Now that we Northern Hemisphere folks are in the middle of winter, we’ve decided that a movie focused on the type of weather we are experiencing would be appropriate, “Snowball Express”!
This month’s movie has a cast of great actors and actresses who entertain their audiences throughout the entire movie. Today we will cover the synopsis of the movie, along with the bios that come in the Campaign Manuals. Notice the plural of “Manuals”? Well, we do have a bonus this month, in that we have the original CM from 1972 (12 pages), it’s Ad-Pad (9 pages), a re-release double feature in 1974 (6 pages) with the second movie being “The World’s Greatest Athlete, and a CM from the UK (4 pages).
The same synopsis is found in all three CM’s, with the original 1972 version being the only one that states that it is not for publication. There are a few articles that are duplicated between the 1972 and 1974 releases, and the 1974 double play has three articles that talk about both movies together. These will be covered in a later article this month.
So, with so many articles and topics, we should get started!
Synopsis:
(From the 1972 CM, also found in the UK release CM and 1973 double-feature CM)
“Snowball Express” Synopsis (not for publication)
Johnny Baxter (DEAN JONES), an insurance company accountant, had had it with the New York City rat race. He gets the chance to make the great escape though, when he is willed the estate of a distant uncle in Silver Hill, Colorado.
The principal asset is the Grand Imperial Hotel, some ten thousand feet up in the Rocky Mountains. Johnny’s wife, Sue (NANCY OLSON), doesn’t share his exuberance for the new adventure, nor do his pretty, blonde teen-age daughter, Chris (KATHLEEN CODY), and 12-year-old son, Richard (JOHNNY WHITAKER). But they don’t have much choice over the move, and Johnny packs them all into a station wagon, along with family’s St. Bernard, Stoutheart, and the trek west begins.
Nearing their destination they ask directions to the hotel from service station owner Double L. Dingman (GEORGE LINDSEY) and his young assistant, Wally Perkins (MICHAEL McGREEVEY), who is immediately taken with Chris.
The Baxter’s are completely disillusioned when they discover the Grand Imperial Hotel is a drab, old, dilapidated structure, but there is no turning back because all the family funds are sunk in the venture. They find the place deserted, except for an old prospector, Jesse McCord (HARRY MORGAN), who Johnny takes on as a handyman.
Since the hotel is badly in need of repairs Baxter approaches the town banker, Martin Ridgeway (KEENAN WYNN), for a loan. He refuses but offers to buy the place for the purpose of converting it into a boy’s home. It is clearly evident, from the disgusted look of his secretary, Miss Wigginton (MARY WICKES), that he has other intentions.
Late that afternoon while riding his snowmobile in the hills above the hotel, Wally meets Johnny and Sue out walking.
He thanks them for the use of their snow. The realization that the slopes belong to him inspires Johnny to turn the area into a ski resort.
Johnny makes arrangements by phone to discuss a loan with Mr. Wainwright (GEORGE KIRKPATRICK), a banker from a nearby town. Desperate, he fakes it by telling Wainwright that he can ski and they agree to meet at the local ski area. It proves chaotic, as he turns the slopes into a disaster area, and the Wainwright loan attempt is a total wipeout.
In the meantime, Ridgeway has con-of $3,000 for a tow engine to get skiers to the top of the hill. But calamity strikes as the hotel water heater blows up, wrecking the kitchen; now the entire funds have to be used to repair the damages.
Jesse remembers an old donkey engine that pulled logs in earlier mining days, rusting in the woods. Dragging it to the hotel is no problem but getting it up the hill is a project. Young Richard solves the issue by advising his father that if the donkey engine, nicknamed “Donkey Hotey,” can pull logs it should be able to drive itself up the hill.
On the day of the hotel’s grand opening an avalanche blocks the railroad tracks, stalling a ski train and the passengers have to be routed to the Grand Imperial Hotel.
During a skiing demonstration for the guests, Wally helplessly schusses down a slope where he goes out of control and disappears over a precipice, landing in the branches of a tree. Jesse ties Johnny to Donkey Hotey’s tow rope and lowers him just in time to catch Wally. As they are both being brought up, the engine’s over-heated boiler shoots out flames which burn the lash rope sending Donkey Hotey rattling off on a spree. Baxter frees Wally, but still tied to the tow line, is whipped along as the machine crashes through the hotel.
