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Pub, former townhall / Pulheim / Rhein-Erft-Kreis / North Rhine-Westphalia / Germany
Album of Germany (the west): www.flickr.com/photos/tabliniumcarlson/albums/72157713209...
California Memory is one of the beautiful racehorses seeing out his retirement at Living Legends at Woodlands Historic Park. Such beautiful creatures. California Memory won over $9 million in prizemoney, starting his career in Europe but had most of his wins in Hong Kong.
I haven't worn this pendant for years, but it's finding a new role now as a photo prop. I like it because it has a matte finish, so I don't keep seeing myself or my camera in it. Definitely a bonus. :)
For this week's Macro Mondays group theme, Gold or Silver. For scale, the pendant is about 1¼" across at its widest point.
Conrail RS32 2031 stands outside the Maryland & Delaware engine house in Federalsburg, Maryland Although the 1961 Alco looks rough, the M&D forces rehabilitated it to operating condition. It’s questionable whether it ever worked on the M&D, but it was transferred to the Arkansas & Missouri where it had a long career as its 42, and later, 30.
This photo shows a number of chess pawns lined accprding to their size. It is a free and easy allegory (or maybe a harsh truth) referring to some professional career. And what is your opinion? Feel free to express it in the comment section under this photo. And don't forget to give it a little star.
Every day I have to get up early, wear the dress he chooses, have perfect makeup, cook his breakfast before he goes to work, do the shopping and house-cleaning in the dress he has chosen, cook his tea when he comes home and then perform approximately in the bedroom.
In return he gives me a little money for clothes and cosmetics.
I didn’t think this one through 😉❤️
Snapped this one on my way out the door, going to work in the morning. New suit and new purse.........I felt absolutely wonderful even though it's a Monday morning. :-)
Located between village Liepa and the primeval valley of River Gauja.
Lode clay deposit was discovered in 1953 by the geologist J.Slienis. Ten years later industrial extraction of clay for brick-making was started. The clay-pit became world famous when the geologist V.Kuršs in 1970 first time in the history of the world discovered well preserved fossils of Upper Devonian armoured fish and Strunius kurshi fish. Still nowhere else fish fossils in such good condition have been discovered; part of the fossils can be viewed in the expositions and funds of Latvian Museum of Natural History. Nowadays clay is extracted by the company „Lode“ which produces finishing, oven-chimney, and construction bricks, as well as other clay items. The Lode armoured fish deposit is a protected nature monument.
Information taken from www.entergauja.com/
Located between village Liepa and the primeval valley of River Gauja.
Lode clay deposit was discovered in 1953 by the geologist J.Slienis. Ten years later industrial extraction of clay for brick-making was started. The clay-pit became world famous when the geologist V.Kuršs in 1970 first time in the history of the world discovered well preserved fossils of Upper Devonian armoured fish and Strunius kurshi fish. Still nowhere else fish fossils in such good condition have been discovered; part of the fossils can be viewed in the expositions and funds of Latvian Museum of Natural History. Nowadays clay is extracted by the company „Lode“ which produces finishing, oven-chimney, and construction bricks, as well as other clay items. The Lode armoured fish deposit is a protected nature monument.
Information taken from www.entergauja.com/
"All right lads, today we have a very special guest to talk about the exciting career possibilities of being a bounty hunter. Now let's give a warm Stormtrooper High welcome to Mr. Boba Fett!"
(inspired by Mr. 8 Skeins of Danger's photos of Boba!) :D
(Just found out this was explored on April 27, currently ranked at #393! Woo Hoo!
Thanks from me, Boba Fett, and the Stormtroopers!) :D
Apollo Career Center in Lima, Ohio. These Ford Crown Victoria's are training cars and have been worn from years of sitting outside.
Italian postcard by Rizzoli, Milano, 1939, for Orologi e Cinturini Delgia. Photo: Studio Chaplin.
American actress Paulette Goddard (1905-1990) started her career as a fashion model and as a Ziegfeld Girl in several Broadway shows. In the 1940s, she became a major star of Paramount Pictures. She was Charlie Chaplin's leading lady in Modern Times (1936), and The Great Dictator. Goddard was nominated for an Oscar for Best Supporting Actress for So Proudly We Hail! (1943). Her husbands included Chaplin, Burgess Meredith, and Erich Maria Remarque.
Paulette Goddard was born Pauline Marion Levy in Whitestone Landing, Long Island, New York. Sources variously cite her year of birth as 1911 and 1914, and the place as Whitestone Landing, New York, USA. However, municipal employees in Ronco, Switzerland, where she died, gave her birth year of record as 1905. Goddard was the daughter of Joseph Russell Levy, the son of a prosperous Jewish cigar manufacturer from Salt Lake City, and Alta Mae Goddard, who was of Episcopalian English heritage. They married in 1908 and separated while their daughter was very young, although the divorce did not become final until 1926. According to Goddard, her father left them, but according to J. R. Levy, Alta absconded with the child. Goddard was raised by her mother, and did not meet her father again until the late 1930s, after she had become famous. To avoid a custody battle, she and her mother moved often during her childhood, even relocating to Canada at one point. Goddard began modeling at an early age to support her mother and herself, working for Saks Fifth Avenue, Hattie Carnegie, and others. An important figure in her childhood was her great uncle, Charles Goddard, the owner of the American Druggists Syndicate. He played a central role in Goddard's career, introducing her to Broadway impresario Florenz Ziegfeld. She made her stage debut as a dancer in Ziegfeld's summer revue, 'No Foolin' (1926), which was also the first time that she used the stage name Paulette Goddard. Ziegfeld hired her for another musical, 'Rio Rita', which opened in February 1927, but she left the show after only three weeks to appear in the play 'The Unconquerable Male', produced by Archie Selwyn. It was, however, a flop and closed after only three days following its premiere in Atlantic City. Soon after the play closed, Goddard was introduced to the much older lumber tycoon Edgar James, president of the Southern Lumber Company, by Charles Goddard. She married him in June 1927 in Rye, New York, but the marriage was short. Goddard was granted a divorce in Reno, Nevada, in 1929, receiving a divorce settlement of $375,000. Tony Fontana at IMDb: "A stunning natural beauty, Paulette could mesmerize any man she met, a fact she was well aware of. "
Paulette Goddard first visited Hollywood in 1929, when she appeared as an uncredited extra in two films, the Laurel and Hardy short film Berth Marks (Lewis R. Foster, 1929), and George Fitzmaurice's drama The Locked Door (1929). Following her divorce, she briefly visited Europe before returning to Hollywood in late 1930 with her mother. Her second attempt at acting was no more successful than the first, as she landed work only as an extra. In 1930, she signed her first film contract with producer Samuel Goldwyn to appear as a Goldwyn Girl in Whoopee! (Thornton Freeland, 1930) with Eddie Cantor. She also appeared in City Streets (Rouben Mamoulian, 1931) with Gary Cooper, Ladies of the Big House (Marion Gering, 1931) starring Sylvia Sidney, and The Girl Habit (Edward F. Cline, 1931) for Paramount, and The Mouthpiece (James Flood, Elliott Nugent, 1932) for Warners. Goldwyn and she did not get along, and she began working for Hal Roach Studios, appearing in a string of uncredited supporting roles for the next four years, including Young Ironsides (James Parrott, 1932) with Charley Chase, and Pack Up Your Troubles (1932) with Laurel and Hardy. One of her bigger roles in that period was as a blond 'Goldwyn Girl' in the Eddie Cantor film The Kid from Spain (Leo McCarey, 1932). Goldwyn also used Goddard in The Bowery (Raoul Walsh, 1933) with Wallace Beery, Roman Scandals (Frank Tuttle, 1933), and Kid Millions (Roy Del Ruth, 1934) with Eddie Cantor. The year she signed with Goldwyn, Goddard began dating Charlie Chaplin, a relationship that received substantial attention from the press. They were reportedly married in secret in Canton, China, in June 1936. It marked a turning point in Goddard's career when Chaplin cast her as his leading lady in his box office hit, Modern Times (1936). Her role as 'The Gamin', an orphan girl who runs away from the authorities and becomes The Tramp's companion, was her first credited film appearance and garnered her mainly positive reviews, Frank S. Nugent of The New York Times describing her as "the fitting recipient of the great Charlot's championship". Following the success of Modern Times, Chaplin planned other projects with Goddard in mind as a co-star, but he worked slowly, and Goddard worried that the public might forget about her if she did not continue to make regular film appearances. She signed a contract with David O. Selznick and appeared with Janet Gaynor in the comedy The Young in Heart (Richard Wallace, 1938) before Selznick lent her to MGM to appear in two films. The first of these, Dramatic School (Robert B. Sinclair, 1938), co-starred Luise Rainer, but the film received mediocre reviews and failed to attract an audience. Her next film, The Women (George Cukor, 1939), was a success. With an all-female cast headed by Norma Shearer, Joan Crawford, and Rosalind Russell, the film's supporting role of Miriam Aarons was played by Goddard. Pauline Kael later wrote of Goddard, "she is a stand-out. fun."
