B.o.Y.: The Women of Beyond the Valley of the Dolls, Part XXI – Dolly Read

"Using unknowns you avoid highly exaggerated salaries and prima donnas."
Russ Meyer

To repeat ourselves yet again : Beyond the Valley of the Dolls, Russ Meyer's baroque 1967 camp masterpiece, one of only two movies he ever made for a major Hollywood studio (in this case, Fox), is without a doubt one of the Babest movies ever made. While we have yet to review it here at a wasted life (if we did, we would foam at the mouth in raging rave), we have looked at it before: back in 2011, in our R.I.P. Career Review of Charles Napier (12 Apr 1936 – 5 Oct 2011), and again in 2013 in our R.I.P. Career Review for the Great Haji (24 Jan 1946 – 10 Aug 2013) — both appear in the film — not to mention in almost every Babe of Yesteryear blog entry the past 1.5+ years.

"This is not a sequel. There has never been anything like it!"
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In Haji's entry, we wrote, among other things, the following: "Originally intended as a sequel to the 1967 movie version of Jacqueline Susann's novel Valley of the Dolls (trailer), Meyer and co-screenwriter Roger Ebert instead made a Pop Art exploitation satire of the conventions of the modern Hollywood melodrama, written in sarcasm but played straight, complete with a 'moralistic' ending that owes its inspiration to the Manson-inspired murder of Sharon Tate and her guests on August 9, 1969. Aside from the movie's absolutely insane plot, the cinematography is also noteworthy — as are the figures of the pneumatic babes that populate the entire movie. For legal reasons, the film starts with the following disclaimer: 'The film you are about to see in not a sequel to Valley of the Dolls. It is wholly original and bears no relationship to real persons, living or dead. It does, like Valley of the Dolls, deal with the oft-times nightmare world of show business but in a different time and context.' [...]"

"Any movie that Jacqueline Susann thinks would damage her reputation as a writer cannot be all bad."
Vincent Canby

Russ Meyer films are always populated by amazing breasts sights, but Beyond the Valley of the Dolls literally overflows its cups in an excess of pulchritude that (even if somewhat more demurely covered than in most of his films) lights the fires of any person attracted to women of the curvaceous kind that preceded today's sculptured plasticity. The film is simply Babe Galore.
And so we continue our look at the flesh film careers of the breasts women of the Babest Film of All Times, Beyond the Valley of the Dolls. The size of the women's breasts roles is of lesser importance than the simple fact that they are known to be in it somewhere, and so far we have looked at the cleavage known unknowns and mildly knowns in the background and the headlining semi-knowns in the front for too many monthly blog entries — with more breasts babes to come. Our entries focus, if in a meandering manner, on their nipples careers in film... and, with this set entry, we have but two more Babes to go before we're finished drooling with the project.*
* One set of love pillows Babe we don't look at is she who is an American National Treasure: the Great Pam Grier. Though she had her film debut in Beyond the Valley of the Dolls unseen somewhere in the background of the opening party scene and therefore should be included, we feel that a Wonderment of her caliber deserves an entry all of her own — a Sisyphean task we might one day undertake.

So far, we have looked at the T&A careers of the following women of Beyond the Valley of the Dolls:
Part I: The Non-babe of Note — Princess Livingston
Part II: Background Babe — Jacqulin Cole
Part III: Background Babe — Bebe Louie
Part IV: Background Babe — Trina Parks
Part V: Background Babe — Lavelle Roby, Pt. I (1968-76)
Part VI: Background Babe — Lavelle Roby. Pt. II (1979-2021)
Part VII: Killer Babe — Samantha Scott
Part VIII: Background Babe — Karen Smith
Part IX: Background Babes — The Five Mysterians
Part X: Background Babe — Gina Dair
Part XI: Background Babe — Cissi Colpitts, Pt. I (1970-80)
Part XII: Background Babe — Cissi Colpitts, Pt. II (1981-88)
Part XIII: BVD — Phyllis Davis, Pt. I (1966-73)
Part XIV: BVD — Phyllis Davis, Pt. II (1975-2013)
Part XV: Background Babe — Veronica Ericson
Part XVI: BVD — Edy Williams, Pt. I (1963-67)
Part XVII: BVD — Edy Williams, Pt. II (1968-82)
Part XVIII: BVD — Edy Williams, Pt. III (1983-90)
Part XIX: BVD — Erica Gavin, Pt. I (1965-71)
Part XX: BVD — Erica Gavin, Pt. II (1973-2020)

And now it is time to look at the three main Babes of Beyond the Valley of the Dolls, the members of the music band around which the entire movie revolves, The Carrie Nations (formerly: The Kelly Affair).

The Carrie Nations. Left to right: Petronella Danforth (Marcia McBroom), Kelly MacNamara (Dolly Read), and Casey Anderson (Cynthia Myers).

The Carrie Nations do

Sweet Talking Candyman:

As indicated by the first three names listed on the poster, somewhat further above, of Beyond the Valley of the Dolls, the three women of the band are the true lead characters of the movie. (In truth, however, the movie has so many characters it could arguable be called an ensemble movie.) Beyond the Valley of the Dolls was, for all three women, the first (and last, actually) film in which any of the three women were ever to play a lead role.

Margaret "Dolly" Read, who plays the band's lead singer Kelly MacNamara, was born on 13 September 1944 in Bristol, Gloucestershire, England (UK). Most online sources claim Dolly is her given name, but seeing that she was original credited onscreen in both her initial bit parts on British television and her first movie credit as Margaret Read, we would hazard to guess that as her birth name. As of May 1966, however, when she became Playboy's first British Playmate of the Month ever,* she became known as Dolly Read.
* The first British Playmate of the Month — indeed, the first Playmate ever — to be fully (and frontally) nude, however, was the apparent bibliophile and truly statuesque Marilyn Cole of the January 1972 issue; she went on to become the first British Playmate of the Year.

