Love Hollywood Style: Claudette Colbert.

Colbert, was best known for her confident, intelligent style and her subtle, graceful acting and in 1928, married Norman Foster, an actor and director, who performed with Colbert in the Broadway show, The Barker. They never lived together, supposedly because Colbert's mother disliked Foster and would not allow him into their home. Colbert and Foster divorced in 1935.

In December of that year, Colbert married Dr. Joel Pressman, a surgeon at UCLA. The marriage lasted 33 years, until Pressman's death of liver cancer in 1968.

For years, Colbert divided her time between her apartment in Manhattan and her summer home in Speightstown, Barbados. After suffering a series of strokes in 1993, she stayed at her home in Barbados, where she died on July 30, 1996, at age 92. Colbert is buried in the Parish of St. Peter Cemetery in Barbados.

Video:

Montage of stills from films that won Oscars for the year 1934 (presented at the 7th Academy Awards on February 27, 1935) set to the year's Oscar-winning song.

Imitation of Life(1934).

Imitation of Life(1934). Drama directed by John M. Stahl. Based on Fannie Hurst's 1933 novel of the same name. Cast: Claudette Colbert, Warren William and Rochelle Hudson, Louise Beavers and Fredi Washington. The film was released by Universal Pictures on November 26, 1934, and later re-issued in 1936. A 1959 remake with the same title stars Lana Turner.

Fredi Washington, was a light-skinned African-American. After playing this role, she was criticized by some in the black community who believed that the actress wanted to pass herself off as white. The truth was.. she was a civil rights activist.

Although, cast as the daughter of Louise Beavers, 'Fredi Washington, was less than two years younger than her onscreen mother. She was, considerably slimmer than Beavers, which allowed them to pass as mother and daughter.

The story begins, after the death of her husband, Beatrice Pullman, continues to sell his maple syrup and hires Delilah Johnson to take care of the house and her daughter Jessie. Delilah moves in with her daughter Peola, who, is light-skinned black girl.

One morning, after tasting Delilah's family recipe pancakes, Bea, decides to open restaurant named "Aunt Delilah's Pancake House". The restaurant business, makes them very wealthy, but... Peola, continues to resent her mother.

Soon after, the suggestion of a hobo Elmer Smith, Bea boxes the pancake mix and hires him as her manager. Delilah, makes twenty percent of the profits, but.. she still wants to continue working as Bea's maid.

At a party celebrating the tenth anniversary of the business, Bea meets ichthyologist Stephen Archer, who is a friend of Elmer. Bea and Stephen fall in love and make plans to marry.

Now, a college student Jessie returns home for a vacation, but Bea asks Stephen to look after her as she travels to Virginia with Delilah to find Peola, who has turned up missing. In Virginia, Delilah finds Peola working in a place that prohibits black customers. Peola denies knowing Delilah, then returns home to disown her mother, so that she can live her own life.

Things take a turn for the worse when, Jessie falls in love with Stephen, even though he does not feel the same way about her. And now.. Heartbroken, Delilah, becomes ill. On her deathbed, Delilah asks Bea to take care of Peola.

Peola attends Delilah's funeral, and becomes overwhelmed by the her loss of her mother. Bea takes her home, and Peola agrees to return to college. Bea postpones their wedding until Jessie no longer loves Stephen. Stephen promises to wait, and Bea and Jessie think back to the time when Delilah first moved in with them.

 I love both versions of this movie.. Even though the remake is in color, this one has many special scenes. Claudette Colbert, seemed like a more likable person than Lana Turner and Louise Beavers, giving such wonderful performance, pulls on your heart strings. I think that their friendship was was much more believable. I'm so glad to have both versions in my DVD collection.

Fredericka Carolyn "Fredi" Washington (December 23, 1903 – June 28, 1994) was a talented African American dramatic film actress, who was active during the period known as the Harlem Renaissance (1920s-1930s).

She is best known for her role as Peola in the 1934 version of the film Imitation of Life. Fredi Washington was born in Savannah, Georgia to Hattie and Robert T. Washington, who according to her sister Isabel, were both African American.

 Fredi was the second of their five children. Her mother, Hattie, died when Fredi was a girl. As the oldest girl in her family, Fredi helped raise her younger siblings Isabel, Rosebud and Robert with the help of her grandmother, who the family called "Big Mama." After her mother's death, Fredi was sent away to a school for colored/minority girls in Philadelphia because motherless girls during this time were thought of as orphans.

Her sister, Isabel, soon followed her. At some point her father, Robert T. Washington remarried, but his second wife died while carrying his child. He later remarried a third time and produced four more children, giving Fredi a total of eight siblings.

