Intl. Notebook

November 26 2025

A HEAPING PLATEIA

It never qualified as a visual feast but it gave readers plenty of the basics.

We picked up this November 1963 issue of the Portuguese pop culture magazine Plateia in Lisbon a while back because it had a rare shot of U.S. actress Carol Lynley on the cover. The art is never amazing inside this publication, but at three euros we feel we got a good deal, and there are photos we’ve never seen before, even if small and printed on cheap paper. Superstars Ursula Andress, Catherine Deneuve, Jayne Mansfield, Gregory Peck, and Romy Schneider show up, as do more Eurocentric screen performers such as Sara Montiel, Maximillian Schell, and Rosa Schiaffino. Also making appearances are playwright Jean Cocteau and singer Amália Rodrigues. In the end Plateia covers a lot of entertainment territory, making for a good timekiller for readers back then, and a nice item in our stacks today. We have about twenty-five scans below, and you can see another issue at this link.

Portugal, Plateia, Carol Lynley, Jean Cocteau, Ursula Andress, Romy Schneider, Rosa Schiaffino, Amália Rodrigues, Catherine Deneuve, Jayne Mansfield, Sara Montiel, Marina Neves, Jorge de Sousa Costa, Maximillian Schell, James Cagney, Barbara Payton, Gregory Peck

Vintage Pulp

July 31 2025

KERRY ON

Look on the bright side, lady. How many people can say they were robbed by two walking clichés?

Here’s something we picked up in at the Feria de Ladra in Lisbon a while back, and why not? How often do you see a woman being robbed by a mustached mafioso type and a dopey guy in western style buckskins? They’re the odd couple of crime. They probably argue over the merits of whiskey versus grappa. We had to have it.

It came from the publisher Agência Portuguesa de Revistas, which ran a comic series called Mundo de Aventuras, and under that umbrella published adventures starring the character Kerry Drake. This issue, number 1,200 in the series, is titled A Libertação de Colt Sadler. It’s a translation or licensed reimagining of the U.S. newspaper comic also named Kerry Drake, about an intrepid investigator who later becomes a police detective.

The character was originally created in 1943 by Alfred Andriola and Allen Saunders (the latter of whom was uncredited), and lasted forty years, as Drake faced outrageous villains such as Dr. Prey and the Man without a Face, solving problems with a gun as well as his wits. The above version, which came in 1972, is attributed to José de Oliveira Cosme and Mário de Aguiar. It cost us the princely sum of two euros.

Portugal, Lisbon, Agência Portuguesa de Revistas, José de Oliveira Cosme, Mário de Aguiar, Alfred Andriola, Allen Saunders, comic art

Intl. Notebook

May 22 2025

HURRY HURRY! STEP RIGHT UP!

Welcome back, friends, to the show that never ends.

A live auction of numerous vintage carnival, circus, and sideshow posters begins today at 5:00 p.m. on the site Potter Auctions. We like all things carnival related, so we thought we’d share some of the many items that will be on sale. The posters come from numerous western countries. Among the selection here are examples from France (Gustave Saury art, poster #1, and Jacques Faria, at bottom), Italy (Mauro Colizzi, #2, and Renato Casaro, #3), Germany, Portugal, Poland, and of course the U.S. These are expensive, but all are frameworthy. We have other items in this vein on the website. Here, for example, are more posters made to promote circuses and carnivals, and if you click through from there you’ll find a collection of posters from magicians and magic shows. We’ll return to this subject later.

Germany, Portugal, France, Italy, Poland, Cleveland, Ringling Brothers and Barnum & Bailey Circus, Circus Karl Hagenbeck, Averado Ciriello, Mauro Colizzi, Gustave Saury, Jacques Faria

Vintage Pulp

February 19 2025

DOOMED ROMANCE

And some women think their boyfriends go ballistic.

This stylish cover illustration was painted by René Calviera for La romance de mon Colt, “the romance of my Colt,” a 1951 novel credited to Maureen Sullivan but which was really written by André Helena. This exemplifies the different mindset of French cover artists, as Calviera (he has a Portuguese name, so maybe he was from Portugal, but still) captures their abstract minimalist aesthetic nicely. He also managed a short run as a production designer on such French films as 1956’s Don Juan, 1957’s Charmants garçons, and 1958’s Paris Holiday, which had Bob Hope in the lead but was filmed in France. We probably won’t see Calviera again, but this is a fun effort.

France, Portugal, Éditions de la Dernière Chance, Don Juan, Charmants garçons, Paris Holiday, Maureen Sullivan, André Héléna, René Calviera, Bob Hope, cover art, literature

Intl. Notebook

November 16 2024

LISBONUS MATERIAL

Portugal's bustling capital gives and keeps giving.

