Monday 26 May 2014

PETER CUSHING : A HAPPY 101ST BIRTHDAY TODAY! COME JOIN THE CELEBRATION!


WELCOME! Today we are marking the anniversary of PETER WILTON CUSHING birth! 101 years TODAY! And today we invite you to join us in what we hope will be a truly interactive experience. We can't celebrate without YOU! So, lots happening through out the day. A terrific THREE PART COMPETITION, with a fantastic bundle prize, for one lucky winner. We'll be asking you to take part in our PETER CUSHING BIRTHDAY FILM FEST, there's features, banners and images. It should all make for a great day, so make sure you drop in often. Drop In OR Miss Out! Happy Birthday Peter Cushing!


Thursday 22 May 2014

WE HAVE OUR WINNERS: ONE LAST TIME COMPETITION


Here Are our WINNERS! Congratulations!

The QUESTION in our Peter Cushing and Christopher Lee 'ONE LAST TIME' Competition was:

Peter Cushing and Christopher Lee shared a personal motto. Choose the correct ONE from choices below:

A) STEP ASIDE!
B) STEP DOWN!
C) STEP AROUND!
D) STEP UP!
E) BIG STEPS!
F) STEP OUT!

The ANSWER WAS: F STEP OUT!

All THREE WINNERS have won a RARE hi res 8 x 12 photograph of Peter Cushing and Christopher Lee as featured at the bottom of this post! WELL DONE! Thank you to all who took part and entered in the fun. More Competitions to come THIS WEEKEND in our Peter Cushing 101 Birthday Celebrations!

Tuesday 20 May 2014

NEWS: SNEAK PEEP OF 'ISLAND OF TERROR' BLU RAY PACK FROM ODEON ENTERTAINMENT : #petercushing


NEWS: Here's SNEAK PEEP of the #ODEONENTERTAINMENT blu ray pack for their release of 'ISLAND OF TERROR' starring #Petercushing, Edward Judd, Carole Gray, Eddie Byrne and Niall MacGinnis. Directed by Terence Fisher. Release is expected soon!

#PETERCUSHING AND CHRISTOPHER LEE SWEAT IT OUT! NIGHT OF THE BIG HEAT: BLU RAY NOW ON PRE ORDER



#ODEON ENTERTAINMENT'S '#NIGHT OF THE BIG HEAT' starring #PeterCushing, Christopher Lee is now available for PRE ORDER with a street release date of JUNE 23rd 2014.

Monday 19 May 2014

INGRID PITT AND THE THEATRE ROYAL CUSHING BUST : OCTOBER 1998


OCTOBER 1998: Ingrid Pitt Unveils Bust Of Peter Cushing 
At Chatham Theatre:

Ingrid said on her website at the time: 'One of the best `do's' I've been to recently was down in Chatham. A group of theatre lovers have got together to try and save The Theatre Royal. It was a project dear to the heart of Peter Cushing and it now looks as if, with the council backing it, there maybe a future for the derelict theatre. I was there to open an exhibition of Peter's water colours and unveil a bust of his head.'


She goes on to say, 'Sheila Gray, secretary of the restoration group, rang me a couple of days after my visit and told me that at last the local council have decided to help out with a welcome £50,000. Now I don't want to claim that my visit had anything to do with the councils belated magnanimity but..... whatever the reason, I was asked back in October and presented with a life-size head of Peter Cushing. Tit for tat! In Vampire Lovers he decapitated me - now I've got my own back. I wish Peter had been there to see it, it would have suited his sense of humour!'

Sunday 18 May 2014

YOU ARE CORDIALLY INVITED : PETER CUSHING 101 BIRTHDAY WEEKEND AT PCASUK


IT'S GOING TO BE FUN! LOOK FOR MORE DETAILS DURING THE WEEK! #PETERCUSHING101BIRTHDAY


'ONE LAST TIME' PETER CUSHING AND CHRISTOPHER LEE PHOTO COMPETITION


PCASUK 'ONE LAST TIME' COMPETITION: Following on from our 'ONE LAST TIME' feature yesterday, here's our second competition of the week!

