And so we begin…(after the flip, that is.)

*  “The Lady Vanishes“ turned out to be Alfred Hitchcock‘s penultimate English film before launching his Hollywood blockbuster career with “Rebecca.” Since it came out within a few years of the somewhat better known “The Man Who Knew Too Much” in 1934 and “The 39 Steps” the following year, this 1938 box office smash sometimes tends to get lost in the shuffle. That’s a crime because “The Lady Vanishes” is one of Hitch’s jolliest and most entertaining films, even if Hitch himself might have played it down because of all the justified attention the writing team of Sidney Gilliat and Frank Launder received for their classic screenplay.

Like the master’s self-homaging “North by Northwest,” “The Lady Vanishes” is set largely aboard a train and features an in-the-dark protagonist suddenly embroiled in dangerous espionage shenanigans. The innocent who gets in over her head this time is a mostly charming but also somewhat entitled young lady of means (Margaret Lockwood) who has already had a run-in with a rude but chivalrous musicologist (Michael Redgrave). When she befriends a lovably hobbitish Englishwoman (Dame May Whitty) who disappears not only from the train but, apparently, from the memory of everyone she has encountered, something is very obviously up. Chills, suspense, comedy and romance definitely ensue, with an accent on comedy and romance.

Contemporary audiences might be a bit thrown off by the fact that the film opens as a light comedy with only the barest hint of a thriller element until a genuinely shocking murder about half an hour in. They might also be thrown by the use of very obvious miniatures for the establishing shots of a small Balkan village that open the film. Go with it — once the thriller elements kick in, it’s one tense little ride.

Also those miniatures, necessitated by a lowish budget — even Hitchcock, no stickler for realism, worried about them — are a fun reminder than this is a movie, not real life, and the lengthy intro is a pretty delightful comedy set-up which, among other treats, features one of the English screen’s most popular classic era comedy teams. Though they teamed up for the first time on “The Lady Vanishes,” actors Basil Radford and Naunton Wayne would come to be at least as tied to cricket-obsessed travelers Charters and Calidicott as John Cho and Kal Penn are seemingly forever wed to cannabis-loving journeyers Harold and Kumar.

Radford and Wayne would reprise their roles, sometimes under different character names and sometimes not, in a number of films. Their films ranged from a segment of the 1945 anthology horror classic “Dead of Night” to low budget vehicles like “Crooks Tour,” which is featured on this typically chock-full-of-greatness Criterion disc, a Blu-Ray update of a 2007 release. You can also see them in “Night Train to Munich”, a worthy World War II-era follow-up from writers Gilliat and Launder directed by Carol Reed (“The Third Man“) that is very nearly as much fun as “The Lady Vanishes.”

* While we’re on the topic of great thrillers set aboard trains, if you were one of the masses left perhaps a bit less than overwhelmed by 2009’s “The Taking of Pelham 123,” taking a look back at the nifty though special-feature free Blu-Ray edition of the crackling 1974 “The Taking of Pelham One Two Three“ may reveal something about the way violent action thrillers should actually be made, or at least the way I think they should be made.

Grumpy-not-yet-old-man Walter Matthau stars as a hang-dog head of the New York subway police who suddenly finds himself confronted by a group of murderous hijackers. Led by a wiley, utterly ruthless ex-mercenary played by the equally superb Robert Shaw (“Jaws“), the gang requests a cool million in return for the lives of a group of luckless passengers.

With a screenplay by one of the wittiest scenarists of his day, Peter Stone (“Charade,” “1776”), this adaptation of a novel by John Godey blends R-rated suspense with plenty of black comedy and satire. It’s main target is the brutality of contemporary urban life. “Screw the goddamn passengers! What the hell did they expect for their lousy 35 cents – to live forever?” asks the world’s most callous dispatcher who seems to be angling for a position in the hardline Giuliani administration two decades early. Few movies not made by Sidney Lumet or Spike Lee capture the contentious  humor of the people of New York with this much accuracy and aplomb.

The top-notch supporting cast includes Hector Elizondo, Woody Allen pal Tony Roberts at his absolute best as an ultra-blunt deputy mayor, and Jerry Stiller — best known today as both Ben and George Costanza’s dad — as a lackadasical deputy. “Reservoir Dogs” fans will take note of the color coded names of the hijackers, Ringo Lam’s 1987 Hong Kong crime flick, “City on Fire,” was not the only movie Quentin Tarantino was borrowing from.

* We’re incredibly late for Valentine’s Day (and even later if you know when the Blu-Ray dropped) but, even among French films, there are few productions as purely romantic as 1934’s “L’Atalante.” The most famous of the two features included on Criterion’s “The Complete Jean Vigo,” it’s a moving, evocatively filmed, and extremely simple fable about a the highs and lows of love as experienced by the captain of a small canal barge (Jean Dasté) and his lovely bride (Dita Parlo). Delicate but also fierce in its gritty depiction of down-at-the-heels pre-World War II France, it also features a great comic performance by the legendary comic Michel Simon as a lovable old sea salt whose blood would probably test out at 40 proof.