David O' Selznick was pleased with Paulette Goddard's performances, particularly her work in The Young in Heart, and considered her for the role of Scarlett O'Hara in Gone With the Wind (Victor Fleming, 1939). Initial screen tests convinced Selznick and director George Cukor that Goddard would require coaching to be effective in the role, but that she showed promise, and she was the first actress given a Technicolor screen test. After he was introduced to Vivien Leigh, he wrote to his wife that Leigh was a "dark horse" and that his choice had "narrowed down to Paulette, Jean Arthur, Joan Bennett, and Vivien Leigh". After a series of tests with Leigh that pleased both Selznick and Cukor, Selznick cancelled the further tests that had been scheduled for Goddard, and the part was given to Leigh. Goddard's next film, The Cat and the Canary (Elliott Nugent, 1939) with Bob Hope, was a turning point in the careers of both actors. The success of the film established her as a genuine star. Her performance won her a ten-year contract with Paramount Studios, which was one of the premier studios of the day. They promptly were re-teamed in The Ghost Breakers (George Marshall, 1940), again a huge hit. Goddard starred with Chaplin again in his film The Great Dictator (1940). In 1942, Goddard was granted a Mexican divorce from Chaplin. The couple split amicably, with Chaplin agreeing to a generous settlement. At Paramount, Goddard was used by Cecil B. De Mille in the action epic North West Mounted Police (1940), playing the second female lead. She was Fred Astaire's leading lady in the acclaimed musical Second Chorus/Swing it (H.C. Potter, 1940), where she met actor Burgess Meredith, her third husband. Goddard made Pot o' Gold (George Marshall, 1941), a comedy with James Stewart, then supported Charles Boyer and Olivia de Havilland in Hold Back the Dawn (Mitchell Leisen, 1941), from a script by Wilder and Brackett, directed by Mitchell Leisen. Goddard was teamed with Hope for a third time in Nothing But the Truth (Elliott Nugent, 1942), then made The Lady Has Plans (Sidney Lanfield, 1942), a comedy with Ray Milland. She co-starred with Milland and John Wayne in Reap the Wild Wind (Cecil B. DeMille, 1942), playing the lead, a Scarlett O'Hara type character. The film was a huge hit. Goddard did The Forest Rangers (George Marshall, 1942) with Fred MacMurray. One of her better-remembered film appearances was in the variety musical Star Spangled Rhythm (George Marshall, 1943), in which she sang "A Sweater, a Sarong, and a Peekaboo Bang" with Dorothy Lamour and Veronica Lake.
Paulette Goddard received one Oscar nomination for Best Supporting Actress for So Proudly We Hail! (Mark Sandrich, 1943) opposite Claudette Colbert and Veronica Lake. She didn't win, but it solidified her as a top draw. Goddard was teamed with Fred MacMurray in the delightful comedy Standing Room Only (Sidney Lanfield, 1944) and Sonny Tufts in I Love a Soldier (Mark Sandrich, 1944). In May 1944, she married Burgess Meredith at David O. Selznick's home in Beverly Hills. Goddard's most successful film was Kitty (Mitchell Leisen, 1945), in which she played the title role. Denny Jackson/Robert Sieger at IMDb: "The film was a hit with moviegoers, as she played an ordinary English woman transformed into a duchess. The film was filled with plenty of comedy, dramatic and romantic scenes that appealed to virtually everyone." In The Diary of a Chambermaid (1946), Goddard starred with husband Burgess Meredith under the direction of Jean Renoir. It was made for United Artists. At Paramount she did Suddenly It's Spring (Mitchell Leisen, 1947) with Fred MacMurray, and De Mille's 18th century romantic drama Unconquered (Cecil B. DeMille, 1947), with Cary Grant. During the Hollywood Blacklist, when she and blacklisted husband Meredith were mobbed by a baying crowd screaming "Communists!" on their way to a premiere, Goddard is said to have turned to her husband and said, "Shall I roll down the window and hit them with my diamonds, Bugsy?" In 1947, she made An Ideal Husband in Britain for Alexander Korda, and was accompanied on a publicity trip to Brussels by Clarissa Spencer-Churchill, niece of Sir Winston Churchill and future wife of future Prime Minister Anthony Eden. She divorced Meredith in June 1949, and also left Paramount. In 1949, she formed Monterey Pictures with John Steinbeck. Goddard starred in Anna Lucasta (Irving Rapper, 1949), then went to Mexico for The Torch (Emilio Fernández, 1950). In England, she was in Babes in Bagdad (Edgar G. Ulmer, 1952), then she went to Hollywood for Vice Squad (Arnold Laven, 1953) with Edward G. Robinson, and Charge of the Lancers (William Castle, 1954) with Jean-Pierre Aumont. Her last starring role was in the English production A Stranger Came Home/The Unholy Four (Terence Fisher, 1954).
