Hooray for Hollywood? - Volume One

During my never-ending excavations of used book stores, flea markets and antique shows, I am always looking for something that catches my eye regarding my affinity for classic movies and stars. I recently parted with $3.00 so that I could bring home the book seen here, "Hollywood on Hollywood," a collection of remarks on Tinseltown made by the stars who worked there. Compiled by Doug(las) McClelland, who penned many a biography of famous performers, it is full of a variety of quotes that I will periodically share with my readers. Naturally, I've also unearthed photos to go with! So here come the first 15.

"I have been in show business for twelve years. They have known me in Hollywood but two. Yet as picture-making goes, two years is a long time. Nevertheless, my advice has never been asked about a part in a picture. I found out I was going into Susan Lenox (1931) in Del Monte. Read it in the paper. When I walked on the set one day, they told me I was going to play Red Dust (1932) in place of John Gilbert. I have never been consulted as to what part I would like to play. I am paid not to think." -- Clark Gable, 1932. (This is the first time I had ever heard that John Gilbert had ever even been considered for Red Dust...! More vintage pics and info on Gable here.)

"Hollywood was capable of hurting me so much. The things about Hollywood that could hurt me (when I first came) can't touch me now. I suddenly decided that they shouldn't hurt me-that was all." -- Joan Crawford, Photoplay, 1930s. (This reminds me of JC's approach to eating, too. She would always leave the food that tasted the best on the plate, presumably things like rich potatoes or desserts, in an effort to keep her figure.)

"To survive in Hollywood, you need the ambition of a Latin American revolutionary, the ego of a grand opera tenor and the physical stamina of a cow pony." -- Billie Burke, 1940s. (Best known as Glinda in The Wizard of Oz (1939) and for playing a variety of dithering society types, it sounds like Miss Burke was made of strong stuff underneath that exterior.)

"Hollywood is a chain gang and we lose the will to escape; the links of our chains are forged not of cruelties, but of luxuries: we are pelted with orchids and roses; we are overpaid and underworked." -- Clive Brook, 1933. (I enjoyed this description of the lure of Tinseltown for those brought to it from afar.)

"Hollywood has come a long way since its infancy, when signs on for-rent apartments warned, 'No Dogs or Actors!' We didn't even have the doubtful distinction of first billing!" -- Gloria Swanson, 1949. (Do check out Glo's fur-lined cloak with matching hat and those platform shoes!)

"Back in the forties everybody went to the movies. There were houses open twenty-four hours a day where the seats never cooled. Soldiers, war workers on the swing shift, housewives, school children, couples on a date, pensioners-they all packed in to see the dreams Hollywood printed on celluloid, preferably in gorgeous Technicolor." -- Keenan Wynn, 1959. (Certain parts of Wynn's life could be made into a fascinating movie, too!)

"(In 1930s) Hollywood there was an exclusive clique, and no matter how big a name you were on Broadway, until you made it in the movies you didn't exist. I was just another Broadway star and didn't rate." -- Ethel Merman, 1978. (Regardless of her ability, I don't think that Merm had quite the right face & figure to make it as a leading lady in 1930s Hollywood. But I did enjoy her in the Eddie Cantor musical comedies she made nonetheless.)

"People tell you that the reason a lot of actors left Hollywood when sound came in was that their voices were wrong for talkies. The truth is that the coming of sound meant the end of all-night parties. With talkies, you couldn't stay out till sunrise anymore. You had to rush back from the studios and start learning your lines, ready for the next day's shooting at 8 am. That was when the studio machine really took over. It controlled you, mind and body, from the moment you were yanked out of bed at dawn until the publicity department put you back to bed at night." -- Louise Brooks, 1979. (This is an interesting alternative theory about the shift in personas during the transition to sound, though I doubt it's completely accurate. I LOVE the earrings she's wearing here!)

"Yes, there was racism in Hollywood in the 1930s and 1940s. I dealt with it as I deal with it in my own race; I ignore it and concentrate on non-racism. I have no regrets about my years in Hollywood. I loved the weather there." -- Butterfly McQueen, 1984. (Trivia Tidbit: Miss McQueen was part of the the first incarnation of The Wiz, but her role was cut during out of town tryouts. She remained onboard as understudy to the role of Addaperle, Good With of the North.)

"I'm not a little girl from a little town makin' good in a big town. I'm a big girl from a big town makin' good in a little town." -- Mae West, 1932. (By 1935, only one person in the U.S. was pulling in more dough than Mae West. It was the obscenely-wealthy William Randolph Hearst, which really ought to tell you something about her income...!)

