Bufera (1926)

October 13, 2015, 10:00 pm

≫ Next: Viktor Staal

≪ Previous: Dolly Bouwmeester

$

0

0

In the silent Italian mountain drama Bufera/The Storm (Wladimiro De Liguoro, 1926), Rina De Liguoro plays a woman seduced and abandoned by a rude mountain man. He leaves her with a child. When finally her life seems to retake thanks to another, kinder man, the first one reappears. Luckily a mountain storm swallows the inconvenient intruder.


Italian postcard by Ed. G.B. Falci, Milano, no. 373. Photo: Rina De Liguoro in Bufera/The Storm (Wladimiro De Liguoro, 1926).


Italian postcard by Ed. G.B. Falci, Milano, no. 377. Photo: Rina De Liguoro and Celio Bucchi in Bufera/The Storm (Wladimiro De Liguoro, 1926).


Italian postcard by Ed. G.B. Falci, Milano, no. 378. Photo: Rina De Liguoro and Celio Bucchi in Bufera/The Storm (Wladimiro De Liguoro, 1926).

Glittering Career

The star of Bufera was Rina De Liguoro (1892-1966), the last diva of the Italian silent cinema. She had her breakthrough in 1924 as the sensual, untamed Roman empress Messalina, and the beautiful countess continued her glittering career in such epics as Quo Vadis (1924), Casanova (1927) and Cecil B. De Mille's notorious Madam Satan (1930).

Her co-star was the athletic Celio Bucchi (1886-1964), an Italian actor who starred during the 1920s in adventure films like La congiura di San Marco/The conspiracy of San Marco (1924). Later he became a nameless extra and warehouse manager of a studio in Turin.



Italian postcard by Ed. G.B. Falci, Milano, no. 388. Photo: Rina De Liguoro and Celio Bucchi in Bufera (Wladimiro De Liguoro, 1926).


Italian postcard by Ed. G.B. Falci, Milano, no. 389. Photo: Rina De Liguoro and Celio Bucchi in Bufera/The Storm (Wladimiro De Liguoro, 1926).


Italian postcard by G.B. Falci Editore, Milano, no. 393. Photo: publicity still for Bufera/Storm (Wladimiro De Liguoro, 1926).

Source: IMDb.

---

Viktor Staal

October 14, 2015, 10:00 pm

≫ Next: EFSP's Dazzling Dozen: A Star's Best Friend

≪ Previous: Bufera (1926)

$

0

0

Good looking Austrian actor Viktor Staal (1909-1982) was the nice, a bit wooden star of many films of the Third Reich. Very popular were the two films in which he played the romantic interest of Zarah Leander.


German postcard by Film-Foto-Verlag, no. G 170. Photo: Baumann / Ufa.


German postcard by Film-Foto-Verlag, no. G 115. Photo: Binz / Ufa.


German postcard by Film-Foto-Verlag, no. G 214, 1941-1944. Photo: Baumann / Ufa.

Big, Blond and Blue-eyed

Viktor Staal was born Rudolf Viktor Stiaßny in Frankstadt, Austria-Hungary (now Franstat pod Radhostem, Czech Republic) in 1909. He attended acting classes in Vienna and got his first engagements at small theatres. Later he acted at the Volkstheater Wien where he had his breakthrough as an actor.

He made his film debut in 1935 in a bit part in the operetta Eva/Eva, the Factory Girl (Johannes Riemann, 1935) starring Magda Schneider. He also played small roles in such films as Alles für die Firma/Everything For the Firm (Rudolf Meinert, 1935) with Felix Bressart, and Das Einmaleins der Liebe/Love's Arithmetic (Carl Hoffmann, 1935) with Luise Ullrich.

In 1936 he played his first leading role opposite Anny Ondra in the adventure Donogoo Tonka (Reinhold Schünzel, 1936). This Austrian-German coproduction brought him to the Ufa studio in Berlin. Ufa offered the big, blond and blue-eyed Austrian a contract, and during the next years Staal became a popular Ufa star with successful films like Waldwinter/Winter in the Woods (Fritz Peter Buch, 1936), Ein Mädel vom Ballett/A Girl from the Chorus (Carl Lamac, 1937) with Anny Ondra, and Brillanten/Rhinestones (Eduard von Borsody, 1937).

In seven films, he appeared opposite Hansi Knoteck, including Waldwinter (1936), Brillanten (1937), Ritt in die Freiheit/Ride to Freedom (Karl Hartl, 1937), the comedy Eine Nacht im Mai/A Night in May (Georg Jacoby, 1938) with Marika Rökk, and Gewitter im Mai/Storms in May (Hans Deppe, 1938). Knoteck would become his wife in 1940.

A huge hit was the romantic drama Zu neuen Ufern/To New Shores (Detlef Sierck/Douglas Sirk, 1937), in which he starred opposite Zarah Leander. Other popular films were the musical comedy Capriccio (Karl Ritter, 1938) starring Lilian Harvey, and the romantic drama Umwege zum Glück/Detours To Happiness (Fritz Peter Buch, 1939) with Lil Dagover.


German postcard by Ross Verlag, no. 9495/1, 1935-1936. Photo: Ufa.


German postcard by Film-Foto-Verlag, no. A 3839/1, 1941-1944. Photo: Baumann / Ufa.


German postcard by Ross Verlag, no. A 2260/1, 1939-1940. Photo: Baumann / Ufa. Publicity still for Umwege zum Glück/Detours to happiness (Fritz Peter Buch, 1939) with Lil Dagover.


Big card by Ross Verlag. Photo: Hämmerer / Ufa. Publicity still for Frauen für Golden Hill/Women for Golden Hill (Erich Waschneck, 1938) with Kirsten Heiberg.

Great Box-Office Success

During World War II, Viktor Staal starred again with Zarah Leander in the slick romance Die grosse Liebe/The Great Love (Rolf Hansen, 1942) which became one of the greatest box office successes of the cinema of the Third Reich. He also played in productions like Zwielicht/Twilight (Rudolf van der Noss, 1940), the very funny musical comedy Hab' mich Lieb/Make Love To Me (Harald Braun, 1942) with Marika Rökk, the Henrik Ibsen adaptation Nora (Harald Braun, 1944), and the crime drama Via Mala (Josef von Báky, 1944-1948).

The original version of Via Mala was finished in March, 1944, but the propaganda ministry required director Von Baky to redo the ending. The censor accepted the film in March 1945, but changed his mind ten days later. Its official premiere was delayed until 16 January 1948.

After the war, Staal first worked on stage again at the Theater am Schiffbauerdamm in Berlin. During the war he had not appeared in notorious Nazi propaganda films so he was allowed to go on from his earlier successes in the film business, and would appear in 39 more films till 1977. He was still much in demand as the good-looking lover or husband in such films as Zwischen gestern und morgen/Between Yesterday and Tomorrow (Harald Braun, 1947) starring Hildegard Knef, Mathilde Möhring (Rolf Hansen, 1950) featuring Heidemarie Hatheyer, and Haus des Lebens/House of Life (Karl Hartl, 1952) with Cornell Borchers.

He grew out of the part though and played different roles in the thriller Spion für Deutschland/Spy for Germany (Werner Klingler, 1956) with Martin Held, the WW II drama Der Fuchs von Paris/The Fox of Paris (Paul May, 1957), and as Kara Ben Nemsi in the Karl May adaptation Die Sklavenkarawane/The Caravan of Slaves (Georg Marischka, Ramon Torrado, 1958).

When his film career dropped off he worked mainly for TV, such as in the well known series Landarzt Dr. Brock/Country Doctor Dr. Brock (1967-1969) with Rudolph Prack. To his last films belong Wilde Wasser/Wild Waters (Rudolf Schündler, 1962) with Marianne Hold, Der Jäger von Fall/The Hunter of Fall (Harald Reinl, 1974), and Die Standarte/The Standard (Ottokar Runze, 1977) with Jon Finch and Peter Cushing.

Viktor Staal passed away in 1982 in München (Munich), Germany. He and Hansi Knoteck had a son, Hannes (1942), who became an architect.


German postcard by Film-Foto-Verlag, no. A 3468/1, 1941-1944. Photo: Binz / Ufa.


German postcard by Film-Foto-Verlag, no. A 3569/1, 1941-1944. Photo: Binz / Ufa.


German postcard by Film-Foto-Verlag, no. A 3664/1, 1941-1944. Photo: Baumann / Ufa.


German postcard by F.B.Z. Photo: Binz.


German postcard by Druck und Verlag Photo Kitt, München, no. 517. Photo: Rotzinger.

Sources: Stephanie D'heil (Steffi-Line) (German), Thomas Staedeli (Cyranos), Filmportal.de (German), Wikipedia and IMDb.

EFSP's Dazzling Dozen: A Star's Best Friend

October 15, 2015, 10:00 pm

≫ Next: Imported from the USA: Elizabeth Taylor

≪ Previous: Viktor Staal

$

0

0

New series alert! During our trip to the Pordenone Silent Film Festival earlier this month, we did a post on twelve silent cowboys. We hope you liked the idea, because we did. We already imagined dozens of variations - some wild and crazy. But we start this series, which we created especially for Postcard Friendship Friday, with twelve of our favourite postcards of stars with their dogs.


Our Gang. German postcard by Ross Verlag, no. 4356/1, 1929-1930. Photo: Metro-Goldwyn-Mayer.


Truus van Aalten. German postcard by Ross Verlag, no. 4184/1, 1929-1930. Photo: Atelier Binder, Berlin.


Harry Piel in Sein bester Freund (1929). German postcard by Ross Verlag, Berlin, no. 4587/1, 1929-1930. Photo: Ariel Film.


Jenny Jugo. German postcard by Ross Verlag, no. 6156/3, 1931-1932. Photo: Atelier Binder, Berlin.


Gretl Theimer. German postcard by Ross Verlag, no. 7441/3, 1932-1933. Photo: Atelier Binder, Berlin.


Dave and Dusty. British postcard by Raphael Tuck & Sons. Photo: Pathé Pictorial. Publicity still for Dave and Dusty (1946-1949), a series of short British films chronicling the friendship between a young boy and his shaggy dog. The two friends get into trouble and have various adventures, meeting a host of colourful characters along the way. Raphael Tuck & Sons published a series of black and white postcards of the popular duo, apparently in aid of The Tailwaggers animal charity.


Alice & Ellen Kessler. German postcard by Netter's Star Verlag, Berlin.


Mehdi El Glaoui. French postcard by Editions d'art Yvon, Paris, no. 6. Photo: RTF / Gaumont. Publicity still for the film Sébastien parmi les hommes (Cécile Aubry, 1968). This is Sébastien and his dog Belle. They were the main characters in the French TV series Belle et Sébastien/Belle and Sebastian (1965) and its sequels Sébastien parmi les hommes (1968) and Sébastien et la Mary-Morgane (1970). The three series were also edited into feature films. Director Cécile Aubry was in the late 1940s and 1950s a shining star of the French cinema. The cute star of her series, Mehdi El Glaoui, was Aubry's own son from her marriage to the pasha of Marrakesh. Belle was played by the dog Yalov.


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


Darry Cowl. French postcard by Ed. Borde, Bal, no. 106. Photo: Wiezniak / Philips.


Jean Rochefort. East-German postcard by VEB Progress Film-Vertrieb, Berlin, no. 23/71, 1971. Photo: Unifrance-Film.


Ernst Verebes. Belgian postcard by S.A. Cacao et Chocolat Kivou, Vilvo[o]rde, Belgium. For either a late silent or early sound film.

This is a post for Postcard Friendship Friday, hosted by Beth at the blog The Best Hearts are Crunchy. You can visit her by clicking on the button below.

Imported from the USA: Elizabeth Taylor

October 16, 2015, 10:00 pm

≫ Next: Renée Björling

≪ Previous: EFSP's Dazzling Dozen: A Star's Best Friend

$

0

0

British-American actress Elizabeth Taylor (1932-2011) began as a Hollywood child star. As an adult she came to be known for her acting talent and beauty. She had a much publicised private life, including eight marriages and several near death experiences. Taylor was considered one of the great actresses of Hollywood's Golden Age, but she also made several films in Europe.


French postcard by E.D.U.G., no. 98.


German postcard by Krüger, no. 902/20.


French postcard by E.D.U.G., no. 37. Photo: publicity still for Cat on a Hot Tin Roof (Richard Brooks, 1958).

A dual citizen

Elizabeth Rosemond Taylor was born in 1932 in Hampstead Garden, a northwestern suburb of London. She was the daughter of Francis Lenn Taylor and Sara Sothern, who were United States citizens residing in England. Her father was an art dealer, and her mother was a former stage actress. So Liz was a dual citizen of the United Kingdom and the United States, born British through her birth on British soil and a US citizen through her parents.

At the age of three, Taylor began taking ballet lessons. Shortly before the beginning of World War II, her parents decided to return to the United States. They settled in Los Angeles, California, where her father established a new art gallery, which included many paintings he shipped from England. The gallery soon attracted numerous Hollywood celebrities who appreciated its modern European paintings.

Universal Pictures gave the little, but already breathtakingly beautiful Taylor a seven-year contract, and only nine, Elizabeth appeared in her first film, There's One Born Every Minute (Harold Young, 1942). After less than a year, however, the studio fired Taylor for unknown reasons. MGM was searching for an English actress for Lassie Come Home (Fred M. Wilcox, 1943) with child-star Roddy McDowall. Taylor received the role and was offered a long-term contract.

Her first assignment was a loan-out to 20th Century Fox for a film version of the Charlotte Brontë novel Jane Eyre (Robert Stevenson, 1943) with Orson Welles. Taylor returned to England to appear in The White Cliffs of Dover (Clarence Brown, 1944). Taylor's persistence in seeking the role of Velvet Brown in MGM's National Velvet (Clarence Brown, 1944) made her a star at the age of 12. Her character was a young girl, training her beloved horse to win the Grand National. The film costarred Mickey Rooney and English newcomer Angela Lansbury,and became a great success.

Next, she was cast in another animal film, Courage of Lassie (Fred M. Wilcox, 1946). The film's success led to another contract for Taylor paying her $750 per week. Her roles as the neurotic Mary Skinner in a loan-out to Warner Brothers'Life With Father (Michael Curtiz, 1947), Cynthia Bishop in Cynthia (Robert Z. Leonard, 1947), Carol Pringle in A Date with Judy (Richard Thorpe, 1948), and Susan Prackett in Julia Misbehaves (Jack Conway, 1948) were all successful. Taylor earned a reputation as a consistently successful adolescent actress, with a promising career. Her portrayal of Amy in the American classic Little Women (Mervyn LeRoy, 1949) was her last adolescent role.


Dutch postcard. Photo: MGM.


Dutch postcard. Photo: MGM.


French postcard by Editions du Globe, no. 524. Photo: Warner Bros.

An easy transition to adult roles

In October 1948, Elizabeth Taylor sailed to England to film Conspirator (1949). Taylor made an easy transition to adult roles. Conspirator failed at the box office, but 16-year-old Taylor's portrayal of a 21-year-old debutante who unknowingly marries a communist spy, was praised by critics for her first adult lead in a film. Her first box office success in an adult role came as Kay Banks in the comedy Father of the Bride (Vincente Minnelli, 1950), alongside Spencer Tracy. The film spawned a sequel, Father's Little Dividend (Vincente Minnelli, 1951), which also did well at the box office, but it would be Taylor's next picture that would set the course for her career as a dramatic actress.