Paulette Goddard began appearing in summer stock and on television, guest starring on episodes of Sherlock Holmes, an adaptation of The Women, this time playing the role of Sylvia Fowler, The Errol Flynn Theatre, The Joseph Cotten Show, and The Ford Television Theatre. She was in an episode of Adventures in Paradise and a TV version of The Phantom. After her marriage to Erich Maria Remarque in 1958, Goddard largely retired from acting and moved to Ronco sopra Ascona, Switzerland. In 1964, she attempted a comeback in films with a supporting role in the Italian film Gli indifferenti/Time of Indifference (Francesco Maselli, 1964), starring Claudia Cardinale and Rod Steiger, which was her last feature film. After Remarque's death in 1970, she made one last attempt at acting, when she accepted a small role in an episode of the TV series The Snoop Sisters, The Female Instinct (Leonards Stern, 1972) with Helen Hayes and Mildred Natwick. Upon Remarque's death, Goddard inherited much of his money and several important properties across Europe, including a wealth of contemporary art, which augmented her own long-standing collection. During this period, her talent at accumulating wealth became a byword among the old Hollywood élite. During the 1980s, she became a fairly well known (and highly visible) socialite in New York City, appearing covered with jewels at many high-profile cultural functions with several well-known men, including Andy Warhol, with whom she sustained a friendship for many years until his death in 1987. Paulette Goddard underwent invasive treatment for breast cancer in 1975, successfully by all accounts. In 1990, she died at her home in Switzerland from heart failure while under respiratory support due to emphysema, She is buried in Ronco Village Cemetery, next to Remarque and her mother. Goddard had no children. She became a stepmother to Charles Chaplin's two sons, Charles Chaplin Jr. and Sydney Chaplin, while she and Charlie were married. In his memoirs, 'My Father Charlie Chaplin' (1960), Charles Jr. describes her as a lovely, caring and intelligent woman throughout the book. In October 1944, she suffered the miscarriage of a son with Burgess Meredith. Goddard, whose own formal education did not go beyond high school, bequeathed US$20 million to New York University (NYU) in New York City.
Sources: Tony Fontana (IMDb), Denny Jackson / Robert Sieger (IMDb), Wikipedia and IMDb.
And, please check out our blog European Film Star Postcards.
Belgian postcard by Nieuwe Merksemsche Chocolaterie S.P.R.I., Mersem (Anvers). Photo: Universal.
Dark-haired Hollywood beauty Yvonne De Carlo (1922–2007) was a Canadian American actress, singer, and dancer whose career in film, television, and musical theatre spanned six decades. From the 1950s on, she also starred in British and Italian films. She achieved her greatest popularity as the ghoulish matriarch Lily in the TV sitcom The Munsters (1964-1966).
Yvonne De Carlo was born Margaret Yvonne Middleton in 1922 in West Point Grey (now part of Vancouver), British Columbia, Canada. She was the only child of William Middleton, an Australian-born salesman, and Marie DeCarlo, a French-born aspiring actress. Her father deserted the home, leaving her mother to make a living as a waitress. When De Carlo was ten her mother enrolled her in a local dance school and also saw that she studied dramatics. De Carlo and her mother made several trips to Los Angeles to seek fame and fortune in Hollywood. In 1940, she was first runner-up to Miss Venice Beach, and she also came fifth in the 1940s Miss California competition. A year later, she landed a bit part as a bathing beauty in Harvard, Here I Come (Lew Landers, 1941). She also appeared in the three-minute Soundies musical, The Lamp of Memory (1942), shown in coin-operated movie jukeboxes. Other roles were slow to follow, and De Carlo took a job in the chorus line of Earl Carroll. During World War II she performed for U.S. servicemen and received many letters from GIs. She got her big break when she was chosen over a reported 20,000 girls to play the lead role as a European seductress in the Technicolor spectacle Salome, Where She Danced (Charles Lamont, 1945), with Rod Cameron and Walter Slezak. She played a dancer during the Austrian-Prussian war who is forced to flee her country after she is accused of being a spy and ends up in a lawless western town in Arizona. Producer Walter Wanger described her as "the most beautiful girl in the world." Though not a critical success, it was a box office favourite, and the heavily-promoted De Carlo was hailed as an up-and-coming star. Universal signed her to a long-term contract. De Carlo was given a small role in the prison film Brute Force (Jules Dassin, 1947), starring Burt Lancaster. Two years later she was again cast opposite Lancaster in her first important role in the classic Film Noir Criss Cross (Robert Siodmak, 1949). Claudio Carvalho at IMDb: "Burt Lancaster has an outstanding performance in the role of an honest man obsessed with his former wife, who becomes a criminal trying to regain the love of his fickle ex-wife. Yvonne De Carlo is also perfect and very beautiful, in the role of a cold and manipulative woman, being a perfect 'femme-fatale'." However, Universal preferred to cast De Carlo in more conventional fare, such as Casbah (John Berry, 1948) a musical remake of the 1938 film Algiers, the adventure film River Lady (George Sherman, 1948), and Buccaneer's Girl (Frederick de Cordova, 1950). In the latter, she played a New Orleans singer who becomes involved with a Pirate Lord (Philip Friend).
When Yvonne De Carlo was in England making Hotel Sahara (Ken Annakin, 1951), she asked Universal for a release of her contract even though she still had three months to go. The studio agreed. De Carlo had always travelled extensively to promote her films and her appearances were widely publicised. In 1951 she became the first American star to visit Israel. De Carlo regularly played in European films from now on. She starred in the British comedy The Captain's Paradise (Anthony Kimmins, 1953), about a captain of a ferry boat between the restricted British colony in Gibraltar and Spanish Morocco (Alec Guinness) who keeps two wives in separate ports. De Carlo of course played the hot-blooded mistress, Nita in Tangiers. She persuaded director Anthony Kimmins to talk Alec Guinness into doing the mambo with her in a nightclub sequence. Guinness, not usually thought of as a physical actor, consented to a week's worth of dance lessons from De Carlo and the sequence is one of the film's highlights. In England, Yvonne De Carlo also co-starred with David Niven in the comedy Happy Ever After (Mario Zampi, 1954). Her film career reached its peak when director Cecil B. DeMille cast her as Sephora, the wife of Moses (Charlton Heston) in his biblical epic The Ten Commandments (1956). It was to be her most prominent role. She later played a lead performance in the Civil War drama Band of Angels (Raoul Walsh, 1957) with Clark Gable, starred as Mary Magdalene in the Italian biblical epic La spada e la croce/The Sword and the Cross (Carlo Ludovico Bragaglia, 1958), with Jorge Mistral and Rossana Podestà, and had a supporting role in the Western McLintock! (Andrew V. McLaglen, 1963) featuring John Wayne. In 1964, De Carlo was deeply in debt, her film career was over and she was suffering from depression. Then, she was offered the role of Lily Munster, the wife of Herman Munster, in the legendary TV sitcom The Munsters (1964-1966). The Munsters are a weird but honest family. Herman, the father (Fred Gwynne) is Frankenstein's monster. Lily, his wife (Yvonne De Carlo), and the cigar-chomping Grandpa, her father (Al Lewis) are vampires. Their little son Eddie (Butch Patrick) is a werewolf. Their niece Marilyn (Pat Priest) is the only normal one. She is the ugly duck of the family. The sitcom went on the air in 1964 and lasted only two seasons, but achieved a kind of pop-culture immortality in decades of reruns and movie and television spinoffs. Wolfgang Saxon in The New York Times: "In her cape and robes and with a streak of white in her black hair, Miss De Carlo’s Lily was a glamorous ghoul and a kind of Bride of Frankenstein as a homemaker, “dusting” her gothic mansion at 1313 Mockingbird Lane with a vacuum cleaner set on reverse. The humor mostly derived from the family members’ oblivious belief that they were no different from their neighbors." After the show's cancellation, De Carlo reprised the role as Lily Munster in the Technicolor film Munster, Go Home! (Earl Bellamy, 1966). After 1967, De Carlo became increasingly active in musicals, appearing in off-Broadway productions of Pal Joey and Catch Me If You Can. Her defining stage role was as Carlotta Campion in the original Broadway cast of Stephen Sondheim's musical Follies (1971-1972). Playing a washed-up star at a reunion of old theater colleagues, she introduced the song I'm Still Here, which would become well-known. Yvonne De Carlo married stuntman Robert Drew Morgan, whom she met on the set of the Western Shotgun (Lesley Selander, 1955). They had two sons, Bruce Ross (1956) and Michael (1957-1997). After Bob Morgan's untimely accident, De Carlo was dismissed from her contract at Metro-Goldwyn-Mayer in 1960. Morgan became an alcoholic and they divorced in 1974. De Carlo kept appearing in films and TV series. After her role in the TV Movie The Barefoot Executive (Susan Seidelman, 1995), she retired from acting at age 72. In 2007, she died from heart failure in Los Angeles. De Carlo was 84.
