TCM Schedule for Saturday, January 15, 2022 -- What's On Tonight: Epic Saturday Nights

[Staph]

In the daylight hours, TCM has the usual Saturday matinee lineup of films and shorts. Then in primetime, it's the second week of Epic Saturday nights, featuring some of Hollywood's greatest epics. Tonight's big film is Cleopatra (1963). Enjoy!


6:00 AM -- Affectionately Yours (1941)
1h 30m | Comedy | TV-G
A foreign correspondent hurries home to stop his wife from getting a divorce.
Director: Lloyd Bacon
Cast: Merle Oberon, Dennis Morgan, Rita Hayworth

Bette Davis was the original choice to play Sue Mayberry.


8:00 AM -- The Stork's Holiday (1943)
7m | Animation
The stork has problems with anti-aircraft guns when trying to deliver babies in World War II Germany.
Director: George Gordon
Cast: Pinto Colvig


8:09 AM -- Goofy Movies Number Three (1934)
9m | Short | TV-G
This short film has Pete Smith provide comedic narration over silent footage and present a spoof of James A. FitzPatrick's Traveltalk series.
Cast: Pete Smith


8:19 AM -- Scenic Grandeur (1941)
8m | Short | TV-G
This short film highlights the natural beauty of the Northwestern United States.
Cast: James A. Fitzpatrick


8:28 AM -- Gun Smugglers (1948)
1h 1m | Western | TV-G
A young boy threatens to follow in his outlaw brother's footsteps.
Director: Frank Mcdonald
Cast: Tim Holt, Richard Martin, Martha Hyer


9:30 AM -- Batman and Robin: The Wizard's Challenge (1949)
16m | Crime | TV-G
An invisible criminal mastermind sets a bomb to kill the Dynamic Duo.
Director: Spencer Gordon Bennet
Cast: Robert Lowery, Johnny Duncan, Jane Adams

Batman's hometown of Gotham City has always been understood to be an over-the-top analog of New York. Due to a low budget, Batman (1943) and this movie treat Gotham as an analog of Los Angeles.


10:00 AM -- Beach Peach (1950)
6m | Animation | TV-PG
Popeye comes to grips with a wolfish lifeguard who tries to steal Olive Oyl.
Director: Seymour Kneitel
Cast: Jack Mercer, Jackson Beck, Mae Questel

Because the lifeguard is wearing a sailor hat, and has Bluto's voice and physique, it is logical to assume he was originally intended to have been Bluto before someone decided to use a new character instead.


10:08 AM -- Blues Busters (1950)
1h 7m | Comedy | TV-G
The Bowery Boys open a night club when a tonsillectomy turns one of them into a singing star.
Director: William Beaudine
Cast: Leo Gorcey, Huntz Hall, Adele Jergens

Satch's contract says it will pay him $300/week. That's the equivalent of nearly $3,000/week in 2016.


11:30 AM -- The Romance of Robert Burns (1937)
15m | Short | TV-G
The story behind Robert Burns' famous song "Auld Lang Syne".
Director: Crane Wilbur
Cast: Owen King, Linda Perry, Marcia Ralston


12:00 PM -- The Last Gangster (1937)
1h 21m | Crime | TV-G
When a notorious gangster gets out of prison, he vows revenge on the wife who left him.
Director: Edward Ludwig
Cast: Edward G. Robinson, James Stewart, Rose Stradner

One of the few films - and quite possibly the only one - where James Stewart sports a mustache. He appears unshaven in many films (especially westerns) but in the latter part of this one he is clean shaven except for the upper lip.


1:30 PM -- Dial M for Murder (1954)
1h 45m | Suspense/Mystery | TV-PG
A straying husband frames his wife for the murder of the man he'd hired to kill her.
Director: Alfred Hitchcock
Cast: Ray Milland, Grace Kelly, Robert Cummings

Alfred Hitchcock had chosen a very expensive robe for Grace Kelly to wear when she answered the phone. Kelly balked and said that no woman would put on such a robe just to answer the ringing telephone while she was asleep alone; she would answer it in her nightgown. Hitchcock agreed to do it her way and liked the way the rushes turned out, and he allowed Kelly to make all costume decisions for herself in their subsequent movies together.


3:30 PM -- The Time Machine (1960)
1h 43m | Horror/Science-Fiction | TV-G
A turn-of-the-century inventor sends himself into the future to save humanity.
Director: George Pal
Cast: Rod Taylor, Alan Young, Yvette Mimieux

Winner of an Oscar for Best Effects, Special Effects -- Gene Warren and Tim Baar

The film takes place on December 31, 1899, on January 5, 1900, on September 13, 1917, on June 19, 1940, on August 19, 1966 and in October 802,701.



