European Film Star Postcards

Swiss actor Michel Simon (1895-1975) was a popular and beloved star of the French cinema and stage. His larger than life personality, impeccable comic timing and great repertoire were seen in more than 100 films. He started his film career during the silent period, and starred in classic masterpieces by Carl Theodor Dreyer, Jean Vigo, Marcel Carné and Jean Renoir.

Mexican card, no. 301.

General Insubordination

François Michel Simon was born in Geneva, Switzerland in 1895. He used to say about himself that "as misfortune never comes singly, cinema was born the same year". He was the son of a Protestant sausage maker.

Simon drifted through his early years as a boxer, commercial photographer and acrobat. In 1912 he was magician, clown and acrobat stooge in a dancers' show called Ribert's and Simon's, in the Montreuil-sous-Bois Casino. Conscripted into the Swiss Army in 1914, he was thrown out through a combination of tuberculosis and general insubordination.

In 1915, he saw Georges Pitoëff acting in Hedda Gabler, at the Theatre de la Comédie of Geneva. He then decided to become an actor too, but had to wait until 1920 before making his first brief appearance on stage, with Pitoëff's company, speaking three lines for the registrar role in William Shakespeare's Measure for Measure.

He was spotted for the first time in a supporting role in George Bernard Shaw's Androcles and the Lion. In 1922, his company moved to Paris at the Comédie des Champs-Élysées.

He quit the following year to become a light comedy actor in plays by Tristan Bernard, Marcel Achard and Yves Mirande. Marcel Achard presented him to Charles Dullin, in whose company he acted in Je ne vous aime pas (I Don't Love You) with Valentine Tessier.

French postcard by Cinémagazine, no. 51.

French postcard by Editions P.I., Paris, no. 43. Photo: Studio Piaz.

Unusual Face

Louis Jouvet, who had meanwhile replaced Pitoëff, hired Michel Simon at the Comédie des Champs-Élysées. Simon then gave a brilliant performance in Jean de la Lune, a play by Marcel Achard. His inimitable talent transformed his Cloclo supporting role to the big attraction of the play.

His theatrical career then blossomed with a large repertoire: Shakespeare, George Bernard Shaw, Luigi Pirandello, Oscar Wilde, Henri Bernstein, but it was film that made him most popular.

One of his first film appearances was as Pomino opposite Ivan Mozzhukhin in Feu Mathias Pascal/The Late Mathias Pascal (1925), based on the novel by Luigi Pirandello and directed by Marcel L'Herbier.

Very soon after, he appeared in La vocation d'André Carel/The Vocation of André Carel (Jean Choux, 1925) with Blanche Montel. The film used small-scale production methods, just as the Nouvelle Vague would do from 1958 on.

Essentially a theatre performer throughout the 1920s, Simon occasionally appeared in small film roles, notably in Casanova (Alexandre Volkoff, 1927) and as Jean LeMaitre in La Passion de Jeanne d'Arc/The Passion of Joan of Arc (Carl Theodor Dreyer, 1928).

In these silent films, he brought his amazing appearance and his unusual face - a talent with an exceptional mobility, but truly without mannerism. He easily played with his body using an unlimited virtuosity, especially his ugliness, evolving from smartness to sympathy, goodness to naivety, ludicrousness to frightening, stupidity to comical, mischievousness to cruelty.

French postcard by Ed. Chantal, Paris, no. 510. Photo: Pathé Consortium.

French postcard by Editions P.I., Paris, no. 61. Offered by Les Carbones Korès 'Carboplane'.

Italian postcard by ASER (A. Scarmiglia Ed. Roma). Photo: Pesce. Publicity still for La comédie du Bonheur/Comedy of Happiness (Marcel L'Herbier, 1940).

Outstanding Character Actor

With the coming of sound film, Michel Simon became firmly established as one of France's outstanding character actors. Full film stardom came his way when, in 1931, Simon starred in the film version of his great stage success Jean De La Lune/Moon-Struck Jean (Jean Choux, 1931) with Madeleine Renaud. People remarked that his elocution and voice tone were as original as his appearance and play.

As Hal Erickson at AllMovie writes: “His screen performances of the 1930s remain fresh and alive even after six decades, largely due to Simon's sudden spurts of improvisation”. Especially his roles in the films directed by Jean Renoir, such as the bitter and highly controversial psychological drama La Chienne/The Bitch (1931), the comedy On Purge Bebé/We Purge Baby (1932) and Boudu Sauvé Des Eaux/Boudu Saved From Drowning (1932). The latter was remade in Hollywood as Down and Out in Beverly Hills (1986, Paul Mazursky) with Nick Nolte in the Michel Simon role, Richard Dreyfuss and Bette Midler.

Hal Erickson continues: “Renoir has credited the actor with introducing the ‘improv’ technique to French filmmaking. Capable of harnessing his rocky-road face, bulky body and shambling manner for the purposes of menace as well as mirth, Simon proved a fearsome creature in Jean Vigo's last film, L'Atlante (1934) opposite lovely Dita Parlo.”

It is probably for his role as Père Jules in L’Atalante that he will be best known: the slightly roguish, ageing barge-man with a heart of gold. He went on to work with another great director, Marcel Carné, on the comedy-farce Drôle de Drame/Bizarre, Bizarre (Marcel Carné, 1937) with Louis Jouvet, and the romantic drama Le Quai des Brumes/Port of Shadows (Marcel Carné, 1938) with Jean Gabin.

French postcard by Ed. Chantal, Rueil, no. 40. Photo: Discina. Publicity still for La comédie du Bonheur/Comedy of Happiness (Marcel L'Herbier, 1940).

Italian postcard. Photo: publicity still of Maria Mercader and Michel Simon in Il re si diverte/The King's Jester (Mario Bonnard, 1941).

Photo with dedication. Collection: Didier Hanson.

Faust and Mephistopheles

Michel Simon later also worked with such other A-list directors as Julien Duvivier at La Fin du Jour/The End of the Day (1939) and Panique/Panic (1946), and René Clair, appearing in the latter's La Beauté du Diable/Beauty and the Devil (1950) opposite Gérard Philipe as both Faust and Mephistopheles.

In 1957, Simon's film career nearly came to an abrupt end when he suffered facial and body paralysis as a by-product of an impure makeup dye. Despite his reduced physical mobility, he painstakingly made a comeback.

Hal Erickson: “Having been forced into minor parts for several years by a debilitating illness, veteran film actor Michel Simon made a triumphant return to leading roles in the charming, poignant Le Vieil Homme et L'Enfant/The Two of Us (Claude Berri, 1967).” That year, he won the Silver Bearfor Best Actor at the 17th Berlin International Film Festival for his penetrating portrayal of an anti-Semitic French peasant in this beautiful film.

After that he made a few more films, including Walerian Borowczyk's Blanche (1971), a tragic romantic tale set in 13th century France, and his final film the crime drama L'Ibis Rouge/The Red Ibis (Jean-Pierre Mocky, 1975).

All reports indicate that Michel Simon conducted his private life in the manner of one of his gross, eccentric film characters: he lived alone on a huge country estate, sharing space with a pet parrot and four apes.

Michel Simon died in 1975 in Bry-sur-Marne, France, from a pulmonary embolism. His latest companion was the German artist Margarethe Krieger. The actor François Simon (1917) is his son.

French postcard by OPSIS, Paris, no. C 7 - Personalités du XXe siècle. Photo: J. Mounicq.

Scene from Drôle de Drame/Bizarre, Bizarre (1937) with Louis Jouvet. Source: Julien Morvan (YouTube).

Commercial for cigarettes. Source: ROBAGGIO10 (YouTube).

Scene from Le Vieil Homme et L'Enfant/The Two of Us (1967). Source: Bethoetpopeck (YouTube).

Sources: Hal Erickson (AllMovie), Michael Brooke (IMDb), Les Amis de Michel Simon (French), Wikipedia and IMDb.

Het meisje met de blauwe hoed/The girl with the blue hat (1934) is a Dutch 'army film', directed by Austrian director Rudolf Meinert. Stars are Roland Varno, Truus van Aalten and Lou Bandy. The film is an adaptation of the book Het meisje met de blauwe hoed by Johan Fabricius and was remade in 1972 as a popular television series with colour and new songs.

Tony van den Berg, Roland Varno, Het meisje met de blauwe hoed

Truus van Aalten, Het meisje met den blauwen hoed

Dutch postcard by M. B.& Z. (M. Bonnist & Zonen, Amsterdam). Photo: Filma. Publicity still for Het meisje met den blauwen hoed/ The Girl with the Blue Hat (Rudolf Meinert, 1934) with Truus van Aalten. Collection: Egbert Barten. Comment by Ali Gardener at Flickr: "It looks like taken very spontaneous and still so perfectly posed! I like also the shadow of the shoes and all those splendid details."

Roland Varno, Het meisje met de blauwe hoed

Dutch postcard by M. B.& Z. (M. Bonnist & Zonen, Amsterdam). Photo: Filma. Publicity still for Het meisje met de blauwe hoed/The Girl With the Blue Hat (Rudolf Meinert, 1934) with Roland Varno. Collectie: Egbert Barten.

Unusual for the Netherlands

Het meisje met de blauwe hoed/The girl with the blue hat was an unusual production for the Netherlands in the 1930s. It was the first production by Filma, the film production company of 27 years old Wil Tuschinski, son of cinema chain owner Abraham Tuschinski. For the first time, a moving camera was used in the Cinetone Sound Film studios in Amsterdam. The production costs amounted to 100,000 guilders - a record for the Dutch film industry at the time.

The three stars were also interesting. Dutch-born actor Roland Varno (1908-1996) is best known for his role as one of the schoolboys in Josef von Sternberg's Der blaue Engel/The blue angel (1930). He appeared in several German and Dutch films of the early 1930s and then moved to Hollywood, where he made a film with Greta Garbo, As You Desire me (George Fitzmaurice, 1932). However, he mostly worked in Hollywood as a character actor, often in B-pictures.

The female leading role was played by another Dutch film star with a career abroad, Truus van Aalten (1910-1999). She starred in 29 European films during the 1920s and 1930s. She made most of them in Berlin and Vienna, and Het Meisje met de Blauwe Hoed/The girl with the blue hat was the only film she made in the Netherlands.

Singer and entertainer Lou Bandy (1890-1959) played a dual role in Het meisje met de blauwe hoed/The girl with the blue hat as Toontje and as himself. Bandy was one of the most popular artists of The Netherlands between the two world wars. His songs Zoek de zon op (Look for the sun) and Louise zit niet op je nagels te bijten (Louise, don't bite your nails) became Dutch evergreens. In this film, Bandy sings the songs In de petoet (In the brig) and Vaste verkering (Steady dating) which soon became hits in the Netherlands.

Lou Bandy in Het Meisje met de Blauwe Hoed (1934)

Dutch postcard by M. B. & Z. (M. Bonnist & Zonen, Amsterdam). Photo: Filma. Publicity still for Het Meisje met de Blauwe Hoed/The girl with the blue hat (Rudolf Meinert, 1934) with Lou Bandy.

Lou Bandy, Het Meisje met de Blauwe Hoed

Dutch postcard by M. B. & Z. (M. Bonnist & Zonen, Amsterdam). Photo: Filma. Publicity still for Het Meisje met de Blauwe Hoed/The girl with the blue hat (Rudolf Meinert, 1934) with Lou Bandy.

Roland Varno and Truus van Aalten a.o. in Het meisje met den blauwen hoed (1934)

Dutch postcard by M. B. & Z. (M. Bonnist & Zonen, Amsterdam). Photo: Filma. Publicity still for Het Meisje met de Blauwe Hoed/The girl with the blue hat (Rudolf Meinert, 1934) with Eberhard Erfmann, Lau Ezerman, Gusta Chrispijn-Mulder, Tony van den Berg, Adrienne Solser, Roland Varno and Truus van Aalten.

Too wild for him

The film is also described as an army comedy. The story was based on a semi-autobiographical novel which Johan Fabricius published in 1927 and follows the story quite well. Roland Varno plays nerdy Daantje Pieters, who works in a grocery shop in Gouda when he is suddenly called to The Hague to serve for the Dutch army.

In the army, Daantje is the victim of teasing of his fellow soldiers. Especially his roommate Toontje (Lou Bandy) has great pleasure in keeping him fooled. The only thing that keeps Daantje going is the thought of 'the girl with the blue hat' (Truus van Aalten), a beautiful girl he spotted aboard the train to the garrison.

Despite the unfriendly beginning, smart and sneaky conman Toontje takes Daantje under his wing (not to mention his grocery supplies). During a visit to a revue of Lou Bandy Daantje notices again the girl with the blue hat. He is too shy to approach her, but Toontje arranges a meeting in a bar, to the chagrin of her date. The girl, who answers to the name Betsy, is attracted to Daantje and the two spend a romantic evening.

Daantjes mother (Adriënne Solser) is not impressed by the sexually liberated Betsy and sees her son would rather marry his neighbour Hilda Jansma (Tony van den Berg). Back in The Hague Betsy realizes that she and Danny do not fit together. She explains that she is too wild for him and breaks off the engagement.

Truus van Aalten in Het meisje met de blauwe hoed

Truus van Aalten, Roland Varno in Het meisje met de blauwe hoed

Dutch postcard by M. B. & Z. (M. Bonnist & Zonen, Amsterdam). Photo: Filma. Publicity still for Het Meisje met de Blauwe Hoed/The girl with the blue hat (1934) with Lou Bandy.

War Propaganda

During the Second World War, Het Meisje met de Blauwe Hoed/The girl with the blue hat was banned by the Nazis along with two other Dutch films, De Big van het Regiment/The Regiment's Mascot (Max Nosseck, 1935) and Ergens in Nederland/Somewhere in the Netherlands (Ludwig Berger, 1940) because of 'war propaganda'.

Chip Douglas at IMDb loves the film: "As a piece of Dutch cinema history this film is a clear standout. " About Varno and Van Aalten he notes: "They play their parts well, but it is Bandy who dominates the picture. His contribution, as well as the musical numbers managed to bring in a large enough audience to break even. However, writer Fabricius apparently wasn't very pleased when he found out they turned his book into a musical."

In 1972, a seven-part Dutch television series was broadcast, Het Meisje met de Blauwe Hoed/The girl with the blue hat (Dick van 't Sant, 1972) with Huib Rooymans, Jenny Arean and André van Duin in the lead roles. Rooijmans and Arean were married at the time, but divorced in 1973. Due to its length, the story was reworked and the very popular TV series contained more scenes and even more songs. Fabricius possibly turned in his grave.

Roland Varno, Truus van Aalten, Dries Krijn en Lou Bandy in Het meisje met de blauwe hoed

Dutch postcard by M. B.& Z. (M. Bonnist & Zonen, Amsterdam). Photo: Filma. Publicity still for Het Meisje met de Blauwe Hoed (1934) with Roland Varno, Truus van Aalten, Dries Krijn en Lou Bandy.

Lou Bandy, Roland Varno, Het Meisje met de Blauwe Hoed

Dutch postcard by R.E.B., no. 3. Photo: publicity still for Het Meisje met de Blauwe Hoed/The girl with the blue hat (1934) with Lou Bandy and Roland Varno.

Scene from Het Meisje met de Blauwe Hoed/The girl with the blue hat (1934). Source: Kanaal van Johanpa3 (YouTube).

Scene from the TV series with André van Duin singing Vaste verkering. Source: Johnny Keurntjes (YouTube).

Sources: Henk van Gelder (Hollands Hollywood - Dutch), Kathinka Dittrich (Geschiedenis van de Nederlandse Film en Bioscoop tot 1940 - Dutch), Chip Douglas (IMDb), Wikipedia (Dutch) and IMDb.

French singer and songwriter Michel Paje (1945) was one of the yéyé pop stars of the early 1960s. He worked for the cinema as an actor and composer and is now known as a voice actor under his real name Michel Roy.

French postcard by Publistar, Marseille, no. 1190. Photo: P.P.P. / Vogue.

Yéyé Star

Michel Paje was born as Michel Roy in 1945 in Paris. He attended the boarding school St Nicolas in Issy-les-Moulineaux. During his youth, he had several jobs: assistant to a photographer, lighting assistant at the cabaret Le Milliardaire, employee of a British insurance company.

At the same time he took singing lessons with Jean Lumière, Charles Humel (the composer of Plaines du Far West for Yves Montand), and Christiane Néré where he met Alain Barrière and Isabelle Aubret.

He also took drama courses with René Simon a.o. He won the 1st prize Dramatic Art, Classical Section, at the Maubel conservatory in a play by Alfred de Musset. He played in a film and on stage at the festival of Enghien. But soon he chose for the music.

Paje became a star of the yéyé (French pop style) singer and recorded his first single in 1963: Tu peux pleurer (You can cry). His next song Nous on est dans le vent (We're in the wind) was one of the summer hits of 1963. It was later used for the soundtrack of the film comedy Jet-Set (Fabien Onteniente, 2000) with Samuel Le Bihan and Lambert Wilson.

In the following years he recorded several singles and two albums. His song On a l'âge de raison, mais on n'a jamais raison would be his greatest hit.

French postcard by Editions Starama, no. 868. Photo: Nisak / Vogue.

French postcard by Publistar, Marseille, no. 973. Photo: Vogue.

Apothéose porno

Michel Paje continued his singing career in Canada where he had his own TV show À la page (1967). In Montréal, he composed a song for the Expo 67, Bonjour Montréal, of which he also made an English version, Hello Montréal.

