg after the success in Europe of "The Blue Angel," Marlene starred in many films like "Destry Rides Again," "Morocco," and "Shanghai Express," sang in Las Vegas nightclubs, did television specials, and now tours with her one-woman shows. She has recently bought an apartment on Avenue Montaigne in Paris, a city she says "every woman loves." "I eat only steaks and greenery," she claims. "And I dedicate myself to looking sexy, rather than being sexy." Mistress and mother to every man, she is wife only to Rudi Siebert, for some 30 years, but he lives on a chicken ranch in California and they see each other seldom. "I think stars make their own luck," she says thoughtfully, pouting with that lower lip.

"Impressarios unnerve me. I have no agent or manager except myself. I guess you could say Burt Bacharach is my musical generalissimo, my overlord." A sometimes defiant and regal lady, with no hobbies except herself, no vices except self-exploitation, she has no dangerous habits except a gift of eliciting monumental praise from otherwise reasonable men. Ernest Hemingway, for example, wrote: "Dietrich is brave, beautiful, loyal, kind, and generous. She has an honesty and a sense of the tragic and comedy in life that never lets her be truly happy." Jean Cocteau said: "In her voice I hear the voice of Lorelei.

The secret of her beauty lies in her loving heart. And this caring holds her higher than most mortal courage." "But where will this all end?" Marlene herself asks. "This world is in a mess, while I just keep going on. I am grateful that people still understand what I am trying to do with my songs, and I wish them love." In each generation there can be counted on the fingers of a single hand the artists that can grip an audience in an emotional vice by some sort of mixture of technique and magic. Marlene Dietrich is one of this breed, and a performer the likes of which is unlikely to be seen again.

Helen Ferguson YESTERDAY'S STARS TODAY Helen Ferguson tells of brass bed By NANCY ANDERSON Copley News Service HOLLYWOOD Helen Ferguson thinks she has three claims to distinction. To uniqueness even. "The only reason I wanted to get into movies was to be able to buy my mother a brass bed," Helen chuckles. "I'll bet no other actress can make that claim. "Then, I think I was the only actress of my era who was never invited to San Simeon; and I was the only one of Rin-Tin-Tin's leading ladies who didn't have to put sugar water on her face to get him to lick her.

"He liked my face just as it was. "Those are my three claims to fame." That's what Helen says, badly underrating herself. For she's distinctive, distinguished, even unique, on numerous other counts. She's a petite lady of gigantic character whose energy and determination brought her from midwestern poverty to stage and movie stardom and then to a foremost position in the tricky field of Hollywood public relations. Helen's fighting spirit and sense of humor have survived professional disappointments, personal tragedies and a serious illness which, several years ago, forced her retirement to Palm Desert, Calif.

Helen's first acting job was as a 12-year-old stunt girl, a job she got after crawling into a movie studio, through the coal chute, to convince a studio manager to give her a job. She did it, she said, so she could buy her mother a brass bed and pay her for the years of hard work she had had as a divorcee raising her. That was the beginning of her career as a stunt girl. Once, because she had long, beautiful hair, she was asked to fall down stairs and land so that her lengthy locks would trail on the steps behind her. Helen took the fall, letting her hair fly out as instructed.

Lying still as the camera rolled, she smelled smoke and assumed trash somewhere was burning. But, after the scene was finished, she discovered that her own hair was I A New York doctor says that some tennis players complain of "tennis toe" as well as tennis elhow. According to Dr. Richard C. Gibbs.

M.D., Ihe pain of tennis toe is associated with the appearance of a beneath the loenails. The Spanish Armada was a fleet of 130 ships gathered by Philip II of Spain for the invasion of England in 1588. An altack by Ihe English under Sir Francis Drake drove Ihe Armada north, and a severe storm wrecked the remnant off the north of Scotland. After 8 on Monday and Tuesday Plus Distinctive Pizza at Cables End 110526th Ave. 356-4847 Thanks to all who entered the ecology drive and congratulations to Dennis Schwindt, the winner of 78 pounds of icecream! on fire, ignited by a falling torch.

Once as a stunt girl, Helen doubled for Edward Arnold when he was a handsome leading man rather than the portly and somewhat sinister character actor he became. Graduating from stunt work to acting assignments to leading roles, Helen was transferred to Hollywood by Goldwyn Studios. And there she met and married her girlhood idol, actor Bill Russell. After his death, she married Richard Hargreaves, a Beverly Hills businessman, who also left her widowed. As an actress, Helen was versatile, playing leads in pictures ranging from westerns (including the first that John Ford directed) to serious drama including the critically acclaimed "Hungry Heart." In this she portrayed a Jewish immigrant girl so effectively that one critic feared American-born, French-Irish Helen would be typecast forever as a Jewish immigrant.

"To prepare for that part," she remembers, "I went downtown and lived with a Jewish family who owned a delicatessen. They were very sweet to me." Her introduction to Rin-Tin- Tin coincided with her introduction to Jason Robards who had reached Hollywood by way of the stage to become an instant romantic hero. Almost immediately after Helen had been exposed to Robards' charms (though over the footlights only), she got a call from Jack Warner asking her if she'd like to be in a Rin-Tin-Tin picture. She said that she would. Then he told her that Jason Robards would be her leading man.

