Reginald Denny

Do you remember Max de Winter's friend and secretary Frank Crawley in Alfred Hitchcock's Rebecca? It was a small part but the dashing blue-eyed man who played it made the most of it. You'd never guess by seeing him that he had been a star 20 years before that film.

He was born in London in 1890. The son and grand-son of comedians, he appears on stage at the age of 6 in the play The Royal Family, opposite Gertrude Elliott, in the part of the young Prince Charles Ferdinand. At 16, while still taking acting courses, he decides to become a professional boxer. Championed by Lord Lonsdale, he wins a tournament in 1908.

He then spends a year in the USA to play in a musical, Quaker Girl, opposite Miss Ina Claire. On his return, he sings at the Opera of Manchester and leaves again for a tour in Australia and India.

In Rebecca with Joan Fontaine

In 1913, he gets married in Calcutta to Irene Haisman, an actress who plays with him in several plays and films, and then goes back to New York where he appears in Twin Beds, James Barrie's Rosalind with Marie Tempest, The Professor's Love Story with George Arliss, and The Great Catherine.

He spends Word War I in the Royal Flying Corps, afterwhich he is hired for the New York revue The Passing Show of 1919 at the Winter Garden. He also appears with John Barrymore in Richard III.

It is then that he starts appearing regularly in films: Bringing up Betty, Paying The Piper (directed by George Fitzmaurice), Disraeli (with George Arliss again!), Footlights (with Elsie Ferguson), Sherlock Homes (also with John Barrymore, a film recently restored and available on Blu-ray).

But it is in the role of Napoleon Gibbs Jr. in 39 East that he is noticed by the public and by author H.C. Witwer who offered him to star as boxer Kid Roberts in the Universal serial called The Leather Pushers, adapted from his story. Denny was a shoe-in for the role with his experience of boxing. The serial lasted 24 episodes from 1922 to 1924 and a remake was made in 1940 starring Richard Arlen (from Wings).



Reginald even plays the son of Kid Roberts, Elliott Beresford, in the now lost film On your Toes.

Aside from the serial, Reginald Denny is offered starring parts in features, most often related with sports: The Kentucky Derby (Cinemagazine calls him "impeccable" in it, although they find the film disappointing), Sporting Youth (he even has an accident during the shoot of this film and recovered), and occasionally other subjects like the adaptation of his favorite author Jack London's Abysmal Brute.

One of these films is called Fast and Furious, not unlike the 2001 Rob L. Cohen film The Fast and the Furious.

He also stars in many comedies, eight of which with Otis Harlan, Happy in Snow White, like Where Was I? where the disapproving father (played by Tyrone Power Sr.) of his bride-to-be hires a girl to pretend he is already married; or What Happened to Jones? where, pursued by the police for gambling, he ends up in rags in a Turkish bath on ladies night.

Reginald in a 1925 Xmas publicity picture with wife Irene Haisman and daughter Barbara

In Out All Night, he takes the place of a ship surgeon.

In Skinner's Dress Suit, another comedy, he steps in the shoes of former star Bryant Washburn who starred in a previous version of the film.

His influence is such then that he even takes the role of director on his film That's My Daddy, when the original director Fred C. Newmeyer and he have "creative differences".

Mary Pickford and Reginald Denny

He embraces talking pictures and helps famous stars speak some of their first words. Jeannette MacDonald in Oh, for a man!, Buster Keaton in Parlor Bedroom and Bath, Mary Pickford in Kiki!
He then keeps starring parts opposite Norma Shearer, Robert Montgomery, Boris Karloff, Bette Davis, etc. But as he gets older, he gradually becomes a supporting character actor, his recurring part of Algy Longworth in the Bulldog Drummond films being an example.

By the 1940s, his most notable parts are in Alfred Hitchcock's Rebecca, in Sherlock Holmes and the Voice of Terror and in H.C. Potter's Mr. Blanding Builds His Dream House (starring Cary Grant).

Reginald's employee: Marilyn Monroe

He also develops a passion for model planes and radio controlled planes and launches the Radioplane company. One of his factory employee, nurse Ethel Dougherty, in April 1944 finds a job there for her daughter-in-law Norma Jeane, who gets noticed by a photographer a few months later and will soon become Marilyn Monroe.

He then focuses his career on television and ends it by a role in the acclaimed TV series Batman as King Boris and his very last role is in the Batman feature (available on Blu-ray) as Commodore Schmidlapp. Incidentally, that series is to be released this year on DVD.

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Confidential

I was at work the other day, and saw one of my colleagues reading a trash magazine with nude pictures of some reality TV starlet splashed all across the front page, with a caption saying she wasn’t a whore when all about her pose screamed otherwise.

