Fenella

A moment to celebrate the beyond marvellous Fenella Fielding, 90 this year. The fabulous Fenella is still working, in London theatre, and is not a relic of those CARRY ON films, She only did two in fact, the priceless CARRY ON SCREAMING and CARRY ON REGARDLESS. She, like Barbara Windsor and Shirley Eaton, Dilys Laye and the equally individual Rosalind Knight seem to be the only survivors of the CARRY ON gang, along with Jim Dale of course and Sheila Hancock and Amanda Barrie both from CARRY ON CLEO. She was a scream of course as the vampire in 1966's CARRY ON SCREAMING, 

Fenella's deep husky voice and languid, beyond-camp manner ensures that she will be long remembered and not only by CARRY ON fans. She also popped up in DOCTOR IN LOVE in 1960 and as another vamp with Dirk in DOCTOR IN DISTRESS in 1963, and was an amusing Gwendolen, teasing out Oscar Wilde's lines in a 1964 television THE IMPORTANCE OF BEING EARNEST (see Fenella label) and also did a Tony Curtis comedy and other television roles, and was the Loudspeaker Announcer in THE PRISONER series. She was a delightful Lady Eager in LOCK UP YOUR DAUGHTERS in 1969. Its good to see Fenella is still around, with her voice as individual as Joan Greenwood's or Glynis Johns' or Babs Windsor. Long may she last. 

White Feather, 1955

WHITE FEATHER is a perfect mid-'50s western, which somehow I never saw at the time. I was 10 or so then and seeing all those early 50s westerns with my father: JOHNNY GUITAR (the first film I saw aged 8, what a vivid introduction to cinema), SHANE, THE COMMAND, DRUM BEAT, SITTING BULL, THE GAMBLER FROM NATCHEZ, GARDEN OF EVIL, CATTLE QUEEN OF MONTANA, THE MAVERICK QUEEN, THE LAST WAGON, RIVER OF NO RETURN, BROKEN LANCE etc. We kids loved anything with covered wagons and Indian attacks on forts, and heroes like Dale Robertson, Clint Walker, Audie Murphy or Guy Madison, or as teamed several times, Robert Wagner and Jeffrey Hunter. 

My father also took me to all those John Wayne and James Stewart westerns, like NIGHT PASSAGE and Ford's THE SEARCHERS, where Hunter had his immortal moment as half-breed Martin Pawley (Wagner had tested for that for Ford would not cast him, it would have been Wagner's first teaming with Natalie Wood if he had).  

WHITE FEATHER: The story of the peace mission from the US cavalry to the Cheyenne Indians in Wyoming during the 1870s. The mission is threatened when a civilian surveyor befriends the chief's son and falls for the chief's daughter.

Wagner is the  lead here, and Jeff is Little Dog, the Indian brave, with Hugh O'Brien as his sidekick.  Debra Paget is the indian princess and stodgy John Lund also features. 

We have covered Jeff Hunter several times before - he is one of "People We Like" - he of course died aged 42 in 1969, Wagner is still here and writing entertaining books, at 86, while Hugh died last year aged 91. Wagner and Hunter appeared in at least 5 films together, as well as the all-star THE LONGEST DAY, while Hunter also did five with Debra Paget - we are very partial to their 1954 PRINCESS OF THE NILE where Deb does one of her torrid dances, and Jeff wears a turban and harem pants, in old Cairo, right. Debra was back out west with Elvis in his first film LOVE ME TENDER in 1956.

WHITE FEATHER though is well done, scripted by western maestro Delmar Daves, but directed by one Robert D. Webb.  

Postcards from the edge

Another visit to La La Land with a return to 1990's POSTCARDS FROM THE EDGE, Mike Nichol's satisfying comedy drama from Carrie Fisher's book, all the more poignant now after her recent passing and that of her mother Debbie Reynolds. Shirley McLaine - never a favourite of ours - does maybe her best work here, outside of THE APARTMENT, as Suzanne Vale's movie star mother, who drinks a lot and can't help upstaging her daughter.

Substance-addicted Hollywood actress Suzanne Vale is on the skids. After a spell at a detox centre her film company insists as a condition of continuing to employ her that she live with her mother Doris Mann, herself once a star and now a champion drinker. Such a set-up is bad news for Suzanne who has struggled for years to get out of her mother's shadow, and who finds her mother still treats her like a child. Despite these problems - and further ones to do with the men in in her life - Suzanne can begin to see the funny side of her situation, and it also starts to occur to her that not only do daughters have mothers, mothers do too.

