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Gossip Friday: Jiminy Cripes
From September 1941: Rumors spring out of nowhere in Hollywood and traverse the town’s grapevine routes like wildfire. A report that Gable and Carole Lombard were splitting up had the town on its ears one day last week. Gable, it was said, had quit home and gone to live with George Raft. After MGM’s phones buzzed for hours with queries, the matter was put squarely up to Gable. “Jiminy Cripes,” he said, using much stronger language than that, “what have I done to get this? I don’t even know George Raft.”
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Gossip Friday: Concentration
From December 1948: Clark Gable was once asked how he got into a romantic mood for his big movie scenes. “I concentrated,” he explained, “on a big, juicy tenderloin steak!”
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Gossip Friday: Plumb Wrong
From August 1950: When Clark Gable eloped with Lady Sylvia Ashley a few months ago, the Hollywood skeptics and frustrated matchmakers started comparing notes on whether or not the newlyweds were properly suited to one another–and the answer turned out to be “no.” They agreed that the lady was a charmer, all right, but they also agreed that the new Mrs. Gable, being a super-sophisticate, was not the girl for a rugged, down-to-earth guy like Gable, who preferred hopped-up automobiles to yachts, and whose best pal was more apt to be a garage mechanic than a member of the titled aristocracy. If Lady Sylvia was a bit miffed at his…
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Gossip Friday: Regifting
From December 1948: Anita (The Face) Colby, who recently resigned an executive post at Paramount in Hollywood to establish a public relations firm in New York, arrived here the other day with two expensive paintings–farewell gifts from Clark Gable. What Miss Colby doesn’t know is that the paintings were brought over from Paris and presented to Gable by Dolly O’Brien, once her rival for the handsome actor’s affections. And Miss O’Brien, of course, doesn’t know that Gable, no lover of art, has given the paintings to Miss Colby, between whom no love is lost.
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Gossip Friday: A Good Critic
From July 1936: The big show at a Hollywood Boulevard movie house the other evening was for that group of people who sat behind Clark Gable and Carole Lombard at a showing of “San Francisco.” But Gable’s conversation about the picture he’s in didn’t go unnoticed. He’d made a good movie critic.
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Gossip Friday: Returns But Won’t Talk
From August 1951: Gable’s Wife Returns but Won’t Talk Mrs. Clark Gable, who still buys her airplane tickets under the name of Lady Sylvia Ashley, arrived home from Honolulu today and promptly shook her head at questions about her divorce fight with her movie-idol husband. The 40-year-old blonde socialite stepped down from the Pan American Stratocaster at International Airport at 7:25am, carrying the usual tourist accessories–an armload of leis and a ukulele. But her smile faded when she spotted the newsmen and she tossed her long blond locks in annoyance when asked if she planned to press immediately her divorce action against Clark Gable. “I’ve made all the statements about…
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Gossip Friday: Rhett’s Horse
From July 1939: Clark Gable is becoming so attached to the splendid five-gaited horse which he rides in “Gone with the Wind” that he is seriously considering its purchase for his own use.
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Gossip Friday: Belated Honeymoon
From July 1939: The only people, apparently, who don’t know where Clark Gable and Carole Lombard are going to spend their belated honeymoon are Mr. and Mrs. Gable. Gable admitted that he and Mrs. Gable have discussed a motor trip through Europe (Gable has never been abroad)), Alaska, the Panama Canal and South America. “We haven’t gotten around to Africa yet,” grinned Gable, “or Niagara Falls.” But with Metro Goldwyn Mayer speeding work up on “The Great Canadian,” to follow “Gone with the Wind,” the chances are that the Gables will spend their honeymoon in Hollywood. ___ “The Great Canadian” wasn’t made, with or without Gable. And unfortunately, Clark and…
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Gossip Friday: Not Magnificent
From July 1939: Metro people who have seen some of the 16 reels of “Gone with the Wind” say Clark Gable dominates the picture. Warner-ites confide that Olivia de Havilland steals it. Selznick employees claim it’s a triumph for Vivien Leigh, who is in almost every scene. But nobody says it’s magnificent.
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Gossip Friday: Update on Scarlett
From July 1939: Hollywood–The movie capital has not been kind to Vivien Leigh, and Miss Leigh, in turn, hates Hollywood. Neither knows much about the other, but it is unlikely that there will be time for revision of opinions. When the last mile of film has been ground through David Selznick’s cameras, his Scarlett O’Hara expects to be gone with the wind. On January 13 (which fell on a Friday), when Miss Leigh was formally signed to the most coveted role in the most talked-about picture in screen history, Hollywood welcomed her with mixed jealousy and resentment, blank puzzlement about her qualifications, feigned pity for the difficulty of her role,…