For her performance in A Place in the Sun (George Stevens, 1951), Taylor was hailed. She played Angela Vickers, a spoiled socialite who comes between George Eastman (Montgomery Clift) and his poor, pregnant factory-working girlfriend Alice Tripp (Shelley Winters). The film was based on Theodore Dreiser's novel An American Tragedy. Critic A.H. Weiler wrote in The New York Times‍: "Elizabeth's delineation of the rich and beauteous Angela is the top effort of her career".

After some disappointingly run-of-the-mill films, a more substantial role followed opposite Rock Hudson and James Dean in the epic Giant (George Stevens, 1956). Taylor was nominated for an Academy Award for Best Actress four years in a row for Raintree County (Edward Dmytryk, 1957) opposite Montgomery Clift; Cat on a Hot Tin Roof (Richard Brooks, 1958) opposite Paul Newman; Suddenly, Last Summer (Joseph L. Mankiewicz, 1959) with Montgomery Clift and Katharine Hepburn; and finally winning for BUtterfield 8 (Daniel Mann, 1960). The film co-starred Laurence Harvey and her then-husband Eddie Fisher. Suddenly, Last Summer's success placed Taylor among the box-office top-ten, and she remained there almost every year for the next decade.


Dutch postcard by Filmphoto Service, Amsterdam, no. KF 41. Photo: MGM.


German postcard by Ufa, Berlin-Tempelhof, no. FK 3515. Photo: G.B. Poletto / Ufa.


French postcard by Editions P.I., Paris, no. 1051. Photo: John Everton / Ufa.

Cleopatra

In 1960, Elizabeth Taylor became the highest-paid actor in Hollywood when she signed a $1 million dollar contract to play the title role in 20th Century Fox's lavish production of Cleopatra (Joseph L. Mankiewicz, 1963). During the filming, she began a romance with her future husband Richard Burton, who played Mark Antony in the film. The romance received much attention from the tabloid press, as both were married at the time. Taylor ultimately received $7 million for her role.

Her second Academy Award, also for Best Actress in a Leading Role, was for her performance as Martha in Who's Afraid of Virginia Woolf? (Mike Nichols, 1966), playing opposite then-husband Richard Burton. Taylor saw the film as her chance to really act, because her character was to be twenty years older. She added gray hairs and transformed herself both physically and vocally: she intentionally gained weight, minimized makeup, and added excessive mascara to her eyes along with smudgy bags beneath them.

Taylor and Burton appeared together in six other films during the decade, among them The V.I.P.s (Anthony Asquith, 1963), The Sandpiper (Vincente Minnelli, 1965), and The Taming of the Shrew (Franco Zeffirelli, 1967). By 1967 their films had earned $200 million at the box office. Their next films Doctor Faustus (Richard Burton, Nevill Coghill, 1967), The Comedians (Peter Glenville, 1967) and Boom! (Joseph Losey, 1968), however, all failed at the box office.

Taylor appeared in John Huston's Reflections in a Golden Eye (1967) opposite Marlon Brando and Secret Ceremony (Joseph Losey, 1968) opposite Mia Farrow. By the end of the decade her box-office drawing power had considerably diminished, as evidenced by the failure of The Only Game in Town (George Stevens, 1970), with Warren Beatty.

Throughout the 1970s, Taylor continued to star in numerous theatrical films, such as Zee and Co. (Brian G. Hutton, 1972) with Michael Caine, Ash Wednesday (Larry Peerce, 1973), The Blue Bird (George Cukor, 1976) with Jane Fonda and Ava Gardner, and A Little Night Music (Harold Prince, 1977). With Richard Burton, she co-starred in Under Milk Wood (Andrew Sinclair, 1972) and Hammersmith Is Out (Peter Ustinov, 1972).


British postcard in the Picturegoer Series, London, no. D 903. Photo: Warner Bros. Publicity still for Giant (George Stevens, 1956) with James Dean.


Czech postcard by UPF, Praha / Press Photo. Photo: publicity still for Cleopatra (Joseph L. Mankiewicz, 1963) with Hume Cronyn.


Belgian postcard by SB (Uitgeverij Best), Antwerpen (Antwerp). Photo: still for Cleopatra (Joseph L. Mankiewicz, 1963).

Malice in Wonderland

In 1980, Elizabeth Taylor starred in the mystery film The Mirror Crack'd (Guy Hamilton, 1980), based on an Agatha Christie novel. In 1985, she played movie gossip columnist Louella Parsons in the TV film Malice in Wonderland (Gus Trikonis, 1985) opposite Jane Alexander, who played Hedda Hopper. Taylor appeared in the miniseries North and South (Richard T. Heffron, 1985) and her last theatrical film was The Flintstones (Brian Levant, 1994).

Taylor also acted on the stage, making her Broadway and West End debuts in 1982 with a revival of Lillian Hellman's The Little Foxes. She was then in a production of Noël Coward's Private Lives (1983), in which she starred with her former husband, Richard Burton. The student-run Burton Taylor Studio in Oxford was named for the famous couple after Burton appeared as Doctor Faustus in the Oxford University Dramatic Society production of the Marlowe play. Taylor played the ghostly, wordless Helen of Troy, who is entreated by Faustus to make him immortal with a kiss.

In 2007, Taylor acted onstage again, appearing opposite James Earl Jones in a benefit performance of the A. R. Gurney play Love Letters. The event's goal was to raise $1 million for Taylor's AIDS foundation. Tickets for the show were priced at $2,500, and more than 500 people attended. The event happened to coincide with the 2007 Writers Guild of America strike and, rather than cross the picket line, Taylor requested a "one night dispensation". The Writers Guild agreed not to picket the Paramount Pictures lot that night to allow for the performance.

In the early 1980s, Elizabeth Taylor had moved to Bel Air, California, which was her residence until her death. Taylor was married eight times to seven husbands, including actor Michael Wilding, producer Michael Todd, singer-actor Eddie Fisher and Richard Burton, whom she married twice. In 2011, she died at the age of 79 in Los Angeles, surrounded by her four children.


Trailer Suddenly, Last Summer (1959). Source: dameelizabethtaylor (YouTube).


Trailer Cleopatra (1963). Source: dameelizabethtaylor (YouTube).


Trailer Boom! (1968). Source: DVDFilmFun (YouTube).

Sources: Wikipedia and IMDb.

Renée Björling

October 17, 2015, 10:00 pm

≫ Next: Willy Birgel

≪ Previous: Imported from the USA: Elizabeth Taylor

$

0

0

Renée Björling (1888-1975) was a Swedish film and stage actress, who peaked in the Swedish silent cinema, but also played small parts in Ingmar Bergman's films.


Swedish postcard by Nordisk Konst, Stockholm, no. 1116/2. Photo: publicity still for Carolina Rediviva (Ivan Hedqvist, 1920) with Richard Lund.


Swedish postcard by Nordisk Konst, Stockholm, no. 1091/?. Photo: publicity still for the Swedish silent film Dunungen/In Quest of Happiness (Ivan Hedqvist, 1919), based on a novel by Selma Lagerlöf. The man in the middle is director Ivan Hedqvist as Theodor and the lady on the left is Jenny Tschernichin-Larsson, who plays Teodor's mother.

The Quest for Happiness

Renée Louise Björling, born in 1888 in Lovö, was the daughter of actress Manda Björling (1876–1960). Her half-sister was opera singer Sigurd Björling (1907–1983).

Renée Björling debuted in 1909 on stage and studied stage acting in 1915-1917 at the Dramatens elevskola. Afterwards she acted at various theatres, e.g. the Nya Teatern, Lorensbergsteatern and the Kungliga Dramatiska Teatern (now Dramaten).

As film actress, she debuted in 1912 in Fadren (Anna Hofman-Uddgren, 1912), based on a play by August Strindberg. Björling played Bertha, daughter of the protagonist Adolf (August Falck). Afterwards she acted e.g. in the title role in Dunungen/The Quest for Happiness (Ivan Hedqvist, 1919) opposite Hedqvist himself, as Dortka in Victor Sjöström’s Klostret i Sendomir/The Monastery of Sendomir (1920) with Tore Svennberg and Tora Teje, and as the lead of Carol[in]a in Carolina Rediviva (Ivan Hedqvist, 1920) with, again, Hedqvist himself.

Her silent career continued to flower with films such as En vildfagel (John W. Brunius, 1920) with Tore Svennberg, Vallfarten till Kevlaar (Ivan Hedqvist,1921) with Torsten Bergström and after Heine, Fröken Fob (Elis Ellis, 1923) with Rudolph Forster,Norrtullsligan/The Nurtull Gang (Per Lindberg, 1923) with Tora Teje, Carl XIIs Kurir (Rudolph Antoni, 1924) with Gösta Ekmanand Nils Asther, Livet pa landet/Life in the Country (Ivan Hedqvist, 1924), Halta Lena och Vindögda Per (Sigur Wallén, 1925), and Tva konungar (Elis Ellis, 1925).

Her last silent parts were in Charlis tant (Elis Ellis ,1926), and Gustav Wasa del I (John W. Brunius, 1928) with Gösta Ekman in the lead.



Swedish postcard by Nordisk Konst, Stockholm, no. 1116/1. Renée Björling and Richard Lund in the Swedish silent film Carolina Rediviva (Ivan Hedqvist, 1920).


Swedish postcard by Nordisk Konst, Stockholm, no. 1091/10. Photo: publicity still for the Swedish silent film Dunungen/In Quest of Happiness (Ivan Hedqvist 1919), starring Renée Björling and Ivan Hedqvist.

Ingmar Bergman

In the early 1930s, Renée Björling played parts in Vi som gar köksvägen (Gustav Molander 1932) and the sequel Vi som går kjøkkenveien (Tancred Ibsen, 1933), Björling had two leads during the war years in Gustav Molander's Striden går vidare (1941) opposite Victor Sjöström, and in Släkten är bäst (Ragnar Falck, 1944) with Sigurd Wallén.

Björling was also visible in several films of Ingmar Bergman, in small parts, as Aunt Elisabeth in Sommarlek/Summer Interlude (Ingmar Bergman, 1961) starring Maj-Britt Nilsson, in Sommaren med Monika/Summer with Monica (Ingmar Bergman, 1953) starring Harriet Andersson, in En lektion i kärlek/A Lesson in Love (Ingmar Bergman, 1954) with Eva Dahlbeck, and in Kvinnodröm/Dreams (Ingmar Bergman, 1955).

Among her later films were also Sceningang (Bengt Ekerot, 1958), written by Erland Josephson, and Kvinnen i leopard/The Woman with the Fur Coat (Jan Molander, 1958), starring Harriet Andersson.

Renée Björling stopped her film and TV career in 1968. She had played in some 40 silent and sound films. From 1925 to 1932 she had been married to captain Gunnar Ursell and had a daughter Monica with him. Her granddaughter is opera singer Malena Ernman.

Renée Björling died in 1975 in Täby.She lies buried at Skogskyrkogården cemetery in Stockholm.


Swedish postcard by Nordisk Konst, Stockholm, no. 1091/1. Publicity still for the Swedish silent film Dunungen/In Quest of Happiness (Ivan Hedqvist 1919), starring Renée Björling and Ragnar Widestedt.


Swedish postcard by Nordisk Konst, Stockholm, no. 1091/12. Publicity still for the Swedish silent film Dunungen/In Quest of Happiness (Ivan Hedqvist 1919), starring Renée Björling, Ivan Hedqvist and Ragnar Widestedt.

Sources: Svensk Filmdatabas (Swedish), Wikipedia (Swedish, English and German) and IMDb.

Willy Birgel

October 18, 2015, 10:00 pm

≫ Next: Danièle Delorme (1926-2015)

≪ Previous: Renée Björling

$

0

0

German actor Willy Birgel (1891-1973) started his film career when he was already over 40. He was the charming grand seigneur of the Ufa films of the 1930s. Despite his many appearances in Nazi propaganda films, he became again a very busy film actor in the German cinema of the 1950s.


German postcard by Ross Verlag, no. A 2991/1, 1939-1940. Photo: Bavaria Filmkunst.


German postcard by Film-Foto-Verlag, no. A 3617. Photo: Ufa / Binz.


German postcard by Film-Foto-Verlag, no. A 3659/2. Photo: Ufa / Binz.

Staatsschauspieler

Wilhelm Maria (Willy) Birgel was born in 1891, in Köln (Cologne), Germany. He was the son of Johann Heinrich Birgel, a goldsmith and engraver, and his wife Henriette (born Dreyers).

Willy began his acting career in 1912 on the stage in Köln. In the following years he played in theatres in Bonn, Dessau, Köln and Koblenz. The first World War interrupted in 1915 his career and he was wounded while serving with a German artillery unit in Serbia. After the war he continued his stage career in the theatre of Aachen. In 1924 he became a company member of the Nationaltheater of Mannheim, where he had triumphs with roles like Faust and Mephistopheles in Goethe’s Faust I, Franz Moor in Schiller’s Die Räuber/The Robbers and the title characters in Shakespeare’s Hamlet and Richard III.

His film debut came rather late. He was already over forty years old before he got his first major film role as the English Camp Commandant in Ein Mann will nach Deutschland/A Man Wants to Get to Germany (Paul Wegener, 1934). This Ufa-production portrayed a German engineer (Karl Ludwig Diehl) living in South America who hears in 1914 of the war in Europe. He has only one thought: home to Germany to help a fatherland under attack. The film showed of the kind of German values that were emphasized in Nazi Germany.

Other films he made for the National Socialist Regime included Unternehmen Michael/The Private's Job (Karl Ritter, 1937), Feinde/Enemies (Viktor Tourjansky, 1940) with Brigitte Horney, and Kameraden/Comrades (Hans Schweikart, 1941). In 1937, Reichspropagandaminister Joseph Goebbels named Birgel Staatsschauspieler (Actor of the State), the highest honor for German actors at the time. Beside the propaganda films, he starred in several popular entertainment films becoming an unlikely public favorite.

Birgel had his first leading part in Fürst Woronzeff/Prince Woronzeff (Artur Robison, 1934). He appeared as a chivalrous aristocrat and distinguished gentleman in Das Mädchen Johanna/Joan of Arc (Gustav Ucicky, 1935) with Gustaf Gründgens and Heinrich George, in Schlussakkord/Final Accord (Detlev Sierck/Douglas Sirk, 1936) with Lil Dagover, and in Fanny Elssler (Paul Martin, 1937) with Lilian Harvey. Great successes were Zu neuen Ufern/To New Shores (Detlev Sierck/Douglas Sirk, 1937) and Der Blaufuchs/The Blue Fox (Viktor Tourjansky, 1938), both in which he appeared at Zarah Leander's side.

Meanwhile he also had success on stage at the Berliner Volksbühne. Till the end of the war he continued his career with films like Der Fall Deruga/The Deruga Case (Fritz Peter Buch, 1938), Maria Ilona (Géza von Bolváry, 1939) opposite Paula Wessely, Das Herz der Königin/The Heart of a Queen (Carl Froelich, 1940) with Zarah Leander, ...reitet für Deutschland/Riding for Germany (Arthur Maria Rabenalt, 1941), the Rudolf Diesel biography Diesel (Gerhard Lamprecht, 1942), and Der Majoratsherr (Hans Deppe, 1944).


