The Last Supper and 10066 Cielo Drive

Apparently, Jon Aes Nihil has been hosting what he refers to as the Last Supper for the past 35 years at El Coyote. This year, Patty was lucky enough to get invited to sit with him, Matthew Roberts, Stoner van Houten and his roomie, Michael Channels, folks from the Museum of Death in Hollywood, "Uncle Paulie" from whatuphollywood.com (who worked for the LA Free Press in 1969) and a mysterious gentleman named "Ed" from Pennsylvania who refused to be photographed.

What a night. Of course, no one showed up on time for 6:30 cocktails (Jon Seger, where were you?). No one showed up on time for dinner either: Reservations were for 7pm, but nearly everyone waited until 8pm to make their appearances. The wait staff was freaking, Stoner was freaking, and Patty successfully resisted the urge to pop an Ativan. Once the table was full however, a good time was had by all as we passed books, photographs and an El Coyote baseball cap around the table to be signed.

By 9:30pm. the wait staff was again freaking. One of them came to the table, looked Patty square in the face and said, "There's a shit ton of people waiting for this table, its time to leave."  Stunned, Patty replied, "Well, I'm not in charge here." "Who is?," he asked?  Patty shrugged, so he stood further down the table and repeated his same line as if he'd been rehearsing it for a while. A gentleman at the table next to the Sharon Tate booth took Patty aside and offered to buy the whole table another round, just to piss dude off.  However, we complied. Michael Channels' video of the occasion can be seen here.

Cielo was next.  David Oman was hosting a party at his house that we were told was a paid event.  Patty didn't ask how much Oman charged per person to tell his ghost stories and serve Foster's on tap.

On the way out, Patty, Stoner and Stoner's roomie Dave Finkelberg noticed Scott Michaels coming up the hill with a group of very sober looking tourists who didn't say a word. Stoner walked up to him and introduced himself.  "Yeah, I've heard of you," he replied.

The next day, a friend of Patty's forwarded her a link from tmz.com: Oman is claiming that the ghost of Sharon Tate set off his fire alarm around midnight. Um...okay...

The Curious Case of Brooks Poston

I had finished editing Manson Family Movies in 1984, minus the soundtrack. I was living in Encino and saw that Brooks & Jane were playing in Venice so naturally I went to see them. I figured I was the only one in the audience who knew who Brooks was in relation to Manson. Between sets we talked and I told him I had made a Manson movie that was in some ways a comedy due mainly to being made with no money. He thought that was a good approach. I also told him I was working on the soundtrack and he said "I recorded some of Charlie's songs you could possibly use." So I got his number. When I tried calling the number a few days later it did not work.

The next time I ran into Nick Bougas I told him the story, and he said he would work on locating Brooks. As it turned out, Nick was living in Burbank and so was Brooks, so Nick told him he was really interested in his music and arranged a meeting. He was able to score one of the audio tapes that Brooks and Jane had put out, but claimed that Brooks was adamant that he never recorded any of Charlie's music, and that he never said he had.

Nick made me a copy of the tape that he got and gave me Brooks' number, so I called him. I told him how we met and reminded him of what he had said, and again he denied ever having said that he recorded any of Charlie's music. I told him that I would like to get a copy of the other tape he put out, so he said to send him like $5 and he would send me one, which he did. Sometime later Nick told me that Brooks and Jane had joined some other cult and fled L.A. because their new cult leader told them that "L.A. would fall in the ocean."  

Many years later Nick moved to Georgia and I talked to him maybe once a year rather than all the time. Several years later I heard a rumor that Paul Watkins was talking to Nick on the phone, who recorded the call, and that Paul said that he had never turned on Charlie and that the Bug told him, as well as many others involved with Manson, that if they did not say in court what he told them to say that he would charge them with accessory to first degree murder. I wanted to hear this call so I called Nick but he denied any knowledge of it. I told him I had heard otherwise. He then said he had a flood in his basement, and since he had so much stuff he may have had it but it most likely got destroyed.

