Phyllis Thompson

A white dropout struggles to become a cartoonist and filmmaker, drawing inspiration from the harsh, gritty world around him. Still sharing his rundown apartment with his middle-aged parents, an oafish slob of an Italian father and a ditzy nutcase of a Jewish mother, he's ridiculed and looked down upon by his friends, hypocrites who run with violent gangs and the Italian Mafia, and a shallow Black girl who makes her living downtown with the pimps and pushers. The cartoonist gets a chance to pitch a film idea to a movie mogul, but the story proves too outrageous: a far-future Earth, depleted by war and pollution, where a mutant antihero challenges and kills God.

Ice skating is the theme; at the Tropical Ice Garden, in Westwood Hills, are seen a flock of skating stars including Irene Dare and Phyllis Ann Thomoson, as well as Hollywood luminaries such as Franklyn Pangborn, Norma Shearer, Rita Hayworth, Mickey Rooney, Dick Purcell and Ann Sheridan.

Ice skating is becoming a more and more popular activity, especially with ice arenas making it possible to skate in warmer climes and ice shows bringing the beauty of figure skating to the masses. For the novice skater just learning, there will be the inevitable bumps and falls. New skaters learn that their skate blades have an inside and outside edge. Basics they learn are how to glide properly and how to stop. Most maneuvers conducted by figure skaters are based on figure eights, figure threes and loops. Other areas of the arts and entertainment mesh with figure skating, such as music, fashion and dance. The most famous professional revue, the Ice Follies, incorporates many other aspects of entertainment into their show beyond the basic ice skating.