Surfing by Ben Marcus

Author:Ben Marcus
Language: eng
Format: epub
Publisher: MBI
Published: 2013-05-15T16:00:00+00:00

Like others who have surfed through Hollywood films, Muñoz isn’t a great fan of the movies he was in: “Gidget was corny, but you know I’ve probably seen it three times since we made it; each time I see it I appreciate it more for a fairly honest attempt to capture what was going on in surfing at the time. They tried, but Hollywood can’t seem to help Hollywoodizing everything they do.”

In 1963, Samuel Z. Arkoff and James H. Nicholson of American International Pictures began producing a string of “surf” movies, directed by William Asher and starring Frankie Avalon and Annette Funicello. These waxploitation films—Beach Party (1963), Muscle Beach Party (1964), Bikini Beach (1964), Beach Blanket Bingo (1965), and How to Stuff a Wild Bikini (1965)—shamelessly cashed in on the surf craze, employed a lot of real surfers, launched some careers, revived others, and sunk a few.

The Beach Party flicks flip-flopped from phony to funny every few minutes. It’s hard not to like a series that revived Buster Keaton’s career and launched Little Stevie Wonder, but there’s also a lot that’s hard to stomach—like Frankie Avalon, that short, dark, and handsome Italian guy from South Philly portraying a surfer who had an annoying habit of breaking into song in front of his girlfriend.

The ongoing theme of each of these movies was Annette fending off frisky Frankie, who is not yet ready to get married. Their breakup-to-makeup shenanigans resulted in a lot of love songs, heartbreak songs, and makeup songs—Frankie and Annette crooning in front of a projection screen with the full moon shimmering on the water and the lights of Point Dume twinkling in the background.

Musically, the Beach Party movies all had a similar motif. Frankie and Annette were joined by semi-regulars like chanteuse Donna Loren—borrowed from Dr. Pepper commercials—and a force of nature named Candy Johnson as the Perpetual Motion Dancer. Johnson shook that thing like few things have ever been shaken; there was so much mojo locked up in her booty she had the power to take out surfers on waves, bikers on their choppers, and any other male within a hundred yards. Each movie also boasted a regular house band, starting with Dick Dale for the first two movies. He was replaced by the Pyramids, the Exciters, and the Kingsmen. Love ballads, novelty songs, and some good rock’n’roll—these movies had it all.

Beach Party: The first of the series set the stage for the corny-to-cool scenario. The film begins with Frankie and Annette on spring break, driving a jalopy along PCH and singing a bongo-driven, jazzified “Beach Party” theme song. This song tests the assertion that it’s hip to be square, but the music goes uphill from there.

After a quick charge through the surf, Dick Dale and his baby blue Stratocaster jump into “Secret Surfin’ Spot” and the gang starts frugging. From a contemporary perspective, Dale’s rocking scenes may not appear to be anything special. But this was 1963, pre-Scopitone, pre-Hullabaloo, pre-Shindig, pre-MTV; it was music video before music video.

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