More years went by. I ran into [a prominent TLB scholar] at a flea market and he told me he had paid a lot of money for the original tapes of Brooks and Jane's music, and that Nick's girlfriend told him to not buy from me because I had crappy copies of this music. I had always been good friends with her and Nick, so now what's up? I told this man that Nick got one tape directly from Brooks and I got the other one directly from Brooks, and that Nick had made my copy off of the one that he had, so this "bad quality story" was some sort of con or who knows what.

Even more years pass and it is now close to the present time. Some guy turns up selling CDs of about 15 concerts and studio recordings of a band I never knew existed called Desert Sun comprised of Brooks, Jane, Paul and this other guy. The amazing thing is they HAD recorded a number of Charlie's songs!  It was obvious that this band was into Charlie as they recorded a number of his songs live and in studio. Furthermore Paul did a song explaining his present feelings toward Charlie, basically saying that he was still with him but they had gone different ways.  This band seems to have existed from 1972 on however I'm not sure when it ended.

I have been involved in ways with the Manson case since I first heard of it in 1969 following Altamont in November 1969, which I attended. When the case broke in December 1969 I was all over it. From 1971 and onward for the next several years I was Hitch Hiking on the Road and immediately ran into a number of people and we stayed together for years as a sort of Family. We were quite aware of the parallels with the Manson situation. The reason I mention that is because if I had known of this band's existence back then, I definitely would have gone to their concerts.

Another CD in this collection is called Hello Nick and it is a 40 minute message from Paul to Bougas. I was finally able to hear it recently. This was not the rumored phone call between Nick and Paul regarding Paul's being coerced by the Bug into testifying against Charlie in court. So perhaps the recording of that phone call actually was drowned in Nick's basement? Then again I did hear from someone years ago regarding the gist of the call. So someone somewhere has a copy.

I also found out recently that the mysterious new cult leader that Brooks and Jane fled with was Paul Crockett. It was around 1984 or 1985 as that's when Nick lost track of them and they were no longer living in Burbank. They had all moved to Washington.

Even more recently I heard that Crockett had died so now what is Brooks to do?

Film Reviews

FILM THREAT #16 1988

When Charles Manson and various Family members landed in jail, they left behind more than just a coroner's nightmare and a hefty dose of public outcry.  Movie exploitation has never known grace, and Manson's was a story of seemingly endless cinematic possibilities.  His life sentence may end soon as the pseudo-Christ has recently become plagued with cancer.  Here we present the most complete filmography of Manson influenced films.

MANSON (1974) is still banned in California, Robert Hendrickson's and Laurence Merrick's objective documentary is somewhat preoccupied with the Family more so than Manson himself.  Various free members talk openly about the goals and structure of the Family in between Charlie stalking the courthouses.  There are brief home-movie excerpts taken on Spahn Ranch, mostly shots of horseback riding and partying.  Towards the end a miniscule excerpt from an interview with Manson by Jerry Rubin is added, if just to fulfill the title's promise.  Those who have read "Helter Skelter" or "The Family" will get a refresher course here; others, however, might get a jolt.  Film was released on a limited run in

New York with Polanski's "Macbeth".  Music by Paul Watkins and Brooks Posten.  Available on World Wide Video.

HELTER SKELTER (1976) was a natural for film after the success of the book.  Unfortunately (or fortunately, depending on how you look at it), TV grabbed up the rights and the result may be the grand daddy of 70's play-it-safe exploitation, a truly ridiculous film made compelling by over-dramatization in the wrong places, stereotypical characterizations, and an awful fake Beatles soundtrack.  Following the book straight, as TV allows, the dons a sterile (albeit opinionated, re: con) view and turns Manson into a caricature of Menace.  Steve Railsback as Manson gives a glassy eyed performance of Peter Lorre on mescaline.  As Susan Atkins, Nancy Wolfe chews the scenery via catatonic dementia that reaches the cosmos of pop entertainment.   Suffering from a logbook of facts, dates, figures, places and people serving as its scenario, the film rarely breathes life or depth into the most obvious places.  George DiCenzo, for example, plays the straight role of Bugliosi as a grey-area, a navel picking nimrod who'd never be invited to anyone's party.  Key Video version runs 120 minutes;  original TV version clocks in at 194 minutes.


