Sinister Cinema: Abraham Polonsky — Dangerous Citizen

Posted on August 19, 2026 by Don

Tuesday August 18, 7pm — it felt like the meeting of a secret society. Always fun.

Eddie Muller of TCM’s Noir Alley sent out an invite to a private screening in the 4-Star on Clement for his new documentary Dangerous Citizen: The Life and Times of Abraham Polonsky.

The 111-minute doc had “its World Premiere at the Locarno Film Festival, August 9, 2026” — as “the centerpiece of a program focusing on filmmakers singled out for political persecution by anti-Communist ‘witch-hunters’ in the U. S. government during the 1940s and ’50s.” I think we were the first audience of any size stateside to put eyeballs on it.

I asked Eddie how many of the Hollywood Ten he’d met. He didn’t think any, but had met several of their children. I once thought — for some offbeat reason — that I had met four of the Ten, but sat down to it one day and determined it was only two. Nuts. Alvah Bessie and Lester Cole. Cole and I sat next to each other on a panel about Hammett circa 1982. Of course Hammett features for a moment in the doc, with a still shot of his swearing in before HUAC. He was blacklisted, too, but wasn’t part of the Hollywood Ten.

As the production blurb notes, the doc details “the life and career of the legendary blacklisted writer-director. . . . Polonsky, nominated for an Academy Award for the screenplay of the hit 1947 film Body and Soul, was barred from working in Hollywood after being branded ‘a very dangerous citizen,’ following his testimony before the House Committee on Un-American Activities.”

Polansky further staked out his corner of film noir by writing and directing Force of Evil (1948) and Tell Them Willie Boy Is Here (1969). He did the screenplay for the 1959 Harry Belafonte noir caper — with racism! — Odds Against Tomorrow.

Since he was blacklisted, Polonsky’s filmography was narrower than most. But worth noting here, as director on Romance of a Horsethief (1971) he got to reunite Yul and Eli from The Magnificent Seven (1960) in a comedic adventure about Polish horse thieves set circa 1905 on the Russian border.

Eddie thoroughly covers Polonsky’s life, including “his WWII service as an operative in the OSS (precursor to the CIA)” under Will Bill Donovan, with clips and “interviews with notable colleagues and artists, including Harry Belafonte, Robert Redford, Lee Grant, Oliver Stone, David Mamet, Phil Kaufman, Julie Garfield, Susan Clark and many more.”

As we milled around, waiting for the start time, I got to see people again I hadn’t encountered in years. The pseudonymous John Marr — of Murder Can Be Fun — wandered in. Julie Lindow came over. I pointed at her and exclaimed: “Wedding!” Her wedding to Peter Maravelis — of City Lights Bookstore and San Francisco Noir 2: The Classics — was one memorable wedding.

Packing them in, local neo-noir novelist Domenic Stansberry was standing right in front of me, back turned. I mentioned to Domenic the noir reading we were part of in The Ha-Ra Bar, various contributors to San Francisco Noir and San Francisco Noir 2 taking the mic.

When people asked me what I’m doing these days, I told them, “I’m driving for Waymo.” Domenic liked that one. Kind of says it all.

Running really late, Peter Maravelis slipped in to catch the tail-end of the film. I assured him the doc was excellent, but warned: “Watch out. Spoilers! TONS OF SPOILERS!”

I don’t know when the doc will start turning up. It’s so new, apparently they are working on getting distribution, entering it in upcoming film festivals. After the hard work of crafting the art is done, comes the hard work of marketing the art. Keep an eye out. If I get updates, I’ll pass them on.

Also, Eddie mentioned that he’s looking into a fresh print incarnation of his San Francisco crime novels — The Distance is very good, with lots of film noir Easter Eggs. But as part of that plan, I guess he’s writing a third novel to make a trilogy. And if I didn’t mishear, he hasn’t finished the third one yet.

In other words, stay tuned.

