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Category Archives: Actors
Happy birthday, John Wayne!
From Who the Hell’s in It: Conversations with Hollywood’s Legendary Actors, by Peter Bogdonavich: His performances in these pictures [Rio Grande, The Quiet Man, The Searchers, The Wings of Eagles, Man Who Shot Liberty Valance] rate with the finest examples … Continue reading
Libeled Lady (1936): It’s So Funny When William Powell lies
In Libeled Lady, William Powell plays Bill Chandler, a guy hired (or, actually, RE-hired) by newspaper editor Warren Haggerty (played by Spencer Tracy) to basically set up heiress Connie Allenbury (played by Myrna Loy) for a big fall, so that … Continue reading
“Where’s his damn box set?” – Kim Morgan on John Garfield
A recap of the Arthur Lyons Film Noir festival in Palm Springs by Kim Morgan, with a special focus on John Garfield. He’s long been a favorite of mine. Due to my obsession with all things Actors Studio starting from … Continue reading
“Jesus Christ! That’s Henry Fonda!”
A great post from one of my new favorite blogs (I spent a good two hours the other day scrolling through the damn thing – it’s RICH) about Henry Fonda, typecasting, and Sergio Leone’s casting of Fonda as the heavy … Continue reading Continue reading
“He’s the man standing up there beside Errol Flynn.” – Amanda McBroom
Amanda McBroom I said recently on Twitter (I know, so ridiculous, like that has any validity whatsoever – however, apparently it’s all going into the Library of Congress, so at least my name will live on forever in some capacity) … Continue reading
Psychopaths and morality: Jeremy Renner and Sissy Spacek
Fascinating article called Psychopaths and Rational Morality: The Frontal Cortex, with an even better conversation going on in the comments. Go read the whole thing, it’s very interesting. It is one of my obsessions: psychopaths, antisocial personalities, whatever name you … Continue reading
Lost Works of Sir Noel Coward
My good friend Kate appeared in a long-running show recently in Chicago called Oh, Coward, which got glorious reviews (that’s just one of them). A three-person cabaret night, devoted to the works of Noel Coward. It felt like she was … Continue reading
Master class with Liv Ullmann
I’ve got Liv Ullmann on the brain after watching the HBO “Master Class” show, where she coached 5 young actors in the Mitch-Blanche date scene in Streetcar Named Desire (which she was, at that time, directing, with Cate Blanchett – … Continue reading Continue reading
Not like you need another reason to love Myrna Loy …
But here you go, just in case. Thanks, Siren. I have been re-watching all of the William Powell/Myrna Loy movies recently (my review of Love Crazy here), and I am in love with them both. Myrna Loy, with her cool … Continue reading
Out of the Past: The Battle of the Under-Actors
Excerpt from Lee Server’s Robert Mitchum: Baby, I Don’t Care: Director and star proved to be ideally matched. In [Robert] Mitchum, [Jacques] Tourneur had found the most expressive embodiment of his own cinematic aesthetic of eloquent, subversive resistance and oneiric … Continue reading