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Stan Bickman – Part II – War Stories from the B-Movie Days

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In my last article, I introduced you to Stan Bickman, a long time producer, line producer and production manager. In this article, I would like to share some of Stan's "Tale's From the Front."

Most of my other articles come from the current times, when we call low budget films "independent films," because they are made outside the studio system, and for less money. This has a maverick, almost admirable connotation. However, without B-movies, which many scoff at as bad movies, today's indies would not exist. Many of Stan's stories come from the B-movie days.

I'll leave a full history of B-movies to movie historians ("http://www.videoflicks.com/bmovie"). As it relates to Stan, I'll say that he left the studios to produce films because he thought it would be exciting, he would have more control, and he saw it as a living. That part is important. It was not about winning Sundance, or attracting attention on IFC. It was simply about making movies.

One of the first films Stan produced was for a film entitled "High School Big Shot". The lead in that film was an actor named Tom Pittman.

Even in those days, Stan understood that you raised money around a name, and he saw Pittman as an up-and-comer. He hoped that he could raise money for another film based on the reaction to "High School Big Shot". Stan was convinced, after working on the film, that Pittman was the next James Dean. In a way, he was right.

On October 31 (Halloween), 1958, Tom Pittman was killed in a car accident in Benedict Canyon, California. By the way, the one review of the movie on IMDB ("http://us.imdb.com/Title?0052891") refers to it as "depressingly awful."

Many of Stan's movies were made with Roger Corman. On one movie, Stan was working with Shelly Winters. While Stan felt she was a wonderful actress, he was somewhat frustrated by her "method" preparation costing valuable time on the set. Stan was always a charmer - especially with women - and thought he had things under control. He would encourage, nudge, cajole - anything to keep things moving. It's a great lesson to those who think an Assistant Director needs to be a screamer to get things done.

One day, Shelly felt pressured by Stan's "encouragement." Her response was, "We're not making a movie. We're making a schedule." Stan appreciated the humor in the response. The next day, he added it as "quote of the day" in the schedule.