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Modelo: Alfredo Zapata, actor
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German postcard by Verlag Hermann Leiser, Berlin-Wilm. , no. 2297. Photo: Fritz Richard.
During his long career, German stage actor Paul Hartmann (1889-1977) made over 100 films, both in the silent and the sound period. Despite his commitment to the Nazi regime, he could continue his career quite smoothly into the 1950s and 1960s.
Paul Wilhelm Constantin Hartmann was born in Fürth, Germany in 1889. He was the son of Wilhelm Hartmann, the manager of a toy-export company, and his wife Maria Hartmann-Betz. From 1907 on, he studied acting with Adalbert Czokke, and in 1908 he had his first engagement at the Stadtheater Zwickau. In the following years, he played at the Bellevue-Theater in Stettin, the Stadttheater Zürich, and from November 1913 at the Deutsche Theater in Berlin under the direction of the legendary Max Reinhardt. He also started to work for the cinema. He made his film debut as a jeune premier in 1915 in Zofia - Kriegs-Irrfahrten eines Kindes/Zofia – the War Odysseys of a Child (Hubert Moest, 1915) with Ernst Pittschau and Hedda Vernon. Soon followed more films like Der Trick/The Trick (Fred Sauer, 1915) with Aud Egede Nissen, Die verschleierte Dame/The Veiled Lady (Richard Oswald, 1915), Ein Blatt Papier/A Page of Paper (Joe May, 1916), Feenhände/Hands of a Fairy (Rudolf Biebrach, 1916) with Henny Porten, the Harry Deebs detective Das Geheimnis der leeren Wasserflasche/The Secret of the Empty Water Bottle (Joe May, 1917) starring Harry Liedtke, Christa Hartungen (Rudolf Biebrach, 1917), and Es werde Licht!/Let There Be Light! (Richard Oswald, 1918). That same year, he appeared in Der Trompetter von Säkkingen/The Trumpeter of Säckingen (Franz Porten, 1918), based on a popular opera (1884) by Viktor Nessler, which in turn was based on a romantic book by Joseph Victor von Scheffel, published in 1854. The story is set in Heidelberg and Säckingen during the 17th century, after the Thirty Years War. Law student, later trumpeter Werner Kirchhof falls in love with Margareta, a baron's daughter, but her mother wants to marry her to the cowardly Damian. Werner proves to be a hero and a compassionate pope makes him marquis of Camposanto. Then, after five years of separation nothing can prevent a happy ending. Hartmann's stage and film career suffered a short break when he was called into the military service in 1917. After that he continued his film career smoothly. In the 1920s he played romantic and melancholic characters in films like Katharina die Grosse/Catherine the Great (Reinhold Schünzel, 1920) with Lucie Höflich, Anna Boleyn/Anne Boleyn (Ernst Lubitsch, 1920) with Emil Jannings and Henny Porten, Schloss Vogelöd/The Haunted Castle (Friedrich Wilhelm Murnau, 1921) with Olga Tschechova, Der Roman der Christine von Herre (Ludwig Berger, 1921) with Heinrich George, Luise Millerin (Carl Froelich, 1922) with Lil Dagover, Alt-Heidelberg/The Student Prince (Hans Behrendt, 1923) with Eva May, Zur Chronik von Grieshuus/The Chronicles of the Gray House (Arthur von Gerlach, 1925) and the silent film operetta Der Rosenkavalier/The Knight Of The Rose (Robert Wiene, 1925) with Jaque Catelain. In 1924 he worked at the Theater in der Josefstadt in Wien (Vienna), and in 1925 he moved over to the Burgtheater. From 1927 he turned away from the film business and devoted his career exclusively to the Burgtheater.
With the introduction of the sound film Paul Hartmann returned to the cinema. He played tough and adamant heroes, like the constructor and captain next to Hans Albers in the deluxe German/British production F.P.1 antwortet nicht/F.P.1 Doesn't Answer (Karl Hartl, 1932), or as the self sacrificing engineer in Der Tunnel/The Tunnel (Kurt aka Curtis Bernhardt, 1933). Other popular films were Der Läufer von Marathon/The Marathon Runner (Ewald André Dupont, 1933), Salon Dora Green/The House of Dora Green (Henrik Galeen, 1933) with Alfred Abel, and Mazurka (Willi Forst, 1935) with Pola Negri. From 1935 on he was a company member of the Preußischen Staatstheater in Berlin, where he stayed till the end of WW II. In 1934 he was named Staatsschauspieler (Stage Artist of the State), and from May 1937 he was part of the UFA Art Committee. He also appeared in such propaganda films as Pour le mérite (Karl Ritter, 1938), the biography Bismarck (Wolfgang Liebeneiner, 1940) and Ich klage an/I Accuse (Wolfgang Liebeneiner, 1941). In April 1942 he became the president of the Reichstheaterkammer. His commitment to the Nazi regime did not really harm his career or his popularity after the war. After being banned from the theatre in 1945 Hartmann could only return to the stage in 1948 as Faust in a production of the Goethe play in Bonn. During the 1950s he was engaged by the Schauspielhaus in Düsseldorf, the Theater am Kurfürstendamm in Berlin, and the Burgtheater in Vienna. He also returned to the cinema. The ageing star now mainly worked as a character actor in supporting roles, such as in Die Dame in Schwarz/The Lady in Black (Erich Engels, 1951) with Mady Rahl, Der grosse Zapfenstreich/The Sergeant's Daughter (George Hurdalek, 1953) with Johanna Matz, Regina Amstetten (Kurt Neumann, 1954), Die Barrings/The Barrings (Rolf Thiele, 1955) with Dieter Borsche and Nadja Tiller, Der Fuchs von Paris/The Fox of Paris (Paul May, 1957), Buddenbrooks (Alfred Weidenmann, 1959), and Rosen für den Staatsanwalt/Roses for the Prosecutor (Wolfgang Staudte, 1959). He finished his film career in the 1960s with productions like the TV-film Hermann und Dorothea (Ludwig Berger, 1961), the Heimatfilm Waldrausch (Paul May, 1962), and the international war film The Longest Day (Ken Annakin, Andrew Marton, Bernhard Wicki, 1962), an all-star re-creation of the D-Day invasion, personally orchestrated by Darryl F. Zanuck. Hartmanns last appearance was in the TV-film Demetrius (Ludwig Berger, Heribert Wenk, 1969). In 1964 he was awarded the Filmband in Gold for his continuing and outstanding contributions to the German Film. Paul Hartmann died in 1977 in München (Munich). He was married twice. During WWI he had married a Slavic ballet dancer, who died in 1952. In 1955 he married the painter Elfriede Lieberun.
Sources: Thomas Staedeli (Cyranos), Hal Erickson (AllMovie), Wikipedia (German), and IMDb.
And, please check out our blog European Film Star Postcards.
Since today's Movie Saturday, here's my top ten actors! I'm also going to include the film (or 1 TV show in this case) where this actor shined the most along side their name, check it out!
1. Paul Rudd (Ant-Man)
2. John C. Reilly (Check it Out! With Dr. Steve Brule) (yeah it's a TV show, but I love him in this role so much!)
3. Chris Pratt (Guardians of the Galaxy)
4. Will Ferrell (Anchorman)
5. John Goodman (The Big Lebowski)
6. Michael Shannon (Midnight Special)
7. Jeff Bridges (The Big Lebowski)
8. Samuel L. Jackson (Pulp Fiction)
9. Sylvester Stallone (Rocky)
10. Michael Keaton (Birdman)
I took this photo of Civil War specialist actor, E.C. Fields, Jr., taking on the role of General Ulysses S. Grant at Camp Nelson, Kentucky. In 1864 the real General Grant visited the camp.