Once upon a time movie stars not only built their success on talent instead of scandals, but avoided the latter like the plague. But trash did not wait for the 21^stcentury to appear in newspapers.

In Hollywood, the pioneers of gossip were a couple of columnists. William Randolph Hearst goon Louella Parsons was the first to come on the scene. Even though she introduced washed up actress Hedda Hopper to her boss, the two women became rivals in the gutter press department. According to David Niven, their methods to collect information was to fix a hefty drink for their guest and to threaten them to reveal secrets about them if they didn’t tell them what they wanted to know.

Louella Parsons & Hedda Hopper

Because of them, stars were sometimes given a boost in popularity, and careers were destroyed. Hedda had an intense hate for Charlie Chaplin and spat venom on him as often as she could, when Louella campaigned against Citizen Kane and its director Orson Welles who dared caricature her boss in the film.

Early scandals included the death of Virginia Rappe during a party for which comic actor Roscoe “Fatty” Arbuckle was sent to prison,  More importantly, even though his fame was comparable to that of Chaplin’s, his career never recovered and, even decades later, he had to use an alias to direct a few films.

Director Thomas H. Ince made the headlines of the Los Angeles Times in 1924 when he died. The paper reported that he was shot aboard William Randolph Hearst’s yacht although his personal physician testified he had died at home of heart failure.

Gay actor William Haines’s career was publicly ruined by MGM because of his refusal to deny his homosexuality.

But in general, the private life of their stars was kept private by the studios and their publicity department. Articles about gay actors like Clifton Webb, Cesar Romero, Tab Hunter, Anthony Perkins, periodically appeared in the papers recounting their happy “confirmed bachelor” status, usually illustrated with pictures of them surrounded by young starlets just in case someone might get the wrong idea.

With the decline of the studio system, the protection that went along with it gradually disappeared as well, and in 1952, Robert Harrison decided it was high time a magazine was created that dealt solely with what the public ashamedly wanted to read: dirt.

Confidential magazine was first published in December of that year and its instant success proved Harrison right. Articles about Robert Mitchum’s conviction for drug use, Marilyn Monroe’s divorce, or Liberace’s sexual orientation assured the magazine’s success.

Although much of the gossip printed had no basis in fact, as is often the case in these publications, it opened the floodgate for future popular magazines. The industry initially fought it. Numerous trials took place by Lizabeth Scott, Maureen O’Hara, Robert Mitchum, Dorothy Dandridge, Liberace, etc.

They eventually had to deal with it and talent agent Henry Wilson “sold out” a story about Rory Calhoun’s criminal past so Confidential would agree to not publish a story about his major star Rock Hudson’s homosexuality.

Some lesser known actors like Barbara Payton even used the magazine to boost their careers.

Maureen O'Hara at the trial

Even though the magazine’s influence decreased after pressure from the studios (and the trials) in the late 1950s, its publication went on until 1978.

Closeted actor Tab Hunter even called his autobiography “Tab Hunter Confidential”, owing to the influence the magazine had on his life at the time. And Errol Flynn’s autobiography is called My wicked wicked ways, after the title of an article about him.
In the excellent "LA Confidential", look no further for the inspiration of Hush Hush Magazine.

And in his book Groucho and Me, Groucho Marx wrote a letter to the head of the magazine when one too many story about his liking young girls or that his TV show You Bet Your Life was crooked. The letter went : "Gentlemen? If you continue to write nasty pieces about me, I shall be obliged to cancel my subscription."
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Lost And Rare Films

Today, I’d like to share an awesome video release, in keeping with the topic of my blog. I already covered lost television episodes in my article about the Avengers. Now, from Festival Films come the first volumes in a series of DVDs called “Lost and Rare”.

And volume 1 contains exactly that! Rare episodes, films, pilots. Some are seen here for the first time since they first aired, and others… have never been seen at all.

So here is your chance of seeing lost and rediscovered footage of Hollywood stars as if you were a sponsor, deciding if the pilot is going to series. Singer – dancer Jane Powell opens the ball with The Jane Powell Show. A 32 minute sitcom so rare that even the Imdb had no record of it before I submitted an entry. As a matter of fact, don’t waste your time looking for info on the internet. You won’t find much.

And yet, this pilot was full of promise. Miss Powell (of Royal Wedding fame) stars as K.C. McKay, a famous singer who quits her job to become the housewife of a suburban college professor. Of course, adapting to campus life will not be easy; especially considering how prejudiced the other professors are against show-business, and how her impresario pressures her to return to work. The part is played by Elliott Reid (Jane Russell’s boyfriend in Gentlemen Prefer Blondes).