Shot at top features me and Eddie in the back of the auditorium during the event. For those who keep track of such things, I’m sporting the hipster jacket the late Dennis McMillan bought for me — to apologize for poisoning me. I like the jacket, but I’m glad I didn’t die for it. Would have looked good in the coffin, I admit. Fold my arms, place the Borsalino on top on my chest, and on to the Viking funeral.

Posted in Dash, DMac, Film, Frisco | Tagged , , , , , , , , , , , , |

Rediscovered: The Block Begins to Creak Under the Weight of All Those Comics. . .

Posted on August 10, 2026 by Don

Now here’s some news.

Brian Leno let me know today that he has decided to sell a chunk off his horde of stuff. For years he’s been hawking wares on eBay, but I think of most of those listings as books he picked up for resale, lesser copies he had in hand which he upgraded, and some things he knew he could do without — Stephen King and so on. He has a couple of high ticket Kingies held in reserve, but they are marked books.

This round, however, will cut down to some sort of core in his collector’s soul.

“Here’s part of my comic collection,” Brian says. “Still more not shown, but this is probably the best part. You can see the first Amazing Spiderman. The first Daredevil.

“Going to start with the X-Men. I think my lowest starting number there is 6, so perhaps no big deal.”

Once these sales start, will the dam finally burst? — will Brian begin offering his signed first edition books — and selections from his autograph holdings?

Naw. I don’t think so. But you never know. . . .

Posted in News | Tagged , |

Rediscovered: More Leno Library

Posted on August 9, 2026 by Don

Brian Leno has come into a group of display cabinets and now is working to fill them up. I imagine he’ll juggle some of the stuff around again, eventually. Maybe have one devoted to his Jack the Ripper collection. Or literary suicides — or others. He’ll run out of cases long before he runs out of categories.

“Quick Pic of some shelves and books,” Brian writes. “Kind of a hodge podge really.”

Just glancing it over I see his Og books top shelf left. Nice dustjacket on Triggernometry bottom shelf extreme right. Next to Trig must be Brian’s copy of Texas Sheriff inscribed by Gene Cunningham.

“The photo in the middle should capture your attention,” Brian says. “Two first class scholars and a clown masquerading as a scholar. I’ll let the viewer decide which is which.”

That photo comes from PulpFest 2012 when Brian and I were on a panel about Robert E. Howard.

Brian casting a hairy eyeball on the clown comes after he found previously unseen postcard snaps of Cross Plains, Texas — REH’s hometown. The current REH newsletter asked to use them, so Brian complied — and the dude sitting on the end never sent a contributors copy or two of the issue.

I suspect they think the next time they want something from Brian, he’ll jump to it. . . .

A bunch of those fanboys are just bozos. No sense of books, or common courtesy. I wasn’t surprised that I never got a contributors copy when the REH Foundation reprinted Steve Harrison’s Casebook with my introduction. I’m amazed, actually, that they had the presence of mind to keep the intro, instead of having someone who doesn’t know anything whip a few words together on a boilerplate.

Or maybe they kept it in by accident.

I heard these fannish forces merrily ditched the Steve Eng intro to REH’s collected poetry (but Steve was in the FIRST EDITION, the one that counts), and let the dogs loose on it.

Oh well, something is in print, I guess, but I’ll hope they don’t do up future versions where the fan writers get to insert their own poems in with Howard. You know they want to.

Ah, Howard Fandom.

Posted in Lit, REH | Tagged , , |

Two-Gun Bob: Mak Morn Meets Kull

Posted on July 28, 2026 by Don

The noted book and pulp collector Kevin Cook sends in a bit of commentary on one of Robert E. Howard’s most famous stories, with additional insight into Karl Edward Wagner (remember, I didn’t think much of Wagner’s attempt at a Bran Mak Morn novel — as detailed in The Dark Barbarian That Towers Over All.)

Point of information to bear in mind: Wagner’s second Mak Morn paperback got a cover, but never appeared.