In 1968 Michel met actress Danielle Ouimet, the hope of the Canadian cinema. They made the Canadian film Tendre et sensuelle Valérie/Valérie (Denis Héroux, 1968) for which he composed the music and played a small part. The director Denis Héroux later became a major producer of well-known French and American films.

Paje also recorded two duets with Danielle Ouimet in 1968 and 1969. Back in France, Paje worked under his own name Michel Roy as a host and producer for the popular radio station Europe 1 in 1969.

He composed soundtracks for such films as the short Comme larrons en foire/Thick as thieves (Edmond Freess, 1970), the Spanish film Los farsantes del amor/The love fakers (Juan Xiol, 1972) and the adult comedy Apothéose porno (Jean-Marie Ghanassia, 1976).

He also composed music for the TV series Recherche dans l'intérêt des familles/Research for the benefit of families (1977) and for commercials. He continued to record until the mid-1970s, often under the alias Alain Jory.

In 2006 he moved to Moscow. According to Wikipedia he worked there on the film Au service du Roi and dubbed the role of King Louis XIV.

Today he is the official voice of the French TV station BFM TV. Michel Roy also works as a voice actor on films, TV programmes, commercials and trailers.

French postcard by Publistar, Marseille, no. 869. Photo: Nisak / Vogue.

Michel Paje sings Nous on est dans le vent (1963). Source: Valetdecoeurs (YouTube).

Sources: Retro Jeunesse 60 (French), Michelpaje.fr (French), Wikipedia (French) and IMDb.

English comedian and actor Norman Wisdom (1915–2010) starred in a series of hit comedies between 1953 and 1966. His trademark role was The Gump, in a jacket three sizes too small with tie awry and tweed cap askew, the eternal schoolboy with the looks of a beaten puppy. Wisdom became a celebrity in countries as far apart as South America, Iran and Albania. Wisdom later forged a career on Broadway in New York and as a television actor.

British postcard. Photo: J. Arthur Rank Organisation.

A star is born!

Norman Joseph Wisdom was born in London in 1915. His parents were Frederick, a chauffeur, and Maud Wisdom (née Targett), a dressmaker who often worked for West End theatres, and had made a dress for Queen Mary. Norman and his brother Fred were raised in extreme poverty and were frequently hit by their father.

After a period in a children's home, Wisdom ran away when he was 11 but returned to become an errand boy in a grocer's shop on leaving school at 13. Having been kicked out of his home by his father in 1929 he became a cabin boy in the Merchant Navy. Wisdom enlisted into the King's Own Royal Regiment, but his mother had him discharged as he was under age. He later re-enlisted as a drummer boy in the 10th Royal Hussars of the British Army.

In 1930 he was posted to Lucknow, in the United Provinces of British India, as a bandsman. There he gained an education certificate, rode horses, became the flyweight boxing champion of the British Army in India and learned to play the trumpet and clarinet. At the outbreak of the Second World War, Wisdom was sent to work in a communications centre in a command bunker in London where he connected telephone calls from war leaders to the prime minister. He met Winston Churchill on several occasions when asked for updates on incoming calls, and once was disciplined for calling him Winnie.

Whilst performing a shadow boxing routine in the army gym, Wisdom discovered he had a talent for entertainment. He began to develop his skills as a musician and stage entertainer. In 1940 aged 25, at a NAAFI entertainment night, during a dance routine, Wisdom stepped-down from his position in the orchestra pit, and started shadow boxing. Hearing his colleagues and officers giggles, he broke into a duck-waddle, followed by a series of facial expressions. Over the next few years, until he was demobilized in 1945, his routine would be suffixed with his characteristic singing and the trip-up-and-stumble.

After the war his variety debut came at the old Collins Music Hall on Islington Green, north London, in 1945, and he started touring Britain in pantomime and summer shows. In 1948 he made his first West End appearance, on a variety bill at the London Casino, and became famous virtually overnight. "A star is born!" announced the Daily Mail, and the following week Wisdom went straight to the top of the bill at the Golders Green Hippodrome, north London.

His next date was a summer show with the magician David Nixon, and for this appearance he meticulously worked out the characterisation for which he became famous: variously known as Norman or The Gump or Pitkin – an enthusiastic, puppyish little man with a too-tight tweed jacket and crooked cap. Attired as such, and complete with the later familiar jerky gait and propensity for sudden collapses, he played a volunteer who came out of the audience to help – and, of course, reduce to a shambles – Nixon's magic act.

German postcard by Ufa, Berlin-Tempelhof, no. FK 988. Photo: J. Arthur Rank Organisation. Publicity still for Trouble in Store (John Paddy Carstairs, 1953).

A Cult Figure in Albania

Norman Wisdom made a series of low-budget star-vehicle comedies for the Rank Organisation, beginning with Trouble in Store (John Paddy Carstairs, 1953) with Lana Morris and Margaret Rutherford. This film earned him a BAFTA Award for Most Promising Newcomer to Film in 1954. The film broke box office records at 51 out of the 67 London cinemas in which it played and was the second most popular film at the British box office in 1954.

The follow-up was One Good Turn (John Paddy Carstairs, 1955) co-starring Joan Rice. It was the 7th most popular film at the British box office in 1955. Other comedies were Man of the Moment (John Paddy Carstairs, 1955) with Belinda Lee, Up in the World (John Paddy Carstairs, 1956) with Maureen Swanson, and The Square Peg (John Paddy Carstairs, 1958) with Honor Blackman.

The series peaked commercially with A Stitch in Time (Robert Asher, 1963). His films' cheerful, unpretentious appeal make them the direct descendants of those made a generation earlier by George Formby. Never highly thought of by the critics, they were very popular with domestic audiences and Wisdom's films were among Britain's biggest box office successes of their day.

They were also successful in some unlikely overseas markets, helping Rank stay afloat financially when their more expensive film projects were unsuccessful. Wisdom was a cult figure in Albania, where he was one of the few Western actors whose films were allowed in the country during the dictatorship of Enver Hoxha. In Hoxha's view, proletarian Norman's ultimately victorious struggles against capitalism, personified by Mr. Grimsdale and the effete aristocratic characters played by Jerry Desmonde, were a Communist parable on the class war. He was known as Mr Pitkin after the character from his films. In 1995, he visited the post-Stalinist country where, to his surprise, he was greeted by many appreciative fans, including the then President, Sali Berisha. During this trip, Wisdom was filmed by Newsnight as he visited a children's project funded by ChildHope UK.

His films usually involved the Gump character, Norman Pitkin, in a manual occupation in which he is barely competent and in a junior position to a straight man, often played by Edward Chapman (as Mr Grimsdale) or Jerry Desmonde. They benefited from Wisdom's capacity for physical slapstick comedy and his skill at creating a sense of the character's helplessness. The series often contained a romantic subplot; the Gump's inevitable awkwardness with women is a characteristic shared with the earlier Formby vehicles. His innocent incompetence still made him endearing to the heroine.

Wisdom made two films independently in order to extend his range, one of which, There Was a Crooked Man (Stuart Burge, 1960) is according Richard Dacre in Encyclopedia of British Cinema, amongst his finest, but the cinema public craved only the Gump.

British postcard by Rotary Photo. Photo: J. Arthur Rank Organisation.

Going Gently

In 1966, Norman Wisdom went to the United States to star in a Broadway production of the Jimmy Van Heusen and Sammy Cahn musical comedy Walking Happy. His performance was nominated for a Tony Award.

He also completed his first American film as a vaudeville comic in The Night They Raided Minsky's (William Friedkin, 1968) with Jason Robards and Britt Ekland. After a typical performance on The Ed Sullivan Show, further US opportunities were denied him when he had to return to London after his second wife left him.

In 1969 he made a fairly sophisticated sex comedy, What's Good for the Goose (Menahem Golan, 1969), in which he did a bedroom scene with Sally Geeson. His public was not ready for the little Gump in bed with a woman, and Wisdom's career as a top film comedian was over.

His subsequent career was largely confined to television, and he toured the world with a successful cabaret act. He won critical acclaim in 1981 for his dramatic role in the television play Going Gently (Stephen Frears, 1981). In this harrowing play, set in the cancer ward of a London hospital, he portrayed a retired salesman unable to come to terms with terminal illness. For once the pathos was unforced, and Wisdom triumphed in a difficult role, winning a BAFTA Award.

In 1992 he played a retired burglar in a film thriller, Double X: The Name of the Game (Shani S. Grewal, 1992), which sank almost without trace.

Wisdom became prominent again in the 1990s, helped by the young comedian Lee Evans, whose act was often compared to Wisdom's work. His classic Rank films were playing to new audiences on television screens and DVD, with a growing number of new young fans in the United Kingdom and abroad. The high point of this new popularity was the knighthood he was awarded, for services to entertainment, in the 2000 new year's honours list. During the ceremony, once he had received his knighthood, he walked away and again performed his trademark trip at which the Queen smiled and laughed.

From 1995 until 2004 he appeared in the recurring role of Billy Ingleton in the long-running BBC comedy Last of the Summer Wine. The role was originally a one-off appearance, but proved so popular that he returned as the character on a number of occasions. In 1996, he received a Special Achievement Award from the London Film Critics.

In 2002 Wisdom filmed a cameo role as a butler in a low budget horror film, Evil Calls: The Raven (2008). In 2004, he made an appearance on Coronation Street, playing fitness fanatic pensioner Ernie Crabbe. In 2005, Wisdom announced his retirement from the entertainment industry on his 90th birthday. He intended to spend more time with his family, playing golf and driving around the Isle of Man, where he was living.

In 2007 he came out of retirement to take a role in a short film called Expresso (Kevin Powis, 2007), set during one day in a coffee shop. Wisdom plays a vicar plagued by a fly in the café. The film premièred at the Cannes Film Festival 2007. Producer Nigel Martin Davey gave him only a visual role so he would not have to remember any lines, but on the day Wisdom was alert and had his performance changed to add more laughs.

A year later he played a cameo in the horror film The Legend of Harrow Woods (Robert Driscoll, 2008). Wisdom published the autobiography Don't Laugh At Me (1992) and Richard Dacre wrote the biography Trouble in Store (1991).

Wisdom was married twice. His first wife was Doreen Brett, whom he married in 1941. By 1944 they had separated when Doreen gave birth to a son, Michael (1944), fathered by Albert Gerald Hardwick, a telephone engineer. The marriage was dissolved in 1946. He married his second wife, Freda Isobel Simpson, a dancer, in 1947; they had two children: Nicholas (born 1953, who later played first-class cricket for Sussex) and Jacqueline (1954). The couple divorced in 1969, with Wisdom granted full custody of the children.

Norman Wisdom died in 2010 at Abbotswood nursing home on the Isle of Man at the age of 95. Stephen Dixon in his obituary in The Guardian: “Wisdom was almost the last in a great tradition of knockabout, slapstick clowns, a performer who relied less on words than on an acrobatic physical dexterity to gain his laughs.”

British autograph card. Sent by mail in 1958. Photo: J. Arthur Rank Organisation.

Sources: Stephen Dixon (The Guardian), Richard Dacre (Encyclopedia of British Cinema), The Telegraph, Wikipedia and IMDb.

Swiss actress Dorothea Wieck (1908-1986) became a major star and a lesbian idol with her role as the adored teacher Fräulein von Bernburg in the German classic Mädchen in Uniform/Girls in Uniform (1931). She made more than fifty films, but she was also a prominent stage actress of the Deutsche Theater, the Schillertheater and other main theatres in Berlin.

German postcard by Ross Verlag, Berlin, no. 6846/1, 1931-1932. Photo: Atelier Binder, Berlin.

German postcard by Ross Verlag, Berlin, no. 7447, 1932-1933. Photo: Gerty Simon, Berlin.

German postcard by Ross Verlag, Berlin, no. 7503/1, 1932-1933. Photo: Robertson, Berlin.

German postcard by Ross Verlag, Berlin, no. 7771/1, 1932-1933. Photo: Klagemann / Terra.

Dutch postcard, no. 558. Sent by mail in 1934. Photo: Paramount.

Silent Films

Dorothea Olavia Wieck was born in Davos, Switzerland, in 1908. She was the daughter of wholesale merchant Hans Leopold Wieck and Friederike Wernicke. After spending most of her childhood in Sweden, Dorothea was schooled in Dresden. At the age of 12, she started to study dance and at 15, she attended acting courses by Maria Moissi, the first wife of Alexander Moissi, in Berlin.

She studied with Max Reinhardt and made her stage debut in Vienna at the Theater in der Josephstadt. Later she appeared in Munich at the Münchner Kammerspiele in plays by Carl Zuckmayer and Ferenc Molnár.

After being spotted by director Franz Seitz, she began her film career with a part in the comedy Heimliche Sünder/Secret Sinners (Franz Seitz, 1926), followed by a bigger role in Die kleine Inge und ihre drei Väter/Little Inge and Her Three Fathers (Franz Osten, 1926).

Soon followed more leading roles in silent films like Ich hab mein Herz in Heidelberg verloren/I Lost My Heart at Heidelberg (Arthur Bergen, 1926), Sturmflut/Storm Tide (Willy Reiber, 1927), and Der Fremdenlegionär/Foreign Legionaire (James Bauer, 1928) with Therese Giehse.

Her breakthrough followed after the introduction of sound film. She had an international success with the pioneering feminist film Mädchen in Uniform/Girls in Uniform(Leontine Sagan, Carl Froelich, 1931). Hertha Thiele co-starred as a sensitive girl, who is sent to an all-girls boarding school where she develops a romantic attachment to one of her teachers, Fräulein von Bernburg (Wieck).

First when the lesbian themed film was released in the United States it was banned. First Lady Eleanor Roosevelt saw the importance of the film though and the ban was lifted. Later in Germany the Nazi regime even tried to burn all the copies of the film, but they couldn't.

Bruce Eder at AllMovie: "it was attacked in its time, though not for the lesbian-oriented, homo-erotic aspects of its story and visuals, but for being a critique of the educational establishment. It thus became an underground classic, taken to heart by iconoclasts of all stripes and, most especially, by lesbian audiences. Even by the standards of the twenty-first century, the honesty of the movie is startling when one considers its origins. The technical side of the filmmaking may be a little frayed, but the acting and direction have endured in their appeal across many decades, and the movie continues to attract attention as something more than an artifact."

Austrian postcard by Iris Verlag, no. 995. Photo: Emelka.

German postcard by Ross Verlag, Berlin, no. 61/3, 1926. Photo: Münchner Lichtspielkunst AG (Emelka). Publicity still for Ich hab mein Herz in Heidelberg verloren/I Lost My Heart in Heidelberg (Arthur Bergen, 1926) with Werner Fuetterer.

Dorothea Wieck and Hertha Thiele in Mädchen in Uniform (1931)

Dutch Postcard by M. Bonnist & Zonen, Amsterdam, Z., no. 104 e. Photo: Fim Film, Amsterdam. Publicity still for Mädchen in Uniform/Girls in Uniform (Leontine Sagan, Carl Froelich, 1931).

British card in the series Film Shots by Film Weekly. Photo: Deutsche. Publicity still for Mädchen in Uniform/Girls in Uniform (Leontine Sagan, Carl Froelich, 1931) with Hertha Thiele.

German postcard by Ross Verlag, no. 164/2. Photo: Phoebus Tonfilm prod. Publicity still for Trenck (Ernst Neubach, Heinz Paul, 1932) with Theodoor Loos. Collection: Didier Hanson.

German postcard by Ross Verlag, no. 7265/1, 1932-1933. Photo: Phoebus Tonfilm Prod. Publicity still for Trenck - Der Roman einer großen Liebe/Trenck - The novel of a great love (Ernst Neubach, Heinz Paul, 1932).

Hollywood

In the years after Mädchen in Uniform, Dorothea Wieck starred in well-known productions like the operetta Gräfin Mariza/Countess Mariza (Richard Oswald, 1932), and Anna und Elisabeth (Frank Wisbar, 1933) again with Hertha Thiele.

In 1932, Wieck married baron Ernst von der Decken, a journalist and author. They were not often together and divorced in 1935.

The international success of Mädchen in Uniform led her to Hollywood where she starred in two films, Cradle Song (Mitchell Leisen, 1933) and Miss Fane's Baby Is Stolen (Alexander Hall, 1934), based on the Lindbergh kidnapping case. Both films flopped at the box office and this, combined with accusations of espionage for the Nazis, forced her return to Germany.

In the following years Wieck played in such popular films as Der Student von Prag/The Student of Prague (Arthur Robison, 1935) starring Adolf Wohlbrück (Anton Walbrook), and Die gelbe Flagge/The Yellow Flagg (Gerhard Lamprecht, 1937) with Hans Albers.

During wartime Dorothea Wieck turned her attention to the theatre, and also worked as a stage director. As a celebrated actress, she was repeatedly dinner partner of Chancellor Hitler. She occasionally appeared in front of the camera in the propaganda film Kopf hoch, Johannes!/Head up, Johannes! (Viktor de Kowa, 1941), Andreas Schlüter (Herbert Maisch, 1942) featuring Heinrich George, and Der Grüne Salon/The Green Room (Boleslaw Barlog, 1944). In Italy, she made Inviati speciali/Special Guests (Romolo Marcellini, 1943).

Dutch postcard, printed by Smeets & Schippers, Amsterdam. Photo: Paramount.

Dutch postcard by M. Bonnist & Zonen, Amsterdam-Z., no. B 299. Photo: Paramount. Publicity still for Cradle Song (Mitchell Leisen, 1933).

German postcard by Ross Verlag. Photo: Paramount.

