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Sure you do! As with so many of the superb character actors of Hollywood’s classic period, facial recognition often precedes the name. Donald MacBride, born in Brooklyn in 1889, spent years in vaudeville, the stage and in silent pictures to emerge as a go-to supporting player in dozens Thirties and Forties comedies and crime movies. […]
Considered one of Alfred Hitchcock’s best, and a film treasured by fans of Bergman and Grant. 1946’s Notorious is also notable for the freedom it provided Hitchcock. Distracted by his production of Duel in the Sun, David Selznick — who had Hitchcock under contract — decided to sell the entire package to RKO. The director […]
He starred in 4 of the top ten grossing films of 1941: Louisiana Purchase (with Vera Zorina), Caught in the Draft and Road to Zanzibar (both with Dorothy Lamour) and Nothing But the Truth with Paulette Goddard. Big stars of the forties, say Clark Gable, Gary Cooper and Ingrid Bergman, might sometimes star in 2 […]
Well. how much did you know about one of Hollywood’s most famous personalities? (Oh, that first name.) Did you know that she was equally as famous in vaudeville, radio and on Broadway? In the Forties, for example, she trade on-air radio banter with the likes of Bing Crosby, Al Jolson and Rudy Vallee. She was […]
No question: today’s Quiz subject sported a name that classic movies fans have been conjuring with for decades. Go ahead: let it roll off the tongue. We like to have fun from time to time over-articulating other delicious sounding actress names: those, for example, of Maria Ouspenskaya, Vera Hruba Ralston or Zizi Jeanmaire. Of course, […]
Is it still spellbinding? Solid actors, great director, some behind the camera romantic hijinks and a musical score that is perhaps the film’s most most memorable element. All this plus the spectacle of Alfred Hitchcock, in his customary cameo in each of his pictures, walking out of a hotel elevator smoking a cigarette and toting […]
Yes, she was famed ecdysiast Gypsy Rose Lee’s sister, and yes she was Baby June, but June Havoc (seen above with Alan Ladd and below with Dennis O’Keefe) had quite a career in films as well as on Broadway. Here she is posing with her big sister. The two were pushed by their overbearing mother […]
A fun film if you can find it. A favorite of Joe’s. Republic Pictures made some pretty interesting films during its time in Golden Age Hollywood. This one — 1944’s Casanova in Burlesque costarring Joe E. Brown, June Havoc and Dale Evans (yes, that Dale Evans) — amply qualifies. It’s about a stripper (Havoc) who […]
The actor pictured above was the second man to portray the famed detective on screen. Did you know him? Or the title of that film? Ok, today is “answer day” relating to our weekly Quizzes, so we’ll refrain from asking more questions and begin providing some answers. The chap you are seeing at the beginning […]
We are not usually given to creating our Quizzes around made up characters but this week marks, we hope, a welcome exception. The reason: He was one of the most famous fictional detectives of the 1920s and 30s and naturally the famous novels became famous movies. What distinguishes Philo Vance from other detective series of […]