Word: sam
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Dates: during 1950-1959
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...were to X-ray every Oscar," says Movie Producer Sam Katzman, waving a cigar the size of a shinny stick, "you'd find every one of them has an ulcer inside." "Jungle Sam" Katzman probably will never have either an Oscar or an ulcer. He specializes in such surefire blends of sex and adventure as Serpent of the Nile and Battle of Rogue River, plus a stream of quickies for the cap-pistol set (Chief of the Senecas, Jet Commandos), and a seemingly endless chain-ten so far-of Jungle Jim pictures. Jungle Sam never spends more than half...
Those Old Arabs. Sam Katzman, a bouncy, bulb-shaped 51, has his own formula for keeping his earning record perfect. His five sound stages (at Columbia's dingy old subsidiary studio) are usually buzzing with assorted pygmies, giants, animals (wild and tame), half-dressed women (wild & wild-eyed), cowboys and pâpier-maché interplanetary vehicles. With these props Sam can roll into a picture at the drop of a dollar. Says he: "We don't get stories. We get titles and then write stories around them or to fit them. For instance, we had this title...
...average Katzman schedule calls for ten pictures a year, but Jungle Sam keeps his program "flexible," i.e., a batch of titles adaptable to any situation, usually some front-page news. A few days after the Korean war broke out, a Columbia executive sighed for a Korean film. "How would you like A Yank in Korea?" asked Sam. "Great!" replied the executive. Six weeks and two days later, A Yank in Korea (a remake of A Yank in the R.A.F. and predecessor of A Yank in Indo-China) was ready for distribution...
...Love That Chimp." Producer Katzman's most successful serial is his Superman, which grossed more than $1,000,000, and was so popular in South America that the whole 31-reel cliff-hanger-5 hours 10 minutes long-was run off as a single feature. Sam pre-tests the plots and chapter endings on his 15-year-old son Jerome and playmates. "If they guess how the guy gets out of the predicament each week, it goes out immediately and we rewrite until they can't guess...
...Jungle Jim pictures, starring ex-Tarzan Johnny Weissmuller, and a chimpanzee named Tamba, are Sam's biggest grossers. Each picture costs about $300,000, brings in close to $1,000,000. Says Sam fondly: "I love that chimp. He's out there now learning new tricks for his next picture . . . I love animals anyway, because the audience loves them...