Me Tarzan, You Rebecca!

It’s amazing that in starting this journey through the dark winding cobweb strewn back passages of my mind, that I have rediscovered so many joys from my childhood years...this week it was all those wonderful Tarzan films starring Johnny Weissmuller.

What started me on this particular trail was recalling the name Henry Stephenson.

Henry Stephenson

Henry Stephenson was a dignified British character actor who at the time he appeared in the film Tarzan Finds A Son (1939) was almost 70. Not the most familiar of names but a face that would pop up in many films from Captain Blood (1935) to Oliver Twist (1948) - in which he played the kindly Mr Brownlow with Sir Alec Guinness as Fagin and Robert Newton as Bill Sikes.

Thinking of Henry Stephenson got me reflecting on other British and US character actors from that era and the flood gates opened - Sir C Aubrey Smith, Sir Cedric Hardwicke, Nigel Bruce, Dame Judith Anderson, Gladys Cooper, Reginald Denny, George Sanders.

Johnny Weissmuller

But I’m leaping ahead, let me return to the beginning - Henry Stephenson appeared in two of the twelve Tarzan films made by Weissmuller, the former Olympic swimmer who filled the role and the loin cloth from 1932 until 1948. In both movies Stephenson played a character who was ennobled, Sir Guy Henderson and Sir Thomas Lancing, and this is what actors like Stephenson gave to the cinema - they gave gravitas and a sense of class - it balanced the crassness and brashness of some of the new stars like Weissmuller.

As a boy, a chance to watch or re-watch a Tarzan film was never missed, mostly to see the antics of Cheetah the chimpanzee of course. Weissmuller was a very athletic man and according to the biography of Esther Williams, he did not reserve that ability just for playing Tarzan!

Ably supported by Maureen O’Sullivan as Jane and Johnny Sheffield as Boy, the hero battled angry natives, angry lions, angry crocodiles, angry snakes and also angry Nazis. Guess who won?
And who could forget one of the most iconic sounds in film history....Tarzan Calling!

This sound was claimed by Weissmuller as his own, but we know now it was created in a studio by Douglas Shearer, a sound recordist.

The making of the Tarzan films gave the studios a chance to use loads of stock footage and as they were cheap to make and had a good audience response, they were steadily churned out over the course of 16 years until Weissmuller handed the loin cloth and swinging vine duties to Lex Barker and Gordon Scott.

There was also room for lots of great character actors to make appearances, like Sig Ruman, Neil Hamilton, Henry Wilcoxon, Barton MacLane, Maria Ouspenskaya and the aforementioned Sir C Aubrey Smith.

C Aubrey Smith

Smith had been a cricketer, a victorious England Captain no less,  and he carried this love of the game to America where he was quite insistent that any British actors come along and join the Hollywood Cricket Club. With roles in films as diverse as The Crusades, The Prisoner of Zenda and And Then There Were None, he also played Jane’s father in Tarzan The Ape Man (1932).

Now stay with me because the connections are going to get a bit convoluted...

Tom Conway

Tom Conway was an actor who will
probably ring no bells in the minds of anyone reading this blog - but for me Tom Conway is a name I recall for a couple of reasons. Firstly he was the brother of George Sanders, who he closely resembled, and secondly he starred as The Falcon, taking over the role from his brother and making a series of quite good mystery thrillers. Conway starred in two Tarzan films, one with Weissmuller and one with Lex Barker - he was suave, there is not other word to describe him - suave.

Of course  this was a family trait because his younger brother, Sanders, was the epitome of the suave English gentleman even though he was born in Russia. He may have been born in Russia but it was to British parents who repatriated him to England at the start of the Russian revolution.

George Sanders

If you have not heard or do not recall George Sanders, let me remind you that it was he who provided the voice of Shere Khan the Tiger in The Jungle Book (1967).