German postcard by Film-Foto-Verlag, no. A 3659/1, 1941-1944. Photo: Ufa / Binz.


German postcard by Das Illustrierte Blatt. Photo: Ufa / Lindner. Publicity still for Das Herz der Königin/Mary Queen of Scots (Carl Froelich, 1940) with Lotte Koch.


German postcard by FBZ, no. 225. Photo: Merkur-Film / T. v. Mindszenty. Publicity still for Das ewige Spiel/The eternal game (Frantisek Cáp, 1951) with Cornell Borchers.

On the Allied Black-list

After World War II, Willy Birgel was on the Allied black-list and did not make another film until 1947. Director Harald Braun and producer Erich Pommer offered him a role in Zwischen gestern und morgen/ Between Yesterday and Tomorrow (Harald Braun, 1947) with Hildegard Knef.

By the 1950s, he was back on the level of his pre-war popularity. He often appeared together with superstar Hans Albers, for example in Vom Teufel gejagt/Hunted by the Devil (Viktor Tourjansky, 1950). He specialized in supporting roles as the elderly grand seigneur and also of the father figure, and appeared in many Heimatfilms, for example Heidi (Luigi Comencini, 1952), and Johannisnacht/Midsummer Night (Harald Reinl, 1956) with Hertha Feiler.

In the 1960s, Birgel was able to make the transition to television. In the cinema he was seen in films like Frau Cheneys Ende/The End of Mrs. Cheney (Franz Josef Wild, 1961) with Lilli Palmer, and Sommersprossen/Beyond Control (Helmut Förnbacher, 1968). Interesting was Schonzeit für Füchse/No Shooting Time for Foxes (Peter Schamoni, 1966) in which Birgel made fun of his own image. The film won the Silver Bear of the Berlin Film Festival.

In 1966 Birgel himself won the Bundesfilmpreis, a honorary award for his continued outstanding individual contributions to the German film over the years. He was also awarded the Bambi award in 1960 and the Filmband im Gold award in 1964 and 1966. His last film was the Italian film Il Gesto/The Gesture (Marcello Grottesi, 1973).

Willy Birgel died in 1973 of heart failure, in Dübendorf, Zürich, Switzerland. He was buried in his birth city, Köln. Birgel was married twice: first to actress Carola Cajetan, with whom he had a son, and later to actress Charlotte Michael, with whom he had a daughter. Both his marriages ended in a divorce.

I loved this comment by Miss Mertens at one of our postcards at Flickr : "From my mother I know, that it was the biggest compliment in the 1940s, when somebody told a man: 'You are looking like Willy Birgel'."


German postcard by Werbedrück Rudolf Stepanek, München. Photo: Gloria / Lilo. Publicity still for Sterne über Colombo/Stars Over Colombo (Veit Harlan, 1953) and Die Gefangene des Maharadscha/Circus Girl (Veit Harlan, 1954).


German postcard by Film-Foto-Verlag, no. A 3876/1. Photo: Ufa / Binz, Berlin.


German postcard by Film-Foto-Verlag, no. G 204, 1941-1944. Photo: Binz.

Sources: Wikipedia, Deutsches Historisches Museum (German), Thomas Staedeli (Cyranos), Miss Mertens (Flickr) and IMDb.

Danièle Delorme (1926-2015)

October 19, 2015, 4:30 pm

≫ Next: La Brière (1924)

≪ Previous: Willy Birgel

$

0

0

On 17 October 2015, French actress and film producer Danièle Delorme passed away. Delorme acted in more than seventy films and television productions since 1942. She is probably best remembered for her starring roles in the original French production of Gigi (1948) and in Minne (1950), both based on novels by Colette. In the 1970s she played the female lead in the hit comedy Un éléphant ça trompe énormément/An Elephant Can Be Extremely Deceptive (1976). She also co-produced several films directed by her husband, Yves Robert, and other directors. Danièle Delorme was 89.


French postcard by SO ME FAB, Marseilles / Imp. De Marchi. Photo: Sam Lévin.


French postcard, no. 153.


French postcard by Imp. De Marchi Frères, Marseille.

Colette

Danièle Delorme was born Gabrielle Danièle Marguerite Andrée Girard in 1926 in Levallois-Perret, France. Her parents were the painter and poster designer André Girard and his wife. Danièle aspired a musical career and studied to be a concert pianist, but the war and the French occupation by the Nazis interfered. She fled to Cannes, where she got acting classes from Jean Wall.

In 1942, she made her first stage appearances with the company of Claude Dauphin. She also made her film debut opposite Dauphin in La belle aventure/Twilight (Marc Allégret, 1942) using her birth name, Danièle Girard. The film was banned in 1943 by the German Occupation authorities because Dauphin had by then joined the F.F.L. (French Liberation Forces).

For her next film, Les petites du quai aux fleurs/The Girls of the Quai aux Fleurs (Marc Allégret, 1944) Girard adopted the stage name Delorme. After the liberation she finished her studies in Paris with lessons by René Simon and Tania Balachova. She played opposite Michel Auclair in Alain Resnais early film, Ouvert pour cause d'inventaire/Open for Inventory Causes (Alain Resnais, 1946). Sadly no copies of this film exist anymore.

The following year she played a small part in Les jeux sont faits/Second Chance (Jean Delannoy, 1947) starring Micheline Presle and based on an original scenario by the Jean-Paul Sartre. She also appeared in a supporting part in Maurice Tourneur’s last film, Impasse des Deux Anges/Dilemma of Two Angels (Maurice Tourneur, 1948) starring Paul Meurisse and Simone Signoret.

Then Delorme had her breakthrough in the title role of the original French production of Gigi (Jacqueline Audry, 1949), a decade before Leslie Caron starred in the famous 1958 Hollywood adaptation of the Colette’s classic novel directed by Vincente Minelli.

Reviewer Bensonj at IMDb writes: “This delightful film succeeds because of the talents of all who contributed to it, but mostly because of the fresh, light performance of Daniele Delorme in a role that could have been so much less. The young girl's mother and aunt expend extraordinary efforts to develop her into a high class mistress (without letting her in on the plan). This sordid idea is handled with a sure, light touch, succeeding because of the direction, writing and performances, especially that of Delorme, who is sweet but not too sweet, innocent but not too innocent, and above all bright, fresh and unaffected.”


French postcard by Editions du Globe, Paris, no. 108. Photo: Studio Harcourt.


French postcard by Editions du Globe, Paris, no. 211. Photo: Studio Harcourt.


French postcard by Editions P.I., Paris, no. 435. Offert par les Carbones Korès. Photo: Lucienne Chevert.

Kept Girl

Danièle Delorme starred opposite Louis Jouvet and Bourvil in the title role of famous French suspense director Henri-George Clouzot’s only comedy Miquette et sa mère/Miquette (Henri-Georges Clouzot, 1950). The result was disappointing. JbduMonteil at IMDbwrites: “There's nothing from his magic touch here. Reigning supreme over French suspense movies (Le corbeau, Les diaboliques, Le salaire de la peur), his art becomes ineffective when it comes to bittersweet albeit bland comedies like this one. The good cast (Louis ‘Quai des orfèvres’ Jouvet, Bourvil and Danielle Delorme does not make up for this trite story of an ingénue and these light-hearted gallantries. Probably the only Clouzot movie which is not worth watching”.

More successful was Minne, l'ingénue libertine/Minne (1950), again based on a Colette novel and directed by Jacqueline Audry, the first female director of the French sound cinema. Franck Vilard was again Delorme’s leading man. Among her next films is the experiment Traité de bave et d'éternité/Venom and Eternity (1951) in which Isidore Isou, the leader of the lettrist movement, lashes out at conventional cinema and offers a revolutionary form of film-making: through scratching and bleaching the film, through desynchronizing the soundtrack and the visual track, through deconstructing the story, he aims to renew the cinema the same way he tried to revolutionize the literary world.

Délorme’s cooperation with Jacqueline Audrey and Colette continued with Olivia/The Pit of Loneliness (Jacqueline Audry, 1953), which captures captures the awakening passions of an English adolescent (Marie-Claire Olivia) for her headmistress (Edwige Feuillère) at a small finishing school outside Paris. Délorme played an older student.

She was also one of the many stars who appeared in Si Versailles m’était conté/Affairs in Versailles (Sacha Guitry, 1954), a history of the Versailles palace from its founding by Louis XIII to the present. In Italy she played the wife of Marcello Mastroianni in an episode of the anthology film Tempi nostri/A Slice of Life (Alessandro Blasetti, Paul Paviot, 1954) and in the biopic Casa Ricordi/House of Ricordi (Carmine Gallone, 1954) about Giovanni Ricordi, who in 1807 made a deal with the Teatro La Scala in Milan to print all their music sheets, in exchange for the handwritten works of all the composers hired by the Scala.

Other films in which she starred were the drama Le dossier noir/Black Dossier (André Cayatte, 1955), the thriller Voici le temps des assassins.../Deadlier Than the Male (Julien Duvivier, 1956) as a femme fatale opposite Jean Gabin, and as Fantine in Les misérables (Jean-Paul Le Chanois, 1958).

In between there was another cooperation with Jacqueline Audry and Colette: Mistou ou Comment l'esprit vient aux filles... (Jacqueline Audry, 1956) in which she starred as a kept girl who lives in a desirable apartment which looks out onto the Eiffel Tower during the First World War. Besides her cinema appaerances, she also often worked in the theatre in plays by Jean Anouilh, Marcel Achard and Eugène Ionesco.


German postcard by Ufa Film-Foto-Verlag, Berlin-Tempelhof, no. FK 505. Photo: Sam Lévin, Paris.


German postcard by Ufa, Berlin-Tempelhof, no. FK 954. Photo: C.L.M. Film, Paris / Pallas Film Verleih. Publicity still for Si Versailles m'était conté.../Fabulous Versailles (Sacha Guitry, 1954).


East-German postcard by VEB Progress Filmvertrieb, Berlin, no. 147/673, 1958. Photo: Defa. Publicity still for Les misérables (Jean-Paul Le Chanois, 1958).

Beware of Dark Sunglasses

In the early 1960s, Daniële Delorme worked a few times with some of the young directors of the Nouvelle Vague. She appeared with Anna Karina and Jean-Luc Godard in Agnès Varda’s short comedy Les fiancés du pont Mac Donald ou (Méfiez-vous des lunettes noires)/The Lovers of the Pont mac Donald (Beware of Dark Sunglasses) (Agnès Varda, 1961) and appeared again for Varda’s camera in the classic Cléo de 5 à 7/Cleo From 5 To 7 (Agnès Varda, 1962) featuring Corinne Marchand.

She also played in other interesting films such as the crime film Le septième juré/The Seventh Juror (Georges Lautner, 1964) with Bernard Blier, Le voyou/The Crook (Claude Lelouch, 1970) featuring Jean-Louis Trintignant, and Belle (André Delvaux, 1974) opposite Jean-Luc Bideau.

Although she continued to play leading parts, her appearances in the cinema had become rarer but her film career got a boost with the hit comedy Un éléphant ça trompe énormément/An Elephant Can Be Extremely Deceptive (Yves Robert, 1976) in which she played the wife of Jean Rochefort.

IMDb reviewer David Vanholsbeeck comments: “Whereas the story may not be very original, this film is extremely charming and amiable nonetheless. It has a great supporting cast ((Claude) Brasseur is a stand-out), very funny moments and many real-life characters. Too bad this charming little film was later remade as The Woman in Red (with Gene Wilder and Kelly LeBrock). But Hollywood seems to have this ‘urge’ to make their own version of each film with a bit of success outside the States. Anyway, if you have to choose between the original and the remake, choose Un éléphant...(or Pardon mon affaire as it is sometimes called).”

A year later the sequel Nous irons tous au paradis/Pardon Mon Affaire, Too! (Yves Robert, 1977) with the same cast was also a hit. At IMDb,Bob Taylor reviews: “Daniele Delorme, who was married to Yves Robert, is the real treasure in this picture. Her career as actress spanned three decades of steady work before she started a production company with her husband. Here she is a wonderful foil for Rochefort in their tense domestic scenes together; she's calm while he's agitated.”


Belgian collectors card by Cinema Novy, Nevele, no. 140. Photo: Limot.


French postcard by Editions P.I., Paris, no. 750. Photo: Sam Lévin.


French postcard by Editions P.I., Paris, no. 971. Photo: Studio Vallois.

Phenomenal Success

Danièle Delorme was since 1956 married to the director of the two comedies above, Yves Robert and they were partners in film production company La Guéville. In 1962 she had co-produced with him La guerre des boutons/The War of the Buttons (Yves Robert, 1962), based on a classic French anti-war novel of the same title written in 1912 by Louis Pergaud.

James Travers reviews at Films de France: “La Guerre des boutons is one of the most important films about childhood in French cinema, certainly one of the most memorable. It was made at the height of France’s protracted and costly war with Algeria, something which may have contributed to director Yves Robert’s problems in finding a financial backer for the film. In the end, he had to set up his own production company with his wife, Danièle Delorme. No French distribution company would touch the film, so Robert was forced to turn to the Americans - Warner Brothers took up the challenge, but without any great enthusiasm. No one, least of all its director, could have anticipated the film’s phenomenal success. It attracted just under 10 million spectators in France and was also an international hit. The film was well-received by the critics, and won the prestigious Prix Jean Vigo in 1962.”

Other films that she coproduced with her husband were Les Copains/The Buddies (Yves Robert, 1965) with Philippe Noiret, and the comedy Alexandre le bienheureux/Very Happy Alexander (Yves Robert, 1968) again starring Noiret. Later she also worked with other directors such as Jacques Doillon on La drôlesse/The Hussy (1979), and with Alain Cavalier on Un étrange voyage/A Strange Trip (1981). In this period she also appeared in TV projects as La naissance du jour/Daybreak (1980), directed by Jacques Demy and based on a novel by Colette. She served as a member of the jury at the 1988 Cannes Film Festival.

Her last film appearance was in the short film La vie sans secret de Walter Nions/The Secretless Life of Walter Nions (Hugo Gélin, 2001) which featured her former film husband Jean Rochefort. In real life Danièle Delorme had married actor Daniel Gélin in 1945. A year later they had a son, Xavier Gélin. Delorme divorced Gélin in 1954 after he admitted having an affair with Romanian-born model Marie Christine Schneider, that produced a daughter, Maria Schneider. Xavier Gélin (1946–1999) was a successful actor who died of cancer at the age of fifty-three.

Delorme and Yves Robert remained married until his death in 2002. More recently Delorme worked as an associate producer on the mystery drama UV (Gilles Paquet-Brenner, 2007) with Jacques Dutronc and Marthe Keller.

Danièle Delorme died in Paris on 17 October 2015. She was 89.


Miquette et sa mère/Miquette (Henri-Georges Clouzot, 1950). Source: luc lebelge22 (YouTube).


Gigi (Jacqueline Audry, 1949). Source: luc lebelge22 (YouTube).


French trailer for Nous irons tous au paradis (Yves Robert, 1977). Source: Raoul Gauguin (YouTube).

Sources: James Travers (Films de France), Bensonj (IMDb), David Vanholsbeeck (IMDb), Bob Taylor (IMDb), AlloCiné (French), Wikipedia (English and French), and IMDb.

