Actress Yvette Mimieux is remembered by TCM
Whether she used it to charm genuinely or to cloak a character’s toughness, Yvette Mimieux had a delicate beauty that radiated in any project she did.
The actress – who died in January, a little more than a week after she had turned 80 – will be remembered in a Turner Classic Movies tribute from the evening of Wednesday, May 4, into the early hours of Thursday, May 5. Whether she was cavorting in a swimsuit or immersed in sci-fi with killer robots or a time machine, Mimieux always was a distinctive presence on the screen.
A Los Angeles native, she made her debut in “Platinum High School” before famously playing the female lead in “The Time Machine,” launching a very active span of work of MGM. Mimieux’s projects for other companies ranged from exploitation fare (“Three in the Attic,” “Jackson County Jail”) to a couple of Disney movies including the expensive fantasy “The Black Hole.” She also was quite visible on TV throughout the 1970s and 1980s, a notable example being the 1974 movie “Hit Lady,” which she also wrote.
Here’s a look at the movies TCM will show in its salute to Mimieux, in order.
“Light in the Piazza” (1962): Mimieux is quite touching as a mentally challenged woman who begins a romance with an Italian suitor (George Hamilton) while traveling abroad with her mother (Olivia de Havilland).
“Where the Boys Are” (1960): One of Mimieux’s earliest hits remained one of her biggest,
featuring her as one of several college friends experiencing spring break‘in Fort Lauderdale.
“Dark of the Sun” (1968): Easily among the most brutal films Mimieux made, this adventuredrama features her as a newly widowed woman who aligns with mercenaries in the Congo.
“The Time Machine” (1960): As a woman encountered in the distant future by a time traveler, Mimieux had an iconic role in this much-beloved adaptation of the H.G. Wells novel.
“Toys in the Attic” (1963): Dean Martin has the rather showier role as her new husband, but Mimieux still scores in the Lillian Hellman story of strained – and sometimes strange –family relations.
Red (James Spader) finds himself questioning the presumed current whereabouts of one of his former “associates” in the new episode “Laszlo Jankowics.” Diego Klattenhoff, Harry Lennix, Hisham Tawfiq and Amir Arison also star.
10 p.m. on WUSA Blue Bloods
When Erin (Bridget Moynahan) discovers she is being stalked by a recently released prison inmate who spent 12 years behind bars, she asks Danny and Anthony (Donnie Wahlberg, Steven Schirripa) to probe her office’s role in the man’s sentencing in the new episode “Tangled Up in Blue.” Meanwhile, after unwittingly taking drugs at a party, Jamie (Will Estes) is caught driving under the influence and must work to save his badge.
10 p.m. on WMPT WETA International Jazz Day Celebration
This year’s edition of this joyous annual event unites people of all ages, backgrounds and nationalities, who gather to celebrate the rich legacy of jazz and how it has promoted peace, individual expression, diversity and dialogue among different cultures. Actor Michael Douglas hosts the inspiring global concert that caps the event, featuring such exceptional guest artists as Herbie Hancock, Andra Day, Marcus Miller, Dee Dee Bridgewater and Dianne Reeves.
11 p.m. on AMC That Dirty Black Bag
This violent yet often darkly funny “Spaghetti Western” series chronicles an eight-day clash between incorruptible Arthur McCoy (Dominic Cooper), sheriff of the droughtparched Old West community of Greenvale, and Red Bill (Douglas Booth), a taciturn bounty hunter who rolls into town carrying a filthy bag filled with the decapitated heads of his victims. The latter is on a mission of vengeance, searching for the man who killed his mother.