Meryl Streep has one of her best early roles here as the drug-addled actress Suzanne tries to get her life back on track, and Mike Nichols fills the film with a great cast: not only Dennis Quaid, but Simon Callow, Richard Dreyfuss, Gene Hackman, Annette Bening and even the great Mary Wickes (from 40s and 50s classics like NOW VOYAGER and WHITE CHRISTMAS, she also went on to SISTER ACT). 

But the film boils down to those encounters between Meryl and Shirley, and both shine, Shirley in her hospital scene getting ready to face her public - the gays love her - and belting out a version of Sondheim's "I'm Still Here". Meryl too sings up a storm in that final country music scene. 

It all certainly works now and is a film to savour for many fine moments.
Maybe its time for another look at Carrie's THESE OLD BROADS telemovie with not only Debbie and Shirley but Dames Elizabeth Taylor and Joan Collins - which we covered before. see Debbie label.

Back to La La Land

A return visit to LA LA LAND was nice this week, for a rainy afternoon, as my partner had not seen it, and yes, he loved it - the music and dancing and the jazz and all those bright colours. I liked it a lot too again, but it seemed a tad too long, and maybe shallow. 

But hey, we like Ryan Gosling, Emma Stone is a big discovery for me and some sequences just sang for me, recalling moments from the Cukor 1954 A STAR IS BORN (walking around the movie sound stages), AN AMERICAN IN PARIS,  SINGING IN THE RAIN, THE BANDWAGON's "Dancing In The Dark"- Minnelli is a big influence here as is French director Jacques Demy - echoes of UMBRELLAS OF CHERBOURG and particuarly THE YOUNG GIRLS OF ROCHEFORT, that 1967 delight and of course Scorsese's NEW YORK NEW YORK with that other driven, more intense couple both finding their individual careers but having to separate to do so - LA LA LAND is not quite in that league, but has so many blissful moments we don't care, thanks to Damien Chazelle's flair. He captures the spirit of those films and recreates it in present day Los Angeles - Joni's "city of the fallen angels", taking in REBEL WITHOUT A CAUSE's Griffith Park Observatory along the way. 
More on Scorsese, Demy, Minnelli and Ryan at labels. 

Some '70s gals ...

Some of our favourite 1970s actresses who provided lots of amusing goofy moments - so no Jane, Faye, Julie, Diane or Jill, instead its Madeline, Terri, Barbara, Karen and Sandy !

The late great Madeline Kahn: Eunice in WHATS UP DOC?, Trixie Delight in PAPER MOON, Lili Von Shtupp in BLAZING SADDLES, Kitty O'Kelly in Bogdanovich's bomb AT LONG LAST LOVE, the monster's bride in YOUNG FRANKENSTEIN.

Terri Garr: TOOTSIE, CLOSE ENCOUNTERS ...,  her great line in YOUNG FRANKENSTEIN: "He vould have an enormous schwanzstucker" ... (There's also of course Cloris Leachman's immortal Frau Blucher ...).

Barbara Harris, so deliously amusing in PLAZA SUITE, touching in NASHVILLE, perfect in Hitch's last FAMILY PLOT.

Karen Black, if only for her air hostess flying the plane in AIRPORT '75, her country queen in NASHVILLE, also in FAMILY PLOT, and another Altman: 1982's COME BACK TO THE FIVE AND DIME, JIMMY DEAN, JIMMY DEAN, which also featured:

Sandy Dennis (1937-1992) who of course started in the Sixties with WHO'S AFRAID OF VIRGINIA WOOLF?, UP THE DOWN STAIRCASE, A TOUCH OF LOVE, THE FOX etc and delighted us in the Seventies with THE OUT OF TOWNERS and her ditzy turn in NASTY HABITS. 

Plus we have to mention Melinda Dillon, so wonderful in CLOSE ENCOUNTERS... and Eileen Brennan, particularly in THE CHEAP DETECTIVE,

Soon, maybe, the '70s guys: Caan, Dern, Devane, Burt Reynolds, Segal, Gould, Sutherland, and the big hitters Nicholson, Redford, Newman, Hackman, De Niro, Pacino and more  ... or maybe not,

Lee in London, continued ....

Many thanks to Colin for sending me these scans of a 1970s magazine feature on our favourite, Lee Remick, when she was living and working in London. Nice picture too of her with her (second) husband Kip Gowans (1930-2011).  Lots more on Lee (whom I had a nice meeting with in 1970, as discussed in previous Remick posts) and her time in London. She was on the cover of "Radio Times" three times for her work with the BBC. She met Kip when he was assistant director on her 1969 film HARD CONTRACT, a fascinating oddball thriller. They were married until her death in 1991, aged 55.

