November 29, 1945: "The Lost Weekend" Premieres

November 29, 1945: The Lost Weekend premieres, based on the novel by Charles R. Jackson, and directed by Billy Wilder. It is Hollywood's classic portrayal of alcoholism. And the title is a little misleading: Although it wraps around a weekend, it runs from Thursday afternoon to Tuesday morning, so The Lost Week might have been a better title.

Ray Milland plays Don Birnam, an alcoholic writer from New York, preparing for a weekend vacation with his brother Wick. Jane Wyman plays his girlfriend, Helen. He goes out for a drink, but, as so often happens, one drink becomes many, and he misses the train for his vacation.

Don tells Helen that he's 2 different people: "Don the Writer" and "Don the Drunk." He's lying, both to her and to himself, proving it by pawning his typewriter on Saturday so he can buy more booze. He wakes up in the alcoholics' ward of a hospital on Sunday. On Monday, he falls victim to delirium tremens, a.k.a. "The D.T.'s." His screams alert a neighbor, who calls Helen, who nurses him through the night. He commits to being Don the Writer, and begins to write his novel based on the events of the "weekend."

Milland won the Academy Award for Best Actor, preceding Richard Burton as the 1st actor from Wales to win one. He later appeared in Dial M for Murder and Love Story, directed for television, and became one of TV's finest character actors. He died in 1986, as a result of substance abuse -- not alcohol, but tobacco.

Wyman later won the Academy Award for Best Actress for Johnny Belinda. She was married to Ronald Reagan from 1940 to 1949, and was the mother of his daughter Maureen. Together, they adopted a son, Michael. She was already a Republican, so his political switch, from liberal to conservative, was not one of the reasons they split. She later remarried, and starred on the TV series Falcon Crest. She lived until 2007.

*

November 29, 1945 was a Thursday. Baseball was out of season. The NBA hadn't been founded yet. No games were scheduled for the NHL.

There were 2 games in college football. Number 10 Texas beat their arch-rivals, Texas A&M, 20-10 at Kyle Field in College Station. And the University of Chattanooga (now the University of Tennessee at Chattanooga) beat the University of Mississippi (a.k.a. Ole Miss), 31-6 at Chamberlain Field in Chattanooga, Tennessee.

August 10, 1950: "Sunset Boulevard" Premieres

Left to right: Erich von Stroheim,

Gloria Swanson and William Holden

August 10, 1950: Sunset Boulevard is released by Paramount Pictures. Occasionally, Hollywood turns the camera back on itself, only likes part of what it sees, and makes a movie about the movie industry. This may be the best of them, showing the industry for all its glory, and all its venality.

Sunset Boulevard, the street, runs from the Pacific Coast Highway in Pacific Palisades, through the cities of Beverly Hills and West Hollywood, through several districts in Los Angeles, including Hollywood (which, unlike Beverly Hills and "WeHo," is not a separate city), sub-including "the Sunset Strip," east to Figueroa Street, a north-south street on which the Crypto.com Arena, and, further south, the Los Angeles Memorial Coliseum and Banc of California Stadium (on the site of the Los Angeles Memorial Sports Arena) sit. (UPDATE: In 2023, the soccer facility was renamed BMO Stadium.)

Sunset Boulevard, the film, was directed by Billy Wilder, who had already proven himself a master of both drama and comedy. There's not much comedy in this film. It's narrated by William Holden as Joe Gillis, a screenwriter who needs money now, especially because his car is about to be repossessed. Even in late 1949, when the movie begins, a car was necessary to get around Southern California.

(The 1988 film Who Framed Roger Rabbit? has the L.A. streetcar line, known as the Red Car, discontinued in 1947. In reality, the Red Car did exist, but it kept running until 1961, and its "Western District" did run to Hollywood, Burbank and Beverly Hills, all the way to Santa Monica -- roughly the route of today's Metro D or E lines on Los Angeles' subway system. The film takes more dramatic license: The Red Car was not discontinued so that freeways could be built, to accommodate the increase in automobile traffic. It was the other way around: The increased traffic had already happened, and some of the freeways had already been built for it, making the Red Car obsolete.)

Joe hides his car in a secluded house at 10086 Sunset Blvd., 14 miles west of Los Angeles City Hall. (The address does not actually exist, but there is a driveway off Sunset that includes 10060 and 10100, so 10086 would be there.) It turns out to be the home of Norma Desmond, once one of the biggest stars in the business, but she hasn't made a film since the "silents" gave way to the "talkies." Joe tells her, "You used to be big." She says, "I am big. It's the pictures that got small."