Interestingly enough, though it is easy to find Dolly Read Martin's current address online, it is difficult to find much of anything reliable about her background or early life. According to the Thought Experiment, which took its info from unreliable sources, the "former Miss Bristol Teenager" attended the Eleine Hartley-Hodder School of Drama as a child. After a variety of uncredited roles, she became one of six British Playboy Bunnies (below, chosen from a "nationwide British Bunny Contest sponsored by Radio London") to go to Chicago — the other five being the forgotten/unknown Doreen Allen, Kathleen Bascombe, Joan Findlay, Catherine MacDonald and Maggie Adam.

While in training at the Bunny School in Chicago, she was spotted by the staff photographer Pompeo Posar, who asked her to model for the magazine. Moving to La La Land, she initially had little success in show biz, and by the time the casting for BVD came around, she was "living on beans" [Daily Mail]. BVD was a hit, and perhaps she could have parlayed the success  of the movie into an acting career, but then she met her future husband Dick Martin (30 Jan 1922 – 24 May 2008), the co-host of the classic sketch comedy show, Rowan & Martin's Laugh-In (1968 to 1973), whom she married for the first time a year after the release of BVD. He preferred not to have an actress wife so, but for occasional appearances on TV series and game shows, she gave up her career for love. ("I was so in love with Dick Martin [...] and he didn't want to be married to an actress, and when I didn't go in for an audition that my agent wanted to send me out on, my agent then dropped me as a client. So I chose a romance over a career." [Greasy Kid Stuff]) They were married 22 Aug 1971 to 1975), and again from 11 May 1978 until his death on 24 May 2008 (but even when divorced they seem to have remained a couple).

 

The Kiss of the Vampire

(1963, dir. Don Sharp)

In what appears to be her second known credit — the first being background decoration the previous year in an episode of the British series Maigret, a series that ran for 52 episodes from 1959-63 — Dolly Read (still Margaret Read at the time) appears, uncredited, as the "First Disciple" in this Hammer movie.

In an interview with the Daily Mail in 2018, Dolly mentions "Dick [Martin] and I were watching it one night. It was very interesting, it was very good. Then I said: 'That's my voice!' I had hair like Princess Leia." So, she seems to have a line or two in the movie, whence the photo above (of Dolly without Princess Leia hair) is claimed by some as a publicity photo.

We looked at The Kiss of the Vampire, briefly back in 2011, in our R.I.P. Don Sharp blog entry, where we made no note of Dolly and wrote:
"In need of a director who could handle low budgets well, Hammer pulled in Don Sharp to do this film, which was originally intended to be the third installment of their Dracula franchise as well as the second not to feature Dracula himself (like the film that it follows, The Brides of Dracula [1960 / trailer]); it ended up being a stand-alone vampire film. (The ending of the film was even supposedly originally intended for The Brides of Dracula and was scrapped due to Peter Cushing's objections; it does, however, appear in the paperback novelization of The Brides of Dracula.) In the US, the film was cut and then re-titled Kiss of Evil for TV, resulting in a much less bloody movie that often doesn't make sense and is totally anti-woman-empowerment.

Music from the movie —

James Bernard's Vampire Rhapsody:

The plot: Gerald (Edward de Souza) and Marianne Harcourt (Jennifer Daniel) are a honeymooning couple in driving through 20th-century Bavaria when their car breaks down. They become caught up in a cult led by the vampire Dr. Ravna (Noel Willman [4 Aug 1919 – 24 Dec 1988]) and his two blood-sucking children Carl (Barry Warren [12 July 1933 – 22 Feb 1994]) and Sabena (Jacquie Wallis). Dr. Ravna has the hots for Marianne and wants her for his own..."

 

Trailer to

Kiss of the Vampire:

Spoiler: Female disciple Dolly, like uncredited female disciple Marie Laye, uncredited female disciple Elizabeth Valentine and uncredited female disciple Jackie White, dies by the end of the movie. Unlike Ms. Marie & Ms. Elizabeth & Ms. Jackie, Ms. Dolly had an acting career of sorts — though Ms. Jackie did have a speaking part two years later in the Val Guest trifle Contest Girl a.k.a. The Beauty Jungle (1964 / trailer below), a film that surely would have been better had Russ Meyer directed it.

Val Guest's

The Beauty Jungle:

As for the main actors of The Kiss of the Vampire, the year prior, Edward de Souza was in Hammer's Phantom of the Opera (1962 / trailer), with Herbert Lom as the Phantom and Michael Gough as Lord D'Arcy. Jennifer Daniel (23 May 1936 – 16 Aug 2017) played the lead cleavage three years later in Hammer's typically beautiful but atypically dull horror The Reptile (1966 / trailer); her last film role was supposedly as a zombie (or "snapper") in the decidedly low-rent Christmas with the Dead (2012 / trailer). Barry Warren's last appearance in a feature film is in Hammer's Frankenstein Created Woman (1967 / trailer) and, according to Sarah Miles (of The Sailor Who Fell from the Grace of the Sea [1976 / trailer]), Barry Warren later realized himself/herself as a woman, spending the last five years of her life as a [post-op] female, Claire Warren. A "fact" we here at a wasted life have been unable to confirm 100%, per say, though we did locate a deceased Claire Warren with the same birth and death dates (12 July 1933 – 22 Feb 1994).

The colorful German poster to The Kiss of the Vampire was painted by Klaus Dill (6 Oct 1922 – 19 Feb 2000), a graphic artist and illustrator known above all for his western art. The nephew of the German Impressionist Otto Dill, Klaus entered art school in 1939 only to be drafted in 1940; from 1943 to 1947 he was a prisoner of war. Returning to post-war Germany, he resumed his studies (1949-52) and subsequently became a successful book and comic illustrator and film poster artist, doing some 627 film posters by 1987. He died of a brain tumor on 19 Feb 2000. Among his many posters, that of Roman Polanski's Fearless Vampire Killers (1967 / trailer & poster below)...

