Vintage
photograph of a man-made pantomime stage prop in the form of a giant primate
head (but NOT derived from a real, dead animal) (public domain/Wikipedia)
It’s been quite a while since I last
posted a 'ShukerNature Picture of the Day', but this particular photograph
seemed an ideal candidate for such a role, especially as it's one that I've been
meaning to blog about for ages, so here it is, together with what I've managed
to uncover concerning its nothing if not visually striking subject.
Needless to say, had I encountered this
picture recently I would probably have simply assumed it to be an AI-generated
image and therefore may not have investigated it, as the head was certainly far too big to be from any type of anatomically-feasible primate, even one of the cryptozoological kind.In reality, however, I first
encountered it online some years ago (on Wikipedia, if memory serves me
correctly), and its arresting appearance was such that I decided to do whatever
I could to identify exactly what it depicted and where it had originated. Here
is what I discovered.
As indicated by this present ShukerNature
post's tongue-in-cheek title, parodying the biblical Salome's imperious demand to
King Herod Antipas for John the Baptist's head (served on a platter, which it duly
was!), I had initially wondered whether this public-domain photo may have been
in some way related to the original, classic King Kong monster movie released by RKO Radio Pictures in spring
1933, directed by Marian C. Cooper and Ernest B. Schoedsack, and starring Fay
Wray alongside this movie's titular stop-motion mega-star created by celebrated
animator Willis H. O'Brien. Perhaps it was a spare giant ape head for close-up
shots, or used for publicity purposes?
Although that idea ultimately proved
false, I suspect that it nonetheless contains an element of relevance to the
latter movie. For what I finally found out was that the object in this photo is
actually a gaff, in this instance specifically a stage prop that had featured in a major pantomime performed just a few
months after the release of King Kong,
so it seems possible that the prop was inspired by this film, which had proved such
a massive hit worldwide earlier that same year.
Publicity
photo-still of American actress Fay Wray promoting the 1933 film King Kong (public domain)
According to an unidentified, tantalizingly-brief
newspaper report published on 11 December 1933 that had contained the photo, what
it depicted was a 4.5-ft-tall giant ape or monkey head made from cardboard and
paper (NOT from the remains of any real, dead animal) that had been specially
constructed by a stage props company for a pantomime staged in Glasgow,
Scotland, during the winter 1933/34 pantomime season.
Sadly, the report gave no further
details, not even naming the pantomime in question or the theatre where it was
staged. According to the Panto Archive website's comprehensive listing of
Glasgow pantomime venues and productions (click here to view the entire list), the only
pantomime staged in Glasgow during the 1933/34 season was 'Babes In The Wood',
at the Theatre Royal, and featuring veteran Scottish music hall comedian Tommy
Lorne (1890-1935) as its principal star.
Perhaps, therefore, the giant monkey/ape
head had appeared in it in the capacity of a guardian to the babes abandoned in
the wood, or possibly as a comic bogeyman-type character. This is only
speculation on my part, however, as I have been unable to discover any further
information concerning either the head itself or the pantomime in which it
appeared, but I did succeed in locating a second newspaper photo of it. Dating from
the same period, but this time showing the head of a man inside the prop's gaping
mouth and a woman standing alongside it, this second photo can be accessed here. I wonder if this eyecatching effigy still survives somewhere, stored away, perhaps, in the vaults of some theatre or stage props provider?
At any rate, we can all be reassured now by the
comforting knowledge that somewhere deep within the cloud-shrouded Skull Island
of make-believe movie-land, the real King Kong is still striding majestically through
his stop-motion domain with his huge head held high, still firmly attached to his
mighty neck and shoulders, whereas, tragically, the same cannot be said for John
the Baptist's.Speaking of Skull Island: be sure to click here to read my full review of the more recent King Kong-starring monster movie Kong: Skull Island in my film review blog, Shuker In MovieLand.
Me
with a gargantuan statue of King Kong at Wookey Hole's Dinosaur Valley in Somerset, southwest England, on 29 August 2010 (© Dr Karl
Shuker)