Dead Famous

Season 2 Episode 9 - Jayne Mansfield

2005 · 48 min

TV-14

Movie Star, TV Star, and songbird, the busty blonde bombshell that was Jayne Mansfield was born in 1933, and was only 34 when she died. Starring in films such as The Girl Can't Help It and Will Success Spoil Rock Hunter?, with her breathy voice, sexy squeaks, and voluptuous looks (and an IQ of 163!) Jayne was one of the true sex symbols of the 20th Century. Jayne Mansfield tragically died in '67 on the way to a television appearance, when her car slammed into the back of a truck on a fog-shrouded highway near New Orleans. She was killed instantly, but her three children asleep in the back all lived. Jayne wasn't decapitated, in contrast to wide-spread rumours - it was a wig that flew out of the car. Sceptic Gail Porter and sensitive Chris Fleming pick up the Mansfield story in Biloxi, the last place where she performed on the night before she died. Will a sance there bring contact from beyond the grave? A midnight trip to Dead Man's Curve, where Jayne lost her life, brings fascinating results; but it is the i

S02:E01 - Alfred Hitchcock

Gail and Chris experience what could be their scariest moment so far in the sance room of The Winchester Mystery House in Santa Cruz - a spectacular sprawling mansion whose owner kept an army of carpenters working day and night for 38 years and claimed her design plans were dictated by the spirits themselves. Chris finds himself taken over by a mysterious and forceful spirit and is so distressed as he writhes about that Gail fears for his very sanity and the crew have to intervene to save him.Remember the creepy old schoolhouse from The Birds? Gail and Chris won't forget it in a hurry, after the weird goings-on they encountered there.And deep beneath a San Francisco hotel that featured in Hitchcock's thriller Vertigo, Gail inches fearfully into a dark, forbidding tunnel. Could the ghost of the corpulent film director really have squeezed himself into such a confined space? And if not, just what is it that scares Gail so much?

S02:E02 - Houdini

Searching for the ghost of Harry Houdini has become something of a national pastime in the United States with an annual sance at which, for 78 years, he has failed to make an appearance. So Gail and Chris have their work cut out to track down the ghost of the world's most famous escapologist. Will the great man get away from them, too? Their search takes them from the Eastern State Penitentiary, the blueprint for modern escape-proof prisons, where the man known as The Jailbreak King might still be tampering with the locks, to the 103-ghost Palace Theatre on Broadway where Houdini performed in the vaudeville era, to the Houdini Museum in Scranton, and Coney Island, where Houdini met his wife, performed, and took an interest in the freak shows. But could the man no jail could hold be captured by our cameras?

S02:E03 - John Wayne

At 6 ft 4, John Wayne is the archetypal larger-than-life character - so you'd think his spirit would be pretty easy to find. The Hell it is, as Mr Wayne might have put it himself. Gail and Chris, displaying true grit, travel to Tombstone in Arizona - the setting for several of his films - and attempt to unearth the spirit of the giant of Western movies. Alone at night in Boot Hill Cemetery, they examine their photographs afterwards and find a pair of eyes had been staring at them out of the darkness. There was no-one else there at least, no-one who was alive! With 28 ghosts reputed to haunt the Birdcage Theatre, Gail and Chris had high hopes - and they weren't disappointed. Just what is it they caught on the camera they left in the locked and empty room? And what, or who, did they encounter on the Wild Goose, the converted minesweeper that was John Wayne's pride and joy?

S02:E04 - Joan Crawford

For a Hollywood legend who spent her entire life seeking the limelight, Joan Crawford seems to be spending her afterlife playing hard to get. Undaunted, Gail and Chris refuse to be denied their audience with the woman they call the ultimate movie star and try to find her in all her old haunts in Los Angeles and Santa Cruz. Refused access to her old Hollwood home where the bedroom walls spontaneously burst into flames, Gail and Chris explore the famous Raleigh Studios - setting for the film Whatever Happened To Baby Jane?, and capture something intriguing on their camera. But is is Miss Crawford? More spirits assail our daring duo at the Moss Beach Distillery, one of them even playing with Chris's muscles, but still no sign of Joan. Our search switches to Brookdale Lodge, frequented by celebrities and at one time by gangsters, and where a six-year-old girl drowned in a stream that runs through the restaurant. With 49 ghosts and 46 rooms, things look promising - and Gail and Chris are rewarded when a strange sw