Trailer to Polanski's

Fearless Vampire Killers:

"A Hammer Films vampire tale! No, not a Christopher Lee one. No Dracula and no Van Helsing in this one. Steaks [sic] through the heart? Not here. 1963's The Kiss of the Vampire is just a little different than most Hammer vampire films. Don't panic. We still have a ravishing damsel in much distress and a very charming and exotic vampire in an old castle. In fact, we have lots of handsome vampires and their very stunning vampire brides. Oh yes...bats! Oh, you'll love the bat carnage in this one. [Zisi Emporium]"

"[The Kiss of the Vampire] treats vampirism as something enticing and tempting, but dangerous and evil. There is a not so subtle allusion to drug use in the film. However, this story is really a symbol for anything that is damaging but irresistible for those who are in its power. Any sin that society tries to rationalize is fair game really. [...] The story really takes its time and explores these ideas from many angles and from the many different perspectives. The temptation of evil, the protection one tries to provide one's loved ones against it, the fear it inspires in the powerless, the rationalization of those engaging in it and the grief of those impacted by it. Not everything here is commendable or makes entire sense. The climax of the film opens a whole other can of worms. For those who enjoy an older, more studied and paced approach to horror as a morality play, this is a great experience. The cinematography and art direction are great and the music is superb. [Nonmodern]"

When released in Great Britain, The Kiss of the Vampire hit the cinemas as part of a double feature with Freddy Francis' Paranoiac (1963), which was co-scripted by Jimmy Sangster.

Trailer to

Paranoiac:

Casino Royale

(1967, dir. Ken Hughes, Joseph McGrath, John Huston, Robert Parrish, Val Guest, & Richard Talmadge)

 

Not to mistaken with the good version of the story, Casino Royale (2006 / trailer), or for the earlier TV version that made Bond an American, Casino Royale (1954 / trailer), though all three are indeed based on Ian Fleming's original novel, Casino Royale (1953), however faintly. The artwork usually used for the posters, one version below, was supplied by the great poster artist Robert E. McGinnis, who did most Bond film posters all the way up into the 70s.

Opening credits to

Casino Royale (1967):

No, this is the legendary fiasco (but box office smash) from 1967, and it is a movie that has yet to turn up on any of Dolly Read's online filmographies. Over at Pipe Dreams & PJs, however, they write, "According to The Playmate Book: Five Decades of Centerfolds, [...] following her Playmate of the Month pictorial, Dolly had an uncredited bit part in the movie Casino Royale in 1967 [...]." Something we confirmed via the Dolly Read entry (p. 116) in our own copy of The Playmate Book: Five Decades of Centerfolds; likewise, as you can see below, the February 1967 Playboy pictorial The Girls of Casino Royale features her, discreetly nude, in a scene that was either cut or plays for a nanosecond at best and definitely did not include any dialogue. (The other possibility, of course, is that Playboy just staged the shot for the pictorial and then lied about her participation — wouldn't have been the first time, and as far as we could tell, Dolly has never "officially" spoken of the Casino Royal film shoot.)

 

"[Ian] Fleming was able to sell the rights to Casino Royale [the debut novel of James Bond] to film producer Gregory Ratoff in 1955, leading to a series of issues when the screen rights to the other Bond novels were bought by United Artists in 1961. Because of this, despite having been the first ever James Bond book — and excluding the distinctly off-brand Peter Sellers Bond satire with the same title, from 1967 — Casino Royale was in fact the last title from the 14 Fleming novels to be turned into an official James Bond film. [Telegraph]"

Trailer to

Casino Royale:

"The distinctly off-brand Peter Sellers Bond satire" is one of the great clusterfucks of out-of-control cinema, hated and reviled by the critics, and a huge financial success that word of mouth couldn't kill, although arguably it should have. At least five directors worked on it at one point or another, and easily twice as many people "contributed", in one way or another — e.g., by simply rewriting or improvising their lines — to the all-over-the-place script. The official directors, credited or not, are: John Huston (5 Aug 1906 – 28 Aug 1987), the director of Beat the Devil (1953); Ken Hughes (19 Jan 1922 – 28 April 2001), of The Atomic Man (1955 / trailer) and Night School (1981 / trailer); Val Guest (11 Dec 1911 – 10 May 2006) of The Quatermass Xperiment (1955 / trailer) and Quatermass 2 (1957 / trailer); Richard Talmadge (3 Dec 1892 – 25 Jan 1981) of Project Moon Base (1953 / trailer); Robert Parrish (4 Jan 1916 – 4 Dec 1995) of Journey to the Far Side of the Sun (1969 / trailer) and The Destructors (1974 / trailer); and Joseph McGrath of The Magic Christian (1969 / trailer below).*

* Anyone who has seen the unfunny, all-hell-cuts-loose final scenes of both Casino Royale and the oddly backward, star-studded "satire" The Magic Christian can only assume that McGrath was guilty of both, as they are virtually the same. ("The trouble with this one [The Magic Christian] is that it is obvious and mean-spirited and is neither insightful nor amusing.")

Trailer to

The Magic Christian (1969):