In desperation, Johnny decides to enter the Silver Hill Winter National Snowmobile Race for the prize money, using Wally’s machine. Since the boy’s collar bone has been broken in the skiing mishap, Jesse goes along as Johnny’s partner; their competition is three-time winner Ridgeway and his partner, Dingman, along with eighteen other snowmobile partnerships.
The race is a nightmare series of mishaps from start to finish for Johnny and Jesse, and Ridgeway takes it.
A few days later Johnny is about to sign the place over to Ridgeway when Miss Wigginton informs him that according to his great-uncle’s will he owns an adjoining holding of 3,000 acres of Douglas Fir trees, which Ridgeway was waiting to grab. Johnny learns too, that Crazy Jake had also deeded land to Silver Hill, provided the city fathers erected a church, hospitals and a library. And since a library is non-existent, this land also reverts to him.
When a somewhat sheepish Ridgeway sidesteps the matter by offering to finance a new ski lift for the resort, Johnny knows that he and his family have really found their niche.
Bios:
(From the 1972 CM)
“Push-Button” Veteran Dean Jones Stars Again
While serving a four year hitch in the Naval Air Corps during the Korean War, Dean Jones, who is currently starring in Walt Disney Productions’ way-outdoor comedy, “Snowball Express,” spent time in Korea keeping drones — the radio controlled aircraft — flying.
He even participated in one of the most publicized actions of the encounter by flying a drone Hellcat, loaded with bombs, into a North Korean railway tunnel. “Push-button” warfare, the papers called it.
Later, stationed in San Diego, he was engaged in firing drones for the fleet to use in target practice. But he got more fired up over the idea of entertaining and took very active part in base programs, eventually transferring to Special Services where he produced and starred in a local TV program “Liberty Call.”
Singing was what Dean wanted to do most, and off duty he got himself booked into a local nitery and sang for his supper and ten dollars a session.
Dean was just doing what came naturally. “I’ve been singing ever since I can remember. My parents provided early lessons for me back home in Decatur, Alabama; in fact, my father used to accompany me on the guitar,” he recalled.
At 15 he had left home to launch his singing career. In New Orleans he got a job in a French Quarter club which paid him a staggering three dollars a night. To exist he had to augment his income with an assortment of odd jobs from cotton picking to timber cutting.
The club folded after four months and Dean decided to return to Decatur and finish high school. He then spent a year as a voice major at Asbury College in Kentucky before going into service.
At the end of his tour of duty he was hired as a singer in a melodrama at Knott’s Berry Farm near Los Angeles. Composer Vernon Duke caught his act and gave him an introduction to MGM musical producer Arthur Freed. A screen test was arranged and Dean was signed by the studio. He was never given a singing assignment though, for as a contract player he got cast in straight acting roles. It was only years later that he was able to do his thing on several TV variety shows and in his series, “What’s It All About World?”
Dean has made his reputation in the comedic vein in films and on the “Ensign O’Toole” and “The Chicago Teddy Bears” series. He has been good for Walt Disney pictures, having starred in eight of them: “That Darn Cat,” “The Ugly Dachshund,” “Monkeys, Go Home!” “Blackbeard’s Ghost,” “The Horse in the Gray Flannel Suit,” “The Love Bug,” “$1,000,000 Duck,” and most recently, “Snowball Express.”
Between films and TV he has appeared on Broadway in “There Was A Little Girl” with Jane Fonda, “Under The Yum-Yum Tree” with Gig Young, and in the original production of “Company.”
His film credits also include “Handle With Care,” “Never So Few,” “Under The Yum-Yum Tree,” “The New Interns,” “Any Wednesday,” “Two On A Guillotine” and “Mr. Super Invisible,” a picture he made in Italy.
Dean’s chief pride are his two daughters, Carol Elizabeth, 17, and Deanna Mae, 15. He is mad about car and motorcycle racing, especially when he is doing the driving, and he has a great interest in antiques. A student of world affairs he is particularly outspoken on the subject of ecology.
In color by Technicolor, “Snowball Express” also stars Nancy Olson, Harry Morgan and Keenan Wynn and was directed by Norman Tokar. The screenplay, by Don Tait, Jim Parker and Arnold Margolin, is based on the book, “Chateau Bon Vivant” by Frankie and Johnny O’Rear. Ron Miller produced. Buena Vista releases.
(From the 1972 CM)
Nancy Olson, Star of “Snowball,” Acts Only When the Spirit and Right Part Move Her
With the uncertain acting climate being what it is in Hollywood these days, Nancy Olson is in a somewhat enviable position — she acts when the spirit and the right part move her.