Since writer-director Jean Vigo died at 29 the same year as his best known film was released, he has attained a sort of John Keats-like status among cinephiles enchanted by his romantic, melancholy surrealism. As sad as Vigo’s early passing remains, it at least means that it’s not hard to put the great cineaste’s complete works on a single disc and you can watch them all in a single long afternoon. These include the anarchy laden boarding school drama, “Zero de Conduit” (“Zero for Conduct”), and some frequently arresting experimental silent shorts.

* Is there a stranger, more interesting, confounding, and compelling 1990s movie than Todd Haynes’ seductive and mostly very entertaining 1998 ode to 1970s glam-rock, “Velvet Goldmine“? Somewhat hampered by the refusal of David Bowie to allow any of his songs to be used, Haynes nevertheless takes advantage of a treasure trove of iconic pop from such stalwarts as Lou Reed, Brian Eno, Roxy Music, and, of course, T-Rex, as well as such contemporary (14 years ago) bands as Pulp and Grant Lee Buffalo.

Although I once felt like a pretty lonely fan of this odd amalgam of rock and roll musical and off-kilter “Citizen Kane” rip-off by way of Phillip Dick and George Orwell, I’m glad to see the young folks have recognized it’s problematic brilliance. The new Blu-Ray, naturally looks superb, sounds amazing, and is a great vehicle for Haynes’ appropriately stylized vision. The commentary by Haynes and producer Christine Vachon is also a must for anyone who’s interested in the film and its many antecedents.

* It’s a thrill to finally see 1958’s “The Big Country“ in high definition 1080p on a big screen TV, but it would be even greater to see it in 35mm on an actual movie screen. Still, the home version ain’t bad for this big, big epic in which the characters themselves are obsessed with just how very, very large their little piece of the American West happens to be. Directed by William Wyler (“The Best Years of Our Lives,” “Roman Holiday“) and co-produced by liberal-minded star Gregory Peck, this very unusual epic western plays today as something of an enjoyably longwinded rebuttal to the those in public life for whom every problem may be solved by a war.

As with “The Lady Vanishes,” I could easily spend days writing about this film — and I’d link to a blog post about it on my old web site right now if I hadn’t been hacked — but all you need to know is that it’s much more than a message picture. There’s some really stirring action pieces, in particular an epic final three-way confrontation and a lengthy fight featuring Peck and his unbending romantic rival, played by Charlton Heston, who was cajoled by Wyler into taking a gig between playing Moses in “The Ten Commandments” and taking on the part of Judah Ben Hur in Wyler’s follow-up epic. It’s definitely one of my two or three favorite Heston performances.

“The Big Country” is also chock of sexy late-fifties romance, sexiness largely supplied by its two outstanding female leads, Carroll Baker (“Baby Doll”) and Jean Simmons (from “Guys & Dolls,” “Elmer Gantry” — not Kiss!). It’s a perfect movie for a long Sunday afternoon. I don’t like to say “they don’t make ’em like this anymore,” but I really do wish this kind of grand “something for everyone” mass entertainment still existed at the movies.

* There was a time when featuring a television star in a movie was pretty much considered the box office kiss of death. Since it starred two stars of a hugely successful TV series and did, in fact, bomb miserably, 1972’s “Hickey and Boggs“ might have been Exhibit A for that viewpoint. The real marketing problem, however, was that the stars were Bill Cosby and the late Robert Culp of “I Spy,” a lighthearted globetrotting buddy spy show that no one would have considered edgy or groundbreaking in any way if it weren’t for the fact that Cosby was the first African-American star of a U.S. TV show. The movie is anything but lighthearted.

Cosby and Culp had become buddies in real life and both were men of some real artistic ambition. Clearly, Culp — a cartoonist in his youth — wanted to be a serious filmmaker and he went all-in on this very dark tale post-noir about two down on their luck Los Angeles PIs. Though beset with a somewhat shambling and overly complicated screenplay by a young Walter Hill, it was clear that Culp had a strong sense of style and an eye for striking and stylish visuals. This really good looking transfer on a on-demand DVD is the first time the film has been available for a decent home video viewing in some time. (A previous DVD is, by all accounts, horribly inferior so be sure you’re getting the new MGM edition.)

* It’s fortunate for everyone that, unlike Jean Vigo, the very skilled director Alan Rudolph has enjoyed a good long life and a lengthy career, because if his filmmaking had ended with 1976’s “Welcome to L.A.,“ I wonder if anyone would remember him. This is a tough film to sit through and not in a good way, despite the requisite first-rate cast.

