A found footage mash-up of Muscle Beach Party (1964) and Wipeout by the Surfaris, a final project for my Fall 2013 Aesthetics of Surfing Class. No copyright infringement intended; I claim no ownership over the source material.
Dear Natalie, I just got this little video of my friend Candy Johnson (aka) Miss Perpetual Motion!. I took care of her in her last years and I miss her tremendously still. She was very proud of her work and was astonished that folks were crazy about it. Thank you for making this and odd that it was for the Fall of 2013. Candy passed away on October 20, 2013. She IS Dancing With The Stars! Sincerely, Kene J. Rosa
Hi Kene, we have a research team working on a new production and would like to ask you some questions about Candy to potentially feature her in the story. Please contact us at cherry_productions@outlook.com
We all LOVED Candy. She shaped the moves of anyone serious about dancing in the 70's. Never got over her fringe. Her work was and is valued evidenced by me searching Candy in the year 2020. Candy gave fringe a new meaning! RIP, Candy Dancer...
I often wondered what happened to Candy & so appreciate your post & video filling us all in. I am so terribly sorry to hear that she has passed away & it just seems impossible with all the energy & enthusiasm she showed in her dancing, for her to be “forever quieted!!” I absolutely adored her & just loved her dancing! Candy was a big reason that I loved these movies so much as a teenager! I adored Annette Funicello & Frankie Avalon but Candy was right beside them, I assure you! Loved her amazing energy, her enthusiasm, her dancing & even the outfits she wore in the Beach Party movies! Loved watching the grime shake as she would dance all over the beach or wherever the scene was being filmed! She was “such a real cutie” & I just really feel so very bad & truly sad that she has passed away! Thank-you so much for filling us all in on Candy, for I assure you Kene, it is so very much appreciated! How blessed you were Kene to be able to call Candy “your friend!!” God Bless you!!! ♥️
Candy came up in my mind this morning as my wife was showing me a video of Tina Turner dancing & singing to Proud Mary & my wife was amazed at her energy level. So I just had to mention Candy in comparison to Tina & now I’m in the doghouse , but it was totally worth it as Candy is the Most Energetic by far !!!😀😀😀
This is the woman who the song "I Want Candy" was written about. Originally by the Strangeloves (1965), Bow Wow Wow changed the gender of the lyrics and made it a big hit in 1981.
How incredible your story is! Thank-you for sharing it with us all for I never knew that! I never knew that she appeared at the World’s Fair in 1964! My Nana took me there when I was just 14 & what a thrill it would have been to see her in person perform there. Amazing too, that the Strangeloves actually wrote a song about her, memorizing her forever more, just as the Beach Party movies did. What an extraordinary honor too, to have a song written about you! Just loved her & so sad she has passed away!
She did a regular dance show for the World's Fair of her high energy dancing. Read where she had trouble with the IRS about her deductions for hosiery. Since she danced in her stockings and no shoes she probably went through them by the case
I remember Candy’s dancing in the Beach Party movie series & always thought she was an extraordinary dancer! I so remember the parts of her dancing with the fringe on her outfit spinning crazily as she danced! I so loved watching her dance in these outfits! She would then shake her hip wildly to the left or to the right & boys would fall off their surf 🏄♀️ boards, fall in the Beach or be thrown wildly across the room by her “fantastic dance moves!” As a 13 & 14 yr old, I adored these movies but loved watching her dancing in particular! I do not think anyone then or now, with the possible exception of Ann Margaret ( movies “Bye Bye Birdie & Viva Las Vegas immediately come to mind) can compare to her extraordinary energy & expertise in dancing!! Watching this video, reminded me again, exactly why I so loved her dancing & exactly why she & her dancing were so unforgettable!! I always wondered where she was & what she was doing, because she was such an incredible dancer! Thanks to Utube for such a wonderful & fun video on Candy, bringing back such fantastic cinematic moments! I wish more information was available about Candy & her later years! She was an incredibly, multitalented woman, loved & admired by so many!!!!♥️💕♥️💕♥️💕♥️
So cool. I met her decades ago. Annette Funicello was so impressed by her kindness and spirit. Underrated in context of history as was Annette both of whom were friends.
Candy was a Force of Nature and Queen of the Shimmy. Her kinetic energy was non stop, able to knock surfers off their boards and thwart bad guys. She should have made workout videos back in the day. She is one of my idols and I love watching all the Beach movies she was in.
Candy is always a treat! She sure could shake it! I wonder how fast those fringes on her outfits moved? 65 maybe 75 mph ? I love this video Miss you Candy
Incredible! She was so multitalented in every way. I wish she had written her biography for I would have bought her book in a heartbeat! How interesting her story would have been too!
I grew up watching All the beach movies as a kid. I remember watching Candy dance like there was no tomorrow. She was always my favorite dancer. RIP Candy.