La Brière (1924)

October 20, 2015, 10:00 pm

≫ Next: Lu L'Arronge

≪ Previous: Danièle Delorme (1926-2015)

$

0

0

La Brière (Léon Poirier, 1924) was a French rural film drama, based on a 1923 novel by Alphonse de Chateaubriant which had won the Prix Goncourt. The very atmospheric film, produced by the Compagnie Universelle Cinématographique, was shot in March-April 1924, partly at the Gaumont studios in Paris, partly on location at the fenscape at St. Joachim, Brière, a region west of Nantes, in French Brittany.


French postcard. Caption: Laurence Myrga as Théotiste.


French postcard. Caption: Moonlight over the Breton marsh.

Rough and unpolished

The story of the silent film La Brière/Passion and Peat (Léon Poirier, 1924) deals with the rough and unpolished men and women who inhabit the region of La Brière and live on peat cutting, when peat is running out.

A fierce argument breaks out about the draining of the marshes in service of the manufacture of bricks. An old stubborn man, Aoustin (José Davert), leads the resistance to the drainage project, and refuses to give his daughter Théotiste (Laurence Myrga) to a young peasant, Jeanin (Armand Tallier), who is in favour of the draining.

When a pregnant Théotiste is still refused marriage and Aoustin even wants to have Jeanin arrested for poaching, the latter shoots Aoustin's hand off. Théotiste has a miscarriage, is accused of killing her child, after which Jeanin and the whole community shun her.

Aoustin gets a wooden hand. He wants to kill Jeanin, but first needs to bring Théotiste to a hospital through the marshes. He gets lost in the freezing cold while his daughter dies. In the end Aoustin lets Jeanin go.


French postcard. Caption: The home of Aoustin (José Davert). In the back his wife (Jeanne Marie-Laurent) and daughter Théotiste (Laurence Myrga).


French postcard. Caption: Betrothal. Jeannin (Armand Tallier) and Théotiste (Laurence Myrga).

All because a daughter won’t obey her father

La Brière premiered on 23 April 1925 and despite its independent production, it was commercially launched by an exclusive month-long run at the Paris Madeleine-Cinéma. It was very successful.

The atmospheric cinematography of La Brière was done by Lucien Bellavoine, and the sets were designed by Robert-Jules Garnier. Paul Ladmirault from Nantes composed a special score for the silent film.

La Brière was the breakthrough of José Davert, an hitherto quite unknown actor, who would act in several films of Poirier afterwards, such as Verdun, vision d'histoire (1928). In addition to Davert, Laurence Myrga and Armand Tallier, Jeanne Marie-Laurent plays Aoustine, the mother.

Richard Abel writes in his study French Cinema. The First Wave, 1915-1929: “By 1924, the realist provincial film reached a kind of apotheosis in two large-scale productions which combined the French love for the ambiance of river or canal landscapes with their interest in the culture of Brittany.”

La Brière was one of the two. Abel: “For the most part, La Brière’s rhythm is slow, magisterial, in correspondence with the calm, flat landscape of the salt marsh and the lives of its rustic inhabitants. With his large solid physique and expressionless weathered face, Aoustin becomes an icon of the people’s determined resistance to change.”

Abel: "The socioeconomic conflict is displaced almost completely into the family, where it is resolved tragically in a romantic, moralistic plot that turns the old man’s rebellious vision into a form of blindness. Théotiste bears a dead child illegitimately; Aoustin loses a hand that is replaced by a wooden one; the salt marsh turns into bricks – all because a daughter won’t obey her father.”


French postcard. The idyll between Jeannin (Armand Tallier) and Théotiste (Laurence Myrga).


French postcard. Caption: Twilight.

Sources: Richard Abel (French Cinema. The First Wave, 1915-1929), Cinematheque Bretagne (French), Wikipedia, and IMDb.

---

Lu L'Arronge

October 21, 2015, 10:00 pm

≫ Next: EFSP's Dazzling Dozen: Top Hats

≪ Previous: La Brière (1924)

$

0

0

Little is known about Lu L'Arronge (1902-1991), who was a star of the German silent cinema, just after the First World War. The actress, who specialized in playing high-spirited teenagers,  had her own production company with which she produced several films.


German postcard by Rotophot in the Film-Sterne series, no. 225/1, 1919-1924.

Half a woman, half a girl

Five years ago, when I wrote the first version of this post, there were some star postcards to prove that Lu L'Arronge must have been a well known actress at the time, but that surprisingly little was known about her. This has changed since then. Thanks to the sources mentioned below, we can now tell a bit more about Lu's life and work. But a lot still stays unclear.

Lu L'Arronge was born in 1902 and came from an old theatre family. Arronge is a variant for the Jewish names Aaron, Arons and Aronsohn. Her father was a cousin of stage writer Adolf L'Arronge. Her grandfather belonged to the founders of the Bühnengenossenschaft (the union organization of the German stage members) in 1871.

At an early age, Lu cherished the wish to become a stage actress, but her mother didn't accept that her daughter would become an actress. When the German film industry became 'modern' during World War I and conquered a huge public, Lu's wish to become an actress returned and she knew to convince her mother.

Thomas Schaedeli writes at his site Cyranos that Lu conquered the big screen from 1917 on. She played in films like Die Schlange der Kleopatra (1917), Lu's Backfischzeit (1917), Lu'chens Verlobung am Gartentor (1917), s'Liserl vom Loischtal (1917) and Kain (1918).

Schaedeli adds that she finally founded her own company in 1919, to star in films including Wenn's Landlüferl weht (1918), Anna Karenina (1919), Die weisse Maus/The White Mouse (1919), and Die Geisterbraut/The Ghost Bride (1919).


Lya Mara. German postcard by Ross Verlag, no. 241, 1919-1924. Photo: Becker & Maass.

The Ghost Bride

IMDb shows that Lu's production company L'Arronge Film GmbH was already founded in 1917 for the comedy Lu's Backfischzeit/Lu's Backfisch times (Franz Schmelter, 1917). L'Arronge Film GmbH produced 9 films including Wenn's Landlüferl weht (Karl Moos, 1918), and Die weisse Maus/The White Mouse (Leonhard Haskel, 1919), but then the film company halted.

In the Leo Tolstoy adaptation Anna Karenina (Friedrich Zelnik/Frederic Zelnik, 1919), Lu only had a minor part. Star of the film was Lya Maraand the film was produced by her and her husband-director's company Zelnik-Mara-Film.

L'Arronge's screen career quickly went downhill. IMDb lists only one more film appearance after her minor part in Anna Karenina (1919). Her final film was Die Geisterbraut/The Ghost Bride (Herbert Gerdes, 1920), produced by Georg Alexander's company Neue Berliner Film. It must have been her final film.

A few years before, Lu was interviewed for the publication Die Frau im Film 1919 (The Woman in Film 1919), in which several female stars of the silent German cinema (including Erna Morena, Pola Negri, Lya Mara) answered questions about their work. Lu said that she had "the big luck to be engaged at a new-created firm, for one year, which I gave my name. Here I prefer to play the high-spirited teenager things, half a woman, half a girl."

IMDd notes that Lu L'Arronge acted during her career in 14 films and that she produced 9 films. When she stopped she must have been only 18 or 19 years old. What happened with Lu after her film dream was over? I only know that she died in 1991 at the age of 89, but that's more than I could tell you five years ago.


Erna Morena. German postcard by Messter Film GmbH, no. 10. Photo: Karl Schenker, 1914.


Pola Negri. German postcard by Ross Verlag, no. 407/5, 1919-1924. Photo: Rembrandt.

Sources: Thomas Staedeli (Cyranos), Die Frau im Film 1919, Filmportal.de, and IMDb.

EFSP's Dazzling Dozen: Top Hats

October 22, 2015, 10:00 pm

≫ Next: Imported from the USA: Jean Seberg

≪ Previous: Lu L'Arronge

$

0

0

New series alert at EFSP! During our trip to the Pordenone Silent Film Festival earlier this month, we did a post on twelve silent cowboys and liked the concept. So, last week we started a new series especially for Postcard Friendship Friday with a dozen star postcards with a theme. Last week it was stars with their dogs. Today we present you our twelve favourite postcards of stars wearing amazing hats.


La Jana. German postcard by Verlag Hermann Leiser, Berlin-Wilm., no. 6606. Photo: Ernst Schneider, Berlin. Collection: Didier Hanson.


Elise de Vere. French postcard. Photo: Lucien Waléry, Paris.


Italia Almirante Manzini. Italian postcard by Ballerini & Fratini, Firenze, no. 204. Photo Scoffone. Italia Almirante Manzini as Violante in the film L'Arzigogolo (Mario Almirante, 1924), adaptation of the play by Sem Benelli.


Brigitte Helm. German postcard by Ross Verlag, Berlin, no. 71/12. Photo: Ufa / Parufamet. Publicity still for Metropolis (Fritz Lang, 1927). Collection: Didier Hanson.


Adolphe Menjou and Kathryn Carver. British Real Hand-Coloured Photograph postcard, no. 3384/1. Photo: Paramount. Publicity still for Service for Ladies (Harry d'Abbadie d'Arrast, 1927).


Ossi Oswalda. German postcard by Ross Verlag, no. 1690/1, 1927-1928. Photo: Deutsch-Nordische Film-Union.


Lizzi Waldmüller. German postcard by Film-Foto-Verlag, no. A 3615/1, 1941-1944. Photo: Film-Foto-Atelier / Tobis.


Joan Greenwood. East-German postcard by VEB Progress Film-Vertrieb, Berlin, no. 1068, 1959. Photo: J. Arthur Rank. Publicity still for The Importance of Being Earnest (Anthony Asquith, 1952).


Lilli Palmer and Johanna Matz. East-German postcard by Progress, no. 1306, 1960. Photo: publicity still for Frau Warrens Gewerbe/Mrs. Warren's Profession (Ákos Ráthonyi, 1960).


Ingrid Andree. German postcard by WS-Druck, Wanne-Eickel, nr. F 74. Photo: Ringpress.


Lotti Huber. German postcard by Edition Wild, Waldbröl. Photo: Gertrude Garancy. Colouring: Cesa, 1990.


Gaby Deslys. British postcard by Rotary Photo, no. 11843 Q. Photo: Talbot, Paris. Collection: Didier Hanson.

This is a post for Postcard Friendship Friday, hosted by Beth at the blog The Best Hearts are Crunchy. You can visit her by clicking on the button below.

Imported from the USA: Jean Seberg

October 23, 2015, 10:00 pm

≫ Next: Annie Girardot

≪ Previous: EFSP's Dazzling Dozen: Top Hats

$

0

0

American actress Jean Seberg (1938-1979) became an icon of the Nouvelle Vague with her role in Godard’s A Bout de Souffle/Breathless (1960). She appeared in over 30 films in Hollywood and Europe.


French postcard by Editions P.I., Paris, no. 900. Photo: Sam Lévin.


German postcard by WS-Druck, Wanne-Eickel, no. 334. Photo: Columbia / Filmpress Zürich.


Romanian postcard by Casa Filmului Acin.


Romanian postcard by Casa Filmului Acin.

Breathless

Jean Dorothy Seberg was born in Marshalltown, Iowa, in 1938. Her parents were Dorothy Arline Benson, a substitute teacher, and her husband Edward Waldemar Seberg, a pharmacist. Her father was of Swedish descent and her mother was of English and German ancestry. Jean had a sister Mary-Ann, a brother Kurt, and a brother David, who was killed in a car accident in 1968.

One month before her eighteenth birthday, Jean landed the title role in Otto Preminger's Saint Joan (1957) after a much-publicized contest involving some 18,000 hopefuls. Her name was entered by a neighbour.

Her only acting experience had been a single season of summer stock performances. Saint Joan, based on the George Bernard Shaw play, was a failure.

Preminger had promised her a second chance, and he cast Seberg in his next film Bonjour Tristesse (1958), which was filmed in France. That film’s only moderate success and the atrocious reviews for Seberg nearly ended her career, but her next film, the comedy The Mouse That Roared (Jack Arnold, 1959) starring Peter Sellers, was a success.

During the filming of Bonjour Tristesse, Seberg met a young French lawyer with film abitions, François Moreuil. He became her first husband, and Jean based herself in France.

There she got her breakthrough role as Patricia in Jean-Luc Godard's landmark feature, À bout de soufflé/Breathless (1960), opposite Jean-Paul Belmondo. The film became an international success and critics praised Seberg's performance.


German postcard by WS-Druck, Wanne-Eickel, no. 195. Photo: dpa.


Italian postcard by Bromofoto, Milano, no. 1670. Photo: Columbia C.E.I.A.D.


French postcard by St. Anne, Marseille. Photo: Sam Lévin.


French postcard by E.D.U.G., Paris, no. 140. Photo: Sam Lévin.

Suicide

Jean Seberg was now an icon of the Nouvelle Vague, the French New Wave. She appeared in several French films, including Philippe De Broca's comedy-drama L'amant de cinq jours/Five Day Lover (1961). In 1961, she took on the lead role in her husband François Moreuil's debut film, La recreation/Love Play, with Christian Marquand.

She gave a memorable performance as a schizophrenic in the title role of Robert Rossen's Lilith (1964) opposite Warren Beatty. In 1969, she appeared in the Western musical Paint Your Wagon (Joshua Logan, 1969), based on Lerner and Loewe's stage musical, and co-starring Lee Marvin and Clint Eastwood. Her singing voice was dubbed by Anita Gordon.

Seberg also starred in the disaster film Airport (George Seaton, 1970) opposite Burt Lancaster and Dean Martin. The film earned nearly $ 100 million and originated the 1970s disaster film genre.

In the late 1960s, Seberg became involved in anti-war politics. Her involvement with the Black Panther movement yielded the attention of the FBI, that spread the rumour about her pregnancy in 1970 being a child by Raymond Hewt, a Black Panther movement leader. Although her husband Romain Gary acknowledged her daughter Nina as his own, during her pregnancy she confessed that her baby was actually the product of an affair (during a separation from Gary) with a revolutionary student named Carlos Navarra. Her daughter Nina died as a result of complications sustained from Jean overdosing on sleeping pills during her pregnancy, on 25 August 1970, two days after her birth. On every subsequent anniversary of Nina's death, Jean attempted suicide.

Seberg remained active during the 1970s in European films. She appeared in the thriller L'attentat/The Assassination (Yves Boisset, 1972) with Jean-Louis Trintignant, Bianchi cavalli d'Agosto /White Horses of Summer (Raimondo Del Balzo, 1975) with Frederick Stafford, Le Grand Délire/The Big Delirium (Dennis Berry, 1975), with Pierre Blaise and Isabelle Huppert, and Die Wildente/The Wild Duck (Hans W. Geissendörfer, 1976), based on Henrik Ibsen's The Wild Duck.

In 1979, Jean Seberg was found dead. She had committed suicide by a barbiturate overdose in the back seat of a car in a Paris suburb. Her body wasn't found until 11 days later. Rumours flew that Jean's suicide was masterminded by the FBI but it was never proven. Buried in the Montparnasse cemetery in Paris, her funeral was attended by such notables as Jean-Paul Sartre and Simone de Beauvoir.

Seberg was married four times. Her husbands were François Moreuil (1958-1960), the author Romain Gary (1962-1970), TV director Dennis Berry (1972-1978), and Algerian playboy Ahmed Hasni (1979–her death). With Gary, she had a son, Alexandre Diego Gary, born in 1962. In December 1980, Romain Gary committed suicide. Gary's suicide note, which was addressed to his publisher, indicated that he had not killed himself over the loss of Seberg but over the fact that he felt he could no longer produce literary works.


