European Film Star Postcards

Since yesterday, EFSP follows Le Giornate del Cinema Muto again - till Saturday 12 October. The Silent Film Festival in Pordenone is the main festival in its kind and this year's edition is the 38th. And yes, the 'Nasty women' will return! In 2017, Maggie Hennefeld and Laura Horak presented a retrospective full of subversive pleasures. Again, the series features shorts made largely in the 1910s and earlier, showcasing strong-minded women and girls delighting in wreaking havoc and upending the rules of patriarchal power. For this post we selected five cards from our Pathé album from 1911. If the short comedies of these three nasty women are on show in Pordenone or not, we don't care. This post is our little subversive pleasure.

Léocadie

French collectors cards by Pathé Frères, 1911. Photo: SCAGL / Pathé Frères. Mistinguett and Juliette Clarens in Léocadie veut se faire mannequin (Frédéric Mauzens, 1911).

Léocadie veut se faire mannequin/Leocadia Wishes to Be Fashion-model came out in August 1911. It was directed and scripted by Frédéric Mauzens. Uncle Dufond wants to marry his nephew Onésime to a charming widow, Boxing Clorinde (Juliette Clarens). But Onésime, prey to a fatal love, formally repels the offer of his uncle who threatens to cut off his food and ruthlessly chases away his girlfriend, the young Léocadie (Mistinguett).

Léocadie soon finds a job as a model and has just started in her new job, when the boy of her janitor comes to warn that Onésime is drowning in his tub, out of despair. Listening only to her heart, Leocadie flies to his aid without worrying about the elegant dress she wears, which is precisely the one the rich Boxing Clorinde has selected.

The fashion designer, the client, and the model are all at Léocadie's, where Onésime, recalled to life by their good care, escapes only with difficulty to the fury of the two rivals. In the end, Léocadie, who triumphs as mistress of the battlefield, chases the importune uncle and his dangerous protegee.

French collectors cards by Pathé Frères, 1911. Photo: SCAGL / Pathé Frères. Mistinguett and Juliette Clarens in Léocadie veut se faire mannequin (Frédéric Mauzens, 1911).

Léontine

French collectors cards by Pathé Frères, 1911. Photo: SCAGL / Pathé Frères. Scene from Le bateau de Léontine (1911).

The Pathé series about Léontine, a girl always into terrible mischief, is typical 'Nasty women' stuff. In the short comedy Le bateau de Léontine/Betty's Boat (?, 1911), 'Titine' has received a superb three-master for her party. She has promised her parents to be very good in their absence, but she cannot resist the temptation to have her boat sailing.

She turns the kitchen faucets wide-open, so the room serves as a pool to her exploits. Soon the ship is sailing in the 'open sea', but Titine is still dissatisfied. However, the water, crossing the floor, flows in large streams onto the lower floors, drowning the tenants, and transforming the stairs in impassable torrents.

Titine, unsuspecting the dramas that take place below her, quietly floats in a barrel amidst the disaster. It is still unclear which actress played Leontine in this series.

Rosalie

French collector's cards by Pathé Frères, 1911. Photo: Pathé Comica. Sarah Duhamel as Rosalie in Rosalie a trouvé du travail (Romeo Bosetti, 1911).

Rosalie is hired as worker at a fashion shop in Rosalie a trouvé du travail (Romeo Bosetti, 1911). She has to promise to be at work always at 7 sharp, but the next morning she awakes at 10 to 7, shoots out of bed, dresses in haste, jumps down the stairs, and crosses the obstacles like a tornado.

After a dishevelled run full of wild episodes, Rosalie arrives, red-headed and muddy, scarred with snags, at the fashion shop, only to read the sign on the closed front door, 'closed on Sundays and holidays'.

French collector's cards by Pathé Frères, 1911. Photo: Pathé Comica. Sarah Duhamel as Rosalie in Rosalie veut en finir avec la vie (1911).

In Rosalie veut en finir avec la vie/Rosalie wants to finish life (Romeo Bosetti, 1911), Rosalie is fired, so she wants to commit suicide. She shoots herself with a revolver but only destroys the mirror. She throws herself on the tramway rails, but, alas, this one takes another track. She throws herself from a parapet but in vain.

Desperate, she goes into a gun shop, throws a bomb and mounts to heaven But is only to cause her to descend again, this time in the arms of a well-moustached police officer, so gets lust for life again. The film was released in March 1911.

Sources: Fondation Jerome Seydoux (French) and IMDb.

Till Saturday 12 October EFSP follows Le Giornate del Cinema Muto. The Silent Film Festival in Pordenone is the main festival in its kind and this year's edition is the 38th. Yesterday we had a post on the early comedies with 'Nasty women', and today the men follow. The programme 'The Origins of European Slapstick' presents comedies with 'Euro-clowns' like Max Linder, Walter Forde, Grock, Karl Valentin, Charles Puffy and the Scandinavian duo Pat & Patachon (or Fi og By), amd EFSP presents their postcards.

French postcard by Théâtre Pathé Grolée, Lyon. Photo: Pathé Frères. Max Linder as Polichinelle in La légende de Polichinelle (Albert Capellani, 1907).

Polichinelle is an automaton in love with a cute doll in the same shop. When the doll is sold, a fairy helps Polichinelle to follow her. After a series of wild adventures he arrives at the house of the buyer just in time to save the doll from being burned.

French postcard. Photo: Pathé.

French comedian Max Linder (1883-1925), with his trademark silk hat, stick and moustache was an influential pioneer of the silent film. He was largely responsible for the creation of the classic style of silent slapstick comedy and he was the highest paid entertainer of his day.

French postcard by J. Combier, Macon. Photo: Production Jacques Haik. Grock in Son premier film (Jean Kemm, 1926).

Grock (1880-1959) was a Swiss clown, composer and musician. 'The king of clowns' was once the most highly paid entertainer in the world. His act was a mixture of pantomime and musical blunders. Some of Grock's performances have been preserved on film such as in the silent film Son premier film/What For? (Jean Kemm, 1926).

German postcard by Heliogravüre J.B. Obernetter, München. Collection: Marlene Pilaete.

Bavarian comedian Karl Valentin (1882-1948) starred in many silent German films in the 1920s. Valentin was also active as a cabaret performer, clown, author and film producer, and was sometimes called the 'Charlie Chaplin of Germany'. His work influenced artists like Bertolt Brecht and Samuel Beckett.

German postcard by Ross Verlag, no. 1207/1, 1927-1928. Photo: Roman Freulich / Unfilman (Universal).

Fat Hungarian stage and film comedian Károly Huszár(1884–1942 or 1943) or Charles (Huszar-)Puffy or Karl Huszar-Puffy was the most popular slapstick star of the Hungarian silent era. He later worked in both Germany and Hollywood. He played minor roles in such classics as Dr. Mabuse, der Spieler/Dr. Mabuse, King of Crime (1922) and he was the star of a series of slapstick shorts for Universal.

Italian postcard by Il Piùlibri. Photo: youth portrait of Antonio De Curtis (Totò) with dedication.

Totò (1898–1967) was one of the most popular Italian film stars ever, nicknamed 'il principe della risata' (the prince of laughter). He starred in about 100 films, many of which are still frequently broadcast on Italian television. Totò is an heir of the Commedia dell'Arte tradition, and can be compared to Buster Keaton and Charlie Chaplin. His style and some of his recurring jokes and gestures are universally known in Italy.

German postcard by Ross Verlag, no. 3828/2, 1928-1929. Photo: Lothar Stark-Film. Fy og Bi in Filmens Helte/Long and Short, the film heroes (Lau Lauritzen, 1928), produced by the Danish studio Palladium.

The Danish double-act Fy og Bi (Fyrtårnet og Bivognen aka Pat & Patachon or Long and Short) was the most famous comedy couple of the European silent cinema. Long Carl Schenstrom (1881-1942) and short Harald Madsen (1890-1949) became very popular in the 1920s with their short slapstick films.

Dutch postcard for the Danish comedians Fy og Bi, that is long Carl Schenstrom (1881-1942) and short Harald Madsen (1890-1949). They were called 'Watt & Half Watt' in the Netherlands (Long and Short in Britain, Pat und Patachon in Germany). The Dutch cinema De Munt, Kalverstraat 226, Amsterdam, was at the time the cinema for their films in Amsterdam.

Till Saturday 12 October EFSP follows Le Giornate del Cinema Muto in Pordenone. The subject of one of the retrospectives of this year's festival is William S. Hart (1864–1946), the foremost Western star of the silent era. He entered films in 1914 and achieved stardom as the lead in The Bargain (Reginald Barker, 1914). Hart was particularly interested in making realistic Westerns, and his films are noted for their authentic costumes and props. Hart also had an extraordinary acting ability, honed on Shakespearean theatre stages in the United States and England.

French postcard by A.N. in the Les vedettes de cinéma series, Paris, no. 32. Photo: Film Paramount.

French postcard by A.N. in the Les vedettes de cinéma series, Paris, no. 170. Photo: Film United Artists.

French postcard by Cinémagazine-Edition, Paris, no. 293.

Eager to conquer the new medium film

William Surrey Hart was in 1864 in Newburgh, New York. His parents were Nicholas Hart and Rosanna Hart, and he was a distant cousin of the Western star Neal Hart.

His father later worked as an itinerant mill hand in remote sections of Illinois, Iowa, Minnesota, and Wisconsin. Bill grew up in unsettled areas with few white settlers, playing with Sioux children. He learned some of their words and also became adept at Indian sign language.

Hart lived for a while in the Dakota Territory, then worked as a postal clerk in New York City. In 1888 he began to study acting.

He toured and travelled extensively while trying to make a name for himself as an actor, and for a time directed shows at the Asheville Opera House in North Carolina, around the year 1900. He had some success as a Shakespearean actor on Broadway, working with Margaret Mather and other stars.

In 1899 he created the role of Messala in 'Ben-Hur', and later appeared uncredited in an early silent film version, Ben Hur (Sidney Olcott, Frank Oakes Rose, 1907) with Gene Gauntier. That same year, he received excellent reviews for his lead part in the stage version of 'The Virginian' (1907). In the following years, Hart established himself as one of the top interpreters of Western roles on stage.

Hart was eager to conquer the new medium film. After playing supporting roles in two short films, including His Hour of Manhood (Tom Chatterton, 1914). he achieved stardom as a bank robber in the Western The Bargain (Reginald Barker, 1914). He regarded this feature as his true film debut. He was 49 at the time.

W Morrow at IMDb: "The opening credit sequence certainly underscores the sense of a new career for the leading man: all the major players, starting with Hart, are first seen in formal contemporary attire, standing before a stage curtain. As each actor bows low, a cross-fade occurs, and he or she rises in the character makeup and costume they will wear in the film. It's a charming device, and one that serves as a perfect metaphor for this important juncture in Hart's career."

In 1915 William S. Hart signed a contract with Thomas H. Ince and joined Ince's Triangle Film Company. Hart starred in his own series of two-reel western short subjects, which were so popular that they were supplanted by a series of feature films. Many of Hart's early films continued to play in theatres, under new titles, for another decade. In 1915 and 1916 exhibitors voted him the biggest money making star in the United States.

In 1917, he followed Ince to to join Famous Players-Lasky, which merged into Paramount Pictures, and received a very lucrative contract from Adolph Zukor. In the films Hart began to ride a brown and white pinto he called Fritz, the forerunner of later famous movie horses known by their own name. Hart was making feature films like Square Deal Sanderson (William S. Hart, Lambert Hillyer, 1919) and The Toll Gate (Lambert Hillyer, 1920) with Anna Q. Nillson, which were popular with fans.

American postcard. IMDb does not list a film with this title, closest match is Travelin'on (Lambert Hillyer, 1922), produced by William S. Hart Productions, and distributed by Paramount.

Spanish postcard by Amattler Marca Luna chocolate, series 11, no. 15.

Vintage postcard with unknown nationality and editor (US?). William Hart was known as 'The Two-Gun Man'.

A story book hero or a bully?

During the late 1910s and early 1920s, Willam S. Hart was one of the most consistently popular movie stars, frequently ranking high among male actors in popularity contests held by movie fan magazines. At IMDb, Ed Stephan describes William S. Hart as "A storybook hero, the original screen cowboy, ever forthright and honest, even when (as was often the case) he played a villain."

From 1920 till 1925, he was the owner of his own film company, William S. Hart Productions (1920-1925) aka The William S. Hart Co. William S. Hart's career began to dwindle in the early 1920s due to the publicity surrounding a paternity suit against him, which was eventually dismissed.

In 1921, Roscoe 'Fatty'Arbuckle was charged with the rape and manslaughter of aspiring actress Virginia Rappe. The case had many salacious aspects particularly surrounding the sexual injuries found on the victim's body. Many of Arbuckle's fellow actors refused to give any comments to the press. However, Hart who had never met or worked with Arbuckle, made a number of damaging public statements in which he presumed the actor's guilt.

Arbuckle later wrote a premise for a film parodying Hart as a thief, bully, and wife beater, which was bought by Buster Keaton. The following year, Keaton co-wrote, directed and starred in the comedy film The Frozen North (1922). As a result, Hart, refused to speak to Keaton for many years.

By that time, Hart's brand of gritty, rugged Westerns with drab costumes and moralistic themes gradually fell out of fashion. The public became attracted by a new kind of movie cowboy, epitomised by Tom Mix, who wore flashier costumes and was faster with the action. Paramount dropped Hart.

He made his last film, Tumbleweeds (King Baggott, 1925), for United Artists and retired to a ranch in Newhall, California. While living in semi-retirement in Newhall, he was disturbed by a plane which kept flying over his house. The plane was being piloted by Amelia Earhart, and they ended up becoming good friends after he invited her to dinner in order to complain about the noise her plane was making.

By that time audiences were more interested in the antics of a Tom Mix or Hoot Gibson than the Victorian moralising of Hart. Hart was a friend of legendary wild west lawman Wyatt Earp, and along with Tom Mix, he was a pallbearer at Earp's funeral in 1929.

William S. Hart died in 1946 in Newhall, and is buried in Greenwood Cemetery, NY. He was married to actress Winifred Westover from 1921 till their divorce in 1927. They had one child, William S. Hart, Jr. (1922–2004).

He donated his estate to the City of Los Angeles, on the condition they install a fountain and use the park for the arts. Today, the internationally renowned Actors Studio has its West Coast branch at the William S. Hart Park, in West Hollywood, in Hart's old estate. His mansion in Newhall, California, is now a museum and has been preserved with its original fixtures and furnishings intact.

British postcard in the Cinema Stars series by Lilywhite Ltd., no. CM 44. Photo: Triangle Pictures.

French postcard by Éditions Filma in the Les Vedettes de l'Écran series, no. 82. Photo: Grandes Productions Cinématographiques.

Swedish postcard by Forlag Nordisk Konst, Stockholm, no. 1103.

French postcard by Editions Cinémagazine. Photo: Paramount.

French postcard by Edition Paramount, Paris.

Spanish postcard by La Novela Semanal, no. 42.

Sources: Ed Stephan (IMDb), W. Morrow (IMDb), Wikipedia and IMDb.

EFSP follows Le Giornate del Cinema Muto in Pordenone. Subject of one of the retrospectives of this year's festival is striking, sophisticated Suzanne Grandais (1893-1920). She was the most beautiful and refined actress of the French silent cinema. Her nickname was 'the French Mary Pickford' because of her angel face and blond hair. Grandais died when she was only 27.

Vintage postcard. Collection: Didier Hanson.

French postcard.

Spanish postcard.

British postcard by K Ltd.

French postcard by Editions Cinémagazine, no. 25. Photo: Reutlinger.

Possibly a French postcard, but editor unknown.

Louis Feuillade

Suzanne Grandais was born as Suzanne Gueudret in Paris, France in 1893.

At the age of 15, she already started to work as a dancer. Her first stage appearance was in Le Château Des Loufoques (The Castle of Loufoques) by Benjamin Rabier at the Théâtre de Cluny.

After a tour through South America, she played some parts in short silent films for the Lux and Eclair companies. Then she was discovered by pioneer director Louis Feuillade who hired her for Gaumont. Wikipedia (English) however suggests it was director Leonce Perret who discovered her at the Moulin Rouge.

From 1911 till 1913, Grandais made some 45 films for Gaumont, mostly short comedies and dramas. First she appeared in Feuillade's series Scènes de la vie telle qu'elle est/Life As It Is. In his Encyclopedia of Early Cinema, Richard Abel writes that these films were marked by her 'sober, restrained acting'.

Later Grandais often played Léonce Perret's wife or temptress in the Léonce series, elegant comedies starring and directed by Perret. She also appeared in such feature-length adventure melodramas as Le Mystère des roches de Kador/The Mystery of the Rocks of Kador (Léonce Perret, 1912).

In 1913-1914, Grandais switched to the German Dekage company (Deutsche Kinematograph Gesellschaft), for which she did another 18 films, directed by Marcel Robert and Charles Decroix. Then she founded her own film company with Raoul d'Archy, Les Films Suzanne Grandais.

Spanish collectors card by Amatller Marca Luna chocolate, series 3, no. 10. Photo: Eclipse. Suzanne Grandais, Jane Danjou and Marcel Marquet in Midinettes (René Hervil, Louis Mercanton, 1917).

Spanish collectors card by Amatller Marca Luna chocolate, series 3, no. 11. Photo: Eclipse. Suzanne Grandais and Anthony Gildès in Midinettes (René Hervil, Louis Mercanton, 1917).

Spanish postcard by Amatller Marca Luna, series 6, no. 3. Photo: Eclipse. Suzanne Grandais in Lorena (Georges Tréville, 1918).

Spanish postcard by Amatller Marca Luna, series 6, no. 10. Photo: Eclipse. Suzanne Grandais and Jean Aymé in Lorena (Georges Tréville, 1918).

German postcard by Verleih Hermann Leiser, no. 7872. Photo: Willinger.

Car Crash

During the First World War, Suzanne Grandais also worked at Eclipse. The drama Suzanne (René Hervil, Louis Mercanton, 1916) was a major international success and turned Grandais into a star. French women started to notice that she always wore the latest fashions.

The great film critic Louis Delluc compared her to American serial queen Pearl White in the journal Paris-Midi in 1918. In 2005, Richard Abel called her 'arguably the most popular French actress of the early 1910's': "Grandais was equally adept at playing subtly pathetic figures, deceptive partners in crime, or witty wives who deftly outsmarted their husbands".

On Saturday 28 August 1920, Suzanne Grandais was killed while making the film serial L'Essor/The Rise (Charles Burguet, 1921) in the Alsace. She was only 27, when she died in a car crash between Sézanne and Coulommiers. Cameraman Marcel Ruette was also killed. Director Charles Burguet and his wife were in the back of the same car, but both survived. The accident happened during the shooting of the film, and the ending of the film had to be changed.

In 2009, Gallimard published a book on Grandais Un amour sans paroles (A Love Without Words), written by Didier Blonde. The author mentioned that he could see only one film of her. Most of Suzanne Grandais' more than 60 films are considered lost. But there's good news for him: several of her films have been saved by Eye Filmmuseum in Amsterdam.