Sanders would become a regular in Hollywood and British cinema across 40 years until he committed suicide at the age of 65. He left a most revealing note which read:

‘Dear World, I am leaving because I am bored. I feel I have lived long enough. I am leaving you with your worries in this sweet cesspool. Good luck.’

He did leave behind a wonderful collection of performances, usually the cad or the villain and an especially smooth performance in the film Rebecca (1940).

And so we arrive at our final destination for today, a film that is still watched and enjoyed the world over, Hitchcock making his first film in America but a very British story and a film stuffed with great British character actors including the aforementioned C Aubrey Smith plus Dame Judith Anderson, Nigel Bruce and starring Laurence Olivier and Joan Fontaine.

Joan Fontaine is the younger sister of Olivia De Havilland, both still alive at the respective ages of 93 and 94. The only sisters to win Best Actress Oscars, they were both nominated in 1942 when Fontaine’s win was the start of an alleged falling out between them.

Joan Fontaine and Judith Anderson
in Rebecca (1940)

The one iconic role in the film that I recall above all others is that of Mrs Danvers played with controlled malice by Dame Judith Anderson. Listen to her here trying to persuade Fontaine to commit suicide...
Dame Judith Anderson as Mrs Danvers

Dame Judith - T'Lar

Dame Judith was an Australian who was a renowned stage actress before moving to films. A string of great performances followed topped off for me by her portrayal of the Vulcan High Priestess T’Lar in Star Trek:The Search for Spock. She was 86 and from every wonderful wrinkle shone a life of acting greatness.

Anyway, there we have it, from Tarzan to Rebecca and all because of Henry Stephenson, a man forgotten by many - but not by me.

Let me ask you a question...

 What was the first talking picture?

You probably said ‘The Jazz Singer’. 

The 1927 film, starring Al Jolson, contained some sections with synchronized sound but it wasn’t the first -  there had been earlier films which had achieved this milestone - so what is it about The Jazz Singer that sets it apart and earned it a false place in cinematic history and makes it the wrong answer in countless pub quizzes?

Perhaps it was the story, but perhaps and more likely is that Jolson was one of the biggest stars of his time - people loved him. During the premiere of the film, when he uttered those immortal words “Wait a minute, wait a minute, you ain't heard nothin' yet”.... the audience went wild, they stamped and applauded, perhaps they understood how magical this moment was and what the future held for them, as movie-goers.

In a way this phrase was a war cry, a challenge perhaps to all film makes that followed - they had to top this cinematic moment.

They had to find something special, in stories, in action, in music, in performance - the studios knew they were in a battle for the hearts and minds of all those who flocked to the cinema, flocked to lose themselves in the stories on screen, to escape the drab dismal depression years, to sit in the dark and to laugh and cry with the stars. Yes, it was a battle and a battle in which no prisoners would be taken (apart from The Prisoner of Zenda).

The studio system was in full swing, Fox, MGM, Warner Brothers, RKO and Paramount were the five main players with United Artists, Universal and Columbia taking up smaller percentages of the huge cinema going market. This was the Golden Age of Hollywood.

There were some great stars made in those golden years, Garbo, Gable, Crawford, Cagney, Bogart, I could go on - but it was the lesser known names that drew my attention and who were added to the lists I was keeping, actors and actresses not so famous to modern audiences but very well known in their day. 

I was drawn to the likes of Paul Muni,Luise Rainer,George Raft, and the dark brooding beauty of Gale Sondergaard.

Paul Muni & Luise Rainer

Muni was a great actor, in a film career spanning thirty plus years he was nominated for the Best Actor Oscar on five occasions - winning in 1937 for playing Louis Pasteur in a biopic about the scientist. He also has the distinction of being one of only two actors to receive an Oscar nomination for his first and last film appearance - he shares that honour with James Dean.

I suggest you have a look at these clips and you will see how wide ranging his skill was as an actor - he was the Daniel Day Lewis of his time, he immersed himself in the character so well.

