TCM: The Greatest Movie Channel

[prican58]

Simmons may have had a "wasted" career to a certain extent, she doesn't come near to Richard Burton's "could have been a contender" career. He made good films like "Beckett" but he could have gone down as one of the great giants of stage. Beautiful face and beautiful voice but made his bones as Elizabeth Taylor's husband more than for acting.  He could have had a Peter O'Toole kind of career. 

[Rinaldo]

I guess I don't see it quite that way. He did have a substantial stage career, including the classics (two seasons of rep at the Old Vic, after he achieved movie stardom), and the partnership with Taylor came after more than a decade of starring roles -- he added luster to her stature just as much as she gave more visibility to his. The biggest obstacle to a long respected-veteran sort of movie career (in my view) is that what was most distinctive about him (his vocal authority, his hypnotic magnetism) came to seem old-fashioned over the years; he wasn't the chameleon sort of actor who disappears inside a role, he was always inescapably Burton. (And became easy to parody.)

 

Lest I seem to be critical of an actor I greatly admire, let me append the soliloquy that closes Act I of Camelot (I don't know why this is in B&W, this TV special was telecast in color). It's a problem with the show that none of the three principals ever gets a song about the dilemma among them; the central conflict remains unmusicalized. But this excerpt shows why any of us, if we were writing the show, would have made the same "mistake" -- with Burton on hand, this moment must be a speech.

 

[monakane]

I guess I don't see it quite that way. He did have a substantial stage career, including the classics (two seasons of rep at the Old Vic, after he achieved movie stardom), and the partnership with Taylor came after more than a decade of starring roles -- he added luster to her stature just as much as she gave more visibility to his. The biggest obstacle to a long respected-veteran sort of movie career (in my view) is that what was most distinctive about him (his vocal authority, his hypnotic magnetism) came to seem old-fashioned over the years; he wasn't the chameleon sort of actor who disappears inside a role, he was always inescapably Burton. (And became easy to parody.)

 

 

I think part of the problem with Burton was that the movies in the mid-60s were not very good.  It was a time when the old studios were fading and the auteur movement hadn't yet taken hold.  It's my least favorite era of the movies.  Can you imagine Burton with directors like Scorsese or Coppola?

Edited August 6, 2015 by monakane

[editorgrrl]

Watching Father Takes a Wife with Menjou and Swanson. It's amusing and I like seeing Menjou in a different kind of role.

Very nice seeing the very young Desi Arnaz. There was a scene where Desi is singing to a recorded version of "Perfidia". It's such a beautiful song, very romantic. (For reference, it's the tune we see Rick and Ilsa dancing to in the Paris flashback in Casablanca.) But I notice that Desi isn't actually singing. Firstly, he just never had such a booming, forceful singing voice. Second, it is evident to me that whoever did sing the song he wasn't a Spanish speaking person as I could sense a distinct American accent at certain points.

http://www.tcm.com/this-month/article/33760%7C0/Father-Takes-a-Wife.html

Father Takes a Wife was Arnaz's second film but was always an embarrassment to him. He was supposed to sing "Perfidia" in the movie but the studio executives felt like his voice was unsuited to the classical orchestration and had him dubbed by a singer with an Italian accent. As a result, he received letters for years from his Spanish fans who wondered why he affected a different accent for the part.

[prican58]

editorgrrl, Desi didn't have the most beautiful voice, he was a serviceable vocalist. His talent was orchestration, his pure love of Latin music and maybe even playing a mean conga.  I don't disparage him. I love the guy and even have a cd of some of his best songs. My dad was a dj on Spanish language radio here in NYC back in the 60's/70's and he also used to emcee at some of the Latin nightclubs in Manhattan. Dad knows all about that kind of music with an almost encyclopedic knowledge of writers, songs, singers of that genre and he says Desi was good for the American palate. Not too complicated, very common man. There were more talented performers of that ilk, but he is one of the reasons I love that era of Latin/Cuban music. Cubans invented the damn thing to begin with.

