Sunday, June 7, 2015

Crossover of the Week



October 1949
MADISON SQUARE GARDEN
            Boxer Marcel Cerdan’s sparring partner Steve Costigan once fought “Tiger” Valois. Cerdan and Costigan meet with lawyer Tom Hagen, who represents Vito Corleone. Hagen asks Cerdan to throw an upcoming match, but Cerdan refuses. Hagen meets with Don Vito, whose son Michael has been forced into exile in Italy by the vendetta of other mob families. The Nyctalope attends Cerdan’s fight. The hero’s old foe Gofrey Cultnom has been tasked by Corleone to use his mystic powers to affect Cerdan’s performance. After Leo defeats Cultnom, Corleone assigns Roman Orgonetz to engineer Cerdan’s death in a plane crash.
            Short story by Emmanuel Gorlier in Night of the Nyctalope, Jean-Marc and Randy Lofficier, eds., Black Coat Press, 2012; reprinted in French in La Nuit du Nyctalope, Jean-Marc and Randy Lofficier, eds., Rivière Blanche, 2012. Marcel Cerdan was a real boxer. Sailor Steve Costigan’s two-fisted exploits were chronicled by Robert E. Howard; he fought “Tiger” Valois in “The Bulldog Breed.” Don Vito Corleone, his son Michael, and his consigliere/lawyer/adopted son Tom Hagen are from Mario Puzo’s novel The Godfather, as well as the film trilogy directed by Francis Ford Coppola. Michael Corleone also appears in Puzo’s The Sicilian, bringing in that novel as well. The Nyctalope is the hero of French pulp novels by Jean de La Hire; he battled Cultnom in de La Hire’s story “Night of the Nyctalope.” Roman Orgonetz is a professional assassin and agent of the spy cartel SMOG in Henri Vernes’ novels about adventurer Bob Morane.

5 comments:

  1. I just read up on Marcel Cerdan on Wikipedia. That gave a whole lot of context to this entry when you know about his life.

    I guess this is the first appearance of Corleone in the CU? Are they any other appearances?

    I haven't read any of the Bob Morane novels, because the only language I understand is English (and that's debatable.) It does seem that when he reference in Tales of the Shadowmen and other Black Coat Press stories it's indirectly. He does not really appear and is just mentioned or it is another character from the series that does. I wonder if that was for copyright reasons or it just ended up that way.

    ReplyDelete
  2. This is the first CU reference to the Godfather that I have found.

    I hadn't realized it, but you're right about Bob Morane. The only story I have listed in the Crossovers manuscript where he actually appears himself is Michel Stephan's "With the Compliments of Nestor Burma!"

    ReplyDelete
  3. Jim Rockford of the Rockford Files was brought in by two indirect references as well. He was brought in by an episode were he goes to Bay City from Raymond Chandler's novels (actually there are two episodes in Bay City, but I did not know that when I e-mailed Win about that long ago so only one appeared in Crossovers) and one where he works with a reporter from the Independent News Service from Kolchak the Night Stalker. He never actually meets Marlowe or Kolchak or any other character another from what I know.

    Speaking of Bob Morane and the fact that I can't understand French, a long time ago I may have found a reference to Jean Ray's Malpertuis on a French Bob Morane website. I'm not certain because I said I don't know French. In Malpertuis, the titular house sits next to a monastery formally home to a group known as the Barbusquins. I spent sometime online trying to find out if this was a real religious order. I did not find out for sure, but the Barbusquins are mentioned on a Morane website.

    http://www.bobmorane.be/encyclopedie/perso-morane_bob.html

    As I said, I don't know French so I don't know if it has anything to do with Malpertuis and it could in fact be a real religious order.

    ReplyDelete
    Replies
    1. The Rockford Files also crossed over with a show called Richie Brockelman, Private Eye.

      http://www.poobala.com/richieandrockford.html

      Delete
    2. I completely forgot about Richie Brockelman.

      A lot of other fictional PIs appeared on the Rockford Files. A few in poorly disguise attempts at spinoffs. Most notably, though, a pre-Magnum Tom Sellek. He played Lance White a super cool, super rich, super competent PI that annoyed the more human Rockford. Personally, I always preferred his appearances on Rockford to Magnum PI.

      Delete