Movie stars play records too!

Sophia. Rock. Alain & Romy. Dusty ... I had a Dansette record player just like Dusty's.

The original boys in the band

Fascinating going back to the original BOYS IN THE BAND now, after seeing the recent theatre revival in London the other week (review below, & at Theatre, gay interest labels). William Friedkin's 1970 film features the original cast of nine who played it in New York and London in the late sixties. Its been interesting and sad too finding out what happened to them.

The play and film had long been unseen, and seen as a cliche of early gay stereotypes, but its a fascinating drama by Mart Crowley (still here now) showing how self-loathing some gays were then, before Stonewall and the 1970s gay liberation shook things up. Then of course in the 1980 the Aids spectre arrived ....

There's neurotic Michael who hosts the birthday party for Harold, "a 42 year old pock-marked Jew", his birthday present of the midnight cowboy hustler, then there's uncomplicated nice guy Donald, the screaming queen Emory, coloured guy Bernard, the couple Hank and Larry with their own problems of fidelity, and straight guy Alan who drops in .....

Five of the cast died of Aids-related illnesses: Kenneth Nelson (Michael) aged 63 in 1993, who had a theatre career in London; Frederick Combs (Donald) aged 56 in 1992; Leonard Frey (Harold) aged 49 in 1988 - he was also the tailor in FIDDLER ON THE ROOF; Robert La Tourneaux (cowboy) aged 45 in 1986, and Keith Prentice (Larry) aged 52 in 1992. Cliff Gorman (Emory) had a long career, starting in JUSTINE and LENNY on stage (but lost the film to bigger name Dustin Hoffman) died aged 65 in 2002 of leukaemia. Reuben Green (Bernard) seems to have vanished, while Laurence Luckinbill (Hank) and Peter Green (Alan) are both still here and are interviewed on the 2008 German dvd I got of the film, where director Friedkin enthusases about the cast and the film, as does writer Mart Crowley. 

Its fascinating to see it again as originally staged and made cinematic by Friedkin, as the cast use all those props and the food and lots of drink. Its as savage as Albee's WHO'S AFRAID OF VIRGINIA WOOLF? (also having a London revival at the moment), and it remains a great play, capturing a decisive moment in gay evolution. 

Beatles for sale - in vinyl

Now that vinyl records are back again - and a lot pricier than they used to be, a new collection of The Beatles albums in vinyl caught my attention, now that I can play vinyl again. Its so satisfying dropping the needle on the long-playing album, the way listening to music used to be, rather than pressing 'play' on a cd or streaming music.

The Beatles on vinyl collection starts with that classic ABBEY ROAD, at a decent price of £9.99, and there is a new album every two weeks, retailing at £16.99 - cheaper than buying them at a record store. The next one is SGT PEPPER'S LONELY HEARTS CLUB BAND - I will have to get that one too, though I have the CD, as I do of most of the fab's albums, and I may also have to get HELP, A HARD DAY'S NIGHT, REVOLVER and all their main albums again on vinyl. These may have been originally released as a box set, but this new collection allows one to just get the albums one wants, There are really a dozen original Beatles albums (if one includes THE MAGICAL MYSTERY TOUR,, originally a double EP), the rest of the 23 here are those compilations and anthologies. 

I will be back in 1967 with flatmate Stan and Linda, the girl upstairs, as SGT PEPPER unfolds again. All are in facsimiles of the original albums, with magazines and notes. We Beatles fanatics will be pleased (though of course back then in the late Sixties I also loved The Rolling Stones, Cream, The Yardbirds, The Moody Blues, The Pink Floyd, some Who, The Band, The Doors, Jefferson Airplane, The Lovin Spoonful, and those early Joni, Neil Young, Tom Rush, Aretha Franklin albums....).

RIP, continued ...

Alan Aldridge (1943-2017), age 73.  Graphic artist whose album covers and posters saw him hailed as a 'Young Meteor' of the Sixties. I vividly remember his fantastic art work on Penguin paperbacks, I had his "Illustrated Beatles Lyrics" book, and his "Sunday Times" colour supplement covers, like that handpainted mini car in 1965. 