Paul Muni as Scarface   

Paul Muni as Zola

Gale Sondergaard also received an Oscar nomination for her first film - Anthony Adverse (1936) but she actually won the award. I first saw her in a film called The Cat and the Canary which starred Bob Hope, she played a sinister housekeeper named Miss Lu. Her appearance in that film remains etched in my memory and in later years I recall seeing her playing the Spider Woman in a Sherlock Holmes film starring Basil Rathbone and the wonderfully over the top Nigel Bruce.

Paulette Goddard and Gale Sondergaard

A promising film carer was snuffed out though as she offered her support to her husband, Herbert Biberman. Biberman was one of the Hollywood Ten - blacklisted and jailed during the Un-American Activities trials - basically it was a fear of communism and in not naming names, Biberman was jailed for contempt of court. 

Sondergaard would leave film making for twenty years although she did maintain a presence in the theatre - in later life, aged 77, she gave a great performance as Elk Woman in the Richard Harris film - The Return of a Man Called Horse.

For me though, it will always be Miss Lu that flashes into my minds eye when I hear the name Gale Sondergaard and I highly recommend The Cat and The Canary, Bob Hope, Paulette Goddard and the menacing George Zucco all add to the fun and fear factors in their own inimitable style.

Let me quickly mention Luise Rainer - she has just celebrated her 101st birthday and she is, I believe, the oldest living Oscar winner. 

A relatively short film career spanning just a dozen or so films, she earned two Oscars, back to back wins in 1936/37. She was...sorry, she is by all accounts a very strong minded lady. Even in the far off days of 1930’s Hollywood, she did not bend easily to the will of the powerful men in charge - she demanded better wages, script control and many things that actresses would now take for granted. She quit the movies and has lived a life that suited her, occasional theatre or tv roles but a name made and a name that will be remembered.

I said in an earlier blog that I would return to Laurel and Hardy - they were great favourites of so many and still are - with their bowler hats and ties, suffering the disasters that life threw at them, they have secured a place in the history of the world not just cinema.

In 1932 they made a film called The Music Box - it was a simple premise, the two hapless heroes have to deliver a player-piano to a nice house (1127 Walnut Avenue) - at the top of a flight of steps!

Just find 30 minutes, watch it and have a good laugh.

The Music Box

2011 - With Thanks to Robin Hood

What to blog in 2011?

I wanted a theme for this years blogs and having listened to the magnificent Radio 4 series, The History of the World in 100 Objects, I had decided that I would write the History of My World in 100 Objects and I spent some time thinking and planning what those 100 objects would be.

The list ran from a toy dog on wheels through butterscotch sweets via the school bus, Hammer Horror Films, Tuscany and many others from which I could have woven a story into which I could pour the truth and the fiction of my life.

One of those objects would have been a collection of hard backed books that I kept from the age of about 14 and in which I wrote exhaustive lists of all the actors I had seen in various films and whose details I memorised - yes I was a boring child and my only real friends were the imaginary ones that I kept in my head some of whom were famous film stars. I didn't need a bible, I only needed the latest copy of Halliwell's Film Guide.

We did have a sniff of fame around the family with my father’s uncle’s wife's nephew being the actor and film director Brian Forbes - we never met.

Anyway, yesterday I was sat drinking a cup of tea flicking through the tv channels and I came across the 1938 classic The Adventures of Robin Hood starring Errol Flynn. It is a great swashbuckling adventure, based closely on historical texts written around...1937.

The thing that suddenly surprised me was, here was a film I hadn’t watched in many years and yet I found my self naming all the actors; Basil Rathbone, Claude Rains Olivia De Havilland - well maybe any film watcher could have named them but then I went further, there was Eugene Pallette, Patric Knowles (and yes I even remembered that Patric didn't have a K)  Alan Hale,  Una O’Connor and Melville Cooper...all those lists and names just flooded back into my head and I decided that this year, 2011, this is the year we revisit the book of lists - we revisit all the actors and films that were my friends and obviously still are.



