The Silver Screen Oasis

HAPPY BIRTHDAY

ROBERT DUVALL is 80 today


JANE WYMAN (1917 - 2007)


GEORGE REEVES (1914 - 1959)


JEAN-PIERRE AUMONT (1911 - 2001)


CORA WITHERSPOON (1890 - 1957)

Wow, Jane Wyman looks terrific in that picture, super sensuous.. From what period is it Joe?

Fernando, the image of Miss Wyman is from the 1930s. She is a doll indeed.

Charley Grapewin and Paul Muni taking direction on "The Good Earth"

Ann Sheridan giving boxing champ Jack Dempsey a workout on the dance floor

Diana Lewis and hubby William Powell enjoy a night out on the town (or are they at home?)

Holy smokes! That is a sexy picture, and Powell looks years younger than he probably is, if my time frame for the Lewis marriage is correct.

Given his choice of jackets, one hopes the lights were low at the clubs he frequented that night!

And only William Powell could get away with mixing a patterned tie with that checked jacket and not look like a goof. Maybe it's the boutonnière that makes the whole ensemble work, but I think it's really something in Bill's DNA filed under "style."

Truer words ne'er spoken on these board, MF!
Bill Powell had the old pour quois non at a cellular level, enabling him to make Manhattan phone listings sound droll & witty, and I don't doubt that if he'd swapped duds with Mike Mazurki before starting, he'd still have been the life of the party.

One of the revelations of Sarah Baker's book Lucky Stars, the dual biography of Charles Farrell and Janet Gaynor, was that Farrell had an affair with "Mousie" Powell that lasted for almost two decades. Baker described it as close as Farrell ever came to a second marriage. His marriage to Virginia Valli was very unhappy, but she refused to divorce him, and they remained married until her death in (I think) 1968.

I started to write something about Powell's loud clothing, but when I looked a second time, it didn't look so loud on him.... that's style.

Now I feel even more terrible for Mr. Powell. The poor man was doomed in his love life. It seems almost impossible that he should be.

JackFavell, according to Baker's book, Powell and Farrell were very good friends, and Powell actually did not feel betrayed. Due to the consequences of surgery for prostate cancer and other health problems, there were some things he could no longer do and felt that Farrell was "taking care" of Mousie. (Or words to that effect.)

It was indeed a very sad situation and I'm sure poor Virginia Valli had to have been grinding her teeth, but then she had been grinding them for decades, as her marriage with Charlie went sour almost from the beginning and he had been with other women throughout the years, and sometimes would even travel for months at a time to avoid being home. He begged for a divorce but she just wouldn't give it. I guess in those days he couldn't divorce her since there would be no grounds on her part.

There's a wonderful picture in Baker's book of Charlie and Mousie on the tennis court (they were both crazy for tennis) -- he's lifting her up in the air and she has the happiest smile on her face.

But even that affair ended once Charlie got truly old and let his world shrink in on him; he stopped seeing even his oldest friends, including Mousie, and would only communicate with his domestic help. The only person he would still talk to is Janet Gaynor (whom he had wanted to marry before he married Valli) but after her death he didn't talk to anyone except his housekeeper and his maid.

Wendy, Mr. Powell had a happy marriage to actress Diana Lewis (44 years) until his death at age 91. In Hollywood, that is a miracle.

Thank you for clarifying. Powell has always been a favorite of mine and it seemed heartbreaking to me that he might have been cuckolded, after Lewis brought him out of his depression over Jean Harlow's death.