Our generation has forgotten just how formidable and brilliant this American commander was. It was the battles of America's bloodiest war, the Civil War, that would forge arguably America's greatest commander, General Ulysses S. Grant. In the British television series Great Commanders, Grant is placed among the world's six greatest military commanders of all time, among the likes of Alexander the Great, Julius Caesar and Britain's very own Horatio Nelson. He is the only American on that very short list. Consider this: Confederate general after general went up in vain against him. That is amazing considering that Grant studied from the same military playbook. He was taught by the same military professors at West Point, and fought in the same wars. Yet, this low-key quiet midwesterner was considered unpredictable, unorthodox and ruthless. He wouldn't be shackled by the manual that he had been trained so well on. He would learn and change course. He outfoxed even the greatest enemy commanders who rebelled against the United States.
In surveying American history, Theodore Roosevelt said in 1900 of Ulysses Grant, "Mightiest among the mighty dead loom the three great figures of Washington, Lincoln, and Grant." Roosevelt went on to place Benjamin Franklin, Thomas Jefferson and Alexander Hamilton in the second tier.
But the early 20th Century would erode Grant's considerable accomplishments. With the flourishing of Jim Crow laws and the erection of Confederate statues, the false reputation of Grant spread as a drunk, a brute and a crook.
Yet, this supposed brutish plebeian, who allegedly obtained his wins by sheer brute advantage and was no intellectual match for his opponents, would produce in his sunset days the Personal Memoirs of Ulysses S. Grant. The autobiography would be the literary standard of prose, conciseness and candor that broke from the norms of the time that all U.S. Presidents since consider before writing their memoirs. How did such a literary gem happen from such an unskilled bungler who won simply because he had logistical advantage on his side?*
Camp Nelson was a distribution center for the U.S. Army and it also became a recruiting and training center for the U.S. Colored Troops. Before the Emancipation Proclamation, southern slaves that ran to the U.S. Army from the Confederacy were considered contraband of war. Despite the demands of the states in rebellion, the U.S. refused to return the slave property back to their Southern owners. Eventually, thousands of slaves served the U.S. Army at Camp Nelson.
In 1864 General Grant actually visited Camp Nelson. Grant assessed that Camp Nelson was in a poor position as a distribution center within the military's supply chain for Army efforts against the Confederacy. But his colleague, General Sherman, persuaded the commander to keep the camp going in its role of a recruiting and training center for colored troops.
*Note: Mathematics and logistics, two under-appreciated military skills, were Grant's talents coming into the Civil War. He had a knack for both. Regarding book authors from Civil War commanders, I am also a fan of General Lew Wallace of the U.S. Army, who wrote the fictional work Ben Hur about how adversity and life's unfairness can make one stronger — something that General Wallace knew from experience.
From a visit to Højris Castle. As a visitor you were invited to solve a 'murder crime'. They have live actors roaming the castle and a different story/crime to solve each year. Very popular and a good way to engage visitors of all ages.
Photo by Poul-Werner Dam / bit.ly/PWD_Flickr
Terracotta figurine of actors with masks. During the Hellenistic age comedy grew so popular that its theatrical types became the subjects of mosaics, wall-paintings and a common non expensive motif figurines. All favorite subjects of comedy (the pedagogue, the villager, Heracles and old Silen) are often depicted as humorous, rotund figures wearing mask.
The actors wore tights that covered them from neck to wrists and ankles; under the tights they had heavy padding fixed over the belly and backside, and sometimes breasts as well. The seams down the sides of sleeves or leggings were often made clear by painters. On the outside of the tights at the front was affixed a large leather phallus.
Source: Gregory W. Dobrov, “Brill’s Companion to the Study of Greek Comedy”
Terracotta figurine
Ca. 4th century BC
Thessaloniki, Archaeological Museum
British postcard in the Picturegoer Series, London, no. W. 301. Photo: Boulting Bros.
English actor, film director and producer Richard Attenborough (1923) won two Oscars for Gandhi in 1983. He has also won four BAFTA Awards and three Golden Globe Awards. As an actor he is known for his roles in Brighton Rock (1947), The Great Escape (1963) and Jurassic Park (1993).
Richard Samuel Attenborough, Baron Attenborough was born in Cambridge, England in 1923. ‘Dickie’ was the eldest of three sons of Mary Attenborough née Clegg a founding member of the Marriage Guidance Council and Frederick Levi Attenborough, a scholar and academic administrator who was a don at Emmanuel College, Cambridge. Richard’s brothers were nature documentarian David Attenborough and John Attenborough, who was an executive at Alfa Romeo before his death in 2012. Attenborough was educated at Wyggeston Grammar School for Boys in Leicester and studied at the Royal Academy of Dramatic Art (RADA). At the age of 12, his acting career had started when he appeared in shows at Leicester's Little Theatre. Attenborough's film career began in an uncredited role as a deserting sailor in the war film In Which We Serve (Noël Coward, David Lean, 1942). During the Second World War Attenborough served in the Royal Air Force. After initial pilot training, he was seconded to the newly-formed RAF Film Unit at Pinewood Studios, under the command of Flight Lieutenant John Boulting where he appeared with Edward G. Robinson in the propaganda film Journey Together (John Boulting, 1943-1945). He then volunteered to fly with the Film Unit and after further training, where he sustained permanent ear damage, qualified as a sergeant, flying on several missions over Europe filming from the rear gunner's position to record the outcome of Bomber Command sorties. After the war, he made his breakthrough as a psychopathic young gangster in the film of Graham Greene's novel Brighton Rock (John Boulting, 1947), a part that he had previously played to great acclaim at the Garrick Theatre in 1942. Brighton Rock received critical acclaim and was the most popular British film of 1947. After that, he was type-cast for many years as working-class misfits or cowards in films like The Guinea Pig (Roy Boulting, 1948) in which the 26-year-old Attenborough was wholly credible as a 13-year-old schoolboy, London Belongs to Me (Sidney Gilliat, 1948) with Alastair Sim, and the naval drama Morning Departure (Roy Ward Baker, 1950) starring John Mills. In 1949 exhibitors voted Attenborough the 6th most popular British actor at the box office.