Sources: Wolfgang Saxon (The New York Times), IMDb, and Wikipedia.
And, please check out our blog European Film Star Postcards.
I love the Lady Golfer, and Pilot/Flight Attendant?! And the Packaging?! Do my eyes deceive me or are they boxed???
These new fashion separates are so damn cute. Images were found on the Walmart website. Unfortunately I don't know when these will be available(Hopefully soon)
Why to choose an ordinary job/Career?
Want to work with brands like #MercedesBenz,#Lamborghini,#Ferrari ?
To grab the opportunity visit @ bit.ly/23o1j9Q
French collectors card in the series 'Portrait de Stars; L'encyclopédie du Cinéma' by Edito Service, 1993. Photo: Collection Christophe L. Irene Papas in Alexis Zorbas/Zorba the Greek (Michael Cacoyannis, 1964).
Irene Papas (1926) is a Greek actress of international fame. In a career spanning more than fifty years, she starred in over seventy films, including such classics as The Guns of Navarone and Zorba the Greek. Papas also portrayed ancient Greek heroines as Helen in The Trojan Women, Clytemnestra in Iphigenia, Electra and Antigone.
Irene Papas (Greek Ειρήνη Παππά) was born as Eiríni Lelékou in Chilimodion, outside Corinth in Greece in 1926. At 12, she enrolled in a dramatic school. She spent her first professional years as a singer-dancer in stage reviews and as a radio vocalist In 1943 she married director Alkis Papas. Four years later the marriage ended in a divorce. She kept his name. Papas rose to stardom acting in Greek films as the drama Hamenoi angeloi/Fallen Angels (Nikos Tsiforos, 1948) and Nekri politeia/Dead City (Frixos Iliadis, 1952). In Italy, she played in the crime comedy Le Infedeli/Unfaithfuls (Mario Monicelli, Steno, 1953) with Gina Lollobrigida, the American-Italian Film Noir The Man from Cairo (Ray Enright, 1954) starring George Raft, and the epic adventures Teodora, imperatrice di Bisanzio/Theodora, Slave Empress (Riccardo Freda, 1954) featuring Gianna Maria Canale, and Attila, Flagello di Dio/Attila (Pietro Francisci, William Witney, 1954) with Anthony Quinn and Sophia Loren. The next stop was Hollywood, where Papas appeared for MGM in the big-budget western Tribute to a Bad Man (Robert Wise, 1956) as the love interest of James Cagney. In Athens, she was trained in the classics of Greece's Golden Age. She played all the major tragic stage roles, including Medea and Electra. In addition, she was active in the contemporary productions put on by the Greek Popular Theatre in the late 1950s. She also featured in the film Bouboulina (Kostas Andritsos, 1959) about the Greek heroine of 1821 (when Greek fought the Turks). Papas became best known to international filmgoers for her portrayals of gutsy resistance fighter Maria Pappadimos in the major box-office hit Guns of Navarone (J. Lee Thompson, 1961); the widow in Alexis Zorbas/Zorba the Greek (Michael Cacoyannis, 1964); and the wife of Yves Montand in the political thriller Z (Costa-Gravas, 1968), which won the Oscar for Best Foreign Film of 1969. In between, she starred in film adaptations of the classic Greek tragedies Antigoni/Antigone (George Tzavellas, Dinos Katsouridis, 1961) and Ilektra/Electra (Michael Cacoyannis, 1962), and she made her Broadway debut in 'That Summer, That Fall' (1967).
Irene Papas is an occasional singer. In 1969, she recorded 11 songs of Mikis Theodorakis, for the album Irene Papas Songs of Theodorakis. Papas and Theodorakis had worked together in 1964 on Alexis Zorbas/Zorba the Greek. In 1971 she contributed to a song of the concept album 666 of the Greek rock band Aphrodite's Child, with singer Demis Roussos and Vangelis Papathanassiou, who later became an Oscar-winning composer. With Vangelis, she also recorded 'Odes' (1976), containing eight Greek folk songs, and 'Rapsodies' (1986), an electronic rendition of seven Byzantine liturgical hymns. The songs and hymns were re-arranged by Vangelis. Both records have gained the status of classical music in Greece and are very popular around the Greek Orthodox Easter. In the cinema, she appeared as Catherine of Aragon in Anne of the Thousand Days (Charles Jarrott, 1969), opposite Richard Burton and Geneviève Bujold. She also delivered award-winning performances in the ambitious Euripides adaptations directed by Michael Cacoyannis, playing Helen in The Trojan Women (1972) opposite Katharine Hepburn and Vanessa Redgrave, and Clytemnestra in Iphigenia (1977). In 1976, she starred opposite Anthony Quinn in Mohammad, Messenger of God/The Message (Moustapha Akkad, 1976) about the origin of Islam, and the message of Mohammad. With Quinn, she reunited in Lion of the Desert (Moustapha Akkad, 1982). Other interesting films were the Italian biopic, Cristo si e fermato a Eboli/Christ Stopped at Eboli (Francesco Rosi, 1979) about prominent anti-fascist author Carlo Levi (Gian-Maria Volonte), and the Gabriel Garcia Marquez adaptations Erendira (Ruy Guerra, 1983), and Cronaca di una Morte Annunciata/Chronicle of a Death Foretold (Francesco Rosi, 1987) starring Rupert Everett and Ornella Muti. Her last film appearances were as Christian Bale’s mother in Captain Corelli's Mandolin (John Madden, 2001), and as a tourist on a cruise ship in Um Filme Falado/A Talking Picture (Manoel de Oliveira, 2003) with Catherine Deneuve. In 2002, she was named Europe's woman, a title given to women who offer a lot to European civilization. In her speech, she sang a Greek folklore song. According to IMDb, she has no intention of returning to Greece to play in the theatre, because she has suffered from continuous negative criticisms. Irene Papas lives in Greece, Spain, and Italy. In 2018 it was announced she had been suffering from Alzheimer's disease for the past five years. Irene Papas is the aunt of director-producer Manousos Manousakis and actor Aias Manthopoulos.
Sources: AllMovie, Wikipedia, and IMDb.
