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He appeared in over 180 movies. Did he eclipse, say, W.C. Fields in the drunk characterization category? Hear us out and then you decide. He was born Mortimer J. Naughton in 1882 in Brooklyn, N.Y., and passed away 61 years ago. Jack Norton was a prototypical classic movie character actor, appearing (credited or not) in […]
They’re remembered as one of the great screen teams, and yet they only made — count ’em — 4 films together. Quickly, can you name them? Ok, let’s take the movies in chronological order: To Have and To Have Not (1944). The movie is director Howard Hawks’ justifiably classic To Have and Have Not. As our Books-To-Movies maven, […]
He was a really BIG star in the 1940s, but is almost totally forgotten today. Why that is a question we throw open to our readers. Tell us why, please. Cornel Wilde — born in what is now Slovakia as Kornel Weisz in 1912 — is eclipsed in the fog of Hollywood history while, […]
The former Myrna Adele Williams of Helena, Montana was several things to many people: an insouciantly witty actress, a glamour-puss and a formidable actress who could perform comedy and drama with ease and panache. Certainly, Myrna Loy, as she became to be known, had a lengthy career — beginning in the silent era 20’s and […]
She wasn’t just the quintessential wife and mother on screen! She had range — and sex appeal. So how much do you really know about Myrna Loy? It’s not too much of an exaggeration to say that she is essential to an understanding of the glories as well as the deficiencies of big studio classic Hollywood. She […]
There are character actors and then there are character actors. Who could forget Akim Tamiroff? He is pictured above with Katina Paxinou, the great Greek actress when they appeared in For Whom the Bell Tolls. Both Tamiroff and Paxinou, unforgettably good supporting players, also appeared in Orson Welles’ Mr. Arkadin. […]
A popular leading man of the 1940s, Jeffrey Lynn is totally forgotten today. Luckily he made a few films which bear repeated viewing. (That’s our man above with Olivia DeHavilland in the the 1940 romantic drama, My Love Came Back.) So, ok, you’ve never heard of this guy. But rest assured he was a Forties […]
Every once in a while we like to revisit some notable classic movie titles. Today’s choice is 1954’s The Barefoot Contessa, written and director by Joseph Mankiewicz and costarring Ava Garner and Humphrey Bogart. The movie is really a down-home show biz story wrapped up in Hollywood’s then fascination with Europe. Bogie — just three […]
She has been viewed as “the fallen Queen” of film noir, whose screwball — she was once up for Judy Holliday’s role in 1950’s Born Yesterday — seductive screen presence belied her British and Scottish royal family heritage. MGM’s Louis B. Mayer changed her name from Gloria Hallward, and once saw in her the aristocratic […]
We’ve published blogs and have run a number of Monday Quizzes devoted to what we see as the Queens of Film Noir, notably including Marie Windsor, Audrey Totter, Lizabeth Scott, Jane Greer, Gene Tierney, Coleen Gray, Veronica Lake and Jean Gillie. But for some dumb reason we have not focused on perhaps the Queen of […]