Here’s Kevin:

I bought and read the First Passage collection with the earlier drafts of well-known Howard stories. It seemed to me that REH was at many times just trying to get the story down on the page, and then all the poetical turns of phrase and passages that we remember so well were added only to the final draft.

It was especially disappointing to read the first draft of “Kings of the Night,” my favorite Howard story.

The passage describing Kull’s appearance at the sunrise, “Against the golden birth of day he loomed colossal; a gigantic god from the dawn of creation” is missing, as was the brilliant ending where Kull sees his torn mail and notched sword from what he thought was a dream — which includes the line “For the wisdom of the Eternities is denied even unto princes and Kull could no more understand what Gonar told him than you can understand my words.” Plus the final line  “. . . the kingdom which has been born of swords and slaughter in this howling valley is a thing no more solid than the foam of the bright sea.”

The reference to Gonar brings to mind a conversation I had with Karl Wagner at the second World Fantasy Convention 1976.

This came after publication of his Bran Mak Morn pastiche Legion from the Shadows. I reminded him of the line from “Kings of the Night” where Bran states, “No man knows how old he is — sometimes I think he is the original Gonar himself!”

Wagner stated in a very authoritarian tone that “Bran’s Gonar is not the original Gonar.”

I realized that at that moment he was misappropriating Bran Mak Morn to be his character, much the same way that we all condemned de Camp for misappropriating Conan as his own.

Wagner’s next line is either very funny or very sad depending upon your point of view, but he stated that “I intend to write about Gonar in detail in my third Bran novel.”

Posted in REH | Tagged , |

Posse McMillan: Alias D. B. Bug, Esq.

Posted on July 24, 2026 by Don

Kent Harrington popped in a note about the recent nod to our pal (and publisher) Dennis McMillan: “Loved the shirt post and the shirt. It reminded me how we used to use aliases for fun. I was always Lt. Raj Gupta Light Brigade etc. Usually, or a variant of that. I think I was the one that started calling him the Doctor which I think he enjoyed.”

As I mentioned, I’ve been digging in email archives rounding up stuff to move over to a new DMac file. One email I found from early 2009 — unconnected with Kent — features a guy using “The Doctor” to refer to Dennis.

You could do it scientifically, I guess, find guys with communiques from DMac and get precise stats on use of the aliases. Also, I need to check my snail mail files, somewhere around here, for others. I know that when Dennis and I attended the Left Coast Crime convention in Portland in March 2002 he was going by D. B. Bug, Esq. — Daddy Blue Bug.

In 2007 I find Denny Ray McSteinheimer-Schmidt — and D. von Stahanlanderheim.

In 2008 add in D.R. Nyurlenhopoper, Hep Hop-Hed Stern Assoc. — and D-Ray McNonners, Jr. — and Deeny Ray Munknunkler, Jr.

In 2009 Von Nylander, S.D. — and Von Nylander, From the Borox Open Pit Mind — and Von Nylander, the Elder of Days. Plus D.R. McSkunkhed, Jr. — and Denis McMee-yhuns, ex-offico de antigua casa de Manuel Ramirez, constructor de guitarras y bandurrias, S. A.

The pic at top shows me and D-Ray — Dennis Ray — McMillan mid-March 2009 on a side trip during the Tucson Book Fair.

Posted in DMac | Tagged , |

Rediscovered: Metcalfe and Gawsworth

Posted on July 18, 2026 by Don

I used to get images from Brian Leno of his recent autograph purchases. I still do, but I used to, too.

Yep, it’s Autograph Hound Saturday once again — this time featuring John Hancocks and holographic scribblings from writer John Metcalfe (for our purposes, horror writer John Metcalfe, The Smoking Leg, etc) and that legendary literary boozehound John Gawsworth, promoter of M. P. Shel, Arthur Machen, and others. Brian sent these pics back in 2024. Kind of blurry, but good enough to get the idea cross.