And, please check out our blog European Film Star Postcards.
German postcard by H.S.K.-Verlag, Kölm (Cologne), no. 505. Photo: Paramount. Ray Milland in Copper Canyon (John Farrow, 1950).
British actor and director Ray Milland (1905-1986) had a screen career that ran from 1929 to 1985. He appeared in many Hollywood movies as the archetypal, unflappable British gentleman. Milland is best remembered for his gut-wrenching, Academy Award-winning portrayal of an alcoholic writer in The Lost Weekend (1945), for the murder-plotting husband in Dial M for Murder (1954), and as Oliver Barrett III in Love Story (1970).
Ray Milland was born Reginald Alfred John Truscott-Jones on a mountain called Cymla, above the town of Neath in Wales in 1905. Milland was the son of Alfred Jones and Elizabeth Annie (née Truscott). As a child, he took the name of his stepfather, Mullane, and was known in his early career as Jack Mullane. He later took his stage name Raymond Milland from the flat area of land called the mill lands in Neath, which he remembered fondly from his youth. In 1925, Milland enlisted as a guardsman with the Royal Household Cavalry in London. As part of his training, he became skilled in fencing, boxing, horsemanship and marksmanship. An expert shot, he became a member of his company's rifle team, winning many prestigious competitions, including the Bisley Match in England. When his duty service was completed in 1928, Milland stumbled into acting when a British filmmaker spotted him at a party and offered the 22-year-old a bit part in the romance The Plaything (Castleton Knight, 1929). More small and big roles in the British cinema and on stage followed. Among his British films were the silent ‘backstage’ drama Piccadilly (Ewald André Dupont, 1929) starring Anna May Wong, the adventure The Flying Scotsman (Castleton Knight, 1929) and the drama The Informer (Arthur Robison, 1929). Raymond Milland was discovered by a Hollywood talent scout while performing on the stage in London, and travelled to America under a short-term contract with MGM. MGM shortened his first name to Ray and continued casting the acting novice in minor supporting roles. MGM agreed to loan him out for more substantial parts in Will Rogers' Ambassador Bill (Sam Taylor, 1931) at Fox in which he tries to overthrow the boy-king of a fictional European country, and Warner Bros.' Blonde Crazy (Roy Del Ruth, 1931) in which he competes with con-artist James Cagney for Joan Blondell's affections.
When his contract with MGM expired, Ray Milland bounced around taking whatever roles he could get, including a supporting part in Fox's Charlie Chan in London (Eugene J. Forde, 1934). He returned to England for roles in This Is the Life (Albert de Courville, 1933) with Gordon Harker and the comedy Orders is Orders (Walter Forde, 1934), a satire on Hollywood movie-making. Finally, based on the strength of two films he made with Carole Lombard - Bolero (Wesley Ruggles, 1934) and We’re Not Dressing (Norman Taurog, 1934) - as well as the endorsement of his leading lady, Paramount Pictures signed Milland to a long-term contract. He would remain with the studio for some twenty years. Charming and debonair, he can be seen as suave, self-assured romantic leading man in a number of excellent drawing-room comedies, mysteries and adventures, including The Big Broadcast of 1937 (Mitchell Leisen, 1936), The Jungle Princess (William Thiele, 1936) featuring Dorothy Lamour, Beau Geste (William Wellman, 1939) with Gary Cooper, and I Wanted Wings (Mitchell Leisen, 1941) with Veronica Lake. At Film Reference, Frank Thompson writes: “The quintessential Milland performances of the ‘leading man’ variety are contained in Leisen's delightful Easy Living and Kitty. The darker, more sinister side of his personality first came to the fore in Farrow's Alias Nick Beal, a film in which Milland plays the Devil himself.” Easy Living (Mitchell Leisen, 1937) was a depression-era screwball comedy and social satire written by Preston Sturges and starring Jean Arthur. Reel Classics calls it “an often-overlooked delight”. Kitty (1945, Mitchell Leisen) was a variation on Pygmalion, in which a London aristocrat (Milland) takes it upon himself to make a lady of a guttersnipe (Paulette Goddard). Milland had a terrible accident during the filming of Hotel Imperial (Henry Hathaway, 1939) with Isa Miranda, when, taking his horse over a jump, the saddle-girth broke and he landed head-first on a pile of bricks. His most serious injuries were a concussion that left him unconscious for 24 hours, a 3-inch gash in his skull that took 9 stitches to close, and numerous fractures and lacerations on his left hand. When the Second World War began, Milland tried to enlist in the U.S. Army Air Forces, but was rejected because of his impaired left hand. He worked as a civilian flight instructor for the Army, and toured with a United Service Organisation (USO) South Pacific troupe in 1944.
Ray Milland had made over 60 feature films by the time he won an Oscar for his portrayal of an alcoholic trying to kick the booze in Billy Wilder's The Lost Weekend (1945). It would be pinnacle of Ray Milland's career and an acknowledgement of his serious dramatic abilities. The surprise shown by the critical establishment at Milland's proficiency in the role suggests that nothing much had ever been expected of him. Milland was the first Welsh actor to ever win an Oscar. He was also the first actor not to have spoken a single word during his acceptance speech, preferring to simply bow his appreciation before casually walking to the stage exit. For this performance, he was also given an award at the first Cannes Film Festival. Five years later, he gave a strong performance in Close to My Heart (William Keighley, 1951), starring with Gene Tierney as a couple trying to adopt a child. As Milland grew older and his value as a romantic lead began to wane, the more sinister aspects of this self-assuredness became more evident. In 1954, he starred as the suave and mannerly accomplice opposite Grace Kelly in Dial M for Murder (Alfred Hitchcock, 1954). Other films that exploited the murderous glint in Milland's eloquent eyes include The Thief (Russel Rouse, 1951) a Film Noir without any dialogue, and The Girl in the Red Velvet Swing (Richard Fleischer, 1955) with Joan Collins. He made many television appearances. He starred as a professor in the CBS sitcom Meet Mr. McNutley (1953-1955). The program was renamed in its second season as The Ray Milland Show. From 1959–1960, he starred in the CBS detective series Markham. In the late 1960s, he hosted rebroadcasts of certain episodes of the syndicated western anthology series, Death Valley Days under the title Trails West.
