"The Misfits" and Me - by Christian Esquevin

Where does the first step begin on a journey to fate? For me it was sometime in August of 1960, just a kid on a camping trip with his parents and their friends. Lake Tahoe was the destination, with side trips to Squaw Valley, Reno, Carson City, and Virginia City, Nevada. Little did I know, nor anyone else in our little party, that we would run into the production of The Misfits, starring Marilyn Monroe, Clark Gable, and Montgomery Clift, as directed by John Huston. It was clear from the entourage around Gable and Marilyn that this was a very big deal. And my father reinforced this message with his excited exclamation, “there’s Marilyn Monroe and Clark Gable!” although he probably uttered this in French, my parents’ and their friends’ native language. 

Myth Making: The Misfits (1961)

Pulitzer Prize winning playwright Arthur Miller traveled to Reno, Nevada, in the spring of 1956 to divorce his first wife. Fulfilling the state's six week residency requirement until the marriage was legally dissolved, Miller stayed at a cabin on Pyramid Lake, about 100 miles from "the biggest little city in the world." During his time in this "forbidding but beautiful place," he got to know a few modern-day cowboy types who made their living capturing wild mustangs and selling them to be butchered for dog food. Miller was invited to join them on one of these hunts. From his experiences in a "whole state full of misfits," Arthur Miller later fashioned a short story that was published the following year in Esquire magazine.

Over the Rain-Forest and the Still Water Beach

Abandoned movie set, Mismaloya, Mexico: photo courtesy of TripAdvisor

The programmers at Turner Classic Movies may not have planned the schedule with me in mind, but they’ve lined up a fine mix of films for me on my birthday this year.

Bruno Ganz in Wings of Desire

I share my day with Sir Laurence Olivier (born May 22, 1907), and TCM has programmed some films of his that I haven’t seen, including Term of Trial (1962), co-starring the great French actress, Simone Signoret. Later on in the day my beloved San Francisco provides the setting for the 1955 sci-fi classic, It Came from Beneath the Sea, in which the city is attacked by a radiation-enlarged octopus. In the evening, this month's TCM guest programmer, Deborah Winger, is set to appear. Among her choices is one film I haven’t seen but have had on my to-watch list for a long time: Wim Wenders' 1987 classic, Wings of Desire, brought its director the Best Director prize at Cannes in 1987 and won or was nominated for a raft of other awards.

Winger has also chosen to spotlight John Huston’s masterful production of Tennessee Williams' The Night of the Iguana (1964), one of the great film adaptations of Williams' work.