Old Hollywood
Cinema
1900-1979
Nostalgia is a seductive liar - George Wildman Ball
Lauren Bacall (1944, photo by Bert Six) The phone in the bedroom rang. I picked it up. It was Lauren Bacall.  “I’ve been waiting for Tony for an hour,” Lauren said angrily. “Where the hell is he?” “Lauren,” I replied, “you’re complaining to me because my husband is late for a date with you?” “Well, dear,” she said, “If your husband doesn’t respect your marriage, why should I?” “You’re absolutely right, Lauren,” I said, “He’ll be there in a few minutes. Look for a man with a bandaged head.’” -Shelley Winters, in her autobiography The Middle of My Century

Lauren Bacall (1944, photo by Bert Six)

The phone in the bedroom rang. I picked it up. It was Lauren Bacall. 

“I’ve been waiting for Tony for an hour,” Lauren said angrily. “Where the hell is he?”

“Lauren,” I replied, “you’re complaining to me because my husband is late for a date with you?”

“Well, dear,” she said, “If your husband doesn’t respect your marriage, why should I?”

“You’re absolutely right, Lauren,” I said, “He’ll be there in a few minutes. Look for a man with a bandaged head.’”

-Shelley Winters, in her autobiography The Middle of My Century

Max Schreck & Gustav von Wangenheim in Nosferatu, A Symphony of Horror (1922, F.W. Murnau) (via Lotte Eisner’s Murnau) 

Max Schreck & Gustav von Wangenheim in Nosferatu, A Symphony of Horror (1922, F.W. Murnau) (via Lotte Eisner’s Murnau) 

Mary Pickford in Little Annie Rooney (1925, dir. William Beaudine) (via Silent Cinema) “Good may have prevailed in Mary Pickford’s movies, but the set of her tough little jaw told you that it damn well better.” -Andrew Sarris, The Silents

Mary Pickford in Little Annie Rooney (1925, dir. William Beaudine) (via Silent Cinema)

“Good may have prevailed in Mary Pickford’s movies, but the set of her tough little jaw told you that it damn well better.”

-Andrew Sarris, The Silents

Mary Pickford in Little Annie Rooney (1925, dir. William Beaudine) (via Silent Cinema) “Good may have prevailed in Mary Pickford’s movies, but the set of her tough little jaw told you that it damn well better.” -Andrew Sarris, The Silents

Mary Pickford in Little Annie Rooney (1925, dir. William Beaudine) (via Silent Cinema)

“Good may have prevailed in Mary Pickford’s movies, but the set of her tough little jaw told you that it damn well better.”

-Andrew Sarris, The Silents

From Fantasia’s “The Sorcerer’s Apprentice” sequence (1940, dir. James Algar) (online here) “Walt Disney sure had me fooled. I always thought he was an Establishment square, the pious merchant of every virtue that middle America cherishes and young America hates. Who else could make cuteness so commercial? Or extract so many millions from a mouse? But suddenly the young have embraced this king of squares. His Fantasia was revived recently at a New York theater and, overnight, there they were, lined up outside, making such a box-office hit of the 30-year-old film that it’s now being booked into cities and college towns all across the country. Obviously Fantasia is saying something to the young in 1970 that it wasn’t saying to me — or anyone — in 1940. I remember it then for its heavy cultural pretensions: Uncle Walt bringing good music to the masses by wrapping it in easy-to-take animated cartoons. The other day I went to the movie again and saw just what the young have discovered - that Disney was zonked out of his mind while making the movie and so was his entire studio. Safely hidden behind the chaste pillars of classical music, he was a hippie 30 years ahead of his time, producing a psychadelic light-and-sound show that was his only flop because nobody was freaked out enough to dig it. Knowing this, I now feel sorry for Disney. It’s no fun to be a secret pioneer. In Fantasia he anticipated by a whole generation the ideas that were to bestow instant priesthood on Marshall McLuhan, Timothy Leary, & Allen Ginsberg, and he died without getting any of the credit. Long before TV made us a visual society feeding on picture images, long before McLuhan announced that ‘the medium is the message’, Disney was giving us a sensory experience, America’s first acid trip.”  -William Zinsser, “Walt Disney’s Secret Freakout”, LIFE magazine (April 1970)

From Fantasia’s “The Sorcerer’s Apprentice” sequence (1940, dir. James Algar) (online here)

“Walt Disney sure had me fooled. I always thought he was an Establishment square, the pious merchant of every virtue that middle America cherishes and young America hates. Who else could make cuteness so commercial? Or extract so many millions from a mouse?