5:30 PM -- Being There (1979)
2h 10m | Comedy | TV-14
Political pundits mistake an illiterate gardener for a media genius and turn him into a national hero.
Director: Hal Ashby
Cast: Peter Sellers, Shirley Maclaine, Melvyn Douglas

Winner of an Oscar for Best Actor in a Supporting Role -- Melvyn Douglas (Melvyn Douglas was not present at the awards ceremony. Co-presenter Liza Minnelli accepted the award on his behalf.)

Nominee for an Oscar for Best Actor in a Leading Role -- Peter Sellers

Modern viewers may be confused by the various characters--even the doctors--not immediately understanding that Chance is on the autism spectrum. Autism was horribly misunderstood and widely unknown, even among medical professionals, at the time this film was released. It was so taboo, most parents tried to hide their children's autism, resulting in the public not knowing much about it. A shift through the 1990s and 2000s from seeing autism as a taboo mental illness to current views of autism as neurodivergence (simply a different way of being) helped de-stigmatize autism, which allowed those in the ASD community to open up and educate the public.



WHAT'S ON TONIGHT: PRIMETIME THEME -- EPIC SATURDAY NIGHTS



8:00 PM -- Cleopatra (1963)
4h 3m | Epic | TV-PG
The legendary Egyptian queen tries to use her beauty to conquer the Roman Empire.
Director: Joseph L. Mankiewicz
Cast: Elizabeth Taylor, Richard Burton, Rex Harrison

Winner of Oscars for Best Cinematography, Color -- Leon Shamroy, Best Art Direction-Set Decoration, Color -- John DeCuir, Jack Martin Smith, Hilyard M. Brown, Herman A. Blumenthal, Elven Webb, Maurice Pelling, Boris Juraga, Walter M. Scott, Paul S. Fox and Ray Moyer, Best Costume Design, Color -- Irene Sharaff, Vittorio Nino Novarese and Renié, and Best Effects, Special Visual Effects -- Emil Kosa Jr.

Nominee for Oscars for Best Actor in a Leading Role -- Rex Harrison, Best Sound -- James Corcoran (20th Century-Fox SSD) and Fred Hynes (Todd-AO SSD), Best Film Editing -- Dorothy Spencer, Best Music, Score - Substantially Original -- Alex North, and Best Picture

Dame Elizabeth Taylor had 65 costume changes for this movie, a record for a movie at the time. That record was taken from Taylor by Dame Julie Andrews in 1968 when she played the lead role in Star! (1968), which is also another movie produced and distributed by Twentieth Century Fox. Based on the life of the actress Gertrude Lawrence, Star! (1968) saw Andrews change costumes a staggering 125 times, a record still unbroken or unmatched to this day. Dame Joan Collins and Madonna came close with 85 costume changes for the mini-series Sins (1986) and the big-budget musical epic movie Evita (1996), respectively.


12:30 AM -- The Mob (1951)
1h 27m | Crime | TV-14
A police detective fakes a suspension so he can go undercover.
Director: Robert Parrish
Cast: Broderick Crawford, Betty Buehler, Richard Kiley

Very early "walk-on" by Charles Bronson, who has a few lines as an angry dock worker when "Tim Flynn" shows up at the docks looking for work.


2:30 AM -- The Lady from Shanghai (1948)
1h 26m | Crime | TV-PG
A romantic drifter gets caught between a corrupt tycoon and his voluptuous wife.
Director: Orson Welles
Cast: Rita Hayworth, Orson Welles, Everett Sloane

Near the end of shooting, Orson Welles told "Columbia" executives that he wanted a complete set repainted on a Saturday for shooting on Monday. Columbia exec Jack Fier told Welles it was impossible, because of union rules and the expense that would be incurred by calling in a crew of painters to work on a weekend. Welles and several friends broke into the paint department that Saturday and repainted the set themselves, and when they were finished they hung a banner on the set that read "The Only Thing We Have to Fear is Fier Himself." When the union painters arrived at work on Monday and saw that the set had been repainted by someone else, they refused to work, threw a picket line around the studio and threatened to stay on strike until a union crew was paid triple time for the work that had been done (which was why Fier had refused to authorize the work in the first place). To placate the union, Fier agreed to pay them what they wanted but put the cost on Welles' personal bill. In addition, he had the union painters paint a banner saying "All's Well That Ends Welles."


4:15 AM -- F for Fake (1973)
1h 25m | Documentary | TV-14
Director Orson Welles examines the career of a notorious art forger.
Director: Orson Welles
Cast: Orson Welles, Oja Kodar, François Reichenbach

At the start of the film, Orson Welles promises that "everything in the next hour will be solid fact." The film is 89 minutes long and every assertion made in the final 29 minutes is untrue.