Most of these films are short comedies and dramas, often directed by Léonce Perret, from her early years at Gaumont. These include Graziella la Gitane/Graziella the Gypsy (Léonce Perret, 1912), Le homard/Lobsters: All Styles (Léonce Perret, 1913), and L'obsession du souvenir/The Obsession of a Souvenir (1913). The films are preserved with beautiful tinted and stencil-colored colours. Eye also owns some feature films with Suzanne Grandais such as Le mystère des Roches de Kador/The Mystery of the Rocks of Kador (Léonce Perret, 1912).

French postcard. Photo: Phocea Films. Suzanne Grandais in Méa Culpa (Georges Champavert, 1919).

French postcard. Photo: Phocéa Film. Suzanne Grandais in the tile role of Simplette (René Hervil, 1919).

French postcard. Photo: Phocéa Film. Suzanne Grandais in Simplette (René Hervil, 1919).

Suzanne Grandais in Suzanne et les Brigands (1920)

French postcard by Phocéa-Film, no. 16. Photo: Phocéa-Film. Suzanne Grandais in Suzanne et les Brigands/Suzanne and the Brigands (Charles Burguet, 1920).

Suzanne Grandais and Henry Roussel in Gosse de Riche (1920)

French postcard. Photo: Phocéa-Film. Suzanne Grandais and Henry Roussel in Gosse de riche/Rich Kid (Charles Burguet, 1920).

French postcard. Photo: Phocéa-Film. Suzanne Grandais in Gosse de riche/Rich Kid (Charles Burguet, 1920).

French postcard. Photo: Sciarabin, Strasbourg / Phocea Films. Suzanne Grandais in L'essor/The rise (Charles Burguet, 1920), 1st episode.

French postcard by Phocea-Films. This card was made for the 10th (and final) episode of the serial L'Essor/The Rise (Charles Burguet, 1921). Photo: Sciarabin, Strasbourg.

Sources: Richard Abel (Encyclopedia of Early Cinema), Alberto Blanco (Find A Grave), Gallimard, Wikipedia (French and English), and IMDb.

EFSP still follows Le Giornate del Cinema Muto in Pordenone. The retrospective of Suzanne Grandais, about which we posted yesterday, is combined with a retrospective on another legendary French actress, Mistinguett (1875-1956). As a singer, she captivated Paris with her risque routines. She went on to become the most popular French entertainer of her time and the highest paid female entertainer in the world. Mistinguett also appeared more than 60 times in the cinema.

French postcard, sent by mail in 1905.

French postcard in the series Nos artistes dans leur loge, no. 2. Photo: Comoedia.

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

French postcard by Cinémagazine-Edition, no. 176. Photo: P. Apers.

Austrian postcard by Iris-Verlag, no. 5108. Photo: P. Apers.

French postcard. Illustration: Cabrol. Collection: Marlène Pilaete.

Miss Tinguette

Mistinguett was born as Jeanne Florentine Bourgeois in Enghien-les-Bains, France, in 1875. She was the daughter of labourer Antoine Bourgeois, and seamstress Jeannette Debrée. At an early age Jeanne aspired to be an entertainer. She began as a flower seller in a restaurant in her hometown, singing popular ballads as she sold her flowers.

When a song-writing acquaintance made up the name Miss Tinguette, Jeanne liked it. She made it her own by joining it together and eventually dropping the second S and the final E (Mistinguett). Mistinguett made her debut at the Casino de Paris in 1895, and appeared also in shows at the Folies Bergère, Moulin Rouge, and Eldorado.

In 1908 she made her film debut in the short silent film L'empreinte ou La main rouge/The Impression or the Red Hand (Henri Burguet, 1908) for Pathé Fréres. Her co-star in this film was Max Dearly. The next year, he chose her to be his partner to create La valse chaloupée (or the Apache Dance) in the Moulin Rouge.

Between 1909 and 1915, she appeared on the stages of the Paris music halls but also in dozens of short films for Pathé, including Fleur de pavé/Her Dramatic Career (Albert Capellani, Michel Carré, 1909) with Charles Prince, Une petite femme bien douce/A Sweet Little Lady (George Denola, 1910) which she also wrote, and Le clown et le pacha/The Clown and the Pasha (Georges Monca, 1911), again with Prince.

In Une bougie récalcitrante/A Stubborn Spark Plug (Georges Monca, 1912), she appeared for the first time opposite the much younger Maurice Chevalier. With Chevalier she would have a relationship of more than 10 years.

The most successful film among her Pathé films was Les misérables (Albert Capelani, 1913), a four-part-serial based on the famous novel by Victor Hugo.

Austrian postcard by Iris-Verlag, no. 5108. Photo: P. Apers.

French collectors cards by Pathé Frères, 1911. Mistinguett in the early French comedy Léocadie veut se faire mannequin (SCAGL/ Pathé Frères, 1911).

French postcard by F.C. & Cie, no. 283. Photo: Boyer & Bert. Mistinguett and Max Dearly performing the Apache Dance. Collection: Didier Hanson.

French postcard by Etablissements photographiques de Boulogne-sur-Seine. Photo: H. Manuel. Mistinguett and Max Dearly at the Casino de Paris.

French postcard in the Nos Artistes dans leur loge series no. 55. Photo: Comoedia, Paris.

French postcard, no. 159. Photo: P. Apers, Paris.

Legs of 500,000 Francs

During the First World War, Mistinguett continued to appear in Pathé productions like the comedies La valse renversante/The Amazing Waltz (Georges Monca, 1914) again opposite Maurice Chevalier, and Rigadin et la jolie manucure/Rigadin and the Pretty Manicurist (Georges Monca, 1915) with Charles Prince.

In Italy, she appeared in La doppia ferita/The Double Injury (Augusto Genina, 1915). Opposite the legendary Harry Baur, she starred in Chignon d'or/The Gold Chignon (André Hugon, 1916) and Fleur de Paris/Flower of Paris (André Hugon, 1916).

Mistinguett first recorded her signature song Mon Homme in 1916. It was popularised under its English title My Man by Fanny Brice and has become a standard in the repertoire of numerous pop and jazz singers.

In 1918, she succeeded Gaby Deslys at the Casino de Paris, and remained the undisputed star of nocturnal Paris until 1925. In 1919 her legs were insured for the then astounding amount of 500,000 francs. During a tour of the United States, she was asked by Time magazine to explain her popularity. Her answer was: "It is a kind of magnetism. I say 'Come closer' and draw them to me."

After WWI, Mistinguett's film career halted. She only appeared in a few more films, including L'île d'amour/Island of Love (Berthe Dagmar, Jean Durand, 1928) and Rigolboche (Christian-Jaque, 1936). Mistinguett's stage career prospered and lasted over fifty years.

Her last film appearance was as herself in the Italian musical Carosello del varietà/Variety Carousel (Aldo Bonaldi, Aldo Quinti, 1955). In 1956, Mistinguett died at the age of 80. She is buried in the Cimetiere Enghien-les-Bains, Île-de-France, France.

French postcard by Agence Phot. de reportage Keystone, Paris. Courbevoie: Mlle Mistinguett at the departure of the match Paris-London on hydrocycle by René Savard (crossing The Channel between Calais and Dover).

French postcard for Cherry Brandy "Regals". Illustration: Dolly Tree. Collection: Marlène Pilaete.

French postcard in the Les Vedettes de Cinéma series by A.N., Paris, no. 97. Photo: Sarony. Bouboule was Mistinguett's goddaughter, an admittedly talented child actress. She was born in 1917 and from 1921 on, she appeared in 13 films.

French postcard by Bleuet, no. 970. Photo: Utudjian, Paris.

French postcard by Bleuet, no. 971. Photo: Utudjian, Paris.

Mistinguett and Earl Leslie in Paris Miss

French postcard by J.R.P.R., Paris, no. 506. Photo: P. Apers. Mistinguett and Earl Leslie in the revue ' Paris Miss' at the Casino de Paris in 1930.

French autograph card.

French postcard, no. 113. Photo: Studio Harcourt.

French postcard by Editions P.I., no. 49. Photo: Studio Piaz.

French or Belgian postcard. Mistinguett in the sound film Rigolboche (Christian-Jaque, 1936).

Sources: Wikipedia and IMDb.

Till Saturday 12 October EFSP follows Le Giornate del Cinema Muto in Pordenone. A major section of this year's festival is 'Restorations & Rediscoveries'. One of the films is Sally, Irene and Mary (1925), directed by Edmund Goulding. Sally, Irene and Mary are three showgirls, each with a different approach to life and love. They were played by Constance Bennett, Sally O'Neil and a very young Joan Crawford. It was Crawford's first hit and her following film career would span many decades, studios, and controversies. In her silent films she made impact as a vivacious Jazz Age flapper and later she matured into a star of psychological melodramas.

Joan Crawford in Our Dancing Daughters (1928)

French postcard by Cinémagazine-Edition, no. 664. Photo: MGM. Joan Crawford in Our Dancing Daughters (Harry Beaumont, 1928).

Joan Crawford and her first husband, Douglas Fairbanks Jr. German postcard by Ross Verlag, Berlin, no. 4628/1, 1929-1930. Photo: Metro-Goldwyn-Mayer.

Dutch postcard by H.A.T.E., Rotterdam, no. 445, sent by mail in the Netherlands in 1934. Photo: George Hurrell / MGM (Metro-Goldwyn-Mayer).

British Real Photograph postcard by Milton, no. 21A. Photo: Metro-Goldwyn-Mayer.

Dutch postcard by JosPe, no. 221. Photo: George Hurrell / Metro-Goldwyn-Mayer.

The free-spirited, all-American girl

Joan Crawford was born Lucille Fay LeSueur in 1904, in San Antonio, Texas. Her parents were Anna Belle (Johnson) and Thomas E. LeSueur, a laundry labourer. By the time she was born, her parents had separated.

The young Lucille was bullied and shunned at Scaritt Elementary School in Kansas City by the other students due to her poor home life. She worked with her mother in a laundry and felt that her classmates could smell the chemicals and cleaners on her. She said that her love of taking showers and being obsessed with cleanliness had begun early in life as an attempt to wash off the smell of the laundry.

Her stepfather Henry Cassin allegedly began sexually abusing her when she was eleven years old, and the abuse continued until she was sent to St. Agnes Academy, a Catholic girls' school. By the time she was a teenager, she'd had three stepfathers.

Lucille LeSueur worked a variety of menial jobs. She was a good dancer, though, and she entered several contests, one of which landed her a spot in a chorus line. Before long, she was dancing in the choruses of travelling revues in big Midwestern and East Coast cities.

She was spotted dancing in Detroit by famous New York producer Jacob J. Shubert. Shubert put her in the chorus line for his show 'Innocent Eyes'(1924) at the Winter Garden Theatre on Broadway. Then followed another Schubert production, 'The Passing Show of 1924'. After-hours, she danced for pay in the town it-spot, Club Richman, which was run by the 'Passing Show' stage manager Nils Granlund and popular local personality Harry Richman.

In December 1924, Granlund called Lucille to tell her that Al Altman, a NYC-based talent scout from MGM had caught her in 'The Passing Show of 1924' and wanted her to do a screen test. Metro-Goldwyn-Mayer (MGM) offered Crawford a contract at $75 a week. On New Year's Day 1925 she boarded the train for Culver City.

Credited as Lucille LeSueur, her first film part was as a showgirl in Lady of the Night (Monta Bell, 1925), starring MGM's most popular female star, Norma Shearer. Crawford was determined to succeed, and shortly after she also appeared in The Circle (Frank Borzage, 1925) and Pretty Ladies (Monta Bell, 1925), starring comedian ZaSu Pitts. She also appeared in a small role Erich von Stroheim's classic The Merry Widow (1925) withMae Murray and John Gilbert.

MGM publicity head Pete Smith recognised her ability to become a major star, but felt her name sounded fake. He told studio head Louis B. Mayer that her last name, LeSueur, reminded him of a sewer. Smith organised a contest called 'Name the Star' in Movie Weekly to allow readers to select her new stage name. The initial choice was 'Joan Arden', but after another actress was found to have prior claim to that name, the alternate surname 'Crawford' became the choice.

She first made an impression on audiences in Edmund Goulding's showgirl tale Sally, Irene and Mary (1925). The film, which co-starred Constance Bennett and Sally O'Neil, was a hit. Joan's popularity grew so quickly afterwards that two films in which she was still billed as Lucille Le Sueur: Old Clothes (Edward F. Cline, 1925) with Jackie Coogan, and The Only Thing (Jack Conway, 1925) were recalled, and her name on the billings was changed to Joan Crawford.

In 1926, Crawford was named one of the WAMPAS Baby Stars, and she starred opposite Charles Ray in Paris (Edmund Goulding, 1926). Within a few years, she became the romantic female lead to many of MGM's top male stars, including Ramón Novarro, John Gilbert, and action star Tim McCoy. She appeared alongside her close friend, William Haines in the comedy Spring Fever (Edward Sedgwick, 1927). It was the second film starring Haines and Crawford (the first had been Sally, Irene and Mary (1925)), and their first onscreen romantic teaming.

Then, Crawford appeared in the silent horror film The Unknown (Tod Browning, 1927), starring Lon Chaney, Sr., who played Alonzo the Armless, a circus freak who uses his feet to toss knives. Crawford played his skimpily-clad young carnival assistant whom he hopes to marry. She stated that she learned more about acting from watching Chaney work than from anyone else in her career.

Her role of Diana Medford in Our Dancing Daughters (Harry Beaumont, 1928) elevated her to star status. Joan co-starred with Anita Page and Dorothy Sebastian, and her spunky wild-but-moral flapper character struck a chord with the public and zeitgeist. Wikipedia: "The role established her as a symbol of modern 1920s-style femininity which rivaled Clara Bow, the original It girl, then Hollywood's foremost flapper. A stream of hits followed Our Dancing Daughters, including two more flapper-themed movies, in which Crawford embodied for her legion of fans (many of whom were women) an idealized vision of the free-spirited, all-American girl."

The fan mail began pouring in and from that point on Joan was a bonafide star. Crawford had cleared the first big hurdle; now came the second, in the form of talkies. But Crawford wasn't felled by sound. Her first talkie, the romantic drama Untamed (Jack Conway, 1929) with Robert Montgomery, was a success. Michael Eliott at IMDb: "It's rather amazing to see how well she transformed into a sound star and you have to think that she was among the best to do so."

Ramon Novarro and Joan Crawford in Across to Singapore (1928)

German postcard by Ross Verlag, no. 3775/1, 1928-1929. Photo: Metro-Goldwyn-Mayer. Joan Crawford and Ramón Novarro in Across to Singapore (William Nigh, 1928).

Nils Asther and Joan Crawford in Dream of Love (1928)

German postcard by Ross Verlag, no. 4260/1, 1929-1930. Photo: Metro-Goldwyn-Mayer. Nils Asther and Joan Crawford in Dream of Love (Fred Niblo, 1928).

Belgian postcard by P.I.A. Belga Phot., Bruxelles. Photo: Metro-Goldwyn-Mayer. Caption: Les plus beaux films sont interprétés par les stars de la Metro GOLDWYN Mayer.

Belgian postcard by S.A. Cacao et Chocolat Kivou, Vilvoorde / N.V. Cacao en Chocolade Kivou, Vilvoorde. Photo: Metro-Goldwyn-Mayer (MGM).

Italian postcard. Caricature by [Zeb].

The Woman with the Smear

In the early 1930s, tired of playing fun-loving flappers, Joan Crawford wanted to change her image. Thin lips would not do for her; she wanted big lips. Ignoring her natural lip contours, Max Factor ran a smear of colour across her upper and lower lips. It was just what she wanted. To Max, the Crawford look, which became her trademark, was always 'the smear'.

As the 1930s progressed, Joan Crawford became one of the biggest stars at MGM. She developed a glamorous screen image, appearing often as a sumptuously gowned, fur-draped, successful career woman. She was in top form in films such as Grand Hotel (Edmund Goulding, 1932), Sadie McKee (Clarence Brown, 1934), No More Ladies (Edward H. Griffith, 1935), and Love on the Run (W.S. Van Dyke, 1936) with Clark Gable.

Crawford often played hard-working young women who found romance and success. Movie patrons were enthralled, and studio executives were satisfied. Her fame rivalled, and later outlasted, that of MGM colleagues Norma Shearer and Greta Garbo. Among her early successes as a dramatic actress were The Women (George Cukor, 1939), Susan and God (1940), Strange Cargo (1940), and A Woman’s Face (1941).

By the early 1940s, MGM was no longer giving Joan Crawford plum roles. Newcomers had arrived in Hollywood, and the public wanted to see them. Crawford left MGM for rival Warner Bros.

In 1945 she landed the role of a lifetime in Mildred Pierce (Michael Curtiz, 1945). It is the story of an emotional and ambitious woman who rises from waitress to owner of a restaurant chain. The role gave her an opportunity to show her range as an actress, and her performance as a woman driven to give her daughter (Ann Blyth) everything garnered Crawford her first, and only, Oscar for Best Actress.

The following year she appeared with John Garfield in the well-received Humoresque (Jean Negulesco, 1946). In 1947, she appeared as Louise Graham in Possessed (Curtis Bernhardt, 1947) with Van Heflin. Again she was nominated for a Best Actress from the Academy, but she lost to Loretta Young in The Farmer's Daughter (H.C. Potter, 1947).

Crawford continued to choose her roles carefully, and in 1952 she was nominated for a third time, for her depiction of Myra Hudson in Sudden Fear (David Miller, 1952) opposite Jack Palance and Gloria Grahame. This time the coveted Oscar went to Shirley Booth, for Come Back, Little Sheba (Daniel Mann, 1952).

In 1955, Crawford became involved with the Pepsi-Cola Company through her marriage to company Chairman and Chief Executive Officer Alfred Steele. Crawford married four times. Her first three marriages to the actors Douglas Fairbanks, Jr. (1929–1933), Franchot Tone (1935–1939), and Phillip Terry (1942–1946) all had ended in divorce.

After his death in 1959 she became a director of the company and in that role hired her friend Dorothy Arzner to film several Pepsi commercials. Crawford's film career slowed and she appeared in minor roles until 1962. Then she and Bette Davis co-starred in Whatever happened to Baby Jane? (Robert Aldrich, 1962). Their longstanding rivalry may have helped fuel their phenomenally vitriolic and well-received performances.

Crawford's final appearance on the silver screen was in the bad monster movie Trog (Freddie Francis, 1970). It is said Bette Davis commented that if she had found herself starring in Trog, she'd commit suicide. Anyway, Joan Crawford retired from the screen, and following a public appearance in 1974 withdrew from public life. Turning to vodka more and more, she became increasingly reclusive.

In 1977, Joan Crawford died of a heart attack in New York City. She was 72 years old. She had disinherited her adopted daughter Christina and son Christopher; the former wrote the controversial memoir 'Mommie Dearest' (1978). In 1981, Faye Dunaway starred in the film adaptation Mommie Dearest (Frank Perry, 1981) which did well at the box office.

Joan Crawford is interred in a mausoleum in Ferncliff Cemetery in Hartsdale, New York.

Joan Crawford and Robert Montgomery in Untamed (1929)

French postcard by Cinémagazine-Edition, Paris, no. 663. Photo: Metro-Goldwyn-Mayer. Joan Crawford and Robert Montgomery in Untamed (Jack Conway, 1929). Collection: Geoffrey Donaldson Institute.