Ditto, I was in my teens back then also and now 74 and I still love to dance and I do as many of candies dance steps that I am still able to do. Bless her heart she helped me Aldi's to have strength in my legs from dancing every chance I got every dance place there was that I could go to and even now in the privacy of my home
RIP 2 surfers-turned-actors who were in the Frankie & Annette Beach Party movies. ED GARNER (passed on Mar 5) and JOHNNY FAIN (passed on Mar 9). Both Garner & Fain were plucked off Malibu beach by Director William Asher to do surfing stunts and provide atmosphere for Beach Party (1963) the very first of the Frankie & Annette flicks. As the beach movies became wildly popular, a core group of surfers and bikini-clad starlets emerged as audience favorites. American-International signed them to contracts and began promoting them as the 'beach party gang'. Ed Garner and Johnny Fain were part of the gang, along with Salli Sachse, Patti Chandler, Mary Hughes, Linda Opie and Michael Nader (who would one day star in Dynasty). The 'beach party gang' didn't just appear in the films; AIP would also send them out on promotional tours. Kitschy movie ads heralded: 'the beach party gang goes drag racing' or 'the beach party gang goes sky diving'. Garner and Fain were in Beach Party, Muscle Beach Party, Bikini Beach, Pajama Party, Beach Blanket Bingo, Ski Party, How to Stuff A Wild Bikini and The Ghost in the Invisible Bikini (Garner only). Thank you ED GARNER and JOHNNY FAIN for bringing the myth of a sun-drenched California surfing paradise to all of us kids who grew up with these movies.
🤣🤣🤣Candy’s dancing was phenomenal!! My gosh, what she put into each dance she did. She absolutely “had the moves” & she was so darn adorable too( so tiny!)!
Omg I love her outfits!! I wonder where you can get a fringe set like that(I know they have modern ones but it's just not the same)!! The two piece almost looks like it's made of satin underneath! Probably be complicated to make! If anyone knows let me know!!!
A while back one of the male background dancers in these movies asked on social media who was their favorite among these pictures. I said Candy and he seemed put off by my remark. "Why HER?" he replied. I told him because she stands out. There's that enormous bouffant hairstyle, that she clearly was NOT a teenager, and those fringe outfits she shimmied half to pieces, along with that incredible energy and charisma she exerted. I said she' doesn't belong among pseudo-teenagers, and yet she absolutely makes it work and steals every scene!
I am now 72 years old and Wendy's beach party movies came out my mother took me to the drive-in movies to see all of them. My parents were divorced it was just her and me and bless her heart she sat through these movies that or four teenagers young adults but honestly I think she likes him almost as much as I did I have been a dancer because of Candy and Goldie Hawn I would go to every dance studio they had back then but you just don't see them around anymore and even now at night time alone I'll turn on the music and dance around with my bird on my shoulder and yes I like to net and Frankie but my favorite was candy and so sorry to hear that she passed away I could just see her shimmying down the aisle
fucking Candy Johnson; and Dick and the Deltones (who did more for early sales of Fender Stratocasters than any advertising campaign, ever) and i'm a sucker for surfing films - all of them. these "Beach Party" films are so much fun, but if you haven't already seen it, catch "Endless Summer" - the classic of classic surfing films.
Loved Endless Summer as a teenager & my husband & I just recently rewatched it again on tv! I still love it & we found it every bit as interesting as when I first watched it as a teenager, at the movie theater! My husband loved it too & we were both so glad we happened to see it advertised on tv, so able to watch it! We also caught “The Tammi Show”( Jan & Dean hosts & many great acts!) around the same time. I originally saw that at the movie theatre too but we caught that playing on Cable( loved it!) just like the fantastic “Endless Summer!” Loved them all!♥️
No need to swear. This is about dancing beach, movies and good times in the 60s not the F word. People that start a sentence with the airport or someone delusional.
"Muscle Beach Party" Dancing Star Candy Johnson Sets Record Work Day - Talk about working hard and long hours, consider the record daily routine assumed by "perpetual motion" twist dancer Candy Johnson for her starring role in American International's "Muscle Beach Party," opening ..................... at the ................... theatre. Typical day for Candy during production of the musical comedy started in the preceding evening with her 9:30 p.m. show at a top Palm Springs night spot. After her last show at 1:45 a.m., including over three hours of mighty strenuous dancing, came sleep until 4 a.m., then up and out within the hour for a 125-mile drive to Los Angeles with her manager at the wheel, arriving just in time to meet her 6:30 a.m. call on the set for a long day of dancing for the film. Immediately after 7 p.m. quitting time in Hollywood, it was back by auto to Palm Springs just in time to make her 9:30 p.m. show. Candy attributes her stamina and ability to handle this schedule to boundless energy and plenty of vitamins. Her co-stars, Frankie Avalon and Annette Funicello just say "Whew!" From page 7 of the Muscle Beach Party promo ad press kit. Year 1964.
She was so much fun to watch. As a kid I thought she had super powers. And I thought these movies represented ultra modern living even though they came before my time. My parents were very conservative so the movie characters seemed edgy to me.
Why women back then were not fat.. They actually moved them body parts...Why I always notice them dancers.. They seem to age well. So many nice legs.. So little time to inspect them..
Apart from the fact that the woman was not 20 when she appeared in that movie, as her official date of birth leads to think, she was more energetic than really good in her dances, nevermind if they were free-styled or choreographed: you can see people like Joey Heatherton being more skilled and smooth in her casual dancing than peppy-uppy Candy in those overproduced movies.