But suddenly the young have embraced this king of squares. His Fantasia was revived recently at a New York theater and, overnight, there they were, lined up outside, making such a box-office hit of the 30-year-old film that it’s now being booked into cities and college towns all across the country. Obviously Fantasia is saying something to the young in 1970 that it wasn’t saying to me — or anyone — in 1940. I remember it then for its heavy cultural pretensions: Uncle Walt bringing good music to the masses by wrapping it in easy-to-take animated cartoons.

The other day I went to the movie again and saw just what the young have discovered - that Disney was zonked out of his mind while making the movie and so was his entire studio. Safely hidden behind the chaste pillars of classical music, he was a hippie 30 years ahead of his time, producing a psychadelic light-and-sound show that was his only flop because nobody was freaked out enough to dig it.

Knowing this, I now feel sorry for Disney. It’s no fun to be a secret pioneer. In Fantasia he anticipated by a whole generation the ideas that were to bestow instant priesthood on Marshall McLuhan, Timothy Leary, & Allen Ginsberg, and he died without getting any of the credit. Long before TV made us a visual society feeding on picture images, long before McLuhan announced that ‘the medium is the message’, Disney was giving us a sensory experience, America’s first acid trip.” 

-William Zinsser, “Walt Disney’s Secret Freakout”, LIFE magazine (April 1970)

via Fantasia’s “The Sorcerer’s Apprentice” sequence (1940, dir. James Algar) “Walt Disney sure had me fooled. I always thought he was an Establishment square, the pious merchant of every virtue that middle America cherishes and young America hates. Who else could make cuteness so commercial? Or extract so many millions from a mouse? But suddenly the young have embraced this king of squares. His Fantasia was revived recently at a New York theater and, overnight, there they were, lined up outside, making such a box-office hit of the 30-year-old film that it’s now being booked into cities and college towns all across the country. Obviously Fantasia is saying something to the young in 1970 that it wasn’t saying to me — or anyone — in 1940. I remember it then for its heavy cultural pretensions: Uncle Walt bringing good music to the masses by wrapping it in easy-to-take animated cartoons. The other day I went to the movie again and saw just what the young have discovered - that Disney was zonked out of his mind while making the movie and so was his entire studio. Safely hidden behind the chaste pillars of classical music, he was a hippie 30 years ahead of his time, producing a psychadelic light-and-sound show that was his only flop because nobody was freaked out enough to dig it. Knowing this, I now feel sorry for Disney. It’s no fun to be a secret pioneer. In Fantasia he anticipated by a whole generation the ideas that were to bestow instant priesthood on Marshall McLuhan, Timothy Leary, & Allen Ginsberg, and he died without getting any of the credit. Long before TV made us a visual society feeding on picture images, long before McLuhan announced that “the medium is the message”, Disney was giving us a sensory experience, America’s first acid trip.  -William Zinsser, “Walt Disney’s Secret Freakout”, LIFE magazine (April 1970)

via Fantasia’s “The Sorcerer’s Apprentice” sequence (1940, dir. James Algar)

“Walt Disney sure had me fooled. I always thought he was an Establishment square, the pious merchant of every virtue that middle America cherishes and young America hates. Who else could make cuteness so commercial? Or extract so many millions from a mouse?

But suddenly the young have embraced this king of squares. His Fantasia was revived recently at a New York theater and, overnight, there they were, lined up outside, making such a box-office hit of the 30-year-old film that it’s now being booked into cities and college towns all across the country. Obviously Fantasia is saying something to the young in 1970 that it wasn’t saying to me — or anyone — in 1940. I remember it then for its heavy cultural pretensions: Uncle Walt bringing good music to the masses by wrapping it in easy-to-take animated cartoons.

The other day I went to the movie again and saw just what the young have discovered - that Disney was zonked out of his mind while making the movie and so was his entire studio. Safely hidden behind the chaste pillars of classical music, he was a hippie 30 years ahead of his time, producing a psychadelic light-and-sound show that was his only flop because nobody was freaked out enough to dig it.

Knowing this, I now feel sorry for Disney. It’s no fun to be a secret pioneer. In Fantasia he anticipated by a whole generation the ideas that were to bestow instant priesthood on Marshall McLuhan, Timothy Leary, & Allen Ginsberg, and he died without getting any of the credit. Long before TV made us a visual society feeding on picture images, long before McLuhan announced that “the medium is the message”, Disney was giving us a sensory experience, America’s first acid trip. 

