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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Letter from Jennifer Jones to husband David Selznick, March 1959
Dearest:
Hope you are well and the deal goes but most of all that you miss me a little. Betty Bogart [Lauren Bacall] came through from Klosters on her way to London with her two children in hand and she told me I was pushing my luck. That you are a very attractive guy and in her words there are plenty of dames in wait for an attractive guy. I said I was less concerned since she had left California but I realized the danger, only I had to continue this work [psychoanalysis] with Dr. Meier. Her reply was, if you can take it, exactly as follows. “F— the Doctor, go home and get yourself l— and you won’t need doctors or diets. Greatest thing in the world for the complexion.”

Jan Steen
Prayer before the Meal
1660
oil on oak panel
52.7 by 44.5 cm.; 20 1/4 by 17 1/2 in.

 

Joel Meyerowitz, New York City, 1963

 

Alvar Aalto
No 41 Lounger
1929-1933

 

Harold Feinstein, Breezy Curtains, Vermont, 1975

 

Nicolas De Stael, La Route, 1954

 

Edouard Boubat, Enfants, Montmartre, Paris, 1948

 

Rick McGinnis
House in the hills above Malibu, Los Angeles, Dec. 2016

 

“Sometimes I dread the truth of the lines I say. But the dread must never show.”
—Vivien Leigh

 

Vilhelm Hammershoi, Interior of Courtyard, Strandgade 30, 1899, oil on canvas, width: 470 x height: 660 cm.

 

Cary Grant to Ingrid Bergman, Notorious, 1946
Screenplay by Ben Hecht

 

Ferdinand Bol (1616-1680), Eliezer and Rebecca at the Well , ca. 1645-1646, Oil on canvas, 171×171.8cm

 

Rick McGinnis
Bugattis, Petersen Automotive Museum, Los Angeles, Nov. 2016

 

Helen Lundeberg, Desert Road, 1960, oil on canvas, 50 x 40 inches (©The Feitelson / Lundeberg Art Foundation)

 

Herbert Ponting, Ice Cave with the “Terra Nova” in the distance, 1911

 

Pierre Auguste Renoir, A Walk in the Woods ( aka Madame Lecoeur and her Children), 1870

 

Fred Stein, Paris Evening, 1934

 

Erwin Blumenfeld, The Women Who Serve, Harper’s Bazaar, July 1943 © The Estate of Erwin Blumenfeld

 

On being scolded for playing a prostitute in the pre-code film, Blood Money, 1933.
“I played a masochistic nymphomaniacal kleptomaniac, not a prostitute.”
—Frances Dee

 

 

Roman Vishniac
His Wife, Luta
Latvia, 1920

 

Frans van Mieris the Elder,
1635 – 1681
A Woman in a Red Jacket feeding a Parrot
c. 1663
Oil on copper
22.5 x 17.3 cm

 

Erwin Blumenfeld
Fur, 1949

 

Robert J. Avrech
Injured? Robertson Boulevard, Los Angeles, 2016
Me: “Bad abortion?”
Karen: “Progressively speaking, the baby survives.”

 

Rare copper gold plated Hanukkah Menorah and dreidel made by Israeli artist Moshe Zabari, Israeli b. 1935.

 

 

Lielle, Maayan, Ariel and Livia wish all our friends and relatives a lovely and meaningful Shabbat.
Photo by: Steve Cohn
www.stevecohnphotography.com

 

Reader Interactions

Comments

  1. Got a great set of pictures this week, Robert. Especially loved Rick McGinnis’s photo of the house above Malibu, looking like it’s just floating on the tops of trees. Also, the Ivanka-Donald bit made me laugh out loud.

  3. I love Karen’s sense of humor! Love the 2 Paris pictures

    On the value of shrinks: Had a good friend who was a master mechanic and the first service manager of what became one of the country’s largest MB dealers. He said that as a rule, the shrinks who brought in their cars were “crazier than me”.

    And that was saying something.

  4. I had to laugh at that picture of the lovely Miss Dee, Robert. I’m a regular at the Ace of Spades website and someone there mentioned “I Walked With A Zombie” this morning so I went looking for pictures of her to post. And I posted the same one as you! It’s a sign I’m going to have to see “Blood Money.”

  5. I do not like Lauren Bacall, then, now or at any time, other than on screen. Jennifer Jones does not rise to the dislike stage, just a wallow. But Frances Dee, great looking and greatly talented, shines in my eyes. Have look at her in Wheel of Fortune with John Wayne, or Four faces West, with her husband, Joel, Charles Bickford and a scene stealing Joseph Calleia.

  6. Ok, so, did Ms. Jones take Ms. Bacall’s advice? Bacall really seemed to speak her mind; according to Shelley Winters’ memoir, Bacall once called her to ask where Winters’ husband was, because he was late for a date with her. Winters got all upset, but Bacall answered, “Listen, if you don’t respect your marriage, why should I?” Admirable for her honesty, if not for her morality.

    Did Faye Dunaway ever play Frances Dee? Very strong resemblance, at least in that picture.

    thanks for the beautiful pictures! Good Shabbos all.

    • Jones did not take Bacall’s advice. In fact, she stayed in therapy with Dr. Meier, four sessions a week for the rest of her life—and what a shock!—only got crazier.
      Faye never played Frances, but Frances Dee was scandal free and put her career on hold in order to marry actor Joel McCRea and be a mother to their three children. The marriage lasted from 1933 until his death in 1990. Sadly, Dee is not very well known or remembered though she was a gifted actress. She’s probably best known for her role in the cult classic “I Walked With a Zombie” 1943.
      Glad you enjoy Friday Photos, Shabbat Shalom.

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