Gossip
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Gossip Friday: Better Be Home Soon
From 1955: When Clark Gable returned from making “The Tall Men” in Durango, Mexico, he brought Kay Spreckels a gold monogrammed ring. Every local columnist insisted it was a wedding ring–but here’s the inside story. The crew of the picture is crazy about Kay, so they pooled their cash and sent the ring to Kay via “The King.” He did call the beautiful blonde every day while he was away. And Kay’s maid summed up the situation, saying “That man better come home soon or he’ll be too broke to marry you!”
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Gossip Friday: Off the Hinges
From December 1939: Carole Lombard visited the set of the untitled Clark Gable-Joan Crawford picture when some of the early scenes of his escape from a Guinea prison were being filmed. One brief shot showed him running down a corridor and through a door which slammed behind him. But Gable did it so violently that an end section of wall, presumably made of stone, rocked dangerously, and a hinge was torn from the door. Whooped Miss Lombard: “He’s just like that at home!”
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Gossip Friday: Don’t Set Your Watch To It
From November 1933: Studio bound, Clark Gable always sets his watch by a clock on Hollywood Boulevard. And the other day he learned that the clock had been stopped for weeks at 9:30.
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Gossip Friday: No Visitors
From February 1937: Dr. Franklyn Thorpe (Mary Astor’s ex-husband) has made an isolation ward of the swanky suite in the Beverly Wilshire Hotel where Clark Gable is nursing a heavy cold. All visitors are barred. Gable growls, however, that he’ll be back at work in a day or two.
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Gossip Friday: Please Sign My Cake
From November 1933: An autograph nut hunted up Clark Gable at the auto station in downtown Los Angeles where he and Claudette Colbert are making scenes for Columbia’s “Midnight Bus,” and asked Gable to autograph his birthday cake. the fan brought along an icing-writing device, much To Gable’s amazement and amusement. The mob that hung around the bus depot so complicated work that Director Frank Capra thought up two devices to thin the crowd. He had studio carpenters bring saw horses and planking enough to fit a banquet table for 200, then had the studio put on a free feed for that many. In the meantime, the same carpenters put…
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Gossip Friday: Not a Diva
From October 1936: Clark Gable is in the Metro commissary eating lunch. He sits at the long table reserved for the writers and the directors. There is only one other actor, Spencer Tracy, who ever sits at this table and mingles with the boys. Seldom do the tourists glimpse the stars dining in the Metro commissary. Robert Taylor may be seen there, but I have never seen Joan Crawford, Myrna Loy, William Powell, etc. Gable, finishing his lunch, gets up and walks to the sound stage where he is working. This particular day he happens to be working in the flicker “Love on the Run.” On the way to the…
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Gossip Friday: Back from the Dead
From March 1937: When Clark Gable was ordered home to bed with a cold, he left protesting that he could finish out the day all right. But he scarcely had left the studio before word was all over the colony that he had collapsed on the set. I was at the Brown Derby about 5 o’clock (asking an intern for something to cure a cold) and there received the news of Mr. Gable’s supposed collapse, and even considerable detail about what he said and who carried him out to an automobile. All false, of course, but it shows what happens. By 8 o’clock the rumor-mongers had slain Mr. Gable, and…
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Gossip Friday: Police Dog Pup?
From October 1931: Clark Gable hadn’t been on the lot for more than a few months before they named a salad after him on the lunchroom menu–avocado, lettuce, grapefruit, cottage cheese. he is that popular. Gable is of rough-hewn timber. Men like him. And he has those dimples for the ladies. Shaggy brows. Unruly hair. The kind of gray eyes you’d hate to meet if he were mad. Under it all is an elfish charm, bordering upon the naivete. Shy, sort of. A bit fierce. Yet warm as blazes when you know him. Like a police dog pup.
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Gossip Friday: Appearing Together
From February 1937: Film fans who plan to attend the Shrine flood relief benefit Wednesday night in the Shrine Auditorium were assured last night that they will see Clark Gable and that Carole Lombard will be with him. Miss Lombard last night signified her intention to accompany Gable to the benefit. Bob Burns is taking his bazooka. Eleanor Powell and Bill Robinson will dance. Sophie Tucker will sing. Warner Baxter, Edward Arnold and May Robson are signed for appearances. Stars who previously have volunteered their services include Harold Lloyd, George Burns and Gracie Allen, Jack Benny and Mary Livingston and Bing Crosby and Stoll’s orchestra. Tickets are on sale at…
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Gossip Friday: No Pearls or Mink Allowed
From 1955: It’s so much hooey, that printed report that his doctors tabooed cocktails for Clark Gable. The King’s health is churning and so is his interest in Kay Williams Spreckels and not Marilyn Monroe as 20th Century Fox subtly hints! When Clark went duck hunting recently, it was Kay whom he asked to hostess a party for him. She made arrangements with Chasen’s where they cooked and served the wild birds in their private dining room. Clark loves gags so Kay dressed up a hysterical-looking dummy and placed it at the head of the table. The lady guests were instructed to wear sweaters and tweeds and–“no pearls or mink…