Looking for Mabel Normand
Madcap Mabel Normand
INDEX
ANNA MAY WONG
ANNA MAY WONG
AT
PORDENONE 2007
“ANNA
Kevin Brownlow on Abel Gance
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=GJ2kRzJajyo&mode=related&search
I am spending far too much of my time on YouTube but none of it has been wasted. Just today, I found another video posted by our friend Bruce Long.
This time Bruce has given us, Kevin Brownlow, the silent film scholar in an interview done sometime during the 1980s on Abel Gance. It runs about 4 ½ minutes and there are a number of clips from Napoleon. Brownlow goes into detail regarding Gance’s liberation of the camera, editing and the story of Gance’s use of his gun to call ‘action’! This is fine stuff.
OLIVE THOMAS IN PRINT
Writer Michelle Vogel is putting her knowledge of Classic Hollywood on the printed page once again with Olive Thomas - The Life and Death of a Silent Film Beauty. Thomas, hailed the “most beautiful woman in the world” by artist Harrison Fisher, was a girl on her way to the top. Like many aspiring actresses, she traveled to Hollywood with a dream. She first won a beauty contest in New York which led her to a part in Florenz Zeigfeld’s “Follies”, and the rest, should have been film history. Instead, Thomas’ story took a tragic detour with her untimely and mysterious death at the young age of 25.
The Roaring 20s, as they were known, were full of parties and letting loose. World War I was over and everything seemed to return to normal. Maybe they had in Anytown, USA. In 1920s Hollywood, life was anything but normal. Vogel’s prologue takes us back in time to those golden and scandalous Tinseltown nights. The lives and infamous deaths of such stars as Roscoe "Fatty" Arbuckle, Wallace Reid and director William Desmond Taylor seem too surreal to believe; but, these are the people to whom we're immediately introduced. It’s the perfect setup to a love story, a drama and a mystery, the very things that Olive Thomas’ life would become.
Vogel takes us from the prologue and throws us into a virtual timeline. The book is full of beautiful photography and rare candids, including one of Thomas posing with the 1916 New York Yankees, and even a vintage skin cream advertisement promoting the 1918 film "Heiress For A Day".
Olive, a pretty face with an unending thirst for knowledge, would ask questions to the point of annoying those around her. To her, it was the natural way of things. Incredibly, she managed to finesse her way into directing a few scenes in one of her own movies. The readers must remember, this was a woman in an industry dominated by men. She eventually married into Hollywood royalty by becoming Mrs. Jack Pickford. Jack was the brother of Mary Pickford, America's Sweetheart. Though it seemed like Mary and her mother did not approve of the marriage, Olive kept her head up the way she always did. Jack and Olive often showered each other with lavish gifts, which included jewelry and the latest automobiles. Many times they'd be working on opposite coasts, so these extreme measures were most likely over-compensation for not seeing each other. Life appeared to be grand, until a fateful trip to Paris in 1920. Olive died from what was said to be suicide by poisoning.
We delve straight into the numerous speculations about Olive's death. Vogel examines the unexplained and the unsettling angles like a rogue detective. From her birth to her childhood, from her rise to stardom to her death and finally to her funeral (attended by some 15,000 people) and the investigation thereafter, we're escorted along as if it were happening all over again. In Chapter 10, we get a "special" addition to the haunting story! I won't spoil it, but this was a great additive that, in retrospect, was very fitting to a woman as persistant as Olive Thomas. The book even gives a detailed list of Olive's stage and film appearances. If Michelle Vogel's list of credits are any indication, this is the perfect tribute to a woman that many have long forgotten. Olive Thomas was already an icon in the making, a rival to Mary Pickford that never got the chance to shine as bright as she could have. This is a book for enthusiasts and novices alike. It's written in a way that is very easy to understand, despite its incredible amount of information and research.
Pre-orders are currently being taken for Olive Thomas - The Life and Death of a Silent Film Beauty. If you would like to purchase a copy (personally recommended!), you can click the following link to place your order: Order the book now!