Joan Crawford and Lionel Barrymore in Grand Hotel (1932)

Dutch postcard by JosPe, no. 361. Photo: MGM. Joan Crawford and Lionel Barrymore in Grand Hotel (Edmund Goulding, 1932).

Vintage postcard. Photo: George Hurrell, 1932.

Joan Crawford and Franchot Tone in Dancing Lady (1933)

Dutch postcard, no. 571. Photo: George Hurrell / Metro-Goldwyn-Mayer (MGM). Joan Crawford and second husband Franchot Tone in Dancing Lady (Robert Z. Leonard, 1933).

Joan Crawford and Clark Gable in Dancing Lady (1933)

Dutch postcard, no. 596. Photo: George Hurrell / Metro-Goldwyn-Mayer (MGM). Joan Crawford and Clark Gable in Dancing Lady (Robert Z. Leonard, 1933).

French postcard by Erpé, no. 607. Photo: Metro-Goldwyn-Mayer (MGM). Joan Crawford in Mannequin (Frank Borzage, 1937).

Spencer Tracy and Joan Crawford in Mannequin (1937)

British postcard by Art Photo, no. 164. Photo: Metro-Goldwyn-Mayer. Spencer Tracy and Joan Crawford in Mannequin (Frank Borzage, 1937).

German postcard by Ross Verlag, no. A 1972/1, 1937-1938. Photo: Metro-Goldwyn-Mayer (MGM).

French postcard by E.C., Rueil-Malmaison, no. 58. Photo: Metro-Goldwyn-Mayer (MGM).

Dutch postcard by J. Sleeding N.V., Amsterdam, no. 11. Photo: Warner Bros.

Sources: Stephanie Jones (The Best of Everything), Michael Elliott (IMDb), Encyclopaedia Britannica, Wikipedia and IMDb.

Today is the final day of Le Giornate del Cinema Muto 2019. The Silent Film Festival in Pordenone closes with the classic Hitchcock thriller The Lodger (1927). So in its last Pordenone post, EFSP features the star of the film, gorgeous matinee idol Ivor Novello (1893-1951). The 'Valentino from The Valleys' was one multi-talents of the British stage and cinema during the first half of the 20th century. On stage, the 'British Sex God in tight pants' produced and composed a string of hit musicals, starring himself. He also appeared in several successful silent and early sound films in France, Great-Britain and Hollywood.

British Postcard in the Celebrities Series, no. 137, printed by Associated Photo Printers, London by courtesy of W & F Film Service.

British postcard, presented with Girl's Cinema, 1922.

British Postcard in the Picturegoer Series, London, no. 82. Photo: Foulsham & Banfield.

British postcard in the Picturegoer series by Real Photograph, London.

British postcard in the Picturegoer series, London, no. 194.

Crashes

Ivor Novello was born as David Ivor Davies at Llwyn-yr-Eos, Wales in 1893, to the well-known singing teacher and choral conductor Clara Novello Davies and David Davies, rent collector for the city council. The family then went to live in Cardiff, where his mother taught the Welsh Ladies Choir.

As a boy, Novello was a successful singer in Welsh Eisteddfod. He then attended the Magdalen College School in Oxford, where he sang in the famous choir. The good-looking boy made his first public appearances as a pub and working men's club pianist and singer in and around the Cardiff area.

Novello also showed a facility for writing songs, and when he was only 15, one of his songs was published. After leaving school, he gave piano lessons in Cardiff, and then moved to London in 1913. He took a flat above the Strand Theatre, which became his London home for the rest of his life.

At the start of the First World War, Novello wrote Keep the Home Fires Burning, a song that expressed the feelings of innumerable families sundered by World War I. Novello composed the music for the song to a lyric by the American Lena Guilbert-Ford. It became a real World War I standard, and earned him £15,000.

In 1916 Ivor received a commission as a Sub-Lieutenant and trained as a pilot in the Royal Naval Air Service. He completed dual flying instruction but crash landed on his first solo. His second solo flight ended in a more serious crash, in which he injured his ankle. The Royal Navy grounded him, and he was posted to clerical duties for the duration of the war.

While he was in the Navy, he worked for the show Theodore & Co (1916). It was a production by George Grossmith, Jr. and Edward Laurillard with a score composed by Novello and the young Jerome Kern. Again, it was a hit and, these successes made David Ivor Davies an overnight celebrity.

Austrian postcard by Iris Verlag, no. 506. Photo: First National Film.

Austrian postcard by Iris Verlag, no. 5188. Dedication: "All good wishes from Ivor Novello, 1928."

British Postcard, no. 4.

British postcard, no. 3865/1. Photo: FPS. At the backside: Real Hand-coloured Photograph.

French postcard by Editions Cinémagazine, no. 375.

Home Fires

David Ivor Davies legally changed his name to Ivor Novello in January 1927, although he was known by that name on stage from at least 1918. After the First World War he pursued a film acting career and debuted as the romantic lead in L'appel du sang/The Call of the Blood (Louis Mercanton, 1919).

This French romantic melodrama starring Gabriel de Gravone was a box office success and earned Novello the sobriquet the 'Valentino from The Valleys'.

It was followed by roles in such films as the French drama Miarka, la fille à l'ourse/Gypsy Passion (Louis Mercanton, 1921) featuring Desdemona Mazza, the British drama Carnival (Harley Knoles, 1921) with Matheson Lang, and the romance The Bohemian Girl (Harley Knoles, 1922) with Gladys Cooper.

In 1923, he made his American movie debut in D. W. Griffith's The White Rose. His classic profile made Novello a matinee idol among filmgoers. On stage, he occasionally played dramatic roles, such as the title role in the first London production of Ferenc Molnar's Liliom, the Hungarian play from which the American musical Carousel was later adapted.

In 1924 Novello wrote and appeared in his first play, the successful The Rat which transferred quite well to film the following year. This film adaptation, The Rat (Graham Cutts, 1925) inspired two sequels - The Triumph of the Rat (Graham Cutts, 1926) and The Return of the Rat (Graham Cutts, 1929), both with Isabel Jeans.

Gladys Cooper and Ivor Novello in The Bohemian Girl (1922)

British postcard in the Famous Oldies series by Collectorcard, Croydon, no. C9005. Photo: The National Film Archive. Gladys Cooper and Ivor Novello in The Bohemian Girl (Harley Knoles, 1922).

British Postcard in the Picturegoer Series, London, no. 39A. Photo: Ivor Novello in The Rat (Graham Cutts, 1925).

Ivor Novello and Elizabeth Allan in The Lodger (1932)

British postcard by A Real Photograph in the Film Partners series, no. P 41. Photo: Stanborough. Ivor Novello and Elizabeth Allan in the sound version of The Lodger (1932).

Ivor Novello in Love and Let Love (1933)

British postcard by Raphael Tuck & Sons, London, no. 50-S. Photo: Gaumont-British. Still for Love and Let Love/Sleeping Car (Anatole Litvak, 1933).

British Postcard by Beagles, no. 313.R. Photo: Francis Bruguiere.

Hitchcock

Ivo Novello peaked as a film star when he was the lead of two of Alfred Hitchcock's early suspense thrillers. He convincingly portrayed the brooding, sinister suspected serial killer in the silent classic The Lodger (Alfred Hitchcock, 1927). That year he also was the protagonist in the lesser-received Downhill (Alfred Hitchcock, 1927) with Isabel Jeans.

In 1928 Novello starred in the silent adaptation of Noel Coward's successful play The Vortex (Adrian Brunel, 1928), and made his last silent film, the comedy A South Sea Bubble (T. Hayes Hunter, 1928) with Benita Hume and Alma Taylor.

Novello's dark, handsome looks belied a charming modesty. He had a fine, well-modulated speaking voice that transferred quite well to talkies. After the introduction of sound film, he wrote and starred in Symphony in Two Flats (Gareth Gundrey, 1930) and remade The Lodger (Maurice Elvey, 1932) with Elizabeth Allan as his co-star.

During this time he surprisingly wrote the dialogue for Tarzan the Ape Man (W.S. Van Dyke, 1932), the first film to star Johnny Weissmuller and Maureen O'Sullivan. After his last film Autumn Crocus (Basil Dean, 1934), he decided to devote himself full time to music and the theatre.

He earned rave reviews for his opulent, romantically melodramatic stagings of Glamorous Night (1935), The Dancing Years (1939) and Perchance to Dream (1945). During his career he wrote eight musicals and appeared in six of them, all non-singing parts. Novello wrote his musicals in the style of operetta and was one of the last major composers in this form. He generally composed his music to the librettos of Christopher Hassall.

Although adored by thousands of women, Novello was gay. In 1916 he met the then 21-year-old actor Bobby Andrews. The pair became friends, then lovers, and stayed together for 35 years. They performed together many times in Novello's musicals and plays. In 1921, Novello also had an affair with the British poet and writer Siegfried Sassoon. Sassoon's biographer, John Stuart Roberts later wrote that Novello "was a consummate flirt who collected lovers as he gathered lilacs."

During most of his life, Novello lived in a country house in Littlewick Green, which he had bought from his film earnings. In 1951, Ivor Novello suddenly died from a coronary thrombosis in London at the age of 58. 7,000 people attended his funeral (women outnumbered men 50 to one).

Since the 1950s, the annual awards of the Performing Rights Society are named in his honour. In 2001, Jeremy Northam played Novello in Gosford Park (Robert Altman, 2001).

British postcard in the Picturegoer series by Real Photograph, London, no. 82a.

British postcard in the Picturegoer series by Real Photograph, London, no. 39c. Photo: Dorothy Wilding.

Short Apache Dance from The Rat (1925). Source: Jrrzyboy (YouTube).

Trailer for The Lodger (1927). Source: Chuy Espinosa (YouTube).

Ivor Novello in the mob scene of The Lodger (1927). Source: Karloff4 (YouTube).

Sources: Anthony Slide (Encyclopedia of British Cinema), Gary Brumburgh (IMDb), BBC Wales, Wikipedia and IMDb.

On 4 October 2019, Diahann Carroll died of cancer, aged 84. She was among the foremost African American actors to break down long-seated prejudices in casting. Carroll was the first black performer to have her own sitcom, Julia, which ran for 86 episodes (1968-1971), and the first to win an Emmy in the category of best actress in a leading role in a comedy series. She also won a Tony for her performance in the Broadway musical 'No Strings', written especially for her by Richard Rodgers, which highlighted an interracial romance without mentioning colour. Her films include Carmen Jones (1954), Porgy and Bess (1959), Paris Blues (1961) and Claudine (1974). And her conniving and glamorous Dominique Deveraux was a match for Joan Collins’ Alexis Colby, doubling the 'nasty in Dynasty (1984-1997).

Vintage postcard, no. 018. Photo: Milton H. Greene.

A bold, interracial love story

Carol Diann Johnson was born in the Bronx, New York, in 1935. She was the first child of John Johnson, a subway conductor, and his wife, Mabel (nee Faulk). When their daughter was an infant the family moved to Harlem, where she grew up.

Music was an important part of her life as a child, singing at age 6 with her Harlem church choir. A few years later the 10-year-old became a recipient of a Metropolitan Opera scholarship for studies at the New York High School of Music and Art. After graduating she attended New York University, majoring in sociology.

At the same time, she did modelling for Ebony magazine. When she was 16, she teamed up with a girlfriend from school and auditioned for Arthur Godfrey's Talent Scouts show using the more exotic sounding name of Diahann Carroll. This led to her performing on radio and television and in nightclubs while still in her teens.

Her big break came in 1954 when Truman Capote chose her for a leading part in the Broadway musical 'House of Flowers', based on his short story and for which he wrote the book and lyrics. Carroll, who played a young sex worker in a Caribbean island bordello, had the best numbers, 'A Sleepin’ Bee' and 'I Never Has Seen Snow'.

In the same year Carroll made her film debut in Otto Preminger’s Carmen Jones (1954), an all-black, updated movie version of the Georges Bizet opera 'Carmen'. She played a friend of Dorothy Dandridge in the title role, performing in the quintet Whizzin’ Away Along De Track. Carroll was dubbed by Bernice Peterson because her own voice was not considered operatic enough, and she was dubbed again (this time by Loulie Jean Norman) as Clara, the young mother 'singing' the renowned lullaby 'Summertime' in Porgy and Bess (Otto Preminger, 1959), Preminger’s big-screen adaptation of George Gershwin’s opera.

Martin Ritt’s Paris Blues (1961) presented Carroll with her first co-starring role, as an American tourist in Paris who, with her friend (Joanne Woodward) meets two fellow American jazz players (Sidney Poitier and Paul Newman). She falls for one of them, but fails to persuade him to return with her to the 'racist' US. At the same time, Poitier and Carroll were having an affair in real life.

Diahann returned to Broadway. She was rewarded with a Tony Award for her exceptional performance as a fashion model in the 1962 musical 'No Strings,' a bold, interracial love story that co-starred Richard Kiley. Richard Rodgers, whose first musical this was after the death of partner Oscar Hammerstein, wrote the part specifically for Diahann, which included her rendition of the song standard 'The Sweetest Sounds.'

American postcard by Coral-Lee, Rancho Cordova, CA, no. 20. Photo: Douglas Kirkland, 1978. Caption: Diahann Carol (sic) - Star popsinger, was born in New York in 1935. Her career has spanned a multitude of super-successful night club, screen and TV engagements.

The first black bitch on television

On screen, Diahann Carroll appeared again for Preminger, in Hurry Sundown (Otto Preminger, 1967), set in rural 1940s Georgia. She played an elegant local schoolteacher who had gone north and been corrupted. Despite a terrible script, Carroll came off slightly better than her co-stars, Michael Caine and Jane Fonda, in this condescending melodrama on race relations.

After a conventional heist film, The Split (Gordon Flemyng, 1968), in which Carroll was the wife of a robber (Jim Brown), came Claudine (John Berry, 1974), a romantic comedy and one of the few mainstream films starring black actors in the 1970s that was not described as 'blaxploitation'. She played a Harlem widow on welfare raising six children on her own, who is courted by a garbage collector played by James Earl Jones. Surprisingly, after being Oscar-nominated as best actress for Claudine, Carroll did not return to feature films for 16 years.

The reason was her rewarding work on television. In the popular sitcom Julia (1968), she touchingly portrayed an ordinary nurse and widow struggling to raise a small son. Diahann became the first full-fledged African-American female 'star' - top billed, in which the show centered around her lead character. The show gradually rose in ratings and Carroll won a Golden Globe award for 'Best Newcomer' and an Emmy nomination.

There followed many guest appearances in TV series and the role of Maya Angelou’s selfish mother in an adaptation of the acclaimed autobiography I Know Why the Caged Bird Sings (Fielder Cook, 1979).

However, it was her role as the sleek Dominique Deveraux, which Carroll claimed made her 'the first black bitch on television' in the glossy Dynasty (1984-1987) and its spin-off The Colbys, that brought her greatest fame. As the character owned a music company and was a successful singer, the soap also gave Carroll the chance to display her vocal talents, already apparent from her several albums and club appearances.

Among her other TV series was A Different World (1989-1993), a spin-off from The Cosby Show, in which she appeared in eight episodes as the mother of a southern belle; The Lonesome Dove (1994-1995) and Grey’s Anatomy (2006-2007), for which she received a Prime Time Emmy nomination.

Carroll was married and divorced four times: to the record producer Monty Kay, with whom she had a daughter, Suzanne; to a Las Vegas boutique owner, Freddie Glusman, whom she divorced on grounds of physical abuse; to a managing director of Jet magazine, Robert DeLeon, who spent large amounts of her money before dying in a car crash; and finally to the crooner Vic Damone, who neglected her for golf. She was engaged to the British broadcaster David Frost from 1971 to 1973. Much about these relationships was revealed in her memoir 'The Legs Are the Last to Go' (2008).

Diahann Carroll passed away in Los Angles of complications from cancer. She is survived by Suzanne, a journalist, and two grandchildren, August and Sydney.

Trailer Paris Blues (1961). Source: Department of Afro-American Research Arts Culture (YouTube).

Trailer Claudine (1974). Source: Department of Afro-American Research Arts Culture (YouTube).

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

On 1 October 2019, Schlager singer and actor Karel Gott (1939-2019) passed away. He was the most successful male singer of the Czech Republic, and also had many successes in the German-speaking countries. He released more than 125 albums during his career, selling over 30 million records worldwide. In the annual national poll Český slavík, ‘the Sinatra of the East’ was thirty-eight times elected as the Most Favourite Male Singer.

Karel Gott in Kdyby tisíc klarinetu (1965)

East-German postcard by Progress Starfoto, no. 2376, 1965. Karel Gott in Kdyby tisíc klarinetu/If a Thousand Clarinets (Ján Rohác, Vladimír Svitácek, 1965).

German postcard by Franz Josef Rüdel, Filmpostkartenverlag, Hamburg, no. 4909. Photo: Polydor / Hoffmann.

Karel Gott in Ta nase písnicka ceská (1967)

East-German postcard by VEB Progress Film-Vertrieb, Berlin, no. 3094, 1968. Karel Gott in Ta nase písnicka ceská/The Czech song (Zdenek Podskalský, 1967).

German promotion card by Polydor.

East-German postcard by Progress Film-Verleih, Berlin, no. 113/77, 1977. Photo: Mirvald.

Eyes Covered by Snow

Karel Gott was born in 1939 in Pilsen, at that time Protectorate of Bohemia and Moravia, now Plzeň, Czech Republic, and has lived in Prague since age 6. He initially wanted to study art, but failed the exams at the School of Industrial Art, upon which he began training as an electrician.

On completing his studies, he began working as an electrician, but was soon fascinated by the new types of music flooding the city, and became interested in jazz. He experimented with playing the bass and the guitar, but eventually decided to focus on singing, studying it privately.

In 1958, he participated in the amateur singing contest Looking for New Talent in the Prague Slavonic House. He utterly failed to impress the judges, but soon made a name for himself in Prague jazz circles, finally getting his first engagement at the Vltava Prague Cafe that same year.

In 1960, he decided to undertake singing professionally. He studied opera at the Prague Conservatory under Konstantin Karenin, a student of the brilliant Russian bass Feodor Chaliapin. Knowing of Gott's interest in current musical trends, Karenin instructed him not only in classical Italian pieces, but also in the hits of the day. It was at this time that Gott travelled abroad (to Poland) for the first time with the Jazz Orchestra of the Czechoslovak Broadcast, conducted by Karel Krautgartner.

In 1962 or 1963 (the sources differ), Gott released his first single, Až nám bude dvakrát tolik (When we are twice as old), a duet with jazz singer Vlasta Průchová. Gott was voted into the Zlatý slavík (Golden Nightingale) viewer's survey, placing 49th and receiving a total of three votes.

His first solo single, Mesicni reka, the Czech version of Moon River became his breakthrough hit in 1962. In 1963 Gott was offered a place at the recently founded Prague Semafor theatre, which was then at the forefront of the emerging Czechoslovakian pop music scene. He released Oči sněhem zaváté (Eyes Covered by Snow), which became the year's best-selling record. Shortly afterwards, Gott received the first of his Zlatý slavík awards, given to the most popular artist of the year.