Presented by Rudolph’s mentor, Robert Altman, clearly the idea is to present something of a West coast follow-up to Altman’s heartland masterpiece, “Nashville.” Set largely in the Los Angeles music business, the results are mostly kind of unwelcome, as are the musical stylings of singer-songwriter Richard Baskin whose work, along with stars Keith Carradine and Geraldine Chaplin, had also been featured in “Nashville.” Baskin’s songs, like the movie, are morose without being engaging in any particular way.

Also featuring a young Harvey Keitel, Sissy Spacek, and Sally Kellerman (the original Hotlips from Altman’s film version of  “M*A*S*H”), this is a movie that only a young man could have made. It sports the special bitterness of those who have recently figured that life is not always what your parents said it would be. On the plus side, Angelenos might get some fun out of spotting old L.A. locations now long gone or transformed. On the other hand, there’s more of that stuff in Altman’s great “The Long Goodbye” and,  yes, “Hickey and Boggs.” Watch those instead.

We all know about the various superheroes that have found their way from the pages of DC and Marvel Comics into the world of live-action television series, including Superman, Batman, Wonder Woman, the Flash, Spider-Man, the Hulk, and the like. The ones who often get short shrift, however, are the ones that have been created specifically for the small screen.

Remember Captain Nice? Mr. Terrific? Nightman? M.A.N.T.I.S.?

No…? Then you take my point: the costumed crusaders that originated from existing source material are the ones which have tended to remain in the public consciousness.

There is an exception to this rule, however, and we’re pretty sure the reason he hasn’t been forgotten is that, in addition to possessing the powers of flight, super strength, invisibility, and many others, he’s also the only made-for-TV hero who had a theme song that many of us still remember almost 30 years down the line:

Thank you, Joey Scarbury…but, also, thank you, Stephen J. Cannell, creator of “The Greatest American Hero,” for coming up with such an awesome concept for a series.

Ralph Hinkley (William Katt), a high school teacher, takes his class on a field trip and, after leaving them temporarily to go in search of aid for their van’s flat tire, encounters a UFO. Also present: FBI Agent Bill Maxwell (Robert Culp), who just happened to be in the neighborhood, as it were. The aliens present Ralph with a red suit and cape, inform him that wearing it will provide him with superhuman abilities, and tell him that he and Bill must work together to save the world. Sounds great…except that, while walking back to civilization, Ralph loses the instructions, leaving him uncertain as to exactly how the suit works. Cue 3 seasons and 44 episodes of superhero shenanigans, anchored by Culp’s delightfully grouchy performance and made even more watchable by the gorgeous Connie Sellecca, who plays Ralph’s girlfriend (and eventual wife), Pam.

Now, you may be asking yourself, “Didn’t they already release this set awhile back?” Indeed, they did, but that was back when Anchor Bay held the rights to the series. Since then, the rights to most of Stephen J. Cannell’s series have come to Mill Creek…and if you focus really, really hard on the awesomely low price of this set, it may help offset the depression you experience when you learn that the bonus material from the previous Anchor Bay sets stayed with Anchor Bay. The only thing you’ll get here is a 20-minute interview with Cannell. It’s something, but when compared to the inclusions on the previous sets, it sure ain’t much. Still, if you really, really wanted “The Greatest American Hero: The Complete Series,” you would’ve bought it back when it first came out. Since you apparently only kind of wanted it, though, this is the perfect chance to snap it up at a ridiculously reasonable price.

The only real drawback: you’ll never, ever get the theme song out of your head.

Click to buy “The Greatest American Hero: The Complete Series”

Come aboard as we set sail for…

Ted Lange: Hi, Will!

Bullz-Eye: Hey, Ted, how’s it going?

TL: Good! How are you doing?

BE: I’m doing well. It’s a pleasure to talk with you.

TL: What city are you in?

BE: I’m in Norfolk, Virginia. Where are you? Somewhere on the east coast, I guess, given how early it is.

TL:West coast, actually!

BE: Wow, then it’s really, really early there. Are you in California?

TL: Yessir. Los Angeles, California, city of the angels! (Laughs)

BE: Well, one of our writers here at Bullz-Eye was actually at the TV Land Awards the other night…

TL: Oh, really?

BE: He did the red carpet thing, and then he headed into the bloggers’ room, so he wasn’t in there with the action, per se, but he said it was a good time.

TL: It was a good time. It was a lot of fun.

BE: So was the entire cast there for the reunion?

TL: Well, Gavin MacLeod (Captain Stubing) had a back operation – he hurt himself, hurt a couple of his discs – so he wasn’t able to be there. We really missed him, because, you know, he’s the anchor of the show as the captain. So I called him up and talked to him to see how he was doing, and he was a little weak, but he was recuperating well. But everybody else was there, and they all brought their kids. Fred Grandy (Gopher) brought his daughter, I brought my son…it was a lot of fun.