East-German postcard by VEB Progress Film-Vertrieb, Berlin, no. 155/71, 1971. Photo: publicity still for Un milliard dans un billard/Diamond Cue (Nicolas Gessner, 1965).


Trailer for Bonjour Tristesse (1958). Source: rosen88kavalier (YouTube).


Trailer for À bout de soufflé/Breathless (1960). Source: TheEnlightenGroup (YouTube).


Trailer for Philippe De Broca's L'amant de cinq jours/Five Day Lover (1961). Source: Cohen Film Collection (YouTube).

Sources: Wikipedia and IMDb.

Annie Girardot

October 24, 2015, 11:00 pm

≫ Next: Maureen O’Hara (1920-2015)

≪ Previous: Imported from the USA: Jean Seberg

$

0

0

French star Annie Girardot (1931-2011) was a sympathetic, perky, and talented actress. With her typical gravelly voice she appeared in many French and Italian quality films of the 1960s and 1970s. Unforgettable is her role as the tragic prostitute Nadia in Visconti’s classic Rocco e i suoi fratelli (1960), loved by two brothers played by Alain Delon and Renato Salvatori.


French postcard by Ed. EDUG, Paris. Photo: Sam Lévin.


French postcard.


French postcard by St. Anne, Marseille. Photo: Sam Lévin.

Need to Take Risks and Experiment

Annie Suzanne Girardot was born in 1931, in Paris, France. In 1954 she graduated with honours from the Conservatoire de la rue Blanche(the Paris conservatory). That year she made her professional debut with the distinguished Comédie-Francaise.

Her performance in Jean Cocteau’s La Machine à écrire in 1956, opposite Robert Hirsch, was admired by the author who called her “The finest dramatic temperament of the postwar period”. She remained with the Comédie-Francaise troupe through 1957, occasionally taking time off to perform in films, on radio, television and in Parisian cabarets and revues.

Her inability to contain her need to take risks and experiment within the rigid dictates of the Comédie propelled Girardot toward the cinema. She had made an inauspicious film debut in the comedy Treize à table/Thirteen at the Table (André Hunebelle, 1955). The following year she won the Prix Suzanne Bianchetti for her role as a blackmailing vamp opposite Pierre Fresnayin L'homme aux clés d'or/The Man With the Golden Keys (Léo Joannon, 1956). In her early film roles, Girardot was typically cast as a doomed woman of dubious morals in dark films like Le rouge est mis/The red Light is On (Gilles Grangier, 1957) and Maigret tend un piège/Maigret Lays a Trap (Jean Delannoy, 1957), both starring Jean Gabin.

On stage she worked with famous director Luchino Visconti in Deux sur la balançoire/Two for the Seesaw (1958), at the side of Jean Marais. In the cinema she finally had her breakthrough when she played Nadia the prostitute in Visconti's epic family drama Rocco e i suoi fratelli/Rocco and His Brothers (Luchino Visconti, 1960). Nadia's beauty drives a wedge between Rocco (Alain Delon) and his brother Simone (Renato Salvatori), who eventually rapes her and stabs her thirteen times. Her depiction of the reformed prostitute suffering in her humiliation was both poignant and compelling.

During filming Girardot and Salvatori became romantically linked and they married in 1962. The couple later separated, but never divorced. In 1988 Salvatori died. Their daughter is Giulia Salvatori (1962).


French postcard by Editions du Globe, Paris, no 611. Photo: Sam Lévin.


French postcard by Editions P.I., Paris, no. 851. Photo: Bernard-Vauclair, Paris.


East-German postcard by VEB Progress Filmvertrieb, Berlin, no. 1696, 1962. Photo: publicity still for Rocco e i suoi fratelli/Rocco and his brothers (Luchino Visconti, 1960).

Dad's cinema

Through the early 1960s, Annie Girardot never worked with the young directors of the Nouvelle Vague, by whom she was seen as the actress of the Cinéma de Papa (Dad's cinema). And indeed she worked regularly with older directors like Christian-Jaque in La Française et l'Amour/Love and the Frenchwoman (1960), and Guerre secrète/The Dirty Game (1965) and Marcel Carné in Trois chambres à Manhattan/Three Rooms in Manhattan (1965). For her role in the latter film as the neurotic Kay discovering love, she won the Best Actress award at the Venice Film Festival.

She also played leads in Italian pictures directed by Marco Ferreri likeLa donna scimmia/The Ape Woman (1963), Il seme dell'uomo/The Seed of Man (1969), and Dillinger è morto/Dillinger Is Dead (1969), Mario Monicelli in I compagni/The Organizer (1963), Duccio Tessari in Una voglia da morire (1964) and again by Luchino Visconti in the anthology Le streghe/The Witches (1966).

Girardot became a box office magnet in France with Vivre pour vivre/Live for Life (Claude Lelouch, 1967). She gave a reserved, dignified performance as the deceived but forgiving wife of Yves Montand. Another big hit was the sentimental melodrama Un homme qui me plaît/A Man I Like (Claude Lelouch, 1969) in which she was the vivacious Françoise destined to finish unhappily with Jean-Paul Belmondo.

In the 1970s, Girardot was one of the most popular stars of the French cinema, associated with the directors Lelouch, Philippe de Broca, and André Cayatte, and with actor Philippe Noiret. Her biggest international hit was the fact-based tale Mourir d'aimer/Death of Love (André Cayatte, 1971) about the Gabrielle Russier affair. Very convincingly she played the middle-aged literature teacher who was accused of corrupting a minor, one of her students with whom she had an affair, and who, out of despair, committed suicide in jail. In the late 1960s the affair had become a much debated subject, even president Georges Pompidou referred to it. The film was nominated for a Golden Globe.

Each new film of ‘La Girardot’ was eagerly awaited for. Girardot typically played strong-willed, independent, hard-working, and often lonely women, giving her characters an earthiness and reality that endeared her with women undergoing similar daily struggles. Girardot became thus one of the symbols of the early-'70s feminist movement in France - though in personal life Girardot was not terribly involved with feminists.


Romanian postcard by Casa Filmului Acin.


East-German postcard by Progress Filmverleih, Berlin, no. 64/79, 1979.


French postcard by Editions Atlas, Evreux, no. 43. Photo: publicity still for the TV Mini-Series Le Vent des Moissons/The Wind of Harvest (Jean Sagols, 1988).

Adept Comedienne

Annie Girardot started to play mother roles of young stars like Claude Jadein Les feux de la Chandeleur/Hearth Fires (Serge Korber, 1972) or Isabelle Adjani in La gifle/The Slap (Claude Pinoteau, 1974). She played Isabelle Huppert's mother in two films: Docteur Françoise Gailland/No Time for Breakfast (Jean-Louis Bertucelli, 1975) and La pianiste/The Piano Teacher (Michael Haneke, 2001).

For portraying the title character in Docteur Françoise Gailland she won the César, the French Oscar, for Best Actress in 1977. Though she gave solid performances in many dramas, Girardot proved herself also an adept comedienne in such films as La vielle fille/The Old Maid (Jean-Pierre Blanc, 1972), Tendre Poulet/Dear Inspector (Philippe de Broca, 1977), La zizanie/The Spat (Claude Zidi, 1978) and L'ingorgo - Una storia impossibile/Traffic Jam (Luigi Comencini, 1979). Her success as the female detective Lise Tanquerelle, comically caught between personal and professional roles, in Tendre Poulet led to the sequel On a volé la cuisse de Jupiter/Jupiter's Thigh (Philippe de Broca, 1980).

She also helped young film directors making their first films. On stage she had a triumph in 1974 with Madame Marguerite, her signature role, which she reprised many times till 2002. That year she was awarded the Molièreaward for her role.

By the 1980s, her cinema career was in sharp decline and her film appearances became sporadic. She published her autobiography Vivre d'aimer in 1989, followed by Ma vie contre la tienne in 1993. However, in 1995 she made a come-back playing a peasant wife in Les Misérables (Claude Lelouch, 1995). The role won her a Cesar for Best Supporting Actress. Upon accepting the award, a joyous and tearful Girardot expressed her happiness that she had not been forgotten. She also offered her heartfelt thanks to her many film industry colleagues.

In 2002, she was again awarded this award for her role as the nightmarish mother in La pianiste/The Piano Player (Michael Haneke, 2002). She collaborated with Austrian director Haneke again, in Caché/Hidden (Michael Haneke, 2005) starring Juliette Binoche. In 2006

Annie Girardot revealed in magazine Paris Match that she was suffering since 2003 from Alzheimer's disease. The following year Giulia Salvatori published, with journalist Jean-Michel Caradec'h, the biography La Mémoire de ma mère about her mother. Annie Girardot appeared for the last time in the TV documentary Annie Girardot, ainsi va la vie/Annie Girardot, as life goes (2008). Since 2008, she lived in a sanatorium in Paris.

In 2011, Annie Girardot passed away. She was 79. At Flickr, Kay Harpa commemorated Annie: "Annie could make us laugh and cry - she was a beautiful lady full of generosity and interest for other people. She could be many women - she was the first feminine actress to play lawyer, surgeon, doctor,........ great parts they usually give to men. She had a beautiful and sensitive way of looking at people, things,...... her soul and heart were reflected in her beautiful brown eyes."


French trailer for Maigret tend un piège (1957). Source: lbena65 (YouTube).


Trailer for Rocco e i suoi fratelli/Rocco and His Brothers (1960). Source: Filmmuseum Amsterdam (YouTube).


Scene from La donna scimmia/The Ape Woman (1963). Source: Alex Settantasette (YouTube).


French trailer for Les Novices (1970) with Annie Girardot and Brigitte Bardot. Source: Modcinema (YouTube).


French language scene from Docteur Françoise Gailland (1976). Source: Romuald MAHLER-GLEY (YouTube).

Sources: Sandra Brennan (AllMovie), R. F. Cousins and Kelly Otter (Filmreference.com), Sol (IMDb), Ephraim Katz (The Film Encylopedia), Wikipedia, and IMDb.

Maureen O’Hara (1920-2015)

October 25, 2015, 4:00 pm

≫ Next: Maria Brockerhoff

≪ Previous: Annie Girardot

$

0

0

Last Saturday, Irish born Maureen O’Hara, one of the icons of Hollywood’s Golden Age, has died. The feisty and fearless actress starred in John Ford’s Oscar-winning drama How Green Was My Valley (1941), set in Wales, and Ford’s Irish-set The Quiet Man (1952) opposite John Wayne. The famously red-headed actress also worked successfully with Charles Laughton at Jamaica Inn (1939) and The Hunchback of Notre Dame (1939), starred in the perennial Christmas hit Miracle on 34th Street (1947), and appeared in the Disney children’s hit The Parent Trap (1961). O'Hara was 95.


British postcard, London, no. FS 200. Photo: Pommer-Laughton 'Mayflower' production. Publicity still for Jamaica Inn (Alfred Hitchcock, 1939).


British postcard in the Picturegoer Series, London, no. W 561. Photo: 20th Century Fox.

Alfred Hitchcock

Maureen O’Hara was born Maureen FitzSimons in the Dublin suburb of Ranelagh, Ireland, in 1920. Her mother, Marguerita Lilburn FitzSimons, was an accomplished contralto. Her father, Charles FitzSimons, managed a business in Dublin and also owned part of the renowned Irish soccer team The Shamrock Rovers.

From the age of 6 to 17, Maureen trained in drama, music and dance, and at the age of 10 she joined the Rathmines Theatre Company and worked in amateur theatre in the evenings after her lessons. O'Hara's dream at this time was to be a stage actress. By age 14 she was accepted to the prestigious Abbey Theatre and pursued her dream of classical theatre and operatic singing.

Her first screen test was for a British film called Kicking the Moon Around (Walter Forde, 1938) at Elstree Studios, It was arranged by American bandleader Harry Richman, who was then appearing in Dublin. The result was deemed unsatisfactory, but when Charles Laughton later saw it he was intrigued by her large and expressive eyes.

Laughton arranged for her to co-star with him in the British film Jamaica Inn (Alfred Hitchcock, 1939). Laughton was so pleased with O'Hara's performance that she was cast in the role of Esmeralda opposite him in the Hollywood production of The Hunchback of Notre Dame (William Dieterle, 1939). The epic film was an extraordinary success and international audiences were now alerted to her natural beauty and talent.

From there, she went on to enjoy a long and highly successful career in Hollywood. Director John Ford cast her as Angharad in How Green Was My Valley (1941), which won the Academy Award for Best Picture.

O’Hara was often an example of noble and defiant womanhood, like in This Land Is Mine (Jean Renoir, 1943). In this film, she was reunited with Laughton, who plays a mother-dominated schoolteacher secretly in love with O’Hara, a colleague who is working for the wartime resistance.


Dutch postcard by J.S.A. Photo: M.P.E.


French postcard by Editions P.I., Paris, no. 715. Photo: H.P.S.

John Wayne

Maureen O'Hara starred in Swashbucklers such as The Black Swan (Henry King, 1942), opposite Tyrone Power, and Sinbad the Sailor (Richard Wallace, 1947), with Douglas Fairbanks, Jr. She also starred as Doris Walker and the mother of a young Natalie Wood in Miracle on 34th Street (George Seaton, 1947), which became a perennial Christmas classic.

O'Hara made a number of films with John Wayne. She met Wayne through director John Ford, and the two hit it right off. O'Hara: "I adored him, and he loved me. But we were never sweethearts. Never, ever.”

Opposite Wayne, she played Mary Kate Danaher in The Quiet Man (John Ford, 1952), an iconic film that is still very much celebrated in Ireland and abroad.

In total, they made five films together between 1948 and 1972, also including Rio Grande (John Ford, 1950), The Wings of Eagles (John Ford, 1957), McLintock! (Andrew V. McLaglen, 1963) and Big Jake (George Sherman, 1971).

O’Hara most often played strong and wilful women, but offscreen she was the same. In 1957 her career was threatened by scandal, when the tabloid Confidential magazine claimed she and a man had engaged in 'the hottest show in town' in the back row of Hollywood’s Grauman’s Chinese Theatre. However, as she later told the Associated Press, at the time she “was making a movie in Spain, and I had the passport to prove it”.

She testified against the magazine in a criminal libel trial and brought a lawsuit that was settled out of court. The magazine eventually went out of business.


Dutch postcard by Gebr. Spanjersberg N.V., Rotterdam, no. 2028. Photo: Columbia Film / Ufa.


Dutch postcard by Gebr. Spanjersberg N.V., Rotterdam, no. 2029. Photo: Columbia Film / Ufa.

John Candy's domineering mother

Maureen O'Hara was married three times. In 1939, at the age of 19, O'Hara secretly married Englishman George H. Brown, a film producer, production assistant and occasional scriptwriter, who she had met on the set of Jamaica Inn. The marriage was annulled in 1941.

Later that year, O'Hara married American film director William Houston Price (dialogue director in The Hunchback of Notre Dame), but the union ended in 1953, reportedly as a result of his alcohol abuse. They had one child, a daughter named Bronwyn FitzSimons Price (1944).

In later life, Maureen O’Hara married her third husband, Brigadier General Charles Blair. The couple lived in the US Virgin Islands, where he operated an airline. He died in a plane crash in 1978 and O’Hara took over management of the airline, which she eventually sold. “Being married to Charlie Blair and travelling all over the world with him, believe me, was enough for any woman,” she said in 1995. “It was the best time of my life.”