Karel Gott and Jana Brejchova in Kdyby tisic klarinetu (1965)

Czech postcard by Pressfoto, Praha (Prague). Photo: Karel Gott and Jana Brejchova in Kdyby tisic klarinetu/If a Thousand Clarinets (Ján Rohác, Vladimír Svitácek, 1965). Collection: Carla Bosch.

Carla: I suspect that on these two cards are the film crew making the documentary. With Jana Brejchova, Waldemar Matuska, Hana Hegerova, Eva Pilarova, Karel Gott, Jiri Suchy, and Jiri Slitr. They are all watching a television. In the public are soldiers who are holding music instruments.

Jana Brejchova in Kdyby tisic klarinetu (1965)

Czech postcard by Pressfoto, Praha (Prague). Photo: publicity still for Kdyby tisic klarinetu/If a Thousand Clarinets (Ján Rohác, Vladimír Svitácek, 1965). Collection: Carla Bosch.

Carla: Kdyby tisic klarinetu/If a Thousand Clarinets (Ján Rohác, Vladimír Svitácek, 1965) is a fantasy musical film about a mysterious statue of the composer Johann Sebastian Bach that changes guns into musical instruments. The news spreads and a television station decides to make a documentary film about the subject. My guess is that it must be something like how music can change people. And, more particular, how soldiers change when they are not holding guns, but music instruments instead... But that is just a wild guess.

Czech postcard by Nakladatelstvi Pressfoto, Praha, no. C 11148. Photo: Vileru Rosegnal.

Czech postcard by Nakladatelstvi Pressfoto, Praha, no. C 23365-3. Photo: Jaromir Svoboda.

Maya the Honey Bee

In 1965, Karel Gott was a major star, appearing in the programs Pilgrimage for Two and Evening Prayer while building his own repertoire with his own orchestra. That year, he made his first film appearance in the musical Kdyby tisíc klarinetu/If a Thousand Clarinets (Ján Rohác, Vladimír Svitácek, 1965) with Jana Brejchová.

He also established the Apollo theatre, along with two brothers who were with him in Semafor: Jiří and Ladislav Štaidl. He began composing his own songs, and toured Czechoslovakia and abroad with the Apollo theatre.

His first album, Karel Gott Sings got great acclaim. This first album was followed by an English export album titled The Golden Voice of Prague. In 1967, Gott performed at MIDEM, the International Fair of Record Companies and Music Producers in Cannes, France, where the applause was measured during every concert. He surprised everyone by achieving a level of 54 to Tom Jones' 58.

Following this event, Gott signed a contract with the Polydor / Deutsche Grammophon Gesellschaft record company, renewing it several times until it became a life contract in 1997. Between 1967 and 2000, Polydor released over 125 albums and 72 singles for Karel Gott in German speaking countries in Europe.

Films in which he appeared were Mucedníci lásky/Martyrs of Love (Jan Nemec, 1967) with British director Lindsay Anderson, and the German comedy Charley's Onkel/Charley’s Uncle (Werner Jacobs, 1969) featuring Gustav Knuth.

Gott represented Austria in the Eurovision Song Contest 1968 with the song Tausend Fenster, written by Udo Jürgens. He finished in 13th place. In the same year, Gott spent six months performing daily at the New Frontier Hotel and Casino in Las Vegas.

In the 1970s, domestic success was marked by Gott's presence on television, including the filming of a ten-part serial entitled Karel Gott in Slany. In 1971, after deciding not to return from a concert tour in West Germany to his home country, he was addressed a personal letter from the Czechoslovak party leader Gustav Husak persuading him to change his mind.

One of his most best-known pop hits was the title music to the Japanese anime series Maya the Honey Bee (1975). The original theme was composed by Karel Svoboda and sung by Karel Gott in the German, Czech and Slovak versions. In 1975 he also played the lead in the film musical Hvezda pada vzhuru/A Star Is Falling Upwards (Ladislav Rychman, 1975).

Karel Gott recorded a cover version of the song All by Myself called Kam tenkrát šel můj bratr Jan (Where Did My Brother Jan Go This Time). The song was dedicated to Jan Palach who set himself on fire and burned to death as a protest against Soviet occupation of Czechoslovakia in January 1969. According to Wikipedia, the song was recorded in 1977 while Soviet troops were still present in the country. In order to continue in his career, he had to sign in 1977 the so-called ‘Anti-charter’, a petition organised by the Communist government against the Charter 77 signed by Václav Havel and other dissidents, protesting the government's violations of the Helsinki Accords.

Czech postcard by Nakladatelstvi Pressfoto, Praha, no. 53/3. Photo: Alexandr Janovsky.

East-German postcard by Bild und Heimat, Reichenbach, no. G 6776, 1976. Photo: Leher, Berlin.

East-German postcard by Progress, Berlin, no. 33/76, 1976. Photo: publicity still for Hvezda pada vzhuru/A Star Is Falling Upwards (Ladislav Rychman, 1975) with Zuzana Kocúrlková.

East-German postcard by Progress, Berlin, no. 41/76, 1976. Photo: publicity still for Hvezda pada vzhuru/A Star Is Falling Upwards (Ladislav Rychman, 1975) with Zuzana Kocúrlková.

His second great love

The 1980s were marked for Karel Gott by international success, including the filming in Italy of the musical In the Track of Bel Canto (1981), with a corresponding German-Italian album and duet performance with Sofia Rotaru in the Soviet Union. The following years, Gott received many awards, including The Supraphon Diamond Record Award, given him in 1992, for having sold 13 million records.

In 1990, he decided to end his career and arranged a huge farewell tour. However, the tour was so successful that he re-evaluated his decision. The 1990s were influenced by fundamental changes in the political system of the country, which were reflected in popular music, but it did not threaten his permanent position in the limelight of the domestic music scene. In 1991 a new television survey was created called TýTý. Karel Gott gained the first victory and at the same time became the outright winner of the survey.

In 1993, he established his own artistic agency, GOJA, with František Janeček. It is this agency that lately producedGott's records and organisedhis artistic activities. In 1996, following renewed public interest in his career, Gott again won 'The Golden Nightingale Award' with a huge lead over his rivals, and retained the accolade many times since.

Gott remained popular in a number of countries, including those of the former Soviet Union, where his first record, produced by Melodiya in 1977, sold a staggering 4.5 million copies. In 2000, he had his first concert in Carnegie Hall, New York.

During the 1990s, Gott began to focus increasingly on painting, his second great love. The first exhibition of his paintings took place in 1992, at the Prague Christ Child Gallery. He also exhibited his work successfully in Berlin, Moscow, Munich, Cologne, Vienna, and Bratislava.

In 2001, he played the double role of Lucifer and God in the family comedy Z pekla stestí 2/Goblins and Good Luck 2 (Zdenek Troska, 2001). He also acted regularly in TV series.

Gott had two adult daughters, Dominika and Lucie, from former relationships (they have different mothers). He was also the father to Charlotte Ella with Ivana Macháčková whom he married in 2008 in Las Vegas, the city where he started his international career. Their second daughter, Nelly Sofie, was born in summer 2008. Karel Gott passed away in Prague, Czech Republic, at the age of 80.

German promotion card by Polydor, no. 49.

German promotion card by Polydor.

Compilation of early TV performances by Karel Gott. Source: Hit That Button (YouTube).

Karel Gott sings Kam tenkrát šel můj bratr Jan. Source: Benetomm (YouTube).

Sources: Jan Adam (KarelGott.com), Zuzana Drotárová (Gott.cz), Steve Leggett (AllMusic), Wikipedia (German and English) and IMDb.

Today's film special is about the Italian silent film L'arzigogolo/The Court Jester (Mario Almirante, 1924). The successful costume drama starred diva Italia Almirante Manzini, Annibale Betrone and Oreste Bilancia.

Italian postcard by Ballerini & Fratini, Firenze, no. 529. Photo: Scoffone. Italia Almirante Manzini

in L'Arzigogolo (Mario Almirante, 1924b

Italian postcard by Ballerini & Fratini, Firenze, no. 528. Photo: Scoffone. Publicity still for L'arzigogolo (Mario Almirante, 1924), with Italia Almirante Manzini.

Italian postcard by Ed. G.B. Falci, Milano. Photo: Annibale Betrone in L'arzigogolo (Mario Almirante, 1924).

Italian postcard by Ballerini & Fratini, Firenze, no. 202. Photo: Alba Film. Oreste Bilancia in L'arzigogolo (Mario Almirante, 1924).

Italia Almirante and Oreste Bilancia in L'arzigogolo

Italian postcard by Ed. G.B. Falci, Milano, no. 197. Photo: publicity still for L'arzigogolo (Mario Almirante, 1924) with Oreste Bilancia and and Italia Almirante Manzini.

Italian postcard by Ed. G.B. Falci, Milano, no. 203. Photo: publicity still for L'arzigogolo (Mario Almirante, 1924) with Italia Almirante Manzini and Alberto Collo.

Italian postcard by Ed. G.B. Falci, Milano, no. 204. Photo: publicity still for L'arzigogolo (Mario Almirante, 1924) with Italia Almirante Manzini.

Italia Almirante and Alberto Collo in L'arzigogolo

Italian postcard by G.B. Falci, Milano, no. 209. Photo: Italia Almirante Manzini and Alberto Collo in L'arzigogolo (Mario Almirante, 1924).

An Attractive Cast

The Italian costume drama L'arzigogolo/The Court Jester (Mario Almirante, 1924) has an attractive cast.

Leading lady is Italia Almirante Manzini (1890-1941), wife of director Mario Almirante. Italia had starred in the classic epic Cabiria (1914) and was one of the divas of the Italian silent cinema.

The court jester of the title was played by Annibale Betrone (1883-1950). He was an important figure of the Italian theatre of the first half of the 20th century. Betrone also appeared in several silent and sound films.

Oreste Bilancia (1881-1945) was another well known face of the Italian silent cinema. As in L'arzigogolo, he mostly worked as supporting actor, but occasionally he played the main character.

Italian postcard by Ballerini & Fratini, Firenze, no. 205. Photo: Alba Film. An ensemble shot from the opening scene of L'arzigogolo (Mario Almirante, 1924). Caption: The tournament in honor of Violante.

Italian postcard by Ballerini & Fratini, Firenze, no. 206. Photo: Alba Film.Italia Almirante Manzini as Monna Violante in L'arzigogolo (Mario Almirante, 1924). Caption: Violante leaves for the hunting.

Italian postcard by Ballerini & Fratini, Firenze, no. 20?. Photo: Alba Film. Italia Almirante Manzini as Monna Violante and Alberto Collo as Count Giano in L'arzigogolo (Mario Almirante, 1924). Caption: Giano tries in vain to conquer Violante's coldness.

Italian postcard by Ballerini & Fratini, Firenze, no. 209. Photo: Alba Film. Annibale Betrone as The Jester in L'arzigogolo (Mario Almirante, 1924). Caption: Spallatonda chased from the village.

Italian postcard by Ballerini & Fratini, Firenze, no. 210. Photo: Alba Film. In the back, Italia Amirante Manzini as Monna Violante and Alberto Collo as Count Giano in L'arzigogolo (Mario Almirante, 1924). Caption: The dinner in the house of Count Giano.

Italian postcard by Ballerini & Fratini, Firenze, no. 211. Photo: Alba Film. Publicity still for L'arzigogolo (Mario Almirante, 1924). Caption: The arrival of the buffoon at the castle of Giano.

Italian postcard by Ballerini & Fratini, Firenze, no. 214. Photo: Alba Film. Annibale Betrone as The Jester and Alberto Collo as Giano in L'arzigogolo (Mario Almirante, 1924). Caption: Giano to the Jester: ... if you don't manage to convince Violante of my love I will have your head chopped off!

Italia Almirante and Annibale Betrone in L'arzigogolo

Italian postcard by Ballerini & Fratini, Firenze, no. 216. Photo: Alba Film. Italia Almirante Manzini and Annibale Betrone in L'arzigogolo (Mario Almirante, 1924). Caption: In the calm moonlight the buffoon sees Violante and declares her his love.

Classic Love Story

L'arzigogolo is a classic love story in the vain of William Shakespeare's Romeo and Juliet. The story was a liberal adaptation of a popular 1922 stage play by Sem Benelli. The sets were designed by Luigi Sapelli, better known as Caramba, who specialised in costume dramas. Director of photography was Ubaldo Arata, who was one of Italy's most famous cinematographers.

Italia Almirante plays Monna Violante, daughter of the Prince of Capri, who is wed by her father to the rich merchant Floridoro (Oreste Bilancia), a fat and wealthy merchant, confident and convinced of being protected by good fortune.

Monna Violante falls in love with Spallatonda (Annibale Betrone), the court jester and servant of count Giano (Alberto Collo), one of her suitors. After Giano has been killed by the hand of Spallatonda, Monna Violante and Spallatonda run away.

After the premiere, the critic of Il Roma della Domenica wrote: "L'arzigogolo did not delude the high expectations, because it is the result on screen of an original and interesting work. Therefore the poet (Sem Benelli) can be satisfied."

The critic of La Vita Cinematografica adds: "We never saw Italia Almirante so perfect in place. She exquisitely figures as an intelligent woman. Her plastic beauty, preserved by exuberant costumes, makes ;the complex and enigmatic character of Violante more fascinating and suggestive."

L'arzigogolo became one of the most successful films in Italy of 1924.

Italian postcard by Ballerini & Fratini, Firenze, no. 217. Photo: Alba Film. Oreste Bilancia as Floridoro in L'arzigogolo (Mario Almirante, 1924). Caption: Floridoro and the servant. Floridoro: Her true love? Who is it? When will he come? Is he far away? Is he here?

Italian postcard by Ballerini & Fratini, Firenze, no. 218 or 219. Photo: Alba Film. Annibale Betrone as The Jester and Italia Almirante Manzini as Monna Violante in L'arzigogolo (Mario Almirante, 1924). Caption: The Jester: What! No Milady! You have too great haste to forget. But I remember!

Italian postcard by Ballerini & Fratini, Firenze, no. 220. Photo: Alba Film. Annibale Betrone as The Jester and Alberto Collo as Giano in L'arzigogolo (Mario Almirante, 1924). Caption: The mockery. The Jester: She is in this, it is hers. She whom you'll never have... never!

Italian postcard by Ballerini & Fratini, Firenze, no. 221. Photo: Alba Film. Italia Almirante Manzini as Monna Violante, Annibale Betrone as The Jester, Oreste Bilancia as Floridoro, and Alberto Collo as Giano in L'arzigogolo (Mario Almirante, 1924). Caption: The Jester rebels against Giano and defies death out of love for Violante.

Italian postcard by Ballerini & Fratini, Firenze, no. 222. Photo: Alba Film. Annibale Betrone as The Jesterin L'arzigogolo (Mario Almirante, 1924). Caption: The Jester in prison.

Italian postcard by Ballerini & Fratini, Firenze, no. 224. Photo: Alba Film. Annibale Betrone as The Jester, Oreste Bilancia as Floridoro, and Alberto Collo as Giano in L'arzigogolo (Mario Almirante, 1924). Caption: The Jester: I redeem myself! I am no longer a jester, but a man!

Italian postcard by Ballerini & Fratini, Firenze, no. 226. Photo: Alba Film. Annibale Betrone as The Jester, Oreste Bilancia as Floridoro, and Alberto Collo as Giano in L'arzigogolo (Mario Almirante, 1924). Caption: Dead!

Italian postcard by Ballerini & Fratini, Firenze, no. 227. Photo: Alba Film. Annibale Betrone and Italia Almirante Manzini in L'arzigogolo (Mario Almirante, 1924). Caption: True love...attained in vain... He is dead!

Italian postcard by Ballerini & Fratini, Firenze, no. 228. Photo: Alba Film. Annibale Betrone and Oreste Bilancia in L'arzigogolo (Mario Almirante, 1924). Caption: The buffoon resurrected to the great terror of Floridoro.

Italian postcard by Ballerini & Fratini, Firenze, no. 229. Photo: Alba Film. Oreste Bilancia as Floridoro, and Alberto Collo as Giano in L'arzigogolo (Mario Almirante, 1924). Caption: The Death of Giano.

Italian postcard by Ballerini & Fratini, Firenze, no. 230. Photo: Alba Film. Italia Almirante Manzinias Monna Violante, Annibale Betrone as The Jester, and Alberto Collo as Giano in L'arzigogolo (Mario Almirante, 1924). Caption: The flight of Violante and Spallatonda after Giano's death.

Sources: Vittorio Martinelli (Il Cinema Muto Italiano 1923-1931 - Italian), Wikipedia (Italian) and IMDb.

On 10 October 2019, French actress Marie-José Nat(1940) passed away. She was an acclaimed stage, film and television star, who played glamorous, exotic roles in many films of the 1960s and 1970s. Marie-José Nat was 79.

Romanian collectors card.

German postcard by VEB Progress Film-Vertrieb, Berlin. no. 2323, 1965. Photo: Unifrance Film.

French postcard by Editions P.I., Paris, no. 1052. Photo: Sam Lévin.

French postcard by E.D.U.G., no. 219, presented by Corvisart, Epinal. Photo: Lucienne Chevert.

French postcard by Editions E.D.U.G., Paris, no. 245. Photo: Lucienne Chevert.

Anatomy of a Marriage

Marie-José Nat was born Mary-José Benhalassa in Bonifacio, Corsica, in 1940.

In 1955 she won a photo contest to appear in a photo romance in the magazine 'Femmes d'aujourd'hui'(Women of Today). She started to work as a cover girl and mannequin and had acting lessons at Le cours Simon in Paris.

The following year, she made her film debut in the short Soir de réveillon/Evening's Eve (Gilles Margaritis, 1956) opposite Samy Frey. Later that year she appeared in her first feature film, the Fyodor Dostoevsky adaptation Crime et châtiment/Crime and Punishment (Georges Lampin, 1956) starring Jean Gabin.

She followed it up with such notable films as Rue des Prairies/Rue de Paris (Denys de La Patellière, 1959) as Jean Gabin’s daughter, La Verité/The Truth (Henri-Georges Clouzot, 1960) as the studious sister of pretty and idle Brigitte Bardot, and La Vie Conjugale/Anatomy of a Marriage (André Cayatte, 1963).

In this domestic drama a married couple (Nat and Jacques Charrier) presents in two separate films their separate views on the state of their marriage. The films are titled Jean-Marc ou La vie conjugale/My Days with Jean-Marc and Françoise ou La vie conjugale/My Nights with Francoise.

German postcard by VEB Progress Film-Vertrieb, Berlin, no. 1303, 1960. Photo: Marie-José Nat in Rue des Prairies/Rue de Paris (Denys de La Patellière, 1959).

French postcard by Editions Borde, Paris, no. 187. Photo: Marel.

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

French postcard. Photo: Sam Lévin.

French postcard by E.D.U.G., no. 372. Photo: Sam Lévin.

Golden Palm

Writer-director Michel Drach contacted Marie-José Nat to play in his film Amélie ou le temps d'aimer/Amelie or The Time to Love (1961). The two fell in love, and they married in 1964.

