Actress Carol Lynley ca. 1980. The 1970s were a problematic decade for Hollywood film actresses; still, it’s hard to understand why Carol Lynley’s post-The Poseidon Adventure films consisted almost invariably of low-to-micro-budget, largely ignored fare. The few highlights in the 45-year film career of actress…

Carol Lynley movies: In her heyday, the Blue Denim, Bunny Lake Is Missing, and The Poseidon Adventure actress was often cast as dreamy girl-next-door types willing and able to tear down the walls of social conventions. Two Carol Lynley movies are being presented on TCM:…

Ann Sothern: actress enjoyed belated (second) career peak. In the late 1940s, Sothern was featured in a cluster of A productions, among them the MGM musicals Words and Music and Nancy Goes to Rio, and 20th Century Fox’s double Oscar-winning drama A Letter to Three…

Ann Sothern ca. early 1940s. Although never a superstar, MGM contract actress Ann Sothern was billed above the title in comedies, dramas, and musicals during the 1940s and early 1950s – along the way, getting to sing the classic Oscar-winning ballad “The Last I Saw…

Ava Gardner in The Barefoot Contessa. In Joseph L. Mankiewicz’s (partly) Rita Hayworth-inspired drama, a Spanish nightclub dancer turned international movie star turned member of the Italian nobility discovers that the life of a noblewoman is not what it’s cracked up to be. Ava Gardner…

Jimmy Stewart. ‘Jimmy’ Stewart: Unlikely Hollywood star enjoyed decades-long career in a variety of genres The personification of all-American aw-shucksiness – of the sort you find only in bad movies and bad literature – James Stewart, fondly remembered by some as “Jimmy Stewart,” was one…

Lena Horne. Lena Horne movies: Velvety-voiced singer generally relegated to specialty numbers during heyday of the Hollywood musical Had things been different, it’s anybody’s guess whether or not three-time Grammy winner Lena Horne, Turner Classic Movies’ “Summer Under the Stars” performer of the day (Aug.…

Melvyn Douglas. Melvyn Douglas: From suave leading man to Hollywood’s top female stars to first-rate dramatic actor Unlike Tyrone Power, Errol Flynn, or Gary Cooper, Melvyn Douglas couldn’t exactly be considered a handsome, matinee idol type. Unlike Edward G. Robinson, James Cagney, or Spencer Tracy,…

Hal Prince. Out of his record-setting 21 Tony Awards, eight were as Best Director of a Musical for the following: Cabaret (at the 1967 ceremony), Company (1971), Follies (1972, with Michael Bennett), Candide (1974), Sweeney Todd: The Demon Barber of Fleet Street (1979), Evita (1980),…

Michael Llewelyn Davies dressed up as Peter Pan. J.M. Barrie’s favorite Llewelyn Davies boy, Michael was the most important source of inspiration for Peter Pan, “the boy who wouldn’t grow up.” The play came out when he was 4; the novel Peter and Wendy when…

Peter Pan author J.M. Barrie. Marc Forster’s Finding Neverland ends on a sentimental note: Barrie (Johnny Depp) reminds the orphaned Peter (Freddie Highmore) that the power of imagination can be stronger than death. Real life, however, had a less inspirational finale for all involved. Directed…

Author Allan R. Ellenberger discusses Miriam Hopkins in the interview further below – and in his Hopkins biography Life and Films of a Hollywood Rebel. From pre-Code antiheroine to matronly supporting player, Hopkins stole scenes and/or movies from the likes of Maurice Chevalier (The Smiling…

Howard Keel in Dallas with Donna Reed: late 20th-century mainstream resurgence of two former Metro-Goldwyn-Mayer stars. On Season 8 (1984–1985) of CBS’s hit TV soap Dallas (1978–1991), 1950s MGM contract actor-singer Howard Keel, previously a “guest star” on the show, was hired as a regular…

The Music Man with Robert Preston and Shirley Jones: Independence Day movies. Numerous Hollywood musicals have attempted to capture that elusive, reality-averse quality known as “Americana-ness” – e.g., Yankee Doodle Dandy, Meet Me in St. Louis, In the Good Old Summertime, On Moonlight Bay, By…

John Paul Jones with Robert Stack: 4th of July movies. Although every sign indicates that 2019 is the new 1984, those in the U.S. shouldn’t fret: TCM’s 4th of July movies will transport viewers to the distant past, when there was no climate crisis (or…

Howard Keel at the height of his career in Seven Brides for Seven Brothers, with Jane Powell. In his autobiography, Only Make Believe: My Life in Show Business, Howard Keel refers to the making of Stanley Donen’s 1954 sleeper blockbuster Seven Brides for Seven Brothers…