Popcorn Crunchers, Reel 191 Trivia Quiz

Answer: husband and wife

Husband-and-wife scientists Chris and Andrea Cronyn live in the suburbs of Los Angeles with their intellectually gifted son. Utilizing technology seized from WWII Nazi scientist Franz Calder, they build a "hydrogen tube" radio transceiver in their home laboratory.

This device turns out to be capable of exchanging messages with Martians. The "New York Times'" movie review, while not entirely positive, said, "Peter Graves and Andrea King are serious and competent, if slightly callow in appearance, as the indomitable scientists."

Answer: The Phantom Strikes

The feature-length movies "The Phantom from 10,000 Leagues" (1955), "Phantom from Space" (1953), and "Plan 9 From Outer Space" (1957) are all actual, not-made-up, existent, and authentic motion pictures. The hideous creature in "The Phantom from 10,000 Leagues" turns out to be (accidentally) man-made. A flying saucer containing the "Phantom from Space" crashes in Southern California and a humanoid who is invisible outside of his spacesuit emerges. The extraterrestrials in "Plan 9 From Outer Space" arrive on Earth intent on either dissuading humanity from creating a doomsday weapon or, that failing, purging Earth of mankind.

"The Phantom of the Opera" was a silent film starring Lon Chaney made in 1925. Jack Cassidy starred in "The Phantom of Hollywood" (1974). Based on the long-running comic strip of the same name, "The Phantom" (1996) was directed by Simon Wincer. Rolls-Royce has produced an altogether lovely series of motorcars badged Phantom since 1925. Diligent research has not revealed a 1950s feature-length science fiction movie named "The Phantom Strikes".

Answer: electrocuted/incinerated

The urgency among those seeking to destroy the monster which Victor Carroon had become was predicated upon the mutated creature's apparent ability to spawn and release millions of spores into the air. Carroon, played by Richard Wordsworth, had gone through haphazard developmental mutations incorporating the DNA of a cactus plant, zoo animals, and other human beings. Dr Quatermass opines that the blob of protoplasm which Carroom had become could be destroyed by electrocution.

The creature is followed into Westminster Abbey where restoration work is being done, leaving metal scaffolding in place.

The thing is found atop this scaffolding. Cables linking the entirety of the abbey's electrical power to the scaffold are rigged and, when energised, the beast is (sic) frizzled by the current before it can release spores which could have propagated throughout the world.

Answer: Adam West

Adam West (1928-2017) was born in Walla Walla, Washington, and went on to a career as an actor, singer, and voice-over artist. "Voodoo Island" contained his first role in a motion picture, in which he played "Weather Station #4 Radio Operator". According to West's autobiography "Back to the Batcave" (1994), he was inadvertently left behind on the island where "Voodoo Island" was being filmed and spent the night there alone.

In addition to his many roles on television, his filmography includes "Robinson Crusoe on Mars" (1964), "Batman" (1966), "The Curse of the Moon Child" (1972), "One Dark Night" (1982), "Zombie Nightmare" (1986), "American Vampire" (1997), and "Tales from Beyond" (2004).

Answer: an artificial radioactive isotope called serranium

Dr. Howard Denker experimented with the isotope serranium by exposing it to alpha particles for 200 hours at a time. The resulting isotope absorbs energy every eleven hours, doubles in both size and mass, and exhales fierce radioactivity and magnetic energy. Before he died of radiation poisoning, he said, "It's hungry! It has to be fed constantly - or it will reach out its magnetic arm and grab at anything within its reach and kill it.

It's monstrous, Stewart, monstrous. It grows bigger and bigger!" Scientists calculate that, at this rate of growth, within weeks it will consume the world's energy and grow to sufficient weight to imbalance the Earth's orbit around the Sun.

Answer: False

In addition to the 1953 movie, director Steven Spielberg remade the picture in 2005. Two direct-to-video motion pictures were released in 2005, one by Pendragon Pictures and the other by The Asylum. "The Night That Panicked America" was made for television and broadcast in 1975.

In 2019, the BBC did a three-part adaptation set in Edwardian England, and Fox and StudioCanal produced a 24-episode set in modern-day England and France. Numerous radio adaptations have been produced and broadcast including a BBC dramatisation in 1950, the Lux Radio Theater in 1955, another BBC effort in 1967, and one by National Public Radio in 1988. Annie Gosfield based a 2017 opera on it for the Los Angeles Philharmonic Orchestra. Two of the more memorable comic-book adaptations include one by Classics Illustrated in 1955 and another by Marvel Classics Comics in 1977.

Answer: He was a German Nazi.

Doctor Zakon owns and operates a private psychiatric clinic, the Amerson Clinic, in the south of France. His background is cloaked but insurance investigator Jeff Keenan discovers that Zakon was a former National Socialist in the Third Reich. His use of electronically-induced hypnosis to cure addiction and calm neurotic minds. There is a sinister side effect.

Answer: directing

Gregg G. Tallas (1909-1993) was born Grigoris Thalassinos in Athens, Greece. His work in motion pictures began as an associate film editor to Fritz Lang on "The Testament of Dr. Mabuse" (1933). He went on to direct many movies. His horror and science fiction credits include "Siren of Atlantis" (1949), "Prehistoric Women" (1950), "Cataclysm" (1980), and "Night Train to Terror" (1985). Between 1950 and 1980, he made Greek-language movies. Tallas was married to Laurette Luez, who played Tigri, the lead in "Prehistoric Women", in 1950 in Las Vegas, Nevada.

Their blessed union endured for all of three months.

Answer: Sonny Tufts

Bowen Charlton "Sonny" Tufts III (1911-1970) moved through a career of opera singing, acting in Broadway musicals, motion pictures, and television. His career, his marriage, and his health were destroyed by his alcoholism.

He ended up appearing in B movies and as a one-shot guest star in television series. One of these films was "Cat-Women of the Moon" (1953). Another was "Serpent Island" (1954), in which he played Pete Mason, a marine engineer whose maritime career dissolved in alcohol. Mason is hired by Ricki Andre, played by Mary Munday, to guide her to the island where the treasure may be located.

Answer: He is sent on an endless voyage through space.

Doctor Grood, played by Michael Fox (1921-1996), used science to subdue the planet Ergro. He planned, in concert with the dictator Reckov, played by Gene Roth (1903-1976), to dominate the Universe. Reporter Rex Barrow, played by Judd Holdren (1915-1974), freed the people of Ergro and, in an episode titled "Sentenced to Space", despatches Doctor Grood on a spaceship programmed to travel endlessly through space.