A coherent, if long, version of the plot of Casino Royale, as found at the AFI Catalog: "The original James Bond/007 (David Niven) retired following his star-crossed love affair with Mata Hari and watched with disdain as his gimmick-laden imitators sullied his name. But as the international crime organization known as SMERSH threatens world domination, he agrees to come out of retirement. After his longtime superior McTarry (John Huston as 'M') is killed, Bond goes to Scotland to console McTarry's widow, Lady Fiona (Deborah Kerr [30 Sept 1921 – 16 Oct 2007] of The Innocents [1961 / trailer]), unaware that the woman he encounters is actually a SMERSH agent. Bond's charms are such, however, that Lady Fiona gives up her life of espionage and retires to a convent when Bond declines her offer of love. To outwit his enemy, Bond decides there should be more than one 007 agent. He enlists the services of Vesper Lynd (Ursula Andress of The Mountain of the Cannibal God [1979]) as Vesper Lynd), the world's richest and most seductive spy; Evelyn Tremble (Peter Sellers), the inventor of a foolproof gambling system; Cooper (Terence Cooper [5 Jul 1933 – 16 Sept 1997]), a strong-arm agent trained to resist women; and Bond's own daughter, Mata Bond (Joanna Pettet of The Evil [1978 / trailer]). While Mata is outwitting SMERSH in Berlin, Bond sends Tremble and Vesper to the famed Casino Royale, and there SMERSH agent Le Chiffre (Orson Welles [6 May 1915 – 10 Oct 1985] of Necromancy [1972]) is attempting to replenish his organization's finances by playing baccarat. Although Tremble defeats Le Chiffre at the gaming tables, Vesper is kidnapped as they leave. In pursuit, Tremble is captured, tortured, and eventually shot. Mata is also abducted and carried off in a flying saucer. SMERSH begins to get the upper hand, and Bond swings into action. Upon learning that the casino is merely a front and that SMERSH is headed by his own fiendish nephew, Jimmy Bond (Woody Allen), Sir James utilizes the charms of The Detainer, another 007 (Daliah Lavi [12 Oct 1942 – 3 May 2017] of And Then There Were None [1965]), to induce Jimmy to swallow an explosive capsule. Bond then calls for his allies — the French Foreign Legion, tribes of American Indians, the U. S. Cavalry, United Nations paratroopers, and the Keystone Cops — to invade the casino. During the ensuing melee, [...] Jimmy's internal bomb goes off and the casino and its occupants are blown up."

From Casino Royale — The Look of Love,

sung by Dusty Springfield:

Up until No Time to Die (2021 / trailer), this version of Casino Royale was the only 'Bond movie' in which James Bond dies — all hundreds of them. Other Babes of Yesteryear seen and unseen among the [wasted] cast of thousands: Alexandra Bastedo as Meg, Barbara Bouchet as Moneypenny, Tracy Reed (21 Sept 1941 – 2 May 2012) of Devils of Darkness (1965 / trailer) and Percy (1971 / scene), Jacqueline Bissett of The Mephisto Waltz (1971 / trailer) and more, and both Fiona Lewis and Caroline Munro in nano-second parts...

Oh, yeah: "This is Anjelica Huston's first film role, as she was Deborah Kerr's hands. It's also the first movie for David Prowse (1 Jul 1935 – 28 Nov 2020) as Frankenstein's Monster, a role he would play in The Horror of Frankenstein (1970 / trailer) and Frankenstein and the Monster from Hell (1974 / trailer). He would go on to play, of course, Darth Vader. [B&S about Movies]" Prowse is also found in Vampire Circus (1972) and Russ Meyer's Black Snake (1973 / trailer below).

Trailer to

Russ Meyer's Black Snake (aka Sweet Suzy):

"Patently there's no point of making any comparison between this film and the 1954 Ian Fleming book; Feldman and his people were unable to use anything more than the title and a few incidental names (Orson Welles plays a barely relevant version of LeChiffre, the Soviet paymaster from the book). But it's impossible to imagine agent-turned-producer Feldman making a straight adaptation anyway: his Casino derives entirely from the Bond of the movies, with the cruel licentiousness of cinema-Bond viewed through the lens of a polymorphous Playboy perversity. [N!U!M!]

Herb Alpert & the Tijuana Brass —

theme to Casino Royale:

Okay, to give credit where credit is due: much of Casino Royale — the set design and the women, for example — is truly amazing to look at, and in the right frame of mind (and if you don't care if anything makes sense or not) the movie is enjoyable enough, particularly on a big screen.

With that in mind, let's look at what the Worldwide Celluloid Massacre, which, in its "Counter Culture" rubric, rates the movie as "Of Some Interest", has to say: "An insane spoof on James Bond [...]. David Niven acts as the original and stuttering James Bond, but everyone gets a turn at being James Bond here [...]. He is brought out of retirement to stop the killings of spies by SHMERSH. Everything James Bond is spoofed, including dozens of seductive girls appearing everywhere, some used for spy hardening and training, a cannonball fight with big bad guys that topple under their own weight, Orson Welles tortures Bond with psychedelic hallucinations, a secret evil location has magnificently useless Caligari or psychedelic sets, a game of baccarat becomes a magic show, Mata Hari and Bond's daughter appears in a grand exotic dance, dangerous gadgets misbehave, a UFO appears, and the insane climax features Woody Allen swallowing an atomic bomb while cowboys, Indians and seals participate in a bar brawl. Non-stop colorful madness, but also extremely silly and chaotic."

Closing credits of

Casino Royale (1967):

Tonite Let's All Make Love in London

(1967, dir. Peter Whitehead)

The attention of this documentary is on the London in-scene, and for the most part those who speak, the hipsters of the Blow Up (1966 / trailer) generation, sound self-important and inflated and oddly vapid. Dolly Read doesn't speak, but is seen in her full Bunny outfit exiting an airplane towards the end of the clip below. For a better gander of her in her in her outfit, drool further below...

Dolly not nude descending a staircase:

The film is divided into seven "Movements" followed by a "Happy End". The segments are called (1) Loss of Empire, (2) Dolly Girls, (3) Protest, (4) It's All Pop Music, (5) Movie Stars, (6) Painting Pop and (7) As Scene From the U.S.A.; the title comes from a poem by Allen Ginsberg.

"Tonite Let's All Make Love in London, features music from The Rolling Stones, Pink Floyd, The Animals and Vanessa Redgrave. Flashy and sometimes quite funny, it stitches together interviews with Michael Caine, Julie Christie, Lee Marvin, Mick Jagger and others who talk about music, sex, posing and freedom. Man of the match, however, is David Hockney, who models absurd pop art shades and when asked what he finds sexy, replies, 'The new four-penny stamp, the one with the footballer.' An interesting and amusing documentary that captures the icons of the time in candid interviews and performances from the biggest bands around. [Empire]"

Pink Floyd's soundtrack to

Tonite Let's All Make Love in London:

"Whitehead has an eye for the arresting image and a talent for sly juxtapositions in the editing suite; in the section on 'dolly girls' we see a pair of nuns touring the fashion boutiques, and he plays the Stones' fragile, chivalric ballad Lady Jane over footage of alarmingly aggressive female stage invaders at a near riotous 1966 concert. It's interesting that here, at the height of it all, most of his interviewees are sceptical about London's elevation to the kingdom of kool. [...] Money turns up over and over again, as freedom, as the reason people have the time to attend Vietnam protests. There is much here to confirm the suspicion that swinging London actually swung for very few, and that, as ever, it helped to be rich. [Electric Sheep]" 

Back when London was swinging, Peter Whitehead filmed numerous music promos, the forerunner of today's music videos. Like the one below of The Rolling Stones...

