Manson, Bugliosi et al

[Joseph McBride]

CHARLIE SAYS, a new film on the Manson case that isn't getting much attention, blames the murders almost entirely on Manson's anger at Terry Melcher for not letting him record an album. This is absurdly reductive and is contradicted in the film itself by Manson learning before the murders that Melcher no longer lives at the house, which he visits to find Sharon Tate there with Jay Sebring (Manson actually did visit the house and had a brief interaction with Tate). That film has some virtues (mostly involving what Orson Welles told me interested him about the case, "how this man got control of the minds of all those girls") but mostly hews to the simplistic Vincent Bugliosi theory of the case (which is thoroughly demolished by Jim DiEugenio in PARKLAND/and the revised version, THE JFK ASSASSINATION). The role of Tex Watson in the murders is portrayed incoherently in CHARLIE SAYS; he disappears for long stretches, comes back for no apparent reason, and becomes seemingly the most savage of the gang, with the girls' savagery somewhat minimized. Susan Atkins was arguably the most psychotic and savage of the girls, and the least repentant (unlike Krenwinkel and Van Houten), but Atkins is only vaguely portrayed, and the film seems to buy her specious claim to have found Jesus afterward (as Watson also claimed, though the film doesn't show that). Mae Brussell thought Watson was the prime actor in the murders and Manson the patsy to discredit the antiwar movement and the hippie movement (http://www.maebrussell.com/.... Of course, Watson's Army Intelligence connections are not mentioned in CHARLIE SAYS. There was more than meets the eye in this story. . . .

Since Quentin Tarantino -- taking a page from the Harvey Weinstein CRYING GAME playbook -- has managed to intimidate the press into basically not reviewing the last 34 minutes of his film ONCE UPON A TIME . . . IN HOLLYWOOD in which the plot strands come together, I don't know if Sharon Tate lives or dies in that film, but some reports from Cannes seem to suggest that he contrives a fantasy happy ending for her to make the audience feel good. I can report that CHARLIE SAYS does something like that with its tragic primary character, Leslie Van Houten. Sharon doesn't live, but Van Houten earlier is given a chance to escape the Spahn Ranch in a key scene but chooses not to leave and then somewhat without motivation volunteers to go along and help slaughter the LaBiancas. But at the end of the film, writer Guinevere Turner and director Mary Harron tack on a fantasy ending in which the scene is replayed, and Van Houten chooses to leave Charlie and not participate. This reminds me of William Dean Howells's observation to Edith Wharton, "What the American public always wants is a tragedy with a happy ending."

• •  

Edited May 25, 2019 by Joseph McBride

[Cliff Varnell]

4 hours ago, Joseph McBride said:

CHARLIE SAYS, a new film on the Manson case that isn't getting much attention, blames the murders almost entirely on Manson's anger at Terry Melcher for not letting him record an album. This is absurdly reductive and is contradicted in the film itself by Manson learning before the murders that Melcher no longer lives at the house, which he visits to find Sharon Tate there with Jay Sebring (Manson actually did visit the house and had a brief interaction with Tate). That film has some virtues (mostly involving what Orson Welles told me interested him about the case, "how this man got control of the minds of all those girls") but mostly hews to the simplistic Vincent Bugliosi theory of the case (which is thoroughly demolished by Jim DiEugenio in PARKLAND/and the revised version, THE JFK ASSASSINATION). The role of Tex Watson in the murders is portrayed incoherently in CHARLIE SAYS; he disappears for long stretches, comes back for no apparent reason, and becomes seemingly the most savage of the gang, with the girls' savagery somewhat minimized. Susan Atkins was arguably the most psychotic and savage of the girls, and the least repentant (unlike Krenwinkel and Van Houten), but Atkins is only vaguely portrayed, and the film seems to buy her specious claim to have found Jesus afterward (as Watson also claimed, though the film doesn't show that). Mae Brussell thought Watson was the prime actor in the murders and Manson the patsy to discredit the antiwar movement and the hippie movement (http://www.maebrussell.com/.... Of course, Watson's Army Intelligence connections are not mentioned in CHARLIE SAYS. There was more than meets the eye in this story. . . .