German postcard by Ross Verlag, Berlin, no. 8448/2, 1933-1934. Photo: Paramount.

German postcard by Margarinewerk Eidelstedt Gebr. Fauser GmbH, Holstein. Serie 1, Bild 35. Photo: Marcus.

Supporting Roles

After the war, Dorothea Wieck was reported to be death. After the bombing of Dresden in February 1945, the actress had been buried for 4 days, but she survived though seriously injured. The German magazine Der Spiegel reported on 01/11/47: "Dorothea Wieck, the Berlin stage and film actress is not dead, as was reported incorrectly after the bombing of Dresden in 1944 (sic)." The following tear, she would return to the theatre and make a stage tour.

In the 1950s followed interesting supporting roles in films like Herz der Welt/The Alfred Nobel Story (Harald Braun, 1952) with Dieter Borsche, Man on a Tightrope (Elia Kazan, 1953) starring Frederic March, Das Fräulein von Scuderi/The Miss from Scuderi (Eugen York, 1955) featuring the legendary Henny Porten, the Heimatfilm Das Forsthaus in Tirol/The forester`s house in Tirol(Hermann Kugelstadt, 1955), A Time to Love and a Time to Die (Douglas Sirk, 1958), and Menschen im Hotel/Grand Hotel (Gottfried Reinhardt, 1959) with Michèle Morgan.

After that she retired from the film business more or less. To her last films belong Die Schachnovelle/Brainwashed (Gerd Oswald, 1960) with Curd Jürgens and Das Mädchen und der Staatsanwalt/The girl and the prosecutor (Jürgen Goslar, 1962).

Between 1961 and 1967, Wieck taught acting at her own academy in Berlin. On TV she played in two episodes of the Krimi series Der Kommissar in 1969 and 1973. In 1973 she was awarded for her work with the Filmband in Gold.

Dorothea Wieck passed away in 1986 in Berlin, at the age of 78. She is not forgotten and has still many fans, because of her role in Mädchen in Uniform. At IMDb, reviewer Jan Onderwater notes: "The direction of Sagan/Froelich and the cinematography are outstanding, but it could never have become the classic it is if both Hertha Thiele and Dorothea Wieck had not been in the lead. Photogenic Thiele plays Manuela as a sensitive, but still proud girl; Wieck gives the Von Bernburg character all the subtleties and uncertainties it needs."

German postcard by Ross Verlag, Berlin, no. 9342/1, 1935-1936. Photo: Europa / Cine-Allianz. Publicity still for Der Student von Prag/The Student of Prague (Arthur Robison, 1935).

German postcard by Ross Verlag, Berlin, no. 9182/1, 1935-1936. Photo: Europa / Froelich-Film. Publicity still for Liselotte von der Pfalz (Carl Froelich, 1935).

German postcard by Ross-Verlag, no. A 2732, 1939-1940. Photo: Greinert.

German postcard by Film-Foto-Verlag, Berlin, no. A 3628/1, 1941-1944. Photo: Baumann / Terra.

German postcard by 'Das Programm von heute', Zeitschrift für Film und Theater G.m.b.H., Berlin. Photo: Tobis-Weisse.

Sources: Bruce Eder (AllMovie), Stephanie D'heil (Steffi-line - German), I.S. Mowis (IMDb), Der Spiegel (German)Thomas Staedeli (Cyranos), Sandra Brennan (AllMovie), Wikipedia, and IMDb.

We continue our weekly series 'Imported from the USA' of posts about Hollywood stars who also worked in the European cinema. Today the very sad tale of blue-eyed, peroxide blonde sexpot Barbara Payton (1927-1967). She was less known for her films than for her stormy social life and eventual battles with alcohol and drug addiction. At the end of her film career, she made two interesting films in Great Britain.

British postcard in the Picturegoer Series, London, no. D 86. Photo: Eagle-Lion.

Blossoming good looks

Barbara Payton was born Barbara Lee Redfield in Cloquet, Minnesota, in 1927. She was the daughter of Norwegian immigrants Erwin Lee Redfield and Mabel Irene Todahl. A son, Frank Leslie III was born in 1931. In 1938, the family moved to Odessa, Texas, where Payton’s father started a motel court. Both of Payton's parents had long-standing problems with alcohol.

As Payton was growing into maturity her good looks were also blossoming which garnered her attention. She was known as a lively girl, willing to please and she learned early in life that she had a potent effect on the opposite sex. In November 1943, the then sixteen-year-old eloped with her high school boyfriend William Hodge. The marriage seemingly amounted to nothing more than an act of impulsive, teen-age rebellion, and Payton did not fight her parent's insistence that the marriage be annulled. A few months later, she quit high school.

In 1944, she met her second husband, a decorated combat pilot named John Payton, who at the time was stationed at Midland Air Base. The handsome couple were married in 1945 and moved to Los Angeles where John enrolled at USC under the G.I. Bill. It was still early in their marriage that Barbara, restless and feeling confined by her life as a housewife, expressed a desire to pursue a modelling or acting career. Payton officially launched her modelling path by hiring the services of a local photographer who shot photos of her sporting fashionable outfits. This portfolio attracted the favourable attention of a clothing designer, Saba of California, who signed her to a contract modelling a line of junior fashion.

Her career progressed and in September 1947, the Rita La Roy Agency in Hollywood took her on as a client and brought her more work as a model in print advertising; notably in catalogues for Studebaker cars. She also appeared in clothing ads for such magazines as Charm and Junior Bazaar. During this period in her life, the couple welcomed their son, John Lee, who was born in February 1947. Payton managed to combine the responsibilities of wife, new mother and professional model, yet the strains on the Payton marriage finally reached the breaking point and Barbara and her husband separated in 1948.

Barbara took an apartment in Hollywood with her infant son, with whom she was very close. Payton's drive, fuelled by her high-energy personality, had become focused on promoting her career and showcasing her beauty around the town’s hot spots. She was labelled the 'Queen of the Night Clubs' by columnist Harrison Carroll. Her notoriety as a luminous, fun loving party girl in the Hollywood club scene ignited the attention of William Goetz, an executive of Universal Studios. In January 1949, he signed her, aged twenty-one, to a contract with a starting salary of $100 per week.

Payton first gained notice as a drop-dead gorgeous young woman in the film noir Trapped (Richard Fleischer, 1949), co-starring Lloyd Bridges. In 1950, she was given the opportunity to make a screen test for John Huston's production of the forthcoming MGM crime drama The Asphalt Jungle. She was not chosen and the part of the sultry mistress of a mob connected lawyer went to Marilyn Monroe.

After being screen-tested by James Cagney and his producer brother William, Payton starred with Cagney in the violent noir thriller Kiss Tomorrow Goodbye (Gordon Douglas, 1950). William Cagney was so smitten with Payton's sensual appeal and beauty that her contract was drawn as a joint agreement between William Cagney Productions and Warner Bros. who together saw fit to bestow on Payton a salary of $5,000 a week; a large sum for an actress yet to demonstrate star power at the box-office.

For a relative newcomer, Payton more than managed to hold her own in Kiss Tomorrow Goodbye among a cast of Hollywood veterans and alongside a super-star like Cagney himself. Her portrayal of the hardened, seductive girlfriend, whom Cagney’s character ultimately double-crosses, was critically praised in newspaper reviews of the film. Her acting skills were recognized and her significant screen charisma widely acknowledged. Kiss Tomorrow Goodbye was the highpoint in Payton’s career, the moment in time she was christened as a player with bonafide star power.

British postcard in The People series by Show Parade Picture Service, London, no. P. 1033. Photo: Universal-International.

A black eye and a tarnished reputation

Caught up in the glitz and glamour, Barbara Payton's career had started taking second place to a reckless life full of capricious romances involving a number of top stars and producers, many of them married. In 1949, she had a six month affair with Bob Hope in which he paid for her to live in a luxurious apartment. The affair ended when she began making demands for more money.

Her screen appearances opposite Gary Cooper in Dallas (Stuart Heisler, 1950), and Gregory Peck in Only the Valiant (Gordon Douglas, 1951), both Westerns, were lacklustre productions where her roles were no more than window dressing for the hero and did little to highlight her skills as an actress.

Payton's career decline began with the horror film Bride of the Gorilla (Curt Siodmak, 1951), co-starring Raymond Burr. However, her slightly lurid appeal still seemed to be enough to carry her through Tinseltown. According to rumours, she had affairs with producer Howard Hughes, Woody Strode, George Raft, Dallas co-stars Gary Cooper and Steve Cochran, John Ireland, and Texas oilman Bob Neal.

In addition to her first two marriages, Payton was married two more times. In 1950, she had met classy 'A' actor Franchot Tone and the two were later engaged. She was the subject of a spread in Confidential Magazine when Tone allegedly caught her in bed with Guy Madison. In 1951, while engaged to Tone, Payton began also having an affair with muscular B-movie actor Tom Neal, and she also proposed marriage to him. She allowed him to move into her apartment, which Tone was paying the rent for. She kicked him out when Tone returned from out of town.

Payton went back and forth publicly between Neal and Tone. On 14 September 1951, Tom Neal, a former college boxer, physically attacked Tone at Payton's apartment leaving him in an 18-hour coma with a smashed cheekbone, broken nose and concussion. Barbara ended up with both a black eye and a tarnished reputation. Payton and Tone, who was still recovering from his injuries, were married in 1951 in Payton's hometown of Cloquet, Minnesota. However, after being married, Tone discovered that she had continued her relations with the violence-prone Neal and Tone was subsequently granted a divorce in 1952. When Franchot Tone decided to divorce her, he had a private detective take pictures of her having sex with other men. He then sent the photos to all the major Hollywood studios, hoping they would ruin her career. They did.

Payton and Neal capitalized on the notorious press coverage by touring in plays such as The Postman Always Rings Twice, based on the popular 1946 film of the same name. They would also star together in The Great Jesse James Raid (Reginald Le Borg, 1953), a B-Western that received a limited released to theatres. In May 1953, Payton announced that she and Neal were to be married that summer in Paris. The couple broke up the following year.

Dutch postcard by DRC, no. F 154. Photo: Warner Bros.

I am not ashamed

Barbara Payton's hard drinking and hard living ultimately destroyed her both physically and emotionally. Gary Brumburgh at IMDb: "She went to England to try to rejuvenate her career, but no dice; it was over and her life was skidding out of control. Her once beautiful face now blotchy and her once spectacular figure now bloated, Barbara sank deeper into the bottle."

In England, she starred for the Hammer studio in the Science Fiction film Four Sided Triangle/The Monster and the Woman (Terence Fisher, 1953). And although Leonard Maltin called it a 'bomb' in his Movie Guide, among Hammer fans at IMDb both the film and Payton's acting are highly regarded.

Reportedly, she was also good in her last leading role in the Film Noir Murder Is My Beat (Edgar G. Ullmer, 1955). Linda Rasmussen at AllMovie: "Director Edgar G. Ulmer uses flashbacks and elliptical editing to good effect, but the film lacks any strong visual or narrative center. Barbara Peyton delivers a great performance as the ambiguous, mysterious femme-fatale. While still of some interest, Murder is My Beat lacks the power and grim vision of Ulmer's bleak gem, Detour."

In 1955, Payton married George A. 'Tony' Provas, a furniture store executive in Nogales, Arizona. They divorced in August 1958. In March 1956 she lost custody of her son John Lee Jr. after her ex-husband charged that she exposed their son to "profane language, immoral conduct, notoriety, unwholesome activities" and failed to provide the boy with a "moral education". From then on, her growing alcoholism and drug abuse led to multiple skirmishes with the law, including an arrest for the passing of bad checks.

In 1962, Payton was arrested for prostitution when she propositioned an undercover cop in a Sunset Boulevard bar. Later that year, she was stabbed by a drunk and received 38 stitches to heal the wound. In 1963, she published her autobiography, I Am Not Ashamed, which was ghost written by Leo Guild. She didn't want to be paid in cash or check, but asked for payment in red wine because there were claims on her cash. The book included unflattering photographs of Payton and admissions that she had been forced to sleep on bus benches and suffered regular beatings as a prostitute. In 1965, she was arrested and charged with possession of heroin and a hypodermic syringe.

In 1967, ill and after failed efforts to curb her drinking, Barbara Payton moved back to San Diego, California, to live with her parents. Several weeks later, the 39-year-old former starlet was found there on the bathroom floor - dead of heart and liver failure. Her son, John Lee Payton Jr., was serving in Vietnam when she died. Her life has been the subject of several books including Kiss Tomorrow Goodbye: The Barbara Payton Story (2007), by John O'Dowd, L.A. Despair: A Landscape of Crimes and Bad Times (2005), by John Gilmore, and B Movie. a Play in Two Acts (2014), by Michael B. Druxman.

Trailer Kiss Tomorrow Goodbye (Gordon Douglas, 1950). Source: Felixxxx9999 (YouTube).

Trailer for Bride of the Gorilla (Curt Siodmak, 1951). Source: Trailers, Sci, and/or Fi (YouTube).

Trailer for the British Film Noir The Flanagan Boy/Bad Blonde (Reginald LeBorg, 1953). Source: Captain Bijou (YouTube).

Sources: Gary Brumburgh (IMDb), Linda Rasmussen (AllMovie), Wikipedia and IMDb.

On 18 June it will be exactly 200 years since the French emperor Napoleon Bonaparte was finally defeated by the allied British, Prussian, Dutch and Belgian troops near the Belgian village of Waterloo. The battle not only marked the end of Napoleon, but also the beginning of modern Europe. Yesterday, a presentation on 200 years of Waterloo opened in the Rijksmuseum in Amsterdam. The centrepiece of this presentation is the largest painting (5.67 x 8.23 meters) of the Rijksmuseum, The Battle of Waterloo by Jan Willem Pieneman from 1824. At La Collectionneuse, Marlène Pilaete made a beautiful gallery post 'Napoléon et ces dames', with postcards and bios of 14 actresses who portrayed the women around Napoléon in films. At Flickr, we posted a series of Belgian postcards on the Waterloo Panorama near Brussels, painted 1911, so almost a century after the famous Battle of Waterloo (1815). And this post at EFSP is about the silent Pathé Frères film Napoléon 1er, aka Napoléon (1909).

French postcard by PC, no. 4156. Photo: Pathé Frères. Publicity still for Napoléon 1er/Napoléon (1909). Caption: Passage de Pont d'Arcole (Passing the Bridge of Arcole). This postcard seems to have been inspired by Horace Vernet's 1826 painting Bataille du Pont d'Arcole, now at Christie's, London.

French postcard by PC, no. 4157. Photo: Pathé Frères. Publicity still for Napoléon 1er/Napoléon (1909). Caption: Le Couronnement (The Coronation). This postcard is a reduced, tableau vivant-like citation of Jacques-Louis David's famous painting The Consecration of the Emperor Napoleon I and Coronation of the Empress Josephine (1805-1807) now at the Louvre, Paris.

French postcard by PC, no. 4157. Photo: Pathé Frères. Publicity still for Napoléon 1er/Napoléon (1909). Caption: Austerlitz.

Unknown director

The short silent film Napoléon 1er/Napoléon (1909) was made in two parts. Napoleon Bonaparte was played by Maximilien Charlier, the director of the film is unknown. The film was released by Pathé in May 1909.

Almost all the cards (the series is alas incomplete) refer to the first part:
1- Siège de Toulon (novembre 1793)
2- Arcole (novembre 1796)
3- Campagne d’Égypte (juillet 1798)
4- Passage du Saint Bernard (novembre 1799)
5- La Malmaison (juin 1800)
6- Le Couronnement (décembre 1804)
7- Austerlitz (décembre 1805)
8- Ratisbonne (avril 1809)
9- Présentation du Roi de Rome (mars 1811).

The second part of the film consists of:
1- Incendie de Moscou (septembre 1812)
2- Napoléon et le Pape (janvier 1813)
3- L’abdication et les adieux de Fontainebleau (avril 1814)
4- Waterloo (juin 1815)
5- Captivité et mort le 5 mai 1821

An additional card which is not mentioned at the site of the Pathé archives, shows the snowball fight at the Ecole de Brienne.

Napoléon Ier. Les adieux de Fontainebleau

French postcard by PC, no. 4157. Photo: Pathé Frères. Publicity still for Napoléon 1er/Napoléon (1909). Caption: Les adieux de Fontainebleau. This postcard is vaguely inspired by Horace Vernet's Napoleon Leaves the Guard, 1814 (1825).

French postcard by PC, no. 4156. Photo: Pathé Frères. Publicity still for Napoléon 1er/Napoléon (1909). Caption: Une fête à Malmaison (Feast at Malmaison). The Chateau de Malmaison in the background seems to have been taken from a painting by François Flameng, Reception at Malmaison in 1802 (1894).

Napoléon 1er. La présentation du Roi de Rome

French postcard by PC, no. 4157. Photo: Pathé Frères. Publicity still for Napoléon 1er/Napoléon (1909). Caption: La présentation du Roi de Rome.

A black and white version of the film. Source: The Great Classics (YouTube).

Sources: Fondation Jerome Seydoux (French), Rijksmuseum, Flickr, La Collectionneuse (French) and IMDb.

NB. It is possible that both the postcards and the film on YouTube are actually about the Napoléon film Épopée Napoléonienne (1903) by Lucien Nonguet, also produced by Pathé Frères. We're checking it with the Pathé archives.

Sexy film actress Luisa Rivelli (1930) played many secondary roles in the Italian cinema. She appeared in 50 films between 1943 and 1994 and she was also often seen on Italian television.