In 1952, Richard Attenborough starred in the original West End production of Agatha Christie's The Mousetrap, which went on to become the world's longest-running stage production. He took a 10% profit-participation in the production, which proved to be a wise business decision. During the 1950s, Attenborough worked prolifically in British films and appeared in successful comedies, such as Private's Progress (Roy Boulting, 1956) opposite Ian Carmichael, and I'm All Right Jack (Roy Boulting, 1959), also with Dennis Price. In the late 1950s, Attenborough formed a production company, Beaver Films, with Bryan Forbes. He began to build a profile as a producer on projects including the crime drama The League of Gentlemen (Basil Dearden, 1959), the drama The Angry Silence (Guy Green, 1960) with Pier Angeli, and Whistle Down the Wind (Bryan Forbes, 1961) starring Hayley Mills. In the first two, he also performed as an actor. In 1963 he appeared in the ensemble cast of The Great Escape (John Sturges, 1963) as RAF Squadron Leader Roger Bartlett (‘Big X’), the head of the escape committee and based on the real-life exploits of Roger Bushell. It was his first appearance in a major Hollywood film blockbuster and his most successful film up to that time. During the 1960s, he expanded his range of character roles in films such as Séance on a Wet Afternoon (Bryan Forbes, 1964) and Guns at Batasi (John Guillermin, 1964), for which he won the BAFTA Award for Best Actor for his portrayal of the Regimental Sergeant Major (RSM). In 1965 he played Lew Moran opposite James Stewart in The Flight of the Phoenix (Robert Aldrich, 1965), and in 1967 and 1968, he won back-to-back Golden Globe Awards in the category of Best Supporting Actor, the first time for The Sand Pebbles (Robert Wise, 1967), co-starring Steve McQueen and the second time for his comedic turn as a circus owner in Doctor Dolittle (Richard Fleischer, 1968) starring Rex Harrison. His feature film directorial debut was the all-star screen version of the hit musical Oh! What a Lovely War (Richard Attenborough, 1969). Sergio Angelini in Directors in British and Irish Cinema: “a project inherited from John Mills, who had developed the screenplay with Len Deighton from Joan Littlewood's stage production. This satiric fantasia on the First World War is largely set on Brighton Pier, but Attenborough and cinematographer Gerry Turpin successfully open out the play with a number of bravura sequences, the best remembered being the final shot which pulls back to reveal an entire hillside covered in white crosses.” He later directed two epic period films: Young Winston (Richard Attenborough, 1972), which starred his favourite leading man, Anthony Hopkins, as Winston Churchill, and A Bridge Too Far (Richard Attenborough, 1977), an all-star account of Operation Market Garden in World War II. His acting appearances became sporadic as he concentrated more on directing and producing. His portrayal of the serial killer John Christie in 10 Rillington Place (Richard Fleischer, 1971) garnered excellent reviews and he also played to great acclaim in Indian director Satyajit Ray's period piece The Chess Players (1977). Following his appearance in The Human Factor (Otto Preminger, 1979), he stopped with film acting for more than a decade.
In 1982, Richard Attenborough finally realized a project he had been attempting to get made for 18 years: Gandhi, featuring Ben Kingsley. It proved to be an enormous commercial and critical success. Gandhi won eight Academy Awards, and Attenborough himself was awarded the Oscar for Best Director and as the film's producer, the Oscar for Best Picture. He also won the Golden Globe as Best Director in 1983 for his historical epic. He also published his book In Search of Gandhi, another product of his fascination with the Indian leader. Attenborough then directed the screen version of the musical A Chorus Line (Richard Attenborough, 1985) and the anti-apartheid drama Cry Freedom (Richard Attenborough, 1987), based on the life and death of the prominent anti-apartheid activist Steve Biko and the experiences of Donald Woods. He was nominated for a Golden Globe Award for Best Director for both films. His most recent films as director and producer include the underrated Chaplin (Richard Attenborough, 1992) starring Robert Downey, Jr. as Charlie Chaplin and Shadowlands (Richard Attenborough, 1993), based on the relationship between C.S. Lewis (Anthony Hopkins) and Joy Gresham (Debra Winger). He made his come-back as an actor as the eccentric owner of a dinosaur theme park in Jurassic Park (Steven Spielberg, 1993) and the sequel, The Lost World: Jurassic Park (Steven Spielberg, 1997). He also starred in the remake of Miracle on 34th Street (Les Mayfield, 1994). Since then he has made occasional appearances in supporting roles, including as Sir William Cecil in the historical drama Elizabeth (Shekhar Kapur,1998) with Cate Blanchett, Jacob in Joseph and the Amazing Technicolor Dreamcoat (David Mallet, 1999) and as The Narrator in the film adaptation of Spike Milligan's comedy book Puckoon (Terence Ryan 2002). He made his only appearance in a Shakespeare film when he played the British ambassador who announces that Rosencrantz and Guildenstern are dead at the end of Kenneth Branagh's Hamlet (1996).
Richard Attenborough has been married to English actress Sheila Sim since 1945. With his wife, they founded the Richard and Sheila Attenborough Visual Arts Centre. He also founded the Jane Holland Creative Centre for Learning at Waterford Kamhlaba in Swaziland in memory of his elder daughter. Jane Holland, her mother-in-law, and her 15-year-old daughter Lucy were killed in 2004 when a tsunami caused by the Indian Ocean earthquake struck Khao Lak, Thailand where they were holidaying. Attenborough has two other children, Michael and Charlotte, an actress. Michael is a theatre director and the Artistic Director of the Almeida Theatre in London. In 1967, Richard Attenborough was made a Commander of the Order of the British Empire (CBE). He was knighted in 1976 and in 1993 he was made a life peer as Baron Attenborough, of Richmond upon Thames. At 84, he made his last film as director and producer, Closing the Ring (Richard Attenborough, 2007). According to Jason Buchanan at AllMovie, “Sixty-five years after making his screen debut as a young stoker in co-directors Noël Coward and David Lean's World War II drama In Which We Serve, Richard Attenborough perfects the balance between epic story and intimate tale with this drama starring Shirley MacLaine and Neve Campbell as a mother and daughter who find a relic from the past sparking an incendiary series of events.” Attenborough served as vice president (1973–1995) and president (2002–2010) of the British Academy of Film and Television Arts and as president of the Royal Academy of Dramatic Art (2003– ). For 33 years he was President of the Muscular Dystrophy Campaign, and he is also the patron of the United World Colleges movement. He passionately believes in education, primary education that does not judge upon colour, race, creed, or religion. In 2008 Attenborough published, in association with his long-standing associate Diana Hawkins, an informal autobiography Entirely Up to You, Darling. Later that year he entered the hospital with heart problems and was fitted with a pacemaker. In December 2008 he suffered a fall at his home after a stroke and went into a coma, but came out of it within a few days. Shortly before her 90th birthday, in June 2012 Sheila Sim entered the actors' home Denville Hall, for which she and Attenborough had helped raise funds. In March 2013, in light of his deteriorating health, Attenborough moved into Denville Hall to be with his wife.
Sources: Sergio Angelini (Directors in British and Irish Cinema), Jason Buchanan (AllMovie), Encyclopaedia Britannica, AllMovie, Wikipedia, and IMDb.
And, please check out our blog European Film Star Postcards.
German postcard by Ross Verlag, Foreign, no. 1522/2, 1927-1928. Photo: Paramount / Parufamet. Publicity still for The Freshman (Fred C. Newmeyer, Sam Taylor, 1925).
American actor, comedian, director, producer, screenwriter, and stunt performer Harold Lloyd (1893-1971) is best known for his silent comedies. He ranks alongside Charlie Chaplin and Buster Keaton as one of the three most popular and influential comedians of silent film. Between 1914 and 1947, Lloyd made nearly 200 comedies, often as a bespectacled 'Glass' character, a resourceful, success-seeking go-getter who was perfectly in tune with the 1920s-era United States. His films frequently contained 'thrill sequences' of extended chase scenes and daredevil physical feats. A classic is Lloyd hanging from the hands of a clock high above the street in Safety Last! (1923).
