The Story Behind the Credits

Western Flickers, an new video, has an unusual story behind it's making.

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Temple Publishing
Contact: Victoria Cartwright
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Phone: 661 297-5213
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THE STORY BEHIND THE CREDITS

Saugus, Ca.-Hollywood is a town where people hope, like the Cheers song says, everybody knows your name." Screen credits are negotiated and fiercely fought over. Prior to the making of The Towering Inferno," the stars agents and attorneys jockeyed for first billing in the star packed film. After months of negotiation, it was decided that Steve McQueens name would go first, but Paul Newmans name would be shown next to it, higher on the screen. Satisfying the egos of stars has never been an easy business. Indeed, so hungry for screen glory one video duplicator even requested his name be added to the finished product he only made copies of, and Mel Brooks, gave himself 6 acknowledgements for the many hats he wore in High Anxiety."
Why then in this town of self-promoters would anybody be willing to go uncredited? Usually because they disagreed with the final cut. Marlon Brando, Orson Welles, and Jerry Lewis are among the temperamental who wished to distance themselves from what they felt was a mishandled final product.
   R.J.Thomas has a different story, he takes no screen credit for most of his role in his exciting mockumentary film, Western Flickers," now available on video through amazon.com. The picture is a fake documentary about the egotistical lawman, T. J. Spikes, in pursuit of the notorious outlaw, The Cactus Kid, who had taunted law enforcement and evaded capture for 30 years. Spikes confidently drags a Hollywood film crew along for the ride of their lives to record the capture of the cagy outlaw and his gang. Using footage pieced together from silent era westerns, Thomas weaves together a tale so convincing that people have tried to buy copies of the three fictional films mentioned in the video.
Despite his years of solo dedication to bringing forth the project, Thomas, who was the writer, director, producer, narrator, star, cameraman, and editor, surprisingly only credits himself with the duel titles of producer and director. He gives all other screen credit to fictional employees, truly blurring the lines between fiction and reality. When asked about his decision, Thomas blithely answered, I wanted it to look like more people worked on the film. Most people cant comprehend one person completing such a huge project by themselves, so I wanted to indulge their fantasies." Thomas isnt the only anonymous contributor to the film, also going uncredited for their talented contributions are Roy Rogers, Mabel Normand, Fatty Arbuckle, film director Mack Sennett and others.
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