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FORD STERLING
FORD STERLING KEYSTONE
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Today the film colony, mourning the cheerful actor who was linked with the very beginning of the motion picture industry, applauded reports that the Keystone comedies, which |
released only this month, and the hilarious Keystone cops sequences proved so popular that studio executives are talking of a new Keystone series. A native of Audiences last saw him with “ His widow, Actress Teddy Sampson, was to decide upon funeral arrangement late today. |
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Here is a note from the author of the biographer of Ford Sterling, (you can link to purchase of this book at Mabel’s Store) |
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No wonder there is so much mis information for Sterling about, even the AP made errors. Last seen by audiences in ALICE IN WONDERLAND, I think not. Also wasn't aware Chaplin entered pictures in 1912 either! Sterling actually passed away on the 13th as the 14th Oct article notes, "Sterling died late last night". We went and put some flowers in a vase attached to his niche a few years ago, we suspect it was the first time anyone had bothered for years, I would like to go with you to remember the anniversary of his death but distance prevails. Good luck finding it, even the staff at the cemetery had a hard time locating it. It's on the bottom row in the old 'stand alone' crypt by the main crypt area (not the big white one, the one with the rotunda), his niche has water damage, the word 'Dawn' is written on the brass label, Sterling's name is not. I tried on a couple of occasions to , if not get him moved to a more appropriate place, at least have his name put on the communal niche, there are five cardboard boxes containing ashes in there.
WWW
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Mary Garden
Mary Garden was one of the stars of Sam Goldwyn’s galaxy of stars; Mabel was the first of this grouping of stars and I had posted information on Mary awhile ago but found this ad for perfume today and thought you might like to see it too. To re-read the post on Mary Garden just click on the perfume ad.
THE BARKER (1928)
by Marilyn Slater
I finally saw The Barker (1st National Picture 1928) at Cinecon on Monday morning after missing seeing it at UCLA; I was so pleased that Robert Gitt, the was able to explain the strange and convoluted trip this film has 
made from the Broadway stage (1927) with Walter Huston as Niffy and Claudette Colbert as Lou to this semi-talkie with Milton Sills/Betty Compson/Dorothy MacKaill (Lou) and for me the magnificent and frankly beautiful Douglas Fairbanks, Jr.
As I watched it I can understand what a great part for Clara and your excitement at the remake into Hoop-La (1933). The Hayes Office had their work cut out for them to sanitize it for Betty Grable's Billy Rose's Diamond Horseshoe (1945). This film was terrific and every film lover needs to see it. It has so much going for it – camera work – music – sound innovation – story
line – the midway culture – oh yes the performances. The Barker was only one of the wonderful offerings at Cinecon but for me one of the highlights!
Let Me Stay in the Summer
Let Me Stay in the Summer
by William Thomas Sherman*
Let me stay in the Summer
in that space serene
where the cares of the world
don’t matter,
till Autumn unfurls
its colors in whirls
to calm and to sooth them.
Let me stay in the Summer
in the race clouds run
and processions of light
don’t shatter,
till downpours excite,
bringing respite,
to the dry waiting earth.
Let me stay in the Summer
where it's hot and still;
where sweet living abounds,
nor scatters
till the rising winds sound
and herald around:
"the time of mirth draws near!"
*Mabel’s friend, William Thomas Sherman of the MABEL NORMAND HOME PAGE sent us this lovely poem.
My Lady's Lips (1925)
Saturday night (7/22)
When I saw the film, My Lady’s Lips, (1925) it was a nice surprise I was expecting to see an early Alyce Mills film with William Powell but I found a terrific performance by Ford Sterling as a gangster. Most of the publicity I know about the film circles around William Powell, he is the star of this little social consciousness: morality play and besides he shaves off his mustache.
I received a wonderful email for the Ford Sterling scholar Wendy Warwick White, the author of McFarland book on Ford. And she told me that …”What no one really knows is that Sterling actually went to the Academy of Performing Arts in NY graduating in 1904 and initially did mostly drama including Shakespeare. I have seen his performance in WILD ORANGES which is straight and he did a good job. Look at him in HE WHO GETS SLAPPED too, that is a totally straight role and I really don't think many people are aware they are watching
Poisoned Paradise Review 1924
The review of Clara Bow in POISONED
The Forbidden Story of Monte Carlo (1924 – B.P. Schulberg) by Dario Witer is well worth the read…I missed it and his review makes me realize what it was I missed and I am very sad about not going over to UCLA Sunday night to see it as part of the 13th Festival of Preservation.
Phyllis Haver & Vera Steadman
This looks like the pictures being taken in the camera photo below...I think this is Malibu because of the rocks...?
Bathing Beauty 11
"Bathing Beauty 11" is a bunch of Sennett girls
on the beach c1924/5 shot by George Cannons who
did most of Sennett's stills from at least as
early 1923 according to Steve Rydzewski.
Mack Sennett Weekly Bathing Beauties
In the Mack Sennett Weekly, I found a number of pictures of Bathing Beauties, I think most of these are by Evans, but if you know, there is a place to communicate in “what’s new” on the navigation bar. Although the images themselves are not terrific, the photos are labeled with the Beauty’s name, which is a great help for identifying other photos where you see them in the same swimsuits, as it is seldom that they shared suits.
NAZIMOVA
http://looking-for-mabel.webs.com/nazimova.htm
Alla Nazimova was born in