Since Quentin Tarantino -- taking a page from the Harvey Weinstein CRYING GAME playbook -- has managed to intimidate the press into basically not reviewing the last 34 minutes of his film ONCE UPON A TIME . . . IN HOLLYWOOD in which the plot strands come together, I don't know if Sharon Tate lives or dies in that film, but some reports from Cannes seem to suggest that he contrives a fantasy happy ending for her to make the audience feel good. I can report that CHARLIE SAYS does something like that with its tragic primary character, Leslie Van Houten. Sharon doesn't live, but Van Houten earlier is given a chance to escape the Spahn Ranch in a key scene but chooses not to leave and then somewhat without motivation volunteers to go along and help slaughter the LaBiancas. But at the end of the film, writer Guinevere Turner and director Mary Harron tack on a fantasy ending in which the scene is replayed, and Van Houten chooses to leave Charlie and not participate. This reminds me of William Dean Howells's observation to Edith Wharton, "What the American public always wants is a tragedy with a happy ending."

• •  

Joseph, have you read MANSON IN HIS OWN WORDS (w/Nuel Emmons)?  Leaves  the impression Susan Atkins was the main driver of the plot.  She got off writing stuff on the wall (or was it the fridge?) in Gary Hinman's blood after Bobby Beausoleil whacked him.  According to Charlie it was her idea to commit copycat murders with stuff written on the walls in blood to convince the cops they had the wrong guy after they arrested Bobby.  If so, the entire plot was hatched in Sadie Mae's bloodlust.

 

 

Edited May 25, 2019 by Cliff Varnell

[Joseph McBride]

No, I haven't read that. I will. Atkins always struck me as the most

evil of the girls. I also just watched another new movie on the

subject, THE HAUNTING OF SHARON TATE, an absolutely dreadful

piece of exploitation trash. Imagine the worst possible kind of movie

on the subject, and this is it, abominably written and acted and with

the Tate murders turned into a gorefest for people who get off

on blood and mayhem. The movie's stupid gimmick is that Tate

has premonitions of the slaughter for about a year, which amps up

the constantly hokey "eerie" nature of every shot in this slackly directed film but actually deprives

the movie of genuine dramatic shock. The murders are shown in

detail twice, once as they sort of happened (though the directing

is incoherent), and then at the end as a fantasy of Tate and her

friends fighting back and killing the intruders. So this is the way

Manson/Tate movies are going this year of the 50th anniversary -- fantasy "happy endings." I wonder

if the people who made these two low-budgeters got wind of what Tarantino might do (did he?) and

decided to preempt him. In any case, it's a sad trend that exemplifies

what T. S. Eliot wrote: "Humankind cannot bear very much reality."

Edited May 25, 2019 by Joseph McBride

[Jeff Carter]

There’s another independent film called “The Manson Family” (2000  dir. Jim VanBebber), which borders on fan fiction as the filmmaker and enthusiastic non-professional cast bring their cultish personal fascinations with the Manson family to their role-playing. It’s well-researched and strives to hew to the documented record. The murders are recreated with chilling precision.

Ed Sander’s The Family is perhaps the best book from the era, with a fitting sardonic tone. Peter Levenda’s Sinister Forces trilogy refers to Manson extensively, focussing on what Welles pointed out - the mind control element. Levenda wonders if Manson’s skill-set was developed by psychiatric programs run in the US prison systems as part of MK-ULTRA. That said, the notion that the Tate-LaBianca slayings were crime/revenge related contracted “hits” with collateral damage and staged hippy/cult aspects seems more accurate than Bugliosi’s theory.

[James DiEugenio]

Tom O'Neil's book on that case is finally coming out in a couple of months.  He spent decades on that case.

He also got a major publisher to do it, Little Brown.  

I really regret that Bugliosi is not alive to debate him on TV.  But he told me he included a taped discussion they had in the book.

IMO, Vince did a disservice to the public with Helter Skelter. 

I never heard of Charlie Says Joe,  thanks for the alert.

[David Andrews]

Interestingly, the crap-ola horror film The Haunting of Sharon Tate, whose script reads like a child's idea of the dialogue at Cielo Drive, also has its version of an "It never happened!" ending.  One wonders if this is some nexus of several minds working on the same invention during the same historical period (telephone, electrical power, etc.), or if story ideas just float loose in Hollywood conversations for any thieving magpie to grab and incorporate into his/her screenplay

EDIT - I missed McBride's post when I wrote this.  He's right, don't see it.  I've seen the trailer for the Mary Harron picture, and that looks like dreadful waste as well.

Note to Jeff Carter - see William Weston's Zodiac Killer thread at Deep Politics Forum, in which he takes Ed Sanders' The Family to task for errors and willful misrepresentations.  Weston did some valuable stuff on the TSBD in The Fourth Decade, which is still available by online search, and is in the back threads here.

Edited May 25, 2019 by David Andrews

[Joe Bauer]

Not to drop names ( well I actually am ) but this thread compels me to recall and mention two brief personal encounters with a couple of well known people who were part of the Manson/Hollywood horror story.

