The Generation Gap Rap

Please spare me repetitive rap
I'll snore if they bust one more cap
To glocks they add notches
while grabbing their crotches
I'm bored and lie down for a nap

Gee, a middle aged white guy who doesn't like hip hop. What a shocker. Here's an earlier rap diatribe.

Cottage Cheesy

Disfigured by special effects
Rejected by beautiful ex
He hides in a cottage
(It's dark, with low wattage)
and figures he'll never have sex

Looking a bit like Jonah Hex, scarred WW2 vet Robert Young seeks refuge in The Enchanted Cottage (John Cromwell, 1944).

Waiting for Monroe

If ever she steps on the set
each line in the script she'll forget
She hides in her trailer
where nerves again fail her
Producers are starting to sweat

Marilyn Monroe in The Misfits. Photo source: Movie Title Stills Collection.

Id-Life Crisis

Set free when old farts start regressing
are simian hearts they're repressing
Upon their escapes
these innermost apes
are Marilyn's parts reassessing



Cary Grant and Marilyn Monroe are in the Monkey Business (Howard Hawks, 1952). Image source: Movie Title Stills Collection. Grant plays a research chemist working on a fountain of youth pill who gets a taste of his own medicine.

Boo Hoo Lou

So sad about "Sweet Lou" Piniella

a stand up and Hall of Fame fella

The Cubs made him cry

while saying good-bye

by playing right into the cella

----Surly Hack via houseboy Norm

Pro Exit

Though Marilyn's part is a bit
the men in a minute submit
Her walk-on is grand
but please understand
her walk-off is more of a hit



Groucho Marx (as detective Sam Grunion), Marilyn Monroe and Eric Blore get Love Happy (David Miller, Leo McCarey, 1949). Photo source: Movie Title Stills Collection.

Honk If You're Horny

We once took our dates to the drive-in
in autos so large you could dive in
The film on the screen
would go by unseen
while back-seated hormones were thrivin'

Patter Matter

The carnival barker's a shark
A conman in search of a mark
He pitches and spiels
and offers up "deals"
When wary, "Hey, rube!" he will bark


Photo: W.C. Fields as carny Gabby Gilfoil in Two Flaming Youths (John Waters, 1927).

Carnival of Goals

The carnival midway's aglow,
a tacky and glittery show
Attracting the hicks,
the games are all fixed
to separate stiffs from their dough

The title is a rather uninspired play on the charmingly weird indie film Carnival of Souls (1962). Image source: That Obscure Hollow.

Eight Days a Geek

A market of secret delight,
the carnival's seedy at night
It's creepiest feature,
the geek is a creature
whose bark isn't worse than its bite

Tyrone Power takes a bite out of Nightmare Alley (Edmund Goulding, 1947). Photo source: Wonders in the Dark

Crystal Ball Bearing

The mist of tomorrow now clears
and into the future he peers
The drinker foresees
his liver disease
and so to cirrhosis, says "Cheers!"


A bottle becomes a crystal ball to Ian Kieth and Tyrone Power in Nightmare Alley (Edmund Goulding, 1947). There's more on Power and this amazing, mesmerizing film at Self-Styled Siren, here. Photo: Self-Styled Siren; en.kendincos.net

Nightmare Alley Cats

Calliopes blow in the dark
A carnival barker yells, "Hark!"
"Come shriek at the geek
and peek at the freak
conducting electrical arc!"



Joan Blondell, Mike Mazurki, Colleen Grey and Tyrone Power in Nightmare Alley (Edmund Goulding, 1947). Photo source: The Movie Title Stills Collection; thenighteditor.blogspot.com; moviemail-online.co.uk; cinemaisdope.com

Patricia Neal, R.I.P.

Her talents left men in a stupor
Pneumatically drilled Gary Cooper
Cavorting with Gort
Pat Neil was a sport
An actor, a broad and a trouper



A voice like molasses, she's one of those lasses... Above: Patricia Neal with Gary Cooper in The Fountainhead (King Vidor, 1949). Below: With Gort the robot and Michael Rennie in The Day the Earth Stood Still (Robert Wise, 1951), and Andy Griffith in A Face in the Crowd (Elia Kazan, 1957). Photo source: dvdbeaver.com; tumblr.com

Schwing! The Body Electric

Attracted like moths to a spark
a barker lures rubes to the park
To sideshows they barge
receiving a charge
from cuties that glow in the dark




Tyrone Power, Colleen Grey and Mike Mazurki illuminate the darkness in Nightmare Alley (Edmund Goulding, 1947). Photo source: selfstyledsiren.blogspot.com; filmsnoir.net; filmfanatic.org.

It's Geek to Me

How low can a joe really sink?
Far lower than most folks would think
A geek will eat chicken
alive and still kickin'
There's no low too low for a drink



Tyrone Power runs down to the dark end of Nightmare Alley (Edmund Goulding, 1947). Photo source: DVD Beaver.

Climbing the High Wall

A vet to the psych ward's committed
To strangling his wife he's admitted
First cure and then try him
for murder, then fry him
Is dating the doctor permitted?


Murder suspect Robert Taylor is under the tender loving care of doc Audrey Totter behind the High Wall (Curtis Bernhardt, 1947), another late forties psychoanalytic noir. Click to enlarge the publicity still at the top.

Deadly Do-Right

Kiss deadly, you lunkhead, but kiss me
As soon as I'm dead you can dis me
Affairs are perverse
when sharing a hearse
When I'm in my grave you will miss me



This limerick is merely a play on the title Kiss Me Deadly (Robert Aldrich, 1955) , and has nothing to do with Ralph Meeker as Mickey Spillane's bedroom dick Mike Hammer, or with Maxine Cooper as his "secretary" Velda, or for that matter, with the film's plot. But this one does. Photo source: Only the Cinema