Italian postcard by Bromostampa, Milano, no. 193.

Spaghetti Westerns

Luisa Rivelli was born as Rossella Lanfranchi in Ternate in Lombardy, Italy, in 1930. She studied at the Centro Sperimentale di Cinematografia in Rome.

Rivelli played supporting parts in films like the Italian comedy Non è mai troppo tardi/It's Never Too Late (Filippo Walter Ratti. 1953), based on the novel A Christmas Carol by Charles Dickens, La signora senza camelie/Camille Without Camelias (Michelangelo Antonioni, 1953), and La legge/The Law (Jules Dassin, 1959) starring Gina Lollobrigida.

During the 1960s followed roles in films like the comedy Io, io, io... e gli altri/Me, Me, Me... and the Others (Alessandro Blasetti, 1966) and the Spaghetti Westerns La resa dei conti/The big gundown (Sergio Sollima, 1966) with Lee van Cleef and La belva/Rough Justice (Mario Costa, 1970) starring Klaus Kinski.

In 1968, she presented the popular Sanremo festival, together with Pippo Baudo. From the 1970s on, she became a well known TV personality. She presented programs such as Io compro, tu compri/I buy, you buy (1970-1973), Filo diretto: dalla parte del consumatore (1975-1980), and I problemi del signor Rossi (1981-1985).

Trailer La resa dei conti/The big gundown (Sergio Sollima, 1966). Source: chikungfu (Daily Motion).

Trailer Silenzio: Si uccide/Handle with Care (Guido Zurli, 1967). Source: Italo-Cinema Trailer (YouTube).

Sources: Wikipedia (Italian and English) and IMDb.

Anna Boleyn/Anne Boleyn (1920) is one of the silent historical films directed in Germany by the young Ernst Lubitsch. Henny Porten starred as the ill-fated Anne Boleyn and Emil Jannings as King Henry VIII. Ross Verlag published a wonderful series of sepia postcards of the film, often with photos by the Rembrandt studio in Berlin.

German postcard by Ross Verlag, Berlin, no. 402/1, 1919-1924. Photo: Rembrandt Phot. / Messter Film, Berlin. Publicity still for Anna Boleyn (Ernst Lubitsch, 1920).

German postcard by Ross Verlag, Berlin, no. 402/2, 1919-1924. Photo: Rembrandt Phot. / Messter Film, Berlin. Publicity still for Anna Boleyn (Ernst Lubitsch, 1920).

German postcard by Ross Verlag, Berlin, no. 402/4, 1919-1924. Photo: Rembrandt Phot. / Messter Film, Berlin. Publicity still for Anna Boleyn (Ernst Lubitsch, 1920) with Henny Porten.

The Bad Tempered King of England

Anne Boleyn was the second wife of King Henry VIII of England. Their marriage led to momentous political and religious turmoil. For Ernst Lubitsch' film the script was written by Norbert Falk (as Fred Orbing) and Hanns Kräly.

Lubitsch presents Anna (Henny Porten) as an innocent, a naïve and guileless young woman who is the newly arrived lady-in-waiting to the Queen. She catches the lustful eye of Henry VIII (Emil Jannings), who loves to feast, drink, hunt, and chase around after young beauties. He is tired of Queen to Catherine of Aragon (Hedwig Pauly-Winterstein), and annuls his marriage to her, against the wishes of the pope.

The pompous monarch breaks with Rome, forms the Church of England and marries Anne at the Cathedral. The marriage and the sumptuous festivities that follow are filmed by Lubitsch as spectacular crowd scenes.

Henry tells Anne it is her holy duty to produce a male heir to the throne. But when Anne only gives birth to a baby girl (the later Queen Elizabeth), Henry VIII soon has his eye on yet another lady-in-waiting, Jane Seymour (Aud Egede Nissen).

The bad-tempered King charges his wife with adultery and treason, and imprisons her in the Tower of London. Anne is tortured and confesses to infidelity. She is sentenced to death and at in the final scene of the film she is beheaded.

Henny Porten and Paul Hartmann in Anna Boleyn

German postcard by Ross Verlag, Berlin, no. 645/1, 1919-1924. Photo: Union. Publicity still for Anna Boleyn (Ernst Lubitsch, 1920) with Henny Porten and Paul Hartmann.

German postcard by Ross Verlag, Berlin, no. 645/3, 1919-1924. Photo: Union Film.

German postcard by Ross Verlag, Berlin, no. 645/4, 1919-1924. Photo: Union Film. The baby represents the future queen Elizabeth I.

Henny Porten, Emil Jannings and Ludwig Hartau in Anna Boleyn (1920)

German postcard by Ross Verlag, Berlin, no. 645/5, 1919-1924. Photo: Union. Publicity still for Anna Boleyn (Ernst Lubitsch, 1920) with Emil Jannings, Henny Porten and Ludwig Hartau as the Duke of Norfolk.

Henny Porten and Ludwig Hartau in Anna Boleyn

German postcard by Ross Verlag, Berlin, no. 645/6, 1919-1924. Photo: Union. Publicity still for Anna Boleyn (Ernst Lubitsch, 1920) with Henny Porten and Ludwig Hartau.

German postcard by Ross Verlag, Berlin, no. 645/7, 1919-1924. Photo: Union. Publicity still for Anna Boleyn (Ernst Lubitsch, 1920) with Henny Porten and Paul Hartmann.

German postcard by Ross Verlag, no. 645/8, 1919-1924. Photo: Union. Publicity still for Anna Boleyn (Ernst Lubitsch, 1920) with Henny Porten.

The time is worth spending

In Anne Boleyn, Ernst Lubitsch lets his characters breathe and reveal their corruption down to the tiniest of meannesses. He takes his time, which can try the patience of an audience accustomed to being carried away by action, but the time is worth spending.

A beautiful aspect of Anne Boleyn are the very lavish medieval costuming and the large and elaborate exterior and interior sets. The outdoor scenes are impressive for 1920: a court sports event, Anna’s coronation, a Spring Festival, a hunt, a joust, and even a street battle outside the cathedral.

Emil Jannings is striking and memorable as King Henry the Eighth. He seems to have stepped straight out of Hans Holbein's famous portrait of King Henry VIII.

To introduce the king, Lubitsch uses one of his favourite comedy techniques: the pull-back-and-reveal. A year earlier, he had used this technique in the opening shot of Die Austernprinzessin/The Oyster Princess (1919) to show the bloated Oyster King surrounded by his lackeys. That shot is duplicated here and the look is slightly more realistic but just as revelatory of the character.

Anna Boleyn’s innocence is underlined by Lubitsch through the contrast with the very different character of Jane Seymour (Aud Egede Nissen). Jane is in a sense a mirror image in negative of Anna (Henny Porten). In the late confrontation between the two Jane claims that she serves Anna, but Lubitsch once again positions Anna as innocent: here, dressed in a simple nightdress, Anna kneels before the haughty Jane in her fine clothes.

Ernst Lubitsch constantly composes shots in depth in Anna Boleyn, looking down corridors or through into larger rooms, from the early moments at the harbour where a set of doors are opened onto a bustling street, to the haunting final view of the scaffold.

German postcard by Ross Verlag, Berlin, no. 472/1, 1919-1924. Photo: Rembrandt Phot. / Union Film with Aud Egede Nissen

Ufa Tempelhof studio, set for Anna Boleyn. Album picture from Vom Werden Deutscher Filmkunst (Oskar Kalbus). Part 1. Silent cinema, Altona-Bahrenfeld (Cigaretten-Bilderdienst) 1935.

Bland characterisation

Most critics on the net have mixed thoughts about the film. Ian Johnston at Not Coming to a Theater Near You: "Anna Boleyn does everything to meet the requirements of the historical epic. (...) But the film suffers from Anna’s bland characterisation and a general plodding, predictable tone. It only really comes alive with the character of King Henry."

Lubitsch' film was not the only art work inspired by the tragic figure of Anna Boleyn. Anna has inspired or been mentioned in numerous paintings, novels and films.

In the cinema, she was first portrayed by Clara Kimball Young in a 1912 short film about Cardinal Wolsey. After the portrayal by Henny Porten followed Merle Oberon in the sound film The Private Life of Henry VIII which won an Oscar for Charles Laughton's portrayal of Henry. Oberon received an Oscar nomination.

Elaine Stewart played Anne Boleyn in the film Young Bess (1953), starring Jean Simmons. Geneviève Bujold won a Golden Globe Award, and was nominated for an Oscar, for her portrayal of Anne in Anne of the Thousand Days (1969). Dorothy Tutin was nominated for a BAFTA TV Award for her role as Anne in the mini-series The Six Wives of Henry VIII (1970). When that mini-series was compressed into a film, Charlotte Rampling played Anne in the film version entitled Henry VIII and his Six Wives (1972). Finally, Natalie Portman portrayed Anne in the film The Other Boleyn Girl (2008).

German postcard by Ross Verlag, Berlin, no. 401/2, 1919-1924. Photo: Rembrandt Phot. / Messter Film, Berlin. Publicity still for Anna Boleyn (Ernst Lubitsch, 1920).

German postcard by Ross Verlag, Berlin, no. 401/3, 1919-1924. Photo: Rembrandt Phot. / Messter Film, Berlin. Publicity still for Anna Boleyn (Ernst Lubitsch, 1920).

Sources: Jason Ankeny (AllMovie), Fernando F. Croce (Slant), Ian Johnston (Not Coming to a Theater Near You), AllMovie, Wikipedia and IMDb.

Pierre Brice, the French actor who fascinated millions of European film fans in his role as Apache chief Winnetou, has died. The handsome Brice (1929-2015) was the hero of 11 films based on German author Karl May's tales of America's colonization. During the 1960s, Winnetou - a long-haired saint with a gun - was a superstar among European kids. Brice died in a clinic near Paris. He was 86.

German autograph card. Photo: Lothar Winkler.

German postcard by Schorsch und Söhne, Kulmbach.

German promotion card by Herz Klang for the record Gefühle. Photo: Frank Wunderlich.

Paratrooper In Indochina

Pierre Brice was born into nobility as Baron Pierre Louis de Bris in Brest, France, in 1929. He was 11 years old when the Nazis invaded France. Since he was brought up a patriot, he joined his father in the Résistance at age 15. When he was 19, he enlisted as a volunteer in the French Army and fought four years as a paratrooper in Indochina.

In 1951, Brice returned from the war. He turned his life around and became an actor. He took acting classes from the Russian actor Gregori Chmara. He became a model for advertisements and photo novels, acted as a door-to-door salesman and traveled with a circus.

He got his first small film role in the Eddie Constantine thriller Ça va barder/Give 'em Hell (John Berry, Jacques Lamare, 1955). Bigger roles followed in French productions like Les Tricheurs/Youthful Sinners (Marcel Carné, 1958), but his career in France wasn't likely to take off. He simply did not have the same kind of talents and charisma as Alain Delon (to whom he was sometimes compared), nor did his good looks go down too well with the (then booming) Nouvelle Vague.

Brice was more a typical matinée idol, he was well-built and very handsome. He could easily pull off any kind of adventurer and he looked convincingly in period costume. Brice went to Italy, to appear in the Peplums, the sword and sandal films and similar adventure films like the Gothic horror shocker Il Mulino delle donne di pietra/Mill of the Stone Women (Giorgio Ferroni, 1960), and the modern day crime film Il Rossetto/Red Lips (Damiano Damiani, 1960).

German postcard, no. E 74. Photo: Constantin. Publicity Still for Der Schatz im Silbersee/Treasure of Silver Lake (1962).

Pierre Brice and Lex Barker in Der Schatz im Silbersee

Dutch postcard by Gebr. Spanjersberg N.V., Rotterdam/Edition Facet Publishers. Photo: Rank Film Publishers (Holland) N.V. Publicity Still for Der Schatz im Silbersee/Treasure of Silver Lake (1962) with Lex Barker as Old Shatterhand.

Lex Barker and Pierre Brice in Der Schatz im Silbersee

German postcard, no. ED 52. Photo: Constantin. Still from Der Schatz im Silbersee/Treasure of Silver Lake (1962).

Winnetou

In 1962 at the Berlin Film Festival, Pierre Brice met the German producer Horst Wendlandt, head of Rialto Film. Wendlandt searched for an actor to play a Native American chief in Der Schatz im Silbersee/Treasure of Silver Lake (Harald Reinl, 1962).

Blogger Mike Haberfelner wonders why Wendlandt thought that Pierre Brice would be right for the role: "Sure, Brice was a suitably handsome actor for such a role and he had proven himself as a heroic lead time and again, but he was also almost unknown in Germany and he looked nothing like a Native American." Brice gave a passionate interpretation of Winnetou, and according to Haberfelner his impact easily overshadowed his co-star, Hollywood veteran Lex Barker, who as Old Shatterhand was first-billed in the credits.

Der Schatz im Silbersee was the first filmisation of a novel by Karl May (1842-1912) set in the American West. Earlier films after his novels, like Die Teufelsanbeter/The Devil Worshippers (Marie Luise Droop, 1920) and Die Sklavenkarawane/The Caravan of Slaves (Georg Marischka, Ramón Torrado, 1958), were all set in the Near East.

Der Schatz im Silbersee was a co-production of Germany, Yugoslavia and France. Principal shooting took place in national park Paklenica Karst River Canyon, Yugoslavia now Croatia. Marianne Hoppe had her first international film role, and for the laughs Eddi Arent(Lord Castlepool) and Ralf Wolter (Trapper Sam Hawkins) appeared. British actor Herbert Lom was cast as a bad colonel, but his performance was restricted by the script.

German postcard, no. ED 51. Photo: Constantin. Still from Der Schatz im Silbersee (1962).

German postcard, no. ED 62. Photo: Constantin. Still from Der Schatz im Silbersee (1962).

Karin Dor, Lex Barker, Pierre Brice in Der Schatz im Silbersee. German postcard, no. ED 64. Photo: Constantin. Still from Der Schatz im Silbersee (1962).

Dutch postcard by Facet Publishers, Lunteren, no. 4. Photo: Rank Film Distributors (Holland) N.V. Publicity still from Der Schatz im Silbersee (1962).

A Superstar in West Germany

Der Schatz im Silbersee has a larger-than-life, fairy tale like atmosphere that attracted a huge audience. It was the very first German film to receive the Goldene Leinwand (Golden Screen), for having over 3 million visitors within 12 months. The film also received the Bambi-award 1963 as best box-office-production. It received furthermore a sum of 200.000 DM from the government as a film-prize.

The Old Shatterhand-Melodie, the title melody played on the harmonica by René Giessen and composed by Martin Böttcher, was the most successful track in the German hitparades during the 1960s. It stayed there for several months and over 100,000 copies were sold.

For that time this was very unusual, especially for a film music-track without any singers. The music was accompanied by members of the symphony-orchestra of the Norddeutscher Rundfunk. Later the theme was recorded as a vocal track by several singers, including a version by Pierre Brice.

Suddenly, Pierre Brice, who was virtually unknown in his homecountry and was barely holding his own in Italy, was a superstar in West Germany.

German postcard , no. E 2. Photo: Constantin. Publicity Still for Winnetou I.Teil/Apache Gold (1963).

Pierre Brice and Hrvoje Svob. German postcard, no. E 14. Photo: Constantin. Still from Winnetou I/Winnetou (1963).

German postcard, no. E 5. Photo: Constantin. Still from Winnetou I/Winnetou (1963).

Blood Brothers

Der Schatz im Silbersee was the first Winnetou western, but it is set in time after the next film in the Winnetou series, Winnetou – 1. TeilApache Gold (Harald Reinl, 1963), again with a music score by Martin Böttcher.

Winnetou – 1. Teil, also starred Marie Versini as Winnetou's sister, Mario Adorf as the main villain and Croatian beautyDunja Rajter.

The film depicts the first meeting of Winnetou and Old Shatterhand, but initially they find themselves fighting on opposite sides, and it takes the whole film (and a love story between Old Shatterhand and Winnetou's sister) until they realize each other's righteousness and become friends and blood brothers.

Pierre Brice would go on to portray Winnetou in a total of eleven films, alongside alternatively Lex Barker(Old Shatterhand in 7 films), Stewart Granger (Old Surehand in 3 films), and Rod Cameron (1 film) as the white heroes. All these Westerns were based on the Karl May books and were produced between 1962 and 1968.

Pierre Brice, Gojko Mitić, Stewart Granger, Unter Geiern

Pierre Brice, Stewart Granger and Gojko Mitic. German postcard, no. 10. Photo: Constantin. Publicity still for Unter Geiern/Among Vultures (1964).

Gojko Mitic, Stewart Granger, Pierre Brice, Unter Geiern

German postcard, no. 35. Photo: Constantin. Publicity still for Unter Geiern/Among Vultures (1964).

German postcard, no. 40. Photo: Constantin. Publicity still for Unter Geiern/Among Vultures (1964).

Peplum Spectacle

Pierre Brice appeared also in several other European films like Zorro contro Maciste/Samson and the Slave Queen (Umberto Lenzi, 1963), with Lex Barkerin the non-Karl May film Die Hölle von Manitoba/A Place Called Glory (Sheldon Reynolds, 1965), the James Bond rip-off Schüsse im Dreivierteltakt/Operation Solo (Alfred Weidenmann, 1965), and the Peplum spectacle Dacii/The Dacians (Sergiu Nicolaescu, 1967) with Marie-José Nat.