DB du Monteil writes at IMDb: "Michel Drach's second effort after a good start with On N'Enterre Pas Le Dimanche,and his first movie starring his then-wife Marie-José Nat. Today, Michel Drach has sunk into oblivion, because of an uneven career, his convincing works (AmélieM, Elise Ou La Vraie Vie, Les Violons Du Bal) are forever juxtaposed with his worst (Guy De Maupassant). One should also note that most of his best features Marie-José Nat who was to him what Stephane Audran was to Claude Chabrol: the actress's sensitivity was in perfect harmony with Drach's directing."

Their other films were Elise ou la Vraie Vie/Elise, or Real Life (Michel Drach, 1970) with Bernadette Lafont, Les violons du bal/Violins At The Ball (Michel Drach, 1974) with Jean-Louis Trintignant, and Passé simple/Replay (Michel Drach, 1977).

Les violons du bal concerns Michel Drach’s childhood experiences during the Second World War. For her role Marie-José Nat was awarded Best Actress at the 1974 Cannes Film Festival, and the film was nominated for the Golden Palm award.

East-German postcard by Progress Film-Vertrieb, Berlin, no. 2.348. Retail price: 0,20 MDN. Photo: Unifrance Film.

East-German postcard by VEB Progress-Filmvertrieb, Berlin, no. 2514. Retail price: 0,20 MDN. Photo: Progress. Backside mentions Marie-José Nat as known from the film Rue de Prairies/Rue de Paris (Denys de la Patellière, 1959).

East-German postcard by Progress Film-Vertrieb, Berlin, no. 2.625. Retail price: 0,20 MDN. Photo: Progress. Jacques Charrier and Marie-José Nat in La Vie Conjugale/Anatomy of a Marriage (1963).

German postcard by VEB Progress Film-Vertrieb, Berlin, no. 2626, 1966.

East-German postcard by VEB Progress Film-Vertrieb, Berlin, no. 3009, 1967. Retail Price: 0,20 DM. Photo: Steffen.

New Amant

In 1977, during the shooting of Passé simple, Marie-José Nat met actor Victor Lanoux. He became her new amant. With Lanoux she would often work together in the theatre, and later also on television.

Among her later films were the thriller La nuit du destin/Night of Destiny (Abdelkrim Bahloul, 1997), the war comedy Train de vie/Train of Life (Radu Mihaileanu, 1998) and the romantic drama Le cadeau d'Elena/Elena’s Gift (Frédéric Graziani, 2004) with Michel Duchaussoy.

Nat married four times: first to actor Roger Dumas (1960-1961), then to Michel Drach (1964-1981), subseqently to Victor Lanoux, and since 2005, she was married to painter-author Serge Rezvani. With Drach she had three children, director David Drach, actor Julien Drach and actor Aurelien Drach.

In 2006 Marie-José Nat published a memoir 'Je n'ai pas oublié' (I didn’t forget). She divided her time between Paris and Bonifacio, her birthtown in Corsica. As the most prominent resident, she was known in Bonifacio as the ‘queen of the town.’

Marie-José Nat passed away in Paris in 2019.

German postcard by VEB Progress Film-Vertrieb, Berlin, no. 241/70, 1970. Photo: Linke.

Marie-José Nat, Brigitte Fossey and Marie-France Pisier in Les Gens de Mogador (1972)

French postcard by Editions Atlas, Evreux, no. 23. Photo: Telfrance. Marie-José Nat, Brigitte Fossey and Marie-France Pisier in the TV series Les Gens de Mogador/The people of Mogador (Robert Mazoyer, 1972).

Trailer for Amélie ou le temps d'aimer/Amelie or The Time to Love (Michel Drach, 1961) with Jean Sorel. Source: EuroCineChannel-1 (YouTube).

Trailer for La Vie Conjugale/Anatomy of a Marriage (André Cayatte, 1963). Source: Pancho Vertigen (YouTube).

Sources: Ciné-Ressources (French), AllMovie, Wikipedia and IMDb.

Some years ago, our friend and cinema photo collector Roloff de Jeu arrived at a birthday party with a huge gift for us. He carried a big and heavy wooden frame with him, which had been once part of an exhibition of the NVBF, the Dutch cinema Association. The frame contained old photos of cinema publicity and fronts of cinemas in our hometown Amsterdam. Of course we liked the gift and for years we left the pictures behind the glass in the huge wooden frame. But now it's time to share a selection of the photos with you. With thanks to Roloff!

Rembrandt Theater, Amsterdam

Leise flehen meine Lieder (1933) in the Rembrandt Theater

Dutch photo. Front of the Rembrandt Theater in Amsterdam, The Netherlands. On show was Leise flehen meine Lieder (Willi Forst, 1933), starring Marta Eggerth, Hans Jaray and Hans Moser.

The Austrian actor Willi Forst (1903-1980) was a darling of the German-speaking public. He was also one of the most significant directors, producers, writers and stars of the 'Wiener Filme', the light Viennese musical comedies of the 1930s. On stage he played in operettas and revues, but also worked with Erwin Piscator and Max Reinhardt.

Bacarole at the Rembrandt Theater, Amsterdam

Dutch photo. Front of the Rembrandt Theater in Amsterdam, The Netherlands. On show was Barcarole (Gerhard Lamprecht, 1936), starring Gustav Fröhlich and Lida Baarová.

Beautiful Lída Baarová (1914-2000) was a glamorous Czech film star who worked in Prague, Berlin and Rome. A dangerous affair with Joseph Goebbels, the propaganda minister of the Third Reich, first enhanced and later seriously damaged her career.

Smart German actor Gustav Fröhlich (1902-1987) played Freder Fredersen in the classic Metropolis (1927) and became a popular star in light comedies. After the war he tried to escape from the standard roles of a charming gentleman with the part of a doomed painter in Die Sünderin/The Sinner (1951), but the effort went down in a scandal.

Walt Disney Classics

Dutch photo. Front of the City Theatre in Amsterdam, late 1940s of early 1950s. On show was Pinocchio (Hamilton Luske, Ben Sharpsteen, a.o., 1940).

The second full length animated Disney classic, Pinocchio(Hamilton Luske, Ben Sharpsteen, a.o., 1940), is based on the 19th century Italian novel of the same name by Carlo Collodi. The kind woodcarver Geppetto creates a wooden marionette, which he calls Pinocchio. His wish for Pinocchio to be a real boy is unexpectedly granted by a fairy. The fairy assigns Jiminy Cricket to act as Pinocchio's 'conscience' and keep him out of trouble. Pinocchio is weak-willed and Jiminy is not too successful in his endeavour. Pinocchio doesn't always listen to reason and most of the film he is deep in trouble.

The story has never a dull moment. In fact Pinocchio is about childhood and temptation. Tasting jam, stealing, not going to school, lying, childhood is full of temptations. Everything is new then everything looks pretty. When the standard for kids is to obey to authoritarian figures who know the best for them, the most precious lesson in Pinocchio is not to obey for the sake of obedience but to follow your conscience. Differentiate between right or wrong. That's what being a real boy is about, being unselfish, trustful and brave, not being obedient.

Dutch photo. Dutch publicity for Bambi (David Hand, 1942). The film was shown in Amsterdam in 1948 in three cinemas, Rialto, Nöggerath and Cineac Damrak. Roloff de Jeu suggests this was the large corner window of De Bijenkorf, the most famous department store of Amsterdam. He's probably right while Cineac Damrak was located across the street from De Bijenkorf.

Bambi (David Hand, 1942) was the fifth animated feature produced by Walt Disney. It is based on the book Bambi, a Life in the Woods by Austrian author Felix Salten. The film was released by RKO Radio Pictures in 1942, and received three Academy Award nominations: Best Sound (Sam Slyfield), Best Song (for Love Is a Song sung by Donald Novis) and Original Music Score.

The main characters of Bambi (David Hand, 1942) are Bambi, a mule deer and his parents, the Great Prince of the forest and his unnamed mother. His friends are Thumper, a pink-nosed rabbit; and Flower, a skunk. and his childhood friend and future mate, Faline. For the film, Disney took the liberty of changing Bambi's species into a mule deer from his original species of roe deer, since roe deer are not native to North America, and the mule deer is more widespread in the United States.

English film historian Leslie Halliwell wrote that Bambi was "one of Disney's most memorable and brilliant achievements with a great comic character in Thumper and a climactic forest fire sequence that is genuinely thrilling". He concluded his review that it was "a triumph of the animator's arts". Hal Erickson at AllMovie adds: "In the grand Disney tradition, Bambi is brimming with unforgettable sequences, notably the young deer's attempts to negotiate an iced-over pond, and most especially the death of Bambi's mother - and if this moment doesn't move you to tears, you're made of stone (many subsequent Disney films, including Lion King, have tried, most in vain, to match the horror and pathos of this one scene).

Check out at Flickr, Roloff's albums with

Cinema postcards from the Netherlands, Cinema postcards from Europe and Cinema postcards of the Americas.

Hungarian born film star Lya de Putti (1897-1931) portrayed vamps in German and American silent films. In 1925 she reached the zenith of her career with the leading role in the Weimar classic Variété, as the alluring femme fatale between Emil Jannings and Warwick Ward.

German postcard by Ross Verlag, Berlin, no. 1268/2, 1927-1928. Photo: Ufa. Lya de Putti in Varieté (Ewald André Dupont, 1925).

German postcard by Ross Verlag, Berlin, no. 1273/1, 1927-1928. Photo: Hans Natge.

German postcard by Ross Verlag, no. 2023/1, 1927-1928. Photo: Fanam.

German postcard by Ross Verlag, no. 3178/1, 1928-1929. Photo: Roman Freulich.

German postcard by Ross Verlag, no. 3370/1, 1928-1929. Photo: Roman Freulich.

German postcard by Ross Verlag, Berlin, no. 727/2, 1925-1926. Photo: Alex Binder. Collection: Didier Hanson.

To the capital of the European silent cinema of the 1920s

Amalia 'Lia' de Putty was born in Vécse, Austria-Hungary (now Vojcice, Slovakia) in 1897 (some sources say 1899). She was a daughter of a Hungarian baron and cavalry officer and a former countess. Lia had two brothers, Geza and Alexander, and a sister, Mitzi.

In 1913 (or 1912 according to some sources) she married county magistrate Zoltán Szepessy and she had two daughters with him.

In Budapest, she began her stage career with a short stint in the vaudeville circuit. In 1918 she made her screen debut with A császár katonái/The Emperor's soldiers (Béla Balogh, 1918).

That year she also divorced Szepessy. Shortly after her divorce she married Ludwig Christensen, who died in 1922.

She made her next film in Romania, Pe valurile fericirii/The waves of happiness (Dolly A. Szigethy, 1920). Then she moved on to the capital of the European silent cinema of the 1920s, Berlin.

French postcard by Edition de la Cinematographie Française. Photo: Grandes Productions Cinématographiques (G.P.C.). Photo: Ica von Lenkeffy as Desdemona and Lya de Putti as Emilia in Othello (Dimitri Buchowetzki, 1922).

French postcard by Edition de la Cinematographie Française. Photo: Grandes Productions Cinématographiques (G.P.C.). Photo: Werner Krauss as Jago and Lya de Putti as Emilia in Othello (Dimitri Buchowetzki, 1922).

French postcard by Edition de la Cinématographie Française, Paris. Photo: G.P.C. Publicity still for Der brennende Acker/Burning Soil/La terre qui flambe (Friedrich Wilhelm Murnau, 1922). Helga, Count Rudenburg's second wife (Stella Arbenina), and Gerda, the Count's daughter (Lya de Putti), in a fierce get together.

French postcard by Edition de la Cinématographie Française, Paris. Photo: G.P.C. Publicity still for Der brennende Acker/Burning Soil/La terre qui flambe (Friedrich Wilhelm Murnau, 1922). Gerda (Lya de Putti) and her maid (Leonie Taliansky).

Luciano Albertini and Lya de Putti in Die Schlucht des Todes (1923)

German postcard by Ross Verlag, Berlin, no. 578/1. Luciano Albertini and Lya de Putti in Die Schlucht des Todes (Luciano Albertini, Francis A. Bartoni, 1923). The card depicts the final scene: Luciano has just saved Lya from falling down the Devil's Canyon and reconciles with her after his refusal to acknowledge her illegal child and his failed attempt to suicide.

German postcard by Ross Verlag, Berlin, no. 578/2, 1919-1924. Photo: Leo Klaude, Berlin / Phoebus Film. Luciano Albertiniand Lya de Putti in Die Schlucht des Todes/The Ravine of Death (Luciano Albertini, Albert-Francis Bertoni, Max Obal, 1923).

An alluring femme fatale

In 1920, Lya de Putti progressed to perform classical ballet in Berlin. She became the premiere danseuse at the Berlin Winter Garden in 1924.

In Germany she played supporting roles in films by famous directors. She worked twice with F.W. Murnau, first at the drama Die brennende Acker/Burning Soil (1921) with Vladimir Gajdarov, and then at Phantom (1922) starring Alfred Abel.

She starred in six films produced by Joe May, including the exotic adventure epic Das Indische Grabmal/The Indian Tomb (Joe May, 1921) starring Olaf Fønss.

Her biggest hit – especially in the US – was the UFA production Varieté/Jealousy (Ewald André Dupont, 1925). De Putti played the alluring femme fatale Bertha-Marie, who seduces the simple carnival concessionaire Stephan Huller (Emil Jannings) and then betrays him with the handsome acrobat (Warwick Ward). Feeling doubly impotent because he himself had been a famous aerialist before suffering a crippling accident, Jannings fantasises about killing his rival - and, finally, does so.

De Putti followed this success with star performances in Manon Lescaut (Arthur Robison, 1925) opposite Vladimir Gajdarov, and Junges Blut/Young Blood (Manfred Noa, 1926) with Walter Slezak.

French postcard by A.N., Paris, no. 134. Photo: Phoebus Film. Publicity still for Im Namen des Kaisers/In the Name of the Emperor (Robert Dinesen, 1925).

German postcard by Ross Verlag, Berlin, no. 868/1, 1925-1926. Photo: Binder. Collection Didier Hanson. Early card of De Putti in which her name is still spelled Lia instead of Lya.

German postcard by Ross Verlag, Berlin, no. 1267/1, 1927-1928. Photo: Alex Binder / Ufa. Lya de Putti in Manon Lescaut (Arthur Robison, 1926).

German postcard by Ross Verlag, Berlin, no. 1267/2, 1927-1928. Photo: Alex Binder / Ufa. Lya de Putti in Manon Lescaut (Arthur Robison, 1926).

Lya de Putti and Vladimir Gajdarov in Manon Lescaut (1926)

Italian postcard by G.B. Falci, Milano, no. 129. Photo: A. Stefano Pittaluga. Lya de Putti and Vladimir Gajdarov in Manon Lescaut (Arthur Robison, 1926).

Italian postcard by S.A. Stefano Pittaluga, no. 131. Photo: Lya de Putti in Manon Lescaut (Arthur Robison, 1926).

Invitation to Hollywood

Studio mogul Adolph Zukor invited Lya de Putti to come to Hollywood.

At her arrival in New York in February 1926, she told American reporters that she was twenty-two years old. Her ocean liner's records list her as having been twenty-six.

Her American debut was David Wark Griffith's Sorrows of Satan (D.W. Griffith, 1926) starring Adolphe Menjou. The film was released in two versions, one in America and the other in Europe. In the American version one scene had De Putti fully dressed. The same scene in the European release had De Putti topless.

She went to work for Universal in such films as The Heart Thief (Nils Olaf Chrisander, 1927) starring Joseph Schildkraut, Buck Privates (Melville W. Brown, 1928) with Zasu Pitts, and The Scarlet Lady (Alan Crosland, 1928).

In between these films she returned to Germany for a short time in order to shoot Charlotte etwas verrückt/Charlott something crazy (Adolf E. Licho, 1928). During this stay a serious accident happened. Lya de Putti fell down from a window. The press interpreted it as an attempted suicide. But de Putti recovered quickly and returned to the US.

Hollywood generally casted her as a vamp, and she often wore her dark hair short in a style similar to that of Louise Brooks.

German postcard by Ross Verlag, Berlin, no. 1028/1, 1927-1928. Photo: Alex Binder.

German postcard by Ross Verlag, Berlin, no. 1028/2, 1927-1928. Photo: Alex Binder.

German postcard by Ross Verlag, Berlin, no. 1028/3, 1927-1928. Photo: Alex Binder.

German postcard by Ross Verlag, Berlin, no. 1268/1, 1927-1928. Photo: Alex Binder / Ufa.

German postcard by Ross Verlag, Berlin, no. 1269/1, 1927-1928. Photo: Alex Binder / Ufa.

German postcard by Ross Verlag, Berlin, no. 1269/4, 1927-1928. Photo: Alex Binder / Ufa.

An attempt to make a re-start on Broadway

Lya de Putti was rumored to be engaged to Count Ludwig Salm von Hoogstraten, a former husband of the American oil heiress Millicent Rogers, but she denied the engagement.

De Putti failed to make it big in Hollywood and her Hollywood efforts were inhibited by her foreign accent when the sound film arrived.

She left the screen by 1929 to attempt to make a re-start on Broadway. Later that year she returned to Europe.

In Germany she had a part in Rund um die Liebe/About Love (Oskar Kalbus, 1929), an all star women's picture with a.o. Lilian Harvey and Valerie Boothby.

She went to England to study the language and also made there the silent film The Informer (Arthur Robison, 1929) with Lars Hanson and Warwick Ward. It would turn out to be her final film.

German postcard by Ross Verlag, Berlin, no. 1273/2, 1927-1928. Photo: Hans Natge.

German postcard by Ross Verlag, Berlin, no. 1349/2, 1927-1928. Photo: Terra Film. Lya de Putti in Junges Blut/Young Blood (Manfred Noa, 1926).

Walter Slezak and Lya de Putti in Junges Blut (1926)

German postcard by Ross Verlag, Berlin, no. 1350/1, 1927-1928. Photo: Terra Film. Walter Slezakand Lya de Putti in Junges Blut/Young Blood (Manfred Noa, 1926).

German postcard by Ross Verlag, Berlin, no. 1562/3, 1927-1928. The signature of the photographer could be "Freimuth", but also "Lutteroth", a photographer in Munich whose work was used by Ross, or "Kurzrock", a photographer from Wiesbaden whose work Ross also used.

German postcard by Ross Verlag, Berlin, no. 1819/4, 1927-1928. Photo: Fanam.

German postcard by Ross Verlag, no. 1931/2, 1927-1928. Photo: Melbourne Spurr, Hollywood.

A fatal chicken bone

Lya de Putti returned to America. At the end of 1931 followed a macabre and bizarre accident. De Putti swallowed a chicken bone which had to be surgically removed.

At the hospital, she reportedly behaved irrationally and eluded her nurses. Eventually she was found in a corridor. She contracted an infection, then pleurisy in her right side, followed by pneumonia in both lungs.

Lya de Putti died in 1931 in the New York hospital. She was only 34.

According to Wikipedia, she left "just £800 (UK equivalent at the time) and a few bits of jewellery. Four years earlier, £800 was her weekly wage."

She was survived by her third husband, Louis Jahnke, whom she had married in 1922. Her first husband, Zoltán Szepessy, committed suicide shortly after her death.

