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Gossip Friday: Don’t Ask
From February 1937: Interviewers of Carole Lombard are cautioned in advance that they must not mention or ask about Clark Gable. Interviewers of Gable are expected not to mention Miss Lombard. Yet Gable isn’t in the least reticent about telling friends that he hopes to make a picture with Miss Lombard. Not only wants to, but expects to. __ Wants to make ANOTHER picture with Miss Lombard, to be precise. And a shame that never happened.
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Movie of the Week: Dance Fools Dance (1931) and Laughing Sinners (1931)
This week, we’ve got a Clark Gable/Joan Crawford pre-code double feature: Dance Fools Dance (1931) and Laughing Sinners (1931). These two films were made back-to-back, as Clark, a rising star in MGM’s roster, and Joan, one of MGM’s shiniest stars, were engaged in heated love affair. Clark’s of course second fiddle to Joan in both of these. In Dance Fools Dance, Joan is Bonnie Jordan, a rich girl suddenly thrown into the real world after her father dies and she finds out all his money is gone. She goes to work as a writer for the local newspaper. One of her assignments is to go undercover and get a story on…
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Clark Gable and Carole Lombard’s 80th Anniversary
Clark Gable and Carole Lombard were married 80 years ago today, on March 29, 1939. They were together about three years before they were married and unfortunately never made it to their third wedding anniversary before Carole’s untimely death, but Carole’s impact on Clark’s life can not be overestimated. In 1957, a reporter asked Clark why he doesn’t talk about Carole in interviews. “You may not like my next question,” I said. “Is it true that you don’t like to talk about Carole Lombard because it reminds you of her tragic end and distresses you?” “That isn’t true,” [Clark] said. “My feelings are under better control than that. I have…
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{New Article} 1950: The King Takes a Lady
After Clark Gable suddenly up and married his fourth wife, Sylvia Ashley, there were a lot of articles praising the union (naturally, are they really going to say otherwise) and this here is one of those: They came back to his Encino Ranch on December 21st, the morning after their wedding, Clark Gable and Sylvia Hawkes Ashley Fairbanks Stanley, who has just become Clark’s fourth wife. And as they fled through the ranch gates, surrounded by knots of curious fans, Clark called out merrily, “I have never been happier.” Then, the big white ranch gate swung shut and a couple of burly, grinning cops from the Metro Studios mounted guard…
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Movie of the Week: Lone Star (1952) and Never Let Me Go (1953)
This week, Clark Gable is an 1845 Texas cattle baron chasing Ava Gardner and an American war correspondent chasing Gene Tierney in the back-to-back features Lone Star (1952) and Never Let Me Go (1953). In Lone Star, a semi-factual historical western, Clark is Devereaux Burke, a cattle baron enlisted by President Andrew Jackson (Lionel Barrymore) in 1845 to help convince Texas to become part of the United States. He encounters newspaperwoman Martha Ronda (Ava Gardner) and her beau, Senator Thomas Craden (Broderick Crawford) who want Texas to become its own republic. Devereaux and Martha soon fall in love despite their differing opinions and he prepares for a final showdown with…
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Gossip Friday: Doing a Double Take
From October 1940: Clark Gable and the Missus are burned up about the story going round that all is not well between them. Those who are spreading the poison should be squelched by the announcement that the pair intend taking a four-month honeymoon-vacation just as soon as Carole completes “Mr. and Mrs. Smith.” Another muffler for the gossip was provided by Clark just a few days ago when he told the following story about the wonderful Lombard sense of humor. It seems a bad case of poison ivy hit Carole recently and swelled her face until it looked like an automobile tire about to pop. A vainer woman would have…
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{New Article} 1933: Get Well Soon, Clark Gable!
This article, from 1933, is all about Clark Gable’s recent tragic illness. Now, it is quite true that Clark became very ill as he started production on Dancing Lady. But this piece really exaggerates: There were many in the film colony who were quick to say, “Gable is leaving the cast of Joan Crawford’s ‘Dancing Lady’ because he doesn’t like his role. That business about being ‘sick’ is just a stall!” But it wasn’t a stall! Clark Gable isn’t bluffing—not this time. He is still dangerously ill at the moment this is being written…. Those who saw him hobble about the MGM lot a few days ago, in a painful…
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Movie of the Week: The Secret Six (1931) and Hold Your Man (1933)
This week, we’ve got a double dose of Clark Gable and Jean Harlow in The Secret Six (1931)and Hold Your Man (1933). The Secret Six is really only known today for being Clark Gable and Jean Harlow’s first film together. Both of them had not quite reached star status. Jean, who had recently made a big splash in Howard Hughes’ Hell’s Angels, was borrowed from Warner Brothers by MGM for her small role here. Clark was billed seventh–lagging behind Wallace Beery, Johnny Mack Brown and Lewis Stone for screen time. Not for long, mind you, as the release of A Free Soul a few months later would cement Clark’s name…
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Gossip Friday: Boom Town Preview Postscripts
From November 1940: Boom Town Preview Postscripts: It required 27 varied location sites and a total of 41 sets to screen this story. Metro buily a boom town of its own for this picture. Clark Gable has been suggesting an oil story for himself for about three years; at the age of 18 he worked as a tool dresser in Bigheart, Oklahoma. Spencer Tracy sets a new record for himself in screen fisticuffs, engaging in five battles; this is the second time he and Gable fight each other in films, although the last time, in “San Francisco,” they wore boxing gloves. Gable is two inches taller in the picture than…
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Movie of the Week: Parnell (1937)
This week, Clark Gable is a mutton-chopped Irish politician in love with married Myrna Loy in Parnell. In this historical melodrama, Gable is Charles Parnell, an 1880’s Irish politician dubbed “The Uncrowned King of Ireland” for fighting for Irish freedom from British rule. The British trump up false charges against him to try and keep his efforts down but are unsuccessful. But then Parnell falls in love with Katie O’Shea (Loy), the estranged wife of a British Parliament member. When her husband finds out, he files for divorce and names Parnell as co-respondent, resulting in political and social ruin for Parnell. Just as he begins to fight back for his…