In 1955, Ray Milland started directing films, such as the western A Man Alone (Ray Milland, 1955) with Raymond Burr, and the well-paced espionager Lisbon (1956, Ray Milland) with Maureen O’Hara for Republic Pictures that he also produced and starred in. He did it with surprising proficiency, but the films failed to make him successful. He achieved more success with directing for television. According to Kit and Morgan Benson at Find A Grave, he “was considered a solid and capable director and producer.” Milland returned as a film character actor in such fascinating low-budget horror films as The Premature Burial (Roger Corman, 1962) and The Man with the X-ray Eyes (Roger Corman, 1963), the latter providing Milland with the wittiest, most energetic role of his later career. He appeared in the TV classic Daughter of the Mind (Walter Grauman, 1969) in which he was reunited with Gene Tierney, and he played Ryan O'Neal's father in the hit tearjerker Love Story (Arthur Hiller, 1970). He can also be seen in such dreadful horror films as The Thing with Two Heads (Lee Frost, 1972), the British Crazy House/The House in Nightmare Park (Peter Sykes, 1973), and Terror in the Wax Museum (Georg Fenady). One of the best of that bad lot is Frogs (George McCowan, 1972), a surprisingly enjoyable entry from the ‘nature-run-amok’ horror subgenre. Milland wrote an autobiography, Wide Eyed in Babylon, published in 1974. Toward the end of his life, he guest starred in TV series as Battlestar Galactica (Glen A. Larson, 1978-1979) and the Harold Robbins’ adaptation The Dream Merchants (Vincent Sherman, 1980). His last film was the Spanish fantasy-adventure The Sea Serpent (Gregory Greens, 1986) with Timothy Bottoms, after which his declining health forced him to retire. A book-loving homebody, Milland kept away from the Hollywood glitter and was rarely mentioned in the gossip columns. At 81, he died of lung cancer in Torrance, California in 1986. He was survived by his wife, Muriel ‘Mal’ Weber, to whom he had been married since 1932. They had a son, Daniel, and an adopted daughter, Victoria. Frank Thompson at Film Reference: “Hollywood never quite knew what it had in Ray Milland, but he continuously showed himself to be an adventurous artist, always interested in exposing his established image to radical and surprising lights.”
Sources: Frank Thompson (Film Reference), Lynn Dougherty (Classic Movie Favorites), Kit and Morgan Benson (Find A Grave), Reel Classics, AllMovie, Wikipedia, and IMDb.
And, please check out our blog European Film Star Postcards.
My Career Path
When I graduated from high school in 2003 I was a very confused young man. I did not know much about life but I knew few things about Jesus Christ. I did not have street smarts—I matured very late!--but I knew few Biblical principles. One of the things I knew was that God has a plan for my life and being a new high school graduate I wanted to know His will for my career. So I decided after high school I would work wherever until I discern my God-given talents, and once I know His will for my career then I would pursue getting an education that prepares me for that career path. My high school teachers did not understand why would a student whose overall average never dropped below 90% would want to be a general labourer.
Anyway, after graduating I went to few temporary work agencies to find work. I had to buy steel toed safety shoes because most general labour jobs require them. Pretty soon I found myself working in the warehouse of a clothing company. My boss was a Chinese man who had spent 30 years working there, and my supervisor was an older Chinese man who been working there for many years too. They soon liked me and hired me after 6 months, while temporary workers who have been working there for years were still working for the agency. Two months after being hired the company had their annual wages raise and I did not qualify for it because I had to be working as a full-timer for a full year to qualify for it. But my boss called me into his office and told me that he liked the work I did and wanted to help me and so he gave me a 6% raise which I really appreciated. When I left the office the senior full time workers asked me how much I had gotten for a raise so I told them 6% and suddenly they disliked me! I did not know why their attitude changed toward me until the next day when I found out that the reason was becausethat all full-time workers had gotten only a 3% raise. Like I said, I was very naive and I did not know better as not to disclose this information. Anyway, in the next 3 years my boss had given me about 45% raise, while they had gotten anywhere between 1-3% annual raise.
The reason my boss liked me is that I did every and anything without complaining—I simply did whatever they asked me no matter how menial it was. The Bible says in Colossians 3:23, “Whatever you do, work at it with all your heart, as working for the Lord, not for men.” And my mottos were, “I get paid by hour so I work by hour”, and, “There is a reason why it is called ‘general labour’”—so I never complained about the type of work I had to do or the pay because when I accepted a general labour position I understood two things: I will get paid little, and I will have to do a physical and dirty work.
Anyway, my boss realized I loved to fix mechanical things: paper shredder, lift truck, a table, a cart. So over 3 years he kept asking me to fix broken things around the warehouse, and I realized how much I loved working with gears and mechanical things in general. These experiences brought back memories of how in my teenage years in Iraq I spent all my summer breaks building remote controlled cars, airplanes, and making toy guns and foosball tables, and so on! So I knew I wanted to become a mechanical engineer and therefore 4 years after working in the warehouse I started studying mechanical engineer at UofT.
What I really want to draw attention to is God’s goodness. See, I did not choose the warehouse I worked at but our heavenly Father put me in the right place working for the right boss. People told me that I was working in the wrong place because of their limited wisdom, but God in His infinite wisdom knew what He was doing. God knew what I needed, and so He put me where I needed to be. Being a stubborn person I knew better than listening to people—no matter how well intended their intentions were—because I knew few things:
1) God is real—He exists! (Hebrews 11:6)
2) He is the God of the Bible and I know Him because He revealed Himself in the person of Jesus Christ. Whenever I wondered, “Who is this God I am waiting for?” I realized I knew who He is because I knew who Jesus Christ is. (John 14:9)
3) He is a good, loving, faithful, wise and powerful God, and He is my heavenly Father.
4) He has His own timing and ways of doing things.
So working at the warehouse was His way of helping me find my God-given talent. When I applied to UofT I was told that it was a good thing I had applied then because any high school diplomas older than 4 years old would not be accepted; I did not know that but God did and that was His timing.
***
I worked at the warehouse for 2 summer breaks while I was a student at university. In the third summer, in 2010, the clothing company was going through bankruptcy and so they did not have work for me. I needed work because I needed money for the next school year so I applied to some summer engineering internship. I got an interview so I went to it. The interview lasted 2.5 hours and it was by far the worst interview I had ever heard of! It was so bad that it did not matter what I answered to the questions of the engineer who was interviewing me, the answers were wrong! I mean, he even criticized the font size I used in my resume—which was 11 points instead of 12! I wanted to be out of there so bad, and I hoped he would not hire me because I was too embarrassed to see him again! At the end of the interview he told me that his career was delayed 4 years also because when he graduated, some 30 years earlier, Canada was going through a recession and he could not find a job for 4 years.
After the interview my sister asked, “How did the interview go?” And I told her, “Don’t even ask. If he hired me it would truly be a miracle!” And she said, “That’s right. We have a God who works on our behave.” Two weeks later he called me offering the job alongside one of my classmates. He initially just wanted to hire one student—which was my classmate--but decided to hire me anyway. My boss (the interviewer) turned out to be a very cool and nice man who I learned a lot from. I think I did a good job there and I was offered a full-year internship but I really wanted to go back to school and finish it as soon as possible. Of course this 4 months long engineering experience helped me a lot to include an actual engineering experience on my resume.
For some reason I never felt qualified to do that job, even though I believe I did a good job. I think it is because the engineer who hired me did so more because he felt sorry for me than needed my services. (I think he also hired me because he was able to associate with the experience of having your career delayed 4 years.) I want you to keep this in mind because I will touch back on this point later.
After graduating in 2011 I was desperate for a job, any job, and after few months I found myself working at a government company. I worked there for 6 months and I did not like the job even though the people were nice and the pay was good. My task in the last 2 weeks was so boring that on the last day I was afraid my boss would extend my contract! I so wanted to be out of there even though I knew that would mean I would be unemployed and without money!
After a couple of weeks and getting bored of staying at home I prayed a short and simple prayer asking for two things:
1) I told God that the point of studying mechanical engineering was not to become any engineer or to make money, but to put the talents He had given me into practice. That means I want a design position, and engineering is such a broad field that you can do so many things that are not related to your God-given talents.
