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August 26, 1955 – Satyajit Ray burst onto the international film scene, when his directorial debut Pather Panchali, starring Subir Banerjee, Kanu Banerjee and Karuna Banerjee, premiered in India on this date. Because of all the many delays in this film’s nearly three-year production, director Satyajit Ray became increasingly apprehensive that some event might occurContinue reading “Pather Panchali”

Today is National Banana Split Day, observed annually on this date A 23-year-old apprentice pharmacist at Tassel’s Pharmacy in Latrobe, Pennsylvania created the first banana split in 1904. David Evans Strickler enjoyed inventing sundaes at the store’s soda fountain. His first “banana-based triple ice cream sundae” sold for 10 cents, double the cost of allContinue reading “Stressed spelled backwards is desserts”

August 25, 1972 –American International Pictures released another film in the blaxploitation vein, Blacula, on this date. Blacula was popular in America, debuting at #24 on Variety’s list of top films. It eventually grossed over a million dollars, making it one of the highest-grossing films of 1972.

August 24, 1968 –France exploded its first hydrogen bomb, thus becoming the world’s fifth nuclear power. The Germans break out in an ever slight sweat. (The 1998 film Godzilla uses this particular test as the basis for the monster Godzilla, an infant green iguana mutated by the fallout from the blast.) Another reason to hateContinue reading “Sacre Bleu!”

August 24, 1979 –NBC-TV introduced the girls of Eastland School, an all-girls boarding school in Peekskill, New York, to audiences when The Facts of Life premiered on this date. The pilot Rough Housing may have been the very first children’s program on network television to discuss gender confusion and sexual identity crises among youth; asContinue reading “The Facts of Life”

August 23, 1985 –Atlantic Releasing Corp releases the comedy film Teen Wolf, directed by Rod Daniel and starred Michael J. Fox, on this date. Michael J. Fox and Jeff Glosser couldn’t eat solid food while in make-up. They had milkshakes and soup.

August 23, 1985 –The Toho Studio and New World Pictures released the heavily re-edited American version of The Return of Godzilla (a sequel of the original Gojira movie), Godzilla 1985 (a sequel of the American Godzilla, King of the Monsters) starring the great Raymond Burr, Ken Tanaka, and Yasuko Sawaguchi, on this date. Raymond BurrContinue reading “Godzilla 1985”

August 22, 1893 –If you want to know what God thinks of money, just look at the people he gave it to. Dorothy Parker was born in New York City, to Henry and Eliza Rothschild (… My God, no, dear! We’d never even heard of those Rothschilds ….) on this date. Her birth was twoContinue reading “Brevity is the soul of lingerie.”

August 21, 1911 –Pablo Picasso was having a very bad day. His so called friend, French poet Guillaume Apollinaire, who had once called for the Louvre to be “burnt down,” came under suspicion when the Mona Lisa was stolen from the Lourve on this day; he was arrested and put in jail. Apollinaire, as allContinue reading “It really was the Crime of the Century (at the time, anyway.)”

What did Vincenzo Peruggia steal on August 21, 1911? a. The Shroud of Turinb. Home platec. The Mona Lisad. The Sistine Chapele. The Hope Diamond Bonus: what was his day job? (Answer later today) And so it goes.