She's played by Gloria Swanson, a silent-film star who did successfully make the transition, though many didn't. She was 50 years old when filming began, but seems much older. In modern Hollywood, she would have kept on working until around 50, and then gone from playing romantic leads to playing bosses, mentors and vixens, like Helen Mirren, Meryl Streep and Catherine Zeta-Jones have done.

Her house is run by Max, who, Joe eventually learns, is her ex-husband and ex-director, who "discovered her." He's as creepy as she is. He is played by Erich von Stroheim, who had been one of the silents' top directors, and an actor who specialized in playing villains, billed as "The Man You Love to Hate." To show Norma's earlier career, a clip is shown of Queen Kelly, a 1929 silent film in which von Stroheim directed Swanson.

Norma offers Joe a job as a "script doctor," editing a script she's written for her big comeback. Joe lives there, and Max takes care of his needs as well as hers. Joe soon realizes that Norma has fallen in love with him. He does not return her affections, and she attempts suicide. Joe and Max save her. Soon after this, Joe and Norma begin fooling around. Max knows, but he's still in love with her, and does not interfere with the first happiness she has found in a long time.

Max drives Norma and Joe, in her 1929 Isotta Franchini car, to the Paramount Pictures studios, where they meet another of her former directors, Cecil B. DeMille, who plays himself. He treats Norma with deference, but he doesn't want the script. The studio doesn't want to use the script, or her, just the car.

Finally, Norma discovers another script that Joe has been writing, with his other girlfriend, this one too young for him rather than too old, a studio script reader named Betty Schaefer (Nancy Olson), who had been the girlfriend of another screenwriter, Artie Green (future Dragnet star/producer Jack Webb). Norma telephones Betty to sabotage that relationship. Joe tells Norma he's leaving her, and that her bid for a comeback has already failed. She pulls a gun, and he tells her that he doesn't believe she will kill herself. He's right: She kills him instead, and he falls into the pool.

It is then that we discover that the dead body in the pool at the beginning of the film is Joe himself: He is narrating even though he is dead. The police arrive, and so do the newsreel cameras. Norma comes down the stairs, dressed in her old finery, and tells everyone, "All right, Mr. DeMille, I'm ready for my close-up!" (The line is often misquoted as, "I'm ready for my close-up, Mr. DeMille!")

The film was nominated for 11 Academy Awards, including Best Picture for producer Charles Brackett, Best Director for Wilder, Best Actor for Holden, Best Actress for Swanson, Best Supporting Actor for von Stroheim, and Best Supporting Actress for Olson. None of those won: It only won 3, although 1 was for Best Story and Screenplay, which Brackett and Wilder shared with D.M. Marshman Jr.

In addition to DeMille, Warner Brothers studio head H.B. Warner, gossip columnists Hedda Hopper and Sidney Skolsky, silent film stars Buster Keaton and Anna Q. Nilsson, and songwriters Ray Evans and Jay Livingston played themselves.

von Stroheim died in 1957, DeMille in 1959, Brackett in 1969, Holden in 1981, Webb in 1982, Swanson in 1983, Wilder in 2002, and Marshman in 2015. A young Jack Warden appeared in the film, and he lived until 2006. As of August 10, 2022, Olson is still alive.

In 1999, Kevin Spacey starred in American Beauty, and became the 2nd actor nominated for an Oscar, and the 1st to win one, for playing a dead narrator -- and an amoral narrator.

*

August 10, 1950 was a Thursday. These baseball games were played that day:

* The New York Yankees lost to the Philadelphia Athletics, 5-3 at Yankee Stadium. Alex Kellner outpitched Eddie Lopat, who was relieved by a rookie named Whitey Ford, who pitched 4 scoreless innings. Sam Chapman and Paul Lehner hit home runs for the A's. Joe DiMaggio went 0-for-4.

* The New York Giants lost to the Philadelphia Phillies, 6-5 at Shibe Park in Philadelphia. Granny Hamner led off the bottom of the 10th inning with a single. Andy Seminick singled, and the Giants' center fielder mishandled the ball, allowing Hamner to come all the way around to score.