At a Hollywood party late in 1971 Nancy ran into Ron Miller, an executive producer at Walt Disney Studios, who suggested that she return to the screen in “Snowball Express,” a picture he was going to produce about a family that inherits a resort hotel in the Rockies, and in which her leading man would be Dean Jones.
She found the story greatly exciting and the idea of a Colorado location intriguing, but it took her husband, business executive Alan Livingston, and their 8-year-old son, Christopher, to convince her that the change would do her good; besides they wanted visitation rights to get in some skiing.
“Snowball Express” marks Nancy’s fifth film for Disney. The last was “Smith!” with Glenn Ford and before that she was in “Son of Flubber,” “The Absent-Minded Professor,” both with Fred MacMurray. Her first for the studio was “Pollyanna,” with Hayley Mills.
Milwaukee born and bred, Nancy, the daughter of a physician, won a Wisconsin state oratorial contest in high school — her subject: “How to bring up your parents!” Her gift for public speaking and the experience she got appearing in school plays prompted her decision to become an actress.
She attended the University of Wisconsin for a year and then transferred to the University of California at Los Angeles to be near her parents. Her father, the late Dr. Henry J. Olson, was engaged in research work at the UCLA Medical Center.
It was one of those one-in-a-million chance happenings that Nancy was discovered in a college play by a studio talent scout who had actually come to see the work of another actress. Her first movie was “Canadian Pacific.” When she clicked with the public, Paramount signed and starred her in such pictures as “Union Station,” “Mr. Music,” “Sunset Boulevard” and “Submarine Command.”
For her performance in “Sunset Boulevard” she was nominated for an Academy Award. Then Nancy went to Warners for “Force of Arms,” “Big Jim McLain,” “So Big,” “Boy From Oklahoma” and “Battle Cry.”
In 1950 she married lyricist Alan Jay Lerner of “My Fair Lady” fame, and moved into a 270-year-old colonial mansion outside New York, which was once the headquarters of General Lafayette. Nancy’s two children from this marriage, are Liza, 21, is now working on a magazine staff in New York, and Jennifer, 19 a student at the University of California at Berkeley.
Following her divorce from Lerner in 1957, Nancy starred on the Broadway stage in “Tunnel Of Love,” “Send Me No Flowers” and “Mary, Mary,” replacing Barbara Bel Geddes in the title role.
Nancy is a dedicated homemaker who strongly believes that a wife and mother’s duties are to her family first, then if time allows, to her career. She feels that one of her greatest roles is working in the field of psychology with underprivileged people as a member of the Southern California Counseling Service.
In color by Technicolor, “Snowball Express” also stars Dean Jones, Harry Morgan and Keenan Wynn and was directed by Norman Tokar. The screenplay, by Don Tait, Jim Parker and Arnold Margolin, is based on the book, “Chateau Bon Vivant” by Frankie and Johnny O’Rear. Ron Miller produced. Buena Vista releases.
(From the 1972 CM)
Beautiful Kathleen Cody, Graces “Snowball Express”
Kathleen Cody has been working all her life, loves every minute of it, wouldn’t change a thing.
A radiant blue-eyed blonde, Kathleen began her acting career in a TV commercial at the age of six months. Shortly after her 18th birthday, she was signed by executive producer Ron Miller for a leading role as the daughter of Dean Jones and Nancy Olson in Walt Disney Productions’ way-outdoor comedy, “Snowball Express.”
During the years between she scored sensationally as a model and in every form of show business including commercials, soap operas, summer stock, Broadway plays, TV specials and the flicks.
Admittedly bitten by the bug, she intends to keep on acting for years to come. Kathleen was born October 30, 1953, in the Bronx, New York {he third daughter of Mary and the late James Cody. She has a sister, Patricia, a married sister, Carol Beirne, and a young brother, Michael James.
Carol has been a child model and TV actress after winning a neighborhood theatre baby contest at age two. Patricia followed suit, and when Kathleen was born it seemed no more than standard operating procedure in the Cody family to get her career started early.
“Michael acts too,” Kathleen says. “He’s eight and has been on one TV series for 3% years. It has even spread to the second generation. Carol’s two children are working too.”
Kathleen, however, proved to be the only Cody seriously interested in a career. She modeled and appeared in TV commercials until she was seven, when she turned to the stage with a role opposite Menasha Skulnik in a Florida summer theatre production of “Uncle Willie.” Then it was back to New York for more commercials until her Broadway bow at IVi in “Here’s Love,” starring Janis Paige, Craig Stevens and Laurence Naismith.