In the anthology film Gern hab' ich die Frauen gekillt/Le Carnaval des barbouzes/Killer's Carnival (Sheldon Reynolds a.o., 1966) Stewart Granger, Lex Barkerand Pierre Brice finally worked together - but for some reason, the three actors did not share a single scene in the film.

German postcard, no R 8. Photo: publicity still for Winnetou 2. Teil/Winnetou: The Red Gentleman (Harald Reinl, 1964) with Karin Dor.

German postcard by ISV, no. R 14. Photo: publicity still for Winnetou - 2. Teil/Last of the Renegades (1964).

Karin Dor and Pierre Brice. German postcard, no. R 24. Photo: still from Winnetou - 2. Teil/Last of the Renegades (1964).

German postcard by Krüger. Photo: Bernard of Hollywood / CCC Produktion. Publicity still for Old Shattterhand (1964). Sent by mail in Luxemburg in 1966.

Lex Barker. German postcard by Kruger. Photo: Bernard of Hollywood (Bruno Bernard) / CCC-Produktion. Publicity still for Old Shatterhand (1964).

German postcard by Kruger. Photo: Bruno Bernard / CCC Produktion. Publicity Still for Old Shatterhand (1964).

Karl May Shows

During the 1970s, Pierre Brice played in supporting parts in films like the crime comedy La Pupa del Gangster/Get Rita (Giorgio Capitani, 1975), starring Marcello Mastroianni and Sophia Loren.

He also appeared in several TV shows like the Sci-Fi series Star Maidens (1976). But he will always be best remembered as Winnetou, whom he also played at the Karl May Festspiele in Elspe (1977-1986) and at the Bad Segeberg open air theater, dedicated only to productions of Karl May shows (1988-1991).

In 1979 he played Winnetou - with Siegfried Rauch as Old Shatterhand - in the TV series Winnetou le mescalero/My Friend Winnetou (Marcel Camus, 1980), which did not originate from Karl May material.

At age 69, he again acted in – and co-scripted - a TV mini series Winnetous Rückkehr/Winnetou's Return (Marijan David Vajda, 1998), which met devastating criticism.

Last Friday, 5 June 2015, the 86-years-old Brice was admitted to hospital with a high fever from a lung infection and he died early on Saturday in the arms of his wife, Hella Krekel. The pair, who lived for three decades in a country house 60 kilometers from Paris, had long been planning a return to her home state of Bavaria.

German postcard by Rüdel-Verlag. Photo: CCC / Constantin / Bruno Bernard. Publicity Still for Old Shatterhand (1964).

With Klaus Kinski. German postcard by Filmbilder-Vertrieb Ernst Freihoff, Essen. Photo: Lothar Winkler.

Vintage Dutch postcard. With Lex Barker.

US trailer for Il mulino delle donne di pietra/Mill of the Stone Women (1963). Source: Cult of the Cinema (YouTube).

Trailer for Winnetou - 2. Teil/Last of the Renegades (1964). Source: RialtoFilm (YouTube).

Scene from Winnetous Rückkehr/Winnetou's Return (1998). Source: SebastianVader (YouTube).

Sources: Mike Haberfelner ((Re)search My Trash), Deutsche Welle, Wikipedia and IMDb.

French stage and screen actor Émile Dehelly (1871-1969) was a sociétaire of the Comédie-Française from 1903 till 1928 and had a prolific career at Le Film d’Art between 1909 and 1913. He is the father of film actor Jean Dehelly.

French postcard, no. 17. Photo: Cliché Bert. Publicity still for Les trois mousquetaires (Henri Puctal, André Calmettes, 1913) with Émile Dehelly as D'Artagnan.

French postcard. Photo: publicity still for Les trois mousquetaires (Henri Puctal, André Calmettes, 1913) with Émile Dehelly as D'Artagnan.

Propaganda tours

Emile Léon Auguste Dehelly was born in 1871 in Fresnoy-le-Grand, France. At a young age he moved with his father to Epernon.

In 1893, he was drafted and performed his military service at the 102nd Infantry Regiment in Reuilly. Later, he remained a reservist, and Dehelly was drafted in 1915 for the 30th Territorial Regiment Chartres. He would be released in 1917, after which he focused on acting at the Théâtre aux Armées. He performed on propaganda tours in Norway and Sweden, and for interned soldiers in Switzerland.

In 1890 Dehelly entered the Comédie-Française. Between 1903 and 1928 he was sociétaire, a regular member of the organisation and as such receive a pension after 20 years of service. He acted mostly in the typical Comédie classics by Molière such as L'École des maris (The School for Husbands) but also plays by William Shakespeare and Victor Hugo.

In 1928 he became sociétaire honoraire and in 1931 he said goodbye to the Comédie. As a farewell he once more performed his famous role of Dorante in Le menteur (The Liar) by Pierre Corneille.

In 1909 Dehelly started to act at the newly founded Le Film d’Art, initially often under the direction of André Calmettes. He acted in several short films on historical characters who previously had inspired the stage and history painting (Delaroche et. al.).

Examples are Rival de son père/Rival to his father (André Calmettes, 1909), based on Friedrich Schiller’s Don Carlos, Louis XI (André Calmettes, 1909) with Rolla Norman, Héliogabale/Heliogabalus (André Calmettes, 1909), Les enfants d’Édouard/The Children of Edward IV (André Calmettes, 1910), La reine Margot/Queen Margot (Camille de Morlhon, 1910) with Berthe Bovy in the lead, and Camille Desmoulins (Henri Pouctal, 1911) with Dehelly himself in the lead.

At the Éclair company, Dehelly also acted in short comedies such as Un coup de vent/The gale (Émile Chautard, 1910) with Suzanne Goldstein, and Amour et science/Love and Science (?, 1912) with Renée Sylvaire.

French postcard. Photo: publicity still for Les trois mousquetaires (Henri Puctal, André Calmettes, 1913) with Émile Dehelly as D'Artagnan, Marcel Vibert (Athos), Adolphe Candé (Porthos) and Stellio (Aramis).

French postcard. Photo: publicity still for Les trois mousquetaires (Henri Puctal, André Calmettes, 1913) with Émile Dehelly as D'Artagnan and Guizelle as Constance Bonacieux (at right).

D’Artagnan

In 1913, Émile Dehelly had the lead as D’Artagnan in the two-part, lengthy feature film Les trois mousquetaires/The three musketeers, produced by Le Film d’Art.

André Calmettes had been replaced as the main director at the Film d'art by Henri Pouctal. With Pouctal he previously had acted in the short La comtesse Sarah, a Georges Ohnet adaptation, which starred Nelly Cormon, who would become Dehelly’s antagonist in Les trois mousquetaires as Milady De Winter.

Though Les trois mousquetaires was intensely promoted and internatonally well received, Dehelly stopped his film acting for some years.

He returned in only one more silent film, Graziella (Marcel Vandal, 1926), and two early sound films: Maurin des Maures (André Hugon, 1932), and Chair ardente/Burning flesh (René Plaisetty, 1932). In Graziella he played the writer Alphonse de Lamartine in his older years, while the young Lamartine was played by his own son Jean Dehelly, Graziella by Nina Vanna and Graziella’s lover Cecco by Antonin Artaud.

Chair ardente was director Plaisetty’s last film and was not a huge success. This may have contributed to the fact that Dehelly afterwards didn’t act in film anymore. He was past 60 by then and had already stopped at the Comédie française the year before.

His son Jean Dehelly, born in 1896, had a prolific career in French silent cinema of the 1920s. He also stopped his film acting in 1932. There may be a connection here.

Émile Dehelly died in 1969 in Paris, at the extreme high age of 98. He survived his son Jean by five years.

French postcard. Photo: publicity still for Les trois mousquetaires (Henri Puctal, André Calmettes, 1913) with Émile Dehelly as D'Artagnan.

French postcard. Photo: publicity still for Les trois mousquetaires (Henri Puctal, André Calmettes, 1913) with Émile Dehelly as D'Artagnan and Nelly Cormon as Milady.

French postcard. Photo: publicity still for Les trois mousquetaires (Henri Puctal, André Calmettes, 1913) with Émile Dehelly as D'Artagnan and Jacques Volnys as Count De Rochefort.

Sources: Ciné-ressources (French), Gallica (French), INA (FRench), Wikipedia (French) and IMDb.

Watch also this television interview of 1958 in which a lively Dehelly recalls his work at the Comédie but also a radio performance of Le menteur he once did.

Last Saturday, 6 June 2015, British stage and screen actor and producer Richard Johnson has died, aged 87. He conferred his dark, handsome, saturnine features, assertive jaw, emphatic eyebrows and air of intelligence on scores of classic parts in the theatre, and on a wide range of film and television roles. Johnson was considered for the role of James Bond in the first Bond film, Dr. No (1962). He declined the part as he did not favour a lengthy contract.

Italian postcard. Photo: Dear Film. Publicity still for Khartoum (Basil Dearden, Eliot Elisofon, 1965).

One of his finest performances

Richard Keith Johnson was born at Upminster, Essex, in 1927, the son of Frances Louisa Olive (née Tweed) and Keith Holcombe Johnson. He was educated at Parkfield School and Felsted School before training for the stage at Rada. He claimed to have started acting as a child and then became a professional actor because it made him feel alive, and less aware of his ‘insufficiencies’.

During the Second World War he served in the Royal Navy. His career began with a walk-on part in John Gielgud’s 1944 production of Hamlet in Manchester. He moved to the West End as part of a classical repertoire at the Haymarket where he took small parts in Love for Love, The Circle, and The Duchess of Malfi. After a season of old melodrama in Camden Town, he was in two West End productions, The Madwoman of Chaillot and After My Fashion, as well as open-air Shakespeare in Regent’s Park, before a season with the Bristol Old Vic company in 1953.

He spent the next season in broadcasting, but in 1955 he got his first real break in Jean Anouilh’s version of the Joan of Arc story, The Lark, playing Warwick, one of his favourite parts, to Dorothy Tutin’s Joan. A few months later he was cast as Laertes in Peter Brook’s production of Hamlet, starring Paul Scofield (1955).

After two more West End productions, playing Jack Absolute in The Rivals and Lord Plynlimmon in Plaintiff in a Pretty Hat, he joined the Shakespeare Memorial Theatre at Stratford-upon-Avon. Among his roles were Orlando in As You Like It, Mark Antony in Julius Caesar, Leonatus in Cymbeline and Ferdinand in The Tempest, which transferred to Drury Lane in 1957. The following season he played Romeo and Sir Andrew Aguecheek as well as the title role in Pericles and Don John in Much Ado About Nothing, visiting Moscow and Leningrad as Romeo and Aguecheek.

During the 1960s Johnson became involved with Sir Peter Hall’s production of Cymbeline, leading to Hall inviting him to join him in the Royal Shakespeare Company. There, in 1961, he acted Hans in Jean Giraudoux’s Ondine. He also gave one of his finest performances as Urbaine in John Whiting’s The Devils, a study of 17th-century witchcraft directed by Peter Brook.

Romanian postcard by Casa Filmului Acin. Photo: publicity still for Deadlier than the male (Ralph Thomas, 1967) with Suzanna Leigh.

Deadlier Than the Male

In 1959, Richard Johnson made his film debut in a major co-star role in the MGM war drama Never So Few (John Sturges, 1959), starring Frank Sinatra and Gina Lollobrigida. Subsequently he was contracted by MGM to appear in 1 film per year over 6 years. There he made his biggest films including Robert Wise’s The Haunting (1963), The Pumpkin Eater (Jack Clayton, 1964) and Khartoum (Basil Dearden, Eliot Elisofon, 1966), starring Laurence Olivier and Charlton Heston.

In the early 1960s the director Terence Young had wanted Johnson to play James Bond in preference to Sean Connery. Johnson declined because he was under contract to MGM and did not relish the seven-year commitment. If the stardom for which his career seemed to be heading in the cinema of the early 1960s eluded him, he cut a dashingly romantic figure opposite Kim Novak, whom he married in real life at this time (albeit briefly – they divorced a year later), in the all-star romp, The Amorous Adventures of Moll Flanders (Terence Johnson, 1965).

Johnson certainly displayed Bond-like qualities in some of his film roles, notably when he played a modern-day Bulldog Drummond (reimagined as a 007-type hero) in Deadlier Than the Male (Ralph Thomas, 1967) with Elke Sommer and Sylva Koscina and its less satisfactory sequel, Some Girls Do (Ralph Thomas, 1969) with Daliah Lavi.

In 1969 he founded a production company called Pageant Entertainments Ltd. Its earliest productions included John Aubrey’s Brief Lives at the Criterion (1969). His feature films included the thriller Danger Route (Seth Holt, 1967), Oedipus the King (Philip Saville, 1968), Le calde notti di Lady Hamilton/Lady Hamilton (Christian-Jaque, 1968) starring Michèle Mercier, Julius Caesar (Stuart Burge, 1970), and Hennessy (Don Sharp, 1975) for which he also wrote the original story.

East-German postcard by VEB Progress Filmvertrieb, Berlin, no. 237/70. Photo: publicity still for Columna/Trajan's Column (Mircea Dragan, 1968).

Zombie

Returning to the Royal Shakespeare Company in 1972, Richard Johnson played (both at Stratford and in London) Mark Antony in Julius Caesar, and Antony in Trevor Nunn’s Antony and Cleopatra (opposite Janet Suzman), a performance variously described as “fruity”, “genial” and “declining into a business ruffian”, but also firmly defining the warrior’s handsome gravity.

After starring in a West End musical comedy, Thomas and the King, in 1975, in which he played Thomas, he joined the National Theatre Company for a couple of seasons, showing, again under Peter Hall’s direction, a sharp gift for farce in Noël Coward’s Blithe Spirit, and playing Pontius Pilate in The Passion (1977), Pinchwife in Wycherley’s The Country Wife (1977) and Nendor in The Guardsman in 1978.

He went on to appear in such films as The Four Feathers (Don Sharp, 1978). He also appeared in several Italian films, including Lucio Fulci's cult classic, Zombi 2/Zombie (1979) which was banned for some years, and L'isola degli uomini pesce/Island of the Fishmen (Sergio Martino, 1979) with Barbara Bach.

In 1983 Johnson became founder, chairman, and joint chief executive of a production company, United Artists, with Diana Rigg as director, and the actors Albert Finney and Glenda Jackson. They promoted such films as Turtle Diary (John Irvin, 1985) starring Glenda Jackson and Ben Kingsley, Castaway (Nicolas Roeg, 1986) with Oliver Reed, and The Lonely Passion of Judith Hearne (Jack Clayton, 1987) starring Maggie Smith.

He made something of a comeback at Stratford-on-Avon in 1992 as Antony in Antony and Cleopatra, having two years earlier re-established himself on the television screen in two plays, The Camomile Lawn and Anglo-Saxon Attitudes. In later years, he was a charismatic presence in television productions such as Midsomer Murders, Waking the Dead, Silent Witness and Doc Martin. His later films include Lara Croft: Tomb Raider (Simon West, 2001) and The Boy in the Striped Pyjamas (Mark Herman, 2008). His last known film appearance was in Radiator (Tom Browne, 2014).

Richard Johnson was married four times; first, in 1957 to the actress Sheila Sweet, by whom he had a son and daughter (the photographer, Sukey Parnell). After their divorce he married, in 1965, Kim Novak, a marriage which lasted a few months. In 1982 he married Mary-Louise Norlund, by whom he had a daughter. He also had a son with the French actress, Françoise Pascal. His fourth wife was Lynne Gurney, whom he married on a beach in Goa in 2004. She survives him with his four children and his stepson, the actor Paris Arrowsmith. Johnson’s family said he died on Saturday in the Royal Marsden hospital in Chelsea, west London, after a short illness.

Charlton Heston, Laurence Olivier and Richard Johnson in Khartoum (1965)

Italian postcard. Photo: Dear Film. Publicity still for Khartoum (Basil Dearden, Eliot Elisofon, 1965) with Charlton Heston and Laurence Olivier.

Sources: The Telegraph, The New York Times, The Guardian, Wikipedia and IMDb.

We continue our weekly series 'Imported from the USA' of posts about Hollywood stars who also worked in the European cinema. Like last week, today's post is about a beautiful but baaad girl, who loved to party. Blonde and utterly beautiful Mary Nolan (1902–1948) appeared on stage, screen, and most of all in the tabloids. After a 'sex scandal', she fled to Germany where she starred in 17 silent films under the stage name Imogene Robertson.

Austrian postcard by Iris Verlag, no. 829. Photo: National / Mondial A.G., Wien. Collection: Didier Hanson.

Jazz-Age baby and party girl by nature

Mary Nolan was born as Mary Imogene Robertson in Louisville, Kentucky, U.S. in 1902 (according to Wikipedia and 1905 according to IMDb). She was one of five children born to Africanus and Viola Robertson. Her mother died of cancer at the age of 46. Unable to care for five young children, Africanus Robertson placed Mary in a foster home. She eventually went to live in Catholic orphanage in Missouri where she earned the nickname 'Bubbles'.

The beautiful blonde arrived broke in New York in 1919. Eve Golden at Films of the Golden Age: "She really was breath-taking with her perfect bone structure, cloud of thick blonde hair, and china-blue eyes. It wasn't long before Mary got work as an artist's model for such big shots as James Montgomery Flagg and Arthur William Brown."

Famous Broadway producer Oliver Morosco launched her stage career in the choruses of Daffy Dill and Lady Butterfly (1923). Bubbles proved to be a Jazz-Age baby and party girl by nature. Florenz Ziegfeld Jr. signed her up for his Follies shows on Broadway. As a show girl, she performed under the stage name Imogene 'Bubbles' Wilson.

