Johnny Dark Movie Book

121 • One morning the studio asked Chuck Tatum to use his car and they put sound machinery over entire car. Drove up, down, stop, start, over street, and created all sounds they were to use in the studio. Most race car shooting was done on a heavy duty platform built on front of Lincoln. May have been on back too. All drivers admired the guy who drove the Lincoln - very skilled. They guy that drove the Lincoln car deserved an award says Chuck. Also, one of first times helicopters used to shoot the scenes - shooting back against the mountain going down the hills. • Most scenes shot on Mt Rose - big ski area - outside of Reno. This was a 14 mile from top to bottom of mountain. Most filmed coming down off Mount Rose - near ski area - in Nevada • Much filmed from Carson City coming back to Reno • Also filmed at Pyramid Lake • Shots from helicopter filmed in Carson City area • Indoor shots filmed at Universal • Some filmed at Willys Factory back east (factory shots) • Woodill Wildfire: This was really 6 cylinder engine out of the Willys according to Chuck Tatum. The Woodill people who built it were Willys dealers - confirming the heritage. When filming got to high altitudes, car would not run. This was 6000 feet, and car had no power. Chuck's partner who was Andy Botto who was co - driver of car in movie. Studio's mechanics could not fix it. Chuck volunteered his partner. George Sherman was director, and after this was successfully fixed, George always asked how the "star car" doing (implying all other cars were ordinary). Woodill never sent anyone with car. Botto kept car running thru picture, and he got $5000 tip at end of picture for his help. • Chuck's car lost transmission and had to replace it. • The idea of "Canada to Mexico/border to border race" was based on Pan American Road race which was from Texas to Mexico City. • Hot Rod: October, 1953, Hot Rod - Chuck Tatum Special. This came out before he participated in movie. In hot rod mag, car had motorcycle fenders. In film, it did not b/c chuck updated them. The motorcycle fenders kept vibrating off and getting crushed by tires. • Chace was person who hired the cars. Most people just rented them their car. Chuck was only person who drove his own car. Other drivers drove them. Wanted to use race cars - not sports cars. Most people did not think of Corvette as race car - no one would have believed the Kaiser Darrin was a race car. Chuck only knew the other cars in the movie after he showed up on day 1.