The interactions themselves were brief and innocuous and therefore not very meaningful in this Manson context, however in a celebrity status way,  hopefully will allow me just enough entree into this subject  (as superficial as it may be ) to share some speculative thoughts about a few small parts of the whole affair.

I met Terry Melcher in my work place the Cypress Inn in Carmel, Ca. in the early 2000's.

He was one of the owners. 

He would come up to Carmel from L.A. occasionally and even less often actually come into the hotel to see whoever he may have known there or simply to mingle with a guest or two in the lounge.

The lounge is now named "Terry's Lounge" in memory honor of Terry.

I was an employee at the hotel and being somewhat new had never met Terry Melcher.

One day when he was visiting the hotel he came up to me and introduced himself.

He was extremely friendly and in a very down to Earth and non-pretentious way.

He was like his mother in this way.

He invited me to sit with him in the lounge for a brief first introduction.

We talked about what I did at the hotel, my background before I worked there and my lifetime residency on the Monterey Peninsula.

We talked about our kids a little.  We discovered both our boys had gone to the same private high school locally. We visited and talked for no more than 10 or 15 minutes but what a warm and pleasant chat it was. 

I was very impressed by Melcher's sincerely kind and thoughtful manner.

We parted. Never personally spoke again.

The reason I mention this encounter was to lead into something someone close to Melcher told me later after I mentioned my personal visit with him.

And this was just a spontaneous off-the-cuff comment of advice by this person.

He advised me not to "ever, ever, ever" mention "Charles Manson" in any possible future social contact with Terry.

I didn't ask why. Never talked about this comment again to anyone.

And I never talked to or with Melcher again. He just didn't visit the hotel except rarely.

Looking back however, I assumed that whatever interaction Melcher may have had with Manson must have been extremely unpleasant, even traumatic and frightening.

Another time years earlier I was sitting on some outdoor seating waiting for the arrival of a Los Angeles bound Greyhound bus at the Monterey, CA bus station.

Before the bus arrived a couple of rough edged fellows straggled out from the nearby beach area next to the station and came up to us small already seated group.

This was before similarly rough edged homeless people were everywhere here in California like today. So back then they stood out and even seemed moderately intimidating.

These two fellows were bearded with tousled hair and dressed in slept-in clothes with weathered P-coats. They seemed slightly drunk and were very loud with gravely voices. One of them approached and boldly asked me for change ( which I gave him ) so he could "call someone in L.A." from the pay phone a few feet away.

I could hear him actually talking on the phone but didn't pay any attention to what he was saying.

I don't remember if these two boarded the L.A. bus that finally came. I assumed they did. If so they probably already had their tickets when I first encountered them

However, I couldn't help remembering the face of the fellow who approached me. He was a strong facial boned person. Strong physical build as well.

 A few weeks later there was an article in one of our papers ( San Jose Mercury, San Francisco Chronicle or Monterey Herald ? ) reporting that Dennis Wilson of Beach Boy fame had drowned in the water off of Newport Beach.  ( correction: Marina Del Rey.)

This article was accompanied by a recent photo of Dennis Wilson.

The picture was of the same bearded man who had approached me in the Monterey Greyhound Station. The man who needed to call L.A.

Later, I found out through some basic researching that in the last years of his life, Dennis Wilson apparently lived an itinerant existence at times which included traveling around and hanging out with similar type folks who drank and did who knows what other activities that vagabonds engage in.

I could easily see someone in Wilson's rough edged later years life style coming into contact with people like the Manson family at some drug party location in the L.A. area.

So, we know that Manson, the ultimate opportunity seeking manipulator, weaseled his way into a small part of the Hollywood music scene, probably by indulging certain connected persons with drugs and free sex.  Dennis Wilson reportedly was a person in this milieu Manson was in contact with.

And it was here that Manson started indulging his own delusional fantasy that he really was a talented song writer and singer from his years of prison guitar strumming and writing with an audience of one.

We also know that Manson actually got close enough in this rock star dream fantasy chase, that someone arranged for him and his music to be heard by someone on the higher inside track of the industry. Soon enough however, Manson's crazy make up and work became all to obvious as delusional and he was dismissed, probably through the cold and complete cut off of any more contact or expected call returns.

Manson was the embodiment of blind rage and injustice retribution. Brought out by the slightest violation of his lifetime prison code of "one's word" which in his world of incarceration ethics meant a shank or some other form of extremely brutal justice. And so the story goes that this was the genesis of the eventual Tate/LaBianca murder spree.

Was there any secret agency manipulation into the creation of the Manson family and their eventual killing spree madness?

