In doing some background research for my review of Mya's THE REVENGE OF THE CRUSADER, I came across a few videos that featured Stephen Forsyth, the co-star of that film and lead actor of Mario Bava's HATCHET FOR A HONEYMOON. Though I must have read this info on Tim Lucas' blog, in which Lucas writes about Forsyth's unused musical contribution to the maverick James Bond film, NEVER SAY NEVER AGAIN, I've forgotten that Forsyth has had a post-acting career as a composer, performer, artist, photographer. Here's one of his videos:
Stephen Forsyth also has a website, where you can find out more about this work:
stephenforsyth.com
Forsyth's unused song to the Bond film, written with Jim Ryan, is available for listening here. The singer is Phyllis Hyman. The song was headed to be the theme song for NEVER SAY NEVER AGAIN, but the composer of the film's score, Michel Legrand, threatened to sue, claiming he had the contractual right to be composer of the film's title song. Legrand's resulting song was terrible (as was his score) and a precious opportunity was lost.
Incidentally, a YouTube video that merges the film's credit sequence with Forsyth and Ryan's song has been taken down due to terms of use violation, no doubt a complaint generated by the film's current owners who do not want to embarrass their deficient product. A rescoring of NEVER SAY NEVER AGAIN, using Forsyth and Ryan's discarded song, would do wonders for this film.
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