BE: I was talking to Bob, our man who was there, and he was quite pleased that he’d gotten to talk to Bernie Kopell (Doc) on the carpet. So do you guys keep in touch aside from these occasional public reunions?

TL: Oh, yeah, absolutely. We’re friends. The great thing about the show was that we made friendships, you know? We were acting buddies and everything, but off-camera…I mean, I learned how to play tennis on Bernie’s tennis court. I wasn’t really into tennis ‘til I met Bernie. He’s been a good pal, and Fred I see all the time whenever I’m out on the east coast, and Tewes…we’re all friends, and that was the wonderful ancillary benefit of the show: that we made some really lasting friendships.

BE: So how did you first come onto “The Love Boat”? Obviously, you were pretty well established on television already, thanks to “That’s My Mama.”

TL: Yeah, actually, I did two series. I did “That’s My Mama,” and I did another series called “Mr. T and Tina,” with Pat Morita. The network was aware of me, and they had done a pilot and…they had used the guy who played the postman on “That’s My Mama,” Teddy Wilson, on the first “Love Boat” pilot, and they didn’t like the chemistry of the crew, so when they did the second pilot, they kind of threw everybody out that wasn’t working and brought in some new guys…and they stuck with the “That’s My Mama” cast by bringing me in to play the bartender. (Laughs) So I was very fortunate!

BE: Had you worked with Aaron Spelling before “Love Boat”?

TL: No, I hadn’t, actually. Jimmy Komack was the producer of “Mr. T and Tina,” and he sat me down and said, “You’re going to go work for Aaron Spelling, so let me just tell you that he’s really a great guy.” And, of course, he was correct.

BE: You worked with no end of guest stars on the show, but do you have any particular favorites that leap out at you, either because you idolized them or because they were particularly fun to work with?

TL: Well, there were many memorable reasons for each guest star. Fred and I, we hung out with Brenda Vaccaro in Hong Kong, and we spent the day…sorry, we kidnapped Brenda Vaccaro… (Laughs) …and we had a wonderful time. Every time I bump into Brenda socially here in Los Angeles, she talks about the fun we had.

BE: You know, hand on heart, right before I got on the phone with you, I was transcribing the interview I did with Brenda. I just talked with her about her new HBO movie, “You Don’t Know Jack.”

TL: Oh, no! Really? (Laughs) Oh, man, the three of us – me, Fred, and Brenda – we laughed a lot. It’s stuff like that…I can remember being in Australia with Lloyd Bridges and meeting him and his lovely wife, Dorothy. And then seeing Jeff Bridges win the Oscar…? So, yeah, we got to meet people. And Bernie would give parties up at his house, so Lloyd would come up, and they had wonderful stories about Hollywood when they were starting out. So there were a lot of different things that we did, and we got a chance to meet people and kind of get schooled a little bit about what it was to be a professional, what people look for, and how to work it into your own game, so to speak.

BE: Obviously, some of the people who appeared on the show were in the twilight of their careers when they turned up. Was there anyone who you recall as being just so excited to have the chance to be back working?

TL: I’ll tell you what: Howard Keel did the show. I don’t know if you know Howard Keel, but it was a very interesting thing. He did the show, and he hadn’t acted in awhile, and they would do a scene, and the director would like it, and he’d say, “Cut! Print!” And I watched Howard, and he would kind of walk away shaking his head. So I went over to him and said, “What’s the matter?” And he said, “That wasn’t it. That wasn’t it. I…I could’ve done that better, but…” (Sighs) You know, television moves really fast. But by the end of the second day, he had gotten his chops back, and it was really funny to see, because then the director would say, “Cut, print,” and Howard went, “Yesssssss!” (Laughs) So it was stuff like that, seeing a guy who was rusty finally getting his gears rolling again. And from there, he went on to do “Dallas.” So he got his chops back on our show! There were things like that. Helen Hayes, who was the first lady of the theater, I got to act with her, and that was really a kick because…I wanted to call my English teacher, who spoke very highly of her and Maurice Evans when I was coming up as a kid in high school. And there I was, actually getting to act with them! We had the Mills family: Juliet Mills, Hayley Mills, and John Mills. Vincent Price sat down and told me stories about doing theater with black performers back in the ‘30s and the ‘40s.

BE: Wow.