We know there was some in the larger drug, hippie, free love culture movement.

My guess is that with Manson and Watson etal there wasn't.

Manson was a lone wolf. An extremely cunning, ravenous and ruthless one.

He ravaged and terrified and ruined a lot of victims lives ( including his young manipulated flock ) before he was finally stopped.

There are always ruthless manipulators born and unleashed in every generation.

Jim Jones and Jonestown was worse than Manson!

Any film of the Manson story can't help be a mainly warning one in this regards, whether or not any secret agenda secret agencies were involved.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Edited May 28, 2019 by Joe Bauer

[Cliff Varnell]

2 hours ago, Joe Bauer said:

So, we know that Manson, the ultimate opportunity seeking manipulator, weaseled his way into a small part of the Hollywood music scene, probably by indulging certain connected persons with drugs and free sex. 

My late dear friend Michael Vosse was a publicist with A&M Records in the late 60's/early 70's..  He got the Flying Burrito Brothers signed.  He's featured in the 2004 Gram Parsons documentary FALLEN ANGEL.  He told me that he was tight with Terry Melcher and used to party at the Cielo Drive house on a regular basis.  Michael said the road manager for the Flying Burrito Brothers, Phil Kaufman, knew Charlie Manson from prison and as a favor presented a recording of The Family to some A&M execs.  Michael didn't personally like Kaufman and attended the meeting very briefly.  He said the music was lame folkie crap and the band photos were ugly.  A&M passed on The Family, obviously.

Michael never met Manson, but he was on good terms with Bobby Beausoleil, who was known on Sunset Strip as "Bummer Bob."

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Michael_Vosse

 

Edited May 25, 2019 by Cliff Varnell

[Joseph McBride]

CHARLIE SAYS is not negigible, but something of a misguided mess

with some good acting here and there and some feeling for the pervastive insanity of the period and some sense of trying to

understand the psychology of the girls. It unfortunately doesn't succeed

in doing that very well due to uneven casting, a lack of focus in the screenplay, and

an overreliance on conventional perspectives. But next to THE HAUNTING OF SHARON TATE, CHARLIE

SAYS seems like a work of Carl Theodor Dreyer. Now let's see what Tarantino makes of it.

[David Andrews]

Was there any secret agency manipulation into the creation of the Manson family and their eventual killing spree madness?

We know there was some in the larger drug, hippie, free love culture movement.

My guess is that with Manson and Watson etal there wasn't.

 

I dunno, Joe.  Was Tex Watson sharp enough to climb a telephone pole at the 10050 Cielo Drive gate and cut the phone wire and only the phone wire, so no one at the house would be alerted by the lights going off?  Did Watson and the barefoot women really avoid opening the gate and climb past it using the rough hillside, while tripping, or did the person who left the electric line intact just push the gate button from inside?

How did they afford all those hits of acid, anyway?  They were only dealing in mescaline with the motorcycle gang, and when they screwed that up, they needed to kill Gary Hinman for money.

See what Mae Brussell had to say.

 

Edited May 26, 2019 by David Andrews

[Joseph McBride]

David, I didn't write what you apparently quote me as saying above, so there must be some confusion.

Of course I have read the brilliant Mae Brussell analysis, which makes more

sense to me than the phony official story or other theories. There

is still much we don't know about the case and the role of Tex Watson

in it. I look forward to Tom O'Neil's book. By the way, CHARLIE SAYS

can be watched via streaming on Amazon Prime, although it just opened briefly in theaters.

Edited May 26, 2019 by Joseph McBride

[Anthony Thorne]

In Melbourne over a decade ago, in different years,  I met Jim Van Bebber and William Lustig, the former the director of CHARLIE'S FAMILY, and the latter the director of the grim horror film MANIAC. That one is for genre fans only, though the DVD has an appreciation by William Friedkin. Both Lustig and Van Bebber were nice guys, Van Bebber a little bit nuts, and Lustig very jovial and garrulous.

Over drinks in a restaurant Bill Lustig discussed Van Bebber's movie. He said he didn't think it was that good, but he'd strongly thought of buying the rights to the film for his Blue Underground video label (kind of the Criterion Collection of cult home video releases back then). Lustig said he had a good friend in the Justice Department, and had come close - this was the story he told us - to getting Manson to record a commentary audio track for CHARLIE'S FAMILY, "..and if we'd done that, even though the movie isn't that great, we would have sold a million copies". 

Mae Brussell's commentary on the event is striking. There are seemingly hundreds of hours of her radio show online, and only a small number of them have ever been transcribed. Listening to a few of them, I heard her make intriguing observations about both the Manson event, and Jonestown.

