Happy Easter, 2025 -- April 20, 2025

listal.com

Happy Easter, everyone. Jean Arthur, attired as an artist, decorates a big Easter egg. She made many great movies with Frank Capra, George Stevens and Howard Hawks.

listal.com

listal.com

listal.com

The Sisters -- April 18, 2025

listal.com

Today is the 119th anniversary of the 1906 Earthquake and Fire in San Francisco. In 1938, Anatole Litvak directed Bette Davis and Errol Flyn in The Sisters, a melodrama about the trials and tribulations of three sisters in Montana. Bette Davis's character Louise meets Errol Flynn's Frank, a sportswriter and aspiring novelist. Despite her parents' disapproval, they marry and run off to San Francisco. Frank becomes an alcoholic and they aren't happy. Then the 1906 Earthquake and Fire strikes. Much of the earthquake and fire footage came from a Warner Brothers silent film, In Old San Francisco.

Jean Marsh, RIP -- April 15, 2025

listal.com

Jean Marsh has died. Upstairs, Downstairs is the second Masterpiece Theater series that I can remember. The first was the Lord Peter Wimsey story Clouds of Witness. Jean Marsh and Eileen Atkins created Upstairs, Downstairs. Marsh played the maid Rose. Later, she reprised the role in a 2010 revival of the series. Eileen Atkins played a major role in the revival.

Harold Lloyd -- The First of the Popular Demand Series -- April 14, 2025

Moving Picture World, 04-April-1925

Harold Lloyd engaged Ralph Spence, who was famous for writing witty subtitles, to work on his newest movie, For Heaven's Sake. In 1937, Spence wrote the famous Sh! The Octopus. Associated Exhibitors was re-releasing Harold Lloyd's short film "Now or Never."

Moving Picture World, 04-April-1925

Sam Taylor, who co-directed several of Harold Lloyd's features, was hired to direct the first Harold Lloyd picture to be released by Paramount. 

Rin-Tin-Tin -- The Wonder Dog of the Screen -- April 13, 2025

Seattle Star, 06-April-1925

Rin-Tin-Tin was the biggest dog star of all. During the last days of World War One, Lee Duncan, an American soldier who loved dogs, found Rinty and his sister with their dying mother in a damaged German kennel. Duncan tried to bring the puppies to America, but the female died. Duncan trained Rinty and got him into the movies, where he showed great natural talent.

Seattle Star, 06-April-1925

"Pretty Doggy Actor."

Seattle Star, 06-April-1925

Note that the name of the theater in Seattle is the "Blue Mouse." There was a chain of Blue Mouse Theaters.

The Great Gatsby 100 -- April 10, 2025

Saint Louis Post-Dispatch, 25-April-1925

100 years ago today, F Scott Fitzgerald's The Great Gatsby was published. I used to read it every year or two. Gatsby was neglected for years, and then people called it The Great American Novel.

Saint Louis Post-Dispatch, 25-April-1925

"THE GREAT GATSBY is vital, glamorous, ironical, compassionate. It is a living thing as spontaneous as THIS SIDE OF PARADISE, yet mature."

Baltimore Sun, 18-April-1925

Motion Picture Magazine, September, 1926

The first film adaption of Gatsby was a 1927 silent starring Warner Baxter as Jay Gatsby. The caption for this image from the September, 1926 Moving Picture Magazine says "The Great Gatsby has been a successful character.  He was a best seller when he made his first public appearance between the covers of the F. Scott Fitzgerald novel.  Then he made his stage debut and there was a continual line at the Broadway box-office.  And now he is to try his fortune on the screen.  Warner Baxter, judging from this photograph, will do well by Gatsby."  The movie is lost, but all accounts say that Baxter did not do well by Gatsby.

Motion Picture Magazine, February, 1927

Neil Hamilton, who later played Commissioner Gordon on the Batman television show, played Nick Carraway.  Lois Wilson played Daisy Buchanan.  Hale Hamilton played Tom Buchanan, Georgia Hale played Myrtle Wilson and William Powell played George Wilson. I find the latter hard to picture. 

Photoplay, February, 1927

listal.com

The second film adaption, made in 1949, starred Alan Ladd as Jay Gatsby.  I have never seen this version, but most of the stills that I have seen make it look like a film noir. 

Betty Field played Daisy Buchanan, Barry Sullivan played Tom Buchanan, Macdonald Carey played Nick Carraway, Shelley Winters played Myrtle Wilson, and Howard Da Silva played George Wilson. 

coverbrowser.com

The third theatrical film version of the story came out in 1974.  The 18-March-1974 cover of  Time Magazine featured Robert Redford as Jay Gatsby and Mia Farrow as Daisy Buchanan, and referred to the "supersell" of the movie.  I thought the movie was ok, but rather slow.

Sam Waterston played Nick Carraway and one of my favorites, Bruce Dern, played Tom Buchanan.  Karen Black was very good as Myrtle Wilson. Scott Wilson played George Wilson. 

listal.com

The fourth theatrical film version of the story came out in 2013.  Baz Luhrmann directed and Leonardo DiCaprio played Gatsby and Carey Mulligan played Daisy. The movie didn't do anything for me. 

Tobey Maguire played Nick Carraway and Joel Edgerton played Tom Buchanan.  Isla Fisher played  Myrtle Wilson. Jason Clarke played George Wilson. 

Educational Players Do Their Stuff on the Air -- April 9, 2025

Moving Picture World, 04-April-1925

Radio station KFWB went on the air in March, 1925. It was founded by Warner Brothers and served as a publicity arm for the studio. KFWB no longer belongs to Warner Brothers, but it is still on the air.

Educational Players Do

Their Stuff on the Air

JACK WHITE'S Mermaid Comedy Company, together with performers appearing in other units producing comedies for distribution through Educational Film Exchanges, Inc., last week staged a very successful exploitation tieup when stars of the various companies broadcast a program from the recently opened radio station KFWB at Los Angeles, operated by Warner Brothers.

The program was opened by Eddie Nelson, now starring in Mermaid Comedies, who delivered a monologue and some of the vaudeville chatter which he used on the Orpheum Circuit in the West, where he is known as "The Sunkist Kid." This was followed by the Mermaid Quartette which sang two numbers.

Following this came Clem Beauchamp, an assistant director and a promising lyric tenor, who delivered two songs. The O'Neal sisters, Zelma and Bernice, then sang two of their latest songs, "When You and I Were Young, Maggie," a la 1925, and "Log Cabin." Zelma O'Neil sang a special comedy number, "I'm a Pickford That Nobody Picked," one of her successes from Harry Carroll's "Pickings," the show in which she was appearing when Jack White discovered her. Miss O'Neal is a Cameo star.

Lige Conley, Mermaid star, followed with a display of his versatility in rendering a piano, banjo and saxophone solo. At this point the entire radio program was tied up with the showing of two Mermaid Comedies in Los Angeles, when it was announced that Conley could be seen at Loew's State in "Fast and Furious" and in "What a Night" at the California.

Joseph Diskay, the tenor, a favorite with radio fans, contributed his services to the program and sang two numbers, and Miss Hilda Goldman, operatic soprano, also popular with radio fans on the West Coast, obliged with selections.