This Saturday Night Special is episode seven from season three of the great 1960's TV show "It Takes A Thief."
For this episode they left Universal Studios in California and headed to Rome, Italy for a more authentic location!
"The Three Virgins Of Rome" has a real Eurotrash look and feel to it!
There's going to be an big outdoor exhibition of some famous paintings, so Al Mundy has been hired to stop them from getting stolen. His Father, a noted international art thief known as The Panther just happens to also be in town. Coincidence? Not likely!
I'm sure part of the reason this is such a good looking episode is because the Director is none other than Jack Arnold, the man who directed some of our all-time favourite monster movies like "It Came From Outer Space," "Creature From The Black Lagoon," "Tarantula," "The Incredible Shrinking Man," and "Monster On The Campus," to name a few!
Using International Dungeon fave Karin Dor as Angela was also a stroke of genius!
The pretty cool cast also includes Victor Buono as as Mr. Kent!
I read that Victor Buono at one point was close to 400 pounds in weight, and I believe it from the looks of him in this photo! He was also 6'3" tall!
They come in all sizes. On the complete other end of the scale, Davy (Satan's Harvest) Kaye, the gentleman in the middle, was only 4' 11."
Robert Wagner and Karin Dor make quite an attractive couple!
I really think you could plug Joachim Fuchsberger and Natalie Wood into the same two roles and get away with it! Wouldn't that be interesting?
Just in case you wondered, there are no real "Three Virgins Of Rome" paintings!
Now that is a tricky hiding place!
Time for a word from our sponsor, "Spa-Fon" cleaning products. If you can't get it out with "Spa-Fon," it's permanent!"
So here's where it gets a little slightly unbelievable!
They float "The Three Virgins" away with helium balloons!
And land them safely in this field!
Right!
Here's the cover of a great 7" 45 single by pianist Dave Grusin!
I didn't have any "It Takes A Thief" music to listen to, so I listened to this killer soundtrack from the movie "Robbery," written by John Keating to get me in the mood!
No matter the role, Karin always looks freakin' amazing!
Lord Litter in Berlin was the one who told me about this great episode, so, from the both of us,
"Cheerz!"
"Cheerz!"
3 comments:
Victor Buono was magnificent! One of the greatest talents of our lifetime, and always hilarious in comedic villain roles such as King Tut on BATMAN...
I call it "The Big Guy" club, and we should all watch everything ever done by Victor Buono, Laird Cregar, Bruno VeSota, and Orson Welles! Period!
Bruno VeSota is a hero of mine, due in part to the handful of films he directed. BRAIN EATERS is an extra special favorite, also FEMALE JUNGLE aka THE HANGOVER, and of course the little known fact that he was the primary director of DEMENTIA aka the butchered DAUGHTER OF HORROR. In the vein of silly sci-fi "comedies" Bruno had INVASION OF THE STAR CREATURES, with a few weak gags and goofy moments, but bottom line, it's pretty much a sad failure.
My friend Katherine Victor used to talk about Bruno VeSota as a good friend, with whom she did some commiserating over their shared pain working together in some of the awful films of Jerry Warren. They both deserved better.
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