O'Hara remained retired from acting until 1991, when she starred in the film Only the Lonely (Chris Columbus, 1991), playing Rose Muldoon, the domineering mother of a Chicago cop played by John Candy. Ronald Bergan in his obituary in The Guardian: "she acted everyone else off the screen, a reminder of just how much the cinema had missed her."

In the following years, she continued to work, starring in several made-for-TV films. Her autobiography, 'Tis Herself, was published in 2004 and was a New York Times Bestseller. In 2005 she moved back to Ireland, settling in her house on a 35-acre estate, Lugdine Park, in west Cork, which she had bought with Blair in 1970. In 2012 she returned to the US to be closer to her family as her health declined.

She was never nominated for an Oscar, instead being given an honorary award in 2014. After accepting her statuette from a wheelchair, the then 94-year-old star protested when her speech of thanks was cut short.

Maureen O'Hara died in her sleep at home in Boise, Idaho. She is survived by her daughter, Bronwyn, and by a grandson and two great-grandchildren.


Trailer for Jamaica Inn (Alfred Hitchcock, 1939). Source: Cohen Film Collection (YouTube).


Trailer for The Quiet Man (John Ford, 1952). Source: Eurekaentertainment (YouTube).

Sources: Ronald Bergan (The Guardian), Wikipedia and IMDb.

Maria Brockerhoff

October 26, 2015, 11:00 pm

≫ Next: Gli ultimi giorni di Pompei (1926)

≪ Previous: Maureen O’Hara (1920-2015)

$

0

0

German actress and model Maria Brockerhoff (1942) was a popular starlet and magazine pin-up in the late 1960s. Her films may be forgotten but her postcards with photos by Bernard of Hollywood are still delicious.


German postcard by Krüger, no. 902/368. Photo: Bernard of Hollywood.

Attractive Eyecatcher

Maria Brockerhoff was born in Hamburg, Germany, in 1942. When she studied graphic design, she also worked as a mannequin. During a contest she was chosen as ‘Deutschen Gretchen 65’.

This led to parts in a series of film comedies. The first was Die schwedische Jungfrau/The Virgin from Sweden (Kurt Wilhelm, 1964), starring Paul Hubschmid and Letitia Roman.

Other titles are the Schlagerfilms Ich kauf' mir lieber einen Tirolerhut/I Rather Buy Myself a Tirolean Hat (Hans Bilian, 1965) with Manfred Schnelldorfer and Hannelore Auer, and Komm mit zur blauen Adria/Come Along To The Blue Adriatic (Lothar Gündisch, 1966) with Dietmar Schönherr.

In all these light entertainment films, the beautiful blonde Brockerhoff was merely an attractive eyecatcher.


German postcard by Krüger, no. 903/366. Photo: Bernard of Hollywood.


German postcard by Krüger, no. 902/364. Photo: Bernard of Hollywood.


German postcard by Krüger, no. 902/367. Photo: Bernard of Hollywood.


German postcard by Krüger, no. 902/365. Photo: Bernard of Hollywood.

Playboy Covergirl

In 1965 Maria Brockerhoff traveled to Hollywood to play a part in the action film The Silencers (Phil Karlson, 1966), starring Dean Martin as secret agent Matt Helm. This opportunity fell through because she had not obtained a working permit.

In 1966 she could be seen in 26 illustrated magazines, and she appeared in an uncredited bit role at the side of French star Jean Marais in Le saint prend l’affut/The Saint Lies in Wait (Christian-Jacque, 1966) based on the detective novels by Leslie Charteris.

In 1967 she went again to Hollywood, but negotiations with Columbia Pictures failed when the film studio demanded a seven-year contract.

In Germany she played in erotic films like Pension Clausewitz/Clausewitz Inn (Ralph Habib, 1967) and Komm nur, mein liebstes Vögelein/Come Now, My Dear Little Bird (Rolf Thiele, 1968).

And she was the covergirl of the US edition of Playboy in December 1968. IMDb lists also several cover photos of magazines like Parade (UK), Wochenend (West Germany) and Quick (West Germany).


German postcard by Krüger, no. 902/369. Photo: Bernard of Hollywood.


German postcard by Krüger, no. 902/362. Photo: Bernard of Hollywood.


German postcard by Krüger, no. 900/290. Photo: Bernard of Hollywood.


German postcard by Krüger, no. 902/363. Photo: Bernard of Hollywood.

Sex Comedies

Maria Brockerhoff then appeared in six films in two years, and she finally appeared in an English language film. She had a supporting part in the American-British war film Hannibal Brooks (Michael Winner, 1969) starring Oliver Reed. Albert Ohayon at IMDb: "What can you say about a war movie where an elephant crosses the Alps? It's silly but a heck of a lot of fun. The scenery is gorgeous, the acting is light and the action sequences are top notch. Oliver Reed is perfectly cast as our hero Brooks. He has played so many villain roles that it's great to see him play a nice guy for a change."

Her other less interesting films were made in Germany: the comedy Unser Doktor ist der Beste/Our Doctor Is The Best (Harald Vock, 1969) starring Schlager singer Roy Black, Hugo der Weiberschreck/Hugo, the Woman Chaser (Hans Albin, 1969) with Peter Garden, the sex comedy Die Jungfrauen von Bumshausen/Run, Virgin, Run (Hans Billian, 1970), another sex comedy Frisch, fromm, fröhlich, frei/Renewed, Pious, Happy and Free (Rolf Thiele, 1970) with Horst Frank, and Hurra, ein toller Onkel wird Papa/Hooray, a Super Uncle is a Father (Hans Albin, 1970).

Maria also appeared regularly on German television. She was a permanent cast member of the series Luftsprünge/Bounces (1969). She also made guest appearances in episode of popular Krimi series like Tatort (1972), Der Kommissar (1973) and Bitte keine Polizei/Please No Police (1975). In the mid-1970s the media lost their interest in her. She worked for a while for an advertising agency in München (Munich).

In 1979, Maria Brockerhoff married to George E. Lombard, an American manager of the Lockheed firm. The couple moved to California. There she lives under the name of Maria Lombard.


Theatrical trailer Hannibal Brooks (1969). Source: TaylorHamKid (YouTube).


English language trailer of Die Jungfrauen von Bumshausen/Run Virgin Run (1970). Source: Vicious Habits (YouTube).

Sources: Wikipedia (German), and IMDb.

Gli ultimi giorni di Pompei (1926)

October 27, 2015, 11:00 pm

≫ Next: Mary Kid

≪ Previous: Maria Brockerhoff

$

0

0

The Italian-German silent film Gli ultimi giorni di Pompei/The Last Days of Pompeii (Amleto Palermi, Carmine Gallone, 1926) was one of the many adaptations of the novel The Last Days of Pompeii (1834) by Edward George Bulwer-Lytton. The stars were the Hungarian actors Victor Varconi and Maria Corda, the Italian actress Rina De Liguoro and the German Bernhard Goetzke. Original release prints of the film were entirely colourised by the Pathechrome stencil colour process.


Italian postcard by C. Chierichetti, Milano. Photo: Grandi Films, Roma. Publicity still for Gli ultimi giorni di Pompei/The Last Days of Pompeii (Amleto Palermi, Carmine Gallone, 1926).

Glaucus (Victor Varconi) training at the gymnasium.


Italian postcard by C. Chierichetti, Milano. Photo: Grandi Films, Roma. Publicity still for Gli ultimi giorni di Pompei/The Last Days of Pompeii (Amleto Palermi, Carmine Gallone, 1926).

Pompeian street life with the rich Greek Glaucus (Victor Varconi) and his wealthy friends meeting the blind flower girl Nydia (Maria Corda), who also sings and plays the lyre. The bearded man left in the back is Burbo (Carlo Duse), the brutal tavern owner, who owns Nydia as a slave.


Italian postcard by C. Chierichetti, Milano. Photo: Grandi Films, Roma. Publicity still for Gli ultimi giorni di Pompei/The Last Days of Pompeii (Amleto Palermi, Carmine Gallone, 1926).

A Pompeiian street with Burbo's tavern. Sets were by Vittorio Cafiero, costumes by Duilio Cambellotti.


Italian postcard by C. Chierichetti, Milano. Photo: Grandi Films, Roma. Publicity still for Gli ultimi giorni di Pompei/The Last Days of Pompeii (Amleto Palermi, Carmine Gallone, 1926).

Glaucus (Victor Varconi) has saved Nydia (Maria Corda) from Burbo and taken into his house. Nydia loves Glaucus, but he can only think of Ione.


Italian postcard by C. Chierichetti, Milano. Photo: Grandi Films, Roma. Publicity still for Gli ultimi giorni di Pompei/The Last Days of Pompeii (Amleto Palermi, Carmine Gallone, 1926).

Nydia, in love with Glaucus, thinks she has given Glaucus a love potion, but instead it makes him delirious. It is Arbaces who has concocted this.

The Novel and the painting

The novel The Last Days of Pompeii was written by the baron Edward Bulwer-Lytton in 1834. The novel was inspired by the painting The Last Day of Pompeii by the Russian painter Karl Briullov, which Bulwer-Lytton had seen in Milan.

The novel culminates in the cataclysmic destruction of the city of Pompeii by the eruption of Mount Vesuvius in AD 79. The novel became a bestseller, helped on its release by the eruption of Vesuvius just before publication.

The Last Days of Pompeii uses its characters to contrast the decadent culture of 1st-century Rome with both older cultures and coming trends. The protagonist, Glaucus, a handsome Athenian nobleman and Ione's betrothed, represents the Greeks who have been subordinated by Rome.

His nemesis is Arbaces, a scheming Egyptian sorcerer and a high priest of Isis, and the former guardian of Ione and her brother Apaecides. Arbaces represents the still older culture of Egypt. He murders Apaecides and frames Glaucus for the crime. Repeatedly he attempts to seduce Ione.

Olinthus is the chief representative of the nascent Christian religion, which is presented favourably but not uncritically. The Christian converts Apaecides to Christianity and is sentenced to death for his religion.


German postcard by Ross Verlag, no. 53/3. Photo: Hisa Film-Vertrieb. Publicity still for Gli ultimi giorni di Pompei/The Last Days of Pompeii (Carmine Gallone, Amleto Palermi, 1926). Collection: Didier Hanson.


German postcard by Ross Verlag, no. 1344/2, 1927-1928. Photo: Hisa Film-Vertrieb. Publicity still for Gli ultimi giorni di Pompei/The Last Days of Pompeii (Carmine Gallone, Amleto Palermi, 1926). Victor Varconi as Glaucus.


German postcard by Ross Verlag, no. 1347/1, 1927-1928. Photo: Hisa Film-Vertrieb. Publicity still for Gli ultimi giorni di Pompei/The Last Days of Pompeii (Carmine Gallone, Amleto Palermi, 1926). Bernhard Goetzke as the evil Egyptian priest Arbaces.


Italian postcard by C. Chierichetti, Milano. Photo: Grandi Films, Roma. Publicity still for Gli ultimi giorni di Pompei/The Last Days of Pompeii (Amleto Palermi, Carmine Gallone, 1926).

The funeral of Apecides (Vittorio Evangelisti). Apecides, brother of Glaucus' lover Ione and former pupil of the Egyptian high priest of Isis, Arbaces, has converted to Christianity and threatens to unmask Arbaces's frauds. Arbaces stabs him and puts the blame on Glaucus, drugged unknowingly by Nydia. The priest in the middle is Calenus (Emilio Ghione), who has seen Arbaces murdering Apecides. Arbaces himself (Bernhard Goetzke) can be seen extreme left.


Italian postcard by C. Chierichetti, Milano. Photo: Grandi Films, Roma. Publicity still for Gli ultimi giorni di Pompei/The Last Days of Pompeii (Amleto Palermi, Carmine Gallone, 1926).

At the Via delle Tombe in Pompeii the funeral service for the murdered Apecides is held. In the centre is the priest Calenus (Emilio Ghione).

The Star Cast

Handsome Victor Varconi (1891–1976) was as Glaucus the male star of Gli ultimi giorni di Pompei/The Last Days of Pompeii. The Hungarian Varconi, originally Viktor Varkony, was a highly successful matinee idol of the Hungarian-Austrian and German silent cinema in the 1910s and early 1920s. Later he was the first Hungarian actor to become a Hollywood star until the sound film completely altered the course of his career.

Hungarian Maria Corda (1898-1975) played the slave girl Nydia, who is in love with Glaucus. Corda was an immensely popular star of the silent cinema of Austria and Germany. The pretty, blonde actress was a queen of the popular epic spectacles of the 1920s, which were often directed by her husband, Alexander Korda.

Not pictured on one of the postcards is Rina De Liguoro (1892-1966) as Ione. She was the last diva of the Italian silent cinema of the 1920s. De Liguoro had her breakthrough in 1924 as the sensual, untamed Roman empress Messalina, and the beautiful countess continued her glittering career in such epics as Quo Vadis (1924), Casanova (1927) and Cecil B. De Mille's notorious box office flop Madam Satan (1930).

Emilio Ghione (1879-1930), who played Calenus, was an Italian silent film actor, director and screenwriter. He is best known for writing, directing and starring in the Za La Mort series of adventure films, in which he played a likeable French apache and 'honest outlaw.'

The evil Egyptian priest Arbaces was played by German film actor Bernhard Goetzke (1884–1964). He was one of the impressive stars of German silent cinema, in particular in the films by Fritz Lang. Goetzke appeared in 130 films between 1917 and 1961.


Italian postcard by C. Chierichetti, Milano. Photo: Grandi Films, Roma. Publicity still for Gli ultimi giorni di Pompei/The Last Days of Pompeii (Amleto Palermi, Carmine Gallone, 1926).

Calenus (Emilio Ghione) tries to blackmail Arbaces (Bernhard Goetzke). Arbaces leads him to his treasury.


Italian postcard by C. Chierichetti, Milano. Photo: Grandi Films, Roma. Publicity still for Gli ultimi giorni di Pompei/The Last Days of Pompeii (Amleto Palermi, Carmine Gallone, 1926).

Calenus (Emilio Ghione) has been fooled by Arbaces and is locked up in the treasury, which is also a dungeon.


Italian postcard by C. Chierichetti, Milano. Photo: Grandi Films, Roma. Publicity still for Gli ultimi giorni di Pompei/The Last Days of Pompeii (Amleto Palermi, Carmine Gallone, 1926).

At the basilica (courts of justice). Glaucus (Victor Varconi) is sentenced to die.


Italian postcard by C. Chierichetti, Milano. Photo: Grandi Films, Roma. Publicity still for Gli ultimi giorni di Pompei/The Last Days of Pompeii (Amleto Palermi, Carmine Gallone, 1926).

Glaucus (Victor Varconi) and the Christian Olintus (Ferruccio Biancini), the man on the right, in the prison of the Christians, waiting for their ordeal in the arena.

The adaptations

The first theatrical adaptation of The Last Days of Pompeii was Errico Petrella's opera Jone, with a libretto by Giovanni Peruzzini. It premiered at La Scala in 1858. It was very successful and remained in the Italian repertoire well into the 20th century. In 1877 followed an ambitious theatrical adaptation, which was mounted at the Queen's Theatre, Long Acre in London. It featured a staged eruption of the Vesuvius, an earthquake and a sybaritic Roman feast – the earth did not quake, the volcano did not work, acrobats fell onto the cast below, and the production was an expensive flop.

