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Gossip Friday: Good Lux from Carole
From September 1936: The latest gag present from Lombard to Gable was delivered to a somewhat bewildered Mr. G. at the close of a radio broadcast in which he was appearing in a dramatic skit with Marlene Dietrich. Just as the show ended an attendant brought in a huge floral horseshoe–the kind gangsters used to send their deceased colleagues. The card from Carole read “Good Lux.”
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{New Article} 1961: Clark Gable as I Knew Him
I’ve had this magazine for years and years. I never posted this article in the archive on the site because it is just an abridged version of Kathleen Williams’ book, Clark Gable: A Personal Portrait, so I figured it wasn’t necessary. Recently, I have had quite a few people email me and ask me if I knew where they can find the book, as it is out of print (Ebay and Amazon usually have copies). So I figured it would be worthwhile to put up this article so everyone could at least read the abridged version if they can’t get their hands on a copy. I turned down the first invitation…
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Happy Birthday, Dear Mr. Gable!
Today is Clark’s 111th birthday. I suppose it is slightly feasible that he could still be alive today…but not very likely! Knowing him and his modest ways, I am sure he would be shocked that anyone in the year 2012 remembers him and his movies. But we all do! Here’s what Clark was doing every 11 years on his birthday: 1912: Living in a house his father built on Mill Street in Hopedale, Ohio, young Clark was in the fifth grade, playing the horn in the school band and thriving under the attention of his beloved stepmother, Jennie Dunlap. 1923: Clark (or as he was called then, “Billy”) was working at…
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Gossip Friday: Purple Shorts Exposed!
From June 1940: Clark Gable would just as soon let the past rest in peace so far as the picture “San Francisco” is concerned. Not because he didn’t play one of his greatest roles. It was a shooting of the earthquake scene that neither he nor 500 extras will forget—even if the film that recorded it ended up on the cutting room floor. Buildings were crumbling, water-mains bursting, horses running madly, and Clark was avoiding falling wreckage. He sprang aside, and as he did so, his trousers caught on the nail of a wooden beam. With a rip they came off. And there was Mr. Gable caught short. Extras broke…
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Articles are Back!
Thank you everyone for your patience while this site gets a much-needed facelift. I am happy to announce that the Article Archive is back up and running! Here you will find over 100 articles on Clark’s life and career, ranging from 1932 to 2008. Some highlights: Learn about Clark’s favorite pot roast and how to make his favorite pancakes in The Modern Hostess (1934). Read about one lucky contest winner’s date with Clark in I Had a Date with Clark Gable (1936). Hollywood’s Unmarried Husbands and Wives (1939) is the infamous article that called out Clark and Carole, among other celebrity couples, for “acting like they are married even…
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{January Movie of the Month} Key to the City (1950)
Key to the City is only notable really for the re-teaming of Clark Gable with Loretta Young, his co-star in Call of the Wild fifteen years earlier…oh, and the mother of his daughter, Judy. Loretta was suggested as his leading lady because the studio was trying to bring back some of Clark’s romantic luster as the grim Any Number Can Play and female-less Command Decision has darkened it. Gable is Steve Fisk, the boorish mayor of Puget City, who meets Clarissa Standish (Young), the stuffy mayor of Winona, Maine at the annual mayors conference in San Francisco. They fall in love despite their differences but trouble arises as they try…
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Gossip Friday: Hypnotic to Most…
From July 1941: Clark Gable to most women would be hypnotic. Not so to Rosalind Russell, whom he kisses in “They Met in Bombay.” Before shooting, Roz called to her maid: “Bring me my sex appeal!”—perfume atomizer, gum. ____ Roz is hilarious! There’s a great article in the archive in which Roz discusses working with Clark.
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Goodbye, Carole
Carole Lombard Gable died 70 years ago today. Amazing to think that it has been that long, as Carole left in her wake films and tales that seem so modern. I’ve often thought you could drop Carole down in this day and age and she wouldn’t miss a beat. There is no denying that her death infintely shaped Clark Gable’s life from that day on. He was different…and he was never quite the same. From “The Story Gable Wouldn’t Tell”, Modern Screen magazine, November 1942: Dorothy Canfield Fisher once wrote a story about a girl whose parents’ love and dependence on each other grew with every passing year. Then her…
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Gossip Friday: Puss in Splints
From January 1941: Latest freak at the Gable-Lombard zoo (which is what Hollywood is calling that amazing San Fernando Valley ranch of the stars) is a cat with one hind leg in splints! Seems that Clark and Carole have no less than twenty cats about the place—and the population is going up steadily. But even so, the famous couple can’t find the heart to dispose of any of them, no matter how steady the rate of production. And when one of them meets disaster—well, the other day one of the cats got in a trap and came out with a broken leg. Instead of having her killed, Carole and Clark…
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Gossip Friday: Beauty Shop Chatter
From May 1940: Carole Lombard was at Westmore’s the other day having her hair shampooed and waved. After the star had left, Miss Lombard’s hairdresser took her next appointment–a woman almost too excited to talk. “Tell me all about her,” begged the customer. “Is she going to have a baby like the newspapers say? Wouldn’t it be wonderful if Clark and Carole had a baby? Why, America would go wild!” ________ Shucks, I, for one, am so sad that never happened. Wouldn’t it be something if there was a person walking around today, probably in their 60’s, who was half Clark and half Carole? Talk about hitting the genetic lottery.…