dirs: various
MAD VISITS JOE LEVENAL, HOLLYWOOD'S LATEST PRODUCING GENIUS
Mad #66, October 1961
w: Larry Siegel
a: Mort Drucker
Joseph E. LeVine was the owner of Avco Embassy Pictures. They released plenty of well-known films but were best known for repackaging the Godzilla and Hercules franchises. Hercules Unchained was the most recent of the latter when this was written.
The Hercules movies were financed in Italy and starred Steve Reeves.
As much as these movies are looked down on, there were imitations with even smaller budgets and production values.
"Did I mention I'm immense and immortal?"
ReplyDeleteAmong his other credits, Levine was the producer of The Carpetbaggers, and in the Mad spoof of that film, Larry Siegel mentioned him and this article in the introduction.
He also bore responsibility for another MST3K classic, Santa Claus vs. the Martians.
But I was amazed to discover that he was also the man who made Sophia Loren a star in America, and the executive producer of The Producers, The Graduate, The Lion in Winter, and Carnal Knowledge. So I'd say he repaid his debt to cinema.