That center fielder had gone 2-for-5 in the game, but was not a good outfielder. The next season, he lost his job to a rookie named Willie Mays. The former center fielder was moved to 3rd base. His name was Bobby Thomson.

Jim Konstanty was the winning pitcher for the Phils. They went on to win the National League Pennant, and he became the 1st relief pitcher to be named either League's Most Valuable Player.

* The Brooklyn Dodgers beat the Boston Braves, 4-3 at Braves Field in Boston. Gil Hodges and Roy Campanella hit home runs in support of Elwin "Preacher" Roe, who outpitched Johnny Sain. Jackie Robinson went 1-for-3 with a walk and an RBI.

* A doubleheader was split at Griffith Stadium in Washington. The Washington Senators won the opener, 11-2. The Boston Red Sox won the nightcap, 4-3. Ted Williams had been injured in that season's All-Star Game on July 11, and did not return until September 7.

* The Pittsburgh Pirates beat the Chicago Cubs, 7-4 at Forbes Field in Pittsburgh. The Bucs got home runs from Ralph Kiner, Wally Westlake and Clyde McCullough.

* The Detroit Tigers beat the Chicago White Sox, 10-6 at Comiskey Park in Chicago, in the 1st game of a doubleheader. The 2nd game was called due to rain after 7 innings, with the score tied, 1-1.

* The Cleveland Indians beat the St. Louis Browns, 5-4 at Sportsman's Park in St. Louis. Bob Lemon was the winning pitcher.

* And the Cincinnati Reds and the St. Louis Cardinals were not scheduled.

July 6, 1944: "Double Indemnity" Premieres

July 6, 1944: Double Indemnity premieres, directed by Billy Wilder, and based on the 1943 novella by James M. Cain. Two other Cain works were turned into 1940s film noirs: Mildred Pierce and The Postman Always Rings Twice.

Walter Neff (played by Fred MacMurray) is an insurance salesman. He makes a house call to Phyllis Dietrichson (Barbara Stanwyck), about her husband's automobile insurance. Phyllis asks about getting a policy on her husband's life without his knowledge. Neff deduces she is contemplating murder, and wants no part of it. Phyllis visits Neff's apartment. He concocts a plan to murder Mr. Dietrichson, and trigger the "double indemnity" clause, increasing the payout. Neff commits the murder.

The president of Neff's insurance company believes the death was suicide. But Barton Keyes (Edward G. Robinson), the company's claims manager, scoffs at the idea, but he does find it strange Dietrichson did not file a claim after breaking his leg. He grows to suspect Phyllis. He deduces she had an accomplice who will split the insurance money. The company refuses to pay out the accidental death clause, because Dietrichson was unaware of the policy.

Dietrichson's daughter Lola (Jean Heather) befriends Neff. She thinks her stepmother Phyllis killed her father and his first wife. Neff fears Phyllis will murder her, since Dietrichson changed his will in Lola's favor.

Neff warns Phyllis that pursuing the insurance claim in court risks exposing the murder. He urges Phyllis to lie low while he convinces his boss to pay out the claim. Neff learns that Lola's hotheaded boyfriend Nino (Byron Barr) has been visiting Phyllis every night since the murder. Trying to prevent Lola's death, Neff confronts Phyllis. 

Neff tells Phyllis he knows about her and Nino. He figures her plan was to manipulate Nino into murdering Lola and maybe him. He threatens to kill Phyllis and blame Nino. Phyllis shoots him. He dares her to shoot again. She does not, and he takes her gun. She says she never loved him "until a minute ago, when I couldn't fire that second shot." As they embrace, Neff shoots her twice.

Nino comes to the house. Neff warns him not to go inside. Neff drives to his office and starts recording a confession: "I did it for the money, and I did it for the girl. I didn't get the money, and I didn't get the girl." (Of course not: The Hays Code was still in effect, meaning that evildoers cannot profit from their scheme. Phyllis doesn't, either.) Keyes arrives, and hears the truth. Neff plans to flee to Mexico, but collapses before he can leave the building.

Wilder originally shot an ending with Neff surviving being shot, but being sent to the gas chamber for the murder. Paramount Pictures dropped the scene.

The film was nominated for 7 Academy Awards, including Best Picture, Wilder for Best Director, and Stanwyck for Best Actress, but won none.

*

July 6, 1944 was a Thursday. It was also the day of the deadly Hartford Circus Fire. I have a separate entry for that event.

