*CANDIDS*

[jdb1]

Whoa! I think Platt looks like a combination of Charles Boyer and Pernell Roberts in that photo. Wonder if he ever, ever got a chance to play a role that allowed him to look and act like that man. He had a nice, manly, resonant speaking voice as well. If he never got to play a romantic lead, even in a Grade D movie, it's our loss, no?

It's nice to see Susan Oliver, one of so many prolific film and TV actresses of the 60s and 70s who never quite made it to the greater public consciousness. I think she is much more famous now, due to her performance in the seminal Star Trek pilot episode which is aired so often these days, than she was at the time the episode was made. Oliver was also a director, and a licensed pilot. I think she was among the very small number of women who, up to that time, piloted a small plane solo across the Atlantic. I remember her being in the news when she tried to become the first female pilot to fly a small aircraft solo from the US to Moscow. As I recall it, she didn't make it because Russia denied her entry into its airspace. Not quite sure, but I think this was in the late 1960s. She was younger than I am now when she passed away, which is of course far too young. And she looked very good in green.

[moira finnie]

I always thought Ed Platt's best crack at playing a romantic lead came in Rebel Without a Cause, didn't you? Maybe it's just me, but sometimes I thought that there was a detectable vibe between Ed's police psychologist and Ann Doran as James Dean's emasculating Hysterical Hannah of a Mom, (poor Jim Backus!).


Susan Oliver's trip to Moscow was in the news in '67, as explained in this news item:

Star's Moscow Flight Off

[klondike]

. . . maybe I can thank Mongo for including Andy Robinson, also sometimes billed as Andrew Robinson, along with better-known actors. Robinson gave some very good performances, whether in Charley Varrick or during a run on Ryan's Hope or as Liberace in a made-for-TV movie. I thought the latter might jump start his career again, but not so.

Unfortunately, as is the case with, probably, most Baby Boomers, I remember Andy Robinson best for playing the psycho killer stalking Clint Eastwood in the first Dirty Harry film . . a role that likely afforded him his greatest exposure, but returned the least value for his future casting.

[mongoII]

Be my Valentine

[mongoII]

Alfred Hitchcock helps Ingrid Bergman with her knitting on the set of "Spellbound"

[mongoII]

HAPPY BIRTHDAY

SHERRY JACKSON is 69 today


CLAIRE BLOOM is 80 today


KEVIN McCARTHY (1914 - 2010)


CESAR ROMERO (1907 - 1994)


GALE SONDERGAARD (1899 - 1985)


ARTHUR SHIELDS (1896 - 1970)


JOHN BARRYMORE (1882 - 1942)

[mongoII]

Robert Taylor & Barbara Stanwyck at home when all was peaches and cream

[JackFavell]

Wow! I love that picture for so many many reasons! One, I love how casual Barbara and Robert seem. Barbara always seems so down to earth in her candids. Two, it has a dog (I think ) in it. And three, it looks just like our (much smaller, I'm sure) house when I was a kid in Oklahoma. We had almost the same trellises holding up our porch, which had a planter built in.

[jdb1]

When I was a wee lass I was sometimes allowed to call the annual Jerry lewis MDA Telethon to make a pledge, and one year Cesar Romero took my call. He was very nice to me, not at all condescending, as I recall. Back in those days many people, especially men, were extremely curt and condescending to children, you see. I pledged $5 -- that's how long ago it was. He asked to speak to my mother, to verify that my pledge was legit. I don't know what he said to her, but she was grinning like a loon all the rest of the evening, and possibly the next day as well. So was I, for that matter. It is a very fond memory. Thank you, Butch.

[mongoII]

Nice recollections, Wendy and Judith. Nice to see you back on the boards.

[charliechaplinfan]

They're nice recollections, Cesar Romero must have made your mother's day. What a nice chap.

[mongoII]

Lizabeth Scott acting on the set of "The Strange Love of Martha Ivers"

[klondike]

Whoa!
Good thing Van Heflin wasn't riding that camera when he drove off the road & cracked up at the beginning of TSLOMI . . it would've been a very short movie.

[mongoII]

Let Them Eat Cake...


A celebration of Joan Blondell's birthday on the set of Adventure with Clark Gable, Greer Garson, Lina Romay and director Victor Fleming


Nelson Eddy helps Jeanette MacDonald celebrate three milestones at one time: her birthday, her first wedding anniversary and the start of filming of Sweethearts


Clark Gable, Myrna Loy and Jean Harlow help Lionel Barrymore celebrate his birthday