George Kennedy 100, Cybill Shepherd and John Hughes 75 -- February 18, 2025

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Actor George Kennedy was born 100 years ago today, on 18-February-1925. He was very good in movies like Cool Hand Luke and Charade.

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Actress Cybil Shepherd was born 75 years ago today, on 18-February-1950. I was staggered by her performance in The Last Picture Show.

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Director John Hughes was also born 75 years ago today, on 18-February-1950. I was not a fan of Home Alone, but I always enjoy watching National Lampoon's Christmas Vacation. I enjoyed his Brat Pack movies.

Jefferson in Paris -- February 17, 2025

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Happy Presidents' Day everyone.

I have mixed feelings about Thomas Jefferson. He wrote the Declaration of Independence. He owned slaves. He made the Louisiana Purchase. He was a proponent of limited government powers. I used to think his virtues outweighed his faults, but now I am not so sure. I first became interested in him when I found an old issue of National Geographic which had an article about Monticello. I liked his automatic doors and his clock.

I remember when Fawn Brodie's biography of Jefferson said that he had fathered children with his slave, Sally Hemmings, who was the half-sister of his late wife. DNA tests later proved that people descended from her youngest son are in the male line of the Jefferson family. Some people still insist that Jefferson's brother or some other member of the family was the father. I think it is most likely that Jefferson was the one. 

In 1995, Ruth Prawer Jhabvala wrote a script about Jefferson's time in Paris as Ambassador to France. Her regular collaborators Ismail Merchant and James Ivory produced and directed Jefferson in Paris. Nick Nolte played Jefferson. I would not have thought about casting Nolte in that part. Thandiwe Newton played Sally Hemmings. I thought the movie was slow.

Lon Chaney -- The Year's Big Picture -- February 16, 2025

Selma Times-Journal, 26-February-1925

I have not written about Lon Chaney often enough. Swedish director Victor Sjöström (billed as Victor Seastrom) directed Chaney, Norma Shearer, John Gilbert and Tully Marshall in He Who Gets Slapped, based on a play by Leonid Andreyev. Chaney gave a remarkable performance as a man who acted out his humiliation every day as a clown. This was M-G-M's first production. 

Selma Times-Journal, 26-February-1925

Ottowa Citizen, 07-February-1924

Fred Thomson -- A Hurricane of Action That is Going to Sweep you Into a State of the Tensest Excitement -- February 15, 2025

Casper Daily Tribune, 19-February-1925

"Fred Thomson and his Marvel Horse Silver King" were a popular partnership. 

Casper Daily Tribune, 19-February-1925

Sydney Sun, 22-February-1925

Two of Fred's films were showing in Sydney, NSW.

Happy Saint Valentine's Day 2025 -- February 14, 2025

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Happy Saint Valentine's Day, everyone.

Actress Joyce Mathews offers us a Valentine. 

Hoot Gibson -- A Picture for Every Man, Woman and Child in Bozeman -- February 13, 2025

Bozeman Daily Chronicle, 28-February-1925

"Dainy as a dancer, wild as a hawk, a golden streak through the sagebrush" -- Not Hoot Gibson. A wild horse.

A Display of Lincoln Relics -- February 12, 2025

Moving Picture World, 03-January-1925

Today would have been Abraham Lincoln's 216th birthday. Brothers Al and Ray Rockett produced The Dramatic Life of Abraham Lincoln in 1922. Frances Marion wrote the script, Phil Rosen directed and George A Billings played Abraham Lincoln. It was an elaborate production.

The movie was still in release in 1924/1925. The Liberty Theater in Pittsburgh made its lobby into a museum of Lincoln memorabilia. 

Moving Picture World, 03-January-1925

Despite the unpleasantness of 1864 The Dramatic Life of Abraham Lincoln, was a hit in Atlanta.