Blue Heron International Pictures LLC

 Hollywood Blue Heron Honors Hollywood Super-Hero

Veteran screen actor and Hollywood legend Johnny Duncan arrived in Florida in January to receive a Lifetime Achievement In Film award from Blue Heron International Pictures.

      Johnny with Carole Ferrill, President of The Florida Motion Picture & Television Association.  

 

“Johnny is a true Hollywood icon from the golden age of film,” said executive producer Richard Lester.

“He knew, worked, and socialized with everyone who was anyone during that golden age of Hollywood .”

 

     

           Johnny in costume as Robin, with co-star Robert Lowery as Batman.

 

Johnny Duncan is best known for his iconic role as Robin in the 1949 serial Batman & Robin. However, he started off a few years earlier with Humphrey Bogart in Action in The North Atlantic, and appeared in several features with The Dead-End Kids, later known as The Bowery Boys.

“We used to do those Dead-End Kids movies in five days,” said Johnny. “Producer Sam Katzman said if you couldn’t do a picture in five days, it wasn’t worth doing.”

 

     Johnny smiles in amazement during a visit to Charlie Carlson's unusual museum

Duncan rode the range in the 1940’s and 1950’s with such cowboy heroes as Roy Rogers, Gene Autry, Alan Ladd, and Clint Walker (Cheyenne).

He shared lunch with Ronald Reagan in between takes for Bedtime For Bonzo, socialized with Humphrey Bogart after long hours of filming The Caine Mutiny, and engaged Kirk Douglas in a bloody sword-fight in Spartacus.

 

Johnny with wife, Susan, inspecting an exhibit from the Charlie Carlson World of the Wild, Wacky, and Weird. Johnny, by the way, appeared in the graveyard scene of the cult classic, Plan 9 From Outer Space! 

 

In 30 Seconds Over Tokyo , Johnny shared the cockpit with Van Johnson and Spencer Tracy.

After filming scenes with fellow bad guy, Clint Eastwood in a Cheyenne episode, Clint drove Johnny home in his sporty roadster.

“He had a ‘butch’ haircut with long sideburns back then,” said Johnny smiling.

 

                                                 Crypto Man says it  best!

 

Among his many memories of working in film, Johnny fondly recalls teaching 19 year old Lana Turner how to dance, teaching Marlon Brando how to ride a motorcycle (for their film, The Wild Ones), and getting teased by John Wayne, who called the 5’4” actor “Shorty.”

“We were truly honored to be in the presence of one of Hollywood ’s busiest actors during that special time in Hollywood ,” said Lester.

 

                        Johnny Duncan with Director Gary Lester

 

“Most important of all, Johnny is a fine, decent, and caring human being, who continues to devote his life to making this small planet a better place for us all.”

To see an exclusive Johnny Duncan interview with some material never published before, check out Ed Tucker's Nostalgia File on this famous film fan site.

                                               Click here for Retrorama.       

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         Gary Lester and Astro-Zombies?

Soft-spoken 24 year-old Gary Lester isn’t exactly the type of guy people would expect to be dealing with Astro-Zombies, two million fans, summer camp kids, graduate school, and padlocked chains. Yet his life is shaped by all of these seemingly contradictory factors.

 

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        We Will Never Forget Them 

  October 11. 2008 

 

 

On Monday at noon EDT, Dottie Diehl Carlson transitioned from life after a brief battle with lung cancer.

We loved Dottie. She cared about people; she cared about animals; she cared about the environment.

Her passing leaves a huge hole in the lives of all who knew and loved her. All of us are now trying to adjust to a world without her.

In the world of film, Dottie is immortalized as the eccentric Hoodoo Lady in our comedy/thriller Henry Blackhart is Dead.

Wherever our film, posters, and promo cards now go, Dottie will be there entertaining audiences who never had the privilege of knowing her in person.

She will be there on the screen, however, bringing a little laughter into their lives, and laughter these days is a very good thing.

The film has become a permanent monument to her immense creative talent and love for others.

 

 

On Friday, we suffered another devastating loss, with the passing of our dear friend and Gary's mentor, Armin Lehmann.

Like Dottie, Armin was also an animal lover and social activist.

For most of his 80 years, Armin dedicated his life to non-violence, peace, and tolerance. He traveled to 150 countries with his message, wrote best-selling books, appeared with Oliver North on War Stories, and produced, wrote, and appeared in our award-winning film Eyewitness To History.