These baseball games were played that day:

* The New York Yankees beat the Cleveland Indians, 4-0 at Yankee Stadium. Hank Borowy pitched a 4-hit shutout to beat Mel Harder.

* The New York Giants beat the St. Louis Cardinals, 10-1 at Sportsman's Park in St. Loius.

* The Brooklyn Dodgers lost to the Cincinnati Reds, 10-4 at Crosley Field in Cincinnati.

* The Boston Red Sox beat the Detroit Tigers, 13-3 at Fenway Park in Boston.

* The St. Louis Browns beat the Philadelphia Athletics, 5-0 at Shibe Park in Philadelphia. Bob Muncrief pitched a 4-hit shoutout.

* The Washington Senators beat the Chicago White Sox, 5-0 at Griffith Stadium in Washington. Mickey Haefner pitched a 4-hit shutout.

* The Pittsburgh Pirates beat the Philadelphia Phillies, 6-5 at Forbes Field in Pittsburgh.

* And the Chicago Cubs beat the Boston Braves, 11-6 at Wrigley Field in Chicago. 

June 15, 1960: "The Apartment" Premieres

Jack Lemmon and Shirley MacLaine

June 15, 1960: The Apartment premieres, directed by Billy Wilder. It is a dark comedy. A very dark one.

Jack Lemmon plays C.C. Baxter -- the initials stand for Calvin Clifford, "but everybody calls me Bud," which isn't true, because, throughout the film, he gets called "Buddy Boy" more than anything else -- an accountant for a New York insurance company, and narrates the film, stating that the action begins on November 1, 1959.

He says he makes $94.70 a week. With inflation factored in, that $94.70 comes to $952.39 in today's money. Multiply that by 4 weeks, and you've got $3,809.56. His eponymous apartment is at 51 West 67th Street, "just half a block from Central Park," and he says his rent is $85 a week, or $854 in today's money. I guarantee you, you're not going to get a room, much less an apartment, at that monthly rent in Manhattan in 2022; and even $3,809.56 might not cover a month's rent on an apartment at that particular location today.

In nearly 4 years on the job, he had gotten nowhere in the company, until, through his own social clumsiness, he began letting the higher-ups at his company use his apartment for flings with their mistresses. Those higher-ups are led by Fred MacMurray, in a rare bad-guy role for him that upset many of his fans. In the case of MacMurray's J.D. Sheldrake, the mistresses include elevator operator Fran Kubelik (Shirley MacLaine), the woman Baxter can't bring himself to tell that he loves.

While it has some funny moments, this film is quite dark, including a suicide attempt by Fran, once she realizes that Sheldrake isn't going to leave his wife for her. The tactics of Sheldrake and the other executives -- making this film something of a precursor to the 2007-15 AMC TV series Mad Men, which took place from 1960 to 1971 -- would not be put up with in the #MeToo era. Indeed, just 20 years later, in the film 9 to 5, feminism had already made this film an anachronism.

Fortunately, as he did in Mister Roberts in 1955, Lemmon plays a man who, emboldened by a horrible event, stands up to his horrible boss. Unlike in Mister Roberts, where he was serving in the Navy and on board a ship, so it wasn't possible, in The Apartment, Lemmon gets the girl.

The film was nominated for 10 Academy Awards, winning 5, including Best Picture, and Best Director for Wilder. Lemmon and MacLaine were both nominated, but lost.

*

June 15, 1960 was a Wednesday. These baseball games were played that day:

* The New York Yankees and the Kansas City Athletics were tied 7-7 at Kansas City Municipal Stadium, when it was called due to curfew after 12 innings. It was never resumed. Yogi Berra and Clete Boyer hit home runs. Roger Maris went 4-for-5 with a walk and 2 RBIs. Mickey Mantle did not play.

* A doubleheader was split at Cleveland Municipal Stadium. The Cleveland Indians won the opener, 10-2. The Baltimore Orioles won the nightcap, 13-5. Over the 2 games, Brooks Robinson went 3-for-7 with a walk.

* The St. Louis Cardinals beat the Cincinnati Reds, 6-0 at Crosley Field in Cincinnati. Ray Sadecki pitched a 3-hit shutout. Stan Musial did not play. Frank Robinson went 1-for-3 with a walk.

