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] Date Posted:08:16:04 08/29/05 Mon
This may have been mentioned before because I believe this program has been repeated, but..., on the Discovery Channel last night they had a show called 'Lost Treasures of the Deep'. Of course the subject was pirates and their ships that sank with treausres aboard. However, I thought it was interesting that when they were discussing Blackbeard (possibly the most famous pirate of all!)that they actually used footage from the Robert Newton film. I think they also may have used footage from a silent film, possibly with Douglas Fairbanks?? But most used was RN's film.
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Date Posted:00:03:00 09/08/05 Thu
I think I've seen that special, but even if I hadn't, I wouldn't be surprised that footage of RN was used to depict the historical Blackbeard ... There are those two books I posted illustrations from on the site (at www.mooncove.com/newton/impers.htm under "A Cultural Icon") that depict RN as if he *is* Blackbeard, and there are probably plenty more. Apologies to Ilsa and Lois, but Robert Newton really accomplished something great by etching himself in the cultural consciousness as the quintessential pirate. And at least his career didn't suffer as a direct result of playing the role so well, unlike Bela Lugosi, who found himself typecast after etching his interpretation of Dracula into our psyches in 1931, stuck mostly in B horror movies for the rest of his life. (He died in 1956 also--a very sad year.) At least Bobby continued to get a variety of roles after LJS/Blackbeard, and his final film was an Oscar winner.