Harold Clayton Lloyd was born in 1893 in Burchard, Nebraska, the son of James Darsie Lloyd and Sarah Elisabeth Fraser. In 1910, after his father had several business ventures fail, Lloyd's parents divorced and his father moved with his son to San Diego, California. Lloyd had acted in theatre since a child, and in San Diego, he received his stage training at the School of Dramatic Art and began acting in one-reel film comedies around 1912. Lloyd worked with Thomas Edison's motion picture company, and his first role was a bit part as a Yaqui Indian in The Old Monk's Tale (J. Searle Dawley, 1913). At the age of 20, Lloyd moved to Los Angeles and took up roles in several Keystone comedies. He was also hired by Universal Studios as an extra . Lloyd began collaborating with his friend Hal Roach who had formed his own studio in 1913. They created Will E. Work and then Lonesome Luke, variations of Charles Chaplin's Little Tramp character. In 1914, Lloyd hired Bebe Daniels as a supporting actress. The two were involved romantically and were known as The Boy and The Girl. In 1919, she left him after it became apparent he was unable to make a commitment, and she pursued her dramatic aspirations. Later that year, Lloyd replaced Daniels with Mildred Davis, whom he would marry in 1923. By 1918, Lloyd and Roach had begun to develop a new character beyond an imitation of his contemporaries. Harold Lloyd would move away from tragicomic personas, and portray an everyman with unwavering confidence and optimism. The persona Lloyd referred to as his 'Glass' character was a much more mature comedy character with greater potential for sympathy and emotional depth and was easy for audiences of the time to identify with. To create his new character Lloyd donned a pair of lensless horn-rimmed eyeglasses but wore normal clothing. Previously, he had worn a fake moustache and ill-fitting clothes as the Chaplinesque Lonesome Luke. In August 1919, while posing for some promotional still photographs in the Los Angeles Witzel Photography Studio, he was seriously injured holding a prop bomb thought merely to be a smoke pot. It exploded and mangled his right hand, causing him to lose a thumb and forefinger. The blast was severe enough that the cameraman and prop director nearby were also seriously injured. Lloyd was in the act of lighting a cigarette from the fuse of the bomb when it exploded, also badly burning his face and chest and injuring his eye. Despite the proximity of the blast to his face, he retained his sight.
Beginning in 1921, Harold Lloyd and Hal Roach moved from shorts to feature-length comedies. These included the acclaimed Grandma's Boy, which pioneered the combination of complex character development and film comedy, and the highly popular Safety Last! (Fred C. Newmeyer, Sam Taylor, 1923), which cemented Lloyd's stardom, and Why Worry? (Fred C. Newmeyer, Sam Taylor, 1923). Lloyd and Roach parted ways in 1924, and Lloyd became the independent producer of his own films. These included his most accomplished mature features Girl Shy (Fred C. Newmeyer, Sam Taylor, 1924), The Freshman (Fred C. Newmeyer, Sam Taylor, 1925) - his highest-grossing silent feature, The Kid Brother (Ted Wilde, J.A. Howe, 1927), and Speedy (Ted Wilde, 1928), his final silent film. Welcome Danger (Clyde Bruckman, 1929) was originally a silent film but Lloyd decided late in the production to remake it with dialogue. All of these films were enormously successful and profitable, and Lloyd would eventually become the highest-paid film performer of the 1920s. Although Lloyd's individual films were not as commercially successful as Chaplin's on average, he was far more prolific (releasing 12 feature films in the 1920s while Chaplin released just four) and made more money overall ($15.7 million than Chaplin's $10.5 million). The huge financial success of Welcome Danger proved that audiences were eager to hear Lloyd's voice on film. Lloyd's rate of film releases, which had been one or two a year in the 1920s, slowed to about one every two years until 1938. The films released during this period were: Feet First (Clyde Bruckman, 1930), with a similar scenario to Safety Last which found him clinging to a skyscraper at the climax; Movie Crazy (Clyde Bruckman, 1932) with Constance Cummings; The Cat's-Paw (Sam Taylor, 1934), which was a dark political comedy and a big departure for Lloyd; and The Milky Way (Leo McCarey, 1936), which was Lloyd's only attempt at the fashionable genre of the screwball comedy film. However, his go-getting screen character was out of touch with the Great Depression movie audiences of the 1930s. As the length of time between his film releases increased, his popularity declined, as did the fortunes of his production company. His final film of the decade, Professor Beware (Elliott Nugent, 1938), was made by the Paramount staff, with Lloyd functioning only as actor and partial financier.
In 1937, Harold Lloyd sold the land of his studio, Harold Lloyd Motion Picture Company, to The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints. The location is now the site of the Los Angeles California Temple. Lloyd produced two comedies for RKO, A Girl, a Guy, and a Gob (Richard Wallace, 1941) with Lucille Ball, and a Kay Kyser vehicle, My Favorite Spy (Tay Garnett, 1942) which must have looked good on paper but went nowhere at the box office. He retired from the screen until an additional starring appearance in The Sin of Harold Diddlebock (Preston Sturges, 1947), an ill-fated homage to Lloyd's career, financed by Howard Hughes. This film had the inspired idea of following Harold's Jazz Age, the optimistic character from The Freshman into the Great Depression years. Diddlebock opened with footage from The Freshman (for which Lloyd was paid a royalty of $50,000, matching his actor's fee) and Lloyd was sufficiently youthful-looking to match the older scenes quite well. Lloyd and Sturges had different conceptions of the material and fought frequently during the shoot. The finished film was released briefly in 1947, then shelved by producer Hughes. Hughes issued a recut version of the film in 1951 through RKO under the title Mad Wednesday. Lloyd sued Howard Hughes, the California Corporation and RKO for damages to his reputation "as an outstanding motion picture star and personality", eventually accepting a $30,000 settlement. In October 1944, Lloyd emerged as the director and host of The Old Gold Comedy Theater, an NBC radio anthology series, after Preston Sturges, who had turned the job down, recommended him for it. The show presented half-hour radio adaptations of recently successful film comedies, beginning with Palm Beach Story with Claudette Colbert and Robert Young and ending in June 1945 with an adaptation of Tom, Dick and Harry, featuring June Allyson. The show was not renewed for the following season.
Harold Lloyd remained involved in a number of other interests, including civic and charity work. He appeared as himself on several television shows during his retirement, such as Ed Sullivan's variety show Toast of the Town (1949 and 1958). He appeared as the Mystery Guest on What's My Line? (1953), and twice on This Is Your Life: in 1954 for Mack Sennett, and again in 1955, on his own episode. In 1953, Lloyd received an Academy Honorary Award for being a "master comedian and good citizen". He studied colours and microscopy, and was very involved with photography, including 3D photography and colour film experiments. He became known for his nude photographs of models, such as Bettie Page and stripper Dixie Evans, for a number of men's magazines. He also took photos of Marilyn Monroe lounging at his pool in a bathing suit, which were published after her death. In 2004, his granddaughter Suzanne produced a book of selections from his photographs, Harold Lloyd's Hollywood Nudes in 3D! Lloyd also provided encouragement and support for a number of younger actors, such as Debbie Reynolds, Robert Wagner, and particularly Jack Lemmon, whom Harold declared as his own choice to play him in a movie of his life and work. In the early 1960s, Lloyd produced two compilation films, featuring scenes from his old comedies, Harold Lloyd's World of Comedy (Harold Lloyd, 1962) and The Funny Side of Life (Harry Kerwin, 1963). The first film was premiered at the 1962 Cannes Film Festival, where Lloyd was fêted as a major rediscovery. The renewed interest in Lloyd helped restore his status among film historians. Lloyd and Mildred Davis had two children together: Gloria Lloyd (1923–2012) and Harold Clayton Lloyd Jr. (1931–1971). They also adopted Gloria Freeman (1924–1986) in 1930, whom they renamed Marjorie Elizabeth Lloyd but was known as Peggy for most of her life. Lloyd discouraged Davis from continuing her acting career. He later relented but by that time her career momentum was lost. Davis died from a heart attack in 1969, two years before Lloyd died at age 77 from prostate cancer, at his Greenacres home in Beverly Hills, California. He was interred in a crypt in the Great Mausoleum at Forest Lawn Memorial Park Cemetery in Glendale, California. In 1990, Kevin Brownlow and David Gill produced the documentary, Harold Lloyd: The Third Genius. Composer Carl Davis wrote a new score for Safety Last! which he performed live during a showing of the film with the Royal Scottish National Orchestra to great acclaim in 1993. The Brownlow and Gill documentary created a renewed interest in Lloyd's work in the United States, but the films were largely unavailable. Criterion Collection has since acquired the home video rights to the Lloyd Library, and has released Safety Last!, The Freshman, and Speedy.