Here's YOUR chance to be one of THREE lucky winners who could win themselves A HI RES COPY OF THE PHOTOGRAPH OF PETER CUSHING AND CHRISTOPHER LEE as seen above!. All you have to do is correctly answer the question below!

It's easy to enter our competitions and they are open to anyone, wherever in the world you may be! Answer the question correctly from the options below and EMAIL your answer to us at: theblackboxclub@gmail.com

COMPETITION QUESTION:

Peter Cushing and Christopher Lee shared a personal motto. Choose the correct ONE from choices below:

A) STEP ASIIDE!
B) STEP DOWN!
C) STEP AROUND!
D) STEP UP!
E) BIG STEPS!
F) STEP OUT!


PLEASE NOTE:
ANY ANSWERS POSTED ONTO THIS MAIN WALL / NEWS FEED / WILL BE DELETED AND NOT COUNTED AS AN ENTRY.


The competition closes THURSDAY 22ND MAY 7PM GMT. Winners names will be drawn and announced ONE HOUR LATER AT 8PM GMT AND POSTED HERE. GOOD LUCK EVERYONE!

Saturday 17 May 2014

'ONE LAST TIME' : TWENTY YEARS AGO TODAY: PETER CUSHING AND CHRISTOPHER LEE FOR THE VERY LAST TIME



May 17th  1994, is a date of singular importance for fans of Hammer Horror.  On that day, Christopher Lee and Peter Cushing reunited one last time to record the narration for Ted Newsom’s documentary on Hammer Films, titled Flesh and Blood: The Hammer Heritage of Horror. Newsom’s project was a true labor of love.  Working with a limited budget, he sought to get on-camera interviews with as many of the key surviving actors and production personnel as possible.  His ultimate coup was in securing the services of Lee and Cushing.  It would prove to be the first time that the two old friends had seen each other in a quite a few years, and it would prove to be their final meeting.



The event transpired at a small studio in Canterbury, Kent. The studio had been selected largely for the sake of convenience, as it was close to Cushing’s residence and the actor had also recorded some voice overs there in the past.  Once all the details had been ironed out and everything was in place the director found himself in the enviable position of helping to guide the two legends through the paces one last time.


Cushing was the first to arrive and he was eager to greet Lee upon the latter’s arrival.  Given that Lee hadn’t seen his old friend in so long, nothing could have prepared him for the shock.  Cushing had always been a thin man, but years of pining for his beloved Helen coupled with terminal cancer had reduced him to a literal shadow of his former self. According to Newsom, Lee was visibly taken aback for a brief instant, then rallied and set about keeping his old friend in stitches for the duration of the session. Ever the pro, Cushing was ready and eager to get back to work for the first time since recording his vocal track for the album “No White Peaks” in 1991. Cushing didn’t remain idle by choice: he yearned to work and constant reassurances of future projects from his doting secretary Joyce Broughton kept him hopeful of doing just that. But the reality was, he was simply too ill and too frail to secure the necessary insurance guarantees that would enable him to continue working.


Sooner than give in to despair, Cushing spent his time charming the residents of his beloved sea-side town of Whitstable, gave interviews about everything from his career to his strong religious convictions and enjoyed long-distance telephone calls with old pals like Lee and Vincent Price. The opportunity of going back to a sound stage, even if just for a bit of voice over work, must have seemed heaven sent. Cushing accepted readily and threw himself into the project with enthusiasm … however, if the spirit was willing, the flesh had grown weak. The morning kicked off around 9 AM with some time set aside for the press to come in and ask questions and take some pictures and video commemorating the event.  Lee and Cushing kept each other in stitches as they relived old memories and fielded questions from the reporters. Warned by Cushing’s secretary/care taker, Joyce Broughton, that Cushing's energy might start to fail if they didn’t get on with the show, Newsom started recording the narration around 11 in the morning; approximately two hours later, the track was finished and Cushing was ready for some much-needed rest. Before departing, however, the two men were given a chance to sit, laugh and relax as recordings of some of their favorite cartoons were provided on video tape; the spectacle of the imposing Lee and an ailing Cushing rollicking with laughter at the antics of Bugs Bunny and Sylvester the Cat would surely have been worthy of a film in itself, but this was private time for two old friends: no press were invited to partake in the ritual.