TL: Yeah! I mean, it was amazing…and I got stories that you could never, ever get anywhere else. Jack Gilford knew Lena Horne when she was 16 years old, and he told me the story of meeting her parents and having them say, “Our daughter wants to be in show business. What do you think? What should we do?” So Jack Gilford was part of Lena Horne’s life. You’d never find that in any history book, but you find it when you actually meet people and talk to them. Fred and I had a thing called the Goldwyn Club, and we’d take the oldest stars out to lunch, and we’d buy them lunch and have them reminiscence, just because…in a sense, we were like history buffs, and we were in awe of some of the celebrities that we were getting a chance to work with. We wanted to know what it was like back in the early days. Phil Silvers told us that he used to go buy ice cream for Bill “Bojangles” Robinson. Can you imagine that? He said Bojangles would give him a couple of bucks and say, “I want you to get me a pint of vanilla ice cream, and get half a pint for yourself.” Phil Silvers was Bill Robinson’s errand boy! He’d go off and get Bojangles some ice cream! (Laughs) You’re not going to find that stuff out without talking to these people, but here’s Phil Silvers telling me this story. That was the beauty of the show: if you had any sense of history, you got a chance to get it firsthand.

BE: Speaking of history, to speak of some of the other stuff that you’ve done in your career, you were in “Wattstax.”

TL: Yeah! I was! Along with the inimitable Richard Pryor, back in the day. I was telling somebody, “I always wanted to do a movie with Richard Pryor, I never did a movie with Richard Pryor,” and they said, “Ted, you did ‘Wattstax.’ Both of you guys are in that movie together.” I said, “Oh, yeah!” It’s not the same, though.

BE: What was that experience like? Because that was one of your first films, correct…?

TL: Actually, I did a couple of little things before that, but that was the first really major thing that I did. It was great, because it was all ad-libbed. Mel Stuart, who was the director, would ask us a question, and then we’d vamp on the question. So it was kind of fun. It was more me than it was doing a character. It was me reacting as Ted to different situations. The guy said, “We’re looking for some people who can talk on film and not have any reservations,” and I said, “Well, you came to the right guy! Turn on the camera, and let’s go, buddy!” (Laughs)

BE: What are your recollections about the concert itself?

TL: Well, I remember Isaac Hayes. It was an all-day affair, it was in a stadium, and I remember going to it, but…this was before I got in the film! Because it was in South Central, we went to the concert on our own, and later on… (Hesitates) I mean, we saw them filming at the time, but it wasn’t until later that I actually became a part of the movie! But it was a fabulous day. The whole city turned out for it…and, by that, I mean the population with color, with melanin in their skin. (Laughs) They turned out. That’s mainly who it was, because it was a celebration of Watts. It was our Woodstock, in a sense.

BE: I was fortunate enough to see Isaac Hayes in 2007 at the Hollywood Bowl, when they did a Stax reunion show.

TL: Did you really?

BE: I did. It was post-stroke, so he wasn’t 100% top of his game, but just being able to see that I saw in him in concert…

TL: Yeah, I know what you mean. I got to meet him…actually, I went to the American Film Institute, where I was studying film directing, ‘cause they have a lot of young directors coming through there, myself included, but they used to screen movies up there all the time. Every once in awhile, different celebrities would come up and watch the screenings. Robert Culp came up there. And I remember sitting up there, watching “How the West Was Won” with Isaac Hayes. I mean, that was a thrill.

BE: Talking about directing, I know you’ve done some, but one thing that particularly caught my eye on IMDb was that you had directed and played the title role in a version of “Othello.”

TL: Yeah! What I did was…I was directing Lynn Redgrave on “The Love Boat,” and we started talking, and we talked about the Royal Academy of Dramatic Arts, which I had heard of but had never gone to. And she encouraged me to check it out, and I did, and I found out that they had a special program in the summertime for Americans, but I had to get a letter of recommendation. So I got a letter of recommendation from Lynn Redgrave, went over there, studied Shakespeare, and the professor over there encouraged me to do “Othello.” So when I got back to L.A., about a year and a half later, I got the money together and did a production of “Othello.” And in the middle of doing the stage version, I came into a windfall of some money, so we made it into a movie…and, actually, everyone that’s in the movie was in the stage play.

BE: Nice.

TL: Yeah, it was really good. And I told the guys…I’ll never forget this…I sat them all down, and I said, “Look, I’ve got an opportunity to do this as a movie, so I just wanted to know if everybody’s on board with that idea.” And they said, “Aw, man, you’re not gonna make this into a movie.” And I said, “What do you mean I’m not going to make it into a movie?” They said, “You know how often we do plays and somebody says, ‘We’re gonna turn this into a movie’?” So I said, “Oh, yeah, I never thought of it like that. Well, this time, it’s gonna be true!” And it was, and we did.

BE: You’ve obviously directed a lot of TV episodes. Do any of the experiences particularly stand out as highlights?