The first film version was the British short film The Last Days of Pompeii (1900), directed by Walter R. Booth. Eight years later followed Gli ultimi giorni di Pompei/The Last Days of Pompeii (Arturo Ambrosio, Luigi Maggi, 1908). In 1913 followed to more Italian silent film versions, Gli ultimi giorni di Pompei/The Last Days of Pompeii (Mario Caserini, 1913), and Jone ovvero gli ultimi giorni di Pompei/Jone or the Last Days of Pompeii (Giovanni Enrico Vidali, Ubaldo Maria Del Colle, 1913).

The first sound version was the Hollywood production The Last Days of Pompeii (Ernest B. Schoedsack, Merian C. Cooper, 1935), with Preston Foster and Basil Rathbone. It carried a disclaimer that, although the movie used the novel's description of Pompei, it did not use its plot or characters. The film was a moderate success on its initial release, but made an overall loss of $237,000.

After the war followed the French-Italian version Gli ultimi giorni di Pompei/Les Derniers Jours de Pompéi/The Last Days of Pompeii (Marcel L'Herbier, Paolo Moffa, 1950), starring Micheline Presle and Georges Marchal. The amphitheatre scenes were filmed at the Arena di Verona. The next adaptation was another Italian version, Gli ultimi giorni di Pompei/The Last Days of Pompeii (Sergio Leone, 1959), starring Steve Reeves. Mario Bonnard, the original director, fell ill on the first day of shooting, so assistant director Leone and the scriptwriters finished the film. Later followed two TV versions and a German stage musical, Pompeji (2008).

But how was the 1926 version? David Melville reviews at IMDb: "The last of the great silent Italian epics, The Last Days of Pompeii is as lavish as anything produced by Hollywood at that time - only much, much raunchier. During an orgy in the house of the evil priest Arbaces, naked slave girls are served up (literally!) on platters decked with flowers. A nubile mummy rises out of her sarcophagus to do a striptease and bare-breasted sphinx statues come to life as her chorus line. In the gladiators' tavern, wildly effeminate men (kohl-dark eyelids and lipstick as thick as clotted blood) drool and bat their eyes over so much naked, muscular flesh. All in all, the most satisfyingly decadent Ancient Rome saga until Fellini Satyricon in 1968!"


Italian postcard by C. Chierichetti, Milano. Photo: Grandi Films, Roma. Publicity still for Gli ultimi giorni di Pompei/The Last Days of Pompeii (Amleto Palermi, Carmine Gallone, 1926).

Glaucus (Victor Varconi) in prison. The man on the right is the Christian Olintus (Ferruccio Biancini), who had converted Apecides. Olintus will see the eruption and destruction of Pompeii as a punishment of God.


Italian postcard by C. Chierichetti, Milano. Photo: Grandi Films, Roma. Publicity still for Gli ultimi giorni di Pompei/The Last Days of Pompeii (Amleto Palermi, Carmine Gallone, 1926).

Glaucus is sentenced to die in the arena, eaten by lions, when just in time Glaucus's friend Sallustius, Nydia, Ione and Calenus expose Arbaces as the real murderer and he threatens to be lynched by the mob. Suddenly the Vesuvius erupts and the terrorised people flee.


Italian postcard by C. Chierichetti, Milano. Photo: Grandi Films, Roma. Publicity still for Gli ultimi giorni di Pompei/The Last Days of Pompeii (Amleto Palermi, Carmine Gallone, 1926).

The destruction of the house of Glaucus.

Sources: David Melville (IMDb), Wikipedia and IMDb.

---

Mary Kid

October 28, 2015, 11:00 pm

≫ Next: EFSP's Dazzling Dozen: Boys Will Be Boys

≪ Previous: Gli ultimi giorni di Pompei (1926)

$

0

0

Mary Kid (1901-1988) was a popular actress of the Austrian and German silent cinema. She also played in two early sound films in Italy.


German postcard by Ross Verlag, Berlin, no. 1615/1, 1927-1928. Photo: Atelier Bálazs, Berlin.


German postcard by Ross Verlag, Berlin, no. 3005/1, 1928-1929. Photo: Atelier Badekow, Berlin.


German postcard by Ross Verlag, no. 3345/3, 1928-1929. Photo: Atelier Manassé, Vienna.

Lured by a Count

Mary Kid was born as Marie Anna Albertine Keul in Hamburg, Germany in 1901 (IMDb wrongly states 1904). Mary took theatre lessons in her hometown Hamburg, but before she could start a stage career there, the Austrian film producer Count Sascha Kolowrat took her to Vienna to turn her into a film star.

For Sacha Film she played in three films directed by Mihaly Kertesz (the future Michael Curtiz): Namenlos/Der falsche Arzt/Nameless (1923), Die Lawine/The avalanche (1923), and Harun al Raschid (1923-1924) – in which she had the female lead.

In 1924 Kid returned to Germany and continued her film career in Berlin, performing in around 25 films between 1924 and 1930. Her first German film was the comedy of morals Lumpen und Seide/Rags and Silk (Richard Oswald, 1924 in which she played opposite Reinhold Schünzel, Mary Parker and Johannes Riemann.

This was followed by more Richard Oswald films: Halbseide/Half-silk (1925), Vorderhaus und Hinterhaus/Front building and house at the back (1925) - both again with Mary Parker,Wir sind vom K.u.K. Infanterieregiment/We are from the K.u.K. Infantry regiment (1926), in which Kid had the female lead as Lily opposite Paul Heidemann, and Lützows wilde verwegene Jagd/Lützows wild bold hunt (1926-1927), a film set in Napoleon’s times in which Kid starred as an actress from the Viennese Burgtheater.

Mary Kid had more major roles in Sumpf und Moral/Marsh and morality (Rudolf Walther-Fein, 1924) with Wilhelm Dieterle, Der Bastard/The Bastard (Gennaro Righelli, 1925) with Maria Jacobini, Zirkus Renz/Circus Renz (Wolfgang Neff, 1926), Heimliche Sünder (Franz Seitz sen., 1926), Ich war zu Heidelberg Student/I Was a Student at Heidelberg (Wolfgang Neff, 1926) – in which Kid had the female lead, Die Tochter des Kunstreiters/The daughter of the Circus Rider (Siegfried Philippi, 1927), and Die Geliebte seiner Hoheit/The Lover of His Highness (Jakob & Luisa Fleck, 1927).

In Song/Schmutziges Geld (Richard Eichberg, 1928), Mary Kid played the evil antagonist Gloria who pushes knife thrower Jack (Heinrich George) to rob for her. When Jack is blinded because of the robbery Jack’s new friend Song (Anna May Wong) helps him out, pretending to be Gloria, but she pays for the disguise. She also appeared in Dornenweg einer Fürstin/Rasputin (Nikolaj Larin, 1928) in which Gregori Chmara played the notorious Russian monk.


German postcard. Photo: Westi, Berlin. Publicity still for Lumpen und Seide/Rags and Silk (Richard Oswald, 1925) with Ferdinand Bonn.


German postcard by Ross Verlag, no. 1076/1, 1927-1928. Photo: Alex Binder, Berlin.


German postcard by Ross Verlag, no. 1864/2, 1927-1928. Photo: Atelier Balázs, Berlin.

Between Vienna and Berlin

Then Mary Kid returned to Vienna. During the last years of the silent era she did various films there. In 1928 she starred in Die verschwundene Frau/The Woman Who Disappeared (Karl Hans Leiter, 1928) with Harry Halm and a young Peter Lorre, Die beiden Seehunde/The Two Seals (Max Neufeld, 1928) with Werner Pittschau, and Andere Frauen/Other Women (Heinz Hanus, 1928) with Rina De Liguoro.

In 1929 Mary Kid went back to Berlin to play in Die süsse Yvonne/Sweet Yvonne (Max Reichmann, 1929), in which Kid had the female lead opposite Fritz Schulz, and Der Leutnant ihrer Majestät/The Lieutenant of Her Majesty (Jakob & Luisa Fleck, 1929) starring Agnes Esterhazy as the Empress.

In Berlin, she also appeared in the First World War drama Die Herrin und ihre Knecht/The Boss and Her Servant (1929). Henny Porten stars as a German landlady who is helped by a Russian officer (Igo Sym) despite war time, but is afraid he will choose her younger sister (Kid). She then must choose between love and patriotism. The film was directed by Kid’s old acquaintance Richard Oswald.

In 1930 Kid returned again to Vienna where she played in her last three silent films: General Babka (1930), directed by Hungarian director Desider/Deszö Kertesz, starring Wolf Albach-Retty, Eine Dirne ist ermordet worden/A prostitute has been murdered (Conrad Wiene, 1930), and Der Onkel aus Sumatra/The Uncle from Sumatra (Julius Szöreghy, 1930).

In 1931 Kid went to Italy where she played in her only two sound films. The first was Rubacuori/Heartbreaker (Guido Brignone, 1931), a comedy about an old Casanova (Armando Falconi) who hunts young women until his wife (Tina Lattanzi) finds a jewel that belongs to one of his girl friends. Falconi’s character comes between a prize fighter (Egon Stief) and his wife (Mary Kid).

Kid's second Italian film was Kennst Du das Land/Saltarello (Constantin J. David, 1931). Though produced by the Italian companies Pittaluga and Cines and shot by an Italian crew, the cast was German-Austrian. It was an alternative language version of Terra madre/Mother Earth (Alessandro Blasetti, 1931) starring Leda Gloria.

After that, Mary Kid withdrew to her birthtown Hamburg. There she died nearly sixty years later in 1988.


This is probably an Austrian postcard. Listo-Film was an Austrian film company. As no Listo-Film production with Kid is known at IMDb, Listo-Film may have been used as Austrian distributor for one of Kid's German films.


German postcard by Ross Verlag, no. 3345/1, 1928-1929. Photo: Atelier Manassé, Vienna. Collection: Didier Hanson.


German postcard by Ross Verlag, no. 3345/2, 1928-1929. Photo: Atelier Schneider, Berlin.


Austrian postcard by Iris Verlag, no. 611. Sent by mail in 1932. Photo: Sascha.

Sources: Thomas Staedeli (Cyranos), Wikipedia (German), and IMDb.

EFSP's Dazzling Dozen: Boys Will Be Boys

October 29, 2015, 11:00 pm

≫ Next: Imported from the USA: Maria Montez

≪ Previous: Mary Kid

$

0

0

During our trip to the Pordenone Silent Film Festival earlier this month, we did a post on twelve silent cowboys. We liked the concept. So we started a new series especially for Postcard Friendship Friday: a dozen postcards with a theme. This Friday and the next it is postcards of child stars. The following week twelve little girls who provided keen and tough competition to Shirley Temple. Today, postcards from different countries and different times which all confirm that boys will be boys....


Our Gang. Dutch postcard. Caption: "Gelukkig Nieuwjaar" (Happy New Year).


French postcard. Photo Eclectic Films.

Clément Mary (1905-1974) was as Bébé the best known child actor of the early 1910s. He would later act in French sound films as René Dary.


Italian postcard, no. 3373. Photo: Film Artistica Gloria, Torino. Ermanno Roveri in Il piccolo patriota padovano (Leopoldo Carlucci Gloria 1915). Caption: No longer able to stand the beatings and the hunger, he escapes his tormentor.

Italian actor Ermanno Roveri (1903-1968) started his career as child star, a.o. in various adaptations of the stories from Cuore, such as Dagli Appennini alle Ande, Naufragio, Il piccolo patriota padovano and Il piccolo scrivano fiorentino, all filmed in 1915-1916 for the company Gloria Film.


Dutch postcard by B. Brouwer, Amsterdam. Photo: Bernard Eilers, Amsterdam.

Little Henkie Klein (1921-?) was a child actor in German and Dutch films of the silent era. He was called the 'Dutch Jackie Coogan'.


French postcard. Photo Ajax, no. 172.

René Poyen (1908-1968) was a famous child star in silent French cinema, who started at the age of four as the popular character Bout-de-Zan at the Gaumont film company. Most of his burlesque comedies were filmed by Louis Feuillade.


French postcard by Cinémagazine, no. 238.

Jean Forest(1912-1980) is best remembered for his touching, naturalist and convincing performances as boy actor in the silent French films by Jacques Feyder: Crainquebille (1922), Visages d'enfants (1923-1925) and Gribiche (1926).


German Postcard by Ross Verlag, no. A1276/1. 1937-1938. Photo: Manassée-Ricoll, Wien / Mondial.

Actor, presenter and journalist Peter Bosse (1931) was a popular child star of the German cinema in the 1930s. The boy with his cheeky face made 28 films.


German postcard by Kolibri-Verlag G.m.b.H., Minden/Westf., no. 2000. Photo: H. / Fü.

Oliver Grimm (1948) was Germany's favourite child star for more than a decade, He made 17 films between 1952 and 1963.


Italian postcard in the series Piccoli uomini nel cinema by Ed. Villaggio del Fanciullo, Bologna. Photo: Cino del Duca. Publicity still for Le ballon rouge/The red balloon (Albert Lamorisse, 1956).

French child actor Pascal Lamorisse (1950) is known by film lovers all over the world because of his parts in the short films Crin blanc: Le cheval sauvage (1953) and Le ballon rouge (1956), both directed by his father, Albert Lamorisse.


Italian postcard by Ed. Villaggio del Fanciullo, Bologna. Photo: E.N.I.C. Publicity still for Marcelino, pan y vino/Marcelino Bread And Wine (1955).

Pablito Calvo (1948–2000) was a Spanish child actor. After the international success of Marcelino, pan y vino/Marcelino Bread And Wine (1955), he became a star. At the age of 16, he retired.


German promotion card by Ariola, no. Ar 108. Photo: Norbert Unfried.

Dutch singer and actor Hein Simons (1955) was a famous child star in the 1960s under the name Heintje. He sang in Dutch, English, German, Japanese and Afrikaans, and he sold more than 40 million records worldwide. His greatest hit was Mama. Between 1968 and 1971 he also starred in six German light entertainment films, of which one became surprisingly popular in Red China.


Italian postcard. Photo: publicity still for Incompreso/Misunderstood (Luigi Comencini, 1966) with Stefano Colagrande. Caption: "Questo è il solo film che andro a vedere. James Bond" (This is the only movie I'll go to see. James Bond). This sweet and sad film is also a personal favourite of EFSP's editor-in-chief a.k.a. 008.

This is a post for Postcard Friendship Friday, hosted by Beth at the The Best Hearts are Crunchy. You can visit her by clicking on the button below.

Imported from the USA: Maria Montez

October 30, 2015, 11:00 pm

≫ Next: Nora Gregor

≪ Previous: EFSP's Dazzling Dozen: Boys Will Be Boys

$

0

0

Dominican film actress María Montez (1912-1951) gained fame and popularity as a tempestuous Latino beauty in Hollywood movies of the 1940s. In a series of exotic adventures filmed in Technicolor, she starred as Arabian princesses, jungle goddesses and highborn gypsies, dressed in fanciful costumes and sparkling jewels. Over her career, ‘The Queen of Technicolor’ appeared in 26 films, of which five were made in Europe.


French postcard by Editions P.I., no. 259. Photo: Universal International.


Italian postcard by Rotophot, Milano, no. 14.


French postcard by Editions O.P., Paris, no. 28. Photo: Studio Harcourt.

