Seraphic Secret

Robert J. Avrech: Emmy Award winning screenwriter. Movie fanatic. Helplessly and hopelessly in love with my wife since age nine.

Friday Photos: True Hollywood Confessions

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“It wasn’t the way I looked at a man, it was the thought behind it.”
—Gloria Grahame

Thomas Eakins
American painter and photographer (b. 1844, Philadelphia, d. 1916, Philadelphia)
“Clara”
c. 1900
Oil on canvas, 61 x 51 cm
Musée d’Orsay, Paris

 

Frank Loyd Wright’s 1929 Cord L-29 Cabriolet

 

Dovima wearing Dior at the Eiffel Tower, Paris, 1955, photo by Richard Avedon

 

French poster for Blonde Venus, 1932

 

Joan Crawford
Photo by George Hurrell
1934

 

Horst P. Horst
Dress by Hattie Carnegie
1939
© Conde Nast / Horst Estate

 

“Not many actors could talk [when the talkies arrived]. So they shoved the ones that came from Broadway into everything. It all went so fast. I used to ask myself, ‘What set am I on today? What script am I supposed to be doing – this one or that one? All I shouted for was a day off. We got it Sunday. But I had to stay in bed that one day to get ready for the next six days of shooting. I wonder if Jack Warner appreciated his movie-acting family?”
—Glenda Farrell
John White Alexander (American, 1856-1915)
“The Green Dress”
1890-1899
oil on canvas
39 X 21 inches

 

Dovima, wearing a coat by Dior, in a photo by Richard Avedon for Harper’s Bazaar, 1951

 

“Americana”
by Charles Sheeler (American, Philadelphia, Pennsylvania 1883–1965 Dobbs Ferry, New York)
1931
Oil on canvas
48 x 36 in.

 

Noel Neill, 1946, played Lois Lane in Superman movie serials in 1948 and 1950 as well as on the Superman television series from 1951 to 1957. She continued her Superman association by appearing in the 1978 Christopher Reeve film as Lois Lane’s mother and also had a small part in Superman Returns in 2006. A statue of Noel Neill as Lois Lane was erected in Metropolis, Illinois (”the official home of Superman”) in 2010. She died in 2016.

 

Noel Neill with the “Lois Lane played by Noel Neill statue” on Market Street in Metropolis, IL.

 

“No matter who the nominal hostess was, Norma [Shearer] was always the queen, and no matter what time the party was to begin, Norma was always late, because she would sit for hours—hours!—to do her makeup, then make the grand entrance. She was always and forever the star. She had to be that way, really, because she became a star by force of will—hers and [Irving] Thalberg’s [her husband]. Better-looking on the screen than in life, Norma Shearer was certainly not a beauty on the level of Paulette Goddard, who didn’t need makeup, didn’t need anything. Paulette could simply toss her hair and walk out the front door, and strong men grew weak in the knees.”
—Robert Wagner
Everett Shinn
(American, 1876-1953)
“The Orchestra Pit”, 1906
Oil on canvas, Height: 17.25 in., Width: 19.5 in., Yale University Art Gallery

 

Dovima models a Dior coat in a Richard Avedon photo, Paris, 1955

 

Jane Avril (Zsa Zsa Gabor) Moulin Rouge, 1952
Screenplay by Anthony Veiller, John Huston, Based on the novel “Moulin Rouge: A Novel Based on the Life of Henri de Toulouse-Lautrec” by Pierre La Mure (New York, 1950).

 

A group of Jewish partisans called, The Avengers. Rachel Rudnitzki is pictured here after the Avengers helped the Russian army retake the city of Vilna, 1944.

 

Maayan Ariel and Lielle Meital wish all our friends and relatives a joyous and inspirational Shabbat.

 

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Comments

  1. Gloria Grahame got it right… it’s the thought that counts!

    To Glenda Farrell — according to popular opinion, Jack Warner probably didn’t consider you and the other Studio actors as “family”.

    Robert — I remember learning something of The Avengers back in some history class from long ago, but I don’t see much of anything about Rachel Rudnitzki (other than this photo) on Google. Do you know what happened to her? Aside from the military accessories, she bear a resemblance to my late mother in this photo.

    Nice photo of your granddaughters… do they ever take a bad photo? 😀

  2. your grandchildren are sure cute Robert!

    That must have been amazing to witness “talkies” take over. if you find yourself in Oakland do take a tour of the Paramount theater. Quite a history behind it – built in 1931 with 4,000 seats or so. It was planned in the silent era and finished with talkies, so the organ that came up to the stage on a hydraulic system was obsolete before it opened.

    Didn’t they reshoot some movies for talkies? Somehow Marion Davies Marianne comes to mind.

    Finally the car of Frank Lloyd Wright – he also designed Max Hoffman’s Park Ave showroom (which believe it or not was razed a few years ago!) and in part payment he received a Mercedes 300Sc coupe and a 300SL.

    Hoffman was legendary in import circles as he sold Mercedes post war, brought VW, BMW, Alfa Romeo and others to the US.

    My mother was mentioning a famous LA architect from the 50s – designed a house up here (that like all good designs still looks contemporary) – trying to think of his name.

    Paul Williams
    https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Paul_Williams_(architect)

    • I have always liked the movie “The Bad and the Beautiful” which has a rather fictionalized account of the coming of sound but it is fun. I have always wondered how much is true and which characters are based on real people.

          • The Bad and the Beautiful is about David Selznick, and as biographies go, pretty close to getting it right, from the death of his father, an early industry pioneer, to the Val Lewton like making of a horror movie and a sweeping historical epic.

      • I think that there were many many careers that just dried up overnight.

        It was a different way of acting with no sound and the advent of sound killed many a career I believe

        Actors who women swooned over were found to have funny voices for one

        • I think John Ford and Hitchcock did a lot of their pictures as though they were silent, then added sound. I’m pretty Hitchcock did his own story boards and designs.

        • Actually that story about actors who lost careers because of sound and funny voice is only somewhat so. Mainly those that lost careers had person issues, such as alcoholism or extreme femininity, that would not have precluded their working in some character parts, but not as vigorous leading males. John Gilbert, usually cited, had an adequate voice and was a better than good actor, but, and this is only my view, he was not a star in sound film. By that I mean he did not project a dominant presence on screen. Had he been cast in supporting parts, and laid off the booze he might have been okay. Take a look at his final film, The captain Hates The Sea for confirmation of this.

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