For the next several years, she started a violent love/hate relationship with Ziegfeld comedian Frank Tinney. Tinney was married to the comedy star Edna Davenport. Tinney set Mary up in a West 72nd Street apartment and showered her with expensive gifts, but he also showered her with bruises, both physical and emotional. The abusive affair stirred up a major sex scandal in 1924. The tabloids exposed the tumultuous relationship when Mary was seriously hospitalized after one of their many arguments.

Mary was fired by Ziegfeld and set sail for France where she was scheduled to appear in vaudeville. She made her way to London in October where she reunited with Frank Tinney. By December 1924, Tinney had resumed drinking and began to physically abuse her again.

In early 1925, Nolan finally ended the relationship. She then travelled to Germany where she began to work in the film industry under the new stage name Imogene Robertson.

Her first German film was Verborgene Gluten/Hidden Fires (Einar Bruun, 1925) with Alphons Fryland. Later that year, she appeared in the title role of Die Feuertänzerin (Robert Dinesen, 1925) for the Ufa. She received good reviews for her work in the film which prompted the Ufa to offer her a contract for $1500 a week.

Nolan worked steadily in Germany from 1925 to 1927, and continued to receive favourable reviews for her acting. Her best known films include the mystery Das Parfüm der Mrs. Worrington/The Parfum of Mrs. Worrington (Franz Seitz, 1925) with Ernst Reicher as detective Stuart Webbs, Das süße Mädel/The sweet girl (Manfred Noa, 1926) with Nils Asther, and the drama Die Abenteuer eines Zehnmarkscheines/The adventures of a 10-mark note (Berthold Viertel, 1926).

Mary Nolan and Ralf Horalde in Young Desire

Dutch postcard by Croese Bosman. Sent by mail in 1932. Photo: publicity still for Young Desire (Lew Collins, 1930).

Carnival Sideshow Dancer

While in Germany, Imogene Robertson received offers from Hollywood producers to appear in American films but turned them down. She finally relented after Joseph M. Schenck offered her a contract with United Artists. She returned to the United States in January 1927.

To solve the problem of audiences connecting her with her scandalous past, United Artists suggested she change her name to Mary Nolan. For United Artists, she appeared in an uncredited bit part in Topsy and Eva (Del Lord, 1927), and a supporting role in Sorrell and Son (Herbert Brenon, 1927).

In 1928, Nolan was signed to Universal Pictures. Her first film for the company was Good Morning, Judge (William A. Seiter, 1928), starring Reginald Denny for which she received good reviews. Universal loaned her out to Metro-Goldwyn-Mayer for West of Zanzibar (Tod Browning, 1928), about the vengefulness of a cuckolded magician (Lon Chaney) paralyzed in a brawl with his rival (Lionel Barrymore). Nolan played Chaney's defiled daughter Maizie. The film was a hit and Nolan received favourable reviews for her work in the film.

The following year, she was loaned to MGM again for the romantic drama Desert Nights (William Nigh, 1929), with John Gilbert. Two thieves (Noland and Ernest Torrence) victimize a diamond mine and kidnap its manager (Gilbert), but he gains the upper hand (and falls in love with Nolan) when they flee into the hostile desert. Desert Nights was another financial success and served to boost Nolan's career.

Shortly after signing with Universal in 1927, Nolan had begun a relationship with another married man, studio executive Eddie Mannix. Mannix used his clout to further Nolan's career and was responsible for her loan outs to MGM. Shortly after Desert Nights was released in 1929, Mannix abruptly ended the relationship. This angered Nolan who threatened to tell Mannix's wife Bernice of their affair. Mannix became enraged and beat her unconscious.

Nolan hospitalized for six months and required fifteen surgeries to repair damage Mannix inflicted on her abdomen. While hospitalized, Nolan was prescribed morphine for pain. She eventually became addicted which contributed to the decline of her career.

In the Universal production Young Desire (Lew Collins, 1930), Nolan plays Helen Herbert aka 'La Belle Helene', a carnival sideshow dancer. She falls in love with wealthy, wet behind the ears Bobby Spencer who whisks her off to his hometown of Spencerville and stakes her to an apartment and a job. But Helen's sordid past catches up with her...

By then, Nolan's acting career had begun to decline due to her drug abuse and reputation for being temperamental. She was fired from the film What Men Want (1930). Nolan got into an argument with the film's director, Ernst Laemmle, after she learned she was the only cast member who hadn't received a close up shot. Laemmle banned Nolan from the set and she was subsequently fired. After threatening to file a lawsuit against Universal, the studio bought her out of her contract in January 1931.

She married stock broker Wallace T. McCreary on 29 March 1931. One week before they married, McCreary lost $3 million on bad investments. The couple used McCreary's remaining money to open a dress shop in Beverly Hills. The shop went out of business within months and Nolan filed for bankruptcy in August 1931. Nolan divorced McCreary in July 1932.

After her exit from Universal, she was unable to secure film work with any of the major studios. Nolan spent the remainder of her acting career appearing in roles in low-budget films for independent studios. She made her final film appearances in File 113 (Chester M. Franklin, 1933), for Allied Pictures Corporation. From then on, Nolan appeared in vaudeville and performed in nightclubs and roadhouses around the United States.

Later, Mary Nolan suffered several nervous breakdowns and her health declined. She turned to heroin, and it spelled the end. In 1948, she died of cardiac arrest and liver problems (according to IMDb, but Wikipedia writes she died of a barbiturate overdose). Gary Brumburgh at IMDb: "Mary became just one more Hollywood tragedy -- an incredible beauty whose life turned absolutely beastly."

Austrian postcard by Iris Verlag, no. 5829. Photo: Universal-Film.

Source: Gary Brumburgh (IMDb), Eve Golden (Films of the Golden Age), Thomas Staedeli (Cyranos), Wikipedia and IMDb.

English musician, singer and songwriter John Lennon (1940-1980) rose to worldwide fame with the Beatles, the most commercially successful band in the history of pop. With Paul McCartney, he formed a song writing partnership that is one of the most celebrated of the 20th century. When the group disbanded in 1970, Lennon embarked on a solo career that produced the critically acclaimed albums John Lennon/Plastic Ono Band and Imagine.

British postcard by Photofolio. Photo: Bob Gruen. Caption: New York City, 1974.

From The Quarryman to The Beatles

John Winston Lennon was born in an air-raid shelter during the Blitz in Liverpool. His parents were Julia (née Stanley) and Alfred Lennon, a merchant seaman of Irish descent, who was away at the time of his son's birth. His parents separated and he would not see his father for 20 years. Throughout the rest of his childhood and adolescence he lived with his aunt and uncle, Mimi and George Smith, who had no children of their own.

His mother bought him his first guitar in 1956, an inexpensive Gallotone Champion acoustic. Two years later, when Lennon was 17 years old, his mother, walking home after visiting the Smiths' house, was struck by a car and killed.

Lennon failed all his examinations, and was accepted into the Liverpool College of Art only after his aunt and headmaster intervened. He started wearing Teddy Boy clothes and acquired a reputation for disrupting classes and ridiculing teachers. He was thrown out of the college before his final year.

As a teenager Lennon had become involved in the skiffle craze. At age 15, he formed his first band, the Quarrymen (after Quarry Bank High School, which he attended) in 1956. Lennon first met Paul McCartney at the Quarrymen's second performance, after which he asked McCartney to join the band. In 1957 Lennon met Cynthia Powell at the Liverpool College of Art. They married in 1962.

In 1958, the 18-year-old Lennon wrote his first song, Hello Little Girl, a UK top 10 hit for The Fourmost nearly five years later. McCartney suggested his friend George Harrison as the lead guitarist. Lennon thought Harrison (then 14 years old) was too young. McCartney engineered an audition on the upper deck of a Liverpool bus, where Harrison played Raunchy for Lennon and was asked to join. Stuart Sutcliffe, Lennon's friend from art school, later joined as bassist.

Lennon, McCartney, Harrison and Sutcliffe became The Beatles in early 1960. In August that year, the Beatles were engaged for a 48-night residency in Hamburg, Germany. Desperately in need of a drummer, they asked Pete Best to join them. After the first Hamburg residency, the band accepted another in April 1961, and a third in April 1962. Like the other band members, Lennon was introduced to Preludin while in Hamburg, and regularly took the drug, as well as amphetamines, as a stimulant during their long, overnight performances.

The Beatles were performing at Liverpool's Cavern Club in 1962, when they were introduced to Brian Epstein after a midday concert. He became their manager. Epstein had no prior experience of artist management, but had a strong influence on their early dress code and attitude on stage. McCartney took over on bass after Sutcliffe decided to stay in Hamburg, and drummer Ringo Starr replaced Best, completing the four-piece line-up that would endure until the group's break-up in 1970.

The band's first single, Love Me Do, was released in October 1962 and reached no. 17 on the British charts. They recorded their debut album, Please Please Me, in under 10 hours in 1963. The Lennon–McCartney song writing partnership yielded eight of its fourteen tracks. John was older than the other Beatles and he was very much the leader; he was the quickest wit and the smartest.

Dutch postcard.

German postcard by Filmbilder-Vertrieb Ernst Freihoff, Essen, no. 984. Retail price: 10 Pfg.

Dutch postcard by Remaco NV, Amsterdam.

Dutch postcard by Heracles, Haarlem.

Dutch postcard by Syba, no. 464. Sent by mail in 1964.

Beatlemania

The Beatles achieved mainstream success in the UK during the beginning of 1963. John Lennon married his girlfriend Cynthia Powell when she was pregnant. Lennon had to perform on the evening of his wedding day, and would continue to do so almost daily from then on. Epstein, fearing that fans would be alienated by the idea of a married Beatle, asked the Lennons to keep their marriage secret. Julian was born on 8 April 1963. Lennon was on tour at the time and did not see his son until three days later.

After the tour, Lennon went on holiday to Spain with Brian Epstein, leading to speculation about their relationship. Questioned about it later, Lennon said, "Well, it was almost a love affair, but not quite. It was never consummated. But it was a pretty intense relationship. It was my first experience with a homosexual that I was conscious was homosexual.” In a later fictional film about this vacation, The Hours and Times (Christopher Munch, 1991), Lennon was played by Ian Hart. In another film about the Hamburg years of the Beatles, Backbeat (Iain Softley, 1994), Hart again played Lennon.

After a year of Beatlemania in the UK, the group's historic February 1964 US debut appearance on The Ed Sullivan Show marked their breakthrough to international stardom. A two-year period of constant touring, song writing an film making followed. Richard Lester made two films with The Beatles, A Hard Day’s Night (1964) and Help! (1965). Lennon also wrote two books, In His Own Write and A Spaniard in the Works.

The Beatles received recognition from the British Establishment when they were appointed Members of the Order of the British Empire (MBE) in the 1965 Queen's Birthday Honours. Lennon grew concerned that fans attending Beatles concerts were unable to hear the music above the screaming of fans, and that the band's musicianship was beginning to suffer as a result. His song Help! (1965) expressed these feelings.

The following January he was unknowingly introduced to LSD when a dentist, hosting a dinner party attended by Lennon, Harrison and their wives, spiked the guests' coffee with the drug. The Beatles had their final commercial concert on 29 August 1966. Instead of appearing live, the band began making their own ‘pop clips’, which were featured on television programs of the time. Deprived of the routine of live performances, Lennon felt lost and considered leaving the band. Since his involuntary introduction to LSD in January, he had made increasing use of the drug, and was almost constantly under its influence for much of the year.

1967 saw the release of Strawberry Fields Forever, and the group's landmark album Sgt. Pepper's Lonely Hearts Club Band, which revealed Lennon's lyrics contrasting strongly with the simple love songs of the Lennon–McCartney's early years. In August, after having been introduced to the Maharishi Mahesh Yogi, the group attended a weekend of personal instruction at his Transcendental Meditation seminar in Bangor, Wales, and were informed of Epstein's death during the seminar. They later travelled to Maharishi's ashram in India for further guidance, where they composed most of the songs for The Beatles and Abbey Road.

Lennon played in the anti-war, black comedy How I Won the War (Richard Lester, 1967) starring Michael Crawford. McCartney organised the group's first post-Epstein project, the self-written, -produced and -directed television film Magical Mystery Tour (1967). While the film itself proved to be their first critical flop, its soundtrack release, featuring Lennon's acclaimed, Lewis Carroll-inspired I Am the Walrus, was a success.

With Epstein gone, the band members became increasingly involved in business activities, and in February 1968 they formed Apple Corps, a multimedia corporation composed of Apple Records and several other subsidiary companies. In the cinema, The Beatles could be heard in the animation film Yellow Submarine (George Dunning, 1968).

John and Cynthia divorced after he had fallen in love with Yoko Ono. At the end of 1968, Lennon featured in the film The Rolling Stones Rock and Roll Circus (not released until 1996) in the role of a Dirty Mac band member. The supergroup, composed of Lennon, Eric Clapton, Keith Richards and Mitch Mitchell, also backed a vocal performance by Yoko Ono in the film.

Italian postcard by Silvercart, Milano, no. 514/3. Photo: Nems Enterpriser London Ltd.

Dutch postcard.

Italian postcard. Photo: Carisch.

British postcard, no. 1148. Caption: Beatles - psychedelic.

British Postcard by Fotofolio.

Bed-In for Peace

John Lennon married Yoko Ono in 1969, and changed his name to John Ono Lennon. The couple spent its honeymoon at the Amsterdam Hilton campaigning with a week-long Bed-In for Peace. At their second Bed-In for Peace in Montreal in 1969, they recorded Give Peace a Chance. It became the main anti-Vietnam protest song. Lennon detailed this period in the Beatles song The Ballad of John and Yoko. They also released a series of 14 lithographs called Bag One depicting scenes from their honeymoon, eight of which were deemed indecent and most of which were banned and confiscated.

Lennon's creative focus continued to move beyond the Beatles and between 1968 and 1969 he and Ono recorded three albums of experimental music together: Unfinished Music No.1: Two Virgins (known more for its cover, a nude photograph of Lennon and Ono, than for its music), Unfinished Music No.2: Life with the Lions and Wedding Album. Their live album Live Peace In Toronto became a Top Ten hit.

In 1969, they formed the Plastic Ono Band, which featured Ono, guitarist Eric Clapton, bassist Klaus Voormann and drummer Alan White. They released the album Live Peace (1969) and the singles Cold Turkey (about his battle with heroin addiction) and Instant Karma! In September 1969, Lennon told the other Beatles that he planned to leave the group, and agreed not to inform the media while the group renegotiated their recording contract. He was outraged when McCartney publicised his own departure on releasing his debut solo album in April 1970.

Lennon's own debut solo album, John Lennon/Plastic Ono Band (1970), was received with high praise. Stephen Thomas Erlewine at AllMusic: “a scathingly honest confessional work inspired by his and Ono's primal scream therapy. Lennon supported the album with an extensive interview with Rolling Stone, where he debunked many of the myths surrounding the Beatles.” The album featured the songs Mother, in which Lennon confronted his feelings of childhood rejection, and the Dylanesque Working Class Hero.

In protest at Britain's involvement in the Nigerian Civil War, its support of America in the Vietnam war and (jokingly) against the single Cold Turkey slipping down the charts, Lennon returned his MBE medal to the Queen, though this had no effect on his MBE status. He moved to Manhattan in 1971, where his criticism of the Vietnam War resulted in a lengthy attempt by Richard Nixon's administration to deport him, while some of his songs were adopted as anthems by the anti-war movement and the larger counterculture.

Lennon's next album, Imagine (1971), got a more guarded critical response. But the title song became his most famous post-Beatles track, although the lyrics offended religious groups. In December 1971, Lennon and Ono released Happy Xmas (War Is Over). The new year saw the Nixon administration take what it called a ‘strategic counter-measure’ against Lennon's anti-war and anti-Nixon propaganda, embarking on what would be a four-year attempt to deport him. While Lennon was recording Mind Games (1973), he and Ono decided to separate.

The ensuing 18-month period apart, which he later called his ‘lost weekend’, was spent in Los Angeles and New York in the company of May Pang. Lennon contributed I'm the Greatest to Starr's album Ringo (1973). Lennon then recorded the album Walls and Bridges (1974) with the #1 single Whatever Gets You thru the Night, featuring Elton John on backing vocals and piano. Lennon co-wrote Fame, David Bowie's first US number one, and provided guitar and backing vocals for the recording.

Lennon and Ono were reunited shortly afterwards, and he released Rock 'n' Roll (1975), an album of cover songs. Stand by Me, taken from the album and a US and UK hit, became his last single for five years. The same month, Elton John topped the charts with his cover of Lucy in the Sky with Diamonds, featuring Lennon on guitar and back-up vocals.

Lennon disengaged himself from the music business in 1975 to raise his second son Sean Lennon, who was born on John's 35th birthday in 1975. John wrote the song Beautiful Boy for Sean. Lennon took on the role of househusband, and gave all his attention to his family. He wrote Cookin' (In the Kitchen of Love) for Starr's Ringo's Rotogravure (1976), performing on the track in June in what would be his last recording session until 1980. He appeared in the film Fire in the Water (Peter Whitehead, 1977) with Nathalie Delon.

In 1980, John Lennon re-emerged with Ono with the single (Just Like) Starting Over and the album Double Fantasy (1980). Three weeks after the album’s release, on 8 December 1980, John Lennon was murdered. Mark David Chapman shot Lennon in the back four times at the entrance to his New York apartment. Within minutes after being shot, John Lennon was dead at age 40. He was cremated and Ono scattered his ashes in New York's Central Park, where the Strawberry Fields memorial was later created.

