Royal romance movies: Ramon Novarro and Norma Shearer discover sprightly love and excruciating heartbreak in Ernst Lubitsch’s 1927 silent classic The Student Prince in Old Heidelberg. As a William &…
Rex Ingram. St. Patrick’s Day always reminds me of silent era filmmaker Rex Ingram, among whose silent era efforts are The Four Horsemen of the Apocalypse, The Prisoner of Zenda,…
Alice Terry and Ramon Novarro in Rex Ingram’s Scaramouche. Ramon Novarro is back for the fourth and last installment of Turner Classic Movies’ Sunday evening celebration of the 100 years…
Mexican actors: Durango-born Ramon Novarro, Canadian Norma Shearer, and Dane Jean Hersholt in the German Ernst Lubitsch’s The Student Prince in Old Heidelberg. Turner Classic Movies’ Hispanic Heritage Month celebration…
Norma Shearer in The Student Prince in Old Heidelberg with Ramon Novarro as the titular character. Norma Shearer may not be a household name today, but back in the late…
The Four Horsemen of the Apocalypse with Rudolph Valentino (left) and then-extra Ramon Novarro (right). Rose Dione is seen holding the French tricolor in Rex Ingram’s 1921 blockbuster. Directed by…
The Student Prince in Old Heidelberg with Ramon Novarro and Norma Shearer. The theme of a prince who gives up the girl he loves in order to fulfill his royal…
Jeanette MacDonald, Ramon Novarro, The Cat and the Fiddle Beyond Paradise: The Life of Ramon Novarro is a film star biography I wrote several years ago. The book tells the…
Ramon Novarro, Dorothy Janis, The Pagan. Dorothy Janis, who made a few film appearances at the dawn of the sound era and was the widow of bandleader Wayne King, died…
Whitewashing in Hollywood: Ramon Novarro, Helen Hayes, and Louise Closser Hale as Chinese nationals in The Son-Daughter. The ethnic controversy surrounding the casting of Gérard Depardieu as Alexandre Dumas in…
The Prisoner of Zenda 1937 with Douglas Fairbanks Jr. vs. Ronald Colman. A moderately popular leading man in the early 1930s, mostly as either obnoxious or lackluster “heroes” in forgettable…
The Art Directors Guild (website) Film Society will be screening George Cukor’s extravagant 1960 Western Heller in Pink Tights, starring Sophia Loren and Anthony Quinn, in tribute to production designer…
Silent film actress Anita Page turns 98: Featured in first all-talking Best Picture Academy Award winner Author Allan Ellenberger, currently working on a biography of Miriam Hopkins (Best Actress Academy…
The 1959 MGM version of Ben-Hur is best remembered for its chariot race, which happens to be an imitation of the superior 1925 race for that studio’s mammoth – and…
Ben-Hur 1925 with Ramon Novarro and Francis X. Bushman: Masterfully edited – but deadly, on- and off-screen – chariot race. Although I am not a fan of action-adventure pictures, the…