While still in school in Philadelphia Fredi's family moved North to Harlem, New York in the Great Migration in an effort to seek better opportunities in the industrial north. Fredi followed her family to Harlem. She quit school soon after to help support the family.

Washington started her career as a dancer in the broadway play, Shuffle Along. She was in a few of the first black Broadway shows. Because of her beauty and talent, she easily moved up as a popular featured dancer. She toured internationally with a dance team. During this period she befriended many African American legends including Josephine Baker.

She is best known for her acting career. Washington's first movie role was in Black and Tan (1929) where she played a dying dancer. She had a small part in The Emperor Jones (1933) with Paul Robeson, based on the play by Eugene O'Neill.

In Imitation of Life, was nominated for an Academy Award. Washington turned down a number of chances to pass for white as an actress, which might have led to greater acting.

She had a light complexion and green eyes. Her beauty and appearance led directors to choose darker-skinned actresses for the stereotypical "maid" roles offered to black actresses in those years. At the same time, Hollywood directors did not offer her romantic roles with leading white actors. When Washington played roles in race films intended for black audiences, she often wore heavy makeup to darken her skin.

Washington had a role in, One Mile from Heaven (1937). Realizing that she had few opportunities in Hollywood at the time, Washington quit movies and returned to New York to work in theater.

Fredi was often dismayed that she didn't get to grow as an actress, and tired of being asked to pass or to play "tragic mulatto" roles, another stereotype. She wanted to perform in more complicated, versatile roles. Frustrated, she quit acting and focused her efforts on African American civil rights.

 Washington became a theater writer. She was the Entertainment Editor for People's Voice, a newspaper for African Americans founded by Adam Clayton Powell, Jr., a Baptist minister and politician in New York City. It was published 1942-1948. A very intelligent woman, Fredi was fearlessly outspoken about racism faced by African Americans. She worked closely with Walter White, then president of the NAACP, to address pressing issues facing black people in America.

 Her experiences in the film industry led her to become a civil rights activist. Together with Noble Sissle, W.C. Handy and Dick Campbell, Washington was a founding member with Alan Corelli of the Negro Actors Guild of America (NAG) in New York in 1937.

She served as executive secretary, and worked for better opportunities for African-American actors. She also was active with the National Association for the Advancement of Colored People (NAACP) and worked to secure better hotel accommodations for black actors, who were often discriminated against, as well as less stereotyping and discrimination in roles. In 1953, Washington was a film casting consultant for Carmen Jones, which starred Dorothy Dandridge, another pioneering African-American actress.

 She also consulted on casting for George Gershwin's Porgy and Bess, an opera performed in revival in 1952 and filmed in 1959. Washington dated Duke Ellington for some time but, when she saw he was not going to marry her, she started another relationship.

She married Lawrence Brown, the trombonist in Duke Ellington's jazz orchestra, a relationship which ended in divorce. Washington later married Anthony H. Bell, a dentist. Bell died in the 1980s. Washington died of a stroke, the last of several, on June 28, 1994 in Stamford, Connecticut at the age of 90. According to her sister, Isabel, Fredi never had children. One of Washington's sisters, Isabel Washington (May 23, 1909 - May 1, 2008), was also an actress. Isabel married Adam Clayton Powell, Jr., the first African American elected to Congress from New York state.

CMBA Comedy Classics Blogathon: The Palm Beach Story (1942)

****
Country: US
Director: Preston Sturges

"Sex always has something to do with it," Geraldine Jeffers (Claudette Colbert) says in exasperation to her husband Thomas (Joel McCrea) in writer-director Preston Sturges's 1942 screwball comedy The Palm Beach Story. She is trying to explain to the suspicious Thomas why she has just been given several hundred dollars by a perfect stranger, an elderly millionaire calling himself the Wienie King of Texas, who took pity on her after learning she was about to be evicted from their Park Avenue apartment for not being able to pay the rent. Thomas is having a hard time believing there isn't more to the unlikely tale than Geraldine is telling, and she has been trying to convince him that nothing improper happened. Like The Lady Eve and The Miracle of Morgan's Creek, those other audacious Sturges sex comedies of the 1940s, The Palm Beach Story pushed the strictures of the Production Code to the limit with its sexual innuendo. But then it had to, for the entire film might have been designed to illustrate the truth of Gerry's observation that the tangled relations between men and women are always in some way governed by sex.

The film begins with a mystery. In a silent, stop-and-start slapstick sequence, we see Claudette Colbert rushing out of an apartment in a wedding dress. At the same time, she appears—through the cinematic sleight of hand of crosscutting—to be locked in a closet in the apartment, bound and gagged, while a maid has hysterics and finally faints at the sight of the wedding-gowned Colbert. The meaning of this paradoxical sequence won't be revealed until the last scene in the picture, when it becomes the device used to resolve the plot's multiple sexual entanglements. By that point, though, so much else has happened in this frantically paced movie that most viewers probably won't even remember its puzzling opening.