Sources: Wikipedia and IMDb.
Photoshoot with Matthew Raetz
Actor/Model
Learn more about Matt here
and here
Lake Vista
New Orleans, Louisiana
James Gandolfini, whose portrayal of a brutal, emotionally delicate mob boss in HBO's The Sopranos helped create one of TV's greatest drama series and turned the mobster stereotype on its head, died Wednesday in Italy. He was 51.
Belgian postcard, no. KF 37. Photo: Republic Pictures.
American singer and cowboy actor Roy Rogers (1911–1998) was one of the most popular Western stars of his era. Known as the 'King of the Cowboys', he appeared in over 100 films.
Roy Rogers (born Leonard Slye) moved to California in 1930, aged 18. He played in such musical groups as The Hollywood Hillbillies, Rocky Mountaineers, Texas Outlaws, and his own group, the International Cowboys. In 1934 he formed a group with Bob Nolan called Sons of the Pioneers. While in that group he was known as Leonard Slye, then Dick Weston. From his first film appearance in 1935, he appeared steadily in Westerns, including a bit role as a bandit opposite Gene Autry in The Old Coral (Joseph Kane, 1936). In 1938, he played a large supporting role as a singing cowboy in another Gene Autry Western, The Old Barn Dance (Joseph Kane, 1938). That same year, Autry entered the United States Army Air Force. Republic immediately rechristened 'Roy Rogers', and was assigned the lead in Under Western Stars (Joseph Kane, 1938). Rogers became a matinee idol and American legend. In addition to his own films, Rogers played a supporting role in the John Wayne classic Dark Command (Raoul Walsh, 1940). In the Motion Picture Herald Top Ten Money-Making Western Stars poll, Rogers was listed for 15 consecutive years from 1939 to 1954, holding first place from 1943 to 1954.
Roy Rogers also did numerous radio and television episodes of The Roy Rogers Show. In many of his films and television episodes, he appeared with his wife Dale Evans, his golden palomino Trigger, and his German Shepherd dog Bullet. His show ran on radio for nine years before moving to television from 1951 through 1957. His productions usually featured a sidekick, often Pat Brady, Andy Devine, or George 'Gabby' Hayes. In his later years, Rogers lent his name to the Roy Rogers Restaurants franchised chain. His final film part was as an old time working cowboy who's not settled down in Mackintosh and T.J. (Marvin J. Chomsky, 1975). There was a Roy Rogers & Dale Evans Museum at Branson, Missouri, but it closed in 2011.
Sources: Ed Stephan (IMDb), Wikipedia and IMDb.
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(Brad Pitt, Gran Canaria, 2016)
Justamente este fin de semana estaba pensando dejar de lado las flores y los paisajes durante un tiempo para hacer retratos a algún/a modelo caritativo/a. Mira tu por por donde me encuentro con este pive tan fotogénico en el puerto... Un rato divertido ;)
Italian postcard. Rotalfoto No. 673.
Anthony Franciosa, pseudonym of Anthony George Papaleo Jr. (New York, 25 October 1928 - Los Angeles, 19 January 2006) was an American actor also known as Tony Franciosa.
Anthony George Papaleo was born in New York in 1928 into a family of Italian descent (his grandparents emigrated from Melfi, in the province of Potenza, Italy, in 1890). When his career was already underway, he adopted the surname Franciosa, which was his mother's maiden name, with whom he lived most of his childhood and adolescence, since his parents divorced shortly after his birth and his father left without Anthony jr. He began studying acting when he was only 18 years old, thanks to a scholarship that allowed him to attend the prestigious Actor's Studio in New York and to meet talented young actors such as Marlon Brando, Rod Steiger, James Dean and Paul Newman, the latter of whom would become a great friend. After graduating, his breakthrough to success came almost by chance: while visiting the YMCA for a dance class, he was intrigued by a theatre rehearsal and decided to audition for a part. He made his debut in 1955 in End as a Man, written by Calder Willingham and directed by Jack Garfein, opposite Ben Gazzara, who won a Theatre World Award for his performance and, after appearing in the film version, was associated with the Actor's Studio, as Franciosa had been. The same year, he played the role that would establish his reputation: the character of Polo Pope, the brother of a drug addict veteran of the Korean War, in the play A Hat Full of Rain, which won him a Tony Award nomination and brought him to the attention of Hollywood.
His film debut was in Robert Wise's comedy This Could Be the Night (1957), with Paul Douglas and Jean Simmons. The same year he took part in the film adaptation of A Hat Full of Rain, directed by Fred Zinnemann, which earned him an Oscar nomination for Best Actor in a Leading Role in 1958, the Coppa Volpi and the Special Jury Prize at the Venice International Film Festival. Then he was chosen by Elia Kazan for the role of Joey DePalma in the film A Face in the Crowd (1957), an interpretation that would definitively consecrate him as a star of the big screen. In this period he appeared in films such as Wild is the Wind (1958) by George Cukor, opposite Anna Magnani, The Long Hot Summer (1959) by Martin Ritt and The Naked Maja (1959) by Henry Koster, based on the life of Spanish painter Francisco Goya. In the 1960s and 1970s Franciosa's popularity began to wane, mainly due to her psychological difficulties in coping with an existence constantly in the spotlight and, to a large extent, his difficult character. He began to appear in less successful productions, such as the romantic film Go Naked in the World (1961), opposite Gina Lollobrigida, the comedies Period of Adjustment (1962) and The Pleasure Seekers (1964), and began to frequent television sets more frequently, In the following decades, he starred in series such as Valentine's Day (1964), The Name of the Game (1966--1968), Search (1972-1973), Matt Helm (1975-1976), and Finder of Lost Loves (1984-1985).
Franciosa's experience in Italian cinema was also important, including appearances in films such as Mauro Bolognini's Senilità/ careless (1962), based on Italo Svevo's novel of the same name, Antonio Margheriti's horror film Nella stretta morsa del ragno/ The Web of the Spider (1971), Alberto Lattuada's La cicala/ The Cricket (1980), Pupi Avati's romantic Aiutami a sognare/ help Me Dream (1981), and Dario Argento's Tenebre/ Shadows (1982). Franciosa's last screen appearance was in 1995 in Harold Becker's City Hall, opposite Al Pacino. The actor died in 2006, at the age of 77, as a result of a stroke, at the UCLA Medical Center in Los Angeles.
Sources: IMDb, English and Italian Wikipedia.
Actor
Learn more about Bryan here
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Rivertown
Kenner, Louisiana
Aspiring actor and model. I've been stepping out of my comfort zone and doing more photo shoots lately. Watch out for Matthew, I believe he has it in him to do well in the business. Learn more about him here
City Park
New Orleans, Louisiana
Actor, Model, Musician, Poet
Learn more about Jason here
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Fort St. John
Mid City
New Orleans, Louisiana
British postcard by Film Weekly, London.
With his smooth, boyish good looks, American actor Richard Cromwell (1910-1960) had the makings of a Hollywood star in the early 1930s. The handsome actor became well known with The Lives of a Bengal Lancer (1935), sharing top billing with Gary Cooper and Franchot Tone. His film career reached its pinnacle with Jezebel (1938) with Bette Davis and Henry Fonda and John Ford's Young Mr. Lincoln (1939) also with Fonda. But soon after that, his meteoric career crashed and burned.