 

You said Desi's dubbing was from a guy with an Italian accent. I'm sure that's true, as I actually heard an accent that seemed strictly American. I guess being a non Spanish speaking singer accounts for the oddness.

[Julia]

Dad knows all about that kind of music with an almost encyclopedic knowledge of writers, songs, singers of that genre and he says Desi was good for the American palate. Not too complicated, very common man.

That surprises me a little. I'd heard he came from a very powerful family.

[Rick Kitchen]

Desi's father was mayor of Santiago, Cuba and a Representative in the Cuban Congress prior to the revolution.  His mother's father was an executive with Bacardi Rum.  According to his autobiography, "the family owned three ranches, a palatial home, and a vacation mansion on a private island in Santiago Bay, Cuba".

[prican58]

Yes, he was wealthy in Cuba but he came to America with practically nothing. He never had that aura of privilege here and I think he basically was very humble in his way. Not that he didn't have an ego, just that he could relate to regular folks because he actually became one of them.  Until he got famous.

[HelenBaby]

 

The Little Foxes was just okay for me, not great or spectacular.  In fact I found the film quite slow until after Horace's collapse on the stairs.  Teresa Wright was of course great in her role, as was Bette Davis.  Perhaps someone can explain something to me, when Xan went to get her father from the hospital, just how much time had lapsed to when they got to the hotel where she ran into David?  I thought perhaps it was a day or so, but it seemed like it was much longer when she ran into David again.  David just seemed like a different person from when we last left him.

 .

I love The Little Foxes but it's mainly because it's so well acted. Everyone in it does a wonderful job, and as far as the story goes, it's interesting just how far the damn Hubbard clan will go keep their power in tact. And Wyler can do no wrong as far as I'm concerned.

Your question about the length of the trip; if I'm remembering correctly, Alexandra travels to Virginia to fetch her dad from South Alabama so by the time they run into David in Mobile or thereabouts she couldn't have been gone more than ten days. Other than being surprised at running into them at the hotel, David didn't seem that different but he saw her in a different light.

[Rinaldo]

I really need to see the Little Foxes movie. My high school did that play my junior year, and I was the student assistant director. In particular, I had to give our Horace extra coaching sessions to try to get him to remember his lines (all the while certain that I could have played it better myself...). There's an odd link with our musical the next semester, The Music Man, in that Meredith Willson composed the score for The Little Foxes onscreen.

[ratgirlagogo]

 

I think part of the problem with Burton was that the movies in the mid-60s were not very good.  It was a time when the old studios were fading and the auteur movement hadn't yet taken hold.  It's my least favorite era of the movies.  Can you imagine Burton with directors like Scorsese or Coppola?

But he did some very good ones in the mid 60's - The Spy Who Came In From The Cold, Who's Afraid of Virginia Woolf?, Where Eagles Dare, Taming of the Shrew, Anne of the Thousand Days.  He was professionally active almost to the end of his life, I think.  The problem was that in the seventies he COULD have worked with people like Scorsese and Coppola and instead he was making drive-in movies like Exorcist 2.  Although he did do Equus then also.  I think both he and Taylor had the problem that they were so ridiculously famous that if they made a movie that was anything less than Citizen Kane it seemed like a failure on some level - and they did so many movies that were, ahem, not that great (BOOM, the VIPs, etc.).

[Crisopera]

I (guiltily) enjoy The VIPs, but only because of the Maggie Smith/Rod Taylor and Margaret Rutherford storylines.  The rest is over-dressed dreck.

 

Anybody else watch The New Moon (1930)?  What an odd movie.  They discarded the plot of the operetta completely (no loss) but substituted something even more ludicrous.  And what was a loss was most of the gorgeous Romberg score (including "Softly, As In a Morning Sunrise", insanely).  The two leads were fabulously sung (by Grace Moore and Lawrence Tibbett, Met opera stars), but their acting was, shall we say, not so hot.  (And Adrian sabotaged poor Grace Moore - she looked not only dowdy, but matronly.  It didn't help that she looked enough like the 40s/50s comedienne Joan Davis to be her sister. Lawrence Tibbett, on the other hand, looks like the child of the silent comedian Charley Chase and John C. Reilly.)  The movie is stolen right out from under their noses (petty theft, I know) by the ever droll Roland Young and Adolph Menjou - who can hardly suppress the smirk on his face at the dialogue he has to say.