They had two daughters, Ilona (1914) and Judith (1916). Both daughters were interviewed as old ladies for the documentary Das dritte Leben der Lya de Putti/The Third Life of Lya de Putti (Gisela Scheelein, 1996).

In the film Cabaret (Bob Fosse, 1972), singer Sally Bowles (Liza Minnelli) tells her friend Brian Roberts (Michael York) that Lya de Putti is her 'favourite screen siren'. In a subsequent scene, Bowles dismisses de Putti, claiming that she "makes too many faces."

German postcard by Ross Verlag, Berlin, no. 3020/3, 1928-1929.

Livio Pavanelli and Lya de Putti in Charlott etwas verrückt (1928)

German postcard by Ross Verlag, no. 3221/1, 1928-1929. Photo: Phoebus-Film AG. Livio Pavanelli and Lya de Putti in the German silent film Charlott etwas verrückt/Charlott a little crazy (Adolf E. Licho, 1929).

German postcard by Ross Verlag, Berlin, Foreign, no. 3452, 1928-1929. Photo: G.L. Manuel Frères, Paris.

German postcard by Ross Verlag, no. 3494/2, 1928-1929. Photo: probably a still from The Heart Thief (Nils Olaf Chrisander, 1927).

Lya de Putti and Joseph Schildkraut in The Heart Thief (1927)

German postcard by Ross Verlag, no. 3495/1, 1928-1929. Photo: LPG. Lya de Putti and Joseph Schildkraut in The Heart Thief (Nils Olaf Chrisander, 1927).

German postcard by Ross Verlag, Berlin, no. 3817/3, 1928-1929.

Sources: Hal Erickson (AllMovie), Jessica Keaton (Silence is Golden), Thomas Staedeli (Cyranos), Jarod Hitching (IMDb), Wikipedia, Filmportal.de and IMDb.

Ivo Blom found this series of French postcards of the Les Vedettes de Cinéma series. The series, published by A.N. (Armand Noyer) in Paris, gives a good impression of the most popular silent stars of Hollywood and the European cinema in the mid 1920s. The portraits on the sepia postcards are all exquisite. So, I chose 16 of Ivo's new finds for this post. If you want to know more about this series, check out this earlier post.

French postcard in the Les Vedettes de Cinéma Series, by A.N., Paris, no. 4. Photo: Film Paramount.

Jack Holt, originally Charles John Holt Jr. (1888–1951), was an American motion picture actor in both silent and sound films, particularly Westerns.

French postcard in the Les Vedettes de Cinéma Series, by A.N., Paris, no. 8. Photo: Roman Freulich / Universal Film.

Herbert Rawlinson (1885-1953) was a British actor who knew a rich career in American silent cinema, and less so in sound film, playing all in all in some 400 films.

French postcard in the Les Vedettes de Cinéma Series, by A.N., Paris, no. 11. Photo: Universal Film Company. Perhaps this card is for The Shark Master (Fred Leroy Granville, 1921) which evolves in the South Seas.

Frank Mayo (1889–1963) was an American actor, who appeared in 310 films between 1911 and 1949.

French postcard in the Les Vedettes de Cinéma Series, by A.N., Paris, no. 54. Photo: G.L. Manuel Frères.

American actor Douglas Fairbanks (1883-1939) was best known for his swashbuckling roles in silent films such as The Mark of Zorro (1920), Robin Hood (1922), and The Thief of Bagdad (1924), but spent the early part of his career making comedies. Fairbanks was a founding member of United Artists and of The Motion Picture Academy. He hosted the first Oscars Ceremony in 1929. With his marriage to Mary Pickford in 1920, the couple became Hollywood royalty and Fairbanks was referred to as The King of Hollywood'', but his career rapidly declined with the advent of the 'talkies'. His final film was made in Great Britain, The Private Life of Don Juan (1934).

French postcard in the Les Vedettes de Cinéma Series, by A.N., Paris, no. 75. Photo: G.L. Manuel Frères.

Sandra Milowanoff (1892–1957), also written as Milovanoff, was a Russian actress who became French citizen. She was a star of the French silent cinema in the 1920s, acting with directors like Feuillade, De Baroncelli, Fescourt and Vanel.

French postcard in the Les Vedettes de Cinéma Series, by A.N., Paris, no. 79. Photo: Universal Film. Beery's name is misspelled as Berry.

American actor Wallace Beery (1885-1949) is best known for his portrayal of Bill in Min and Bill opposite Marie Dressler, as Long John Silver in Treasure Island, as Pancho Villa in Viva Villa!, and for his titular role in The Champ, for which he won the Academy Award for Best Actor. Beery appeared in some 250 films in a 36-year career. He was the brother of actor Noah Beery, Sr. and uncle of actor Noah Beery, Jr.

French postcard in the Les Vedettes de Cinéma Series, by A.N., Paris, no. 90. Photo: Henri Manuel.

American actor John Leslie 'Jackie' Coogan (1914-1984) began as a child actor in silent films. He was Charlie Chaplin's irascible sidekick in The Kid (Charles Chaplin, 1921) and played the title role in Oliver Twist (Frank Lloyd, 1922). Many years later, he became known as Uncle Fester in the TV series The Addams Family (1964-1966). In the interim, he sued his mother and stepfather over his squandered film earnings ($48 million to $65 million adjusted for 2012 dollars) and provoked California to enact the first known legal protection for the earnings of child performers, widely known as 'the Coogan Act'.

French postcard in the Les Vedettes de Cinéma Series, by A.N., Paris, no. 160. Photo: G.L. Manuel Frères. Gravone is misspelled as Gravonne on this card.

Gabriel de Gravone (1887-1972) was an actor of the French silent cinema. He is best known as Élie in Abel Gance’s classic film La Roue (1920-1923).

French postcard in the Les Vedettes de Cinéma Series, by A.N., Paris, no. 174. Photo: Suzanne Bianchetti in Les Aventures de Robert Macaire (Jean Epstein, 1925).

French film actress Suzanne Bianchetti (1889-1936) was one of France's most loved and respected actresses of her time. She played Marie Antoinette in Abel Gance's epic Napoléon (1927) and worked with many other great names of the silent cinema. After her death the Prix Suzanne Bianchetti was created in her memory, an annual French award to be given to the most promising young actress.

French postcard in the Les Vedettes de Cinéma Series, by A.N., Paris, no. 179. Photo: G.L. Manuel Frères.

Claude France (1893-1928) was a French actress of the 1920s.

French postcard in the Les Vedettes de Cinéma Series, by A.N., Paris, no. 202. Photo: Fox.

Tall, mustachioed silent screen actor Walter McGrail (1888-1970) acted in film from 1916. By the 1920s he was established as a dapper leading man with all the major studios, peaking as star opposite May McAvoy in The Top of New York (William Desmond Taylor, 1922). During the 1920s his name remained high among the credits, whether as the 'other man', or as the scheming villain. McGrail continued after the coming of sound as supporting player, mainly in second feature Westerns. Between 1950 and 1958 McGrail worked for television series such as The Cisco Kid

French postcard in the Les Vedettes de Cinéma Series, by A.N., Paris, no. 206. Photo: Fox Film.

Alma Rubens (1897–1931) was an American film actress and stage performer. She first acted at Triangle and Cosmopolitan, where she starred in the hit Humoresque (1920), based on a Fanny Hurst story and scripted by Frances Marion. The film won a precursor of the Oscars. While at Fox, Rubens peaked in the hit melodrama East Lynne (1925) opposite Edmund Lowe and Lou Tellegen. Yet, her drug abuse ended her career. She died young of a combination of pneumonia and bronchitis.

French postcard in the Les Vedettes de Cinéma Series, by A.N., Paris, no. 219. Photo: Metro-Goldwyn.

American actor, screenwriter and director John Gilbert (1899-1936) rose to fame during the silent film era and became a popular leading man known as 'The Great Lover'.

French postcard in the Les Vedettes de Cinéma Series, by A.N., Paris, no. 228. Photo: Metro-Goldwyn.

Handsome Malcolm McGregor (1892-1945) had a rich career in 1920s Hollywood as the male partner to such female stars as Pauline Frederick, Norma Shearer, and Corinne Griffith. He debuted in The Prisoner of Zenda (Rex Ingram, 1922) as the dashing lieutenant who helps to defend his king, and had his breakthrough as the male lead in Broken Chains (Allen Holubar, 1922) and All the Brothers Were Valiant (Irving Willat, 1923). Until the late 1920s, McGregor had a prosperous career, but when sound set in his career waned, and in the mid-1930s he stopped acting.

French postcard in the Les Vedettes de Cinéma Series, by A.N., Paris, no. 232. Photo: Metro-Goldwyn. This postcard does not show the famous actor from the silent 1925 epic Ben-Hur, but his lesser-known son Ralph, often indicated as Francis X. Bushman junior.

Ralph Everly Bushman (1903-1978), was an American actor. The son of notable silent film star Francis X. Bushman and Josephine Fladung Duval, he was born in Baltimore, Maryland. He followed his father into the acting business and was never quite as well known as Bushman senior, but nevertheless appeared in close to 60 films in a period of over 20 years, between 1920 and 1943.

Mae Murray and John Gilbert in The Merry Widow

French postcard in the Les Vedettes de Cinéma Series, by A.N., Paris, no. 369. Mae Murray (the trema is a mistake) and John Gilbertas the romantic couple Sally O'Hara and Prince Danilo in The Merry Widow (Erich von Stroheim, 1925). The film was a huge success.

American actress Norma Shearer (1902-1983) was the 'First Lady of MGM'. She often played spunky, sexually liberated ingenues, and was the first person to be nominated five times for an Academy Award for acting. Shearer won the Best Actress Oscar for The Divorcee (1930).

German cigarette card by Ross Verlag in the 'Moderne Schönheitsgalerie' series for Kurmark, no. 289. Photo: Metro-Goldwyn-Mayer (MGM).

Italian postcard by Rizzoli, 1936. Photo: Metro-Goldwyn-Mayer.

British postcard by Art Photo, no. 26. Photo: Metro-Goldwyn-Mayer.

Leslie Howard and Norma Shearer in Romeo and Juliet (1936)

British postcard by Real Photograph, no. 103. Photo: Metro-Goldwyn-Mayer Pictures. Leslie Howard and Norma Shearer in Romeo and Juliet (George Cukor, 1936).

Norma Shearer in Marie Antoinette (1938)

Yugoslavian (Croatian) postcard by St. Kugli, Zagreb. Photo: Metro-Goldwyn-Mayer. Norma Shearer in Marie Antoinette (W.S. Van Dyke, 1938).

Tyrone Power and Norma Shearer in Marie Antoinette (1938)

British Real Photograph postcard in the Film Partners series, London, no. P 254. Photo: Metro-Goldwyn-Mayer. Tyrone Power and Norma Shearer in Marie Antoinette (W.S. Van Dyke, 1938).

A determined attitude

Norma Shearer was born in 1902 in Montréal in Canada. In 1931, she would become a naturalised United States citizen.

Her childhood was spent in Montreal, where her father had a construction business. Norma was educated at Montreal High School for Girls and Westmount High School. At age fourteen, she won a beauty contest.

In 1918, her father's company collapsed, and her older sister, Athole Shearer (later Mrs. Howard Hawks) suffered her first serious mental breakdown. Forced to move into a small, dreary house in a 'modest' Montreal suburb, the sudden plunge into poverty only strengthened Shearer's determined attitude.

In 1920 her mother, Edith Shearer, took Norma and to New York. Florenz Ziegfeld rejected her for his Follies, but she got work as an extra at Universal. Other extra parts followed, including one in Way Down East (D. W. Griffith, 1920.

She spent much money on eye doctor's services trying to correct her cross-eyed stare caused by muscle weakness. A year after her arrival in New York, she received a break in film: fourth billing in the B-movie The Stealers (Christy Cabanne, 1921).

Irving Thalberg had seen her early acting efforts and, when he joined Louis B. Mayer in 1923, gave her a five-year contract. Shearer was cast with Lon Chaneyand John Gilbert in the MGM's first official production, He Who Gets Slapped (Victor Sjöström, 1924). The film was a conspicuous success and contributed to the meteoric rise of the new company, and to Shearer's visibility.

By late 1925, Norma Shearer was carrying her own films, and was one of MGM's biggest attractions, a bona fide star. She signed a new contract; it paid $1,000 a week and would rise to $5,000 over the next five years.

By 1927, Shearer had made a total of 13 silent films for MGM. Each had been produced for under $200,000, and had, without fail, been a substantial box-office hit, often making a $200,000+ profit for the studio. She was rewarded for this consistent success by being cast in Ernst Lubitsch's The Student Prince in Old Heidelberg(1927), her first prestige production, with a budget over $1,000,000.

Privately, Thalberg was very impressed by Shearer. On 29 September 1927, they were married in the Hollywood wedding of the year. Thalberg thought she should retire after their marriage, but she wanted bigger parts.

One week after the marriage, The Jazz Singer was released. Norma's brother, Douglas Shearer, was instrumental in the development of sound at MGM, and every care was taken to prepare her for the microphone.

John Gilbert and Norma Shearer in He Who Gets Slapped (1924)

German postcard by Ross Verlag, Berlin, no. 1587/1. Photo: Ufa. John Gilbert and Norma Shearer in He Who Gets Slapped (Victor Sjöström, 1924).

German postcard by Ross Verlag, Berlin, no. 98/4. Photo: Metro-Goldwyn-Mayer. Ramon Novarro and Norma Shearer in The Student Prince in Old Heidelberg (Ernst Lubitsch, 1927).

German postcard by Ross Verlag, Berlin, no. 98/8. Photo: Metro-Goldwyn-Mayer. Ramon Novarro and Norma Shearer in The Student Prince in Old Heidelberg (Ernst Lubitsch, 1927).

German postcard by Ross Verlag, no. 3880/1, 1928-1929. Photo: Metro-Goldwyn-Mayer. Norma Shearer in The Actress (Sidney Franklin, 1928).

Norma Shearer and John Gilbert in The Hollywood Revue of 1929

German postcard by Ross Verlag, no. 4700/1. Photo: Metro-Goldwyn-Mayer. Norma Shearer as Juliet and John Gilbert as Romeo in the early sound film The Hollywood Revue of 1929 (Charles Reisner, 1929), shot as a series of variety acts. In the film, this sequence was shot in two-color Technicolor.

German postcard by Ross Verlag, no. 5339/2, 1930-1931. Photo: Metro-Goldwyn-Mayer. Norma Shearer in Let Us Be Gay (Robert Z. Leonard, 1930).

Relying on major roles in prestige projects

Norma Shearer's first talkie was The Trial of Mary Dugan (Bayard Veiller, 1929) with Lewis Stone. Four films later, she won an Oscar in The Divorcee (Robert Z. Leonard, 1930).

Shearer intentionally cut down film exposure during the 1930s, relying on major roles in Thalberg's prestige projects: The Barretts of Wimpole Street (Sidney Franklin, 1934) with Fredric March and Charles Laughton, and Romeo and Juliet (George Cukor, 1936) for which she received her fifth Oscar nomination.

Thalberg died of a second heart attack in September 1936, at age 37. Norma wanted to retire, but MGM more-or-less forced her into a six-picture contract.

David O. Selznick offered her the part of Scarlett O'Hara in Gone with the Wind (Victor Fleming, 1939), but the public objection to her cross-eyed stare killed the deal.

She starred in The Women (George Cukor, 1939), turned down the starring role in Mrs. Miniver (William Wyler, 1942), and retired in 1942.

Later that year she married Sun Valley ski instructor Martin Arrouge, eleven years younger than she. He waived community property rights. From then on, she shunned the limelight.

Even after retirement, Norma maintained her interest in the film industry. While staying at a ski lodge, she noticed a photo of the receptionist's daughter and recommended her to MGM - that girl, became the star known as Janet Leigh. She also discovered a handsome young businessman beside a swimming pool - now actor/producer Robert Evans.

Norma Shearer passed away in 1983 in Woodland Hills, California. She was 80 and had been in very poor health in the last decade of her life. Shearer is interred at Forest Lawn, Glendale, California, USA, in the Great Mausoleum, Sanctuary of Benediction, alongside her first husband Irving Thalberg.

Shearer had two children with Thalberg. Her son Irving Thalberg Jr (1930) died in 1988 of cancer. He was a philosophy professor at the University of Illinois at Chicago. Her daughter Katherine Thalberg (1935) died in 2006 of cancer. A vegan, she headed the Society for Animal Rights in Aspen, Colorado, from 1989.

German postcard by Ross Verlag, Foreign, no. 3927/2, 1928-1929. Photo: Metro-Goldwyn-Mayer.

German postcard by Ross Verlag, no. 4129/1, 1929-1930. Photo: Metro-Goldwyn-Mayer.

German postcard by Ross Verlag, no. 4514/1, 1929-1930. Photo: Metro-Goldwyn-Mayer.

German postcard by Ross Verlag, no. 4710/1, 1929-1930. Photo: Metro-Goldwyn-Mayer. Collection: Geoffrey Donaldson Institute.

German postcard by Ross Verlag, no. 5080/2, 1930-1931. Photo: Metro-Goldwyn-Mayer.

German postcard by Ross Verlag, no. 5338/2, 1930-1931. Photo: Metro-Goldwyn-Mayer.

German postcard by Ross Verlag, no. 5803/1, 1930-1931. Photo: Metro-Goldwyn-Mayer.

Dutch postcard, no. 21. Photo: Metro-Goldwyn-Mayer.

French postcard by EC (Editions Chantal, Paris), no. 23. Photo: Metro-Goldwyn-Mayer (MGM).

French postcard by Europe, no. 754. Photo: Metro-Goldwyn-Mayer.

French postcard by Europe, no. 803. Photo: Metro-Goldwyn-Mayer.

French postcard by Ed. Erpé, no. 654. Photo: Metro-Goldwyn-Mayer. Norma Shearer in Marie-Antoinette (W.S. Van Dyke, Julien Duvivier, 1938).

Sources: Ed Stephan (IMDb), Wikipedia and IMDb.

Today, EFSP collaborator Ivo Blom will give a paper at a symposium at the Centre National pour la Cinématographie (CNC, Paris), within the framework of the Franco-Italian-Dutch research project LE CINÉMA MUET ITALIEN À LA CROISÉE DES ARTS EUROPÉENS (1896-1930). He will talk about the importance of painting, literature and theatre for two silent films with Italian diva Italia Almirante Manzini: La statua di carne (Mario Almirante, 1921) and L’ombra (Mario Almirante, 1923). Thus today's blog post is dedicated to the representation of artists and their models in the European silent cinema.

German samples

German postcard by Hermann Leiser Verlag, Berlin, no. 3152. Photo: Richard-Oswald-Produktion. Bernd Aldor in Das Bildnis des Dorian Gray/The Picture of Dorian Gray (Richard Oswald, 1917).

While Dorian remains the same beautiful young man in Das Bildnis des Dorian Gray/The Picture of Dorian Gray, his 'picture' becomes older, uglier, more depraved. Oscar Wilde’s haunting tale was filmed various times.

