Above photo: H.M. Wynant talking with The Howling Man in The Twilight Zone.
The video is H.M fighting Elvis in It Happened at the World's Fair holding the gun on Elvis and Gary Lockwood.
The little girl is now the first lady of Hawaii. She married the governor.
I was in Hollywood with my audiobook, Rock Star Rising almost completed. I planned to attend the Hollywood Collectors Show. The show usually has about 70 actors sitting at tables with photos from their movies that they sign for the fans.
My agent Larry went with me to visit a client of his that had a table there. I didn't know the actor's name, so I didn't think too much of it. Walking up to H.M. Wynant's table Larry introduced me.
Then I looked down and saw a photo of this actor holding a gun on Elvis Presley from the movie It Happened at the World’s Fair. I knew the movie well.
I pointed to the photo and said to H. M. "Hey, you're Vince Bradley, the gangster." He said, "You know my character's name? That's amazing." I said, "You did a great fight scene with Elvis."
Then I saw a photo from one of my favorite Twilight Zone episodes, where the hero is told not to let a man out of a room because he’s the devil. It’s called, The Howling Man. I never realized it was the same actor with that same great voice.
Later, as I walked around the show room, I thought about how I must have this actor in some part of my audiobook. But where?
Then I remembered that I needed a voice to read about eight lines from from Moby Dick that the hero listens to. Also, I needed the final credits read and someone to say: "This is the end of this disc."
It wasn't much. But at least I'd have him on the project. Larry arranged for him to come to the studio to perform.
H.M. told me that his best friend had been the actor Richard Basehart, who played the lead in John Huston's Moby Dick. Basehart also starred in the TV series Voyage to the Bottom of the Sea.
When Basehart passed away H.M. named a playhouse in his honor. So H.M. was excited to read some of the lines that his best friend had read when narration the movie of Moby Dick.
After he finished recording with me, H. M. said, "I felt like Richard was with me in the recording booth."
A few months later, I realized the one of the monks in The Howling Man was the actor that played Richard Basehart's friend Queequeg in Moby Dick. I told H.M. about it. He hadn't realized it and thought it a great coincidence.
A year later, H.M. would play a lead character in my audiobook of McKnight's Memory.
Rock Star Rising and McKnight's Memory audio-books are free on my You-Tube channel. Link Below.
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