When the show closed after 18 months, Kathleen returned to television. At 12 she began the first of several continuing roles in daytime TV serials. She played in “Edge of Night” for 18 months, “As The World Turns” eight months, “Secret’ Storm” four months, and “Dark Shadows” seven months. At 15 she squeezed in a brief movie debut as the leader of some flower children in “Sweet Charity” with Shirley MacLaine.
In 1971 Kathleen was interviewed and signed in New York for a co-starring role in a Hollywood film, “Hot Summer Week.” That led to her Walt Disney Productions comedy, in which she plays the daughter of Manhattanites who run into all kinds of fun and surprises while trying to convert an old Colorado hotel into a fashionable ski lodge. She followed this with her second Disney assignment, “Charlie and the Angel,” starring Fred MacMurray and Cloris Leachman.
Kathleen’s personality is as sunny as her long blonde hair. She sparkles. For all of her wide professional experience she leads an orderly life and is very close to her family. The Codys have a house in the Bronx; Carol and her family live just around the corner.
Kathleen attends Quintano’s professional school in New York City. She rides horseback, plays guitar, composes and sings, does needlepoint, and is learning to paint. Marriage is not yet on her mind. Some day, though, she expects to combine it with acting.
(From the 1972 CM)
Character Actor Pros Harry Morgan and Keenan Wynn are in “Snowball”
Casting the right actors for those certain, juicy character roles in movies can make a hefty difference in how well a picture will, or will not, play.
Just selecting someone in itself can be a very tall order, figuring that there are over 1,600 male character types available and pictured in the Academy Players Directory, the casting director’s bible.
Walt Disney Productions’ has had a high batting average in selecting and casting film and TV features. In the case of the screen comedy, “Snowball Express,” about an Eastern family who try to make a go of running a resort hotel in the Rockies, starring Dean Jones and Nancy Olson, the good results are due to the considered thinking of the producer, director and casting head, namely: Ron Miller, Norman Tokar and Marvin Schnall.
For the part of a weather-beaten, bewhiskered, sharp-tongued, old prospector, Harry Morgan was their choice; Keenan Wynn got the nod as a scheming, tight-fisted, two-faced banker, the modern prototype of the nasty villain who held the mortgage on Little Nell and her dear old mother’s homestead in the popular melodrama of an earlier time.
Harry Morgan, by appearance, voice and sheer numbers of movie and TV roles, is as familiar an actor as they come. Born in Detroit, he was on the New York stage in many a play, including the well-known “Golden Boy.”
Morgan was very active in radio and made his film debut in “To The Shores of Tripoli,” as part of a 20th-century Fox contract in 1942.
Among his many picture credits are “The Ox-Bow Incident,” “A Bell For Adano,” “Inherit the Winds,” “How the West Was Won,” and more recently he was in “The Flim-Flam Man,” “Support Your Local Sheriff” and Disney’s “Scandalous John,” “The Barefoot Executive” and following “Snowball Express” he was cast in “Charlie and the Angel” for the studio.
Morgan was the next-door neighbor, Pete Porter, in the “December Bride” TV series, then had his own situation comedy, “Pete and Gladys,” followed by a regular role on “The Richard Boone Show,” and for four years was Jack Webb’s co-star as the intrepid detective on the second “Dragnet” series.
“I’m not a star,” Keenan Wynn is quick to emphasize, “I’m an actor!” And that he is, of stage, screen, radio and TV. He’s a third generation one too; his mother was Hilda Keenan, actress-daughter of noted Broadway stage star, Frank Keenan, and his father was, need it be mentioned? famed comedian Ed Wynn of all branches of show business.
Keenan was born in New York City and got his solid training in stock company shows, some 107 of them, which led to 21 Broadway plays. Like Harry Morgan, he entered movies in 1942, but under contract to MGM, and he has over 150 to his credit.
This is Keenan’s fourth Disney picture. The others were “The Absent-Minded Professor,” “Son of Flubber,” in which his dad, Ed, also appeared, and “Smith!” with Glenn Ford and Nancy Olson.
In color by Technicolor, “Snowball Express” co-stars Johnny Whitaker, Michael McGreevey, George Lindsey, Kathleen Cody and Mary Wickes and was written for the screen by Don Tait, Jim Parker and Arnold Margolin based on the book “Chateau Bon Vivant” by Frankie and Johnny O’Rear. Buena Vista releases.
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