Edited August 9, 2015 by Crisopera

[Milburn Stone]

I (guiltily) enjoy The VIPs, but only because of the Maggie Smith/Rod Taylor and Margaret Rutherford storylines.  The rest is over-dressed dreck.

 

My favorite scene in the whole movie, though, is not between Maggie Smith and Rod Taylor, but Maggie Smith and Richard Burton. And Burton is good in it. Somehow or other Maggie Smith has come up with some plan or other to save Richard Burton from ruin some way or other. And he looks at her like, who is this amazing woman that I previously took to be a complete nonentity? Or maybe that wasn't it. But that's how I remember it!

Edited August 9, 2015 by Milburn Stone

[Rinaldo]

Anybody else watch The New Moon (1930)?  What an odd movie.  They discarded the plot of the operetta completely (no loss) but substituted something even more ludicrous.  And what was a loss was most of the gorgeous Romberg score (including "Softly, As In a Morning Sunrise", insanely).  The two leads were fabulously sung (by Grace Moore and Lawrence Tibbett, Met opera stars), but their acting was, shall we say, not so hot.  (And Adrian sabotaged poor Grace Moore - she looked not only dowdy, but matronly.  It didn't help that she looked enough like the 40s/50s comedienne Joan Davis to be her sister. Lawrence Tibbett, on the other hand, looks like the child of the silent comedian Charley Chase and John C. Reilly.)  The movie is stolen right out from under their noses (petty theft, I know) by the ever droll Roland Young and Adolph Menjou - who can hardly suppress the smirk on his face at the dialogue he has to say.

I recorded The New Moon but haven't had a chance to watch it yet. It has long fascinated me, though. Partly because, as noted, the stage plot (in my view, still quite viable -- Encores! did a fine production a little over a decade ago, and made an excellent recording) was thrown out. And partly because Grace Moore and Lawrence Tibbett were exceptional phenomena: genuine opera stars who became, for a short while in the first confusion of talking pictures, genuine movie stars. (Both were, at different times, nominated for Academy Awards.) His prestige in the world of opera never suffered as a result, but hers did a bit, in some eyes at least. And it's hard to see now quite what won over national audiences, unless just their voices sufficed. He especially, as Crisopera said, didn't have the look of a big-screen romantic lead.

[CMH1981]

I finally got around to watching Hush, Hush...Sweet Charlotte today.  Great movie all around I felt.  I loved Agnes Moorehead, she can do no wrong on radio, tv, or film.

 

I have a question though, hope some of you can straighten me out.  At the end of the film was Charlotte being led off to jail or was she just being evicted from the house like the sheriff planned to do?  How would Charlotte be able to explain how she was being "gaslighted" by Miriam and Drew based on the consensus that the whole town thought she was loony?  

[HelenBaby]

My favorite scene in the whole movie, though, is not between Maggie Smith and Rod Taylor, but Maggie Smith and Richard Burton. And Burton is good in it. Somehow or other Maggie Smith has come up with some plan or other to save Richard Burton from ruin some way or other. And he looks at her like, who is this amazing woman that I previously took to be a complete nonentity? Or maybe that wasn't it. But that's how I remember it!

She was trying to keep Rod Taylor from ruination and Burton was a rich guy who was in a position to help with cash. She pleads his case and Burton's so impressed by her defense (for lack of a better word) of her boss that he writes a check to cover the funds of a rubber check Taylor had written in the course of a business deal. I think that's how it goes anyway.

Just looked it up and Taylor's business is about to be sold and Smith gets the funds out of Burton to save it.