Richard Cromwell was born LeRoy Melvin Radabaugh in Long Beach, California, in 1910. he was the second of five children of Fay B. (née Stocking) and Ralph R. Radabaugh, who was an inventor. In 1918, when Radabaugh was still in grade school, his father died of the Spanish flu. Roy earnestly delivered morning newspapers to help out the family's budget crisis. on a scholarship, he attended the Chouinard Art Institute in Los Angeles, a precursor to the California Institute of the Arts. He continued to work part-time as a maintenance man, custodian and soda jerk. He set up a small art shop in Hollywood in the late 1920s and made masks and oil paintings there. He sold pictures, made lampshades, and designed colour schemes for houses. The handsome Cromwell made contacts with film stars of the time such as Anna Q. Nilsson, Colleen Moore, Beatrice Lillie, Greta Garbo, Joan Crawford and Tallulah Bankhead, some of whom he also immortalised in his paintings and masks. He painted scenery for community theatre productions and eventually took on acting roles. His first film appearance was an extra role in King of Jazz (John Murray Anderson, Walter Lantz, 1930), along with the film's star, Paul Whiteman and his orchestra. On a whim, his friends encouraged him to audition for the lead role in a Columbia remake of D.W. Griffith's silent classic Tol'able David (1921) starring Richard Barthelmess. Radabaugh won the role over thousands of hopefuls. In storybook fashion, studio mogul Harry Cohn gave him his screen name Richard Cromwell and launched his career. Cromwell earned $75 per week for his work on Tol'able David (John G. Blystone, 1930), which co-starred Noah Beery Sr. and John Carradine. Gary Brumburgh at IMDb: "the studio publicity machines worked overtime to promote both the film and their new leading man. Richard lived up to all the hype once the reviews came out, giving a terrific debut performance in a very difficult role. As the rather weak-willed young boy who finds the strength and courage to right the injustice done to him, he hit overnight stardom". Amid the flurry of publicity, Cromwell toured the country and was even invited to the White House to meet President Herbert Hoover. Cohn signed Cromwell to a multi-year contract based on the strength of his performance and the success at the box office of his debut. In the following years, Richard played several leading roles in smaller films, often in youthful, somewhat sensitive roles. Leslie Halliwell later described him in his Filmgoer's Companion as the "friendly hero of the early talkies". Cromwell maintained a deep friendship with Marie Dressler, which continued until her death from cancer in 1934. Dressler personally insisted that her studio bosses cast Cromwell on a loan-out in the lead opposite her in Emma (Clarence Brown, 1932), also with Myrna Loy. Dressler was nominated for a second Best Actress award for her portrayal of the title role in Emma. This was another break that helped sustain Cromwell's rising status in Hollywood. He was now much in demand and his next roles were in The Age of Consent (Gregory La Cava, 1932) co-starring Arline Judge and Eric Linden, Tom Brown of Culver (William Wyler, 1932), and Hoopla (Frank Lloyd, 1933), where he is seduced by Clara Bow, in her final film. He made an early standout performance as the leader of the youth gang in Cecil B. DeMille's unusual cult-favourite, This Day and Age (1933). To ensure that Cromwell's character used the right slang, DeMille asked high school student Horace Hahn to read the script and comment. Cromwell then starred with Jean Arthur in Most Precious Thing in Life (Lambert Hillyer, 1934). He had his definitive breakthrough when he co-starred with Gary Cooper and Franchot Tone in the adventure film The Lives of a Bengal Lancer (Henry Hathaway, 1935), which was nominated for seven Oscars. Cromwell played the son of a senior officer who is tortured by insurgents. His father refuses to rescue him in order to demonstrate his impartiality. After this promising start, Cromwell's career received a bump when he wanted more artistic independence.
Richard Cromwell's next pictures at Columbia Pictures and elsewhere were mostly inconsequential. Cromwell starred with Will Rogers in Life Begins at 40 (1935) and appeared in Poppy (1936) as the suitor of W.C. Fields' daughter, Rochelle Hudson. In 1937, he portrayed the young bank robber in love with Helen Mack and on the lam from Lionel Atwill in The Wrong Road (James Cruze, 1937). A challenge was his lead role in The Road Back (James Whale, 1937), a sequel to the classic All Quiet on the Western Front (Lewis Milestone, 1930). The film chronicled the story of young German soldiers readjusting to civilian life after WWI. Fearful that this film would not do well in Germany, the new regime at Universal Pictures severely edited the film before release, removing much of the strongly anti-Nazi slant that author Erich Maria Remarque included in the original novel, and which director James Whale had intended to retain in the film version. The resulting film was not well-received. Richard Cromwell took a detour in his career to Broadway for the chance to star as an evil cadet in an original play by Joseph Viertel, 'So Proudly We Hail!'. The military drama was directed by future film director Charles Walters, co-starred Edward Andrews and Eddie Bracken, and opened to much fanfare. The New York Herald Tribune called Cromwell's acting "a striking portrayal" and The New York Times said that he "ran the gamut of emotions" in the play. Cromwell had shed his restrictive Columbia contract and pursued acting work as a freelancer in other media. Cromwell guest-starred on the radio in 'The Royal Gelatin Hour' (1937) hosted by Rudy Vallee, in a dramatic skit opposite Fay Wray. Enjoying the experience, Cromwell acted in the role of Kit Marshall on the radio soap opera Those We Love, which ran from 1938 until 1942. On-screen, Cromwell appeared in Storm Over Bengal (Sidney Salkow, 1938), for Republic Pictures, in order to capitalise on his success in The Lives of a Bengal Lancer. He stood out in supporting roles as Henry Fonda's brother, who kills a man in a duel of honour, in the romantic drama Jezebel (William Wyler, 1938) starring Bette Davis and as defendant Matt Clay to Henry Fonda's title performance in Young Mr. Lincoln (John Ford, 1939). In 1939, Cromwell again tried his luck on stage in a regional production of Sutton Vane's play 'Outward Bound', co-starring Dorothy Jordan. Cromwell drifted into secondary features. He enjoyed an active social Hollywood life with friends including Barbara Stanwyck, Joan Crawford, Franchot Tone, George Cukor, Cole Porter and William Haines. For Universal Pictures, Cromwell starred as a draftsman who thwarts the Nazis in Enemy Agent. He went on to appear in marginal but still watchable fare such as Baby Face Morgan (Arthur Dreifuss, 1942), with Mary Carlisle. Cromwell enjoyed a career boost with Cosmo Jones, Crime Smasher (1943), the film adaptation of the hit radio serial. However, he was next up at Monogram Pictures, where he was cast as a doctor working covertly for a police department to catch mobsters in the forgettable though endearing Riot Squad.