I hope you enjoy the journey, we will be starting in the era of the silent movie and coming right up to date and I will hopefully inspire you to watch some of the films that we mention along the way. This wont be a history of the motion picture, just a ramble through some of the names I listed and some of the films I watched.


“Be a clown, be a clown, all the world loves a clown” - so wrote Cole Porter in the words of the song that Gene Kelly and Judy Garland sang in the 1948 film, The Pirate.

But it isn’t true - I don’t like clowns - I have a slight fear of clowns. Not because of Stephen King and Tim Curry, scary though Pennywise was - no, it was a circus that came to our village when I was about 8 or 9 that started this fear. I was hauled out of the audience and this awful smelly pervert of a clown proceeded to slap my bottom with his oversized shoe. That has made me wary of clowns in the flesh ever since.

But clowns on the screen are a different kettle of confetti altogether...and it is with the great silent clowns that we begin this journey through cinematic history.

Charlie Chaplin, Buster Keaton, Harold Lloyd, the Keystone Cops and of course Laurel and Hardy.

All of the above (with the exception of the Keystone Cops) would have rated a mention in one of the book of lists I kept...details such as their real names and their dates of birth as well as favourite performances. Also in the lists would have appeared other names linked to these great stars - names like Eric Campbell, James Finlayson, Edna Purviance and Edgar Kennedy.

These great icons of the silent film era have left behind famous and equally iconic moments like Chaplin, the little tramp in The Gold Rush eating his shoe or Keaton in Steamboat Bill Jnr  stood in the raging storm whilst the front of a building falls around him and of course Harold Lloyd hanging from the clock high above the street in Safety First.

As a child I was always a greater fan of Chaplin than of Keaton and Lloyd and I reserve my thoughts on Laurel and Hardy for later because for me their greatest work was not in the silent era but a little later.

Chaplin entertained me because he was always the underdog and he always fought against the bullies - and the bullies were always much bigger than him and usually played by the great Eric Campbell.

Eric Campbell & Chaplin in Easy Street

Campbell was a huge man, well over 6ft and weighing in at more than 21 stone, he made the perfect foil for Chaplin’s little tramp.

Alfred Eric Campbell was born in Dunoon, Scotland on the 26th April 1879, he was just one of the many English and Scottish performers who would make their way to America thanks to the impresario Fred Karno - it was he who discovered Chaplin and Stan Laurel.

Campbell arrived in America in 1914 and would make 11 films with Chaplin, the formula often being Chaplin tormenting the big man and eventually winning the heart of the love interest, again most usually played by Edna Purviance. 11 films over the course of two years 1916 and 1917 - and on the 20th December 1917, aged just 38, Campbell killed himself in a car crash, drunk at the wheel.

For me the greatest collaboration between these two men can be seen in the 1917 film Easy Street - just 19 minutes long but a magical film that I cannot recommend highly enough, in fact here is a link - go and spend 20 minutes watching Chaplin, Campbell and Purviance at their best.


http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=vjXaNh7xDqk&feature=related        Part 1

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=jeCanm-31H8&feature=related       Part 2


There is a certain tragedy the story of Eric Campbell but this is a story that was repeated on other occasions for the big men of Hollywood. Two that come to mind from the mists of my memory are Roscoe ‘Fatty’ Arbuckle - tried for murder, his career never recovered he died aged 46 and Laird Cregar, a memorable villain in several films, dead at 31.

Of course you could argue the biggest big man of that era went on to have the biggest of careers, Oliver Hardy - born Norvell Hardy, January 18th 1892 died August 7th 1957, but more about him another time.

Of course there were other great silent stars, some of whom progressed with careers in the talkies, others whose star shone brightest when we didn’t know what they sounded like!

Greta Garbo and John Gilbert, Rudolph Valentino, Ramon Navarro, Lillian Gish, Clara Bow and Theda Bara - very few made a successful transition, Joan Crawford being one of them.

