Shakespeare bust "cameos"?

General goings on in the 1966 Batman World

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Jim Akin
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Shakespeare bust "cameos"?

Post by Jim Akin »

Judging by this publicity shot for the 1963 Disney feature, "The Misadventures of Merlin Jones," Wayne Manor wasn't the only place in Hollywood with a certain bust of the Bard. (It's possible, I suppose, that this is the bust that'd eventually conceal the batpole switch, but it seems likelier, at least to me in my ignorance of backlot practices, that there were several floating around various prop departments.)

Image

Does anyone with greater knowledge of studio practices generally or bat-props specifically have any guess as to whether the Wayne Manor bust is likely to have made its way from Disney's studios to the Batman set? Might this still (or the entire "Merlin Jones" feature) have been shot for Disney at Fox or Desilu? (I haven't seen "Merlin Jones," so I don't even know if the bust appears in that movie. Maybe it was just something handy to incorporate into the photo?)

And on a related note, has anyone seen the bust in any shows or movies other than Batman?

Cheers,

QQ
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Chuck Williams
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Re: Shakespeare bust "cameos"?

Post by Chuck Williams »

That is a copy of the Louis-Francois Roubiliac bust and not the one made for the Batman TV show.
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Ben Bentley
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Re: Shakespeare bust "cameos"?

Post by Ben Bentley »

Ermmmmm.... what Chuck said.

My thought's would be that the famous bust from the show was built for its purpose given the nature of the seemingly perfect location for the hinge where the neck meets the collar. That being said, obviously it has been well documented that props from shows of the same epoch did indeed share the same prop warehouse with more generic pieces such as (Bat-)Computer units showing up on shows like Lost In Space etc.
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Jim Akin
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Re: Shakespeare bust "cameos"?

Post by Jim Akin »

Thanks, guys.
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