"We can't afford to be timid. We can't stand back and be pushed off the rungs of the ladder we have already climbed. Once you let Hollywood push you around, you might as well give up. You are beaten. Your prestige as an artist is gone, your importance and value as a personality somehow damaged. This business is not famous for its second chances. Once you arrive at the top, you've got to fight every moment to stay there. Which is why I never have and never will allow Hollywood to kick me around." -- Merle Oberon, the 1930s. (Few showbiz existences have been as captivating to learn about as Oberon's. She was a woman of many mysteries and contradictions and did try to remain a top-billed star almost to the end - even if the movies were a far cry from the ones of her hey-day.)

"I laugh every time I think of the first interview I had here in Hollywood. The article about me said I had ben a landscape engineer and a specialist with mixed-drinks. That's Hollywood! My landscape engineering amounted to digging ditches for the WPA [Works Progress Administration.] My specializing in mixed-drinks amounted to swabbing beer-puddled bars and, later, mixing drinks." -- George Montgomery, 1941. (I tended to like Montgomery, who you can read much more about here, but never found out why Maureen O'Hara claimed in her autobiography to have "loathed him.")

"Why be beautiful in Hollywood, for the love of Pete? With every car-hop in town a sensational looker, Hollywood is strictly a bull market when it comes to beauty. So if you're asking Walker, she's telling you that she'll struggle along with what she's got for the next fifty years or so. It's done all right for Walker so far. -- Nancy Walker, 1944. (Walker was eerily accurate in her prediction...! She died in 1992, close to fifty years after this remark, and was still working. More about her life and career here.)

"Hollywood personalities are really partly applesauce. We deceive the public, and get paid for it. I get paid pretty well so I deceive the public good." -- Gary Cooper, 1946. (Cooper was an actor who often got more mileage out of a part by saying as little as possible - hence his reputation for often saying "yep" and "nope" on screen! But he was granted two acting Oscars along with an honorary one, so it worked out all right...!)

"If you and your husband both work (in Hollywood) you hardly have time to say hello. You just wave in passing. Actually, I have driven home after working all night to see Desi (Arnaz) passing in a car going to work. 'That face is familiar,' I say. 'Oh yes, my husband I haven't seen for days' and I wave. In Hollywood, too-young people see too much, do too much, go too much. They see others getting divorces and they think nothing of trying it. In a small town they are restrained by example and opinion." -- Lucille Ball, 1947. (No doubt this situation was part of why she insisted that he play her husband when the radio favorite "My Favorite Husband" - with Richard Denning - moved to TV as I Love Lucy. Unfortunately, even that plan couldn't save the marriage in the end.)

That's all folks, till next time!

Tapping Into Some April Showers!

It's been a while since I've launched a full-on April Showers post. I've covered SO many in the last 13 years, that it's challenging to turn up new ones and, over the last couple of years, I've often just done a mini-post for whatever new ones I've come across. But I do have a small collection for today to mark the occasion of April. It's a typically random and off-beat offering. 

 

Chris Atkins, doing it nature's way.

Just as information, I am a completest and rarely leave gents out of posts like this, whether or not they happen to be my own "type." I feel like there's an audience out there one way or the other for anything from the skinniest scrawn to the curvaciously corpulent. But if I happen to suggest that a subject is not exactly cover boy material, it somehow warrants hate mail from some of our flakier readers out there, so I will not be making much personal commentary about anyone's physique. That's up to the viewer to determine. (But anyone can view this site's long history and see that from showers to tubs to bulges to whatever, I've always been inclusive of guys regardless of their specific physicality.) So, let's turn on the tap and go with the flow!

This MGM leading man Robert Montgomery (the father of Elizabeth, who won hearts on Bewitched!) In 1934, he and Clark Gable tussled over the affections of Joan Crawford in the film Forsaking All Others.

Here we find him getting ready for a big night with a spirited shower (and one seriously unbecoming cap!)

As his character in the film is weall-to-do, such drudgery as reaching for his own towel are beneath him!

His valet is on hand to make certain he doesn't have to wait a moment to begin drying off.

This much he can pretty much do on his own.

Same film, we come upon this man entering the "SHOWERS" of a health club.

The brawny attendant has come to inform a showering Clark Gable of a phone call.

Gable requests a towel from the man...

...and even gets a reacharound assistance with putting it on as he races down the corridor!