After that, the two men said their farewells and Cushing was taken back to his cottage in Whitstable. As Newsom tells it, Lee’s demeanor changed rapidly at that moment: shocked and deeply upset by his friend’s condition, he dropped the jokes and smiles once Cushing was out of sight and became comparatively curt and ill-tempered; the prospect of losing a friend so dear to him suddenly became a reality and his tendency to keep his feelings in check deserted him.  One of the things often trivialized in Lee’s character is the staunch loyalty and affection he has for his friends and loved ones; as Newsom would later theorize, he is not a man who handles the loss of loved ones at all well and as such, facing the reality of just such a happening served to rattle him badly.


The documentary endured a tortured “birthing process” and was ultimately rushed through post-production when Hammer’s then-managing director Roy Skeggs (who controlled the British rights in exchange for footing the bill for Cushing’s pay day) told the gob smacked director that it was going to air in the UK in early August.  Left with virtually no time (let alone money) to do the material justice, Newsom soldiered on and delivered on time.  The first segment aired on August 6th ,1994; shortly before Cushing was admitted into the Pilgrim's Hospice at Canterbury. After a fortnight in the hospice, and between the two instalments of 'Flesh and Blood', Peter Cushing died on August 11th at the age of 81.


Much has been written about the end result, some of it positive, a lot of it negative, but Newsom is to be congratulated for pulling off a minor miracle and getting these two screen icons together one last time.  The two men had very different careers and were in very different places by the time this final meeting took place: Cushing’s private life had disintegrated in 1971 when his wife died, but he took solace in keeping busy, accepting just about any offer he could fit into his calendar (resulting in quite a few films he really should have said “no” to doing), but ill health put him on the sidelines.


Lee, by contrast, had enjoyed a brief period of prosperity when he relocated to Hollywood, hoping to distance himself from being perceived as a horror film star, things did not go entirely as planned and he found himself appearing in films quite unworthy of his talents. He remained steadily employed, which was probably the thing that concerned him the most, but eventually he grew homesick and returned to England, grateful for the few good opportunities that came his way (notably hosting an episode of Saturday Night Live) and prepared to do what he needed to do to continue his career into his old age. In 1994, he would appear in several films, ranging from the sublime (A Feast at Midnight) to the ridiculous (Police Academy: Mission to Moscow), but things would gradually improve over the next few years.


At the time of the recording, Lee was just shy of 72, while Cushing was close to turning 81 (as fans will of course realize, they almost shared a birthday: Cushing’s being May 26th and Lee’s May 27th ; to look at the two of them, one would have thought there was a greater gap in age than that. Lee survived a heart condition that nearly killed him in the early 80s and was a vigorous, still commanding presence; Cushing’s condition had deteriorated to the point that he was almost unrecognizable.


At the time of writing, Lee is now just shy of his 92nd  birthday and while he would age gracefully into his mid-80s, the cruelty of time coupled with a back injury sustained on the set of the Hammer production The Resident (2011) have slowed him down and he finally looks his age, if not older. As we reflect on this 20th anniversary of their last meeting, let us remember that Cushing’s death left a void which can never be replaced for fans of the classic horror film; with that in mind, let us cherish Lee for as long as he is with us, for we will likely never see this breed of actor again, especially in the ghettoized confines of the horror genre. But sooner than end things on a gloomy, despairing note, take solace in this: so long as there are fans out there who continue to enjoy watching their performances, Peter Cushing and Christopher Lee will never die.


'ONE LAST TIME' The 20th Anniversary Feature was written by Troy Howarth
Graphics and Image Gallery: Marcus Brooks
Our deepest thanks to Stuart Hughes and Linda King.
With Very Special Thanks to Steve Reed
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