TL: Yeah, I had a couple of really fun things. I mean, my very first directorial endeavor was with a “Love Boat,” and I got to direct Susan Strasberg. I’ll never forget it, because her father (Lee) was, like, the patron saint of method acting, and I was really worried about it and kind of nervous about directing her because I’m thinking, “She probably knows everything about acting. What can I ever say to Susan Strasberg?” But it was the very first day and the very first shot, and she did something that made me go, “Well, let me go over and tell her that, actually, she should do this and this and that.” So I went over to her, and I said, “Listen, Susan, why don’t you try this on this part and that on that part?” And it seemed like an eternity when she answered, because I didn’t know if she was going to say, “That’s the stupidest thing I’ve ever heard,” or, “That’s brilliant,” or what! (Laughs) But she looked at me and said, “Okay.” And after that, I was cool. I didn’t have a problem directing anybody after that, ‘cause if Susan Strasberg can say “okay” after I give her direction, then I’m not intimidated by anybody! (Laughs) And I worked with and directed some really big stars. Like, I directed Milton Berle on “Fantasy Island,” who could be pretty rough on directors…but I had the Susan Strasberg experience in the back of my mind, so me and Milton, we got along great. (Laughs) It was really a fun time.

BE: Tell me about working on “Friday Foster,” because I’m looking at that cast, and I’m, like, “Good grief!”

TL: Yeah, “Friday Foster” was one of my first gigs ever, and…yeah, man, wasn’t that amazing? You’ve got Pam Grier, Carl Weathers…the people who were in that, it was pretty amazing. (Writer’s note: Also in the cast were Jim Backus, Eartha Kitt, Scatman Crothers, Godfrey Cambridge, Yaphet Kotto, and Jason Bernard, who you’d absolutely recognize if you saw him.) But that was, like, one of the first things I ever did, and…you know, I’m from Oakland, California, and when you grow up there, you don’t have a shot in hell in being in the movies, but there I was in this movie with all of these people. I mean, Eartha Kitt…? I’ll never forget that. I had a great time doing that.

BE: It might be a film that you’d put into the “blaxploitation” genre, but you look at that cast, and…I mean, you might not call it a powerhouse cast, but those are all immediately familiar faces.

TL: Well, you know, the reason they called them “black exploitation” was that there was no work for black actors. I mean, they had the big studio pictures, but those pictures…they cost a lot of money to make, and they weren’t cognizant of black performers at that time, and the only way that we got to ply our craft and learn acting in front of the camera was through these other, cheaper movies. So what they did was…it was “black exploitation” because they made these movies at cut-rate prices, and the money that they made off of them was amazing, because the audiences really wanted to see movies with themselves in it. So that’s what the exploitation was: they made them as cheaply as possible, not the best writing, not even the best directing, but it was a chance for us to perform, and they made grand theft money on those movies. So they really exploited us, but by the same token, the studios didn’t use us. They didn’t hire us. I mean, you had a couple of guys. You had Sidney Poitier and couple of other guys, and that was it on the studio side. But where we learned our acting chops and where we got ourselves together was in those low-budget black movies.

BE: Another IMDb discovery that I found, and then found the YouTube clip to back it up, was a movie called “Record City.”

TL: (Horrified gasp) Is that on YouTube?

BE: Well, the trailer is, anyway.

TL: No! You know, Rick Dees was at the TV Land Awards, and he and I were talking there, ‘cause we did that movie together. He’s in “Record City,” too.

BE: Oh, yeah, he’s very prominent in the trailer.

TL: Yeah! Well, you know, he was a big deal at the time. He’d come to L.A. from…well, he’d come from somewhere else, anyway, and he was making a big splash in L.A. So we were laughing together, and somebody said, “How do you two know each other?” And he said, “We did a movie together, and we hope that nobody ever sees it.” (Laughs) And now you’re telling me that the trailer for it is on YouTube!

BE: Oh, man, I put the trailer on my Facebook page, in conjunction with knowing that I was doing this interview, and the general response from everyone was basically, “Oh, my…”

TL: (Laughs) Yeah! You know, they had every second banana that was in television or movies in that film. I remember that Ruth Buzzi was in the makeup chair, and she had to do a lot of makeup ‘cause they had to do some kind of special makeup for her, and I walked in and…I just wanted to mess with her, so her makeup was half on and half off, and I said, “Ruth, the assistant director’s looking for you.” She said, “What do you mean?” I said, “Well, they’ve got to reshoot that stuff you just did.” (Laughs) She got so mad! I said, “Oh, no, no, I’m just kidding! I’m just kidding!” “That’s not funny!” I said, “Well, you should’ve seen your face, then, ‘cause it was hysterical!” We had fun on that movie, but…you know what they did? They shot that movie on tape. This was back in the day, and they shot it on tape, and it just didn’t…that was an early experiment. It would be like doing it in digital today. They shot it on tape, but it was so experimental that it just didn’t look right, and they were trying to master that. Yeah, “Record City,” man… (Starts laughing again)

BE: I’d think that the music licensing alone would keep that off DVD, so you’re probably safe.

TL: Yeah, well, let’s keep our fingers crossed!