Edited August 11, 2015 by HelenBaby

[Milburn Stone]

Yes, that's it! So anyway it's just her and Burton in a lengthy high-stakes scene, and as good as she was in it, I thought Burton did exactly what he needed to do (offering up a credible resistance, making her character earn it) to allow her to be as good as she was in it, which is why I think that even in soap-opera dreck like The V.I.P.s you can find evidence of Burton's incredible skill.

[Milburn Stone]

Last night was Joan Crawford night, and I saw most of Flamingo Road and a few minutes of whatever came after it. In both, Joan's co-star was David Brian, a guy I've seen a lot in the Warner Bros. movies of that period but whose name I never knew. In the second movie, he actually shared top-billing with her in the main title credits. Anyway, the guy was pretty good, and when I saw the top billing ("Joan Crawford and David Brian in") I realized that Warners must have actually had high hopes for him. Guess they didn't pan out.

[prican58]

Prior to watching Green Pastures I was mesmerized by the short Public Jitterbug No, 1 with Hal LeRoy. What a dancer! I'd seen him before but never took time to really watch him. He had that great eccentric style like a Buddy Ebsen, Ray Bolger and even Jimmy Cagney. But he had these seemingly rubberized feet and he was so lanky yet fluid in his routines. And such a baby face, gee whiz look about him. 

 

I am definitely going to start reading up on him. 

 

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=YJoXy0sbVTo  Start at around 5:23 to see the best part. The start, when we see him first is also grand. This one is High School Hoofer 1931

Edited August 12, 2015 by prican58

[ratgirlagogo]

Wow, that is amazing.  The shorts before and after the movies really are some of the best stuff on TCM.  While the surprise factor provides a lot of the fun for me I often wish they showed up on the official schedule - especially the musical and dance ones like that which so often are more exciting than the feature.

[Bastet]

The shorts are listed on TCM's schedule.  They don't show up on my satellite provider's on-screen program guide, but they're on the TCM website.

 

Come to think of it, I'm not sure all are listed, but many are (including the Public Jitterbug one being discussed).

[prican58]

Well I  am preparing to sit down and watch Gunga Din. I love this film with a burning passion. So  much fun. I love Doug Jr and then later on I get to see Prisoner of Zenda again. I literally planned my  day around these two pictures.

 

ratgirl, I agree. Those shorts are so wonderful, partly due to the fact that you see performers who had their  "15 minutes". You sometimes get to see vaudeville acts that never made it out of vaudeville, acts that I imagine were  familiar to the likes of George Burns.

 

Here comes Gunga. Gotta go.    

[magicdog]

Boy have times changed, in terms of having access to the White House to film a commercial picture in the bedrooms?!

 

 

Up until WW2, private citizens could walk up to the front door and ask to see the President!  Today, traffic isn't allowed to pass in front of it, and the fences just keep getting higher!

[Crisopera]

I watched a bunch of the Douglas Fairbanks, Jr. movies this weekend, and found him a more interesting actor than I had remembered.  Warners wasn't exactly sure what to do with him in the pre-code era, so they shoved him into various genres.  He was always going to be under the shadow of his ultra-famous father, but had a much more naturalistic style (except in some of his more swashbuckling roles, as in Sinbad the Sailor).  I think his best performance was in support - Rupert of Hentzau in The Prisoner of Zenda.  He let us see the nastiness under all the charm - really good.  And probably the only time I would pronounce these words - he was better than James Mason in the role.  And I think The Exile deserves more of a reputation - not Max Ophuls' greatest film, but still entertaining.  Certainly the ONLY good movie Maria Montez ever made!

[ratgirlagogo]

 

The shorts are listed on TCM's schedule.  They don't show up on my satellite provider's on-screen program guide, but they're on the TCM website.

You're right of course.  Sigh.  I SHOULD look online but I don't.  The computer in the front seems so far away from the bedroom where the TV is and I got fed up with keeping a laptop back there (cats knocking shit over, etc.).

