Coming attraction poster ‘This gun for hire’ a larger than life billboard of an actor named Alan Ladd, co-star a sexy Veronica Lake, her blonde hairdo over her left eye, East 13th Street and Avenue J, the Midwood theater, 1942, Brooklyn, New York….(balcony)…..Dr. Marvin Kochman’s eye emporium (“Do you get the drift?”)…(Warner Brothers studio, Avenue M..Butcher market, Steubenville, Ohio..Vilna, Poland ghetto)
II
Thousands and thousands of metamorphoses… growing up as a Cro-Magnon man on the Mojave Desert with the Air Force..Sheppard Air Force Base, Wichita Falls (Texas Oklahoma panhandle) out of an oasis like RNCHO MIRAGE to 533 S. Palm Canyon Drive, Palm Springs tennis club turf,(CharlieFarrell, “7
th Heaven” (( Janet Gaynor ,tennis club))
president..Ralph Bellamy ) a hardware store owned and operated by the actor and his wife Sue Carol….
The reluctant hesitant (but not indecisive) gunslinger of “Shane” in counterpoint with Van Heflin Jean Arthur and son Brandon de Wilde, dashing to their ranch stockade “Shane Shane”, the cameras grinding the fading moment…. Alan Ladd riding into the legendary distant dust..
Jack Palance, the desperado from Stanford University, lying dead on the ranch’s kitchen floor..his one armed pushup on Ed Sullivan’s tv Sundays, all but forgotten, in the archives.
III
Among the North Hollywood High School alumni…..Alan Ladd, John Williams, Ron Tuller, (Lana, his wife at Walt Disney) Michael Tilson Thomas, conductor San Francisco Philharmonic, Susan Sontag, Farley Granger, Russ Tamblyn, Marvin Miller, Teri Garr…
IV
“This gun for hire” opening up a hamburger “hamlet” on graduation, “Tacos tamales burridos” Burbank Boulevard, Alan Ladd, a swimming champ, soon was doing stints on radio and small roles in the studios until he was cast in “This gun for hire”…. “Metamorphosing into “Shane”.
A down to earth quiet actor, his daughter Alana gave your author her phone number when we met at a sweet sixteen party in Beverly Hills. Little knowing that we were catapulting back into Avenue J’s hardware stores, her mother and father recreating the scene 3000 miles away…a Danny Kaye borscht belt metaphor in reverse.
V
His store exited the Palm Springs run after 33 years (the ‘33 Plymouth taking us across the Continent to Venice and the roller rink where Charlie Chaplin discovered his persona as “the Tramp”, the derby, mustachio, baggy pants, over sized shoes cane, the empathy supreme.…
VI
Long live Alan Ladd’s own empathy…..Builders hardware, general hardware, appliances, house wares gifts, paints, toys, patio supplies,m sporting goods.
Established 1955-1988, “Shane” into 96 roles from 1933-1966.
May his memorable North Hollywood pathos and humanity endure forever….
Long live “Shane Shane” riding off into the distant dust….
October 12, 2015. Columbus Day. The City that never sleeps…..
