Wild in the Streets *** (1968, Christopher Jones, Shelley Winters, Hal Holbrook, Millie Perkins, Ed Begley, Richard Pryor) – Classic Movie Review 4848

Director Barry Shear’s intelligent and amusing 1968 youth satire stars Christopher Jones as rock star and presidential aspirant Max Flatow (aka Max Frost), who is elected US President when 14-year-olds are allowed to vote.

‘I have nothing against our current President,’ says Max, ‘that’s like running against my own grandfather. I mean, what do you ask a 60-year-old man? You ask him if he wants his wheelchair facing the sun, or facing away from the sun. But running the country? Forget it, babies!’

The 22-year-old Mad Max locks up all the over-30-year-olds in camps and feeds them LSD.

Wild, energetic and full of Sixties ideas, Wild in the Streets scores more often and more strongly than other similar attempts at this idea back then (1967’s Privilege for example).

The entertaining Shelley Winters plays Jones’s overbearing mom Daphne Flatow in typically exuberant, strident style. Diane Varsi plays Max’s acid-dropping former child star girlfriend Sally LeRoy, aged 24. It also stars Hal Holbrook, Millie Perkins, Ed Begley and Richard Pryor as the rock band drummer getting high on LSD with topless white girls.

Also in the cast are Bert Freed, Kevin Coughlin, Larry Bishop, Michael Margotta, May Ishihar, Army Archerd (as himself), Kenneth Banghart, Melvin Belli (as himself), Dick Clark, Paul Frees (as the voice of the narrator), Barry Williams, Walter Winchell (as himself), Jack Latham (as himself), Pamela Mason (as herself), Allan J Moll (as himself), Kellie Flannagan, Salli Sachse, Gene Shacove (as himself), Gary Busey (Concert Attendee), Bill Mumy, Jeffrey Sayre, Guy Raymond, Peter Tork (Ticket Buyer), Bobby Sherman (Interviewer), Barry Williams (Young Max ) and Louis Lomax (as himself).

Robert Thom’s screenplay is based on his story The Day It All Happened, Baby.

The film propelled Jones to the peak of his brief fame. His singing was dubbed by Harley Hatcher (aka Paul Wibier). Jones is also the star of Ryan’s Daughter, Chubasco (1967) and Three in the Attic.

It was released by American International Pictures, who offered the star role to folk singer-songwriter Phil Ochs, but he rejected it, saying he felt it showed the Sixties youth counterculture in a much distorted way.

Jones had made his Broadway debut on 17 December 1961 in Tennessee Williams’s The Night of the Iguana, starring Shelley Winters, who introduced him to Susan Strasberg, and he studied at her father Lee Strasberg’s Actors Studio. In 1965 Jones and Susan Strasberg married had a daughter, and starred together in Chubasco (1967) but they divorced in 1968.

© Derek Winnert 2017 Classic Movie Review 4848

Check out more reviews on http://derekwinnert.com