As of 2012, Lennon's solo album sales in the United States exceeded 14 million and, as writer, co-writer or performer, he is responsible for 25 number-one singles on the US Hot 100 chart. The cover of Rolling Stone issue featuring a nude Lennon hugging and kissing a fully clothed Yoko Ono taken by photographer Annie Leibovitz was voted the top magazine cover of the last 40 years by a panel of magazine editors, artists and designers chosen by the American Society of Magazine Editors. The photo was the cover of Rolling Stone's tribute to Lennon after his death. Ironically, the picture was taken on the last day of Lennon's life.

With George Harrison. Spanish postcard by Oscarcolor, no. 347.

British postcard.

British postcard by Statics, London, no. PC 38. Photo: Sipahloglu.

British postcard, no. MM 054. Photo: Immaginazione Stellare, Monaco.

John Lennon's final scenes from How I Won the War (1967). Source: bill55ted (YouTube).

Clip of Imagine. Source: John Lennon Music (YouTube).

Clip of Stand by Me. Source: Trevor Lombardi (YouTube).

Clip of Beautiful Boy. Source: mac3079b (YouTube).

Sources: Stephen Thomas Erlewine (AllMusic), Wikipedia and IMDb.

Yesterday has been announced that Christopher Lee has died on 7 June 2015. The British film actor is best known as Count Dracula, the bloodsucking vampire. But he created more unforgettable characters on screen, like Francisco Scaramanga in the James Bond film The Man with the Golden Gun (1974), Count Dooku in Star Wars: Episode II - Attack of the Clones (2002), Saruman in The Lord of the Rings film trilogy (2001–2003) and The Hobbit film trilogy (2012–2014), and the title figure in the Hammer Horror film The Mummy (1959). Lee has acted in nearly 230 films in a career spanning nearly 70 years.

German autograph card by Bravo. Photo: Christopher Lee as Dracula.

Charm School

Sir Christopher Frank Carandini Lee was born in 1922 in London, England. He came from an acting dynasty, his great-grandparents founded the first Australian opera company. His parents were Contessa Estelle Marie (Carandini di Sarzano) and Geoffrey Trollope Lee, a professional soldier. They divorced in 1926.

Later, while Lee was still a child, his mother married (and later divorced) the banker Harcourt George St.-Croix. After attending Wellington College from age 14 to 17, Lee worked as an office clerk in a couple of London shipping companies until 1941 when he enlisted in the Royal Air Force during World War II.

Following his release from military service, Lee joined the Rank Organisation in 1947, training as an actor in their Charm School and playing a number of bit parts in such films as the Gothic romance Corridor of Mirrors (Terence Young, 1948) with Eric Portman.

He made a brief appearance as a spear carrier in Laurence Olivier's Hamlet (1948). A few years later, he appeared in Captain Horatio Hornblower R.N. (Raoul Walsh, 1951) as a Spanish captain.

Lee had numerous parts in film and television throughout the 1950s. He also dubbed foreign films into English including Jacques Tati's Les Vacances de M. Hulot/Mr. Hulot's Holiday (1953).

Christopher Lee and Roger Moore in The Man with the Golden Gun (1974)

Dutch postcard by Loeb Uitgevers BV, Amsterdam, no. 5992109, 1985. Photo: Eon Productions / Gilrose Publications / Danjaq S.A. Publicity still for The Man with the Golden Gun (Guy Hamilton, 1974) with Roger Moore.

A blessing in disguise

Christopher Lee struggled to get work early in his career as a supporting actor because almost all the male stars were shorter than he. However, playing the monster in the Hammer film Frankenstein (Terence Fisher, 1957) proved to be a blessing in disguise.

The film was a success and the jumping-off point for Hammer, a small company which had been in production for a number of years, and now filled the void left by the American majors in the production of the horror film. Lee was signed on for future roles in Hammer productions. His deeply melodic basso voice, towering height and slender frame were perfect for imposing, menacing villains.

Lee often played contrasting roles with Peter Cushing in the Hammer films. Cushing was often the protagonist and Lee the villain, whether it be Van Helsing and Dracula respectively in Dracula/Horror of Dracula (Terence Fisher, 1958), or John Banning and Kharis the Mummy respectively in The Mummy (Terence Fisher, 1959).

Lee continued his role as Dracula in a number of Hammer sequels throughout the 1960s and into the early 1970s. He also co-starred with Cushing in The Hound of the Baskervilles (Terence Fisher, 1959), and made numerous appearances as Fu Manchu, most notably in the first of the series The Face of Fu Manchu (Don Sharp, 1965).

He also made a number of films in other European countries. With his own production company, Charlemagne Productions, Ltd., Lee made Nothing But the Night (Peter Sasdy, 1973) and To the Devil a Daughter (Peter Sykes, 1976) with Richard Widmark and Nastassja Kinski. Lee was tiring of his horror image and tried to widen his appeal by participating in several mainstream films, such as The Private Life of Sherlock Holmes (Billy Wilder, 1970), The Three Musketeers (Richard Lester, 1973), The Four Musketeers (Richard Lester, 1974), and the James Bond film The Man with the Golden Gun (Guy Hamilton, 1974) with Roger Moore.

In the late 1970s, Christopher Lee moved to Hollywood, where he remained a busy actor but made mostly unremarkable film and television appearances, and eventually moved back to England. The beginning of the new millennium relaunched his career to some degree, during which he has played Count Dooku in Star Wars: Episode II - Attack of the Clones (George Lucas, 2002) and as Saruman the White in the Lord of the Rings trilogy (Peter Jackson, 2001-2003).

Lee played Count Dooku again in Star Wars: Episode III - Revenge of the Sith (George Lucas, 2005) and as Johnny Depp's character's father in the Tim Burton film, Charlie and the Chocolate Factory (2005).

In 2001, he was created a Commander of the Order of the British Empire in recognition of his services to drama. He was created a Knight Bachelor in2009 in the Queen's Birthday Honours List for his services to drama and charity. In addition he was made a Commander of the Order of St John in 1997.

On 7 June 2015 Christopher Lee died of heart failure in London. He was 93. He had one child, Christina Erika Lee (1963) with his wife Birgit Kroencke Lee (Gitte Lee).

Trailer Dracula/Horror of Dracula (Terence Fisher, 1958). Source: MOVIECLIPS Classic Trailers (YouTube).

Trailer The Wicker Man (Robin Hardy, 1973). Source: MOVIECLIPS Classic Trailers (YouTube).

Trailer The Three Musketeers (Richard Lester, 1973). Source: MOVIECLIPS Classic Trailers (YouTube).

Trailer The Man with the Golden Gun (Guy Hamilton, 1974). Source: MOVIECLIPS Classic Trailers (YouTube).

Sources: Lyn Hammond and Sidhartha Shankar (IMDb), Wikipedia and IMDb.

The Italian silent melodrama L'Ombra/The Shadow (1923) was one of the final Diva films. The starring diva, Italia Almirante (Manzini) was directed by her husband, Mario Almirante. The film, based on a story by Dario Niccodemi, co-starred Alberto Collo, Liliana Ardea and Vittorio Pieri. Pieri had also appeared in the first film adaptation, L'Ombra (Mario Caserini, 1917) starring Vittoria Lepanto.

Italian postcard by Ed. Ballerini & Fratini, Firenze, no. 231. Photo: Alba Film. Publicity still for L'ombra (Mario Almirante, 1923). Caption: "In the garden of the villa of Gerardo and Berta".

Italian postcard by Ed. Ballerini & Fratini, Firenze, no. 232. Photo: Alba Film. Publicity still for L'ombra (Mario Almirante, 1923), with Italia Almirante Manzini as Berta, Alberto Collo as Gerardo and Vittorio Pieri as Berta's godfather Michele. Caption: "Berta: Don't look, you godfather! These are matters which don't concern you."

Italian postcard by Ed. Ballerini & Fratini, Firenze, no. 233. Photo: Alba Film. Publicity still for L'ombra (Mario Almirante). Caption: Morning strolls.

Italian postcard by Ed. Ballerini & Fratini, Firenze, no. 23?. Photo: Alba Film. Publicity still for L'ombra (Mario Almirante, 1923) with Liliana Ardea as Elena and Alberto Collo as Gerardo. Caption: "Berta's little friend and the daily painting lesson".

Italian postcard by Ed. Ballerini & Fratini, Firenze, no. 235. Photo: Alba Film. Publicity still for L'ombra (Mario Almirante, 1923), with Italia Almirante Manzini as Berta and Vittorio Pieri as Berta's godfather Michele. Caption: "Berta: Beware of the thorns, but don't ruin my roses".

Italian postcard by Ed. Ballerini & Fratini, Firenze, no. 236. Photo: Alba Film. Publicity still for L'ombra (Mario Almirante, 1923) with Italia Almirante as Berta and Liliana Ardea as Elena. Caption: "Confidential matters".

Italian postcard by Ed. Ballerini & Fratini, Firenze, no. 238. Photo: Alba Film. Publicity still for L'ombra (Mario Almirante, 1923). Caption: "Struck by paralysis, Berta (Italia Almirante) passed her days in tranquillity and suffering." The nurse was played by Rita D'Harcourt.

Italian postcard by Ed. Ballerini & Fratini, Firenze, no. 239. Photo: Alba Film. Publicity still for L'ombra (Mario Almirante, 1923). Caption: "Berta: Why, Gerardo, don't you recognize Elena? My little Elena?"Italia Almirante as Berta, Alberto Collo as Gerardo and Liliana Ardea as Elena.

Italian postcard by Ed. Ballerini & Fratini, Firenze, no. 240. Photo: Alba Film. Publicity still for L'ombra (Mario Almirante, 1923). Caption: "Berta: Gerardo, I am no more than a shadow in your life...."

Italian postcard by Ed. Ballerini & Fratini, Firenze, no. 241. Photo: Alba Film. Publicity still for L'ombra (Mario Almirante, 1923). Caption: "The sudden healing. Berta: Doctor! It seems as if I am tall... tall. My head spins! I am afraid!" The doctor was played by Domenico Marverti.

Italian postcard by Ed. Ballerini & Fratini, Firenze, no. 242. Photo: Alba Film. Publicity still for L'ombra (Mario Almirante, 1923). Caption: "In the new house of Gerardo. Elena: He is your real masterpiece! "Alberto Collo as Gerardo and Liliana Ardea as Elena.

Italian postcard by Ed. Ballerini & Fratini, Firenze, no. 243. Photo: Alba Film. Publicity still for L'ombra (Mario Almirante, 1923). Caption: "Berta: I am a friend, a relative of his Lordship. I want to make him a surprise."

Italian postcard by Ed. Ballerini & Fratini, Firenze, no. 244. Photo: Alba Film. Publicity still for L'ombra (Mario Almirante, 1923). Caption: "Berta [to Gerardo]: You shouldn't have done this! Raise another family... another home!"Italia Almirante as Berta, Liliana Ardea as Elena and Alberto Collo as Gerardo.

Italian postcard by Ed. Ballerini & Fratini, Firenze, no. 245. Photo: Alba Film. Publicity still for L'ombra (Mario Almirante, 1923). Caption: "Berta: Lord... return me my illness! Return me my cross, it felt so good, so good!"

Italian postcard by Ed. Ballerini & Fratini, Firenze, no. 246. Photo: Alba Film. Publicity still for L'ombra (Mario Almirante, 1923). Caption: "Berta: Doctor, this is a new case, very strange! A sick person who dies of her own healing."Italia Almirante as Berta, in the back Alberto Collo as Gerardo, who repents his bigamy. Extreme left godfather Michele (Vittorio Pieri), next to him the doctor (Domenico Marverti).

Italian postcard by Ed. Ballerini & Fratini, Firenze, no. 247. Photo: Alba Film. Publicity still for L'ombra (Mario Almirante, 1923). Caption: Berta: "The shadow is receding... disappearing from your life."Italia Almirante as Berta and Alberto Collo as Gerardo.

Italian postcard by Ed. Ballerini & Fratini, Firenze, no. 248. Photo: Alba Film. Publicity still for L'ombra (Mario Almirante, 1923), with Italia Almirante as Berta and Alberto Collo as Gerardo. Caption: "Berta: Poor little one! He won't realize to have changed mother." This image represents the final scene of the film.

Source: IMDb.

Blond Swedish pop singer and actress Bibi Johns (1929) was very popular in Europe and the USA during the 1950s. She appeared in several European musical films. In Germany, where she lived from 1954 on, she would become a cult star of the Schlager music. Today she is also known as a painter.

German postcard by Universum-Film Aktiengesellschaft (Ufa), Berlin-Tempelhof, no. CK-91. Sent by mail in Germany in 1962. Photo: Arthur Grimm.

German postcard by Kunst und Bild, Berlin-Charlottenburg, no. CD 1.

German postcard by UFA, Berlin-Tempelhof, no. CK-92. Photo: Arthur Grimm.

Chance of a Lifetime

Bibi Johns was born Gun Birgit Johnsson in Arboga, Sweden, in 1929. There, her father Bertil Johnsson held a trucking business and her mother Anna was a housewife.

During her school years she already performed as a singer under the name of Gun Bertilson. She debuted 13 years old, in a song competition named Children’s day. After finishing school she attended at the request of her parents the fashion trade school in Stockholm.

In 1947, she secretly applied for the group Varat Gäng (Our Team) that she had met years earlier during a concert in her hometown. Varat Gäng was a very popular group in the 1940s consisting of music-talented children teens, that toured around Sweden playing Swing music. She sang and played clarinet and guitar, until the group disbanded in 1948.

During that time she had acquired the stage name Bibbi Johnson. After a few minor appearances, she completed her education at the fashion trade school. Then she joined the trio Yvonne Modin as a guitarist. Finally she joined Carl-Henrik Norin’s jazz band as a vocalist, and recorded her first 78 rpm record in 1949. She was also singing in Thore Swanerud’s jazz band, and the vocal groups The Serenaders and The Metronomers.

In 1951 she made her debut in Germany as a soloist in the entertainment orchestra of the SDR in Stuttgart. Later that year she sang during the Week of light music. An aunt invited her to New York and in 1951, she went to the US on an immigration visa. She started to sing in New York night clubs, and was soon working all over the east US. It was at this point that she started to call herself Bibi Johns on stage.

In 1952, RCA Victor Records offered her a record contract through Gordon Jenkins who supported stars such as Louis Armstrong, the Andrews Sisters, and Dick Haymes. In perfect English she made recordings of The Night Is Filled With Echoes and Someone To Kiss Your Tears Away. In 1953 she won the TV competition Chance of a Lifetime. The price was 1000 dollars, which she spent on a trip back to Sweden to visit her father for his 50th Birthday.

German postcard by Ufa, Berlin-Tempelhof, no. FK 1647. Photo: T. v. Mindszenty / Central Europa Film / Europa Film. Publicity still for Ball im Savoy/Ball at the Savoy (Paul Martin, 1955).

German postcard by F.J. Rüdel, Hamburg-Bergedorf, no. 1313. Photo: Central-Europa / Europa-Film / Frederico. Publicity still for Ball im Savoy/Ball at the Savoy (Paul Martin, 1955) with Bully Buhlan.

German postcard by Ufa, Berlin-Tempelhof, no. FK 3638. Photo: Arthur Grimm / CCC-Film / Constantin Film.

German postcard by WS-Druck, Wanne-Eickel, no. 106. Photo: Hans Deppe-Film / Czerwonski. Publicity still for Tausend Melodien/Thousand Melodies (Hans Deppe, 1956).

Peter Alexander and Bibi Johns in Wehe, wenn sie losgelassen (1958)

German postcard by Kolibri-Verlag, Minden/Westf., no. 399. Photo: Arthur Grimm / CCC / Constantin. Publicity still for Wehe, wenn sie losgelassen/Beware when she is released (Géza von Cziffra, 1958) with Peter Alexander.

Bella Bimba

In Sweden Bibi Johns met the German music producer Nils Nobach, who invited her to Germany for a test recording for the Electrola label before she returned to the US. She recorded in German Bella Bimba, Little Rock/Bye Bye Baby and her first big hit Sehnsucht (Longing) (1953). That song is now one of the evergreens of the Schlager (the German pop).

In the same year she made her first film appearance in the lead of the Swedish production Flicka med Melodie/A Girl With a Melody (Martin Söderhjelm, 1954). That year she also appeared in the German musical comedy An jedem Finger zehn/At Every Finger One (Erik Ode, 1954) with Germaine Damar.

She shuttled several times between Europe and the US. From 1954 she also had her permanent residence in Germany. In fact, she was the first in a row of Scandinavian Schlager singers that succeeded in Germany from the late 1950s to early 1970s. Her hits included Aber nachts in der Bar (But at Night in the Bar), Zwei Herzen im Mai (Two Hearts in May), and Die Gypsy Band (The Gypsy Band).

Occasionally Bibi visited Sweden to record songs, e.g. a Swedish version of Bella Bimba. However, she had her biggest audience in West Germany, where she was the star of the 1950s. She made several films including Ball im Savoy/Ball at Savoy (Paul Martin, 1955) starring Rudolf Prack, the comedy Ich und meine Schwiegersöhne/I and my sons-in-law (Georg Jacoby, 1956) with Grethe Weise, and Musikparade/Music Parade (Géza von Cziffra, 1956) with Peter Alexander.