During the last two years of World War II, Richard Cromwell served with the United States Coast Guard. Upon returning to California following the war's end, he acted in local theatre productions. He also signed on for live performances in summer stock in the East during this period. Cromwell's break from films due to his stint in the Service meant that he was not much in demand after the War's end. He failed to make a comeback as a film actor with a role in the Film Noir Bungalow 13 (Edward L. Cahn, 1948) and he retired from the film industry. All told, Cromwell's film career spanned 39 films. In the 1950s, he returned to his artistic roots and studied ceramics. He built a pottery studio on his property, becoming especially known and admired for his creative tile designs. Returning to the name Roy Radabaugh, Cromwell also wrote extensively, producing several published stories and an unfinished novel in the 1950s. Cromwell was married once, briefly (1945–1946), to actress Angela Lansbury, when she was 19 and Cromwell was 35. They were married in a small civil ceremony in Independence, California. Lansbury later stated in a 1966 interview that her first marriage was a mistake because Cromwell was gay. His homosexuality had been kept secret from the public and Lansbury had not known about it before the marriage. However, Cromwell and Lansbury remained friends until his death in 1960. She later described him as "charming with a good knowledge of jazz music". In 1960 he tried a second comeback in the film business. In July 1960, Cromwell signed with producer Maury Dexter for 20th Century Fox's planned production of The Little Shepherd of Kingdom Come (Andrew V. McLaglen, 1961), starring singer Jimmie Rogers. Diagnosed with liver cancer shortly thereafter, he was forced to withdraw and Chill Wills replaced Cromwell in the film. Richard Cromwell was a heavy smoker for many years and at times advertised Lucky Strike. He died on 11 October 1960 in Hollywood, at the age of 50. He is interred at Fairhaven Memorial Park in Santa Ana, California. For his services to the film industry, Cromwell has a star on the Hollywood Walk of Fame (1627 Vine Street). Cromwell's legacy is preserved today by his nephew Dan Putnam and his cousin Bill Keane IV. In 2005, Keane donated materials relating to Cromwell's radio performances to the Thousand Oaks Library's Special Collection, "The American Radio Archive". In 2007, Keane donated memorabilia relating to Cromwell's film career and ceramics work to the AMPAS Margaret Herrick Library in Beverly Hills.
Sources: Gary Brumburgh (IMDb), Leslie Halliwell (Filmgoer's Companion), Wikipedia (English and German) and IMDb.
And, please check out our blog European Film Star Postcards.
British postcard, no. FA 228. Mel Gibson in Lethal Weapon (Richard Donner, 1987).
American-Australian actor Mel Gibson (1956) became known worldwide thanks to the small-budgeted action film Mad Max (1979). He went on to star in such acclaimed films as Gallipoli (1981) and The Bounty (1984). In 1987, he became a superstar with the buddy cop action-comedy film series Lethal Weapon (1987-1998). As director of Braveheart (1995), he won both the Academy Award for best director and best film. Gibson also produced and directed The Passion of the Christ (2004) about the last phase of Jesus Christ's life on earth.
Mel Columcille Gerard Gibson was born in 1956 in Peekskill, New York, USA. He was the sixth of eleven children of Hutton Gibson, a railroad brakeman, and Anne Patricia (Reilly) Gibson. His mother was Irish, from County Longford, while his American-born father is of mostly Irish descent. His father moved the family from upstate New York to Sydney, New South Wales, Australia, in 1968 after winning as a contestant on the game show Jeopardy! The family settled in New South Wales, where Mel's paternal grandmother, contralto opera singer Eva Mylott, was born. After high school, Mel studied at the University of New South Wales in Sydney, performing at the National Institute of Dramatic Arts alongside future film thespians Judy Davis and Geoffrey Rush. Here, he starred opposite Judy Davis in a production of 'Romeo and Juliet'. After college, Mel had a few stints on stage and starred in TV shows. Eventually, he was chosen to star in the films Mad Max (George Miller, 1979) and Tim (Michael Pate, 1979), co-starring Piper Laurie. The small-budgeted Mad Max made him known worldwide, while Tim garnered him an award for Best Actor from the Australian Film Institute, the Australian equivalent to the Oscar. Gibson got a reputation as a serious, versatile actor. He was a part of the movement dubbed the 'Australian New Wave' by the press. They were a group of filmmakers and performers who emerged from Down Under at about the same time and found work in other parts of the world. Other members included actress Judy Davis and directors George Miller, Gillian Armstrong and Peter Weir.
Mel Gibson went on to star in the World War I drama Gallipoli (Peter Weir, 1981), which earned him a second award for Best Actor from the AFI. In 1980, he married Robyn Moore and had seven children. In 1984, Mel made his American debut in The Bounty (Roger Donaldson, 1984), which co-starred Anthony Hopkins. Then in 1987, Mel starred in what would become his signature series, Lethal Weapon (Richard Donner, 1987), in which he played Martin Riggs. In 1990, he took on the starring role in Hamlet (Franco Zeffirelli, 1990) with Glenn Close, which garnered him some critical praise. He also made the more endearing Forever Young (Steve Miner. 1992) with Jamie Lee Curtis and the somewhat disturbing The Man Without a Face (Mel Gibson, 1993). 1995 brought his most famous role as Sir William Wallace in Braveheart (Mel Gibson, 1995), for which he won two Oscars for Best Picture and Best Director. From there, he made such box office hits as Ransom (Ron Howard, 1996), Payback (Brian Helgeland, 1999) and The Patriot (Roland Emmerich, 2000). His later films include Signs (M. Night Shyamalan, 2002), and Edge of Darkness (Martin Campbell, 2010). For The Passion of the Christ (2004), which he directed, wrote and produced, he spent 25 million dollars of his own money. Back in 1992, he started doing research for the film that was not released until 2004. That year, he was the highest-paid celebrity with a reported $210,000,000 salary from his The Passion of the Christ (2004) profits, plus a potential $150,000,000 that is yet to be accounted for. The way Gibson portrayed the suffering of Christ caused however much controversy. He received further critical notice for his directorial work of the action-adventure film Apocalypto (2006), which is set in Mesoamerica during the early 16th century. He separated from his wife Robyn in June 2006. At the end of July 2006, Gibson was arrested for drunk driving in Malibu, California. During his arrest, he made derogatory comments about Jews and women. On 1 August 2006, he checked himself into a recovery program for alcohol abuse. He did three-year probation following the misdemeanour drunken driving arrest. Robyn finally filed for divorce in April 2009 but it wasn't finalised until December 2011, reportedly because it took them all that time to divide Gibson's estimated assets of $850 million. It is considered the biggest divorce payout in Hollywood history. In 2009, he made a first public appearance together with his girlfriend, Oksana Grigorieva who was then three months pregnant with his daughter Lucia. The couple split in 2010. In 2014, he started a relationship with Rosalind Ross with whom he had his ninth child.
Sources: Wikipedia and IMDb.
And, please check out our blog European Film Star Postcards.
Actor from Alexandria - Method Acting with the Camera
It was a pleasure meeting you, dear Mi Do Fayed, at CIFF 2021!
Title: ['The Unguarded Hour']
Creator: Sassoon, Elias Victor (1881-1961)
Date: 1939
Part Of: Sir Ellice Victor Elias Sassoon papers and photographs
Series: China and Second Sino-Japanese War, 1937-1939, album
Place: Shanghai, Shanghai, China
Physical Description: 1 photograph album cover: part of 1 volume (24 gelatin silver prints); 29 x 38 cm
File: ag2011_0005x_2_5_3_47_opt.jpg
Rights: Please cite DeGolyer Library, Southern Methodist University when using this file. A high-resolution version of this file may be obtained for a fee. For details see the sites.smu.edu/cul/degolyer/research/permissions/ web page. For other information, contact degolyer@smu.edu.
For more information and to view the image in high resolution, see: digitalcollections.smu.edu/cdm/ref/collection/eaa/id/1579
View the Europe, Asia, and Australia: Photographs, Manuscripts, and Imprints Collection
Vintage Italian postcard. 1920s. Ed. A. Traldi, Milano, No. 61.
Gennaro Righelli (12 December 1886 – 6 January 1949) was an Italian film director, screenwriter and actor, who directed over 110 films in Italy and Germany between 1910 and 1947. In 1930, he directed the first Italian sound film, La canzone dell'amore (The Song of Love). He was married to the film star Maria Jacobini, whom he frequently cast in his films.
