Was that Lily or Morticia Who Died?

Actress Yvonne De Carlo died today. Though she had over 120 acting credits listed in Internet Movie Data Base, most people remember here as Lily on the Munsters, the devoted wife of Fred Gwynne's bumbling Herman Munster. You may remember her that way, with the pale makeup, the long black hair with the shocks of pure white running through it. I prefer to remember her as you see her here to my right, which might be from the movie Slave Girl, but who knows (Hey, you remember what you want to remember and I'll remember what I want to remember!)?

A lot of people today, when they heard Yvonne died thought, "Oh my god, Morticia is dead!" Nah, that was Carolyn Jones in the Addams Family. People are always getting the two of them confused as both shows were on in the mid 1960s and both featured pretty strange families. The Addams Family had the better pedigree, but Fred Gwynne had a way of winning people over to the Munsters.

Now when I think of Carolyn Jones I do think of the Addams Family, but I also think of one of my favorite films. Let me describe it to you.

It is directed by Michael Curtiz who directed a little picture called Casablanca. It's based on a novel by Harold Robbins and it stars Carolyn Jones, Walter Matthau, Dean Jagger, a very young Vic Morrow, Paul Stewart and a young singer in his fourth film. It takes place on the mean streets and back alleys of the French Quarter of New Orleans.

The movie is King Creole and the young singer is Elvis Presley and if you've only seen the Elvis movies made in the 1960s, this one will come as quite a shock. Elvis plays a character unlike any he ever played again.

Elvis plays Danny Fisher, a young delinquent who, as the film begins, flunks out of high school for the second time. Danny gets mixed up with a gang of delinquents led by Vic Morrow's Shark and is soon helping them rob stores. Elvis uses his guitar, singing talent and charisma to draw all the customers and staff to him, while the gang steals a store blind. In a really un-Elvis-like moment, Danny picks up a cashier from the store and takes her to a hotel on the pretence of going to a party, but they are the only ones invited. "Come on baby, you know the score" he says as he tries to get the "good girl" to go bad.

While working as a busboy in a nightclub, Danny runs into Ronnie (Carolyn Jones) who is the girl of local crime boss Maxie Fields (Walter Matthau) and his life takes an unexpected turn.

Sure, Elvis becomes a singer at a nightclub on Bourbon Street and does a number of tunes, but the best parts of the movie are when Elvis is just acting. He is really good and he and Jones have some pretty steamy scenes together.

Tough guys, tough girls, good girls who want to go bad, knife fights, muggings, shop lifting, chase scenes, set-ups, escapes and some great Elvis acting; King Creole has it all. Well, almost. If they could have figured a way to get Yvonne De Carlo's tits in the film, it would have been perfect!