Category Archives: On This Day

“I, along with the critics, have never taken myself very seriously.” — Elizabeth Taylor

Posted on February 27, 2026 by sheila

It’s her birthday today. I wrote a big piece on my Substack about National Velvet/A Place in the Sun/Suddenly Last Summer/Cat on a Hot Tin Roof/Who’s Afraid of Virginia Woolf and General Hospital. Naturally there is more to discuss – … Continue reading →

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“Imagination! Imagination! I put it first years ago, when I was asked what qualities I thought necessary for success on the stage.” –Ellen Terry

Posted on February 27, 2026 by sheila

“It is only in comedy that people seem to know what I am driving at!” — Ellen Terry It’s her birthday. In 1907, great English actress Ellen Terry (approaching her 50th year onstage) appeared in George Bernard Shaw’s satirical Captain … Continue reading →

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“I recognize no rights but human rights.” — Angelina Weld Grimké

Posted on February 27, 2026 by sheila

“The ground upon which you stand is holy ground: never never surrender it.” — Angelina Weld Grimké Poet/playwright Angelina Weld Grimké, born on this day in 1880, had a powerful familial legacy. Her paternal grandparents were a white slave owner … Continue reading →

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Eleanor Roosevelt, the D.A.R., and Marian Andersen

Posted on February 26, 2026 by sheila

86 years ago today, First Lady Eleanor Roosevelt publicly resigned from the Daughters of the American Revolution (DAR) after the organization barred famous contralto Marian Anderson from singing at Constitution Hall. Howard University had invited Anderson to sing in Washington … Continue reading →

Posted in Music, On This Day | Tagged | 4 Comments

“Teens always heard my music with their hearts. The beat was just happy. It didn’t have color or hidden meaning.” — Fats Domino

Posted on February 26, 2026 by sheila

You never hear a bad thing about him. There’s the famous moment at Elvis’ 1968 press conference in Las Vegas, where Fats Domino is standing off to the side, and Elvis puts his arm around him and says to the … Continue reading →

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“Sometimes I am two people. Johnny is the nice one. Cash causes all the trouble. They fight.” — Johnny Cash

Posted on February 26, 2026 by sheila

It’s his birthday today. Johnny Cash, singing “Man in Black” in Denmark: Here he is on Tex Ritter’s Ranch Party, 1956 or so. Great guitar solo, too. He’s not just strumming that guitar. The guitar CHUGS along, with an irresistible … Continue reading →

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Happy Twin Peaks Day to those who celebrate

Posted on February 24, 2026 by sheila
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“He is a good listener. When you have a good listener you have a good actor.” — Norman Taurog on Elvis

Posted on February 23, 2026 by sheila

American director Norman Taurog was born in 1899, literally during the first gasps of cinema. What an improbable journey. He was born into a world before cinema had even cohered into an artform … and he ended his career helming … Continue reading →

Posted in Directors, Movies, On This Day | Tagged , | 9 Comments

February 22, 1980: “Do you believe in miracles? YES!”

Posted on February 22, 2026 by sheila

Member when Russia was our enemy? I miss those days. It is truly wild to watch certain people – whose identity for 75 years was opposition to Russia’s tyranny – flip-flop. The cognitive dissonance has to be insane. Or it … Continue reading →

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“I should like to make even the most ordinary spectator feel that he is not living in the best of all possible worlds.” – Luis Buñuel

Posted on February 22, 2026 by sheila

Today is Luis Buñuel’s birthday! From Luis Buñuel’s autobiography My Last Sigh: Connoisseurs who like their martinis very dry suggest simply allowing a ray of sunlight to shine through a bottle of Noilly Prat before it hits the bottle of … Continue reading →

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