Oh, rapture I The company went to Lancaster on location, and one night after dinner Robards invited Helen to go for a drive in the desert. Naturally, she went. "He stopped the ear," she remembers, "and from behind a big rock or a sand dune or something I heard an orchestra playing 'L'Amour Toujour He'd brought an orchestra up from Los Angeles and posted it there just for the evening." STKAMI.OCOMOTIVK The first train in the United States to be drawn by a steam locomotive made its run between Albany and Schenectady, N.Y., on Aug. 9, 1831. Oil of wintergreen is one of the derivaties of salicylic acid, Ihe main ingredient of aspirin.

Eli Wallach, Anne Jackson return to Broadway stage WI1.MAAI i AP Drama Critic YOHK A One (if UK; llicnler's most durably i I'hcd couples, Eli Wallach and Anno Jackson, returned Tluirs- day night to Broadway's stage in that sourish fable of a rimony, "Till! Wallv. of the Toreadors." Kor an extra touch of in- group irony, the opening was followed by a 25tli wedding anniversary parly for the pair. A notable array of slage-screon relehrilies swarmed lo the dual occasion, collective geniality was rampant. Kor audiences coming to less gala ensuing performances through the i i engage- scheduled to end Oct. 20.

the show itself may be only moderately enthralling. Anouilh infused the text with much French wry. a lightness capably preserved in Iho Lncionne Hill translation a was originally presented here in ISIS? starring Sir Ralph Richardson and his wife, Muriel Forbes. Under Hie direction of Brian Murray, the story unfolds a I i off-rhythm and heavy this time. As an aging cavalry general, vintage 1910, Wallach rasps roughly over some i a subtle Iwisls of mood, tramples several humorous cappers so they feebly gasp.

Miss Jackson appears in only one scene, of violent bedroom throws an occasional line of dialogue from somewhere behind Clarke Dunham's neatly period setting. In overdone makeup, she gives a i i a a tinge of distinctive madness. Of the others, William Roer- ick conies off well as Ihe philosophic doctor-friend: Diana Van Der Vlis, long absent from the stage, is a convincing lost love. Within the aforementioned limitations, "The Waltz of Ihe Toreadors" continues lo be a drama of considerable- merit and reward. It is being done al Broadway's littlest playhouse with the longest name, the Circle in the Square-Joseph E.

Levine Theater. Other stage events earlier this week also emphasized the revival trend. A new adaptation of "Moby Dick" is being performed i force and imagination by off-Broadway's Classic Stage Company. Although the all-male cast is not uniformly effective, Christopher Martin's text ami direction build In a out battle with Ihe great whale that gives plenty lo remember. Another opening was another "Taming of the Shrew" interpretation at the Performing Ga rage.

An unkempt crew of slovenly performers who brazenly call themselves Shakespeare and Company have at the comedy with pratfalls and indulgent miscasting. Better they should return lo the London Academy of Music and Dramatic Arts where Tina Packer launched this sententious assault on stagecraft. What other critics said: Clive Barnes, The New York Times: "All in all an iridescent production of a play thai bids Fail' to become a modern classic." i KKSICNS Charles A. l.indherg, out spoken foe of war, resigned as colonel in the Army Air Corps Reserve on April 211, 11141. UNIQUE! UNPARALLELED! SEE 25 FANTASTIC ACTS NEVER BEFORE SEEN IN AMERICA! PERFORMANCE SCHEDULE SEPT.

A.M. P.M. P.M. 19 WED. (KHOW CHARITY NIGHT) 20THURS.

21 FRI. 8:15 22 SAT. 3:00 7:30 23 SUN. 1:00 5:00" CHILDREN UNDER SI.00 LESS THAN ADULT PRICE All Seats Reserved $3.50 Tax Included SAVE $1 ON KIDS UNDER 12 Wed. 7:30 pm Thurs.

4:15 8:15 pm Fii. 4:15 pm Sat. Morning 11 am Douglas Wall, The Daily News: "The production may ncil do Ihe work full justice, but it is a conscientious one. and well worth seeing." Hicharcl Walls, The New York Post: "A delight to see. A satisfying production." GENE HACKMAN IN HUNTING PARTY JOHN WAYNE UNHID STATES MARSHAL PLUS Filmfd In PANAVISIOM DE LUXE COIOB Irom Warner a Wamei CommimlcallQns company TONIGHT! 'FOOTBALL 1DOWS MKjMTi at the MOVIES You say your husband is hypnotized by the TV escapades of the Packers, Dolphins, liagles, Cardinals, Giants, Jets, Gilts, -Wers, Ranis, Bears, Bengals? the crtofi tonight! We welcome "football widows" special low admission TONIGHT ALL FOOTBALL WIDOWS ADMITTED FOR $1.00 LTWM (ilrnda Jackson The Nelson Affair" A .38 slug works better than any Judge or Jury.

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