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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“I just do things I really enjoy. I enjoy acting. When I’m driving to the studio, I sing in the car. I love my work and my wife and my kids and my friends. And I think “You’re a lucky man Gregory Peck, a damn lucky man.” —Gregory Peck
“I just do things I really enjoy. I enjoy acting. When I’m driving to the studio, I sing in the car. I love my work and my wife and my kids and my friends. And I think “You’re a lucky man Gregory Peck, a damn lucky man.”
—Gregory Peck

Artemisia Gentileschi, Self-Portrait as a Lute Player, circa 1615-1617
Artemisia Gentileschi, “Self-Portrait as a Lute Player”, circa 1615-1617

 

Mary Pickford and Douglas Fairbanks were the first two actors to have their footprints and handprints immortalized in cement outside Grauman’s Chinese Theater in Hollywood. Here's the couple with Sid Grauman on April 30, 1927.
Mary Pickford and Douglas Fairbanks were the first two actors to have their footprints and handprints immortalized in cement outside Grauman’s Chinese Theater in Hollywood. Here’s they are with Sid Grauman, April 30, 1927.

 

Sidney Toler and Marlene Dietrich, Blonde Venus 1932. Written by Jules Furthman and S.K. Lauren.
Sidney Toler and Marlene Dietrich, Blonde Venus 1932. Written by Jules Furthman and S.K. Lauren.

 

Pierre Bonnard, The Letter, c.1906, oil on canvas.
Pierre Bonnard, The Letter, c.1906, oil on canvas.

 

Jeanne Eagels in “The Letter”, 1929.
Jeanne Eagels in “The Letter”, 1929.

 

Johannes Vermeer Lady with Her Maidservant Holding a Letter c. 1667 Oil on canvas, 89,5 x 78,1 cm Frick Collection, New York
Johannes Vermeer
Lady with Her Maidservant Holding a Letter
c. 1667
Oil on canvas, 89,5 x 78,1 cm
Frick Collection, New York

 

Robert Frank Detroit,1955
Robert Frank
Detroit,1955

 

Girls, from the World Series, 1982 Lithograph 25 x 34 inches Edition of 40 Signed and numbered
Ed Ruscha, Girls from the World Series, 1982
Lithograph
25 x 34 inches
Edition of 40
Signed and numbered

 

“They say that in Hollywood one can't be honest, but I think honesty counts in Hollywood just as much as it does anywhere else. I think it's just too much trouble to be dishonest and keep up with yourself.” —Bette Davis
“They say that in Hollywood one can’t be honest, but I think honesty counts in Hollywood just as much as it does anywhere else. I think it’s just too much trouble to be dishonest and keep up with yourself.”
—Bette Davis

 

Adam de Coster, Three Singers, 1607-1643
Adam de Coster, “Three Singers”, 1607-1643

 

Gloria Swanson, 1922. Karl Struss. Silver print
Karl Struss, Gloria Swanson, 1922, silver print.

 

Ava Gardner in The Killers, 1946. Screenplay by Richard Brooks, Anthony Veller, John Huston Based on "The Killers" 1927, short story in Scribners Magazine by Ernest Hemingway
Ava Gardner, The Killers, 1946. Screenplay by Richard Brooks, Anthony Veller, John Huston. Based on “The Killers” 1927, short story by Ernest Hemingway.

 

Poster for Street Angel, 1928
Poster for Street Angel, 1928

 

Wallace Berman, Untitled, 1966
Wallace Berman, Untitled collage, 1966

 

Robert J. Avrech, Silent Picture, Los Angeles, 2015.
Robert J. Avrech, Silent Picture, Los Angeles, 2015.

 

“Every time your picture is taken, you lose a part of your soul.” —Anna May Wong
“Every time your picture is taken, you lose a part of your soul.”
—Anna May Wong

 

Gerrit van Honthorst Musical Group on a Balcony, 1621
Gerrit van Honthorst, “Musical Group on a Balcony”, 1621

 

Alfred Eisenstaedt - Nurses at Roosevelt Hospital, New York City, 1937
Alfred Eisenstaedt – Nurses at Roosevelt Hospital, New York City, 1937

 

Sam Levene, The Killers, 1946. Screenplay by Richard Brooks, Anthony Veller, John Huston, Based on "The Killers" 1927 short story in Scribners Magazine by Ernest Hemingway.
Sam Levene, The Killers, 1946. Screenplay by Richard Brooks, Anthony Veller, John Huston, Based on “The Killers” 1927 short story by Ernest Hemingway.

 

Sir William Rothenstein, Reading the Book of Esther, Date painted: 1907–1909 Oil on canvas, 87 x 106.5 cm.
Sir William Rothenstein, Reading the Book of Esther, Date painted: 1907–1909
Oil on canvas, 87 x 106.5 cm.

 

Triplets Christina, Katha, and Megan Dees Modeling Their Braids Before Getting Haircuts (Nina Leen, LIFE Magazine, September 1, 1956)
Triplets Christina, Katha, and Megan Dees Modeling Their Braids Before Getting Haircuts (Nina Leen, LIFE Magazine, September 1, 1956)

 

Jack Youngerman, Red-Vermillion, 1961 Oil on canvas. 97-3/4″ x 76″
Jack Youngerman, Red-Vermillion, 1961
Oil on canvas. 97-3/4″ x 76″

 

Livia Yarden wishes all our friends and relatives a peaceful and inspirational Shabbat.
Livia Yarden wishes all our friends and relatives a peaceful and inspirational Shabbat.

 

Pillow Talk, 1959
Pillow Talk, 1959

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Comments

  2. “They say that in Hollywood one can’t be honest, but I think honesty counts in Hollywood just as much as it does anywhere else. I think it’s just too much trouble to be dishonest and keep up with yourself.”
    —Bette Davis

    I would suspect that in Hollywood there is a lot of backstabbing, but the enduring business relationships have to have honesty as the glue.

    Love both the painting of Hinthorst – for 1621 that painting to me reaches out to me centuries later – and the Eisenstaedt photo of the nurses…Boy, did we lose something when Life Magazine disappeared from the weekly newsstand. Wouldn’t you say that Alfred Eidenstadt was one of the most prolific photographers?

    You might enjoy this little experience I had today.

    I am getting blood drawn in the lab – and I tell the cute nurse that she ought to give a Vincent Price imitation while she is awaiting me with syringe in hand.

    Ya know, “Good day. Ve’ve been vaiting for you” (actually that sounds more like Bela Lugosi).

    Anyway my accent sounded more like Peter Lorre. He’s easy, as Jimmy “you dirty rat” Cagney.

    She replies, “that sounds like someone on The Simpsons”.

    I tell her “where do you think they got it?”

    She was drawing a blank.

  3. Interesting timeline for Grauman’s at http://graumanschinese.org/

    Karl Struss was a photographer in a group in New York with Alfred Stieglitz before becoming a cinematographer. His photo came from that period. I had the pleasure of meeting him before he died at a special screening of “Sunrise.” This is my favorite silent movie and, in my opinion, Murnau’s masterpiece. Go out of your way to see it anytime you have the chance.

    The van Honthorst painting and Eisenstaedt photo remind me of the chalk drawings of Kurt Wenner: http://kurtwenner.com/

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