Morning Choice
1968
Acrylic on wood
72 x 14 x 14 inches
Forest of Poplars
Caposotto, Sermide, Mantova, Italy, 2018
—Bette Davis
Woman with a Parasol
c. 1895
oil on canvas: 190.5 cm. X 149.6 cm.
Rose, July 2020
—Marilyn Monroe
Photo by Trung Pham Huy
Screenplay by Ruth and Augustus Goetz
Based on the stage play The Heiress by Ruth and Augustus Goetz
A fraternity brother had an Austin Healey about 1958. Maybe it was an earlier model but it had an aluminum body and, if anyone sat on a fender, if would deform and not return to shape.
I just read a book titled “Nemesis” which is mostly about Aristotle Onassis, but also had some stories about Marilyn. I don’t know how much of it is true, however.
Have a great weekend.
If half, if one-fourth, what is said about her childhood and adolescence is true, Miss Monroe had ample cause to be miserable. Poor thing, she was as bright as she was pretty. And a talented comedienne. (Comedy gets no respect, but most actors say it’s harder than drama.) She would have benefited from modern therapies for the sexually abused.
Perhaps. Some people, most of us, just are the way we are.
Peggy Cummins and Linda Darnell are an interesting contrast. Both were actively working from roughly 1940 to 1965. Darnell was divorced 3 times and, in 1965, died at the age of 41 from burns she received in a house fire. Cummins was married to one man for 50 years (until his death) and lived to be 92 years old. Not that it is relevant at this late date, but for my money, it must have been the color of her eyes.
I like the Bardot and Carron photo. Bardot was about 19 and Carron about 22 based on the date. Both women have had interesting lives. After her acting career, B.B. has been most noted for her animal activism and her prosecution for “hate speech” in France – she was critical of Muslim slaughter rituals and the humaneness of the practice as well as immigrant influence on French culture. She has been fined for several convictions of “hate speech”. Carron is famous for her dancing and is reportedly one of the few dancers to have danced with Kelly, Astaire, Baryshnikov and Nureyev. Both woman are still alive. B.B. is 86 and Carron is 89.
That Austin Healy is beautiful.
I sometimes wonder if everything wasn’t a struggle for Monroe. My late sister struggled with mental illness and, after her death, I was able to read some of her private journals which described her internal turmoil and the demons which tormented her mind. People can look positively “normal on the outside” while feeling total despair inside their head. I wonder if that was Monroe.
I love the Christian Dior photo and the London photo too, but the Dovima photo is sexy on a whole other level.
I love the Omega watch. I can’t afford the watch, but I love it’s style.
Have a wonderful weekend, Robert.
Love the forest of poplars.
Marilyn Monroe was pretty wise. I wonder why she was so unhappy?
The Heli free thousand was a wonderful sports car and like so many were killed off for model year 1968 due to regulations in the US
67 was the last year of the Cobra, the Healey, and I can’t remember all the rest
I always viewed it is one step down from a jaguar. It had an idle that was melodious.
Typical of so many “2+2“ sports cars the back seats were only good for those who had their legs amputated.
Pretty picture of Dovina! Her name has a small typo
I have a love-hate relationship with this iPhone voice transcription.
Sure it saves time immensely but then you really have to go over it word by word before hitting publish. And make painstaking corrections.
Healey 3000; not Heli free thousand.
With that, at 0301, bid you all good night
Marilyn wise? She died in her mid-thirties by her own hand, not to be applauded or embraced.
Oh and as Peggy Cummins never actually became a movie star, say it was the whole package and that Zanuck was, and not for the first or only time, mistaken. Further, on the misguided assumption that high billing constitues by itself stardom, that is factually wrong — stardom boils down nicely to one thing, bankability, and within that context, there are multiple levels.
Barry,
But. . . but. . . in 2020, Peggy was listed at #16 on The Irish Times list of Ireland’s greatest film actors. 🙂
I found this article from 1950 which questioned why Peggy was being ‘kept down’ by the Hollywood machine. In the article they discuss Peggy being replaced on Forever Amber by “the more aggressively mannered and proportioned Miss Linda Darnell“.
Here is the link:
https://trove.nla.gov.au/newspaper/article/22825732
Joe — being a great actor is an opinion, being a movie star is a state of financial being. She was, from that point of view, simply another Zanuck obsession, along with Bella Darvi and several others. Upon retuning to her homeland, she was still not a movie star, and that includes Night of the Demon. She was a relatively attractive leading lady, but that only makes her one of many. Oh, and Demon in its Britsh and American incarnations, was a commercial failure. Linda Darnell, was a movie star until she drank her way out of it the business.
Wait a minute — TheHollywood machine promotes people, not keeps themdown, and the greatest female star from that nation is clearly Maureen O’Hara.