* The Boston Red Sox beat the Detroit Tigers, 4-3 at Briggs Stadium in Detroit. (The ballpark was renamed Tiger Stadium the next year.) Frank Malzone singled Pete Runnels home with the winning run in the top of the 10th inning. Ted Williams went 1-for-4 with a walk. Al Kaline went 0-for-5.

* The Chicago White Sox beat the Washington Senators, 6-4 at Comiskey Park in Chicago.

* A doubleheader was split at Milwaukee County Stadium. The Milwaukee Braves won the 1st game, 5-4. The Chicago Cubs won the 2nd game, 8-5, despite 2 home runs from Eddie Mathews. Over the 2 games, Hank Aaron went 2-for-7 with 2 walks, and Ernie Banks went 2-for-9 with a walk and an RBI.

* The Los Angeles Dodgers beat the Philadelphia Phillies, 14-2 at the Los Angeles Memorial Coliseum.  Sandy Koufax went the distance for the win.

* And the Pittsburgh Pirates beat the San Francisco Giants, 14-6 at Candlestick Park in San Francisco. Roberto Clemente went 1-for-5 with 2 RBIs. Willie Mays and Orlando Cepeda hit home runs.

March 29, 1959: "Some Like It Hot" Premieres

Left to right: Tony Curtis, Marilyn Monroe, Jack Lemmon

March 29, 1959: Some Like It Hot premieres. It features 3 all-time legends at their peak -- 4, if you count director Billy Wilder.

The film begins in Chicago in 1929, with a pair of jazz musicians: Tony Curtis plays Joe, a saxophone player and an irresponsible ladies' man; and Jack Lemmon plays Jerry, a nervous double bass player. Prohibition is in progress, and Chicago is ground zero for gangland defiance of it. Joe and Jerry work in a speakeasy run by "Spats" Colombo, played by George Raft.

The speakeasy gets raided by the police. Spats finds out a rival gang's leader ratted him out, and so he has the gang gunned down, a reflection of the real-life St. Valentine's Day Massacre. Joe and Jerry see it, and know that Spats know the saw it. They have to get out of Chicago immediately: The weather is cold, but the heat is on them.

They disguise themselves as women named Josephine and Daphne, and join Sweet Sue and her Society Syncopators, an all-female band on a train to a gig in nice warm Miami. On board, they meet the band's singer, Sugar Kowalczyk, a.k.a. Sugar Kane, played by Marilyn Monroe. Among the other "girls" in the band is a fiddler played by future Star Trek actress Grace Lee Whitney.

Sugar confides in the new "girls," saying that saxophone players have taken advantage of her in the past, and she wants to meet "a gentle, bespectacled millionaire" in Miami. So, upon arrival, while they perform -- Joe and Jerry in drag -- Joe takes on a 2nd disguise: "Junior," an heir to Shell Oil. Sugar likes him.

Curtis was then married to another blonde bombshell, Janet Leigh. Their daughter, actress Jamie Lee Curtis, was born between the end of filming and the release of the film. Curtis would later make the shocking claim that he didn't like kissing Monroe, the most popular sex symbol of the era.

An actual millionaire, the much-married, aging, mama's-boy Osgood Fielding III, played by Joe E. Brown, pursues "Daphne." Joe convinces Jerry to keep Osgood occupied onshore so that "Junior" can take Sugar to Osgood's yacht, and pass it off as his own. Once on the yacht, to "reel her in," Joe/Junior claims impotence, and that he would marry a woman who could cure him. She "cures him."

While this is going on, Osgood and Jerry/Daphne dance the tango all night. Back at the hotel, Jerry tells Joe, "I'm getting married!" Joe says, "Congratulations. Who's the lucky girl?" Jerry says, "I am!" Joe snaps him out of it, reminding him that he's "a boy."

But at least they're safe, right? Wrong: There's a Mob sit-down in Miami, and Spats is going to be there. They have to flee, and Joe, as Junior, calls Sugar on the phone, and tells her that he has to break up with her and marry a woman of his family's choosing, breaking her heart.

Joe and Jerry hide under a table at the banquet, and see Johnny Paradise, a young hitman played by Edward G. Robinson Jr., son of another actor well-known for playing gangsters, shoot and kill Spats. (There's an inside joke: Johnny is constantly flipping a coin, which was a gesture that Raft had made famous in gangster movies a quarter of a century earlier, possibly also inspiring the Batman villain Two-Face.) Now, they're in the clear of Spats, but not his enemies.

