french quarter | The Timothy Carey Experience

As I head off this morning for my second BurlyCon experience, I leave you with this video that I’ve shared before (but I have a feeling you won’t mind too much). Timothy arrived in LaFitte, Louisiana in the fall of 1956 to begin filming Bayou. He had an unusual assignment from the film’s producers – he had to learn to “dance real wild.” In New Orleans he asked a cab driver to help him out. The cabbie took him straight to Leon Prima’s 500 Club in the French Quarter. A stunning, statuesque burlesque dancer by the name of Lilly Christine, billed as “The Cat Girl,” was performing there. Tim returned to the club every night for a week to watch her dance. I’m sure he needed little persuasion to conduct this kind of research. After all, it was for the good of the film, right?

This is a beautiful gallery of stills accompanied by the awesome tune Song for Lilly Christine by the one and only Big Rude Jake. Posting will probably be sporadic for the next five days or so. Enjoy!

Tim Carey, 27

Not at All Shy.

His Publicity man said of Tim Carey: “He needs a press agent like he needs a hole in the head. He’s his own best advance man.”

Carey, an unsophisticated 27, is at the Ambassador East to beat the drums for Bayou opening tonight in the Monroe Theater.

Carey is an actor—off as well as on. He’ll tell you: “We were shooting this picture in New Orleans. I told the cabby I had to learn to dance real wild. He took me to the French Quarter.”

It was there, Carey says, that a girl named Lilly Christine at “The 500 Club” did a special dance. They billed her as “The Cat Girl.”

Carey watched her every night for a week. Later, he recalls:

“In New Haven, they put me on the stage to help whip up some interest in Bayou. They hollered when I did the dance.”

Carey admits the picture’s producers censored parts of his dance. He says modestly: “It out-Elvises Elvis.”

– George Murray, “Loop Movies,” Chicago Daily News, January 15, 1958