He also did album covers for Elton John, The Who, Cream and others. One of the original hippie artists then, who - like Klaus Voorman - got into The Beatles inner circle. He looked the part too with that hair and tache. His airbrushed, psychedelic images were part of the scene then and defined the era. A quintessential 60s figure: talented, working class, handsome with long hair and a penchant for velvet suits. He also did posters for films like Warhol's CHELSEA GIRLS, and the logo for The Hard Rock Cafe. His private life was suitably colourful too, having seven children by three different women. Rock'n'Roll ! 

Sir Gerard Kaufman (1930-2017), aged 86. He enjoyed a long career as Labour MP spanning 46 years, including being Father of The House of Commons, and held most senior posts in opposition during Labour's wilderness years. He was Harold Wilson's "media fixer". The waspish MP loved cinema, music, and was a critic, writer ("My Life in the Silver Screen"), The confirmed bachelor was a regular on television. His Jewish parents had fled Tsarist Russia but the scholarship boy was soon on the rise to Oxford, and on to working in newspapers, before becoming an MP.

Bill Paxton (1955-2017), aged 61, after complications after surgery. The amiable actor was was working to the end, having amassed 93 credits, including early roles in THE TERMINATOR, ALIENS, APOLLO 13, TOMBSTONE as well as leads in TWISTER, and in Cameron's TITANTIC and TRUE LIES, 

The wrong envelope!

Hockney: 60 years work at the Tate

A new Dreamgirls

Wow - what a show: non-stop singing, dancing and more costume changes than one can count, plus a diva in the making, as  the 1981 musical DREAMGIRLS finally gets a London production, with a show-stopping turn by Amber Riley (we loved her as Mercedes in GLEE) as Effie, the lead singer of the girl group who is side-lined and finally ousted in favour of the prettier and slimmer Deena, as that girlgroup becomes famous in the late sixties and early seventies. The period is caught nicely here, as soul and r'n'b cross over from black music to mainstream, that era when Tamla, Stax, Atlantic etc hit their golden era.

The musical follows the career of The Dreamettes, a black girl trio from Chicago, loosely based on The Supremes, who rise to fame and fortune during the 1960s. But not before their ambitious manager, Curtis Taylor Jr – a Detroit used car salesman turned Svengali – has renamed them The Dreams and replaced the ferociously talented and feisty Effie White as both lead singer and the lover in his bed with her backup colleague and childhood chum, Deena Jones. She’s a more svelte and malleable proposition, whose prettiness and smoother sound Curtis reckons is likelier to appeal to the cross-over audience and television-viewing record-buyers he’s determined to conquer. It’s a powerful story of how music can sell its soul to avarice and about the artistic compromises forced on black composers and performers if they wanted to swim in the mainstream.

This show has it all. Amber is sensational and of course her huge number "And I'm Telling You I'm Not Going" raises the roof - standing ovation of course. Having seen Aretha and Barbra in their young prime (Aretha in 1968 and '70, Barbra in the London FUNNY GIRL in 1966) I can confirm Amber is the real deal. The whole team work non-stop and the other numbers like "Steppin' to the bad side" get them all moving, as well as the different versions of  "One Night Only".

Michael Bennett of course created the original show which featured Jennifer Holiday (whose albums I liked a lot), Jennifer Hudson and Beyonce did the film, and now Amber and Joe Aaron Reid (as manager Curtis) and Adam J Bernard as the James Brown like singer, now lead the London cast 35 years after it first opened on Broadway, and ten years after the movie, which I have now lined up to see this week. 

Star power

Interesting news that Warren Beatty. 79, and Faye Dunaway, 76, will present the Best Film Award at the upcoming Oscars, 50 years after BONNIE AND CLYDE. I was 21 when Faye and Warren bowled us over in Penn's extraordindary film back in that glorious year 1967 - are we all 50 years older? 

Here's another example of star power: Paul Newman, 67, and Elizabeth Taylor, 60, presenting the Best Film Award in 1992, decades after their CAT ON A HOT TIN ROOF. 

Still of the day: The Misfits

Sky Movies are running lots of Marilyn movies just now, but never THE MISFITS. I used to be obsessed about this 1961 John Huston film when I was younger, and saw it lots of times in that pre-video world - I had to go to any screening of it. Its one I need to see again now, before too long. Lots on it at MM labels. 

And here's Thelma .....

12 Spectacular films

I had this large format spiral bound book "SPECTACULAR! The Story of Epic Films" by John Cary and John Kobal, in 1974, but somehow lost it over the years, so I was pleased to find one cheap online. This would be expensive to produce now, with all those fold-out double page scenes from epic films. It covers it all from the silent days up to the glory Fifties and Sixties era, with special chapters like Robert Wise discussing the making of HELEN OF TROY. Fascinating stuff - it got me list my own dozen Top Spectaculars.