They put on their drag disguises. Joe sees Sugar onstage, singing a lament to lost love. He runs onto the platform and kisses her, causing Sugar to realize that Josephine and Junior are the same person. Jerry persuades Osgood to take "Daphne" and "Josephine" away on his yacht. Sugar runs from the stage at the end of her performance, and jumps aboard Osgood's launch just as it is leaving the dock with Joe, Jerry, and Osgood.

Joe tells Sugar the whole truth, and tells her that she deserves better, but Sugar wants him anyway, realizing he is the first man to genuinely care for her. Meanwhile, Jerry tries to get out of his promise to marry Osgood, by listing reasons why "Daphne" and Osgood cannot marry, including, "I've been living in sin with a saxophone player!" Osgood says, "I forgive you." Daphne says, "I can never have children!" Osgood says, "We can adopt some." Finally, Jerry rips off his wig, and says, "I'm a man!" And Osgood says, "Nobody's perfect."

The film ends there, but leaves it ambiguous as to how Joe and Jerry can stay out of the Mob's crosshairs. There would be no Federal Witness Protection Program until 1970. The easiest presumption is that Osgood could have used his wealth and connections to get them new identities -- identities which did not require them to pose as women.

So here, we have a film with gang violence, premarital sex, impotence, cross-dressing, a potential same-sex marriage, and a man questioning his gender identity -- all this, in a film released in 1959. The Ike Age. The Frigid Fifties, rather than the Fabulous side of the decade. The Hays Code, the puritanical guide that had ruled Hollywood with an iron fist since 1934, refused to approve the film. Ordinarily, this would have been a death blow: People would have been afraid to go see it, lest they be branded as "immoral."

Billy Wilder didn't care. He had already directed Ninotchka, Double Indemnity, The Lost Weekend, Sunset Boulevard, Stalag 17, Sabrina, The Seven Year Itch (with Monroe), Love in the Afternoon, and Witness for the Prosecution. Some of these films had already tried the censors' patience. Along with his next film, The Apartment, Wilder proved that he didn't need the Hays Code's approval, and that people would watch his movies, anyway. It took until 1968, and a few more challenges, for the Code to finally fall.

Some Like It Hot was nominated for 6 Academy Awards, but won only one, for Best Costume Design, Black-and-White -- possibly Wilder's comeuppance for his defiance.

In 1972, the film was adapted into the Broadway musical Sugar, with Elaine Joyce in the title role, and Robert Morse and Tony Roberts as Joe and Jerry. It was re-adapted with an all-black cast under the Some Like It Hot name in 2022, and won 4 Tony Awards, including J. Harrison Ghee, who, as Jerry and Daphne, became, along with Alex Newell for Shucked at the same ceremony, the 1st nonbinary actor to win a Tony Award. (Since both were playing born-male roles, they had been put in the "Best Actor" category, rather than "Best Actress.")

At the time of filming, Marilyn Monroe was married to playwright Arthur Miller, and 4 months pregnant, making her curvier than ever. (I still wonder if Lemmon's line, "It's like Jell-O on springs!" was an ad-lib.) But she lost the baby, and she and Miller soon split up. She died in 1962. Edward G. Robinson Jr., a.k.a. Manny Robinson, also died young, at 40, of a heart attack in 1974. He had outlived his legendary father by only a year.

Joe E. Brown died in 1973, George Raft in 1980, Jack Lemmon in 2001, Billy Wilder in 2002, and Tony Curtis in 2006.

UPDATE: On April 5, 2022, 7 days after posting, the film's last surviving castmember died: Nehemiah Persoff, who played Mob leader "Little Napoleon" in the Miami banquet scene. He was 102 years old.

*

March 29, 1959 was a Sunday. Hockey star Brad McCrimmon was born. His sport was into its Stanley Cup Playoffs, but no games were played on this day. Baseball was in Spring Training. Football was out of season.

There were 2 games played in the NBA. The Syracuse Nationals beat the Boston Celtics, 133-121 at the Onondaga County War Memorial (now the Upstate University Medical Arena) in Syracuse, New York. Dolph Schayes scored 39 points. And the Minneapolis Lakers beat the St. Louis Hawks, 106-104 at the St. Paul Auditorium in St. Paul, Minnesota. Rookie Elgin Baylor scored 33 points.