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Is isn’t every girl who marries three famous men. But then it isn’t every girl who looks like Ava Gardner. Husband No. 1 — On the morning of Jan. 10, 1942, in the small town of Ballard deep in California’s Santa Ynez Mountains, Ava Gardner wed Mickey Rooney. The bride, the first of Rooney’s eight wives, was […]
Again, we ask, the most beautiful actress classic Hollywood ever produced? The best actress? Ava Gardner was so good looking that audiences often didn’t care how good a performer she was or wasn’t. Just being there, up on the big screen, was more than enough. For the record, Gardner, a country tomboy from rural North […]
The most beautiful actress classic Hollywood ever produced? The best actress? We’ve written a lot about Ava Gardner in other blogs, and generally take the position of yes to the first but not necessarily to the second. Gardner was excessively insecure about her acting abilities, but she needn’t have been. She was so good looking […]
There were many famous “sister acts” in the movies. It started back in the silents, with Lillian and Dorothy Gish, Norma and Constance Talmadge, Delores and Helene Costello. It continued in talking pictures. Constance and Joan Bennett, Loretta Young and Sally Blane (and Polly Ann Young). There were the famous Lane Sisters, Priscilla, Rosemary and […]
As the catchall headline above suggests, it’s time once again to dip into our e-mail bag to see what’s on the mind of our recent correspondents. In response to our March 28 blog, OSCAR WINNERS — The New Elite, Reversing The Traditional Trend, about how best-actress Oscar winners are triumphing in the supporting actress category BEFORE […]
Buster Crabbe was one of the first athletes to enter the film business. He was born Clarence Lindon Crabbe on Feb. 17, 1907 in Oakland, Cal., and had a long career. He parlayed his athleticism — as an Olympic swim champion – into wannabe Johnny Weissmuller status in 1933’s Tarzan the Fearless. This was followed […]
For some reason Tony Curtis is regarded today as something of a lesser light relative to his Hollywood post-World War II peers despite his nearly 60-year career covering nearly 130 movie and tv credits. He shouldn’t be. Born in the Bronx (nee Bernard Schwartz) of Hungarian Jewish immigrants, he had a horrendous childhood — spending time […]
Following World War II the major Hollywood studios were enthusiastically stockpiling young talent — eg., Marlon Brando, Rock Hudson, Janet Leigh, Natalie Wood, James Dean, Marilyn Monroe and Robert Wagner. Another name to be added to that list is the subject of today’s Monday Quiz, Tony Curtis. For some reason, Curtis is regarded today as […]
Lana Turner, we have learned, certainly gets the attention of classic movie lovers. Seems we cannot get enough of her. Earlier in April, we featured Lana not only as the subject of our weekly Monday Quiz — a highly prestigious category, to be sure — but also as our Star of the Week. In our […]
A few weeks ago we discussed scrapbooking the stars. How in the past (and who knows, maybe even today) fans filled scrapbooks with clippings and photos of their favorite stars. We asked our readers if they knew of any such scrapbooks and one faithful reader, Jeff Woodman, fessed up. OK, kind of ashamed to admit […]