Edited August 18, 2015 by ratgirlagogo

[elle]

You're right of course.  Sigh.  I SHOULD look online but I don't.  The computer in the front seems so far away from the bedroom where the TV is and I got fed up with keeping a laptop back there (cats knocking shit over, etc.).

Ha!  I thought you were going to say "cats *sitting* on laptop".  Nice warm cozy keys! >^.^<

[voiceover]

I'm here to praise Anna May Wong, whose performance in Shanghai Express is the best thing about the film (though I love Dietrich in it too).  Stunningly beautiful, and wow! could teach the Women of Film Noir a thing or two about serene under pressure: she stabs the bad guy, walks out onto the train platform, and calmly admits to it before boarding.  Overlooked and under-appreciated by Hollywood.

 

And John Gilbert in tonight's Downstairs!  He was a bad, bad boy.  The first time I saw the scene where he turns around & bends over -- all the better to let the cook slap the flour off his ass -- well, just say that I finally understood the meaning of "slack-jawed".  I think I rubbed my eyes in disbelief.

[Milburn Stone]

I'm here to praise Anna May Wong...Overlooked and under-appreciated by Hollywood.

 

At least she wasn't overlooked by Comden and Green.

[CMH1981]

I watched Badlands bc I'm a huge Spacek fan but wow that movie is just odd. I still don't know what to think of it. I get Spacek is playing a sheltered, naive 15 yr old but Sheen's character was just wackadoodle all over the place. I read the Wikipedia article for both real-life people and that didn't help me understand the characters at all.

Is there something in missing with the film The Unsinkable Molly Brown...bc I love musicals and Debbie Reynolds but this film is unwatchable for me and goodness knows I've tried many times to get through but just can't.

A Catered Affair was wonderful. Such a great movie, but I do have to say I would rather have seen Thelma Ritter reprise the role as the Bronx mother.

Edited August 26, 2015 by CMH1981

[Charlie Baker]

Badlands is strange and I guess that's the point.  But it's hard to look away from it once you start watching.  But then you probably don't want to see it again.

 

I don't know that the original stage musical Molly Brown is all that great to begin with, and Reynolds is almost in Betty-Hutton-too-much territory with the pushing she does.  The supporting cast is good, and it's nice to see and hear Harve Presnell at his prime.

 

I too love A Catered Affair, it's so good you can almost forget who these actors are.  (A special nod to Rod Taylor as the groom.)  The author of a fun book about All About Eve tells how Bette Davis and Thelma Ritter liked each other very much, and he suggests Ms. D's performance in Catered Affair is something of an homage to Ms. R.  Still would have been nice to see her play it, I agree. 

[CMH1981]

The funny thing in The Catered Affair is when the son, Eddie, comes onto the screen I immediately thought oh he's gay....I looked up the actor afterwards and sure enough Ray Stricklyn was indeed gay.  Just odd for me I guess to make that connection like that.

 

I did a search to see if there was a version of the Thelma Ritter tv-version of the The Catered Affair and didn't have any luck, does anyone else know of a copy online or somewhere?

 

I'm not one on remakes, but this film I would love to see a remake w/ a great cast, perhaps an indie remake version.  

[voiceover]

I don't know that the original stage musical Molly Brown is all that great to begin with, and Reynolds is almost in Betty-Hutton-too-much territory with the pushing she does.

 

Wow, great comparison.  I like Debbie Reynolds, but I thought her Molly was wayyy* OTT.  And I think the same of Betty & Annie.

 

I think I have that All About Eve book you mentioned.  It's uneven, but a gossipy joy for lovers of the film.

 

*screw autocorrect

Edited August 26, 2015 by voiceover

[Rinaldo]

I don't know that the original stage musical Molly Brown is all that great to begin with, and Reynolds is almost in Betty-Hutton-too-much territory with the pushing she does.  The supporting cast is good, and it's nice to see and hear Harve Presnell at his prime.

The Unsinkable Molly Brown has had an odd life onstage: its original production wasn't a monster hit (as The Music Man had been), but it ran a while, it had a national tour, it briefly became a favorite in summer stock as another vehicle for hearty rowdy leading ladies... and then nothing. There have been attempts of late to revise it into a form that might have a commercial chance now (regional readings have happened), but so far without result.