S02:E05 - John Lennon

Murdered in cold blood at 40, John Lennon is a modern-day immortal. But does his spirit live on in New York, the city he adopted and wished he'd been born in? Gail and Chris foresake the long and winding road and get on the freeways to visit the former Beatle's old haunts in New York, from the entrance of the Dakota Building where he was gunned down to Strawberry Fields in Central Park, the focus of mass pilgrimages on the anniversary of his birth. From the dressing rooms of Shea Stadium, where The Beatles took New York by storm, to the Caf La Fortuna in Greenwich Village, where John and Yoko whiled away the hours over a coffee, and the famous Electric Lady Studios where John recorded, Gail and Chris's search for John's spirit is hair-raising. Is the John Lennon lookalike really possessed by John Lennon while the camera is rolling? And are the signs Gail and Chris receive really from him?

S02:E06 - Bette Davis

How many people know that Bette Davis' ancestors were accused of being witches? Gail and Chris do,so they head for the notorious witch-burning capital of Salem in Massachussetts,only 20 minutes from the town of Lowell where Miss Davis grew up. There, a coven of modern day witches do everything in their power to summon up the spirit of Bette Davis, while Gail and Chris creep around the town that seems to have more haunted buildings than anywhere else on the planet. Did Bette play in the woods as a child near Dungeon Rock, a haunted hot spot where a man spent his entire lifetime digging in vain for pirates' treasure he believed was buried there? And would the grand old lady herself make an entrance at the Victorian Mansion where the owner's grandfather was her chauffeur?

S02:E07 - Buddy Holly

As the world's most famous air crash victim as well as the man who inspired The Beatles, Buddy Holly remains very much alive in the minds of millions of fans around the globe, but is there any trace of him still to be found in his old haunts? Gail and Chris turn the clock back to The Day The Music Died by visiting the place where it died, an isolated cornfield in Iowa, and meeting a man who conquered his terror of flying especially to visit the site where Buddy's plane was smashed into pieces over a wide area. Our daring duo creep around The Surf Ballroom in Clear Lake where Buddy gave his last concert; they meet a fan who was there that night; and they ask a tarot reader to see if she can tempt his spirit back for an encore. Not content with that, they see Buddy's old Chevy in his home town of Lubbock, Texas, investigate strange goings-on at a university campus, and join a team of paranormal researchers in a cemetery at night to see what they can find at Buddy's graveside. Who could have known the surprises

S02:E08 - Bonnie and Clyde

Bonnie and Clyde were a legend in their own lifetime - until those lifetimes were shortened spectacularly by a police ambush that saw them die in a hail of bullets and left their car looking like a colander. Immortalised in the Georgie Fame song and regarded by many as folk heroes, the couple were actually violent bank robbers who killed 13 people and terrorised banks in a notorious spree of crime. Gail and Chris go hunting for their spirits in Dallas, all the time wondering whether they'd really like to come face to face with them in any form. Their search takes them to an enormous and very haunted hotel; a creepy old bank they once robbed; and an overnight stay for Chris in one of their hangoutsAlong the way, they meet Clyde Barrow's nephew, various unexplainable events, and rather more than they bargained for

S02:E09 - Jayne Mansfield

S02:E10 - Elvis

The King of Rock n Roll, and a hero and icon for millions, the final subject of this series of Dead Famous needs no introduction! Searching for Elvis's ghost sees sceptic Gail Porter and sensitive Chris Fleming spend a fascinating week in Memphis. Many claim to see the ghost of the corpulent crooner at the Graceland Gates at midnight, will they have any luck getting this apparition on camera? Or will he be tempted out of celestial retirement with some psychometry at Sun Studios? Will an investigation at the house where he launched his career appeal to the beyond? Or will he join the 90 other spirits that inhabit the disused brewery that made his favourite tipple?Will our presenters be All Shook Up by what they find? Or has Elvis Presley finally left the building?

S02:E09 - Jayne Mansfield

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