• THE SIGN OF THE CROSS - Cecil B De Mille, 1932
• QUO VADIS? - Mervyn Le Roy, 1951
• HELEN OF TROY - Robert Wise, 1955 
• ALEXANDER THE GREAT - Robert Rossen, 1956
• THE TEN COMMANDMENTS - Cecil B De Mille, 1956
• THE VIKINGS - Richard Fleischer, 1958
• BEN HUR - William Wyler, 1959 (with stunt help from Andrew Morton and Yakima Canutt)
• SPARTACUS - Stanley Kubrick, 1960
• EL CID - Anthony Mann, 1961
• CLEOPATRA - Joseph L Mankiewicz, 1963
• THE FALL OF THE ROMAN EMPIRE - Anthony Mann, 1964
• ALEXANDER - Oliver Stone, 2004.

And of course LAWRENCE OF ARABIA. 
Special mention to: THE EGYPTIAN, THE PRODIGAL, THE SILVER CHALICE, LAND OF THE PHAROAHS, SIGN OF THE PAGAN, ATTILA, DEMETRIUS AND THE GLADIATORS, 55 DAYS AT PEKING, KING OF KINGS, BARABBAS, GENGHIS KHAN, SODOM AND GOMORRAH, THE GREATEST STORY EVER TOLD, THE COLOSSUS OF RHODES, ATLANTIS THE LOST CONTINENT, FABIOLA, THE LAST DAYS OF POMPEII, THE GIANT OF MARATHON, APHRODITE and all those other Steve Reeve and Belinda Lee peplums, and Visconti's THE LEOPARD, 
A big NO to those CGI items like TROY or even GLADIATOR ! 

Lots on all these at Epics, Peplums labels. 

Coming up: 12 Bad Movies We Love; 12 European 1960s films. 

RIP, continued ...

Dick Bruna (1927-2017), aged 89. The Dutch artist and illustrator was the creator of the white rabbit Miffy who featured in all those popular childrens' books, which he wrote and illustrated. Miffy was a very simple design and much loved. I even had a cat I named Miffy.

Alec McCowen (1925-2017), aged 91. Another of England's premier actors, with a long a career on stage with lots of television and cinema roles - he actually clocked up 87 screen credits. I saw him on stage in EQUUS. Early roles included in Losey's TIME WITHOUT PITY in 1957, A NIGHT TO REMEMBER, the hilarious THE WITCHES in 1966, Cukor's TRAVELS WITH MY AUNT, Hitchcock's FRENZY, STEVIE, PERSONAL SERVICES, Scorsese's THE AGE OF INNOCENCE and THE GANGS OF NEW YORK and more. An out gay actor, he insisted his late partner was mentioned in his "This Is Your Life" TV programme.

Al Jarreau (1940-2017), aged 76. The smooth jazz singer won 7 grammy awards, and is perhaps best known for the MOONLIGHTING theme song. I loved his hit "We Are In This Love Together" and his 1981 album BREAKIN' AWAY.

A new Boys In The Band

A new touring production of THE BOYS IN THE BAND turns out to be the first major revival in decades of Mart Crowley's 1968 play, a landmark production and a certified gay classic.

I remember the original production being on in London then, but being in my early twenties, I had no interest in seeing it. The original cast did the film too in 1970., directed by William Friedkin, which I saw at the time but had no real memory of, so really I was coming to this new production without any pre-conceived ideas.  A friend saw it last October in its initial theatre run, and it is today finishing a two week run in London's west end.

I had a great seat in the front row, so it almost felt I was on stage with them. It turned out to be another great gay revival like those of THE JUDAS KISS and MY NIGHT WITH REG in recent years (see Theatre. Gay Interest labels).

It is also a 60s landmark play, like Albee's WHO'S AFRAID OF VIRGINIA WOOLF? (also getting a major revival in London this spring), and like that play it also descends into booze hell and 'get the guest' games as the drama unfolds.

I loved the set here, with all those movie star pictures, and that 60s soundtrack. The cast of 9 do it justice too. Mark Gatiss (SHERLOCK, DR WHO) and his real life husband Ian Hallard are the leads as Harold and Michael - host of the birthday party for Harold. Daniel Boys scores as the nice guy Donald, and Jack Derges is an eye-catching midnight cowboy - he may be a trick but he is also a treat in a lively performance. Michael's is the lead role with lots of lines and business - it must be exhausting playing it twice a day on matinee days. 