 

The movie benefited from happening during that mid-60s period when giant family-friendly movie musicals were all the rage; but the changes made for the adaptation (including cutting a big proportion of the score) haven't worn well, and I agree it doesn't look or feel satisfying now. It feels odd that it was filmed at all, when many more commercially successful (and better constructed) stage musicals haven't been.

 

I'm not one on remakes, but this film [The Catered Affair] I would love to see a remake w/ a great cast, perhaps an indie remake version.  

One different kind of remake happened just recently, in 2007-08: a musical version, A Catered Affair (restoring the "A" of the television original, in contrast to the movie's "The"). John Bucchino wrote music and lyrics, Harvey Fierstein wrote the book (and played the uncle), and John Doyle directed. I saw it, having been told by theater-savvy friends that it was "[sigh, pause] worth seeing." In retrospect, that kind of mild recommendation was appropriate; it was carefully and thoughtfully written and performed, certainly not careless or cheap, and some found it moving. It just wasn't terribly involving or exciting (for me at least). Faith Prince and Tom Wopat played the parents.

[Charlie Baker]

I noticed above that I said "A" instead of "The" Catered Affair--and it was because I saw the musical Rinaldo writes of, I guess.  I liked the musical, thought Wopat and Prince were superb, and also thought it would have had more of a life in regional theaters.

A remake of the original is an interesting idea, maybe even if it were updated, as there are always working class families out there who will overextend themselves for a wedding. 

[Crs97]

Just watched Three Comrades this morning and enjoyed it. I love that the romance was peripheral to the love shared among the three friends. Nice way to spend some time.

[elle]

Hey!  Swinging by after running into Milburn Stone over in the "Commercials" Thread.  We met because of a new commercial that uses just a bit of Lee Marvin singing "I was born under a wandering star".

 

Are we not lucky that tptb let Marvin sing and didn't dub him?  He probably falls somewhere between sing-speak and actual singing, all of his songs are just right for him and his character.  Did I mention that I love that movie - Ray Walston, Harve Presnell,  and all the other characters.  Even though it is often referred to in jest, I do think Clint did a decent job with his song.

 

The Nitty Gritty Dirt Band was in PYW (pre-Mr. Bojangles).  Didn't have much to do, but they're there!

Are they the band for the "dance in the rain and mud" scene? Edited August 27, 2015 by elle

[aradia22]

So strange. I wasn't getting updates for this thread. Glad to know the conversation's still going.

[Milburn Stone]

Hey!  Swinging by after running into Milburn Stone over in the "Commercials" Thread.  We met because of a new commercial that uses just a bit of Lee Marvin singing "I was born under a wandering star".

 

 

Paint Your Wagon is available at the iTunes Store. I'm going to rent it soon and watch it on AppleTV, based on your affection for it, elle.

 

While I remain encouraged that people over in the Favorite Commercials topic even remember this movie (Marvin's vocal is being used in an Amazon Prime spot), I've only seen bits of the movie. The reason is two words: Pauline Kael. She eviscerated it, and based on that, I was sure at the time that I didn't need to see it. But now at last I think I'm ready to make up my own mind. :)

[Rinaldo]

I understand you on that, Milburn Stone. I lived by her New Yorker reviews, and only in the last decade or so (especially since the publication of the biography and Craig Seligman's book) have I course-corrected and told myself that respecting her work means enjoying her worldview and her way of expressing it, without remaking all my opinions to match hers.  So in the years it was still playing in theaters, I could never get myself to Paint Your Wagon, though I did catch up with it years later on network TV. At least it has Harve Presnell for "They Call the Wind Maria," though the song isn't set up advantageously.

 

I'm looking around for a label and date for the release of the new (Encores) cast recording; if anybody sees info, please share.

[CMH1981]

Since this has to do somewhat w/ stars we watch here in many films shown on TCM...