Valentino

Valentino was the biggest star of his time and with his death at the age of 31 he assured his place in the history of Hollywood, not just for his movies but for the legend that grew up around his life and death.

Navarro

Not so well known perhaps, Ramon Navarro was another great latin lover of the silent era. He didn’t make the transition to talkies but secured a place in Hollywood folklore through the manner of his death. Navarro was beaten to death by two young hustlers in 1968, the 69 year old Navarro is alleged to have met his end with an art deco dildo stuffed down his throat!

It may only be urban legend but it still brings a lump to the throat.

They had a certain look to them these great silent stars, George O'Brien, Gilbert Roland and the like, all strikingly handsome but thick as two short planks - and the ladies, beautiful, enigmatic and alluring, such as the aforementioned Theda Bara, which seems to be an anagram of Arab Death!

Theda Bara

This old head of mine still stuffed with useless information and I must apologise for the coming year and the drivel I will spill all over the blogosphere.

Enough for now, you have your homework and I will see you all again soon when we will move on to the early talkies amongst other things.

2011 - The Year Nothing Happens...

Happy New Year and welcome to 2011.

The New Year has been ushered in around the world with alcohol and fireworks, hope for the future and really practical problems for the present in places like Australia.

In Ireland they don't have any water and in Oz they have too much - a flood the size of France and Germany put together...just imagine how much happier New Years would be in England if France and Germany were actually flooded.

I don't know how the French and Germans celebrate the New Year - in Denmark they pile broken crockery on the doorstep and in Ecuador they burn effigies to chase away bad luck. In England it used to be just getting drunk and having a good fight - now we still have that but we have added fireworks and now chinese lanterns.

Now, I want you to imagine that your next door neighbour is standing in his garden - it's 11.59pm and he suddenly sets fire to a small bundle of highly flammable material and throws it over the fence at your house...you wouldn't be happy would you?

The lighting and the throwing of mini incendiary devices is against the law and it's just not neighbourly, but then someone realised that if you could throw it far enough people would not know where it came from and if you could fly your fire bomb half way across town then there would be no evidence as to who the pyromaniac was  that burned down your garden shed.

And that is what we have turned into - New Years Arsonists!

With all that fire and flame no wonder we turn to Robert BURNS.....


Lang may yer lum reek

A Christmas Message

If Herod had employed reliable labour all those years ago to find and kill the baby Jesus this would just be another cold weekend in December - instead here we are again, Christmas. The salt and the pepper say hello....

There are three stages to Christmas:

First there is the stress of the pre-Christmas rush when we all dash about like headless turkeys trying to snatch up bargains to give to our loved ones. We then battle through the aisles of our favourite supermarket trying to make sure we have plenty of sprouts to cook and then to throw away after nobody eats them. We then 'deck the halls' with bright coloured lights and find we have the stress of running to B&Q when we discover one of the bulbs has blown. There are parcels to wrap and post, there are cards to address, there are stamps to buy and then there are post boxes too full to take your cards leading to more stress!

But eventually it all comes to an end and the pre Christmas period is past and we have the day itself to experience...more stress.

Locked in a house all day with people you spend all year avoiding - being forced to share your television with people who only watch documentaries on coastal erosion or Eastenders.  Trying to put on a brave face when you open the presents that leave you almost speechless with shock - "wow, a nutcracker shaped like Katie Price - thanks so much." Or perhaps you might get a cook book by Heston Blumenthal.

Trying to remember who likes breast, who likes stuffing, who likes extra gravy and then trying to find something for Aunty Mary who is on a three day diet of beetroot and runner beans.

Holding back from the urge to devour a whole bottle of Pinot in one big gulp just to get you through that long long evening - it is like an eternity only longer and you begin to feel like Nelson Mandela on Robben Island but he at least had a guard to talk to.

Eventually the day passes and you begin to think that the stress must now begin to lift, just a little. Wrong.