Salvatore Gennaro Righelli, born in Salerno, was the son of the Neapolitan dialect actor Angelo and the Bolognese Maria Galassi. He took up the theatrical activity in 1902 in a dialect company following the footsteps of his father. His daughter Lea was the mother of directors Luciano and Sergio Martino.
Righelli started to work in cinema in 1910, when he made his acting debut for the Roman company Cines in a handful of short films such as Amore di schiava (Enrique Santos, 1910) and Anore di torero (Santos, 1910), often acting together with his first wife, Maria Righelli, née Maria Mauro. IMDB and Aldo Bernardini give contrasting information about Righelli's film directions. IMDb claims it was for Andreuccio da Perugia, after Boccaccio, in 1910, but Bernardini doesn't list a director for this film. IMDb lists the film Sperduta with Righelli first playing opposite Maria Jacobini but Bernardini indicates the films as 1911 and with Maria Righelli instead. Indeed, it seems that IMDb erroneously conflates Maria Righelli with Maria Jacobini (Gennaro Righelli and Maria Jacobini would only work professionally from the late 1910s onward and would marry eventually in 1925).
In 1911 Gennaro and Maria Righelli continued at Cines, alternating historical and modern dramas. While it seems that Righelli co-directed with Mario Caserini La fidanzata di Messina and Giovanna la pallida, his first independent directing must have been that of La vita di una chanteuse/ Povera Dora!. In May 1911 Righelli and his wife moved to Vesuvio Films in Naples, where he was actor-director of some 9 films until early 1913, and also manager of the studio. He made his first feature films there, including an adaptation of Boccaccio's Decamerone (1912), the Napoleonic Der Tugenbund (1912), and L'eroica fanciulla di Derna (1912), set during the Italo-Turkish war. In 1913 work at Vesuvio halted and Maria Righelli stopped acting for several years, probably due to a marital crisis, Bernardini suggests. In 1914 Gennaro Righelli encountered misfortune with the companies Victoria Film and Parioli Film, so he returned to Cines in 1915, where he shot the short propaganda comedy Il sogno patriottico di Cinessino and launched Diomira Jacobini, Maria Jacobini's younger sister, in the comedy Diomira si diverte (1915). For Milano Films he did the heavy drama La macchia nel blasone (1915).
Yet, more substantial was Righelli's career at the Roman company Tiber Film, between 1916 and 1920. In 1916 Righelli directed Primo e ultimo bacio, Alla capitale, Febbre di gloria, and Nella città eterna, often with the couple André Habay and Matilde Di Marzio in the lead. In 1917 Righelli continued at Tiber Film with the Giacosa adaptation Come le foglie, with Maria Jacobini in the lead - probably their first professional collaboration on the film sets. Until 1920, Righelli turned out several films per year at Tiber Film, again with the couple Habay-Di Marzio but in particular 9 films with Diomira Jacobini: L'ombra che passa (1917), Demonietto (1917), Quando il sole tramonta (1917), Camere separate (1917), Duecento all'ora (1918), L'autunno dell'amore (1918), Il veleno del piacere (1918), Mademoiselle Pas-Chic (1918), and Le avventure di Doloretta (1919). Righelli also directed Polidor (Il nipote di America, 1917, Venti giorni all'ombra, 1918, also with Diomira Jacobini); Vittoria Lepanto, Diana Karenne (La peccatrice casta, 1919), Italia Almirante Manzini (L'innamorata, 1919); and last but not least, Diomira's sister Maria Jacobini (L'articolo IV, 1918, La regina del carbone, 1919, La vergine folle, 1921). In 1918-19 he co-directed with Polidor also shot a long serial, La canaglia di Parigi, which had trouble with the censor.
From 1920, Righelli worked for the Turinese company Fert, where he was a prolific author varying between literary inspiration (Il viaggio, 1921, after PIrandello) and melodrama with an evocative setting (Cainà, l'isola e il continente, 1922). It was here that he did various acclaimed dramas with Maria Jacobini, who became his girlfriend and finally, in 1925, his wife. Together they did, in addition to Il viaggio and Cainà, also La casa di vetro (1920) with Amleto Novelli, Amore rosso (1921) set in Spain, Il richiamo (1921) with Lido Manetti, and L'incognita (1922). Single collaborations at Fert Righelli had once more with Diomira Jacobini and Italia Almirante Manzini. For the small company EDA, Righelli and Jacobini did the fascinating film La casa sotto la neve (1922), with a thrilling Kammerspiel-like climax when Jacobini's character and her daughter are menaced by the mother's evil suitor (Alberto Capozzi), within a house that is snowed-in.
In 1923, following the crisis that hit Italian cinema, Righelli joined the ranks of Italian directors, from Mario Almirante to Mario Bonnard, from Guido Brignone to Amleto Palermi, who decided to move to Germany. Once in Berlin, the director was hired by producer Jakob Karol and, together with Maria Jacobini, they founded the film company Maria Jacobini-Film GmbH, from which the film entitled Bohème - Künstlerliebe was released. Afterward, they collaborated with several companies such as Trianon and Phoebus. In 1925 Righelli married Jacobini, who starred in his German films Steuerlos (1924), the exotic film Orient - Die Tochter der Wüste (1924) also with the German heartthrob Harry Liedtke, Die Puppenkönigin (1925), and Der Bastard/ Il transatlantico (1925) which includes a spectacular shipwreck scene and of which a nicely tinted & toned version has been found and restored.
In the later 1920s, Righelli maintained his productivity of three to four films a year in Germany, but with other stars in the lead such as Fred Solm (Der Meister der Welt, 1927), Paul Wegener (Svengali, 1927), Mady Christians (Heimweh, 1927), Claire Rommer (Frauenraub in Marokko, 1928), Ivan Mozzhukhin (Der Präsident, 1928; Der geheime Kurier, 1928), Paul Richter (Sensation im Wintergarten, 1928), and Fritz Kortner (Die Nacht des Schreckens, 1929), while Jacobini still starred in Righelli's Fünf bange Tage (1928).
In 1930, when sound film had set in, Righelli returned to Italy to shoot the first Italian sound film, La canzone dell'amore. It starred Dria Paola as young woman who takes care of her mother's baby, causing a break with fiancé (Elio Steiner), a singer who is about to have his breakthrough. Isa Pola is the girlfriend who tries to drive a wedge between the couple. Righelli also directed the French alternative version of the film, La dernière berceuse, with Dolly Davis in the lead. The film, produced by Cines-Pittaluga, was the start of Righelli's new, prolific career in sound film.
During the 1930s, Righelli directed several comedies, some of which starred Sicilian actor Angelo Musco, in titles such as L'aria del continente (1935), Pensaci, Giacomino! (1936), Lo smemorato (1936), and Gatta ci cova (1937). He also directed Jacobini once more opposite Armando Falconi in the comedy Patatrac (1931). Although Righelli directed several Italian sound films in the 1930s and early 1940s, many were average fare comedies and dramas that didn't make history, and none were die-hard propaganda films. They starred the stars of those years, such as Gino Cervi, Germana Paolieri, and Nino Besozzi, although he often directed former stars of the silent era too, in supporting parts. In the immediate post-war period, Righelli directed Anna Magnani in two films that were a great success with the public: Abbasso la miseria! (1945) and Abbasso la ricchezza! (1946), the latter starring the great Roman actress alongside Vittorio De Sica.
Sources: Aldo Bernardini, Cinema muto italiano protagonisti, Aldo Bernardini/ Vittorio Martinelli, il cinema muto italiano, Italian Wikipedia, IMDb.