The Rolling Stones —

Let's Spend the Night Together:

"Taking its title from Ginsberg, Tonite Let's All Make Love in London pushed vérité into new shapes. Shot on the streets and in the clubs, the film makes extensive use of freeze-frames and other editing devices that bring to mind the spacey production techniques of psychedelic pop. A documentary on a semi-imaginary phenomenon, Tonite is torn between Whitehead's need to celebrate the extraordinary cultural explosion going on around him and his desire to unravel the media mythologizing — a task made complex by the heterogeneity of what had been lumped together (in what he now regards as the work of CIA black ops!) as 'Swinging London' in Time's spring 1966 cover story. [Film Comment]"

NAMBLA member Allen Ginsberg reading

Tonight Let's All Make Love in London:

 

That Tender Touch

(1969, writ. & dir. Russel Vincent)

"I want you, Marsha. But it's wrong!"

Terry Manning (Sue Bernard)

 

 

Not to be confused with The Tender Trap (1959 / trailer), "This rediscovered camp gem is a classic example of the lesbian exploitation genre, or what we like to call Dykesploitation! [...] Like most LGBT-themed films of the era, That Tender Touch does not have a happy ending. Nevertheless, its entertainment value is tremendous while it also gives contemporary lesbian audiences a Stonewall-era lesbian snapshot. That Tender Touch has entertained audiences at LGBT film festivals around the globe since being unearthed by queer film historian Jenni Olson. [Wolfe On Demand]"

Released in November 1969. A lesbian drama, written and directed by a heterosexual man, Russel Vincent and, apparently, with a cis-gender cast. Russel Vincent, supposedly the brother of exploitation actor Steve Vincent (but not of the porn actor Steve Vincent), returned two years later with the now lost sexploiter How's Your Love Life (1971) — newspaper advert below, but go here to Temple of Schlock for a full plot description — before disappearing.

Brother Steve Vincent stuck around a few years longer, disappearing after appearing (credited as "Adam Lawrence") in Stu Segal's Drive-in Massacre (1976 / trailer).

According to the copyright, That Tender Trap is based on an "original story" by the movie's cinematographer Robert Caramico (10 Dec 1932 – 18 Oct 1997), one of the former husbands of the legendary Pat Barrington (Rialto Report podcast). Other cinematography jobs of his include, for example, The Happy Hooker Goes to Washington (1977, with Edy Williams and Marilyn Joi), The Black Klansman (1966), The Initiation (1968, supposedly with Erica Gavin), Tobe Hooper's Eaten Alive (1976), and Slumber Party '57 (1976), Mean Johnny Barrows (1975) and Boss Nigger (1974), all three with R.G. Armstrong), and more.

Scene with

Sue Bernard & Bee Tompkins:

The plot, at the AFI Catalog: "Terry (Sue Bernard), a young orphan, is befriended by Marsha Prentis (Bee Tompkins of Panic in the City [1968 / trailer]), an older woman. Traumatized by a rape attempt on her, Terry is drawn into a lesbian relationship with Marsha that continues until Ken Manning (Rick Cooper), unaware of her affair with Marsha, convinces Terry that all men are not like the one who attacked her. Terry and Ken marry, but the young bride cannot bring herself to tell him about Marsha. The two women meet again at a party, and Marsha desperately tries to win back her young lover. Dodie, the maid (Read); Jane, a neighbor (Victoria Hale of One Down, Two to Go [1982, with Jim Kelly]); and a teenager, Wendy Barrett (Phae Dera), all attempt to divert Marsha's attention, but she remains interested only in Terry, who refuses her advances. Desperate at the thought of losing the girl forever, Marsha drowns herself in the pool."

"If Douglas Sirk ever decided to make a torrid soap opera about forbidden Sapphic love, it probably still wouldn't have been as over-the-top and sudsy as Russel Vincent's That Tender Touch. [...] Heavy with romantic flashbacks and heartfelt monologues, That Tender Touch is a healthy combination of exploitation sensibilities and daytime soap sentiments. In other words, plenty of nudity appears throughout an over-the-top romance gone awry storyline. It's certainly one of the most lushly photographed exploitation films of the era, with smooth, fluid cinematography by Robert Caramico [...]. According to [director] Vincent, lesbians are playful, asexual creatures with big hair and lots of lipstick who are either easily swayed into switching teams or psychotically obsessed with controlling other women. Indeed, perhaps the most puzzling aspect of the script is: why is Marsha so obsessed with Terry? Other than being kinda cute, she is a complete dimbulb and far too perky to be endearing. And to make matters even campier, it appears that Terry's next-door neighbors, Irene and her daughter Wendy, are also lesbians, making the move on Marsha whenever they get her alone! While it's interesting that the film is rather progressive in focusing on a lesbian relationship, it's also very archaic in its portrayal of a lesbian being predatory and pathetic. Additionally, the script insinuates that Marsha was once 'normal', having been married previously, and turned to 'the dark side', and that lesbianism can be solved by simply 'finding the right man', an ancient hetero belief. Naturally, as in all old Hollywood films, any character with 'unnatural' homosexual tendencies must perish by film's end. [DVD Drive-in]"

Dolly Read, credited as Margaret Read, shows up to play a maid (that's her above) in her American feature-length film debut. As she told The Daily Mail, "The only scene I remember myself in was the shower scene. I was having a good time, but I don't remember there being any lesbian scenes in it. It was one of those things you do when you are young which comes back to bite you on the bum."