Here’s Brian with the walk-thru:

Hope you’re not getting tired of me sending you some pictures of the shit I pick up, but here’s the Metcalfe signature.

It’s inscribed to John (Gawsworth) — I think the F/O means Flight Officer. Metcalfe signs as Jack — I believe S/L means Squadron Leader.

From 1953, then Metcalfe more formally signed it again in 1964.

Gawsworth wrote a note on the verso of the mount, about time spent with the Metcalfes at their home in ’53.

Posted in Lit | Tagged , , , , , |

Posse McMillan: A Shirt Off His Back

Posted on July 15, 2026 by Don

From time to time I’m prowling through old email archives and when I see something related to, or from, the late Dennis McMillan I’m tossing it into a new DMac file. At minimum, it’ll be fun to round up various of his aliases so they’re easy to find.

Here’s an arch-Dennis tidbit added to an email sent May 5, 2010 — he died on Cinco de Mayo this year. He put out the word:

P.S. The attached jpeg is of a true “flamenco shirt,” of the type I’d like to find in my actual SIZE, XL, although I CAN wear this one (it’s an “L”), so if you ever see anything like this “gypsy shirt” let me know, eh?

Dennis of course played flamenco guitar, extremely well (he jammed with Paco de Lucía), and I’ve mentioned his passion for vintage clothes in memoirs.

He signed off as:

Nylander von Nile-lander, ma-na-ku-ba-lan-do-kan-dai-lar, stenosis

Posted in DMac | Tagged , |

Rediscovered: The Agony and the Ecstasy

Posted on July 9, 2026 by Don

Digging through some unearthed files, I came across a contemporary review of my book Willeford — lost, I’d forgotten about it. The review should have been lost in some other piles of paper, but there it was.

I had done a print-out at the time. Rick Kleffel from his blog The Agony Column. A quick check — I figured it was ancient history — finds the literary blog very much active with a YouTube channel on the side.

But an equally quick prowl in his archives doesn’t turn up the column I could link to. If you want to try it, the title was “From Whip Hand to Dallas, One Book’s Journey from Cheese to Choice” — The Agony Column — June 30, 2003.

In the paragraph I copied. Kleffel describes his discovery of Deliver Me from Dallas (originally released as Whip Hand, without Wlleford’s knowledge). Dennis McMillan told him that I covered the topic in Willeford.

The pull lines from the review:

Herron’s bio isn’t the most straightforward journey. It’s more like sipping drinks in a bar with a Willeford enthusiast who holds forth on the subject at hand with a disarming overabundance of knowledge.

Good review. I’m glad I kept it — and glad I found it.

Posted in DMac, Willeford | Tagged , , , |

Rediscovered: The Library of Brian — Inspiration, or Warning!?!

Posted on June 25, 2026 by Don

Brain Leno has a story about when he was a kid in Bismarck, beginning to buy paperbacks. He’d sit in front of the small bookcase he shelved them on and savor his library. His father made the bookstand “out of an old gutted TV.” Maybe he had 100 books.

Kid Leno would wonder, “Does anyone else have as many books as I do???”

Brian just found a snapshot of that proto-collection.

“I think it’s very cool. Never thought I’d see an old picture of the beginning of my library. Imagine that little bookstand. . . and realize today I’m closing in on probably 11,000 or 12,000 books.”

Those are books proper — I bet Brian is not counting or trying to count the myriad fanzines, journals, magazines and comics he must have. As a famed Autograph Hound I’m sure he’s tabulating up his signed or inscribed books, but he has much more loose autograph material — signed photos, signed cards, signed letters. My guess would be his autograph trove must total in the tens of thousands of items, but that estimation might be colored by his deservedly fearsome reputation for landing John Hancocks.

The snap is old and dim — “just too much glare and fading.”

But Brian sat down to it. “I’ve really studied that picture. My cat is taking center stage but with a magnifying glass I can make out what I had. Some titles on the spines can’t be read, but I spent many, many hours looking at that bookcase — and I still have most of the books to compare against.

