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Bruce Kessler, a racing driver who moved into film and television following retirement, with credits including The Monkees and The A-Team, has died. He was 88. As reported by The Hollywood Reporter, Kessler passed away on Thursday, April 4, at his home in Marina del Rey following a brief illness, according to his brother, author and columnist Stephen Kessler. Born on March 23, 1936, in Seattle, Washington, Kessler moved with his family to Beverly Hills, California, at an early age. He developed a love for cars and began participating in the Sports Car Club of America races at 16 years old. He was also a team driver with Chuck Daigh for the Scarab race cars built by his close friend Lance Reventlow in the late 1950s. Through racing, Kessler became friends with actors James Dean and Steve McQueen. Kessler was one of the last people to speak to Dean before his tragic death on September...

Bruce Kessler, a race car driver who became a TV director as well as a noted yacht designer, died April 4 in Marina Del Rey, Calif. after a brief illness. He was 88.

His brother Stephen confirmed his death.

Kessler started racing at the age of 17 and at 21, he crashed at night during thte 24 Hours of Le Mans, bailing out of the car before it burst into flames. He survived two more crashes before retiring from racing at 26 in 1962.

His first film, the Formula One short “The Sound of Speed,” represented the U.S. at the Cannes Film Festival. The technical expertise he brought to the film led to him being hired as technical advisor on racing and chase sequences for movies, and he served as second unit director for Howard Hawks on “Red Line 7000.”

With the help of Hawks as mentor, Kessler became a director for dozens of TV movies...

Bruce Kessler, who directed episodes of shows including The Monkees, It Takes a Thief, The Rockford Files, McCloud and The Commish when he wasn’t driving race cars, designing boats or circling the globe in a yacht, has died. He was 88.

Kessler died Thursday at his home in Marina del Rey after a brief illness, his brother, author and columnist Stephen Kessler, told The Hollywood Reporter.

Survivors also include his wife, actress Joan Freeman, perhaps best known as the love interest of Elvis Presley’s character in Roustabout (1964). She and Kessler were together for 54 years and married for 33.

Kessler served as second-unit director on Howard Hawks’ Red Line 7000 (1965), an action film about stock cars that starred James Caan, before embarking on a three-decade career as a director for television.

His credits included The Flying Nun, Adam-12, Marcus Welby, M.D., Get Christie Love!, Baretta, Switch, CHiPs, The A-Team, The Greatest American Hero,...

In 1969 eligible young men would try just about anything to get out of The Draft, including wounding themselves. A less drastic tack is taken by the heroes of Bruce Kessler’s drive-in situation comedy: they pretend to be gay, and have to keep up the pretense while trying to date girls on the side. The expected stereotypes abound, but all looks pretty goofy and innocuous today. Some in the Lgbt community consider it progressive for its time. A bikini-clad Candice Rialson can be glimpsed in a bit part on her way to B-movie stardom.

Simone Simon: Remembering the 'Cat People' and 'La Bête Humaine' star (photo: Simone Simon 'Cat People' publicity) Pert, pretty, pouty, and fiery-tempered Simone Simon – who died at age 94 ten years ago, on Feb. 22, 2005 – is best known for her starring role in Jacques Tourneur's cult horror movie classic Cat People (1942). Those aware of the existence of film industries outside Hollywood will also remember Simon for her button-nosed femme fatale in Jean Renoir's French film noir La Bête Humaine (1938).[1] In fact, long before Brigitte Bardot, Annette Stroyberg, Mamie Van Doren, Tuesday Weld, Ann-Margret, and Barbarella's Jane Fonda became known as cinema's Sex Kittens, Simone Simon exuded feline charm – with a tad of puppy dog wistfulness – in a film career that spanned two continents and a quarter of a century. From the early '30s to the mid-'50s, she seduced men young and old on both...

Sorry it's so late, folks, but there's lots of horror DVDs to choose from coming your way this Tuesday, June 24th, so I hope you’ve been saving your cash!

Cannibal Terror (1980)

Directed by Alain Deruelle

One of the original Video Nasties! This French/Spanish co-production follow a pair of idiotic thieves and their large-breasted accomplice as they kidnap the daughter of a local tycoon and decide that the cannibal-infested jungle is the best hiding spot. True, no one would look for them there! Pretty soon they’re either being eaten alive or trying to escape from being eaten alive. Buy it here!!

The Chilling (1989)

Directed by Deland Nuse & Jack A. Sunseri

Now, I can see the benefits of having a cryogenics lab, freezing bodies to preserve them and bring them back when a cure is found for whatever is making them sick, but you’d hope they’d have...

Dark Sky Films has announced a June 24 release for their DVD of Bruce Kessler's 1971 horror film, Simon, King Of The Witches, which stars Allyson Ames, Norman Burton, Jay Della, and Angus Duncan. In the film, Simon, a young man with magic power, invokes the help of the evil forces in order to take revenge of a man who cheated him with a bad cheque.