Hella Moja in Wundersam ist das Märchen der Liebe (1918)

German postcard by Rotophot in the Film-Sterne series, no. 544/2. Photo: Hella Moja-Film GmbH. Hella Moja and Ernst Hofmann in Wundersam ist das Märchen der Liebe/Wonderful is the Fairy-Tale of Love (Leo Connard, 1918).

Cinema’s vision of the painter’s studio often has the model standing on a pedestal, the painter dressed in immaculate clothing, and the floor covered with oriental rugs.

German postcard by Rotphot in the Film Sterne series, no. 549/2. Photo: Decla. Ressel Orla in Die Sünde/The Sin (Alwin Neuss, 1918).

German postcard by Rotophot in the Film Sterne series, no. 549/4. Photo: Decla. Ressel Orla in Die Sünde/The Sin (Alwin Neuss, 1917).

“In Sin,Ressel Orla has first to play the young thing, who becomes an artist's model under the force of circumstances, in order to save her dying father. When she later stands alone in the world, she rises to happiness without suffering from her past. But then the pride of the woman awakens in her, to whom only the right of her own ego applies.” (Lichtbild-Bühne, 13.07.1918). As often happens in 1910s cinema, the model is ashamed by the artwork based on her own nudity when publicly exhibited, and even awarded.

German postcard by Rotophot in the Film-Sterne series, no. 514/4. Photo: Fern Andra Atelier. Fern Andra and (in the back) Alfred Abel in Ein Blatt im Sturm... doch das Schicksal hat es verweht/A leaf in a storm ... but fate has lost it (Fern Andra, 1917).

In 1910s cinema, the female partners of artists often need to help them out by selling their art, or even their own bodies.

German postcard by Rotophot in the Film Sterne series, no. 516/2. Photo: May Film. Mia May and Bruno Kastner in Ein Lichtstrahl im Dunkel/A Ray of Light in the Dark (Joe May, 1917).

Count Gerd Palm (Kastner) is known for his flattering portraits of his models, so countess Lydia von Grabor (May), who has a hideous nose, asks him to paint her. Gerd sees through her facade and paints her as a lovely mother. He is so enchanted by a song from her that he asks her marry him. Lydia cannot believe him, so he flees. Years pass, the counts has her nose operated, and returns to Gerd, but discovers he has become blind. Dressed as a nurse she takes care of him. Her care makes him retake his work. He hears she is now ready to marry him, but when he still doubts she sings the song she once sang for him and they finally unite.

Maria Widal in Das sterbende Modell (1918)

German postcard by Photochemie, no. K. 2511. Photo: Saturn-Film. Maria Widal in Das sterbende Modell/The dying model (Urban Gad, 1918).

German postcard by Photochemie, no. K. 2510. Photo: Saturn-Film. Maria Widal in Das sterbende Modell/The dying model (Urban Gad, 1918).

Das sterbende Modell seems to have been a variation on Edgar Allen Poe’s 'The Oval Portrait'. The more the model is painted, the more she weakens and eventually dies. Painted portraits may have devastating effects on their models.

Henny Porten and Hermann Thimig in Auf Probe gestellt (1918)

German postcard in the Film Sterne series by Rotophot, no. 520/7. Photo: Messter Film, Berlin. Henny Porten and Hermann Thimig in Auf Probe gestellt/Put to the test (Rudolf Biebrach, 1918).

Comedies with artists are rather rare in the 1910s, but a good example is this Henny Porten comedy. As 1910s film convention demands it, the countess prefers the poor, handsome painter to a rich and stupid aristocrat.

Two examples from French and German cinema

Fred Zorilla and Jean Aymé in Lorena (1918)

Spanish collectors card by Amattler Marca Luna chocolate, Series 6, no. 2. Photo: Eclipse. Fred Zorilla and Jean Aymé in Lorena (Georges Tréville, 1918)

Lorena (Suzanne Grandais) is the daughter of the marquis of Chambrey (Maillard), and secretly engaged to the painter Pierre Laurent (Fred Zorilla), but her father has other plans. He wants to give her hand to Count Borgo (Jean Aymé), a son of a late friend. As mentioned above, poor but young, handsome, romantic artists were often opposed to old, rich, depraved, and cynic or stupid aristocrats.

Valdemar Psilander in Um das Bild des Königs (1919)

German postcard by Photochemie, Berlin, no. K. 1944. Photo: Nordisk Films. Valdemar Psilander in Rytterstatuen (A.W. Sandberg, 1919). The German title is Um das Bild des Königs (For the king's statue).

A young sculptor is commissioned by the Minister to make an equestrian statue of the King, for a high sum of money. He also meets and falls in love with the Minister’s niece. Her father, a banker, is involved in wild speculation, kills himself and leaves a giant debt. Secretly, the artist helps out with his prize money, winning the girl of course. So the artist is not only talented but also a gentleman.

Examples of Italian silent films with Francesca Bertini and Helena Makowska

Gustavo Serena and Francesca Bertini in Il processo Clémenceau (1917)

Spanish postcard by Amatller Marca Luna chocolate, Series 2a, no. 6. Photo: Caesar Film. Gustavo Serena and Francesca Bertini in Il processo Clémenceau (Alfredo De Antoni, 1917). In Spain, the film was released as El proceso Clemenceau.

Il processo Clemenceau (Alfredo De Antoni, 1917) is typical for the parabolas in film plots on artists and their models. Artists discover models, often as young, beautiful and innocent girls. Gradually, the women become depraved thanks to the success of the artists, get hooked on money and luxury, and start to cheat. When the sculptor discovers his lover’s betrayal, he first will smash the plaster bust. In the end he will kill the model too. The artist creates the art work and also the model, but when the model misbehaves and does not correspond anymore with the art work’s purity, he may also destroy both the art work and the model. On the left of the card, a copy of a bust made by Amleto Cataldi, portraying Francesca Bertini, and published in the art journal Emporium in 1917.

Francesca Bertini in La donna nuda (1922)

Italian postcard by G.B. Falci, Milano, no. 257. Photo: Caesar Film. Francesca Bertini in La donna nuda (Roberto Roberti, 1922), film adaptation of Henry Bataille's classic play La femme nue (1908).

Francesca Bertini and Angelo Ferrari in La donna nuda (1922)

Italian postcard by La Fotominio / Ed. G.B. Falci, Milano, no. 115. Photo: Caesar Film. Francesca Bertini and Angelo Ferrari in the Henry Bataille adaptation La donna nuda (Roberto Roberti, 1922).

Italian postcard by La Fotominio / Ed. G.B. Falci, Milano, no. 264. Photo: Caesar Film. Angelo Ferrari and Francesca Bertini in the Henry Bataille adaptation La donna nuda (Roberto Roberti, 1922).

In La donna nuda (Roberto Roberti, 1920), the painter Pierre Bernier (Angelo Ferrari) becomes acquainted with Lolette (Francesca Bertini), the model of his old friend Rouchard, picked up from the street. Lolette becomes Pierre’s model and his mistress. Pierre becomes famous thanks to his portrait 'The Naked Woman' which represents Lolette. The evening of his triumph at the Salon he decides to marry her, but after having become rich and famous he falls in love with the Princess of Chaban and abandons Lolette, despite owing her his success. After a suicide attempt over her persistently infidel lover, Lolette recovers in the hospital, rejects Pierre, and decides to return to Rouchard. The film was a remake of a film with Lyda Borelli, made in 1914 by Carmine Gallone, while several sound adaptations of Bataille's play would follow.

Umberto Mozzato and Mercedes Brignone in La Gioconda (1917)

Italian postcard by IPA CT, no. 3654, V. Uff. Rev. St., Terni. Photo: Ambrosio. Umberto Mozzato as Settala and Mercedes Brignone as his wife Silvia in La Gioconda (Eleuterio Rodolfi 1916, released 1917), based on Gabriele D'Annunzio's play. Caption: 'Lucio Settala in the happy intimacy of the family.'

Lucio Settala and Helena Makowska in La Gioconda (1917)

Italian postcard by IPA CT, no. 3877, V. Uff. Rev. St., Terni. Photo: Ambrosio. Umberto Mozzato as Lucio Settala and Helena Makowska as Gioconda Dianti in La Gioconda (1917).Caption: Sculptor Lucio Settala feels his love for his model Gioconda Dianti is ever expanding.

Italian postcard by IPA CT, no. 3871. Photo: Società Ambrosio, Torino. V. Uff. Rev. St. Terni. Mercedes Brignone in La Gioconda (Eleuterio Rodolfi, 1917). Caption: Sivia Settala deposes flowers in the studio of her husband, constating with great sadness, that he is ever more absent.

Italian postcard. IPA CT, no. 3662. Photo: Società Ambrosio, Torino. Helena Makowska as the model Gioconda Dianti in La Gioconda (Eleuterio Rodolfi, 1917).

Postcards for the lost Ambrosio production La Gioconda (Eleuterio Rodolfi, 1916, released 1917), based on Gabriele D'Annunzio's play, and starring Helena Makowska, Umberto Mozzato, and Mercedes Brignone. The statue for which Gioconda Danti poses does not seem to recall any existing statue, but its style reminds of that of the Italian sculptor Leonardo Bistolfi. As was common in silent films on artists, the actor’s studio is full of plasters referring to Antique and modern sculpture.

An example with a male protagonist

Italian postcard. Photo: Milano Film. Ermete Zacconi in Spettri/Gli spettri (A.G. Caldiera, 1918). Caption: Not being able anymore to paint, to do anything, nothing!

Ermete Zacconi in the Italian silent film Spettri/Gli spettri (A.G. Caldiera, 1918), adapted from Henrik Ibsen's play 'Ghosts' (Gengangere, 1881). Caption: Not being able anymore to paint, to do anything, nothing! Oswald Alving, who has been a painter in Paris, returns home, suffering from depressions. He gets into a state of despair and anguish, when his mother reveals him the woman he loves is his half-sister and he is himself suffering of syphilis, inherited from his father. He asks his mother to help him die by an overdose of morphine in order to end his suffering from his disease, which could put him into a helpless vegetative state.

Two films with Italia Almirante Manzini

Italia Almirante in La statua di carne (1921)

Italian postcard by Fotominio, no. 52. Photo: G.B. Falci, Milano. Italia Almirante in La statua di carne (Mario Almirante 1921). Noemi Keller notices the painted portrait of her lookalike Maria, who has died and whom the painter, count Paolo, is still loving, through Noemi.

La statua di carne (Mario Almirante, 1921), starring Italia Almirante Manzini and Lido Manetti. Often in film, deceased persons affect the living ones by their painted portraits. When discovering a painted portrait of the deceased ‘midinette’ Maria, who is her exact lookalike, the mundane stage artist Noemi Keller understands why count Paolo is so obsessed with her. The motif of the Doppelgänger was popular in silent film and in literature. Though based on an original play (1862, by Teobaldo Ciconi, which was already adapted to film in Italy in 1912, the plot of La statua di carne may also remind of the Symbolist novel 'Bruges-la-morte' (1892) by Georges Rodenbach, which inspired various films such as Yevgeni Bauer’s Gryozy/ Daydreams (1915) and Alfred Hitchcock’s Vertigo (1959).

Liliana Ardea and Alberto Collo in L'Ombra (1923)

Italian postcard by Ed. Ballerini & Fratini, Firenze. Photo: Liliana Ardea and Alberto Collo in L'ombra (Mario Almirante, 1923). Caption: Berta's little friend and the daily painting lesson.

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

Italian postcard by Ed. Ballerini & Fratini, Firenze, no. 248. Photo: Italia Almirante Manzini and Alberto Collo in L'ombra (Mario Almirante, 1923). Caption: Berta: Poor little one! He won't realise to have changed mother. This image represents the final scene of the film.

In L’ombra (Mario Almirante, 1924), Berta (Italia Almirante Manzini) is paralysed. Her husband Gerardo (Alberto Collo), an acclaimed painter, starts a double life with Elena (Liliana Ardea), a former pupil. He even has a child with her. The paralysed woman heals, discovers the fraud, and is devastated, preferring to get paralysed again. In the end, the second woman exits, leaving even her child behind. Mark the unfinished portrait of the child on the right. In the play by Dario Niccodemi, on which the film is based, the interior of the painter’s house is described as being full with portraits of the child.

Sources: Ivo Blom, ‘Of Artists and Models. Italian Silent Cinema between Narrative Convention and Artistic Practice’ (Acta Sapientiae Universitatis. Film and Media Studies 7, 2013, 97-110) and Francesco Geraci, ‘Artisti contemporanei: Amleto Cataldi’ (Emporium, XLV, Vol. 267, March 1917, pp. 163-175).

Marie or Maria Ventura (1888-1954) was a Romanian-French actress and theatre director. She became well known in the silent cinema with her role in the popular serial Les misérables (1912). From 1919 till 1941, she worked at the Comédie-Française. In 1938, she directed 'Iphigénie' by Racine, becoming the first women to direct a play at the Comédie-Française.

French postcard, no. 12. Photo: Félix.

French postcard by A.N., Paris, no. 50. Photo: G.L. Manuel Frères.

A dazzling Salome

Marie Ventura was born Aristida Maria Ventura in 1888 (IMDb states 1890) in Bucharest, Roumania. She studied at the 'Dramatic Art Conservatory' of Bucharest in 1901.

After her graduation, she moved to France and was a pupil of Mounet-Sully. Then, at the Conservatoire (the Dramatic Art Conservatory of Paris), she studied with Silvain in whose class she won two first prizes in 1905.

The following years, she acted in plays at the Boulevard Theatres and at the Odéon, then led by Antoine. She triumphed in particular in 'Antar' by Chekri Ghanem.

Ventura also appeared in several early silent French films. One of her first was the short Le roman d'un jeune homme riche/The story of a young rich man (Victorin-Hippolyte Jasset, 1909), produced by Éclair.

Other Éclair productions were L'ensorceleuse/The sorcerer (Victorin-Hippolyte Jasset, 1910) and Hérodiade/Herodias (Georges Hatot, Victorin-Hippolyte Jasset, 1910) based on the novel by Gustave Flaubert. In the latter she played Salome, who dazzles King Herod (Karlmos) with her dance, and claims the head of John the Baptist. The production was shot on location in Tunisia, and was an international success.

She moved to Pathé Frères, where she starred as Isabelle de la Croye, a young Burgundian countess in the period drama Quentin Durward (Adrien Caillard, 1912) featuring René Alexandre. She also appeared for Pathé in La fin de Robespierre/The End of Robespierre (Albert Capellani, 1912) with Georges Saillard and Charles de Rochefort, Le fils de Charles Quint/The Son of Charles Quint (Adrien Caillard, 1912) with Léon Bernard and Paul Capellani, and as Nini in Nini l'assommeur/Nini the stunner (N.N., 1912)

French postcard by Edition Pathé Frères. Photo: Félix. Caption: Mlle Ventura de l'Odéon (Miss Ventura of the Odeon).

French postcard by Edition Pathé Frères. Photo: Félix.

Elegant, with a dramatic temperament and a harmonious voice

Marie Ventura was best known for her role as Fantine Thénardier in the popular Pathé serial Les misérables (Albert Capellani, 1912-1913), based on the novel by Victor Hugo. Henry Krauss starred as Jean Valjean, and Henri Étiévant played his antagonist Javert.

Marie Ventura also starred in an early version of Zaza (Adrien Caillard, 1913), but then the First World War started and probably ended her promising film career.

From 1919 to 1941 Marie Ventura worked at the Comédie-Française. Elegant, with a dramatic temperament and a harmonious voice, she embodied the heroines of Pierre Wolff (Le Voile déchiré/The Torn Veil), Henry Bataille (Maman Colibri/Mom Colibri), Alexandre Dumas fils (La Princesse Georges/The Princess George), Henry Bernstein (Le Secret/The Secret), while playing with great fire the great classical tragedies (Phèdre/Phaedrus, Le Cid/The Cid, Andromaque/Andromache) and romantic dramas (Hernani).

She also interpreted the Repertory, from Molière to Alfred Musset, and created the most contemporary pieces. In 1938, she directed 'Iphigénie' by Jean Racine, becoming the first women to direct a play at the Comédie-Française. She made frequent trips to Roumania and helped to create cultural links between France and her native country.

In the autumn of 1940, after the Nazis had invaded France, Marie Ventura was questioned personally by Jacques Copeau, the Provisionary Administrator of the Comédie-Française, about her origins. She managed to convince Copeau who decided she could remain to work on 'L'Impromptu de Versailles' (The Impromptu of Versailles) by Molière.

But in December 1941, under German pressure, the actress had to retire. After the Liberation, she was reintegrated at the Comédie Française. She then founded a drama class and played on the Boulevards, including in Jean Anouilh's plays 'Colombe' (1950) and 'La Valse des toréadors' (The Waltz of the Toreadors, 1951).

In 1951, she returned for once to the screen in Gibier de potence/Gigolo (Roger Richebé, 1951), starring Arletty and Georges Marchal.

Marie Ventura died in 1954 in Paris. She was 66.

French postcard by Editions Sid, no. 8046. Photo: G.L. Manuel Frères, Paris. The costume on the card refers to a stage play set in the Middle Ages or the Renaissance, but it is unclear which one.

French postcard by Editions Sid, no. 8041. Photo: G.L. Manuel Frères, Paris.

Sources: Comédie Française (French), Wikipedia (French) and IMDb.

Austrian actor Adrian Hoven (1922-1981) was the athletic and dynamic Sonnyboy of the German cinema in the 1950s, who would become one of the stars of Rainer Werner Fassbinder's films in the 1970s. As a writer, producer and director he made horror and erotica with SM overtones.

German postcard by Kolibri-Verlag G.m.b.H., Minden (Westf.), no. F 4. Retail price: 25 Pf. Photo: Melodie / Dt. London. Publicity still for Bonsoir Paris/Good Evening Paris (Ralph Baum, 1956).

German postcard by Franz Josef Rüdel, Hamburg-Bergedorf, no. Fl 2. Photo: Melodie / Dt. London / Heil. Publicity still for Bonsoir Paris/Good Evening Paris (Ralph Baum, 1956).

Adrian Hoven in Sterne über Colombo (1953)

German postcard by Werbedruck Rudolf Stepanek, München. Photo: Gloria / Bayer. Adrian Hoven in Sterne über Colombo/Stars over Colombo (Veit Harlan, 1953).

German postcard by UFA, Berlin-Tempelhof, no. 87. Photo: Arthur Grimm / Constantin Film.

German postcard by Ufa, Berlin-Tempelhof, no. CK-90. Photo: Ringpress / Vogelmann.

Dashing

Adrian Hoven was born as Wilhelm Arpad Peter Hofkirchner in Wöllersdorf, Niederösterreich (Austria) in 1922. He was the son of the administrative officer Rudolf Hofkirchner and his wife Gisela, and he passed in youth in Tyrol, where his grandparents had a hotel.

After graduation, he first completed a precision mechanics apprenticeship in Vienna, studied mechanical engineering and trained as an aircraft technician in the 'Messerschmidt-Werke'. He was a paratrooper during the Second World War, severely wounded in Africa, and was in the infirmary for a long time.

Still during WW II, he was discovered by film director Helmut Weiss and Hoven made his debut in the Heinz Rühmann comedy Quax in Afrika/Quax in Africa (Helmut Weiss, 1943-1947).