Fellow Playboy Playmate (of the same year as Dolly!) Sue Bernard, Miss December 1966 (centerfold above), plays the indecisive Terry Manning; she made her feature-film debut some four years earlier in the Russ Meyer classic Faster Pussycat, Kill! Kill! (1965 / with Haji and Tura Satana) and showed up some years later in Bert I. Gordon's Necromancy (1972). Rick Cooper is also found in the extremely cheesy horror film, The Undertaker and His Pals (1966 / trailer below).

Trailer to

The Undertaker and His Pals (1966):

"That Tender Touch is not perfect, but it's better than I expected and far better than it needed to be. This is still technically an exploitation film. As such there's really no motivation for writer/director Russel Vincent to make this good. I expected gratuitous nudity and sex, wooden characters and constant homophobia. Vincent defied all of my expectations and turned out a pretty solid movie. Yes, it does adhere to some of the homophobia of the time period and some of the conventions of exploitation film. But in a lot of ways, this movie more forward-thinking than lots of WLW films released in the following two decades. That Tender Touch is a surprisingly nuanced film for the time. Over 50 years later, it's still worth a watch. [WLW Film Reviews]"

"Only interesting to see how a lesbian relationship was perceived in the 60s... It looks, feels and sounds like a sleazy porn movie — minus the porn. All the actors demonstrate the same amount of talent as porn stars do...none. A curiosity — only for the curious. [CGiii]"

"That Tender Touch relates the 'sad' story of lesbian lovers Marsha and Teri. Marsha's life revolves around Teri and she is devastated when Teri runs off and marries Ken. She shows up on their doorstop and becomes their house guest. An oblivious Teri prances around in provocative clothing as Marsha begs, pleads and grovels to win back her affection. Wait for the scene where Marsha chases a giggling Teri around the house and wrestles her to the floor. The ghost of The Children's Hour (1961 / trailer below) haunts the melodramatic finale. [CinemaQueer]"

 

Trailer to

The Children's Hour:

 

Beyond the Valley of the Dolls

(1970, dir. Russ Meyer)

The plot, as found at AFI: "Tired of playing to high school audiences, Kelly (Dolly Read), Casey (Cynthia Myers), and Pet (Marcia McBroom), members of a rock trio, travel to Hollywood, California, accompanied by Harris Allsworth (David Gurian), the band's manager and Kelly's lover. There, they are befriended by Kelly's Aunt Susan (Phyllis Davis), an advertising executive, who, despite the misgivings of her lawyer, Porter Hall (Duncan McLeod), decides to share with Kelly the family fortune. At an orgy the band is discovered by the effeminate entrepreneur host, Ronnie 'Z-Man' Barzell (John La Zar), who rechristens them 'The Carrie Nations.' Among lovers quickly acquired at Ronnie's party are Lance (Michael Blodgett), a boorish gigolo, who enters into a liaison with Kelly; Emerson (Harrison Page of Carnosaur [1993]), a law student who wins Pet's love; and Roxanne (Erica Gavin), a lesbian designer who captures Casey's heart. As the celebrated trio perform on national television, Harris, distraught by Kelly's infidelity and Casey's impregnation by him, hurls himself from the catwalk. He is rushed to the hospital, where Dr. Scholl (Dan White) informs Kelly that Harris can look forward to life as a paraplegic. Realizing that Harris is her true love, Kelly devotes herself to his care. Touched by Casey's plight, Roxanne arranges an abortion. Ronnie invites Lance, Roxanne, and Casey to a private party, at which costumes are distributed. Dressed as Superwoman, Ronnie attempts to seduce Lance, who is attired in a loin cloth. Rejected, Ronnie binds the gigolo. After revealing that he is, in fact, a woman, Ronnie bears her breasts, brandishes a sword, and chops off Lance's head. She then plunges a gun into the sleeping Roxanne's mouth and fires. Terrified, Casey phones her friends, who rush to her rescue but arrive too late. As Emerson and Kelly attempt to subdue Ronnie, the gun discharges, killing the transvestite. During the fray, however, the crippled Harris is miraculously cured. In a triple wedding ceremony, Kelly and Harris, Pet and Emerson, and Aunt Susan and an old love are united."

Trailer to

Beyond the Valley of the Dolls:

Over at Greasy Kid Stuff, Dolly asks, "Did you know that in the big party scene in Beyond the Valley of the Dolls, I wore Sharon Tate's dress from Valley of the Dolls? I know it's weird, but I was thrilled that it fit." She also mentions that actually auditioned for the role of Casey Anderson, which ended up going to Cynthia Meyers: "Cynthia originally auditioned for the role I got so they just switched us into our parts." (Smart move, on part of the casting: Dolly would have been much too perky, and Cynthia was definitely better at exuding loss and unhappiness than Dolly.) Over at the Daily Mail, she also says, "I don't think I would have liked that [role] very much, I'm not really into kissing girls."

And then Greasy Kid Stuff asked why her acting career went nowhere after BVD, and Dolly reveals: "By that point I was so in love with Dick Martin (co-host of hit TV comedy show Laugh-In [1968-73]) and he didn't want to be married to an actress, and when I didn't go in for an audition that my agent wanted to send me out on, my agent then dropped me as a client. So I chose a romance over a career."

A shame, one could say, were it not that Dolly seems to have had a very happy life but for not having kids, and if the goal in life is to be happy, then she has had a successful life. Trivia: In BVD, Dolly (or rather, "Kelly") has a fling with Michael Blodgett (or rather, "Lance") — image above. In real life, Michael hooked up with "Casey" (or rather, Cynthia Myers), whom he subsequently convinced (in real life) not to pursue an acting career. Really: men and their fragile egos...

