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Gossip Friday: A Toast to the Winner
Since the Academy Awards are this weekend, here’s one from May 1935: The afternoon before the Awards banquet Norma Shearer and Claudette Colbert were having tea together. “I haven’t any more chance of winning it than the man in the moon,” laughed Claudette. “Nor I,” laughed Norma. “Then let’s toast the winner with a cup of tea,” Claudette suggested. They poured the cups. “To Bette Davis,” they chorused. That night, of course, Claudette carried home the little gold statuette [for “It Happened One Night”]. ____ Claudette famously didn’t even attend the ceremony because she was so sure she wouldn’t win. She had to be stopped at the train station and rushed…
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Gossip Friday: Rhett and…his Scarlett?
From September 1938: With the announcement of Clark Gable as Rhett Butler and Norma Shearer as Scarlett in “Gone with the Wind”, Clark and Norma, far from happy, are wearing two worried frowns on their personable faces. Gable is anxious to know these things: “Will I be the Rhett Butler of the fans’ dreams? If please the North, will the South be happy over the choice? Will I interpret each scene, each move, as the millions of readers have pictured it in their minds and hearts? Will I fail in this, my heaviest assignment to date? Frankly, I don’t see how any actor can win with this role and I’m…
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Property of Carole Lombard
At her untimely death at age 33, Carole left behind quite an impressive estate. Unfortunately, it has been said that her most valuable furs, clothes and jewels perished with her in the plane crash. Still, there were treasures left behind. I have the listing of Carole’s personal property that was appraised at her death; it is quite long and full of much legal mumbo jumbo. The settling of her estate lists it all more concisely and together, but I found the appraiser’s notes on how much everything was worth rather intriguing. So here are the highlights, from the appraiser’s report. Bank accounts: Jewelry and furs: Yowza. Carole definitely had…
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Gossip Friday: Carole with her Clark
Some ooey gooey love mush since it’s nearly Valentines Day… From May 1941: The most in love woman in all Hollywood—Carole Lombard. Watch pictures of Clark and Carole together. Carole either clings lovingly to her husband’s arm or gazes adoringly into Clark’s eyes. She completely submerges herself into one with Gable and openly tell the world with her eyes, “I love this man. He is mine.” For the most in love [girl] we dare you to find any that surpasses Carole Lombard with her Clark. ____ New this week: Saturday: Clark and Carole profiles from Movie Star Parade magazine in the Article Archive Sunday: Screenshots from “Idiot’s Delight” in…
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Movie of the Month: China Seas (1935)
China Seas is a real MGM high octane thriller, set on the high seas, with… Romance! Pirates! Deception! A torrid love triangle! Gable is Alan Gaskell, a roguish captain of a ship that sails between Hong Kong and Shanghai. It’s established pretty early on that he’s been having some adult fun ashore with a Shanghai harlot, Dolly, who goes by the name China Doll (Harlow). So imagine his surprise when setting his ship off to sea that she is on board as a passenger! She confesses she is madly in love with him; he is weary of her and rejects her advances. She is green with jealousy upon the arrival onboard…
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Gossip Friday: On the set of Comrade X
From January 1941: Hedy Lamarr, who has completely forgotten her nervous jitters and family troubles that tore at her heart, has become a fun-loving, chattering, prank-playing imp on the “Comrade X” set. And all because that irresistable Clark Gable has kidded Hedy out of those self-conscious blues into being a real and naturla human being. It’s a new Lamarr, take our word for it. _____ New this week: Tuesday: New look for the site, film page for The Painted Desert Wednesday: Page for Grace Kelly Thursday: Pics of Clark and Sylvia Ashley in the gallery Friday: Clark’s death certificate
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Happy 110th Birthday, Mr. Gable
(http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=KGOUvzPzhkk) I am asked often, “Why Clark Gable? Why a site for him?” First of all, Clark is an excellent place to start if one wants to get into classic films. He is where my love for classic films began. After being awestruck by “Gone with the Wind”, I saw his Oscar-winning performance in “It Happened One Night”, which introduced me to the lovely Claudette Colbert and to investigate more Frank Capra films, and so on. From Clark’s films alone one can be introduced to Joan Crawford, Vivien Leigh, Ava Gardner, Jeanette MacDonald, Marion Davies, Helen Hayes, Grace Kelly, Sidney Poitier, Spencer Tracy, Marilyn Monroe, Jean Harlow, Myrna Loy,…
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Gossip Friday: Snippets from the set of Gone with the Wind
From August 1939: There’s a mad scramble between every scene on the “Gone with the Wind” set. For Vivien Leigh is an Anagram fiend and Olivia de Havilland is equally rabid on the subject of Chinese Checkers–and they like Clark Gable for a partner. Gable happens to like both girls and both games, but he’s hit upon a practical solution for the predicament. It’s three-handed bridge and now everyone is happy. *** Though Vivien Leigh has many elaborate costumes for “Gone with the Wind”, her costliest is the ugliest dress she wears in the picture. Fourteen copies of this dress had to be made, for it is the one which…
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Movie of the Month: Hold Your Man (1933)
Probably the least-known of Clark and Jean Harlow’s pairings, Hold Your Man is a scandulous pre-code with a pretty good melodrama in its center. Gable is Eddie Hall, a small-time con man on the run from the cops when he bursts into Ruby Adams’ (Jean Harlow) apartment and finds her in the bathtub. Ruby and Eddie quickly realize they are two peas in a pod: she is somewhat of a con artist herself, seducing and manipulating men to get what she wants. This is definitely pre-production code stuff, as the film offers no innuendo to cover up the fact that Eddie and Ruby are sleeping together. One of Eddie’s cons…
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Gossip Friday: That Silly Soldier
From March 1944: When Captain Clark Gable, who has been off the screen for over a year, first met little Margaret O’Brien, he asked her if she, too, was in movies. Later Margaret, who was so taken aback, confided to her mother: “That soldier certainly doesn’t know much, does he? He must have never seen a movie in his whole life!” ____ New this week: Love on the Run screenshots in the gallery