The pilot never developed into a series, however, Russell Johnson who plays the husband, went on to star in Gilligan's Island as another professor.

Canine star Munroe

Verna Felton fighting a lion

Next, animal-lovers are in for a treat with a Rintintin-like adventure called Munroe. Watch out for Verna Felton in one of her last roles as the mother-in-law. You may not know her face, but you‘ve heard her voice for sure as the Queen of Hearts in Alice in Wonderland, the fairy godmother in Cinderella, Aunt Sarah in Lady and The Tramp, Flora in Sleeping Beauty or an Elephant in The Jungle Book and Dumbo. Another Disney regular and awesome character actor appearing here is John Fiedler as the cook. He is the kind of character actor who seemed to appear in every TV show in town at least once. He was also the voice of Piglet.

A Margaret O’Brien vehicle is also included (inventively called “Maggie”). Remember little Tootie from Meet Me In St Louis? Well, she grew up. And she is a lot for her parents to handle. As a matter of fact, her screen dad in both films is the same one: Leon Ames. You may remember her mother Fay Baker in a little part as a party girl in Alfred Hitchcock’s Notorious; and her neighbor Jesslyn Fax as Miss Hearing Aid in Rear Window by the same director.

The irony of this volume is that the only pilot that spurred a successful series on this set, was not a pilot at all. Meet McGraw was intended to be just another episode of Four Star Playhouse. It is presented here complete with commercials. Look out for Ellen Corby, the hotel manager in Alfred Hitchcock's Vertigo, in a lengthier part.

And the icing on the cake is the pilot for the second “Ed Wynn Show”. This actor is a fascinating and lovable character: you may remember him in Disney productions like Alice in Wonderland as the mad hatter, That Darn Cat, Son of Flubber or as uncle Albert in Mary Poppins. I strongly suggest you watch The Twilight Zone’s second episode “One for the Angel” where this amazing actor displays his enormous talent. Here he plays a somewhat similar role as a kind of guardian angel not only to his two grand daughters but also to a group of college kids.

An exclusive footage of Ed Wynn talking to the sponsor is included after the show.

Volume 2 of the collection focuses on sports.

In only 10 minutes, the first newsreel “Sports Immortal” offers a 1939 montage of older footage from many sports champions (one of whom is the horse Man O’ War) who remain famous to this day. There is even a rare glimpse at a very young ice-skater Sonja Henie before she started her film career.

Joe DiMaggio

Baseball fans will love Touching All Bases! Actual legends are captured here on film (Like Marilyn Monroe's husband Joe Die Maggio) and should you want to emulate them, they are giving you instructions (with slow motion and all) for your game.
Also from 1939, The Brown Bomber will show you that Entertainment Tonight invented nothing. The camera follows heavy weight champion Joe Louis as a groupie would in his training, his breakfast, his listening to records, etc. 

Kings of Sport is a newsreel featuring champions of the forties like Babe Ruth, Jesse Owens, or golfer Bobby Jones.
To wrap up these volume is a piece of History! Adolf Hitler himself appears in an American newsreel about the 1936 Olympic Highlights. It is fascinating to have an American point of view over the Nazi-themed event so famously covered by German film-maker Leni Riefenstahl.


Find out more about this set and upcoming releases from the official site, the youtube channel, and of course buy volume 1 and volume 2 on amazon !

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Annie Get Your Gun

Annie Get Your Gun is a feel-good movie. Yet it hides so much pain and unhappiness. What should have been a high point on the stars' careers became their doom.
MGM hired Judy Garland and Frank Morgan to reunite in this musical, but he died early in the filming and her health made it difficult for her and she felt wrong for the part.

She recorded all her songs, and the shoot started. Soon, she had to stop because she just did not have the strength. So MGM imported the blonde bombshell Betty Hutton from Paramount.
Along with Judy went director Busby Berkeley who was replaced with George Sidney, and some of the cast.

Betty Hutton was much more appropriate for the part, but the cast and crew hated her simply for being Garland's replacement. She later insisted on interviews that she had a miserable time on the set and that she was disgusted with the film business because of it.

Betty Hutton was a major star in the forties and her fame was consistently rising. She was voted most popular female star by Photoplay magazine in 1950. Today, she is only remembered for this film and the next one (Cecil B. DeMille's The Greatest Show On Earth), afterwhich she disappeared into oblivion, and I'm not sure many people actually know the name of the energetic trapeze artist from the DeMille movie, even though they probably saw it at some point.