In April 2013, Wikileaks released over a million diplomatic records, many reprinting cables between Embassies and intelligence agencies. This September 1975 cable - REPORT OF ASSASSINATION ATTEMPT AGAINST PRESIDENT - was quite something. The plotters, including two women, claimed solidarity with Charles Manson.

https://www.wikileaks.org/plusd/cables/1975MONTRE01596_b.html

[Ron Bulman]

Until I read Reclaiming Parkland about all I thought I knew about Manson and the murders was from going to the drive in and seeing it when this movie came out in 1976.

https://123movie.cx/movie/helter-skelter-j87m8v3

As it's based on Bugliosi's book I guess it was pretty much total BS.  I think we drank a few beers that night but the main thing I remember was thinking these people were nuts.  I'd liked the song for years and couldn't understand how it was supposed to have helped motivate them to do what they did.  

https://www.bing.com/search?q=the+beatles+helter-skelter+cursed&form=PRUSEN&mkt=en-us&httpsmsn=1&refig=5ca206317ec141378cedf34d748ed84c&sp=3&qs=AS&pq=the+beatles+helter&sk=AS2&sc=8-18&cvid=5ca206317ec141378cedf34d748ed84c

It's a song about a roller coaster.  How did he get war over racism, then murder, out of it?

Much of what's mentioned and discussed in this thread is obviously beyond my knowledge of the subject.  When David and Joe mentioned Mae Brussels I thought, her stuff's always good and I started looking.  I'm about to read this, just in case anyone else would like to, here it is.

 http://www.maebrussell.com/Transcriptions/16.html

[David Andrews]

17 hours ago, Joseph McBride said:

David, I didn't write what you apparently quote me as saying above, so there must be some confusion.

Of course I have read the brilliant Mae Brussell analysis, which makes more

sense to me than the phony official story or other theories. There

is still much we don't know about the case and the role of Tex Watson

in it. I look forward to Tom O'Neil's book. By the way, CHARLIE SAYS

can be watched via streaming on Amazon Prime, although it just opened briefly in theaters.

Joseph McBride - I was responding to Joe Bauer. 

I understand - I've mixed up posts here when in a hurry.  And even on a Saturday, we're all, unfortunately, in a hurry.  We all ought to move to Europe, where time is less a pressing thing.  Or so they boast.

Edited May 26, 2019 by David Andrews

[Ron Bulman]

1 hour ago, Ron Bulman said:

Until I read Reclaiming Parkland about all I thought I knew about Manson and the murders was from going to the drive in and seeing it when this movie came out in 1976.

https://123movie.cx/movie/helter-skelter-j87m8v3

As it's based on Bugliosi's book I guess it was pretty much total BS.  I think we drank a few beers that night but the main thing I remember was thinking these people were nuts.  I'd liked the song for years and couldn't understand how it was supposed to have helped motivate them to do what they did.  

https://www.bing.com/search?q=the+beatles+helter-skelter+cursed&form=PRUSEN&mkt=en-us&httpsmsn=1&refig=5ca206317ec141378cedf34d748ed84c&sp=3&qs=AS&pq=the+beatles+helter&sk=AS2&sc=8-18&cvid=5ca206317ec141378cedf34d748ed84c

It's a song about a roller coaster.  How did he get war over racism, then murder, out of it?

Much of what's mentioned and discussed in this thread is obviously beyond my knowledge of the subject.  When David and Joe mentioned Mae Brussels I thought, her stuff's always good and I started looking.  I'm about to read this, just in case anyone else would like to, here it is.

 http://www.maebrussell.com/Transcriptions/16.html

Ho-Lee-Crap.  Ms. Brussel's takes a while to get there setting it up but she does not disappoint.  

After a month of no leads Ed Butler writes the first article pointing the finger at the Communist Black Panthers?  Ed Butler?  The same Ed Butler that set up Oswald to record his "debate" in New Orleans, to be sent to Washington on 11/23/63, used by the media to frame him as a Communist?  Incredible.

Joseph Ball of the Warren Omission represents the indigent Sue Atkins who turns state evidence?

Tex Watson.  No priors, no inclination.  Extradition fought eight months.  More.

Manson, abandoned son of a sixteen year old mother, spent 22 of his 32 years at the time incarcerated?  Wow.  She does then say he was arrested 37 times in 35 years which is confusing, a mistake?

He get's out of prison a few months before, is given a school bus, a guitar and a credit card, grows a beard, buy's dune buggies, communication equipment  and weapons.  Feed's his followers.

Like she says, who paid the bills?