Now you have the stress of joining the queues in the sales to exchange the Katy Price nutcracker for something you really want, something with a little class like a Katherine Jenkins nutcracker.

Then you have to make sure you de-christmas by twelfth night or bad luck may follow throughout the year...I say leave the decorations up, what's the worst that could happen? You just survived Christmas!

The stress of the festive season hits us each and every year and still we have not learned our lesson - and I think the time is coming when we should reflect on the true meaning of christmas and try and model our celebrations around that simple message surrounding the birth of a little baby in a stable.

We should forget the rushing around and the over eating and the terrible presents and we should all go to a stable and wait for the miracle to happen. In the present cold snap it might be an ideal place for the elderly, they could all huddle around a pile of steaming manure and keep the cold at bay by sleeping under a cow, her udders warm with milk - a cosy bed and a midnight snack all in one.

Yes, we should all find a stable and if you don't know where your local stable is, just follow the bright light in the sky - it's not a star it's the Police helicopter but it passes by the stable occasionally so you'll be OK.

If it's too foggy to see the searchlight from the chopper then follow the Shepherds, they live at No.42 and they always spend Christmas in a stable bare - yes, they are naturists but don't worry about the nudity because in the cold weather there is nothing to see, poor Mr Shepherd looks like he has a walnut whip instead of a penis.

If you don't know the Shepherds you could always follow the three wise men - but if you live in Mansfield don't hold out much hope of finding them anytime soon as they are out searching for a virgin and so far they have struck out.

Yes, Christmas would be so much more tolerable in a stable where the only cause for stress would be what can you do with all the myrrh? Oh wait - now where did I put that cook book by Heston Blumenthal?

Yes, I'm a miserable old sod, but it makes me happy - I just joined the board of BHS  (Bah Humbug Society) and on a serious note this christmas will be a sadder day than usual as Mrs B and I will be thinking of Jake and Danny and missing them a lot.

Anyone who has had a bereavement this year will no doubt find the gloss of christmas somewhat diminished and my heart goes out to you all.

************************************************************

The biggest cause of stress this year was what to get Mrs B for Christmas - she doesn't need any more diamonds and she has no room left for handbags and she doesn't want a 42'' plasma screen - bugger.

What she asked for was impossible to get - Take That tickets...there was actually more chance of Jesus knocking on the door and inviting us to have lunch with God. Securing one of the golden tickets was as likely as the news headlines on Christmas Day starting with 'Pope caught tasting flavoured condoms'. Brings new meaning to the hymn, O Cum All Ye Faithful.

In the place of Take That tickets I got Mrs B a new key for the front door. Not just any key mind you, one with her initial on. What more could a girl want?

Gary, Howard, Mark, Jason and Robbie came the loud reply.

But she has me - and in many ways I embody all that she likes about the ageing boy band.

I am a talented writer like Gary Barlow, I have a well muscled dancers physique similar to that of Howard Donald, I have the boyish charm of Mark Owen, I have the charisma of Robbie Williams and finally, like Jason Orange, I have a superb singing voice!

Perhaps I should just wrap a ribbon around myself and say to Mrs B on Christmas morning - Take That!


So there we have it, a little Christmas message of hope and joy radiating out to all who have taken the time during this busy period to pause and reflect...now open the sherry and get blotto and don't forget a turkey is not just for Christmas - it's for Boxing Day too with bubble and squeak.

I hope you all enjoy your time, with family, with friends, with whoever it is that brings you joy - by the time you read this I will have jetted off to sunnier climes  and I will be relaxing in my thong...which reminds me, where did I put those sprouts?

Only joking, why sit in an airport for Christmas when you can sit at home, getting drunk and laughing at all the poor people who were dreaming of Disney and theme parks and the only carousel they will get to see is the one with their luggage on going round and round and round...

I shouldn't laugh really...but I will. A little present to myself, laughing at the unfortunate circumstances of others, what better present can their be?

Merry Christmas -  Tesco own brand mince pie anyone?