I must say I initially did not feel attracted to her personality because I had heard a few interviews and read a few articles which focused on her faith, to which I do no relate at all. I like to hear a film star talk about her career, and occasionally about her personal life if it's of any interest, but I'm sure I'm not interested in hearing them trying to convince me their God is the One for me. And I was afraid it would be the bulk of  Betty's writings.

My brother offered me her autobiography one day and I must say I understood why anyone would need a strong support such as religion with a life like she had. I defy anyone to read the book and not feel sympathy for her by page 50.
Her father left her alcoholic mother, who was a bootlegger. This set the tone for a personal disastrous life.

Incidentally, we learn that Ethel Merman, the star of the Broadway version of Annie Get your Gun, cut Betty's single number out of "Panama Hattie" that they did together previously. The show's song "There's no business like show business" was reused by her in the 20th Century Fox Marilyn Monroe film of the same name.

We also learn that June Allyson, whom Betty had taught to act, sing and dance like her, wasn't exactly the sweetheart that she appeared to be.

And last but not least,  this is one more candid testimony about Cary Grant being bisexual. And you can bet Betty is not a liar.

After "Annie" and except for a few come-backs, Betty stayed out of the public eye and lost all of her money. Her children left her when the money ran out and her mother burned to death. She eventually became a cook in an institution where she met her mentor Father Maguire. In the 2000 TCM interview by Robert Osborne, Betty says she was under the supervision of the state because someone had tried to steal money from her.

Judy as Annie

One of Betty's number was also cut from Annie Get Your Gun. You can hear and see some of the deleted numbers (Betty's and Judy's) on the excellent soundtrack CD and DVD. And if you're interested in Betty Hutton and the Hollywood of the forties, I very much recommend her autobiography called Backstage You Can Have. Her official website is satinandspurs.com


One shot from Annie that I always felt was very sad was from Judy's outtakes were the director yells cut in the middle of her line and she raises her head with surprised eyes and starts complaining but the camera cuts and she disappears from the screen. I'm probably seeing too much into it, but knowing the fate of the film and of these two great actresses, I can't help but to see a symbol of doom in that one shot.

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The Boop Boop a Doop Girl

Helen Kane is a star who influenced iconic people, characters, songs, etc. There aren't many who remember her now, though.
You probably remember Marilyn Monroe singing:
"I wanna be loved by you
Boop Boop Bee Doop"

This song was created by Helen Kane and the trademark scat singing "Boop a Doop" style also was popularized by her in the late twenties. She became such a sensation that Helen Kane merchandise (dolls, comics, etc.) was sold, she recorded 22 songs and made several films.
Max Fleischer (Popeye) capitalized on her fame by creating the cartoon character Betty Boop who went on to become more famous than her model. Helen sued but lost the trial.
In 1950, the film Three Little Words told a romanticized version of the lives of composers Bert Kalmar and Harry Ruby and their meeting with Helen is portrayed. Debbie Reynolds played the part of Helen Kane in her twenties. But Helen's singing style was so special that she did the singing for the film.

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Something's Got to Give

There aren't many films that have such a famous scene. Surely you remember that film where Marilyn Monroe swims naked in a swimming pool. Sure you do,... it had Dean Martin in it, right? For some reason, you just cannot seem to remember the plot, though. But that scene got a lot of press coverage and is just as famous as the blowing skirt in "The Seven Year Itch".

And yet... there never was a film. At least not one that was ever completed. After the United Artists film The Misfits, shot in black and white by John Huston, 20th Century Fox who had the actress under contract felt that she should do another one of her successful Cinemascope Deluxe Color comedies. So an old script produced in 1940 as My Favorite Wife (starring Irenne Dunne and Cary Grant) was dug up and revamped for Marilyn to star in. The film was to be called Something's Got to Give and her co-star were Dean Martin and Cyd Charisse. George Cukor agreed to direct in spite of the problems he encountered with the temperamental star.

Marilyn had been a little plump in her last Fox movie Let's Make Love, but she went on a diet and came back in tip top shape for her makeup and costume test.

Some scenes were shot, among which the famous swimming pool scene. Precious time was lost shooting the same scenes endlessly with children or with a dog. And Marilyn's lack of sleep sometimes prevented her from shooting close-ups.

Unfortunately, Marilyn fell ill and George Cukor started shooting around her, until all the scenes that did not include her were in the can. The studio finally fired the actress. When her co-star would not work with anybody else and for various other obvious reasons, Marilyn was re-hired, but her subsequent death sealed the fate of the film.

However it still had a future. For 20th Century Fox, the first move was to use the script, some of the sets and start a new production with a completely different cast. They threw in a song and adapted the scenario to their new star: Doris Day. The result was Move Over Darling. A far less appealing title but a decent film nonetheless.