 

Gena Rowlands is getting an honorary Academy Award this year and Debbie Reynolds is getting the Jean Hersholt Humanitarian Award.

 

I read on another board, somebody w/a friend on the Board of Governors, that they once again tried to honor Doris Day but she turned them down again.  They were letting her choose whether she wanted just the honorary award or the Jean Hersholt award.  They kept trying to get Day to change her mind up, offering to fly her down or come up to her home to film her accepting the award, till the day before they announced the recipients for this year.

 

Why can't they just honor Doris Day at this point w/o the pomp and circumstances of requiring her to physically accept the award on camera?  Let Osborne accept the award on her behalf as they are great friends and I can't think of anyone else who could honor her w/ such grace.

 

I'm more shocked that they took this long to honor Debbie Reynolds, but what is her humanitarian work for?  The only thing I can think of is her rescuing and preserving the costumes and memorabilia from the films that the studio just tossed out in the garbage.

 

I really wish TCM would show some of the Gena Rowlands body of film work as i'm really unfamiliar w/ it.  I'm hoping that maybe that will change now and they will give her a day w/ a great interview by Robert Osborne.

 

Does anyone else hope that the Academy will give Osborne an honorary Academy Award for introducing the great films of the silent/golden age of film to a broader audience through TCM?

Edited August 28, 2015 by CMH1981

[elle]

Paint Your Wagon is available at the iTunes Store. I'm going to rent it soon and watch it on AppleTV, based on your affection for it, elle.

 

While I remain encouraged that people over in the Favorite Commercials topic even remember this movie (Marvin's vocal is being used in an Amazon Prime spot), I've only seen bits of the movie. The reason is two words: Pauline Kael. She eviscerated it, and based on that, I was sure at the time that I didn't need to see it. But now at last I think I'm ready to make up my own mind. :)

Can't wait to hear what you think of it, even if you only like a song or two.  :0)

 

Now that I think if it, I'm surprised that the song "The Best Things in Life are Dirty" hasn't been cut up and used for a laundry soap commercial.

 

I noticed above that I said "A" instead of "The" Catered Affair--and it was because I saw the musical Rinaldo writes of, I guess.  I liked the musical, thought Wopat and Prince were superb, and also thought it would have had more of a life in regional theaters.

A remake of the original is an interesting idea, maybe even if it were updated, as there are always working class families out there who will overextend themselves for a wedding. 

Considering how big the wedding industry has blown up, it would be refreshing to see a young couple prefer to skip the big wedding even though it is against the family's wishes.  Somehow I don't see anyone making a straight up movie or tv movie of "The Catered Affair", it would have to be played as a farce to get greenlit.

[Rick Kitchen]

This says there will be no Hersholt award this year, Debbie is getting a Lifetime achievement award.

[Milburn Stone]

I understand you on that, Milburn Stone. I lived by her New Yorker reviews, and only in the last decade or so (especially since the publication of the biography and Craig Seligman's book) have I course-corrected and told myself that respecting her work means enjoying her worldview and her way of expressing it, without remaking all my opinions to match hers.  So in the years it was still playing in theaters, I could never get myself to Paint Your Wagon, though I did catch up with it years later on network TV. At least it has Harve Presnell for "They Call the Wind Maria," though the song isn't set up advantageously.

 

Another reason I'm interested in the movie is that I recently read (and highly recommend) the collection of Alan Jay Lerner's letters, edited by Dominic McHugh:

 

http://www.amazon.com/Alan-Jay-Lerner-Lyricists-Letters/dp/0199949271/

 

I don't recall a hell of a lot of correspondence about the PYW movie, but there is some, and while I also can't remember what it said right now :) I do remember being intrigued to see the movie at long last. I think it's mainly because, while Lerner's work definitely became spottier in the sixties and seventies, the book makes you realize he never stopped trying for excellence. To see a great artist trying and failing (either through his own misjudgments or being thwarted by others) has a tragic interest in itself.

