:57:01
Westmore looks at the head
Mueller's sculpting and says
:57:04
"Oh, Chris, that's just great.
Man, you're doin' a terrific job."
:57:07
"Why don't you take
the rest of the day off?"
:57:09
And Mueller, still working,
tells Westmore "No, I wanna finish."
:57:13
Again Westmore says "Chris, you're
doing great work, take it easy."
:57:17
Mueller doesn't budge.
"I don't wanna go. I'm almost finished."
:57:20
"I'm so close to being finished.
I can finish this today."
:57:23
And what could Westmore say to that?
:57:25
Out Westmore goes and then half
an hour or an hour or whatever later,
:57:29
sure enough, here comes Westmore
back in, this time with the press corps.
:57:33
Westmore in his sporty outfit,
goes to where Mueller is working,
:57:36
picks up one of Mueller's sculpting
tools and holds it right to the head,
:57:40
but he doesn't touch the head because
he didn't know what he was doing.
:57:44
Mueller's standing behind
the head, still working,
:57:47
and the photographer
starts snapping away.
:57:49
The pictures are published
and the captions say
:57:51
"Bud Westmore at work on his
newest creation, the creature."
:57:54
No mention of Mueller,
but there he was in the pictures.
:57:57
Because of where Mueller was,
they couldn't crop him out.
:58:00
Mueller got a kick outta that, and
he used to enjoy telling that story.
:58:06
The gill-man outfit was
expensive, needless to say.
:58:09
According to Universal's publicity,
which probably inflated these figures,
:58:13
it was valued at $18,000,
:58:15
and was the product of eight-and-a-half
months of experimentation.
:58:19
"Fashioned of foam rubber, plastic,
:58:21
hidden controls
and specially-tailored fittings,
:58:24
the costume forms the end result of 76
body sketches, 32 different head models,
:58:29
and 176lb of foam rubber used
during the experimental stages."
:58:34
There were articles about
the suit in magazines,
:58:36
including non-movie magazines
like Mechanix Illustrated.
:58:39
There were also behind-the-scenes
photos and an article in Skin Diver.
:58:43
According to Skin Diver,
the August 1954 issue,
:58:46
Creature, which had only been out two
months, had already grossed two million.
:58:55
Hey, the cracked boom
has mysteriously fixed itself.
:58:58
I mentioned that
the gill-man outfit had flex gaps