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My Adventures in Dr. T Land---Part 1
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Let’s start in the deep dark past. 1972 to be specific. When I was in high school, I would show movies in my basement. Now I’m not talking about videos, they weren’t invented until a decade later, I mean good old 16mm prints shown on a Kodak Pageant projector. Usually these films would cost anywhere from sixty to $250 per showing. My father found a place called Union County Film Rental and their prints were between $20 and $60. I ran a thriving paper route business at the time raking in a whopping $8.50 a week. About every three months I would rent a film and invite my friends over for movie night. Most of the time it was a Hammer horror film starring Peter Chushing and/or Christopher Lee.
A real film buff convinced me to rent “The 5000 Fingers of Dr. T” for one of these shows. The films would arrive on Wednesday for a Friday showing and I would have to mail it back on Monday. I was the AV nerd president at school so on Wednesday I would take the projector home and start to watch the film. On a good week, I could view a film 15 times before I sent it back. The record belongs to “The Horror of Dracula” which I watched 29 times before it was returned. In the course of watching “Dr. T,” I began to notice the film had some major continuity flaws. In one chase scene Tommy Retic has a paper in his back pocket that he doesn’t discover until later in the movie, a Band-Aid appears on his finger before he pricks his finger, some of the songs sounded cut, little things that made me believe the film may have been drastically recut and that maybe a longer version existed.
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Well, there is not a lot a kid of 18-years-old can do. So time passes. Eventually I got married and had two kids of my own. By this time vhs is out and I make my kids watch the film. Years later my daughter tells me that it was a really scary experience. I remembered my analysis of the film and start to do a little research on the movie.
You can find anything on the internet. I mean anything. At this point I need to stop and try to remember the order of events, because things happened one top of each other. started to search the web for anything pertaining to “The 5000 Fingers,” Dr. Seuss (the author), and Standley Kramer (the producer). At the University of California library site I discover rough drafts of the film under a Ted Geisel Special section.
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So this gives me the idea to search ebay for a copy of the script. Now if you haven’t been on ebay, be warned in is an addiction. You will find yourself waking up at three am desperate for a fix. You just have to know what new items have appeared in the last 24 hours.
The fact is I didn’t find the script, but I did find a bootleg soundtrack album and the whole second side was all outtake songs. I was really jazzed. I didn’t win the auction, but the seller had a second album that I did buy. And there were several songs omitted from the film. This really got me going. Where were these songs supposed to go in the movie? I needed a road map. Then I hit a screenplay web site, the scriptshack, and they had the “5000 Fingers” script. My first reaction was that it would probably be based on the final version of the movie rather then the real shooting script, but I had to have it.
It arrived and once again I’m flying, not only is it the original script, but it has all the lyrics to the songs and where they go in the film. And here’s the really cool part; it also tells me I was right about the order of the scenes. The movie was shot correctly for continuity, but the scenes were rearranged after shooting. Now comes the next big question, do the missing scenes exist? At least the songs got as far as the studio recording sessions. They are generally completed first and then the scenes are shot with the aid playback.
By this time I begin to notice how much 5000 Finger stuff keeps showing up on ebay. Not a lot at one time, but constantly, at least 4-5 items at any given time. Then two publicity photos of Tommy Rettig sell for $85 a piece. The little man inside me starts to scream, “Hey wake up, some of the people involved in the film are still alive and might be able to answer your questions.” Well, not Tommy Rettig, unfortunately he died in 1996. The next clue is a beautiful obituary for Peter Lind Hayes. It mentions his wife, Mary Heally (Hayes), who is still alive and well and the fact that a close friend has written a biography of Peter and Mary. Tracking down the author was a challenge but I finally found her phone number and called her just to ask what information she might have about the film. She calls back from with an invitation for me to meet with Mary and discuss her recollection of the shooting.
I’m headed to the city on business anyway and call Mary to set up a meeting time with her. While talking to Mary, she reminds me that Stanley Kramer is still alive somewhere in California. Once again it’s back to the internet to locate Mr. Kramer. With the help of the producers association I find a number that’s supposed to be his production company. I called and left a message on the answering machine. I didn’t expect to hear back, but as I was getting ready to meet with Mary, my phone rings and it’s Mrs. Stanley Kramer. She wants to know what my goal is in obtaining information about “The 5000 Fingers”. To be totally honest, I really didn’t know what my goal was. Sure, it would be really cool to discover the missing scenes to one of my favorite movies, but then what? It became very clear, the film needed to be restored and re-released so it could be given the recognition it deserves. When it was originally released it was a total disaster. To quote Hans Conreid, Dr.T himself, “The film never made its print money back. It was comparable only to WILSON as one of the greatest money-losers of all time“. And with the unused songs restored, even old fans would have a whole new experience. Noble thoughts and not bad for spur of the moment. Mrs. Kramer told me that the film was one of Stanley’s big disappointments. He really wanted to direct it but the studio, Columbia, was not willing.