I included the phone call because the sequence affords us a glimpse of The King in his towel.

And there's a nice closeup of him with mussed hair.

Our next flick is the 1952 musical About Face. Taking place in a military school, it kicks off with a song as the guys get ready. Though Gordon MacRae, shown here, isn't seen in the shower...

...it seemed criminal to neglect to put him in the post as he awakens shirtless and starts in to sing.

Can you think of a better way to wake up each morning?!

Do take note that there are five guys showering under three shower heads...! I like those odds. Ha ha!

MacRae's costar is Dick Wesson, who sings his part of the number in the shower.

But he's not even what caught my eye in the scene... It's the two dudes behind him. That's one guy's hand on the other's shoulder! Teamwork!

 

I don't know where his hands are now...

But they are having some FUN that morning. I'd sing, too. Probably, "Ah... sweet mystery of life at last I've found thee."

Now it's 1961 and we find another group shower, this one in the armed forces.

A closer look.

The movie is The Outsider, based upon a true story. Tony Curtis portrays Ira Hayes, a Native American who enlists in the marine corp, helps raise the flag at Iwo Jima, then is swept up into a maelstrom of personal issues afterwards.

Gregory Walcott, as the sergeant, is sure to check each recruit for thorough cleanliness after his shower!

Curtis regards the shower head with trepidation and awe, having never seen such a contraption before.

He may also have been wondering how it would affect his makeup!

No such worries, though. Bud Westmore made sure it stayed on.

Showering alone is just WAY overrated....!

Notable character actor Clifton James is an unlikely subject to appear in a post about showers, but here he is in 1975's Rancho Deluxe.

He wouldn't be alone in the shower because this is, after all, a movie! As he's scrubbing down, wife Elizabeth Ashley is carrying on a conversation with him.

She had several amusing expressions during their exchange.

These two, Bernie Casey and Ron O'Neal, figured into a prior post on underwear bulges, but they're making a return appearance because of a brief shower they took in Brothers (1977.)

This shot shows them placed in a confined stall together.

It's a brief scene, but as I said at the outset, I'm a completest!

1987 brought us Prick Up Your Ears, a dark tale based on the life of playwright Joe Orton. But one bright spot includes Gary Oldman and his partner Alfred Molina's sunny trip to Morocco.

A beach-side shower seems to really be satisfying the boy at left...

 

The whole setup catches the eyes of Oldman.

So he poses for a photo (or ten) to mark the occasion.

In a heartbeat, he's drawn in to the activities.

Like I say, showering alone is way overrated.

Next up is highly-prolific character actor Bruce McGill from the semi-obscure dark comedy Out Cold (1989.) In it, he's a real schmuck who treats his business partner John Lithgow and his wife Teri Garr like hell.

One day he comes barrelling home unexpectedly in order to take a quick shower (before going out to meet another woman.)

It seems like no one wants to get his own towel...! He orders Garr to hand him one.

An irritated Garr watches as her hubby dries off and quickly dresses for another occasion.

One of the most notable facts about this shower is that in the current (HDTV/DVD) rendition of this film, what you see above is all you see.

But in the old, more square, format for VHS, viewers saw everything. The picture was cropped far lower, affording a far more explicit view of McGill. (You can easily see this online. Unfortunately, I don't post full-frontal here in order to keep the site less restrictive.) But Garr wasn't exactly idle herself...

Present (under the bed) during the entire sequence shown above is her cute realtor/side piece! He scampers about when McGill comes home too soon and is seen in the altogether.

So even though her pal isn't in the shower, I had to show him nonetheless in the interest of equal time.

Our final shower comes from the quirky 2002 romantic comedy Pumpkin. Christina Ricci is a sorority sister with a cute tennis star boyfriend played by Sam Ball.

As his shower isn't quite as revealing as this sequence, I'm doing some prep work by sharing this shot.

When Ricci takes part in a charity program and winds up falling in love with one of her developmentally challenged participants, Bell has a meltdown and winds up losing an important tennis match. His teammates are far from understanding about it.

When Ball enters the gang shower room, he is not greeted particularly warmly.

His aggravated teammates have nothing good to say about his performance on the court.

Before long, the subject of Ricci's new boyfriend comes to light.

One of the guys even looks Ball over and intimates that maybe Ricci left him because the other guy had more to offer her...!

Ball is understandably raging by now. But the off-beat movie heads into a few unexpected directions.

And with that, this post has circled the drain and come to its sudsy conclusion.