And then what? Several documentaries about Marilyn Monroe used the same footage over and over. Until a DVD of the documentary The Final Days came out. At the end of it was an attempt to edit all the scenes shot that could fit in a result that could make sense.

You can get a glimpse of what the film would have been, but the main attraction is missing from most of it. The comedy would probably have been in the line of Let's Make Love, but as shallow as Marilyn's role appears, it would have been a very definite turn in her career: never before had she played a mother.
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Gentlemen Prefer Blondes

It's summer! Take a vacation on a boat with Jane Russell and Marilyn Monroe for the musical cruise of your life. We're heading to France and their dubbing of musicals.

What's a musical? C'mon now! Even if the trend of movies where people break into song when they're in love or when they're happy or sad tend to come and go, some still meet with success nowadays like High School musical.

In France, American musicals are still dubbed in French but, probably because they speak better and better English, or maybe because the song sound better that way, they only dub the dialogs and keep the original recording for the songs. That wasn't always the case. Translators in the fifties often became lyricists and had a hard time combining lip synchronism, the musicality of the rimes and the meaning of the sentence.

 They would be frustrated to hear that their hard work was thrown away in many cases like in Gentlemen Prefer Blondes. In fact, when released in France, Marilyn paraded in her pink dress while singing in French. Imagine her Parisian accent. Hard to believe? Yet in this film, Lorelei Lee is in France and is supposed to sing in a Parisian cabaret. She even starts her song by an operatic "non, non, non".

As a matter of fact, the first cabaret sequence in France was supposed to be a "Two Little Girls From Little Rock" reprise sung in French by the two stars. The scene was cut and if neither picture nor sound has turned up since, you can still a glimpse of it in the trailer.

Quite surprisingly for such an important musical, there is no legitimate soundtrack, only songs spread upon various collections of Marilyn recordings. Yet masters are still extant in the Fox vault since The Diamond Collection CD offered us clean recordings of songs like "Anyone Here For Love". Interesting anecdote: this song was supposed to end with  Jane Russell being cheered by the gymnasts, but during shooting, one of them accidentaly pushed her in the swimming pool and the ending was altered musically and visually with a wet Jane Russell so that the dive be kept in the final cut. It is the original version you can hear on the CD and, here again, see in the trailer.

French singer Claire Leclerc recorded her dubbing of Marilyn on November 16 and 17, 1953. Actress Mony Dalmès dubbed her speaking voice. But the voice of the American star is now popular throughout the world, heard many times on CD, so lately when the movie is aired on French TV in a dubbed version, the songs are kept in English, sometimes with subtitles. However these French songs are not lost, you can find them all on DVD. I'm giving you here an extract of the most famous one. In it, Diamond is no longer Marilyn's best friend, it just "seduces her better".

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Marilyn uncovered

I'd like to be as lucky as this guy who found an undeveloped film at the flea market. Well, I would, but in my case the pictures would be of someone's aunt Maude or little Kevin's birthday... That guy got a $2 set of never before seen pictures of Marilyn Monroe and Jayne Mansfield which will bring him a fortune only with the returns of the books that we're bound to see later this year.
Anyway, I'm happy that this lost treasure has been found. Marilyn is so pretty.

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Movie Moguls

Today, I'd like to share a book not unrelated to my subject. I bought "Memo from Darryl F. Zanuck". A book gathering memos from the head of 20th Century Fox for years (during the Golden Age) at a time when these men had complete control over their productions.


In the same styme only with a pronounced focus on Gone With The Wind, I loved the book of memos from David O. Selznick.


It's fascinating to find the personalities of these men through the lines, but also to learn about the making of famous films. One memo deals with Marilyn Monroe and her desire to have her acting coach from the very beginning of success (Don't Bother To Knock). A few apparently insignificant words about casting or script can turn out to be crucial for the fate of the film as we, today's viewer know.


The memo battle between Alfred Hitchcock and Zanuck about the only film he did for Fox, Lifeboat is also included.

Also, Anna and the King of Siam could have starred Olivia de Havilland under the direction of Lubitsch. Thanks to a couple of memos, A letter to Five Wives, became A letter to Four Wives, then A letter to Three Wives, each time knocking out a wife from the scenario.

Masterpieces such as All about Eve are talked about and others that could have been made at Fox like A Streetcar named Desire (produced at Warner's because of missed opportunity).

This book tells you of the films you saw, but also of the ones you could have seen, with different actors, cuts, scripts that the ones you know. Buy Zanuck's book on amazon.com and Selznick's that I mentioned : he comes across as more tyrannical but just as passionate and interesting if not more.

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