2) I told God that I wanted to work at a company that wants to hire. A company that believes I am valuable to it. A company where I feel appreciated.
Few weeks ago I saw this job advertisement on the internet seeking a mechanical designer at an office furniture company. The job required the candidate to have 2-3 years experience and knowledge of sheet metal and a design software called AutoCAD. I did not have any of the requirements so I did not apply to that position, and I can still remember thinking, “This sounds like the job I want, but too bad I don’t qualify otherwise I would’ve applied to it!” Next day a staffing agency called me and told me to come see them about that same position. I was very surprised and so I went to the agency. I was so surprised by the whole ordeal that at the end of the interview with the agency personnel I asked him, “How did you get my resume?” He looked surprise and said, “What do you mean? You sent it to me!” I am sure I sent him my resume and I don’t remember it because I applied to quite few jobs, but the strange thing is that I only remember not sending the resume!
I told the agency that I have no experience in design and I have no knowledge with sheet metal or AutoCAD, but they told me it is ok because the company wants to interview me. So I went to the interview and half way through the interview the senior engineer and hiring manager asked me, “When can you start?” And I was taken aback by his question because they usually ask that question after the interview is over and they usually ask it very casually like, “If you are the successful candidate, what date are you available to start?” So I asked, “Me?” And he laughed and said, “Yes!” And his expression was like, “Who else?!” And I felt like the senior engineer really wanted to hire me, not because he felt sorry for me, but because he believed I can be a valuable member of his team.
The week after I was interview by a human resources lady and half way through the interview she said, “That’s impressive.” And again I felt like I was being valued at this company. That is when I remembered the request in my prayer.
***
Christians we often say, “Trust and obey.” In my life I noticed that is not the complete picture because it is more like, “Trust, obey and trust.” See our obedience is not the end of the story because our obedience is not what gets things done. Our obedience is only an expression of our faith; you say you trust God? Ok then act on this trust by obeying Him. But it is God who gets things done—God’s work is the end of the story. That is why after obedience we still need to trust again to see Him complete His work. For example Gideon trusted God will bring victory though him so he obeyed by downsizing his army to mere 300 men, and then he trusted again as he saw God defeating the enemy—trust, obey, and trust again.
There are few things I want to draw your attention to:
1) We must pray according to God’s will. Supposed that I had prayed for God to make me a successful singer, do you think He will honour my request? The answer is no, because singing is not my talent. When you pray according to God’s will then you do not have to beg and you can pray with confidence. You cannot disobey God and expect Him to fix your deliberate mistakes by simply praying about it.
See, I like classical music but that does not mean I have to become a musician—I can simply enjoy the music of others. I like tennis but that does not mean I have to become a tennis player—I can simply enjoy the game of others. I like cars but that does not mean I have to build my own car—I can simply enjoy the cars made by others. It is wonderful and freeing to know and accept God’s will for our lives. If we do then we can accept ourselves and others, appreciate our talents and the talents of others, and be confident of the path we are to take.
2) Focus on God’s goodness. When I was a new Christian I thought that I was saved by grace but I am to live by works, but we are both saved and are to live the Christian life by God’s grace. If I told you how imperfect and sinless I am then you would say, “Fadi, there is no way God was involved in answering your prayers or your career path!” But this is not about me but about God’s goodness. I have come to the point if life when I do not worry much because I trust in the goodness of God. I am not saying this to encourage you to sin but to free you from worry and the false teaching of living by works.
See, our God is a good God. We are His children not because of our works but because of the Cross of Jesus Christ. For example, suppose that you are Christian and you are an alcoholic and you are struggling with quitting drinking and suppose that your marriage is in trouble and your family needs a healing. Do you think God is going to say, “Gee! Look at this Christian! He can’t stop getting drunk and now He needs my help to heal his marriage! There is no way I am doing that for him! Let him fix himself first then come asking for My help! I am so going to destroy his marriage in the meantime!” No, of course not! At least that is not how the God of the Bible operate and He is the only real God.
Suppose if I am holding the hand of my nephew and we are walking on the side walk but he really wants to run into the busy street to play, do you think I will let him do so just because he wants to? Of course not! I won’t act based on his attitude or actions, but based on my goodness and the fact that I am his uncle and he is my nephew and that I love him! For you this may not be big news but to me it is because I grew up in a Middle Eastern culture where there is no Biblical understanding of who God is. That is why I want to stress the goodness and love of God to you.
3) We are not ruled by the ways this world rule. We are God’s children born by the power of the Holy Spirit, and therefore we do not belong to this world. The principles of this world do not apply to us because we are governed by spiritual principles such as God’s goodness, obedience, and glorifying our heavenly Father. The way God works in our lives is not the same way the world strive to achieve their dreams. Recently I offered to help a Christian facebook friend with her resume because she did not have one and she was about to give up applying to better jobs because she had no resume. The first thing she told me is that people have told her that she needs a really good resume to get a job as a hospital pharmacist. And that made me reflect on my career path and I answered her saying that if God wants her to work somewhere He can do it even if she had no resume at all! That is what He did to me: I got a job I am so unqualified for! He made me find favour in the eyes of the engineers who interviewed me; they knew I was not qualified for the original job posting so maybe they created a junior job position for me.
4) Do not worry. My mom says it is not good that I am worry free (I do worry, of course, but much less than the average person) because she wants me to hurry and get married, and have kids, and buy a house, etc. But why should I worry? If, motivated by love, God sent His only and beloved Son to die for my sins before I was even born, then what can separate me from the love of my heavenly Father? See, my attitude toward life does not come from self-confident (if you had read my older writings you will realize I grew up with no self-confidence), nor my careless attitude toward life as some people think I am, but from my trust “that in all things God works for the good of those who love him, who have been called according to his.” (Romans 8:28) It is good to read the Bible and understand it, but a time must come when we start living it.
I talked about God’s goodness toward me and my career path, but His goodness extends to all areas of our lives: spiritually, physically, emotionally, mentally, financially, relationships, and so on. He wants to take care of you whether it is in regard to your career, marriage, big decisions such as buying expensive things like a house or a car, or planning a career move or even finding the right mechanic for your car!
Few years ago I asked, “How can I get to know God as my heavenly Father since I do not have an idea what a good father is?” I asked that question because I rarely saw my earthly father while growing up because he had to spend most of his time in the army. I learned about what is it like to have a good father from God Himself; God did not need someone to go ahead of Him to show the way—He showed the way! He set the pattern of love, goodness, generosity, and serving and He set the pattern of how to be a good Father.
(Toronto, ON; summer 2012.)
Muffy Roberts Silkstone and Boucle Beauty Silkstone.
Muffy Roberts Silkstone wears vintage Mattel - Career Girl
My write up on photographing the new Cosmopolitan of Las Vegas here
On the weekend of November 20-21, 2010, I was invited to photograph the new Cosmopolitan of Las Vegas prior to their opening December 15, 2010 in Las Vegas NV.
This set of images represents my efforts that weekend to showcase this newest resort property opening up on the Las Vegas Strip. Thanks to David Scherer from The Cosmopolitan of Las Vegas for showing me around, to Miiko Mentz at Katalyst Films for helping to arrange the shoot, and to my wife for modeling for me.