BE: So I mentioned it in passing earlier, but how did you enjoy working on “That’s My Mama”? You know, I think that show has been in syndication ever since it originally aired.

TL: You might be right! “That’s My Mama” was, for me, a great learning experience, because I wasn’t the star of the show, but I was there every week, and I got to see the politics of working on television as well as the art of trying to make a show work and be funny. “That’s My Mama” was how I got my feet wet, so that was a wonderful training ground for me.

BE: And from that into “Mr. T and Tina.” I know it didn’t last long, but I would’ve thought that it would’ve had some considerable promotional heft behind it, since Pat Morita was just coming off of “Happy Days” at the time.

TL: Well, you know, that was the first show canceled that year. (Laughs) We shot eight shows, they showed…I think four before they canceled it. It was on for a month, and that was it. Over and out. But, actually, that was the show that got me “The Love Boat,” because the network saw me do that. The writing was not as strong as it could’ve been, but I got my laughs whenever I came on, so they just took me from that and put me in “The Love Boat,” sight unseen. No screen test, no reading or anything. I just went on television.

BE: So to bring it back to “The Love Boat,” what do you think of when you think of the show?

TL: You know, I really enjoyed the show when I got to travel. That was the fun of being on our particular show, because we went all over the world. You know, we went from Hong Kong to Egypt to Australia to Fiji. I really enjoyed meeting the superstars that came in, acting with them, and seeing the world. I’ll never forget, like, John Astin, who was on “The Addams Family,” he and I hung out in Egypt. My kids asked me, “Were you ever in Egypt?” “Yeah, I was with John Astin!” (Laughs) Me, John Astin, and Fred Grandy, we’d go out exploring in Cairo. It’s stuff like that, where we were having such a good time, like with Brenda Vaccaro in Hong Kong. It was a great time.

BE: Do you enjoy doing the callbacks to the character on various shows?

TL: Oh, yeah. That’s not a problem, because Isaac was a loveable character. I don’t mind that at all. I know some people don’t want to see their characters again. Once they’re done with them, they’re done. But that’s not the case for me. People have very fond memories of Isaac. If they’re sober.

BE: And that begs a question I meant to ask earlier: did you ever have to take a bartending class?

TL: I did, actually! If you ever watch the show, in the first season, you can really see that I mix very few drinks. (Laughs) After the show got established, though, I decided that, for the second season, I would at least know how to make a drink and garnish the glass properly. So that’s what I did: I went to a bartending school, and they gave me a license. And they also gave me a license in the name of Isaac Washington, so I put that up on the set. (Laughs)

BE: Whose idea was the double-point trademark?

TL: That was just an accident. The guy said, “Look into the lens,” and I said, “Well, why am I looking into the lens? I’m making a drink!” And the guy says, “’Cause you’re getting a paycheck.” And the double point came out of nowhere. (Laughs) I don’t know where it came from!

BE: I don’t know if you watch “Futurama” at all…

TL: Yeah, sure!

BE: Okay, so you’ve seen the iZac, then. (Laughs)

TL: Yeah, I saw that. And, actually, I got credit on IMDb for the voice, but I didn’t do the voice! But I figured, “Ah, I’m not going to argue with them.” But I was mad ‘cause they didn’t ask me to do the voice! But recently I did “The Cleveland Show,” and at least they asked me to do the voice for that, so I got to go in and get animated. (Laughs) That was fun.

BE: Lastly, I’m just curious about something. Your biggest part, or at least your most recognizable role, was one that you did in the ‘70s and ‘80s. How do you go about maintaining your career today? Do you actively look for work, or does it come looking for you?

TL: Well, you know, the thing about show business is that a job can come from anywhere. Sometimes it’s somebody that remembers your character that’s at an advertising agency and wants you to promote Bud Light… (Laughs) …or it can be where they’re doing a joke on a sitcom and they want to do something about bartending and remember you. Or sometimes you just go in and audition for a part along with 200 other guys, and they pick you. So the job can come from anywhere. I mean, that’s kind of the thing that you live with as an actor. The thing that I’m most grateful about is that I love the theater, and I was able to maintain myself and not go crazy or end up on drugs because I love doing theater. I actually segued into playwriting, and I’ve written 23 plays. I’m going to be doing a play this summer here in Los Angeles called “Let Freedom Ring,” which is a new play that I’ve written. So my saving grace is that, as well as being on film, I have an affinity for the theater and being on stage. Sometimes they don’t want you on television or you don’t get the part in the movie, but I know that I can always go to the theater and ply my craft.

BE: Well, I think I’ve bent your ear enough, but I hope I gave you a variety of questions that you haven’t gotten recently.

TL: Yeah, you hit some stuff that people don’t usually ask. That was really appealing.

BE: I figured you’d been buried in “Love Boat” questions, but you’ve done some really interesting stuff, so it was nice to be able to ask you about it.