The Kelly Affair (soon to be Carrie Nations) sing

Find It:

Long ago, Time Magazine voted The Carrie Nations seventh on their list of "Top Ten Fake Bands", writing: "Don't you hate it when earnest rock 'n' roll band members are torn apart by money-grubbing suits in the entertainment industry and are then brutally murdered by a drugged-out record producer? Well then, be glad you're not in the all-girl rock trio The Kelly Affair [...]. After being forced to change their name to The Carrie Nations, the band endures a run of drugs, lesbians and hard luck — such as when their former manager [Harris Allsworth*] attempts suicide in the middle of one performance. Sometimes backed by real band Strawberry Alarm Clock, the film's 1960s-era psychedelic pop-rock isn't all that bad. Maybe that's why the punk band Be Your Own Pet wrote a song about them and indie girl group The Pipettes copied one of their performances nearly shot-for-shot in their 2006 video for Pull Shapes."

* Played by David Gurian, whose only other known acting role is in the decidedly obscure anti-drug movie, A Crutch for All Seasons (1970).

A Crutch for All Seasons:

Vega$

(1978-81)

Okay, normally we don't look at TV shows, but here we'll make an exception. The crime drama, starring Robert Urich as a private dick in Vegas named Dan Tanna, was created by Michael Mann (the director behind The Keep [1983 / trailer]) and proved rather a hit. It also co-starred Beyond the Valley of the Doll's Aunt Susan, otherwise known as the actress Phyllis Davis, as Tanna's assistant, and pretty much made Davis a household name in the US of Anal. So when Aunt Susan and Kelly MacNamara share screen time together on the show again after eight years, we have to give at least the episode a gander.

Some other casting in the episode that raises an eyebrow: no one less than Marcia Brady, Maureen McCormick (of Return to Horror High [1987]), is there, above from the episode, and her in-episode daddy is played by Mr Brady himself, Robert Reed ([19 Oct 1932 – 12 May 1992] of Bloodlust! [1961]).

In The Pageant, the eighth episode of the first season (airdate 15 Nov 1978), Dolly Martin (as she is credited) plays a character named Annabelle, but who knows how her character fits in the story, as most online plot descriptions are sketchy at best. The most detailed is at imdb, where kevinolzak wrote: "The Pageant reunites Robert Reed and Maureen McCormick four years after The Brady Bunch (1969-74) came to an end, again cast as father and daughter, but in a much more serious vein. Reed plays ruthless businessman Mike Logan, whose 18-year-old daughter Jenny is viciously raped and brutally beaten in a parking lot. Logan hires Dan Tanna to find the attacker, who has struck repeatedly over the previous month, always teenage blondes, all connected to a beauty pageant where Bea (Phyllis Davis, below from the episode) handles the choreography. Reed's initially vengeful father is overcome with emotion as Dan shows him evidence of the rapist's latest crime; the girl's death convinces his daughter to come clean and identify her assailant. Bea herself must help set a trap for the culprit (Michael Swan [of Friday the 13th Part VI: Jason Lives (1986 / trailer)], who never speaks a word), an electrician recently transferred from another state. Phyllis Davis was joined by her former co-star from 1970's Beyond the Valley of the Dolls, the equally gorgeous Dolly Read, here billed under her married name, Dolly Martin [...]."

One reference to Dolly we found simply states, "Dolly Martin gagged. [Ultimate 70s]" Elsewhere, at the great blogspot Poseidon's Underworld, whence the image below comes, they write a bit more about the episode: "[...] Urich questions a beauty shop owner who may have witnessed McCormick's attack and the owner (who is rocking some hilariously fun big hair) is played by Dolly Martin. Martin was a 1966 Playboy centerfold whose maiden name was Dolly Read. As Read, she'd starred in the hooty 1970 camp classic Beyond the Valley of the Dolls."

"It's a decent episode of Vega$ where Urich, hired by Reed, tries finding the rapist [...]. It turns out to be the lighting guy, who, with a big 70s mustache and wide shoulders, makes a fitfully creepy (and formidable) predator. [Cult Film Freaks]"

The Pageant was directed by actor and director Lawrence Dobkin (16 Sept 1919 – 28 Oct 2002), whom you find in D.O.A. (1949) and The Cabinet of Dr. Caligari (1962 / trailer). Throughout his entire directorial career, Dodkin only directed one feature film, an obscure slice of hixploitation in 1972, Like a Crow on a June Bug, poster above, otherwise also known as...

Sixteen —

the trailer:

 

Mansfield 66/67

(2017, dir. P. David Ebersole & Todd Hughes)

Dolly Read makes a rare appearance as a talking head in this documentary about the last two years of Jayne Mansfield's life. Mansfield 66/67 is another documentary from the happily married documentary filmmakers, Ebersole & Hughes, seen below in a picture cribbed from their website. In interviews, they seem to finish each other's sentences...

"Over at Loverboy, they mention "the impetus behind making this documentary": "Years ago, after doing a massive amount of research, we wrote a narrative feature about Jayne (of The Burglar [1957]) and Anton [LaVey] called The Devil Made Her Do It. [Todd]" "The screenplay is very popular but it also seems to never get made. So, when we were trying to figure out what our next doc should be, we knew this should be it because we knew the story inside and out. And what is fun about a doc versus a narrative project is that you can open it up to speak to cultural issues and hopefully deepen the content. [P. David]"

A trailer to

Mansfield 66/67:

"Opening with bold, hot pink lettering, Mansfield 66/67 warns us that the film we are about to watch conveys 'opinions expressed that are not approved or endorsed'. But, we were well aware we'd be digging through rumours — the film's tagline is 'a true story based on rumor and hearsay'. Is there anything more delectable than a Blonde Bombshell making deals with the devil? Bring on the gossip! [...] Writhing in rumours, Mansfield 66/67 sniffs out the thread of truth in Jayne's life. Reading between the lines of tabloid headers and faulty memories, we hear the story of a starlet who longed for a steady spotlight — clinging to stardom on the heels of Marilyn Monroe only to be cast aside as Sharon Tate strolled in. A woman who oozed sexuality and harnessed it, exploited its quirks — only to find herself hunting for other opportunities as motherhood changed her body; seemingly all the public valued and her only meal ticket (despite playing violin, and *possibly* speaking over five languages [...]) [Nightmare on Film Street]."

