Frank and Ava with Rico Simonini as Frank Sinatra and Emily Elicia Low as Ava Gardner: Explosive real-life relationship between the two temperamental Hollywood stars is the focus of Michael Oblowitz’s indie drama. In a brief q&a, Frank and Ava co-screenwriter and Frank Sinatra portrayer…

Actress Sandra Dee was a hugely popular – and curious – cross between wholesome teen Deanna Durbin and tormented teen James Dean, going to school, catching waves, falling in love, and/or becoming pregnant out of wedlock in several movies of the late 1950s and early…

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: as former nightclub dancer Maria Vargas, Gardner discovers that the life of a noblewoman is not what it’s cracked up to be. Eleven years later, Swinging Londoner Julie Christie would learn the same lesson in John Schlesinger’s Darling. Ava…

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…