To learn more about The Cosmpolitan of Las Vegas, check out their website here or their Facebook page here.
French postcard by A.N., Paris no. 853. Photo: Film H. Diamant-Berger. Henri Rollan as Athos in Les Trois Mousquetaires/The Three Musketeers (Henri Diamant-Berger, 1932).
Henri Rollan (1888-1967) was a French actor and stage director. In addition to rich career on stage he also acted in many French silent and sound films, such as René Clair’s debut Paris qui dort (1923-1925) and the silent and the sound versions of Les Trois Mousquetaires/The Three Musketeers (Henri Diamant-Berger, 1921 and 1932).
Henri Rollan, real name Henri Martine, was born in Paris in 1888. In 1906 he started his acting career with the great André Antoine at the Theatre de l’Odeon, where he would remain until 1909, playing in classics such as Shakespeare’s Julius Caesar. In 1910 Rollan debuted in film, perhaps attracted by previous film contributions by renowned stage actors such as Charles Le Bargy. His first film was probably the Film d’Art production L’Héritière (1910), directed by Henri Pouctal and André Calmettes and starring Paul Mounet of the Comédie française. In the same year Rollan played in the Pathé film L’Amour et le temps (Michel Carré, 1910), a mythological tale starring young Raymonde Dupré as Cupid and thespian Henry Krauss as grumpy old Father Time. Several more Pathé films followed, such as L’Absent (Albert Capellani 1913), in which Henri Étievant played the lead as a Dutch farmer whose son and mother-in-law (Jeanne Grumbach) refuse his second wife (Germaine Dermoz) and her daughter. Six years after the whole family reconciles when first the mother-in-law recognizes the virtues of the second wife and then the farmer blesses the love between his son (Rollan) and his stepdaughter (Dupré). In Jeanne la Maudite (1913) Rolan is the ruthless murder of his uncle, while an innocent lumberjack is imprisoned for the murder. Jeanne, the innocent’s daughter becomes the punch-bag of the village.
In 1914 Rollan played Maurice Lindey in the long running Pathé serial Le Chevalier de Maison-Rouge, adapted from Alexandre Dumas, directed by Albert Capellani and with Paul Escoffier as the Chevalier and Marie-Louise Derval as Geneviève Dixmer. Rollan played the lead here as a young Republican who unknowingly implicates himself in a plot to rescue Queen Marie-Antoinette during the Reign of Terror. The serial had 6 parts, each split up in 10 episodes. In 1918, Rollan played in another film serial, this time in 8 episodes: Le baron mystère, directed by Maurice Chaillot and starring Pierre Alcover. In 1921 he starred in the SCAGL production Les Trois masques, directed by Henry Krauss, a story about family feuds and deadly revenge.
In the same year 1921, Henri Rollan performed Athos in Henri Diamant-Berger’s Les Trois Mousquetaires/The Three Musketeers, a prestigious production by Pathé, with lavish sets and many extras. The super-production rivaled Douglas Fairbanks contemporary Three Musketeers of 1921. Together with Charles Martinelli (Porthos), Pierre de Guingand (Aramis) en Aimé Simon-Girard (D’Artagnan) Rollin became a national star. The success of the film urged Pathé to make the sequel Vingt ans après (Henri Diamant-Berger, 1922) in which Martinelli, Guingand and Rollan remained but Jean Yonnel replaced Simon-Girard. Other films with Rollin in those years were Mimi Trottin (Henri Andréani, 1922), Le Sang d’Allah (Luitz Morat, 1922) and L’Emprise (Henri Diamant-Berger, 1923).
Henri Rollan's last silent film is probably his most famous one, Paris qui dort (René Clair, 1923, but released in 1925), in which he starred as Albert, the guardsman of the Eiffel Tower. Together with a group who just flew into Paris, he is the only one to have survived a scientist’s experiment to freeze the whole of Paris. His former buddy from Les Trois Mousquetaires, Charles Martinelli, played the scientist, while Albert Préjean was the pilot. The startling images of the actors on top of the Eiffel Tower and their reckless behavior still impress today. Incredible this was the debut film of young René Clair, even if the film was publicly released after Clair’s next film Entr’acte (1924). Paris qui dort was produced by Henri Diamant-Berger’s company Films Diamant. After that, Rollin took a break in film acting, but kept playing on stage, performing at various Parisian theatres – in the mid-1920s mainly at the Théàtre de Paris and late 1920s at the Théàtre de Port Saint-Martin.
When sound cinema set in in France, Henri Diamant-Berger called back his ‘musketeer’ to act in Sola (1931), starring Damia; in Clair de lune (1932), starring Blanche Montel and Claude Dauphin; and in the sound version of Les Trois Mousquetaires (1932), this time set up as a two-episode film instead of a long serial. Ten years after the silent version Rollan again played Athos, now with Thomy Bourdelle as Porthos, Jean-Louis Allibert as Aramis, Rollan’s buddy from the silent version Simon-Girard once more as D’Artagnan, and Blanche Montel as Constance. During the 1930s Rollan remained very active in French films, playing in some twenty films, performing opposite actors such as Madeleine Renaud, Gaby Morlay, Michel Simon, Victor Francen, Madeleine Ozeray, Suzy Vernon, Mireille Balin, Marcelle Chantal, Marie Bell, Gina Manès, Florelle and Huguette Duflos. While most of his directors are forgotten names now, some might ring a bell such as Marcel L’Herbier and the Italian directors Augusto Genina and Mario Bonnard. During the war Rollan acted in just a few films, while it took until the late 1940s to have his film acting career revived. During the first half of the 1950s, though, Rollan, had memorable parts as the incompetent Maréchal d'Estrée in Christian-Jaque’s Fanfan la Tulipe (1951) and a French politician in Jacques Becker's Les Aventures d'Arsène Lupin (1956). Rollan’s last film part was in 121 Rue Blanche à Paris (Quinto Albicocco 1961) which starred stage and film actress Berthe Bovy, who just like Rollan had started out in film at the days of film d’art.
While Henri Rollan had acted on stage in the 1930s as well, it was in particular from the mid-1940s on that this intensified. Between the late 1940s and early 1950s he must have been constantly working either on stage or on a film set, despite his age. Moreover, from 1945 on, he also directed various stage plays and would do so until his death. From 1948 on, Rollan almost exclusively played at the Comédie française, and would do so until 1965. Henri Rollan died in Paris on 23 June 1967. As Guy Bellinger writes on IMDb: “He was always a great professional and his performances (most often as a tough, stiff, humorless character endowed with authority) are excellent whatever the film he is in. Of course where he really shone was on stage, as an actor first, later as a renowned director. He was also a much loved and respected drama teacher who guided among others the first steps of Jean Claudio, Jacques Fabbri, Raymond Devos, Anna Gaylor, Annie Girardot, Marie Dubois and Jacques Lorcey. None of these persons ever forgot Henri Rollan, a passionate man who had the gift to transmit his genuine passion to other young passionates.”
Sources: , CineArtistes, Fondation Jerome Seydoux, Cineressources, Wikipedia (French) and IMDb.
And please check out our blog European Film Star Postcards.
Apollo Career Center in Lima, Ohio. These Ford Crown Victoria's are training cars and have been worn from years of sitting outside.