March 2, 1933 -
RKO Studios, on the brink of bankruptcy, gambled the studio on a filmed puppet show for kids, releasing the film King Kong on this date.
In the original film, the character's name is Kong -- a name given to him by the inhabitants of "Skull Island" in the Indian Ocean, where Kong lived along with other over-sized animals such as a plesiosaur, pterosaurs, and dinosaurs. 'King' is an appellation added by an American film crew led by Carl Denham, who captures Kong and takes him to New York City to be exhibited as the "Eighth Wonder of the World".
Kong escapes and climbs the Empire State Building (the World Trade Center in the 1976 remake) where he is shot and killed by aircraft. Nevertheless, "it was beauty who killed the beast", as he only climbed the building in the first place in an attempt to protect the lead female character Ann Darrow.
The film saved RKO Studios from bankruptcy.
March 2, 1939 -
The first of many collaborations between John Ford and John Wayne, Stagecoach, went into general release on this date.
Asked why, in the climactic chase scene, the Indians didn't simply shoot the horses to stop the stagecoach, director John Ford replied, "Because that would have been the end of the movie." In addition, Apaches would have stolen the stagecoach horses because, in their culture, horses were valuable in calculating a warrior's worth.
March 2, 1940 -
The Looney Tunes short, Elmer's Candid Camera, directed by Chuck Jones, and featuring the newly redesigned Elmer Fudd for the first time, premiered on this date.
Elmer Fudd evolved from Egghead, a character created by Tex Avery in the mid-'30s. In this cartoon, Elmer still wears the same attire (derby hat, high collar, green coat) as Egghead, and sports a large, bulbous nose, which was one of Egghead's distinguishing traits.
March 2, 1965 -
The movie version of Rodgers and Hammerstein's musical The Sound of Music, starring Julie Andrews and Christopher Plummer, had its world premiere at New York's Rivoli Theater on this date.
Christopher Plummer admitted that he ate and drank heavily during filming to drown out his unhappiness with making this movie, and found plenty of opportunities to do both in Austria. His costume eventually had to be refitted for his extra weight.
March 2, 1984 -
Rob Reiner's seminal mockumentary, This Is Spinal Tap starring Christopher Guest, Michael McKean, Harry Shearer and a bunch of other great actors premiered in the US on this date.
37 different people have been in the band over the years. Excluding the two original members, one keyboard player, and the original and current bass players, that means the band has had 32 different drummers who inexplicably died.
March 2, 1990 -
Paramount Pictures released the submarine thriller, based on the Tom Clancy novel of the same name, The Hunt for Red October, starring Sean Connery (with the worst attempt at a Russian accept ever), Alec Baldwin, Scott Glenn, James Earl Jones, and Sam Neill, on this date.
After being faxed the script, Sean Connery initially turned the role down on the basis of the plot being unrealistic for the post-Cold War era. Whoever sent the fax neglected to include the foreword, explaining the movie as historical. Once he received the foreword, Connery accepted the role.
March 2, 2009 -
Jimmy Fallon premiered on the third incarnation of the Late Night franchise, first hosted by David Letterman, followed by Conan O'Brien, on this date.
In 2013, Fallon was selected by NBC to succeed the continually retiring Jay Leno as host of The Tonight Show. The last episode of Late Night under Fallon aired one night after Leno's final episode of The Tonight Show on February 6, 2014. Most of the cast and crew immediately began working on The Tonight Show Starring Jimmy Fallon, which premiered on February 17, 2014. Seth Meyers was named as Fallon's replacement, and Late Night with Seth Meyers debuted February 24, 2014.
The Word of the Day
Today in History -
When he was a young man, no one knew for sure if Nicholas I of Russia, the son of Paul I, was Czar, Tsar, or Tzar. It was hard to know anything at all about someone whose last name was a vowel, especially when he lived in a hermitage. Nicholas was therefore as confused as he was powerful, which inevitably led to his becoming an Evil Bastard.
He didn't realize what an Evil Bastard he'd become until he lost the Crimean War, however, at which point he discovered that in addition to being Evil he was also an Incompetent Bastard. This made him Autocratic and he therefore died on March 2, 1855.
His first son Alexander, was left to ponder all of this when he became Alexander II on the same day.
March 2, 1882 -
Queen Victoria was a much beloved monarch, except by her would-be assassins. The queen escaped another assassination attempt on this date. Roderick Maclean, the final in a series of eight malcontents over the course of her very long reign, took a shot at the queen as her carriage pulled away from Windsor railway station after she refused to accept one of his poems.
He was beaten back by two schoolboys with umbrellas and arrested by Superintendent Hayes of the Windsor Police. He was tried for high treason but found not guilty but insane and sent to an asylum.
March 2, 1900 -
... I have never acknowledged the difference between serious music and light music. There is only good music and bad music.
Kurt Weill, composer, Brecht and Gershwin collaborator, was born in Dessau, Germany on this date.
Theodor Seuss Geisel, better known as Dr. Seuss, was born 116 years ago today, on March 2, 1904. He won the Pulitzer Prize in 1984, and is one of only a few men in history to have written illustrated books in verse about a pedophiliac cat.
You can hardly blame the guy for changing his name. (Remember it's National Read Across America Day in honor of Dr. Seuss.)
On March 2, 1931, Mikhail Gorbachev was born with a big red splotch on his head, so he got right into politics. Mr. Gorbachev was the last Evil Bastard to reign over the Soviet Empire. Fortunately, he was also Bumbling Bastard, and his invention of glasnost and perestroika accidentally made walls fall down in Germany.
This caused Boris Yeltsin to ride on top of a tank and was therefore historical.
March 2, 1939 -
Howard Carter died of King Tut's curse on this date.
But dammit remember there is no mummy's curse.
March 2, 1944 -
A train of mixed military/civilian passengers (Train #8017) stalls inside a tunnel outside Salerno, Italy, asphyxiating 426 from fumes. Authorities question Mussolini on the necessities of have trains run on a timely basis to meet ones death in such an unpleasant manner.
March 2, 1944 -
I was a product of Andy Warhol's Factory. All I did was sit there and observe these incredibly talented and creative people who were continually making art, and it was impossible not to be affected by that....
Lewis Allan Lou Reed singer, songwriter, poet and guitarist was born (on the wild side.)
March 2, 1949 –
The first round the world nonstop airplane flight was completed in a US Air Force B-50 Superfortress bomber, the Lucky Lady II headed by Captain James Gallagher, on this date.
They landed back at Carswell Air Force base, Fort Worth, Texas, which they had left on February 26, about 94 hours earlier.
March 2, 1968 -
Syd Barrett left Pink Floyd, after melting his mind with various extremely dangerous drugs on this date. He spends the following years mumbling about pork chops and refrigerators.
A very good biography about Syd Barrett, A Very Irregular Head, came a few years ago.
March 2, 1982 -
Science fiction author Philip K Dick died of a stroke in Santa Ana, California on this date. Since 1974 the author had been possessed by a superalien who arrived in his head via a beam of pink light.
It has been suggested that Mr Dick and Mr Barrett had been in regular communication via the pork chops in his refrigerator.
March 2, 1997 -
Don P. Wolf and a team of researchers at the Oregon National Primate Research Center announced that they had produced rhesus monkeys from cloned embryos, the first successful use of cloning-related technology in primates.
And so it goes.
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