After the war he decided to go to an acting school and chose Dahlberg in Berlin. He started to work on the Berlin stages, like Tribüne, the Renaissance-Theater and the Theater am Schiffbauerdamm. Quickly, he was spotted for his natural acting style.

I was again Weiss who gave him a break in the cinema, the part of a cadet in Herzkönig/King of Hearts (Helmut Weiss, 1947). After the circus drama Tromba (Helmut Weiss, 1949), Hoven decided to concentrate solely on films. It would be the start of a successful career with more than 100 films.

As the young hero or lover he seemed to excel in every genre; in melodramas like Dr. Holl/Affairs of Dr. Holl (Rolf Hansen, 1951), in comedies like Die unentschuldigte Stunde/The Unexcused Hour (Willi Forst, 1957), in romances like Mädchenjahre einer Königin/The Story of Vickie (Ernst Marischka, 1954) and ...wie einst Lili Marleen/Like Once Lili Marleen (Paul Verhoeven, 1956), but also in war films like Canaris/Canaris: Master Spy (Alfred Weidenmann, 1954) and Rommel ruft Kairo/Rommel Calls Cairo (Wolfgang Schleif, 1959).

With his black hair and blue eyes, Adrian Hoven looked as dashing in a dinner jacket as in a uniform.

German postcard by Kolibri, no. 1940. Photo: Camera-Film.

German postcard by Kolibri-Verlag G.m.b.H., Minden/Westf., no. 1207. Photo: Junge Film-Union / Wesel. Publicity still for Der Bagnosträfling/The Prisoner (Gustav Fröhlich, 1949).

German postcard by Kunst und Bild, Berlin, no. A 443. Photo: Panorama Film. Adrian Hoven in Der Dorfmonarch/The village monarch (Joe Stöckel, 1950).

German postcard by F.J. Rüdel, Hamburg-Bergedorf, no. 87. Photo: FAMA-Film / Niczky. Publicity still for Dr. Holl (Rolf Hansen, 1951).

German collectors card by Helmstedter Margarinewerk GMBH, Helmstedt. Photo: Sokal / Allianz-Film. Adrian Hoven in Karneval in Weiß/Carnival in white (Hans Albin, Harry R. Sokal, 1952). Gift by Didier Hanson.

Hannelore Bollmann and Adrian Hoven in Ehe für eine Nacht (1953)

German card by Kolibri-Verlag, no. 127. Photo: Ariston / NF / Brünjes. Hannelore Bollmann and Adrian Hoven in Ehe für eine Nacht/Marriage for One Night (Viktor Tourjansky, 1953).

Horror and Erotica

In 1965, Adrian Hoven founded with Pier A. Caminneci the production company Aquila Film Enterprises.

He made his first film as a director, writer and producer, the psycho thriller Der Mörder mit dem Seidenschal/The Murder With the Silk Scarf (Adrian Hoven, 1966) starring Carl Möhner.

The film was not a box office success so he switched to more commercial genres like horror and erotica. He produced the SM fantasy Necronomicon/Geträumte Sünden/Succubus (Jesus Franco, 1966), which became an international cult hit.

He also occasionally tried his hand at screenwriting under the nom de plume of Percy Parker.

As an actor he could be seen in European thrillers and horror exploitation, including Avec la peau des autres/With the Lives of Others (Jacques Deray, 1966) starring Lino Ventura, Rote Lippen, Sadisterotica/Two Undercover Angels (Jesus Franco, 1969), and Hexen bis aufs Blut gequält/Mark of the Devil (1970) starring Herbert Lom.

German postcard by Kolibri-Verlag G.m.b.H., Minden/Westf., no. 651. Photo: Kolibri / Neubarth.

Romy Schneider and Adrian Hoven in Mädchenjahre einer Königin (1954)

German postcard by Rüdel-Verlag, Hamburg-Bergedorf, no. 1225. Photo: Erma / Herzog-Film / Czerwonski. Romy Schneider and Adrian Hoven in Mädchenjahre einer Königin/The Story of Vickie (Ernst Marischka, 1954).

Adrian Hoven in Die große Starparade (1954)

German postcard by Kolibri-Verlag G.m.b.H., Minden/Westf., no. 1207. Photo: CCC / Gloria-Film / Grimm. Adrian Hoven in Die große Starparade/The great star parade (Paul Martin, 1954).

German postcard by Ufa, Berlin-Tempelhof, no. FK 1888. Photo: Eva-Film / RKO-Film. Publicity still for Solange Du Lebst/As Long as You Live (Harald Reinl, 1955).

Walter Giller, Adrian Hoven and Walter Müller in Die Drei von der Tankstelle (1955)

German postcard by Kolibri-Verlag, Minden/Westf., no. 1777. Photo: Berolina / Herzog-Film / Wesel. Walter Giller, Adrian Hoven and Walter Müller in Die Drei von der Tankstelle/The Three from the Filling Station (Hans Wolff, 1955).

Dutch postcard by Gebr. Spanjersberg N.V., Rotterdam, no. 1254. Photo: NF / Ufa/Film-Foto.

Neue Deutsche Film

More challenging was Adrian Hoven's work for the Neue Deutsche Film. He played a transvestite in Schatten der Engel/Shadow of Angels (Daniel Schmid, 1976).

He worked for several prestigious (TV-)films by the great director Rainer Werner Fassbinder: Welt am Draht/World on Wires (1973) with Klaus Löwitsch, Martha (1974) featuring Margit Carstensen, Faustrecht der Freiheit/Fox and His Friends (1975) as the father of Peter Chatel, Angst vor der Angst/Fear of Fear (1975), Satansbraten/Satan's Brew (1976), and Despair (1978) starring Dirk Bogarde.

Hoven also acted in the 15-hour TV miniseries Berlin Alexanderplatz (Rainer Werner Fassbinder, 1980) and Lili Marleen (Rainer Werner Fassbinder, 1981) with Hanna Schygulla.

He also worked as a TV host. His son Percy Hoven works as an actor and TV presenter too.

Adrian Hoven died in 1981 in Tegernsee, Germany. He was 58. His final film was the carnival drama Looping - Der lange Traum vom kurzen Glück/Looping (Walter Bockmayer, Rolf Bührmann, 1981) with Hans Christian Blech.

Dany Robin and Adrian Hoven in Bonsoir Paris (1956)

German postcard by Kolibri-Verlag, Minden/Westf, no. 2315. Photo: Melodie / Deutsche London / Heil. Dany Robin and Adrian Hoven in Bonsoir Paris/Good Evening Paris (Ralph Baum, 1956).

Doris Kirchner and Adrian Hoven in Lügen haben hübsche Beine (1956)

East-German postcard by VEB Progress Film-Vertrieb, Berlin, no. 1500, 1961. Photo: Doris Kirchner and Adrian Hoven in Lügen haben hübsche Beine/Lies have pretty legs (Erik Ode, 1956).

Adrian Hoven inSing, aber spiel nicht mit mir (1963)

German postcard by Rüdel-Verlag. Photo: Wiener Stadthalle / Bavariafilm. Adrian Hoven in Sing, aber spiel nicht mit mir/Sing, but don't play with me (Kurt Nachmann, 1963).

Trailer for Mädchenjahre einer Königin/The Story of Vickie (Ernst Marischka, 1954). Source: Heimatfilme (YouTube).

Trailer Das Rätsel der roten Orchidee/The Puzzle of the Red Orchid (Helmuth Ashley, 1962). Source: Rialto Film (youTube).

Trailer for Der Mörder mit dem Seidenschal/The Murder With the Silk Scarf (Adrian Hoven, 1966). Source: Spagmanix (YouTube).

Trailer for Eurotrash Chinos y minifaldas/Scorpions And Mini Skirts (Ramón Comas, 1967), "the most surprising production of the year". Source: Night of the Trailers (YouTube).

UNCUT trailer for Kiss Me, Monster (Jess Franco, 1969). Source: Sleazemovies (YouTube).

Sources: Hal Erickson (AllMovie), Stephanie D'heil (Steffi-Line - German), Wikipedia (German) and IMDb.

Terra madre/Mother Earth (Alessandro Blasetti, 1931), is an Italian early sound film starring Leda Gloria, Sandro Salvini, and Isa Pola. The rural drama was produced by Cines-Pittaluga. The photography of the film shows a great expressive value in chiaroscuro and depth, as can be seen on the postcards, published by G.B. Falci.

Italian postcard by G.B. Falci, Milano, no. 14. Photo: Cines-Pittaluga, Roma. Sandro Salvini in Terra madre/Mother Earth (Alessandro Blasetti, 1931). Here in the middle, Duke Marco (Salvini) quarrels with another man, who is difficult to recognise. he could be Vasco Creti, who plays the foreman and father of Emilia.

Italian postcard by G.B. Falci, Milano, no. 15. Photo: Cines-Pittaluga, Roma. Leda Gloria and Sandro Salvini in Terra madre/Mother Earth (Alessandro Blasetti, 1931). On the right Gloria as Emilia and Salvini as Duke Marco. Left in the back, Isa Pola as Daisy and her friend, played by Giorgio Bianchi.

An indication of the social and lyrical value of rural life

Sandro Salvini plays Duke Marco, who has been living in the city for a long time, far from the lands he owns. He only returns when he decides to sell them to maintain a costly standard of living which also includes his mistress Daisy (Isa Pola).

His return is welcomed by peasants hoping he'll stay with them. During a solitary tour of his lands, in which he remembers his youth in the countryside with growing nostalgia, Marco meets Emilia (Leda Gloria), the farmer's daughter, and is struck by her spontaneous energy and freshness. When the peasants learn about the news of the sale their enthusiasm turns into disappointment, but Marco, pressured by financial needs, returns to the city with Daisy to sign the documents.

Here he is joined by a phone call from Emilia informing him of a serious fire that broke out on the farm. At that point, Marco leaves everything, runs into the countryside, directs the victorious fight against the fire and decides to revoke the sale. He will stay to take care of his lands and he will marry Emilia.

Terra Madre was drawn from a subject entitled 'Passa la morte', written in 1930 by Camillo Apolloni, a former actor of silent cinema, which was purchased in 1930 by Cines, which was relaunched by Stefano Pittaluga as the first Italian company in the production of sound cinema.

On the basis of this text, Alessandro Blasetti, in collaboration with the writer and silent film director Gianni Bistolfi, wrote the script with the intention of providing "an indication of the social and lyrical value of rural life". Two parties contested the originality of the story, but years after, Blasetti claimed that from the original story "only the boots of the farmer" had remained.

Italian postcard by G.B. Falci, Milano, no. 16. Photo: Cines-Pittaluga, Roma. Leda Gloria and Sandro Salvini in Terra madre/Mother Earth (Alessandro Blasetti, 1931).

A current of fascism or Soviet-style realism?

Alessandro Blasetti was one of the group of critics gathered around the magazine Cinematografo, who vehemently criticised Pittaluga for years. In 1930, Blasetti and some of his collaborators entered the Cines and became its staunch defenders. The Roman director thus had the opportunity, after the searing failure of Sole (1929) to resume the themes of 'rebirth' at his new studio Cines-Pittaluga.

He did this first with Resurrectio (1931) and then with Terra Madre (1931), in which he revived the 'ruralist' spirit already present in his debut film Sole. It was the contrast between the urban world, considered indolent and parasitic (the 'Stracittà'), and the peasant one (the 'Strapaese'), seen as strong and healthy by a current of fascism, the one born in the countryside, favourable to the preservation of the rural character of the Italian people. Along with Blasetti's other early films, Terra Madre also shows a strong influence of Soviet-style realism.

The film - one of the 10 feature films issued by Cines-Pittaluga in the 1930-1931 season - was shot at theatre 3 of the Cines in Via Vejo in Rome, between September 1930 and January 1931. Locations in the Roman countryside were used for the exteriors. Like the first sound film released in Italy, Gennaro Righelli's La canzone dell'amore, Terra Madre was a co-production of which a German version was made, again at the Cines, on behalf of the company Atlas of Berlin. Kennst Du das Land (1931) was interpreted in the two main roles by Hans Adalbert Schlettow and Maria Solveg (as Maria Matray), and directed by Constantin J. David, who also had directed the German version of the Righelli film.

The future directors Ferdinando Maria Poggioli and Goffredo Alessandrini also worked on the set of Terra Madre. They had entered the Cines as scriptwriter and assistant, both from the group around Cinemagrafo. In early 1931, the magazine had ceased publication when most of its authors were employed by Pittaluga.

Particularly important for highlighting the contrast between city and countryside was the musical comment given on one side to Foxtrot motifs and the other to the rhythm of a popular 'saltarello' and to five choirs performed by the Camerata Lughese of the Canterini Romagnoli. A lot of attention was also paid to photography, so much so that to the two hired operators (Montuori and De Luca) a third assistant joined them, the almost newcomer Clemente Santoni, producing a result of great expressive value in chiaroscuro and depth.

Terra madre was released in March 1931 and was a big success, both critically and commercially. This also was the case for the German version, and equally for a French dubbed version called Le rappel de la terre. Also in Latin America, it was very successful.

Critics were not unanimous in their praise. Some rather praised Pittaluga's effort to raise the new national sound cinema and were less convinced by Blasetti's direction, claiming that in comparison with Sole, in Terra madre the landscape had lost their primitive, raw and pure beauty. Others, such as Leo Longanesi, considered Sole and Terra madre on a par, on equal height. Longanesi called it "a masterpiece of rural rhetoric, an oleograph of our times."

Italian postcard by G.B. Falci, Milano, no. 20. Photo: Cines-Pittaluga, Roma. Publicity still for Terra madre/Mother Earth (Alessandro Blasetti, 1931).

Italian postcard by G.B. Falci, Milano, no. 30. Photo: Cines-Pittaluga, Roma. Leda Gloria in Terra madre/Mother Earth (Alessandro Blasetti, 1931).

Source: Wikipedia (Italian and English) and IMDb.

Olaf Fjord (1897-1945) was an Austrian film actor, director and producer. He appeared in numerous Austrian, German, French, and Czech silent films.

German postcard by Ross Verlag, no. 775/1, 1925-1926. Photo: Alex Binder.

German postcard by Ross Verlag, Berlin, no. 997/1, 1925-1926. Photo: H. Gärtner, Berlin. Collection: Didier Hanson.

German postcard by Ross Verlag, no. 997/2, 1925-1926. Photo: H. Gärtner, Berlin.

German postcard by Ross Verlag, no. 1329/1, 1927-1928. Photo: Atelier Balàzs, Berlin.

German postcard by Ross Verlag, no. 3845/1, 1928-1929.

A Norwegian Austrian

Olaf Fjord was born as Ämilian Maximilian Pouch in Graz, Austria in 1897 (some sources mention 1895). At the age of three, he went with his parents to Bosnia-Herzegovina and grew up there in a Benedictine monastery.

During the First World War he served in the military for a while. Still during the war, he settled in Vienna and took singing lessons. He also completed a business apprenticeship.

In the winter of 1917-1918, he was discovered by the Danish director Einar Zangenberg for the film. He took the stage name Olaf Fjord and during his film career he often described himself as Norwegian.

He appeared in many silent Austrian films, but also started to direct films, including the short Paulchen, das Millionenbaby/Pauly, the Million Dollar baby (Olaf Fjord, 1920). In 1921 he played Ludwig II of Bavaria in the biography Ludwig II. (Otto Kreisler, 1921) with Gina Puch-Klitsch.

In Germany he appeared in the historical epic Monna Vanna (Richard Eichberg, 1922) starring Lee Parry and based on the play by Maurice Maeterlinck. The success of the film lead to bigger parts in German productions as Der Mann um Mitternacht/The man at Midnight (Holger-Madsen, 1924) with Hella Moja, Zwei Menschen/Two People (Hanns Schwarz, 1924) opposite Agnes Esterhazy, and Frauen, die nicht lieben dürfen/Women, not allowed to love (Géza von Bolvary, 1925).

He moved to France for Mon coeur au ralenti/Change of Heart (Marco de Gastyne, 1928) starring British actress Annette Benson, Le désir/The Desire (Albert Durec, 1928), filmed in Algeria, and La madone des sleepings/Madonna of the Sleeping Cars (Marco de Gastyne, Maurice Gleize, 1929).

A huge success was the Czech drama Erotikon/Seduction (Gustav Machatý, 1929) with Ita Rina. Not in the least because a film scene showed bare breasts, a trick the director later repeated with the young Hedy Lamarr in his sensational Ekstase/Ecstasy (Gustav Machatý, 1933).

German postcard by Ross Verlag, no. 4588/1, 1929-1930. Photo: Atelier Richard Frolik, Prague.

Olaf Fjord in Ich hatt' einen Kameraden (1926)

German postcard by Verlag Hermann Leiser, Berlin-Wilm., no. 6184. Photo: Arthur Ziehm Film. Olaf Fjord in Ich hatt' einen Kameraden/I had a comrade (Conrad Wiene, 1926).

German postcard by Verlag Hermann Leiser, Berlin, no. 6290. Photo: Natan Film Production, Paris. Fjord acted e.g. in in the Pathé-Nathan production Mon cœur au ralenti/Change of Heart (Marco de Gastyne, 1928)

Austrian postcard by Iris-Verlag, Berlin, no. 5379. Photo: Bieber, Berlin. Collection: Didier Hanson.

Another Occupation

After the introduction of the sound film, Olaf Fjord appeared both in the German production Kameradschaftsehe/Companionate marriage (Heinz Schall, Josef Medeotti-Bohác, 1929) with Ernst Verebes, and in the Czech language version, Kamarádské manzelství (Josef Medeotti-Bohác, 1930).

In the following years, his parts became smaller, as in the all-star drama 1914, die letzten Tage vor dem Weltbrand/1914: The Last Days Before the War (Richard Oswald, 1931) starring Albert Bassermann.

Alles um eine Frau/Everything for a Woman (Alfred Abel, 1935) with Charlotte Susa and Gustav Diessl, was his final film as an actor.

Fjord had found another occupation though as a director and as a producer. First, he produced an early version of the often adapted material Ferien vom Ich/Holiday From Myself (Hans Deppe, 1934) with Hermann Speelmans, and Pan (Olaf Fjord, Josef Rovenský, 1937) with Christian Kayssler, a film adaptation of a novel by the Norwegian Nobel Prize winning author Knut Hamsun.

Both films, he produced in Nazi Germany. His attempt to produce an adaptation of the novel Gösta Berlings Saga by Selma Lagerlöf failed in 1938.

In January 1939 he emigrated to the United States, where he lived for a while. Olaf Fjord died in Vienna, Austria in 1945, at the age of 47.

Austrian postcard by Iris Verlag, no. 5659. Photo: R. Tomatis, Nice / E. Weil & Co.

German postcard by Ross Verlag, Berlin, no. 1753/2, 1925-1926. Photo: Manuel Frères, Paris.

German postcard by Ross Verlag, no. 4299/1, 1929-1930. Photo: D.L.S. / Rosenfeld-Film G.m.b.H.

French postcard by Editions Cinémagazine, no. 501. Photo: Olaf Fjord in the French film La madone des sleepings/Madonna of the Sleeping Cars (Marco de Gastyne, Maurice Gleize, 1929).

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