TL: Yeah, that was nice, thanks.

BE: Good talking to you, Ted!

TL: You, too!

* Bryan Singer will be producing, not directing, the next “X-Men” prequel. He’ll be directing “Jack, the Giant Killer” instead. And another Mike Fleming story, an exclusive this time: “Paranormal Activity 2” has a director. He’s Tod Williams, best known for “The Door in the Floor.” Sounds to me like Paramount is keeping things modest, wisely.

* The very ill Dennis Hopper got his star on the Hollywood Walk of Fame today.  Amy Kaufman has video of the ceremony which included Hopper rather gently chiding the paparazzi for an incident which caused him to fall. The video itself ends with photographers yelling “Viggo!” and “Jack!”

* Ridley Scott’s “Robin Hood” with Russell Crowe as Robin will be opening Cannes this year. The plot description put me somewhat in mind of the angle the great director Richard Lester and writer James Goldman took on the legend in a film I’m quite partial to, “Robin and Marian,” which starred Sean Connery and Audrey Hepburn.

* Like most serious film lovers, I was very sorry to hear of the cancellation of the newly revitalized “At the Movies” with Michael Phillips and A.O. Scott. Andrew Wallenstein, however, sees a ray of hope for newspapers. Roger Ebert sees more than a ray of hope for the format and the Internet.

* My friend, cartoonist Randy Reynaldo, writes about his encounter with the late Robert Culp, who was attempting to launch a film version of the classic comic strip, “Terry and the Pirates.”

* Angelina Jolie might, or might not, be Maleficent at some future point, or not in a movie that might, or might not, be made by Tim Burton at some point. Sometimes, the Internet can just wear a guy down.

* Here’s a story I like. It looks like David Cronenberg, Viggo  Mortenson and writer Steve Knight will be reteaming for a sequel to a movie I really liked a lot, “Eastern Promises.” Nice to see a sequel happening not just because the prior film was profitable but probably mostly because there’s a legitimate further story to be told and because the makers work well together.

* The rumour mill is touting both Carey Mulligan and Colin Firth for the upcoming redo of “My Fair Lady” which I understand is supposed to be a bit less of a romanticized take on George Bernard Shaw’s “Pygmalion.” Emma Thompson is writing the adaptation (and I hope playing at least a small role in there someplace) and John Madden directing. Anyhow, it sounds good to me.

* I’m trying to keep an open mind, but this story about a “lost” audio recording by Orson Welles of a self-published book by a friend of his becoming the basis of a new family movie gives me the creeps. If Welles is such an all-fired hot property still, why not make “Chimes at Midnight” available in the U.S. again, for God’s sake? The film, which starred Welles as my favorite Shakespeare character, Sir John Falstaff, and used material by Shakespeare from several of the plays featuring the character who figures prominently in the Bard’s greatest history plays, is thought by Wellesians to be as good or better than “Citizen Kane.” I don’t know, but the fact that it hasn’t been available or shown theatrically in the U.S. for, I think, about thirty years or so is a true cinema crime. The idea that all been held up by some legal issues is kind of loathsome. Who profits by keeping the film hidden all these years?

* Your daily dose of meta, as Variety reportedly struggles and strong-arms as it attempts to survive by putting itself behind a marginalizing pay wall, Ms. Nikki Finke has managed to make herself the story in an affair involving the other big trade, The Hollywood Reporter.  It’s actually too long and dull a story to go into involving her rivalry with Sharon Waxman of the Wrap, but the short version is that she’s claimed she was offered a house to become Editor-in-Chief  of THR. though the paper has denied making any offer at all. I’ve said it before under similar circumstances, but the most disturbing part of this story is the idea of Nikki Finke being somebody’s boss. Terrifying.

Costarring with his colleague and friend Cosby, he directed an attempt to translate their TV fame into movies with 1972’s “Hickey and Boggs.”  The film, which was written by a young Walter Hill, tried to go in vastly different, far grittier and grimmer direction than the TV show and failed at the box office. Recently, however, it’s been rediscovered by some cinephiles and crime film fans.

Still, a few year before that Culp appeared in one of the real cultural break-out movies of the 1960s, “Bob & Carol & Ted & Alice.” For better or worse, it helped popularized, or perhaps merely capitalized, on the idea of “swinging” and “free love” among the older, married set. I haven’t seen this one either and I have no excuse other than somewhat mixed-feelings about most of writer-director Paul Mazursky’s other movies. However, in her heartfelt farewell to Culp, Cinematical’s Monika Bartyzel was kind enough to provide the lengthy, terrific clip below. This scene with Natalie Wood really shows Culp’s way with both serious and light material as he experiences a pretty broad swath of emotions in a scene that starts out as something close to straight drama and gradually eases into some pretty delightful comedy. Now, I want to see this.