It is the first major revival of this iconic play in two decades, and it still works as an engrossing drama, capturing that late sixties moment in 1968 before Stonewall and gay liberation in the 1970s and the AIDS crisis in the 1980s. So we get lots of Bette Davis and Judy Garland impressions as Emory and the others camp it up, as Michael's straight college buddy unexpectedly drops in ....

It is 1968 and nine men gather in a New York apartment for a birthday celebration. Harold receives a surprise gift from his friend Emory in the form of a beautiful male hustler. Meanwhile party host Michael gets an unwanted surprise of his own, As the booze is drank and the dope smoked, the mood swings from hilarity to heartbreak. 

It is a busy play to stage, with all those props and food and drink - the cast have to eat salad and lasagne, as well as drink whatever is in those bottles, as well as emote. To my surprise, I liked it a lot, and have now ordered the film dvd to see how it was staged then, and that original cast (above, right), several of whom did not survive the Aids era. 

"Its the Downbeat club at three in the morning, you are singing just for yourself and the boys in the band" - Norman Maine to Esther in A STAR IS BORN, 1954 

This post has now got over 200 views, and my pal Colin tweeted it to the boys:

Colin Howe‏@ColHowe

Great review of @BoysBandPlay on my friend's blog http://osullivan60.blogspot.co.uk/2017/02/a-new-boys-in-band.html?m=1 … @danielboys @Markgatiss @IanHallard @mrjackderges @jamesholmes19

1:48 AM - 19 Feb 2017

Glenda in Yanks ???

Idly watching John Schlesinger's 1979 wartime romance YANKS again on television, I was suddenly caught by this one shot from that emotional climax at the railway station as the GIs pull out and all the womenfolk are crowding the station to say goodbye. The female stars of the film are Vanessa Redgrave and Lisa Eichorn and Rachel Roberts, but surely this is Glenda Jackson, among the crowded extras, she had starred in Schlesinger's SUNDAY BLOODY SUNDAY in 1971. Does anyone else think its our Glenda ?

Joni, out and about again ...

Adele and Beyonce may have been the headline-grabbers at the Grammys this year, but it was good to see our Nr 1 favourite Joni Mitchell at Clive Davis's pre-Grammy party, after her major illness in 2015. Thanks to Mike in San Francisco for the photo. Lots on Joni at label ....

Her website says:

Joni made a rare public appearance last night, attending Clive Davis' annual Pre-Grammy Gala at the Beverly Hilton Hotel in Los Angeles, where she was escorted by writer and filmmaker Cameron Crowe and author Daniel Levitin (pictured with Joni).

Joni was honored as one of the greatest songwriters whose work has touched everyone in the music industry.

She had a good time and was particularly moved by Chance the Rapper and Mary J. Blige’s performances. Herbie Hancock came by and said an extended hello, as did many other well-wishers, including Stephen Stills and Clive Davis.

Weekend treat: a Thelma classic ...

When you have a spare two hours watch this delicious 1951 Paramount comedy THE MATING SEASON, directed by (gay) Mitchell Leisen (whom we have blogged about here before: reviews of MIDNIGHT, HOLD BACK THE DAWN, FRENCHMAN'S CREEK etc) with a great role for the great Thelma Ritter, one of our favourites here. Gene Tierney and Miriam Hopkins also score. Thelma is the all-wise owner of a hamburger joint whose diplomat son marries rich Gene, and gets snarky Miriam as his mother-in-law, but the rich man she has her eyes on falls for down-to-earth Thelma, whom the rich folk think is the son's cook, not his mother. The scene is set ...

Thanks to the boys over at Datalounge for pointing out it is on YouTube, as it has not been available for a long time, though I caught it once on television years ago. It was made just after ALL ABOUT EVE so Thelma is flying here.

We love Thelma (1902-1969) as Clancy, Susan Hayward's companion/nurse in WITH A SONG IN MY HEART in 1952, and as Doris's tipsy maid in PILLOW TALK, and the older Themla back with Marilyn (from ALL ABOUT EVE) as her Reno landlady in THE MISFITS, and ..... out west with Debbie in HOW THE WEST WAS WON and THE SECOND TIME AROUND, as James Stewart's masseuse in Hitch's REAR WINDOW, and her great early roles in A LETTER TO THREE WIVES and PICKUP ON SOUTH STREET and more (Cukor's THE ,MODEL AND THE MARRIAGE-BROKER. DADDY LONG LEGS, A HOLE IN THE HEAD) among her 44 credits.