Where were Clark and Carole 70 years ago today?

 All dolled up and out on the town for a worthy cause!

There’s Clark and Carole looking quite dashing, posing in front of Grauman’s Chinese Theater. The occaison? An all-star radio broadcast for Greek War Relief that was held seventy years ago today–January 8, 1941.

I love  all-star events like this because the pictures answer the questions of “Did so- and-so ever meet so-and-so?”

For instance, the event was only one of two instances that I know of that Carole is pictured with Myrna Loy (and that’s Melvyn Douglas and Tyrone Power with them too):

Carole, Myrna and Tyrone share a secret:The dashing duo with Dick Powell, Frank Morgan, Ann Rutherford and Shirley Temple:

 

Doesn’t Clark looked thrilled by whatever story Samuel Goldwyn is telling?

Being friendly with a guy who reportedly neither one of them liked, Charles Laughton:

The star-studded crowd backstage:

Here’s hosts Jack Benny and Bob Hope:

Melvyn Douglas, Jack Benny and Robert Taylor with Barbara Stanwyck:

Robert Taylor and Barbara Stanwyck with Lewis Stone:

Ronald Colman and Shirley Temple:

 

From Photoplay magazine:

Again we say there is no community anywhere or any group or people so ready and willing at all times to give of their precious time and talent to a worthy cause as the people of Hollywood.

The gigantic radio program organized by Mr. Samuel Goldwyn for Greek Relief and broadcast to Greece and England had practically every star in the business participating, from Shirley Temple to Charles Laughton. Bob Hope and Jack Benny, as co-partners in emceeing, kept the performers in stitches—Bob with lighthearted quips, Benny with his heavyhearted worry.

Myrna Loy was the belle of the ball throughout rehearsals and little Shirley Temple was so popular she and Ronald Colman were compelled to lock themselves in a dressing room to rehearse in peace. But [our photographer] is resourcefulness itself. He merely climbed up to the transom and clicked away.

Big bad George Raft, who scares millions on the screen, got the willies when he learned he was to be tossed like a badminton cock between Benny and Hope in a skit, He couldn’t even go on the air, he was so frightened. 

It was Mickey Rooney who nearly threw the troupe into a fit. Mickey, who had been rehearsing for the Charlie McCarthy-Edgar Bergen show over at NBC, got caught in the traffic jam outside the Chinese Theater on Hollywood Boulevard and arrived backstage just two minutes before he went on the air in a Hardy skit.

 Considering the hours and days of rehearsals and the writing and technical talent that lay behind the broadcast, we’d say Hollywood had done its bit once again—and done it magnanimously.

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You can see the photos from the event in the gallery.

I’ve started organizing the gallery better—it bothered me especially that the candids section was a hodge podge of years and events thrown together in random order. So the random candids have been separated into two year groups, 1930-1944, and 1945-1960.  Those pics are slowly but surely being put in a somewhat-choronological order as well. Certain events have been given their own album–one for the 1935 Academy Awards, for Clark and Kay in Italy in 1959,  for Clark’s handprint ceremony at Grauman’s in 1937 and the Greek Benefit.

I’ve also been adding captions where they are missing and deleting and re-uploading some pics that need better quality or where the watermark screws up the picture. If you know of any in particular, please comment on it in the gallery and I’ll fix it if I can.