Another trailer to

Mansfield 66/67:

"From the producers of Room 237 (2012 / trailer), a super Hollywood Babylon-style documentary about the final years of movie goddess Jayne Mansfield's life and untimely death. Was that ill-fated car crash really caused by a curse after her alleged romantic dalliance with Anton LaVey [below with Jayne], head of the Church of Satan? Packed with talking heads and dazzling clips from the Marilyn-in-Waiting's film career, this is a look at the 50s tabloid star as a precursor to the feminist advances of the 1960s, as a woman who tested the limits of then acceptable female behavior and as 'the first reality TV star'. [Big Screen]"

A clip from

Mansfield 66/67:

"Forget Kevin Bacon. Jayne's popularity and pop culture presence ran so deep that you can play 'Two Degrees of Mansfield' and link her to everyone from Lee Harvey Oswald assassin Jack Ruby to all four Beatles. [Culture Crypt]" That's Jayne below, btw, as Playboy's Playmate of the Month for February 1955.

Other talking heads aside from Dolly Read that you might know include: Kenneth Anger (3 Feb 1927 – 11 May 2023), gossip columnist AJ Benza, Susan Bernard (11 Feb 1948 – 21 Jun 2019), Peaches Christ, director Cheryl Dunye, Tippi Hedren, Marilyn, Yolonda Ross (of The Bad Batch [2016 / trailer] & Shortbus [2006 / trailer]), Mamie Van Doren (of The Girl in Black Stockings [1957]), John Waters (director of Pink Flamingos [1972] & Cecil B. Demented [2000]), Mary Woronov (of Night of the Comet [1984] & Silent Night, Bloody Night [1972]), and with the voices of Ann Magnuson (Jayne), Richmond Arquette (Anton)."

One person Ebersole & Hughes asked who declined to participate was Siouxsie Sioux, whose song Kiss Them for Me is about Jayne and Anton; she said the song says everything that she had to say about Jayne and Anton. (Trivia time: Kiss Them for Me is named after the eponymous film from 1957 [trailer], starring Jayne & Cary Grant.)

Siouxsie Sioux and the Banshees sing

Kiss Them for Me:

"The day may come that someone makes a biographical documentary that is as much of a hyperactive whirlwind of strangeness as was the life of Jayne Mansfield, but today is not that day. Directors Ebersole and Hughes provide instead a rather informative and rather typical movie, albeit one with some eccentric interludes. [366 Weird Movies]"

"This devilishly tasteless documentary [...] is a campy product of pink-tinted postmodernism, matching its form to the playful public persona of its subject. For a while in the 1950s, Jayne Mansfield was second only to Marilyn Monroe in the 'blonde bombshell' stakes, [...] and as the 50s' ideal of womanhood fell out of fashion, Mansfield abandoned serious film acting to take up her place full-time as tabloid icon. The focus is Mansfield's last two years, doing photoshoots with equally publicity-hungry Satanist Anton LaVey, and then dying horrifically in a car accident — but Mansfield 66/67 tries to pin down a mythic figure, caught in changing times, changing attitudes towards women, and the endless altercation between exploitation and empowerment. Its use of 60s-style animation, interpretative dance and catty commentary [...] to tell its tale keeps Mansfield both elusive, and somehow complicit in her own over-the-top presentation, even half a century beyond her martyrdom to image. [BFI]

Famously enough, Jayne died (perhaps keeping, perhaps losing, her head) in a car accident. Less often reported is that her three children — Zoltan Hargitay, Mariska Hargitay (of Ghoulies [1984 / trailer]) and Mickey Hargitay Jr. — all of whom she had while married to Mickey Hargitay (6 Jan 1926 – 14 Sep 2006), above, the star of Bloody Pit of Horror (1965 / trailer / full film) and Lady Frankenstein (1971), were asleep in the back seat and survived only because they were lying down. (As the Germans are apt say, "Glück in Unglück.")

Jayne's story was filmed for TV, with Loni Anderson (below, not from the film*) as Jayne, way back in 1980, and that film is included in John Wilson's book The 100 Most Amusingly Bad Movies Ever Made. Regarding the TV movie, a clip of which is used in the documentary, Todd Hughes says "It was camp crap. It really whitewashed Jayne's story and omitted a lot of the more interesting truths about her. It was [one of] Arnold's [Schwarzenegger] first acting job and he always gets a laugh when people see the clip of him as Mickey Hargitay in Mansfield 6/67. [Loverboy]"

* Regarding the above painting of Ms. Anderson (framed, 54 1/2 by 42 1/2 inches): "A framed acrylic on canvas painting of Loni Anderson wearing a light sheath, signed 'Elfred Lee '91.' Lee, a religious painter, was commissioned by Burt Reynolds to do a nude of Loni Anderson. Reynolds wanted a full-nude painting, but Anderson balked at the idea, and the sheath was a compromise. The painting once hung in their living room, but it was too public for Anderson, who moved it to the bedroom. Accompanied by a photograph of the artist with the painting. PROVENANCE: From the Collection of Loni Anderson. [Julien's Auctions]" Sold (2014) for $4,480.

German Trailer to

The Jayne Mansfield Story (1980):

Trivia: Mickey Hargitay played Hercules in his third feature-film appearance, The Loves of Hercules a.k.a. Hercules vs the Hydra (1960 / trailer). Arnold Schwarzenegger — below, not from any film — who plays Hargitay in the movie above, made his feature-film debut (as "Arnold Strong") as Hercules ten years after Hargitay in Hercules in New York (1970 / trailer).

For a sleazy take on Jayne written by a narcissist, check out Gregg Tyler's The Joy of Hustling — we wrote a book review about it years ago at our zombified blog Mostly Crappy Books.

Playboy Playmates: The Early Years

(1992, writ. Bill Callejas & Steve Silas)

Less a documentary than an hour-and-half-long advertisement and masturbatory ego-boost for Playboy. Dolly is represented with her pictorial (centerfold below) and archive footage.

And now: The Carrie Nations' drummer,

Marcia McBroom