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Gossip Friday: Carole outsmarts Clark
From October 1937: Clark Gable thought it would be fun to turn the tables on Carole Lombard–in payment for some of Carole’s jokes on her friends. So he called fifteen of the leading feminine lights of Hollywood and invited them to a tea the next day at Carole’s house. He explained that Carole and her secretary were busy on a picture that day and had asked him to do the planning. The fifteen guests promptly accepted. Not a word was said to Carole and the next day (Sunday) Clark gleefully “dropped in” to see Carole in the afternoon–and incidentally of course to watch her face when the guests began…
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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.…
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Lots of New Stuff!
I’ve been doing a lot of updates around here so here’s what’s new: First and foremost, a special thanks to R.R. for the awesome new gallery banner! There are several new pictures in the gallery too, so check those out. There’s a new section under Info devoted to Clark’s five wives. So far #4 and #5, Sylvia Ashley and Kathleen Williams, are up. The other three to follow (yes, Carole Lombard is coming soon!) New film pages for But Not For Me, Lone Star and The King and Four Queens, all including audio clips. New radio shows in the Multimedia section: China Seas with Lucille Ball, A Farewell to Arms with Josephine Hutchinson and…
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Gossip Friday: No divorce?
From August 1937: It must have been one of those twenty-minutes-to-the-hour or twenty-minutes-after lulls that happens so often in a room full of people. At any rate, in a sudden silence, the voice of Mrs. Clark Gable was heard to say, “Well now, MINE doesn’t want a divorce.” Three women simultaneously leaped to the nearest telephone to call Carole Lombard. Ria of course knew about Clark’s relationship with Carole at that point (who didn’t?) but like many of his other dalliances, she thought it would pass and she would always remain Mrs. Gable. By 1937 they were no longer living together as husband and wife and it is said that…
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Gossip Friday: The Gables at the racetrack
From March 1934: Clark Gable has gone in for race horses in a big way. And Mrs. Gable is just as excited over them as Clark is. They are spending many a week-end at the race track. Mrs. Gable at the time was Ria. Clark was photographed at the race track from the 1930’s through the 1950’s so it seems it was a lifelong passion. No word on if he ever won any money on racehourse bets! A few updates this past week… Lots of new photos in the Gallery, including some with Ria, Carole and some of his childhood. Film pages added for Betrayed and Susan Lenox: Her Fall and…
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Gossip Friday: A new heir?
From August 1941: The rumors are thick and fast that the Clark Gables are expecting an heir. It has even been reported that Carole’s brother has been boasting that he soon will be an uncle. But Carole claims it’s only poison oak she’s having–and that’s why she has engaged a room in an eastern hospital. Well, only time will tell. Aw, both cute and sad. They so wanted a child but it was not meant to be. And rumor has it the “eastern hospital” visit was not for poison oak—but to check Carole’s fertility.
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Tomorrow is Gable Day!
Tomorrow is Clark Gable Day on TCM! Here is the complete lineup: Mutiny on the Bounty (1935) 1:45am Command Decision (1949) 4:00am Strange Interlude (1932) 6:00am Manhattan Melodrama (1934) 8:00am China Seas (1935) 9:45am They Met in Bombay (1941) 11:15am Betrayed (1952) 1:00pm Idiot’s Delight (1939) 3:00pm Forsaking All Others (1934) 5:00pm Love on the Run (1936) 6:30pm Red Dust (1932) 8:00pm Mogambo (1953) 9:30pm Test Pilot (1938) 11:00pm This is the first time in recent years (if at all) that Clark has had his own day during TCM’s annual Summer Under the Stars festival. Strange Interlude and They Met in Bombay in particular are rare for them to show, …
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Gossip Friday: Clark pulls one on Joan
Here’s this week’s gossip blurb from March 1937: We nominate for the best gag-puller in the town of Hollywood–Mr. Clark Gable! The story told us recently by Joan Crawford wins him the award in nothing flat. It’s a well known fact that Crawford is hipped on the subject of music on the set. Bennett, the chauffeur, spends half his time putting on and taking off records for Joan between scenes. In her collection of victrola records are some of the finest symphonies and operas. One day, during a recent picture together, Clark walked over to Joan’s Victrola, lifted high the pile of records and screaming, “I’m damned sick and tired…
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The Sincerest Form of Flattery…
In this month’s Vanity Fair, in a feature called “Ain’t We Got Style?” , they posed stars of this summer’s movies as stars in “Depression-era classics”. Featured are It Happened One Night, 42nd Street, Letty Lynton, My Man Godfrey, The Grapes of Wrath and two movies set in the 1930’s: They Shoot Horses, Don’t They? and Paper Moon. James Marsden and Rose Byrne are posed as Clark and Claudette Colbert in It Happened One Night: Runaway heiress, love triangle, gruff but adorable journalist–Frank Capra’s 1934 classic has everything a screwball on-the-road comedy should to take the mind off foreclosures and bank closures. The most iconic scene (apart from the one where…
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Gossip Fridays
I’m not going to make a promise I can’t keep like that I promise to post a new blog update every day. But I decided it would be nice to have a weekly feature. So every Friday, I will be posting a new gossip item from vintage newspapers or magazines about Clark. Sometimes I’ll post one about his costars too. These will all be little gossip blurbs that appeared in magazines or newspapers at the time. Some even from vintage radio shows. Today’s the first Gossip Friday, so here’s our inaugural blurb from August 1937: The deepest mystery of the month: why Clark Gable sat on a curb before Carole Lombard’s house…