June 12, 1950 –
Elia Kazan’s film-noir thriller, Panic In The Streets, starring Richard Widmark, Paul Douglas, Barbara Bel Geddes, Zero Mostel, and Jack Palance (in his film debut,) opened on this date.
In the scene where Palance hits Widmark on the head with a gun, the actors rehearsed it with a rubber gun, but when the cameras rolled, Palance substituted a real gun. Widmark, who wasn’t expecting it was out for twenty minutes. According to Widmark “Why did he switch? Who knows?” In a 1986 interview Widmark also recalled how Palance got into the mood of his character by beating on flunky Zero Mostel off-screen. A black and blue Mostel had to go to the hospital after his first week on the movie. “They had to soak him in epsom pads.”
The Haus of Dcaligari 