The Caribbean Cyclone

Maria Montez was born Maria Africa Gracia Vidal in Barahona, Dominican Republic in 1912. She was one of ten children born to Isidoro Gracía, and his wife Teresa Vidal. Her father was a textile exporter and the Honorary Vice Consul of Spain in the Dominican Republic. Despite what several sources write, Montez lived the first 27 years of her life in the Dominican Republic.

In 1932 she married William G. McFeeters, a wealthy banker who served in the British army. In 1939 they divorced and Maria moved to New York City, where she worked as a model. She was discovered by a Universal talent scout and left for Hollywood.

One of her first films for Universal was the Science Fiction comedy The Invisible Woman (A. Edward Sutherland, 1940) in which she had a bit part as a model. In the B-Western Boss of Bullion City (Ray Taylor, 1940) starring Johnny Mack Brown, Montez was the female lead. It was the first time she played a leading role and was the only one of her film roles where she speaks some Spanish. South of Tahiti (George Waggner, 1941) with Brian Donlevy and Broderick Crawford, helped to launch her as a pin-up star.

Her beauty soon made her the centrepiece of Universal's Technicolor costume adventures. Her most frequent costar was Jon Hall, who some critics claimed was even prettier and better built than she was. Their joint films were the big hit Arabian Nights (John Rawlins, 1942) with Sabu, White Savage (Arthur Lubin, 1943), Ali Baba and the Forty Thieves (Arthur Lubin, 1944) with Turhan Bey, the camp classic Cobra Woman (Robert Siodmak, 1944), Gypsy Wildcat (Roy William Neil, 1944), and Sudan (John Rawlins, 1945).

Hal Erickson at AllMovie: “A 24-hour-a-day star, Ms. Montez was famous for her spectacular entrances at nightclubs and social functions; once, when her arrival at the Universal commissary failed to attract notice, she turned her heel and left the room, returning moments later with a huge entourage and accompanying loud noises.”

‘The Caribbean Cyclone’ often quarrelled with her directors and went on suspension for refusing the lead in the Western Frontier Gal (Charles Lamont, 1945). Her role was taken by Yvonne de Carlo who had become a similar sort of star and began to supplant Montez's position at the studio. Montez then appeared in the sepia-toned swashbuckler The Exile (Max Ophüls, 1947) starring Douglas Fairbanks, Jr., and the Technicolor Western Pirates of Monterey (Alfred L. Werker, 1947) with Rod Cameron. It was to be her last film for Universal.


Maria Montez and Jon Hall in White Savage (1943). Vintage card. Photo: Universal. Publicity still for White Savage (Arthur Lubin, 1943).


Maria Montez and Douglas Fairbanks Jr. in The Exile (1947). Spanish postcard by Sobe, no. 452. Photo: publicity still for The Exile (Max Ophüls, 1947).


Maria Montez and Jean-Pierre Aumont. Dutch postcard, no. 3117. Photo: Universal International.


Maria Montez and Tina Aumont. Vintage postcard, no. 301.

Sadistic manager of a circus show

While working in Hollywood, Maria Montez met French actor Jean-Pierre Aumont. They married in 1943 at Montez's home in Beverly Hills. Aumont had to leave a few days after their wedding to serve in the Free French Forces fighting against Nazi Germany during World War II. At the end of the war, the couple had a daughter, Maria Christina (also known as actress Tina Aumont), born in Hollywood in 1946.

The couple starred together in the American adventure film Siren of Altantis (Gregg G. Tallas, 1949), produced by United Artists. It was the first movie Montez made after leaving Universal Pictures. By then, her career in the United States began to wane due to audiences' changing taste in films.

Montez and Aumont, then moved to a home in Suresnes, a western suburb of Paris. In France, Montez appeared in several films and the play L'Ile Heureuse (The happy island), written by her husband. Her first French film was Hans le marin/Wicked City (François Villiers, 1949) with Jean-Pierre Aumont andLilli Palmer. It was a success in Europe.

She then played the sadistic manager of a circus show, who uses her attractiveness to seduce men and force them to do dangerous acrobatic acts in Portrait d'un assassin/Portrait of an Assassin (Bernard-Roland, 1949). One of her victims was played by Erich von Stroheim.

She also wrote three books, two of which were published, as well as penning a number of poems. In Italy, she starred in the Italian-American coproduction Il Ladro di Venezia/The Thief of Venice (John Brahm, 1950) with another former Universal contract star, Paul Christian a.k.a. Paul Hubschmid. Her last film was the Italian adventure film La vendetta del corsaro/Revenge of the Pirates (Primo Zeglio, 1951).

At only 39, Maria Montez died in Suresnes, France in 1951 after apparently suffering a heart attack and drowning in her bath. She was buried in the Cimetière du Montparnasse in Paris where her tombstone gives her amended year of birth (1918), not the actual year of birth (1912). Shortly after her death, a street in the city of Barahona, Montez's birthplace, was named after her. In 1996, the city of Barahona opened the Aeropuerto Internacional María Montez (María Montez International Airport) in her honour.


French postcard by Editions P.I., no. 259. Photo: Universal International.


German postcard by Kunst und Bild, Berlin, no. A 292. Photo: Pallas Film Verleih.


German postcard by Kolibri-Verlag. Photo: Universal International.


German postcard by Kunst und Bild, Berlin, no. A 556. Photo: Universal International. Photo: publicity still for The Exile (Max Ophüls, 1947).

Sources: Hal Erickson (AllMovie), Denny Jackson (IMDb), Wikipedia and IMDb.

Nora Gregor

October 31, 2015, 11:00 pm

≫ Next: Jean Dax

≪ Previous: Imported from the USA: Maria Montez

$

0

0

Austrian Nora Gregor (1901-1949) was an operetta diva and a stage and film actress. Her most famous screen role was Christine de la Chesnaye in Jean Renoir's classic film La Règle du Jeu (1939). She worked briefly in Hollywood during the early talkie era, appearing in foreign-language versions of MGM productions.


German postcard by Ross Verlag, no. 5607/1, 1930-1931. Photo: Metro-Goldwyn-Mayer (MGM).


German postcard by Ross Verlag, no. 5787/1, 1930-1931. Photo: Metro-Goldwyn-Mayer.


Austrian postcard by Iris Verlag, no. 6112. Distributed in Italy by Casa Editrice Ballerini & Fratini, Firenze. Photo: Metro-Goldwyn-Mayer.


French postcard by Europe, no. 85E. Photo: Metro-Goldwyn-Mayer.

Groundbreaking film

Nora Gregor was born in 1901 as Eleonora Hermina Gregor in Görz (Gorizia) in former Austria-Hungary (now Italy) to Austrian Jewish parents.

She made her stage debut in an operetta in Graz, Austria. From there she went to the Volksbühne an das Raimund-Theater in Vienna. Her first silent film was Gefesselt/Tied Up (Peter Paul Felner, 1920). Other early Austrian films were Die Schauspielerin des Kaisers/The actress of the emperor (Hans Otto, 1921) and Meriota, die Tänzerin/Meriota, the Dancer (Julius Herska, 1921), in which she played Lucrezia Borgia. She continued her film career successfully with Die Venus/The Venus (Hans Homma, 1922) with Magda Sonja, and Die kleine Sünde/The Small Sin (Julius Herska, 1923).

With her role as the aristocratic femme fatale Princess Zamikoff in Michael/Chained: The Story of the Third Sex (1924), directed by Danish director Carl Theodor Dreyer, she achieved her first great success. This groundbreaking film tells the story of a bisexual love triangle with Benjamin Christensen and Walter Slezak as the other angles.

After this international breakthrough she appeared in such German productions as Das Mädchen mit dem Protektion/The girl with the patronage (Max Mack, 1925) with Ossi Oswalda, Der Geiger von Florenz/The violinist of Florence (Paul Czinner, 1926) with Elisabeth Bergner and Conrad Veidt, and Eheskandal im Hause Fromont jun. und Risler sen./Marriage scandal in the house Fromont jun. and Risler sen. (A.W. Sandberg, 1927) with Lucy Doraine.

MGM contracted Nora Gregor but while she arrived in Hollywood the talkie replaced the silent film. She had a short appearance in The Hollywood Revue of 1929 (Charles Reisner, 1929) and played the leading role in Olympia (Jacques Feyder, 1930), the German language version of His Glorious Night (Lionel Barrymore, 1930). She made a short excursion to Germany, where she starred with Harry Liedtke in Und das ist die Hauptsache/That's All That Matters (Joe May, 1931) and then she returned to Hollywood for more alternate language versions of MGM productions.

She appeared in Mordprozess Mary Dugan/The Trial of Mary Dugan (Arthur Robison, 1931) and together with Paul Morgan, Dita Parlo and Buster Keatonin Wir schalten um auf Hollywood/We switch over to Hollywood (Frank Reicher, 1931). She also played in the English spoken But the Flesh Is Weak (Jack Conway, 1932) with Robert Montgomery, based on a stage hit by Ivor Novello. Then she returned to Europe.


Dutch postcard, no. 17. Photo: Metro-Goldwyn-Mayer. Publicity still for Mordprozess Mary Dugan (Arthur Robison, 1931).


Dutch postcard. Sent by mail in 1932. Photo: Metro-Goldwyn-Mayer.


Dutch postcard by JosPé, Arnhem, no. 43. Photo: Metro-Goldwyn-Mayer.


Dutch postcard by City Film, no. 104.

Eighty Family Estates

In Germany Nora Gregor played in Abenteuer am Lido/Adventure at the Lido (Richard Oswald, 1933) and opposite Peter Lorre in the entertaining comedy Was Frauen träumen/What Women Dream (Géza von Bolvary, 1933), based on a script by Billy Wilder. The next years she worked at the Max Reinhardt Bühne in Berlin and at the Burgtheater in Vienna, where she played Desdemona in Othello and Juliet in Romeo and Juliet by William Shakespeare.

In 1937, after divorcing pianist Mitja Nikisch, she married Prince Ernst Ruediger von Starhemberg, vice chancellor of Austria and nationalist and conservative politician. After the Anschluss by the Nazis in 1938, they had to flee from Austria and emigrated through Switzerland to France. There, her husband joined the Free French forces. Cut off from their money and the eighty family estates, they were supported for a period by Starhemberg's close friend Friedrich Mandl, the Austrian armaments magnate and former husband of Hedy Lamarr.

In France, Nora Gregor made only one film, the brilliant, black comedy La Règle du Jeu/The Rules of the Game (Jean Renoir, 1938). This controversial film was Renoir's look at bourgeois life in France at the onset of World War II. At Films de France,James Travers writes: "Although La Régle du jeu is now safely acknowledged as one of the greatest films in cinema history, it has certainly had a chequered history. The film was, at the time it was made, one of Renoir’s most ambitious films, costing around five million Francs, but it was a commercial disaster. (...) it was condemned by critics and public alike for its scandalous and depressing tone. Under the occupation during World War II, the film was banned, and soon disappeared into obscurity. The film resurfaced in the late 1950's, having been fully restored (under Renoir’s supervision), and following its showing at the Venice film festival in 1959 it was instantly established as one of the genuine masterpieces of world cinema."

This was to be Nora Gregor's last appearance in the European cinema. WW II forced her and her husband in 1942 to go in exile again and this time they went to Argentinia and Chile. Her last appearance was in the Chilean-French film La Fruta mordida/The Bitten Fruit (Jacques Rémy, 1945). Reportedly depressed since the beginning of her South American exile, she committed suicide in Viña del Mar, Chile (some sources say Santiago de Chile) in 1949. Her son Heinrich Starhemberg (1934-1997) was also an actor, often credited as Henry Gregor.


Scene from Michael/Chained: The Story of the Third Sex (1924). Source: RADIOSANTOS (YouTube).


Scene from Was Frauen träumen/What Women Dream (1933) with Peter Lorre and Nora Gregor.


Trailer of La Règle du Jeu/The Rules of the Game (1938). Source: Janusfilms (YouTube).

Sources: Thomas Staedeli, Hal Erickson (AllMovie), James Travers (Films de France), Rudi Polt (IMDb), Wikipedia, and IMDb.

Jean Dax

November 1, 2015, 10:00 pm

≫ Next: Nadja Tiller

≪ Previous: Nora Gregor

$

0

0

Jean Dax (1879-1962) was a French actor who played in French and German films between 1909 and 1939. During the 1910s he was one of the main stars of the French silent cinema.


French postcard by Editions Cinémagazine, no. 147. Photo: Emera.

Burglar Under Her Bed

Jean Dax was born as Gontran Théodore Louis Henri Willar in Paris, France in 1879.

He made his film debut in 1909 and played that year in such short silent films as the Le Film d'Art productions Le luthier de Crémone/The Violin Maker of Cremona (André Calmettes, 1909) and L'Épi (André Calmettes, 1909) with Henry Krauss.

In the early 1910s, Dax often performed in films with music-hall star Mistinguett, as in L'épouvante/The Fright (Albert Capellani, 1911), in which Mistinguett plays herself, coming home and discovering a burglar under her bed.

Dax also co-acted often with leading actresses like Gabrielle Robinne. During the war of 1914-1918 he didn't act.

In 1919 Dax played in La Rafale/The gust (Jacques de Baroncelli, 1921), with Fannie Ward, the American actress from The Cheat (1915). It was the story of a gambler, who cheats his friends and kills himself despite his friend's attempts to save him.

In this period, Dax also played the lead in the Émile Zola adaptation L'assommoir/The bat (Maurice de Marsan, Charles Maudru, 1921).


Mistinguett. French postcard by Cinémagazine-Edition, Paris, no. 175. Photo: P. Apers.

Memorable Roles

In the 1920s, Jean Dax continued his career on stage as a popular vaudeville actor, but he also became a French film star who also acted in films in Germany.

He played opposite Japanese star Sessue Hayakawa in La bataille/The Battle (Sessue Hayakawa, Édouard-Émile Violet, 1923) and opposite Chaplin's leading lady Edna Purviance in Education de prince/Education of a Prince (Henri Diamant-Berger, 1927).

Dax also played with stars of the German cinema: with Käthe von Nagy and Vivian Gibson in Die Durchgängerin/The Runaway Girl (Hanns Schwarz, 1928) and with Lil Dagoverin Der geheime Kurier/The Secret Courier (Gennaro Righelli, 1928), an adaptation of Stendhal's Le rouge et le noir.

He also played opposite Italian actress Maria Jacobini and Czech actor Franz Lederer in Maman Colibri/Mother Hummingbird (Julien Duvivier, 1929).

When sound film arrived, Dax's parts became smaller. However, he still had memorable roles such as Talleyrand in the French version of Der Kongress tanzt: Le congrès s'amuse/The Congress Dances (Jean Boyer, Erik Charell, 1931) and the old emperor Franz Joseph in Anatole Litvak's historical drama Mayerling (1936) starring Charles Boyer and Danielle Darrieux.

Jean Dax quitted filming when war was at the verge of starting. He died in 1962 in Paris, nearly forgotten. He was 83 (Some sources say 82). Dax was divorced from singer Jeanne Sauvage.


Maria Jacobini. German postcard by Ross Verlag, no. 569/2, 1919-1924. Atelier Riess, Berlin.


Charles Boyer. British postcard in the Picturegoer series, London, no. 1258. Photo: RKO Radio.

Sources: Philippe Pelletier (CinéArtistes - French), Wikipedia (French) and IMDb.