Classic Movies

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),…

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…

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…