Above: something we picked up in Lisbon earlier this year between misadventures our girlfriends are still angry about, a November 1970 issue of the Portuguese pop culture magazine Plateia, or “audience.” Virna Lisi is nearly unrecognizable on the cover without her usual blonde hair. In fact, we thought she was Sylva Koscina when we bought the magazine. The mole later gave away her true identity. That and Virna’s actual name on the cover, duh, but we didn’t notice that because we had to grab things fast during our flea marketing. Inside Plateia you get a nice assortment of contemporary film stars, television personalities, dancers, and musicians. This isn’t an aesthetically spectacular magazine, but for three euros we couldn’t pass it up. We have two more issues we’ll share later.

Intl. Notebook

May 8 2024

HARD TO BEIRA

I'm sorry I hurt your feelings. Have you considered looking for a woman out of your league who's closer to your age?

Above you see one of the items we picked up in Lisbon. It’s an issue of Colecção Cinema. Basically, these and others of its ilk in multiple countries were print versions of current release films. Starring on front are Curd Jürgens and Eva Bartok from their 1956 West German movie Ohne dich wird es Nacht, which was titled in Portuguese À Beira do Pecado, meaning “on the verge of sin.” It was known in English as Without You It Is Night, the literal German title. Sounds dark, and it is. It’s about drug addiction. Though there isn’t as much art inside Colecção Cinema as you’d think considering it’s a cine-novela, we picked it up anyway for the interesting cover and the low price—a mere €1. Fifteen scans below.

Portugal, West Germany, Germany, Colecção Cinema, Ohne dich wird es Nacht, Ð€ Beira do Pecado, Without You It Is Night, Curd Jürgens, Eva Bartok, Barry Coe, cinema

Intl. Notebook

March 19 2024

PORTU-PULP AND PORTU-GALS

Our visit to Lisbon swung between extremes.

Some of you may be wondering whether we actually picked up anything for Pulp Intl. during our ballyhooed trip to Lisbon. We did, we just haven’t had to time to sort and scan it yet. But above you see a snapshot of some items we bought at the city’s twice-weekly Feria de Ladra, which apparently has been going on since 1272 (not a typo), and these days takes place at the Campo de Santa Clara, behind the important monastery of São Vicente de Fora.

The market is a marvel. While it isn’t anything close to Le Marché aux Puces de Saint-Ouen in Paris, it remains one of the better troves of vintage matter you’ll find in Europe, and as a bonus is popular with beautiful women and supports a satellite industry of interesting bars and eateries. Among the items we found were old issues of the pop culture magazine Plateia, crime comics such as Secreto Agente Z33, and a copy of the movie mag Colecção Cinema. We’ll be scanning and uploading those throughout the year, and they’ll be nice reminders of a good trip. Well, mostly good.

When the Pulp Intl. girlfriends left, things went a bit haywire. We’ll share only one episode: the panic inducing disappearance of one of our group, who had been done in by Lisbon’s numerous hills as we searched for a music bar one night, and had headed home to rest with his left arm tingling (which he attributed to a pulled shoulder muscle he’d suffered after taking a spill on what we nicknamed the “heroin stairs”). We stayed at the bar and when we returned hours later he was nowhere to be seen. Frantic calls to his phone produced nothing. Calls to the hospitals ditto. Uh oh.

We organized ourselves for a 4 a.m. search of the deserted barrio where the bar was. Our working theory: coronary, collapsed, rolled into a ditch, died. That hadn’t happened. What had happened was he walked down the hills as planned, was near the apartment we’d rented, but got tractor beamed into a strip club where he spent 1,300 euros on lap dances. Under the circumstances, he’d heard none of our calls. Said he: “I felt better by the time I was passing the club.” Funny episode, but we think he’s due for a medical check-up. The week that was, Pulp Intl. style.

Portugal, Lisbon

Intl. Notebook

March 8 2024

OPERATION PORTUGAL

Pulp Intl. and friends abroad. What's the worst that can happen?

It’s intermission time. Yes, we just took a break, but it was unplanned due to our move and its many associated delays. The upcoming intermission has been planned for a while. We’re going to stage a triple birthday celebration in Lisbon with some of our favorite globetrotters. The Pulp. Intl. girlfriends are coming too, but are bailing on day four. They say they want us to have boy time, but the truth is four days with this crowd is all they can endure.

Mixed into the days and nights (of sedate museum visits and early bedtimes, we swear, girls) will be serious pulp digging. We have no idea whether Portugal has such items, but we’ll only learn the answer by looking. Hopefully we’ll make it back home intact by March 16. That’s the plan, anyway. But you know what they say about plans. To tide you over until our glorious return, let us direct you to some Pulp Intl. favorites.

A small collection of paperback covers by George Gross.

Fifteen covers of the pulp magazine Short Stories.

Modern pulp art by the amazing Owen Smith.

All our issues of the French art deco style magazine Paris Plaisirs.

All our issues of the Australian men’s adventure magazine Adam.

Misty Ayers does her daily lingerie workout then cooks a meal.

The paperback cover art of Bill Edwards.

A look at historic cinemas from around world.

Beautiful covers from the Italian publishers Edizioni MA-GA.

All our write-ups on sexploitation queen Laura Gemser.

And finally, below you’ll find our inexhaustible tabloid index, which used to reside somewhere in 2018, but which we’ve moved in case anyone wants to check out all the scandal sheets we’ve written about.