FRINGE MANSONESQUE EFFORTS:

BEYOND VALLEY OF THE DOLLS (1970)  Russ Meyer and co-author Roger Ebert were not entirely influenced  by the Manson case for their screenplay of the comedic, in-name only sequel to Jacqueline Susann's trashy novel.  Their script covers all exploitable angles- quite successfully.  The character Ronnie "Z-Man" Barzell (played by john LaZar) is a wild illusion of Manson, while the murders in the film smack of tabloid sensationalism.  More interesting is the film as a whole, perhaps the biggest, brashest, most colorful and expensive exploitation film ever made, thanks to 20th Century Fox giving Meyer artistic freedom on the basis of his past films (notably Vixen and Cherry, Harry and Raquel).
 

I DRINK YOUR BLOOD (1971)  Amazing, plenty weird effort from writer/director David Durston (Stigma) and producer (Grimm's Fairy Tales For Adults).  "Satan was an acid head!"  exclaims the leader of a hippie-devil-cult before sending a dog to the slaughter.  His troupe, residing in the woods od upstate New York, are an eye sore for the locals.  After the youths pester an old man, his grandson injects the blood for a rabid dog into their food.  The devil worshipers start foaming at the mouth, take over the town and kill anyone in sight.  One girl turns into a rabid nymphomaniac, is laid by a few dozen hard-hats who, in turn, become rabid killers, too.  Not to be missed.
 



THE DEATHMASTER (1978) Robert Quarry, late of the Count Yorga films, stars as a Manson-type guru to hippie following.  Basically a tired vampire flick.  1950's screen idol Ray Danton directs.
 

BLUE SUNSHINE (1978)  Stanford University radicals are bummed out when the acid they just swallowed fails to take effect.  10 years later they're middle class stiffs with homes and families and insurance premiums, and WHAM!, the supercharged, delay-reaction LSD goes full throttle.  Paying homage to the Family's Yul Brenner phase, the victims lose all their hair, then go on a bloodlust/killing spree.  Writer/director Jeff Leiberman creates a good atmosphere in this staple of late night TV.  Leiberman also makes a terrific worm-conquest film called Squirm.  Zalman King stars with Robert Walden (of TV's Lou Grant), Mark Goddard (Lost in Space, General Hospital), and Alice Ghostley (Bewitched).
 

INVOCATION OF MY DEMON BROTHER (1969)  An embryonic version of Lucifer Rising (1974/82), both made by Kenneth Anger.  Bobby Beausoleil stars as Lucifer in this colorful fairy-tale set in the outer limits of ordinary narrative.  In 1967, the footage for Lucifer Rising was stolen by Beausoleil; legend has it the film was handed over to Manson, who, with Beausoleil, proceeded to bury it in the desert.  Shot in San Francisco; 11 minutes, music by Mick Jagger.
 

MANSON FAMILY MOVIES (1984)  The video box claims "The Manson Family has rumored to have filmed their activities.  This is what those films, The Family movies, may have looked like." 



The key word here is may.  Manson Family Movies is nothing more than poorly done super 8 that is almost unwatchable.  Over quoted John Waters however, has this to say, "Manson Family Movies is a primitive, obsessional, fetishistic tribute to mayhem, murder and madness.  Enough to appall even the most jaded VCR."  The company that distributes this vid, AES-NIHIL carries many other Manson related items including audio tapes, video tapes, articles and interviews.  AES-NIHIL Productions.

THOU SHALL NOT KILL.... EXCEPT (1986)  The best action feature based on the Manson murders, writer-producer Scott Spiegel, who co-wrote EVIL DEAD 2 mixes a little humor into it.  Three Stooges antics meet great sleaze and gore.  Directed by Josh Becker with Sami Raimi as the cult leader, Manson and his gang have to fight off a group of Rambo-esque marines just back from Vietnam.  surely this is the most entertaining.  Recently available on video from Prism Entertainment/Film World Distributors.