-William Zinsser, “Walt Disney’s Secret Freakout”, LIFE magazine (April 1970)

Grace Kelly & Gary Cooper on the set of High Noon (1952, dir. Fred Zinnemann) (via)

Grace Kelly & Gary Cooper on the set of High Noon (1952, dir. Fred Zinnemann) (via)

Gary Cooper in High Noon (1952, dir. Fred Zinnemann)

Gary Cooper in High Noon (1952, dir. Fred Zinnemann)

Stanley Kubrick & Malcolm McDowell on the set of A Clockwork Orange (1971, dir. Stanley Kubrick) (via) “Well, as you know, when Singing in the Rain came out, for generations of people, [Gene Kelly] swinging around that lamp post and slapping in that water, and singing…it’s one of the most euphoric moments we’ve ever seen on film. So when I had to come up with something for this sequence, which involved my character in a very brutal situation, that’s when he’s happiest. So Singing in the Rain just popped out. I just started singing it, and [Stanley] Kubrick bought the rights and we redid the whole thing and incorporated it. A footnote to that is that a year afterward, when the film had been out and it was a big hit, I was invited to come to Hollywood by Warner Brothers. I came out and it was very nice to meet everybody. I had never been to Hollywood before. And some guy who was my minder said, ‘Hey, there’s a party in Beverly Hills tonight, Malcolm. Do you want to go, there’s going to be lots of stars there?’ And I went, ‘Yeah! I would love to!’ I was like a kid in a candy store. And we go and he said, ‘Hey, you won’t believe this. Gene Kelly’s here. Would you like to meet him?’ And I went, ‘Oh yeah!’ (laughs) So he had his back to me and he tapped him on the shoulder and said, ‘Gene, I’d like to introduce you to Malcolm McDowell’ and he looked at me and…then turned around and walked off. But you know, I totally got it. I totally understood. I took his glorious moment and put a different spin on it. I guess I kind of ruined his moment in a way. But of course, it was an homage to him, because it was so amazing. And so indelible in me as a person, that I blurted it out and started singing it [while filming the scene].” -Malcolm McDowell (via)

Stanley Kubrick & Malcolm McDowell on the set of A Clockwork Orange (1971, dir. Stanley Kubrick) (via)

“Well, as you know, when Singing in the Rain came out, for generations of people, [Gene Kelly] swinging around that lamp post and slapping in that water, and singing…it’s one of the most euphoric moments we’ve ever seen on film. So when I had to come up with something for this sequence, which involved my character in a very brutal situation, that’s when he’s happiest. So Singing in the Rain just popped out. I just started singing it, and [Stanley] Kubrick bought the rights and we redid the whole thing and incorporated it.

A footnote to that is that a year afterward, when the film had been out and it was a big hit, I was invited to come to Hollywood by Warner Brothers. I came out and it was very nice to meet everybody. I had never been to Hollywood before. And some guy who was my minder said, ‘Hey, there’s a party in Beverly Hills tonight, Malcolm. Do you want to go, there’s going to be lots of stars there?’ And I went, ‘Yeah! I would love to!’ I was like a kid in a candy store. And we go and he said, ‘Hey, you won’t believe this. Gene Kelly’s here. Would you like to meet him?’ And I went, ‘Oh yeah!’ (laughs)

So he had his back to me and he tapped him on the shoulder and said, ‘Gene, I’d like to introduce you to Malcolm McDowell’ and he looked at me and…then turned around and walked off.

But you know, I totally got it. I totally understood. I took his glorious moment and put a different spin on it. I guess I kind of ruined his moment in a way. But of course, it was an homage to him, because it was so amazing. And so indelible in me as a person, that I blurted it out and started singing it [while filming the scene].”

-Malcolm McDowell (via)

Sonja Henie in My Lucky Star (1938, dir. Roy del Ruth) (photo by John Mescall)

Sonja Henie in My Lucky Star (1938, dir. Roy del Ruth) (photo by John Mescall)

Stanley Kubrick & Malcolm McDowell on the set of A Clockwork Orange (1971, dir. Stanley Kubrick) (via The Stanley Kubrick Archives) “Well, as you know, when Singing In The Rain came out, for generations of people, him swinging around that lamp post and slapping in that water, and singing…it’s one of the most euphoric moments we’ve ever seen on film. So when I had to come up with something for this sequence, which involved my character in a very brutal situation, that’s when he’s happiest. So Singing In The Rain just popped out. I just started singing it, and [Stanley] Kubrick bought the rights and we redid the whole thing and incorporated it. A footnote to that is that a year afterward, when the film had been out and it was a big hit, I was invited to come to Hollywood by Warner Brothers. I came out and it was very nice to meet everybody. I had never been to Hollywood before. And some guy who was my minder said, ‘Hey, there’s a party in Beverly Hills tonight, Malcolm. Do you want to go, there’s going to be lots of stars there?’ And I went, ‘Yeah!’ I would love to!’ I was like a kid in a candy store. And we go and he said, ‘Hey, you won’t believe this. Gene Kelly’s here. Would you like to meet him?’ And I went, ‘Oh yeah!’ (laughs) So he had his back to me and he tapped him on the shoulder and said, ‘Gene, I’d like to introduce you to Malcolm McDowell’  and he looked at me…then turned around and walked off. But you know, I totally got it. I totally understood. I took his glorious moment and put a different spin on it. I guess I kind of ruined his moment in a way. But of course, it was an homage to him, because it was so amazing. And so indelible in me as a person, that I blurted it out and started singing it [while filming the scene].” -Malcolm McDowell (via)