She leaves me feeling that probably the scenes were never shot. And if they were, chances are they are long gone. But the fact the recordings of the songs still exist gives me some hope. Within the same week, I meet with Mary. Her schedule is so full by the time I arrive in town that it looks like we aren’t going to hook up. I beg her and even bribe her with a CD copy of the soundtrack. Finally she agrees to meet with Jan, the lady who wrote her biography, and me.
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Talk about your kid in a candy store! She was so gracious. And to my surprise, she and Peter loved working on the film and were just heartbroken that the final film left out so many of the songs. She can still sing them. Peter, a real electronic bug, had a reel-to-reel copy of the songs. Jan’s children grew up listening to Mary and Peter doing 5000 Finger songs plus all their nightclub songs. Few people are aware how big these two entertainers were in Las Vegas. Performing with most of the name acts including the Rat Pack. It was after a particularly long night of performing at the Sands Hotel, that Stanley Kramer approached Peter in the bar and asked him if he had thought about appearing in films. Peter made some remark and Stanley said “well, I’m Stanley Kramer and I have a script I think is right for you.” At which point Peter jumped up and offers to kiss his feet.
As for answers, once again I got no definitive ones. It
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was, after all, fifty years ago and the production was long and often interrupted. At the same time, Mary and Peter were very busy with Vegas and radio. They had several radio shows and early TV shows. One more side note, while I was visiting Mary, I found an original one-sheet poster for the film. What a sign! Mary could not be sure if the missing scenes had been shot. So once again, I’m left to search the internet for clues for something that might not even exist.
Back on the internet, I found over fifty sites that were in some way related to “The 5000 Fingers of Dr. T” and then I found the missing third floor! Confused? In the film the elevator that takes Bart and Mr. Zabladouski to the dungeon lists four floors, but the demented elevator operator only sings about three. He skips the third floor and with good reason. That’s where they have the household appliances; gas chambers, roasting pans, electric chairs, ECT. It’s in the screenplay, but not in the film. If you listen very carefully you can hear the edit in the music. Once again on the internet I stumble across a site that is an eclectic radio station in Berkley, California. They have a two-hour program for sale called “The Happy Fingers Method” based on the film. I purchased the tape and it is made up of overlapping sounds from many sources, but mainly the 5000 Fingers. It even uses the outtake songs, so I figure they have a copy of the counterfeit soundtrack. Then it starts to play the elevator song and I nearly run off the road, it has the missing third floor verse. How did they get that? Through a series of emails with the station’s main program director I get an email address of the person who supplied the soundtrack.
A few more emails reveal that this person has not only the complete elevator song, but also alternate version of several of the songs. And alternate versions of some of the songs not included in the film. He got his copy from a customer at a record store he use to work in, but can’t remember his name. But he agrees to send me two CD’s of all the 5000 Finger material he has and it is the mother lode. It even contains piano only versions of some of the songs. It appears the reason the songs exist today is that at the time the film was made they made records (acetates) for production people to listen to. The recordings are what still exist today.
Another site I visited had two Dr. T sound clips, one being the Elevator song. Another series of emails and I wind up sending an MP3 files (even had to learn how to make them) to the owner of the site. He gets so excited when I tell him about all the extra tracks that I unearthed that he thinks we can sell the idea of a new soundtrack CD with all the tracks.
Now a new question pops up, who owns the rights to the film and the music? My friend who is trying to get some record companies interested in the CD project feels that Sony is owner, but can’t get much of a response from them. Meanwhile, back in the Batcave, I am busy on the internet and find a site that has been shut down by a law firm that represents Dr. Seuss Enterprises, Inc. The site owner was so mad that they shut him down that he posted the entire letter, including the address and fax numbers. I figured they should know who owns the rights, but their web site refuses to take my email, so I fax (how archaic) them a letter and receive a phone call in return. He tells me to contact a representative in New York City. Seems that they had a reason to research that subject 2 and a half years ago. That would be about the same time that several articles started to appeared announcing the possibility that the film is being transformed into a Broadway show. The New York person turns me over to a person at Sony/Columbia, so it looks like I’m back where I started.
Well by this time I’m pretty tired of tracking down ownership of the movie, so I did whatany frustrated researcher does, I go back to eBay to get an auction fix. A few more 5000 Finger items appear. Now the prices are getting higher.
To be continued........see part 2
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