“Top shelf from the left, the Lancer Conan series — up to the 11th volume, I believe. Then the Lancer Wolfshead, then The Dark Man, Bran Mak Morn, Almuric and King Kull. Next the three Solomon Kane Centaur paperbacks.

“After that the first 8 volumes of the Gor series. Then 3 books or so that I can’t make out, but then David Mason’s Kavin’s World, Return of Kavin and The Sorcerer’s Skull. Then 4 Avon A. Merritt books with the covers by Douglas Rosa, seemed like a uniform set.

“Second shelf is very difficult. By my cat’s right ear is The Catcher in the Rye and a couple down from that is Theodore Dreiser’s Sister Carrie and later I can make out Great American Short Stories. At the very end I can see Alistair MacLean’s Puppet on a Chain and The Satan Bug. Last is Harold Lamb’s The Mighty Manslayer.

“The bottom shelf is easy. Bradbury’s Illustrated Man, Fahrenheit 451 and I Sing the Body Electric. On the Lovecraft side Fungi from Yuggoth, The Survivor and Others, The Doom that Came to Sarnoth and The Dream Quest of Unknown Kadath.

“Since I have classics like Salinger and Dreiser mixed in with fantasy that’s probably all I owned then. Maybe 75 books, counting those that can’t be seen in the picture.

“We were far from rich, poor really, but my father would give me maybe 5 bucks a month, if he could spare it, and I’d walk to the local bookstore and stretch that fiver for all I could get. Paperbacks were cheap then, 40 cents for Ace, others 60 or 75 cents. I could buy a few. Come home, read ’em and stack them in the stand.

“I’m really glad I found the picture and will keep it with my library just to constantly remind me how the collection has grown. 

“Good days, Don, good days.”

Posted in Lit, REH | Tagged , |

Rediscovered: The Latest Life

Posted on June 24, 2026 by Don

Our pal Morgan “The Morgman” Holmes just dropped his new review of the latest biography of Robert E. Howard on the Arkhaven Comics site. Keeping his hand in, even as he populates his own Substack site with the extensive archives of posts he did for the old REHupa blog — with plans to begin moving years of posts he did for Castalia House over, as well.

I only skimmed around in the Will Oliver bio of REH, since I know almost all that material well enough. Couldn’t believe that certain of Howard’s greatest stories don’t even get a mention, much less coverage, in the main text. But he’s going for a meat-and-potatoes life, the day-to-day, not so much the life of the mind — although that creative life is the major reason anyone would be tempted to start a biography of a writer.

In particular, Morgan doesn’t seem too happy with the tedious roster of ancestors, an unhappy holdover from James Boswell long ago kicking off his Life of Dr. Sam: Johnson with that sort of thing. Boswell became synonymous with biography, largely because he hung out with Johnson and captured so many of his witty remarks for posterity — he got the man down on the page. People trying to do the same sort of thing seem to forget summoning up the person, and instead go after blocks of info on all those ancestors. Capturing lightning in a bottle is harder than copying info out of census books.

When I did my biography of Charles Willeford I decided to leave out the ancestors — and the possible scenes I could do where baby Willeford takes his first steps. Made the call because that material is boring as hell. And in Willeford’s case his ancestors didn’t mean anything to him. He was an orphan, pruned from the family tree. Mention his parents who died, and the grandmother he lived with for awhile, and you’ve got it.

Because I left out the ancestors some people seemed to think that I wasn’t doing a “real” biography. Hey, Bozzie had all the ancestors!!!

Many other people, however, have personally thanked me for leaving out the boring first 40 or 50 pages in a bio they always skip.

Will the next guy to attempt a Life of Howard regurgitate the ancestors and detailed descriptions of Cross Plains, Texas? Or get on with it?

Posted in REH, Willeford | Tagged , , , |