This film won Gary Lester a Best Director award at the Daytona Beach Film Festival. It also screened at the Treasure Coast Film Festival, The Non-Violence International Film Festival in Canada last month, and was subtitled in Korean for an audience in Busan, South Korea.

It remains under consideration for several more international film festivals.

 

 

To Dottie and Armin, we offer our thanks and Shalom. What we do from here, we do in memory of them.

        

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                                        (Armin with his wife Kim)

                            

                              Journey of Peace Ends

                              (October 11, 2008)

 

International peace activist and author Armin Dieter Lehmann made the transition from life on Friday, October 10, 2008 at 6:55 PM PDT.

Armin passed away as he wished –with dignity in his home in Coos Bay, Oregon. His wife Kim and daughter Angie were at his bedside.

Armin was 80 years old. He was born May 23, 1928 in Waldtrudering, a borough of Munich, Germany. At ten years old, a law made it mandatory that Armin join the Hitler Youth.

By 16, during the final hours of the Third Reich, he found himself assigned as Hitler's last courier, a story he recounted in his book In Hitler’s Bunker.

By 17, Armin had learned of the Holocaust, and he made a conscientious decision to dedicate the rest of his life to world peace and tolerance.

In the cause of peace, Armin  traveled to more than 150 countries, speaking out for non-violence, tolerance, and understanding to all who would listen.

In his free e-book, Tomorrow's World, Armin offers his hope for the world -- a hope expressed in his original poetry, along with  illustrations by children who will inherit "tomorrow's world." 

Armin Lehmann's Ode To Peace can be seen on YouTube.  

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Cast members Carol Stoughton, Dottie (Diehl) Carlson and Charlie Carlson at the June, 2008 premiere of Henry Blackhart is Dead.

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   We Will Never Forget Asia

                        

                                                                                        Photo by Gary Lester

 

The week after the January, 2009 Blue Heron Annual Awards ceremony, we learned of another loss to the Blue Heron family.

Asia Doliner  survived the unimaginable.  She witnessed the murder of family members in pograms during the opening days of World War II in Poland.

Asia hid disguised as a Christian in Nazi-occupied Warsaw, where she witnessed the destruction of the Warsaw Ghetto and participated in the Warsaw Uprising.

Asia survived the miserable conditions in Flossenburg and Ravensbrueck concentration camps, only to come to America to begin a new life.

Asia's story is told in Deliver Us From Evil, and she is also one of the featured people in Safe Haven: The Warsaw Zoo.

Another voice from the Holocaust has been silenced, but  her story will live on through her films.

                      Asia was a very special person.

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             Deliver Us From Evil

             Broadcast in Israel

                               April, 2008

 

 

The film’s associate producer, Alex Ringer, arranged with Israeli  television executive Anat Litman for a national broadcast the morning of May 1. 2008 - Holocaust Remembrance Day in Israel.

“I am elated,” exclaimed Lester. “The two survivor stories are both heartbreaking and inspirational. Together, they form an eloquent plea for world tolerance and understanding, and I believe our viewers in Israel will be deeply moved by this television experience.”

 

                  

                                         Alex Ringer 

 

“Thanks to Alex, we’ve also placed copies in several major museums,” said R. I. Lester, executive producer for the project.

“The film will be shown and used for educational outreach at Yad Vashem, Israel's major Holocaust memorial, as well asat a museum named after the ghetto fighters."

Yossi Shavit, Archives Director of Ghetto Fighters' House Museum (Beit Lohamei Haghetaot) in Western Galilee, writes that the film, "will be made available to people who wish to learn about the events of the Holocaust and Jewish resistance."

For more information about this outstanding museum in Western Galilee, click here.

 

          

 

"We have also heard from the education director from the former Ravensbrueck Concentration Camp in Germany ,"said Lester, and we understand the film will be used with international student groups visiting that site.”

Robert Tanen, associate director of the Anti-Defamation League has indicated his organization has an educational outreach use for the film too.

Deliver Us From Evil premiered at the Jewish Heritage Festival in Daytona Beach, Florida earlier this month, where an audience estimated in the thousands silently watched the film.

           

                                                                               (Photo by Gary Lester) 

             “Thy children shall come again  to their border.”