Portugal, Lisbon, intermission

Vintage Pulp

August 13 2023

SCREAM BLOODY MURDER

Wait, don't kill me! I can be useful! I can teach you this lindy hop I learned in my dance class!

We said last week we’d get back to British actress Susan George. Above you see her on a poster for Die Screaming Marianne, along with the claim that the movie is the ultimate in suspense. Well, if that’s the case, how could we say no? George plays a nightclub dancer hiding out from her father, a former judge who took bribes during his long career. He lives in a villa in Portugal with George’s half sister. When George turns twenty-one she’ll receive her mother’s inheritance, which is in a Swiss bank account along with papers proving her father was a crook. Her half sister wants the money, which amounts to $700,000, and her father wants the documents. Both decide that killing George is the only way to achieve their goals.

The filmmakers, including cult horror director Pete Walker, primarily come at all this via a somewhat elliptical route that brings to mind giallo cinema, where you aren’t sure what’s significant, or really what’s even going on at first. But by halfway through, it all begins to make sense and the story boils down to the very conventional question of whether George’s father and half sister can get away with murder. We won’t answer that, but we’ll tell you we can’t fully recommend the movie because of its obtrusively oddball style. George definitely made better films, a few of which we mentioned in our previous post on her. That being the case, we’ll see her again. Die Screaming Marianne premiered today in 1971.

Portugal, London, Die Screaming Marianne, Susan George, Barry Evans, Christopher Sandford, Judy Huxtable, Pete Walker, poster art, cinema, horror, movie review

Intl. Notebook

December 25 2022

PLAYMATE REVUE

Ciné-Revue was the go-to publication for movie stars seeking exposure.

Here’s your official Christmas gift, a prime example of that mid-century phenomenon we discuss often, the intersection of mainstream and adult cinema during the sixties and seventies. Ciné-Revue, which was published in Belgium and distributed there and in France, Switzerland, Canada, Portugal, Britain, and the Basque region of Spain, was at the vanguard of that idea. It highlighted both popular stars and their adult counterparts, blurring the line between the two. It wasn’t hard to do. Famous performers often acted in sexually oriented films, and Ciné-Revue was a platform that helped cinematic explorations of sexual ideas be taken seriously.

The issue you see above is the cover of Ciné-Revue Photos 49, a visual compendium of actresses both world famous and somewhat obscure. The names run the gamut from Anita Ekberg to Marina Marfoglia. Marfoglia gets the cover, while Ekberg gets the rear, and that’s exactly what we’re talking about—the obscure elevated over the known. Both are also featured in multiple pages inside—but while Ekberg gets seven, Marfoglia gets eight and the centerfold. The issue is about a hundred pages, but we’re unable to put together a post that long. Instead, we’ve selected some of the nicer images to warm up this winter day. Enjoy, and don’t worry about us slaving over a computer. We put this collection together last week. Right now, on Christmas, we’re traveling with the PIs.

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HISTORY REWIND

The headlines that mattered yesteryear.

February 18

1954—First Church of Scientology Established

The first Scientology church, based on the writings of science fiction author L. Ron Hubbard, is established in Los Angeles, California. Since then, the city has become home to the largest concentration of Scientologists in the world, and its ranks include high-profile adherents such as Tom Cruise and John Travolta.

February 17

1933—Blaine Act Passes

The Blaine Act, a congressional bill sponsored by Wisconsin senator John J. Blaine, is passed by the U.S. Senate and officially repeals the 18th Amendment to the United States Constitution, aka the Volstead Act, aka Prohibition. The repeal is formally adopted as the 21st Amendment to the Constitution on December 5, 1933.

February 17

1947—Voice of America Begins Broadcasting into U.S.S.R.

The state radio channel known as Voice of America and controlled by the U.S. State Department, begins broadcasting into the Soviet Union in Russian with the intent of countering Soviet radio programming directed against American leaders and policies. The Soviet Union responds by initiating electronic jamming of VOA broadcasts.

February 16

1937—Carothers Patents Nylon

Wallace H. Carothers, an American chemist, inventor and the leader of organic chemistry at DuPont Corporation, receives a patent for a silk substitute fabric called nylon. Carothers was a depressive who for years carried a cyanide capsule on a watch chain in case he wanted to commit suicide, but his genius helped produce other polymers such as neoprene and polyester. He eventually did take cyanideâ€”not in pill form, but dissolved in lemon juiceâ€”resulting in his death in late 1937.

February 15

1933—Franklin Roosevelt Survives Assassination Attempt

In Miami, Florida, Giuseppe Zangara attempts to shoot President-elect Franklin D. Roosevelt, but is restrained by a crowd and, in the course of firing five wild shots, hits five people, including Chicago, Illinois Mayor Anton J. Cermak, who dies of his wounds three weeks later. Zangara is quickly tried and sentenced to eighty years in jail for attempted murder, but is later convicted of murder when Cermak dies. Zangara is sentenced to death and executed in Florida’s electric chair.