Stanley Kubrick & Malcolm McDowell on the set of A Clockwork Orange (1971, dir. Stanley Kubrick) (via The Stanley Kubrick Archives)

“Well, as you know, when Singing In The Rain came out, for generations of people, him swinging around that lamp post and slapping in that water, and singing…it’s one of the most euphoric moments we’ve ever seen on film. So when I had to come up with something for this sequence, which involved my character in a very brutal situation, that’s when he’s happiest. So Singing In The Rain just popped out. I just started singing it, and [Stanley] Kubrick bought the rights and we redid the whole thing and incorporated it.

A footnote to that is that a year afterward, when the film had been out and it was a big hit, I was invited to come to Hollywood by Warner Brothers. I came out and it was very nice to meet everybody. I had never been to Hollywood before. And some guy who was my minder said, ‘Hey, there’s a party in Beverly Hills tonight, Malcolm. Do you want to go, there’s going to be lots of stars there?’ And I went, ‘Yeah!’ I would love to!’ I was like a kid in a candy store. And we go and he said, ‘Hey, you won’t believe this. Gene Kelly’s here. Would you like to meet him?’ And I went, ‘Oh yeah!’ (laughs)

So he had his back to me and he tapped him on the shoulder and said, ‘Gene, I’d like to introduce you to Malcolm McDowell’  and he looked at me…then turned around and walked off.

But you know, I totally got it. I totally understood. I took his glorious moment and put a different spin on it. I guess I kind of ruined his moment in a way. But of course, it was an homage to him, because it was so amazing. And so indelible in me as a person, that I blurted it out and started singing it [while filming the scene].”

-Malcolm McDowell (via)

Wendy Carlos & Rachel Elkind - Theme from a Clockwork Orange (Beethoviana) (Stanley Kubrick’s Clockwork Orange)

“I was one of the few artists to have worked more than once with him [i.e. on A Clockwork Orange and The Shining]. The experience and memories are indelibly etched on my brain…Stanley Kubrick was not an easy man to work for. He was vastly interesting, completely open about all his “secrets”, and had a dry sense of humor. You were always stimulated working with him. But it was seldom painless. I would truly have preferred to be another director or friend. 

…Recent attempts since his death to paint a revisionist image of Kubrick as some kind of warm and fuzzy fond old uncle are both ignorant and bizarre. The world has plenty of avuncular supportive seniors already. What’s in short supply in the world is Stanley Kubricks: artists who will spare no effort to do work of the highest caliber. Yes, it’s impractical, and not a role most artists are able to inhabit with comfort, unless you command the respect and financial support system he needed.

It allowed him to “wing it”, the way most creative projects are intuitively ‘steered’, kind of groping forward towards some kind of inevitability. He’d often risk experiments, creative trial and error. When Stanley liked what you were doing he supported you ‘all the way’; you’d be hard pressed to find a more canny supporter. Many young directors got messages and calls from him if he loved their newest film. (I’ll bet Hitchcock, another real master, never did that!) Kubrick assembled a support system/nest to avoid most usual external needs to compromise. We may all envy him in this.

I liked Stanley, I enjoyed Stanley, I loved his intelligence and curiosity — but he often drove me nuts. We’d completely, passionately disagree on some detail, where a day earlier we were seeing things in essentially congruent ways. Yin and yang. I think he rather took my abilities and attempts to please him for granted, but I never knew for sure, and now never will. I did try to do my best work for him each time, each ‘cue’. How could you not?”

-Carlos on working with Kubrick (via)

Grace Kelly & Gary Cooper on the set of High Noon (1952, dir. Fred Zinnemann) (via)

Grace Kelly & Gary Cooper on the set of High Noon (1952, dir. Fred Zinnemann) (via)

Tex Ritter - Do Not Forsake Me, Oh My Darlin’ (written by Dimitri Tiomkin) (High Noon: Original Motion Picture Soundtrack)

Gary Cooper in High Noon (1952, dir. Fred Zinnemann)

Gary Cooper in High Noon (1952, dir. Fred Zinnemann)