[CMH1981]

Okay, well that makes more sense Rick Kitchen, since like I said I was confused about what Debbie Reynolds had done humanitarian wise other than costume/prop preservation.  Of course that then leads me to think they were going to give Doris Day the Hersholt Award for her animal foundation, and when she said no they didn't have any other options and just went with the three honorees instead.

 

I'm a little nervous about Carrie Fisher doing her mother's introduction b/c at times it seems like she is more roasting than honoring her mother.

[ratgirlagogo]

 

I'm a little nervous about Carrie Fisher doing her mother's introduction b/c at times it seems like she is more roasting than honoring her mother.

If you've seen the tribute she does to her mother on TCM, it's very warm and she seems awestruck by her mother.  ( And being awestruck by her mother isn't inconsistent with having , ahem, ISSUES with her mother obviously.)   I'm sure that's the note she'll strike.  

 

In fact her tribute is one of the ones I really like and even though I've seen it many times of course, I always watch it  because a)  I love her commentary on the scene in Bundle of Joy where her mother is getting thrown around the set, while six or seven months pregnant with Carrie and b)  that great last line where she says her mother had a HUGE crush on Jack Lemmon - and that that was the only exception she could think of to her mother's usual terrible taste in men. :)

Edited August 28, 2015 by ratgirlagogo

[Charlie Baker]

Debbie Reynolds did work for many years with the Thalians, a charitable organization focused on mental health issues.

 

Gena Rowlands is a great actress, twice Oscar nominated for movies written and directed by her late husband John Cassavetes. It would be fitting if TCM would show her work. 

 

Doris Day just isn't having it with any lifetime recognition type awards.  Was it just gossip that she refused the Kennedy Center Honor?

[ratgirlagogo]

 

Gena Rowlands is a great actress, twice Oscar nominated for movies written and directed by her late husband John Cassavetes. It would be fitting if TCM would show her work.

The Cassavetes stuff they do show pretty regularly - at least as often as they do anything else from the 70's and later.  When they had Alan Arkin day last weekend I was struck by how little of this non-blockbuster/roadshow/musical  60's and 70's stuff is ever shown anywhere on television.  I'd never seen Rafferty and the Gold Dust Twins, for example. And Popi! such a great movie that plays on TCM not even once a year.  And the original The In-Laws, one of the funniest comedies of the last 50 years.  But if they start showing lots of later stuff, what happens to our beloved older films?  Not for the first time I wish they had a Pre 1960 TCM, a Post 1960 TCM, an International TCM, and B-Movie Dreck TCM (all eras of course).

Edited August 28, 2015 by ratgirlagogo

[Charlie Baker]

I like the way you think, ratgirl.  A while back I really enjoyed it when I caught a lot of 70s stuff on TCM, but I'd hate to see the real vintage stuff diminish.

[aradia22]

I just watched Penelope (1966) with Natalie Wood for the first time today. Oh my gosh, I loved it so much. I was charmed from the opening sequence but Natalie Wood is undeniably the star of this movie. Top of her game. Just so charming and likable and in control. I could just sit back and enjoy the movie. I trusted her to steer the ship. She looked fantastic. I loved all the costume and hair changes in this movie. The script was solid even if it did get a little too silly at times (obvious scene to get her in her underwear is obvious). My only criticism is that I kind of wish she'd ended up with Peter Falk. They had great chemistry. And I used to really like Columbo. Just fantastic. It put me in a really great mood.

[Milburn Stone]

Gena Rowlands is a great actress, twice Oscar nominated for movies written and directed by her late husband John Cassavetes. 

 

Is it just me being a grinch, or does a Lifetime Achievement Oscar for her seem like "award inflation"?

 

I have respect for Rowlands as an actress. But it doesn't seem to me she's done the volume of great work necessary for a Lifetime Achievement Oscar. The imdb shows a lot of credits for her--more than I would have thought--but not many in the "truly indelible" category. Aside from her work with Cassavetes, I don't think she's really made an imprint on the movies. Delivered a lot of good performances, yes, but that's not the same thing.