Harry Langdon -- Here He Is! Our Own Council Bluffs Boy!! -- February 23, 2025

Council Bluffs Daily Nonpariel, 01-February-1925

Comedian Harry Langdon was born in Council Bluffs, Idaho. That city's Daily NonPareil made sure to mention it. Douglas MacLean was a popular light comedian. This ad calls him "Harold Lloyd's Only Rival!" 

Council Bluffs Daily Nonpariel, 01-February-1925

A detail from the above ad shows an newspaper advertising cut for "The Sea Squawk."

Marion Leader-Tribune, 01-February-1925

Ramon Novarro. who was born in Mexico, became a popular actor in Hollywood silent films.

Marion Leader-Tribune, 01-February-1925

Another advertising cut: "An Unlimited Train of Laughter!"

Boise Idaho Statesman, 01-February-1925

This item says that "Harry Langdon will soon abandon making two-reel comedies, and will follow in Harold Lloyd's footsteps by trying feature-length films for Pathe."

Bastille Day, 2024 -- July 14, 2024

Motion Picture Classic, September, 1923

In honor of Bastille Day, here is tres belle French actress Renée Adorée. Her parents were circus performers, and she toured Europe before World War One. After the war, she went to Australia to do a dance act, and there she made her first movie. She came to the US soon after and performed in stage revues.

New York Tribune, 27-July-1921

In 1919 she performed in Oh, What a Girl! on Broadway. Note that her name is listed in the "Brilliant Cast."

Photoplay, May, 1920

By 1920 she was appearing in American films. I doubt she was a member of the Folies Bergere. I think this is a particularly pretty picture.

Photoplay, August, 1920

Motion Picture News, 08-December-1923

During 1923, she signed with Louis B Mayer's Metro Pictures. She was in a serious auto accident which delayed production of Reginald Barker's Women Who Wait, which I think was released as Women Who Give. 

Pictures and Picturegoer, April, 1924

In 1924, Metro merged with Goldwyn to create M-G-M. 

This caption says "She's as French as her name implies."

listal.com

In 1925, Renée Adorée appeared in her most famous movie, the war film The Big Parade. The movie was a major success.

Motion Picture Magazine, March, 1929

Renée Adorée and a bunny. It should be a French Lop. 

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She made three successful talkies at M-G-M but came down with tuberculosis while shooting The Call of the Flesh with Ramon Novarro. She finished the movie, but never worked again. She died in 1933 at the age of 35.

Ramon Novarro 125 -- February 6, 2024

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"Actor Ramon Novarro was born 125 years ago today, on 06-February-1899. He was born in Mexico, but his family emigrated to the United States in 1913 to get away from the Mexican Revolution. By the mid-1920s, he was a popular Latin lover" in Hollywood films. His career as a star was over by the mid-1930s, but he continued to act in smaller parts. He struggled to deal with his devout Catholicism and his homosexuality.

listal.com

Novarro replaced George Walsh as the title character in the troubled production of Ben Hur. I liked him better than Charlton Heston. 

Motion Picture News, 08-September-1923

I also liked him in Rex Ingram's adaption of Rafael Sabatini's Scaramouche. 

In 1968 two cowards robbed and murdered Ramon Novarro. 

Perfect Illusion is Maintained -- August 24, 2023

Motion Picture News, 18-August-1923

Anthony Hope's Ruritanian romance novel The Prisoner of Zenda was a great success when it was published in 1894. Hope published a sequel, Rupert of Hentzau, in 1898. Rupert was the charming villain who had run away at the end of the first novel. 

Motion Picture News, 18-November-1922

In 1922, director Rex Ingram made an adaption of The Prisoner of Zenda, which was a great success. Ramon Novarro played the charismatic Rupert.

The following year, Myron Selznick produced an adaption of Rupert of Hentzau. Victor Heerman directed. Lew Cody, who often played charming rogues, was Rupert. The elaborate nine-page ad shows that this was a major production.