She also sang with Erwin Lehn’s Südfunk dance orchestra in Stuttgart. In 1956 when the first German charts were published, Bibi Johns did not celebrate many great successes anymore. That year she participated at Grand Prix Eurovision 1956, the German pre-selection for the European Song Contest, where Lys Assia would be the winner.

In 1957 she moved to Polydor, for which she recorded duets with Peter Alexander, such as the hit Schon wieder mal (Again). She also co-starred with him in the musical comedies Liebe, Jazz und Übermut/Love, Jazz and High Spirits (Erik Ode, 1957) and Wehe, wenn sie losgelassen/Beware, when she's released(Géza von Cziffra, 1958).

German postcard by Filmbilder-Vertrieb Ernst Freihoff, Essen, no. 239. Retail price: 10 Pfg. Photo: Arthur Grimm.

German postcard by Filmbilder-Vertrieb Ernst Freihoff, Essen, no. 153. Photo: Arthur Grimm.

German postcard by Kolibri-Verlag G.m.bH., Minden (Westf.), no. D 12. Photo: Real / Europa Film. Publicity still for Ich und meine Schwiegersöhne/I and my sons-in-law (Georg Jacoby, 1956).

German postcard by WS-Druck, Wanne-Eickel. Photo: Hans Deppe-Film / Czerwonski.

Cult Star of the Schlager

In the early 1960s, the sales of Bibi Johns’ records subsided somewhat. She returned to Sweden to produce her own stage shows, for tours in the folk parks. For the first time she now had hit singles in her native country, e.g. Leka med elden, Bröllopet and Bibi's Bossa Nova.

In Germany she was frequently seen in various television shows. She had her own special Kennen Sie Miss Johns/Have You Met Miss Johns? She was directed by her then-husband Michael Pfleghar in the popular TV-film Zu jung um blond zu sein/Too Young To Be Blond (Michael Pfleghar, 1961) starring the Kessler twins. Another popular TV-film was Paris ist eine Reise wert/Paris is Worth a Trip (Paul Martin, 1966) with Fernandel and Gus Backus.

In 1966 Bibi Johns also competed at the Deutsche Schlager-Festival in Baden-Baden, but she didn’t reach the final. In the following years she appeared often on TV. In 1970 she worked in London as a singer and hostess at the Rolf Harris Show, a coproduction of the German ZDF and the British BBC, and in 1971 she went on tour with pop singer Tom Jones. One of her last TV appearances was in Der Mann am Klavier/The Man at the Piano (Ekkehard Böhmer, 1985) with Gilbert Bécaud. Till in the 1990s she starred in numerous nostalgia shows, and became one of the cult stars of the German Schlager.

In 1975 she decided to try painting, and started to study fine arts in Munich. Since then, she has made a career as an artist, exhibiting her paintings around Germany. Bibi Johns was married twice. In the early 1950s she was briefly married to an American. Her second husband was the film director Michael Pfleghar (1960-1962). Then she lived for several years with the pianist Peter Jacques, with whom she worked in the musical Das Schlüssel-Karussell (The Key Carousel). Between 1974 and ca. 1990 the composer Rob Pronk was her partner and since 1997 she has lived with the 40 years younger classic pianist Alex Racic. They live in Pullach near München (Munich).

German autograph card. Photo: Dörte Gröning.

Bibi Johns sings Das mach ich mit musik in Musikparade 1956 (Géza von Cziffra, 1956). Source: Della Street (YouTube).

Bibi Johns sing Kannst du schon den Calypso (1957). Source: Frit51261 (YouTube).

Bibi Johns and Peter Alexander sing Vergiß mich nicht so schnell in Liebe, Jazz und Übermut/Love, Jazz and High Spirits (Erik Ode, 1957). Source: Aschenrind (YouTube).

Source: Bibi Johns Website, Stephanie D’heil (Steffi-line - German), Greg Adams (AllMusic), Wikipedia (German), and IMDb.

Actress Ally Kolberg or Ally Kay had a brief career in the German silent cinema. During the late 1910s and early 1920s, she appeared in 16 German films and one Swedish production.

German postcard by Rotophot in the Film Sterne series, Berlin, no. 119/1. Photo: Becker & Maass.

German postcard by Rotophot in the Film Sterne series, Berlin, no. 119/5. Photo: Becker & Maass. Collection: Didier Hanson.

Bubi-comedies

Little is known about Ally Kolberg. During the First World War, she joined the German cinema and appeared in 17 films, often directed by female directors.

Her first film appearance was in the short comedy Einer für drei/One for Three (Hanna Henning, 1916) with Joseph Römer in his popular role as Bubi.

Next she appeared in another episode of the Bubi-series, Bubi ist eifersüchtig/Bubi is jealous (Hanna Henning, 1916).

This was followed up with roles in short films like Mutter/Mother (Hanna Henning, 1917) with Olga Engl, Arme kleine Helga/Poor little Helga (Hanna Henning, 1918) opposite Kurt Vespermann, Und hätte der Liebe nicht/And have not charity (Gertrud Scholz, 1918) with Johannes Riemann, and another Bubi-comedy, Weil ich dich liebe/Because I love you (Hanna Hening, 1918).

German postcard by Ross Verlag, Berlin, no. 253, 1919-1924. Photo: Ernst Schneider.

German postcard by Photochemie, Berlin, no. K. 2954. Photo: Ernst Schneider.

Fröken Ally?

In 1920, Ally Kolberg played in Die Augen der Maske/The eyes of the mask (Karl Gerhardt, 1920) opposite Lil Dagover, the Austrian-German production Das vierte Gebot/The Fourth Commandment (Richard Oswald, 1920), and Das Zeichen des Malayen/The Mark of the Malays (Carl Heinz Boese, 1920).

She was also credited as Ally Kay in films. Her later film roles were in Wem nie durch Liebe Leid geschah/Who never came through heartache (Heinz Schall, 1922) with Margit Barnay, and Die Spitzen der Gesellschaft/The leaders of society (Paul Heidemann, 1923).

In the Swedish production Fröken Fob/Miss Fob (Elis Ellis, 1923), she was credited as Ally Kay-Bing. The film, starring Renée Björling, was shot in Berlin studios, rented for this production

Was Ally Kolberg married now and did she retire from the film business to take care of her family? Possibly in Sweden?

German postcard by Ross Verlag, Berlin, no. 251. Photo: Ernst Schneider.

German postcard by Ross Verlag, Berlin, no. 255. Photo: Ernst Schneider.

Sources: Thomas Staedeli (Cyranos), Filmportal.de and IMDb.

Handsome, robust-looking Henri Vidal (1919-1959) was a wildly popular French leading man who played both heroes and heels opposite incredible beauties, including his wife Michèle Morgan. His thriving film career was cut short by a fatal heart attack at age 40.

French postcard, no. 952.

French postcard by Editions P.I., La Garenne-Colombes, no. 22. Photo: Roger Carles.

French postcard by Editions Votre Vedette (EVV), no. 166. Photo: Aldo Graziati.

Athletic Prowess

Henri Vidal was born in Clermont-Ferrand (some sources say in Royat), France, in 1919.

He started his acting acteer in small theatres, and was noted for his handsomeness and athletic prowess. When he took part in the beauty contest Apollon de l'année 1939 (Apollo of the Year 1939) he was discovered by Édith Piaf.

Vidal made his film debut in Montmartre-sur-Seine (Georges Lacombe, 1941) at the side of Piaf and Jean-Louis Barrault. The following years he appeared in numerous French films, including Les Maudits/The Damned (René Clément, 1947) with Marcel Dalio.

Nowadays he is best remembered for an Italian film, the Roman spectacle Fabiola (Alessandro Blasetti, 1949). At AllMovie, Hal Erickson writes: "After several years of wartime austerity, the Italian film industry returned to spectacle with Fabiola. (...) Originally released in 1949 at a length of 183 minutes, the French/Italian co-production was distributed to the U.S. two years later in a 96-minute version, retaining the action highlights but cutting the plot footage to incomprehensible ribbons."

French actress Michèle Morgan plays the title role in Fabiola, the daughter of a Roman aristocrat (Michel Simon) during the takeover by Emperor Constantine. Fabiola is irresistibly drawn to a Roman gladiator (Vidal), who is secretly working on behalf of the Christian Constantine. When the shooting of the film was finished the beautiful couple married.

French postcard by Editions P.I., Paris, no. 99. Photo: Pathé-Cinéma.

French postcard by Editions Chantal, Rueil, no. 12. Photo: Vog.

French postcard by Editions du Globe (EDUG), Paris, no. 84. Photo: Studio Harcourt.

French postcard by Editions O.P., Paris, no. 24. Photo: Studio Harcourt.

French postcard by Editions du Globe (EDUG), Paris, no. 761. Photo: Studio Harcourt.

Charmant Garçon

After his breakthrough Henri Vidal starred in several other films with Michèle Morgan, like La Belle que voilà/Here Is the Beauty (Jean-Paul Le Chanois, 1950), L'Étrange Madame X/The Strange Madame X (Jean Gremillon, 1951) and Napoléon (Sacha Guitry, 1955).

Other successful films in which he appeared were Orient Express (Carlo Ludovico Bragaglia, 1954), and Porte des Lilas (René Clair, 1957) opposite Pierre Brasseur.

Vidal starred opposite sex kitten Brigitte Bardotin the comedies Une parisienne/La parisienne (Michel Boisrond, 1957) and Voulez-vous danser avec moi?/Come Dance With Me! (Michel Boisrond, 1959). Other beauties with whom he was paired were Sophia Lorenin Attila, Flagello di Dio/Attila (Pietro Francisci, 1954), Marina Vlady in the film noir Les Salauds Vont En Enfer/The Wicked Go to Hell (Robert Hossein, 1955), Mylène Démongeotin Sois Belle et Tais Toi/Be Beautiful but Shut Up (Marc Allégret, 1957), Zizi Jeanmaire in Charmants Garcons/Charming Boys (Henri Decoin, 1957) and Romy Schneiderin Ein Engel auf Erden/Angel on Earth (Géza von Radványi, 1959).

Depressions drove Vidal into a drugs habit. He died of a heart attack in 1959, in Paris. Between 1941 and 1959 he had appeared in 36 films. His last film was La Bête à l'affût/Beast at Bay (Pierre Chenal, 1959) with Michel Piccoliand Françoise Arnoul.

Henri Vidal was married twice, first to Michèle Cordoue (1943-1946) (divorced) and the second time to Michèle Morgan(1950-1959).

French postcard.

French postcard by Editions P.I., Paris, no. 3 7 G. Presented by les Carbones Kores 'Carboplane'. Photo: Sam Lévin.

French postcard by Editions P.I., Paris, no. 1046. Photo: Sam Lévin.

French postcard by Editions du Globe (EDUG), no. 123. Photo: Teddy Piaz, Paris.

German postcard by Kolibri-Verlag. Photo: Prisma.

Sources: Hal Erickson (AllMovie), Sandra Brennan (AllMovie), Wikipedia and IMDb.

Tall and slim American actor Anthony 'Tony' Perkins (1932-1992) is best known for his boyish good looks and his nervous, sweet but often unbalanced characters. He often appeared in European films by noted directors as Anatole Litvak, Claude Chabrol and George Sluizer. Unforgettable is his double role in Alfred Hitchcock's classic thriller Psycho (1960).

Italian promotion card by Bimospa, Roma. Photo: RCA Italiana. Promotion card for the records of Tony Perkins like First Romance and The Prettiest Girl in School.

French postcard by E.D.U.G. Photo: Sam Lévin.

French postcard by E.D.U.G., no. 192.

Norman Bates

Anthony Perkins was born in 1932 in New York City to Janet Esselstyn (Rane) and Osgood Perkins, an actor of both stage and film. His paternal great-grandfather was noted engraver Andrew Varick Stout Anthony. He was five when his father died.

Perkins decided to follow in his father's footsteps when, at age 15, he became a member of the Actor's Equity. He attended the Brooks School, the Browne & Nichols School, Columbia University and Rollins College. Taking the stage in summer stock, the young and shy actor embraced even the more unglamorous aspects of stage work and worked tirelessly. Subsequent performances in such Rollins College productions as The Importance of Being Ernest helped him to develop the necessary skills.

He relocated to Hollywood and made his screen debut in The Actress (George Cukor, 1953) featuring Jean Simmons. In the TV production Joey, he crooned A Little Love Goes a Long, Long Way and was signed to Epic on its strength. An album followed, Tony Perkins, arranged by vocal-music heavyweight Marty Paich and Tony had a hit with Moonlight Swim (1957). He released two more albums for RCA. John Bush at AllMusic: "Instead of the usual, light pop/rock angled at the teen market, Perkins' LPs during 1957-1958 cast him as an equally sensitive jazz singer, more Chet Baker than Ricky Nelson." However, Perkins redirected his focus to acting and never released another record.

He was nominated for a Best Supporting Actor Oscar for his second film, the Civil War drama Friendly Persuasion (William Wyler, 1956). The tall (6'2", 188 cm) Perkins also portrayed the troubled former Boston Red Sox baseball player Jimmy Piersall in the true story Fear Strikes Out (Robert Mulligan, 1957).

Perkins also acted successfully on stage. He was nominated twice for Broadway's Tony Award: in 1958, as Best Actor (Dramatic) for Look Homeward, Angel, and in 1960, as Best Actor (Musical) for Greenwillow. During this time he also co-starred in the films Desire Under the Elms (Delbert Mann, 1958) with Sophia Loren, and the romantic comedy Tall Story (Joshua Logan, 1960) opposite Jane Fonda in her first screen role.

His most memorable role to date would be Norman Bates in Psycho (Alfred Hitchcock, 1960). His portrayal of the homicidal owner of the Bates Motel made filmgoers reluctant to shower alone for decades to come. Psycho was a critical and commercial success, and gained Perkins international fame for his performance as the gender-bending sociopath. His performance gained him the Best Actor Award from the International Board of Motion Picture Reviewers. Later he played Norman Bates again in three sequels.

German postcard by ISV, no. B 26. Photo: MGM. Publicity still for Green Mansions (Mel Ferrer, 1959).

French postcard by Editions P.I., Paris, no. 777. Photo: Paramount.

Dutch postcard by N.V. v.h. Weenenk & Snel, Baarn, no. 861.

Split Image

In 1961, Anthony Perkins received considerable critical acclaim for his performance in the film Aimez-vous Brahms?/Goodbye Again (Anatole Litvak, 1961), opposite Ingrid Bergman, a performance which won him the Best Actor Award at the 1961 Cannes Film Festival. After that came a successful career in Europe, including the role of Joseph K. in the film adaptation of Franz Kafka's The Trial (Orson Welles, 1962).

His main roles include a disturbed young murderer in Pretty Poison (Noel Black, 1968), Chaplain Tappman in Catch-22 (Mike Nichols, 1970), the victim's secretary and translator in the British mystery film Murder on the Orient Express (Sidney Lumet, 1974) starring Albert Finney as Hercule Poirot, and the Dutch film Twee vrouwen/Twice of woman (George Sluizer, 1979).

Anthony Perkins was into psychoanalysis, and was treated by Dr. Mildren Newman in New York, starting in the early 1950s and continuing into the late 1970s. He was a very shy actor, especially in women's company. He had his first intimate heterosexual experience at the age of 39 while working on the film The Life and Times of Judge Roy Bean (John Milius1972) with an actress who also appeared in the film. Perkins declined to identify the actress, but Victoria Principal confirmed it was her in a People magazine article about Perkins.

In 1973, Perkins married photographer Berinthia 'Berry' Berenson. Their children are Oz Perkins (born 1974) and Elvis Perkins (born 1976). As a huge fan of Elvis Presley, Perkins named his second son after his idol. Elvis Perkins is now a musician.

Anthony Perkins became an ordained minister and performed the marriage of director Ken Russell to his second wife, Vivian Jolly, in 1983. A year later, he made headlines when he was arrested at London's Heathrow Airport for possession of eight grams of marijuana and three spots of LSD.

During 1990, he got a blood sample taken due to a palsy on the side of his face. The National Enquirer illegally had his blood sample tested for the AIDS virus, and found out that it was positive. Later that year, The National Enquirer wrote a story about his battle with AIDS, but the ironic thing was that he only found out that he was HIV positive from this article. He suspected that he probably was, but he never checked for it before the article was written.

In 1992, Anthony Perkins died in his Hollywood home of pneumonia as a complication of AIDS. On 11 September 2001, his widow and mother of his two sons, Berry Berenson was one of the 58 victims on AA-11 out of Boston that terrorists crashed into the World Trade Center.

Charles Winecoff's unauthorized biography Anthony Perkins: Split Image (1996) illuminated Perkins' early life, his bisexuality, his later drug use and life with his family. According to Winecoff, Perkins had affairs with Christopher Makos, actor Tab Hunter, dancer Rudolf Nureyev, composer/lyricist Stephen Sondheim, actor Nick Adams, and dancer-choreographer Grover Dale prior to marrying Berenson.

Trailer Psycho (1960). Source: Ageless Trailers (YouTube).

Trailer The Trial (1962). Source: Cinema : 7ème art (YouTube).

Scene from La décade prodigieuse/Ten Days' Wonder (Claude Chabriol, 1971) with Michel Piccoli, Orson Welles, Marlène Jobert and a nude Perkins. Source: Mona Fuchs (YouTube).

Scene from Twee vrouwen/Twice a Woman (1979), starring Bibi Andersson. Source: Nut01 (YouTube).

Sources: John Bush (AllMusic), Jason Buchanan (AllMovie), Tony R. Vario (IMDb), Wikipedia and IMDb.