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Happy 100th Birthday, Judy Garland!
Judy Garland, born Frances Gumm on June 10, 1922, would have been 100 years old today! Although Judy and Clark Gable never co-starred together, they were both on the MGM roster and Judy’s big break into stardom was because of her singing her adulation for a certain Mr. Gable. At the beginning of 1937, 14-year-old Judy was contracted to MGM but they didn’t really know what to do with her. She was extremely talented, yes, but was too young to sing romantic songs. Judy was set to appear on the radio show “Ole Maestro,” a radio variety program run by Ben Bernie. The vintage torch song “You Made Me Love…
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Gossip Friday: Gable and Garland?
From January 1942: Resolutions the stars should make: Clark Gable should resolve to throw his influence to get Judy Garland as co-star. Now that she’s grown up and married, she’s earned that right and I have a feeling her fans would applaud it. Sure, I know she’s wonderful in musicals. She and Mickey Rooney in “Babes on Broadway” ooze so much talent they’re frightening. But remember, Clark once did a song and dance–maybe he could learn to do another one, who knows? Failing that, Judy can go dramatic with him.
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Gossip Friday: Coming in Third
From December 1940: Mickey Rooney, the cigar smoking toughie of Mickey McGuire two-reelers 15 years ago, has been voted the nation’s foremost box office attraction for the second consecutive year, the Motion Picture Herald reported yesterday. The tousled, 20-year-old Rooney won the Herald theater poll by an overwhelming vote over 200 actors and actresses–the handsomest leading men and the prettiest girls of the motion picture industry. This year he carried young Judy Garland with him from relative obscurity in 1939 to the No. 10 moneymaker. The Garland parade began early in 1940, when she and Rooney were cast in “Babes in Arms.” The film was such a smash hit countrywide…
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{Photos} Clark Gable and…
Some of my favorite finds when I am scouring through old fan magazines are candids of random stars together. “I never knew that Blank ever even met Blank!” I often think, particularly now during “awards show season”, how the generations to come won’t feel similar joy, since there are thousands of pictures taken at every red carpet event, awards show and party and so thus the surprise of seeing stars posing together has dwindled. Here are some shots of Clark with other Tinseltown folk… See more in the gallery.
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Oscar Night…Minus Clark and Carole
The Academy Awards are tonight, so I thought I would post something about the night “Gone with the Wind”won it big–February 29, 1940 at the now-destroyed Cocoanut Grove in Los Angeles. Clark didn’t win that night; the only black spot on an otherwise glorious night for the film. The one thing about that evening that has always puzzled me is the lack of pictures of Clark and Carole at the Academy Awards. There are none. Zilch. Zero. I understand Clark didn’t win, but how can there be no photos? I am a Clark photo fanatic, as is evident by the thousands of pictures in the gallery, and I have never…
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Gossip Friday: Mr. Gable and Miss Garland
From August 1937: Judy Garland won her way into the gallant Gable heart by getting up blithely on a platform at the MGM Convention Ball and singing a song which she dedicated especially to Clark. It was called “My Fan Letter to My Favorite Stars”. Gable was there—with Lombard, and so he couldn’t show his deep appreciation to Miss Garland right then. But the other day was Judy’s birthday and Clark came through–with an enticing charm bracelet, and a lot of other gifts, among them a book with his own photograph in it. Bet Carole’s worried! Of course I took the name for this site from Judy’s song, “Dear Mr.…