Flash forward five years. The former bride and groom, Tom and Gerry, are having serious problems in the two areas this movie dwells on—money and sex. Tom, an engineer-inventor, is having trouble raising the capital to finance a demonstration project of his new invention, a stressed-cable mesh airport stretched across skyscraper rooftops. (Is this idea intended to be as loony as it sounds?) Not only are the couple broke and about to become homeless, but the pizazz has gone from their marriage—at least for Gerry, who tells Tom, "We don't love each other the way we used to." When Tom seems reluctant to believe her story about the Wienie King's largesse, it's the last straw and she heads for Palm Beach to get a divorce. Tom, however, isn't ready to give up on the marriage and takes off in pursuit to change Gerry's mind.

On her journey to Palm Beach, Gerry takes the viewer along on what can only be described as a frenetic spree, with one hilarious episode after another coming at a furious pace. Gerry starts her journey with no money, no luggage, no train ticket, nothing but the clothes she is wearing, and before long she has lost even those, showing up for breakfast in the train's dining car wearing a Pullman blanket for a skirt and the top of borrowed pajamas as a blouse, with the pajama pants wrapped around her head as an impromptu turban. This gal is nothing if not inventive. She manages to inveigle her way aboard a Florida-bound train, where she is adopted as a female mascot by the wacky Ale and Quail club, hooks up with a millionaire, J. D. Hackensacker III (Rudy Vallee), acquires an expensive new designer wardrobe and a diamond and ruby bracelet, is wined and dined aboard Hackensacker's yacht for the final leg of the journey, and arrives in Palm Beach engaged to him.

Gerry being serenaded by the Ale and Quail Club

The plot of The Palm Beach Story seems not so much to unfold deliberately as to be improvised as we watch the film. From an initial premise, the picture keeps evolving in unexpected ways, snowballing from one episode to the next, not with any conventional causality, but with its own delirious narrative momentum. If you haven't seen this movie before, trying to predict what will come next is a futile exercise that will only end up keeping you flummoxed. All you can do is surrender yourself to the frenzy of Sturges's relentless comic invention and hold on to your seat for the duration of the ride. One farcical situation seems to follow another spontaneously, in the tradition of sublime narrative anarchy found in the great silent comedies, the Marx Brothers, and the zaniest screwball comedies like Bringing Up Baby. It's only in retrospect that it becomes apparent how carefully engineered the entire edifice is, held together by its own self-generated narrative logic.

In addition to its hilarious situations and frequent physical comedy ("I happen to love pratfalls," Sturges writes in his autobiography), the film is propelled by its clever dialogue and its characters. Sturges, who began as a playwright and later turned to writing movies, knew the value of dialogue and loaded the picture with rapid-fire conversations generously spiked with quips, bons mots, and witticisms. And as the writer as well as the director of the picture, he made sure to get the maximum effect from his expertly crafted dialogue, using long takes and being careful to avoid distracting the viewer with gratuitous directorial flourishes. This, of course, requires the expertise of actors perfectly attuned to Sturges's approach, and in The Palm Beach Story he has assembled a cast that might contain some surprising choices but would be difficult to improve on.

Preston Sturges flanked by his stars

As well as his regular character actors like William Demarest and Franklin Pangborn in smaller roles, mostly as members of the Ale and Quail club, Sturges casts Rudy Vallee as the stodgy, sexually naive millionaire Gerry becomes engaged to. The colorless and rather enervated Vallee is an inspired choice for the boyish J. D. Hackensacker III. Standing in complete contrast is his unconventional sister, the manic, wisecracking Maude, the Princess Centimillia. Married and divorced five times and clearly possessing a powerful sex drive, Maude sets her sights on Tom, by this point masquerading as Gerry's brother, the moment she sees him. Mary Astor, cast against melodramatic type, plays the man-hungry Princess with a superb comic flair I haven't seen her display in any other picture.

As the on-again, off-again Tom and Gerry, Joel McCrea and Claudette Colbert are a great team. He's single-minded, humorless, and sexually possessive, the straight man to Colbert's Gerry. It's a great role for the usually laid-back McCrea, who plays Tom with the same intensity as he played the movie director in Sturges's Sullivan's Travels, released earlier the same year. But the film really belongs to Claudette Colbert. Her Gerry is a woman with a clear and realistic view of herself and others, a woman who makes no bones about her mercenary nature, a great improviser who lives by her wits, using in a benign way what Sturges has described as "the aristocracy of beauty"—in other words, the power of her sexual attractiveness to men—to get by.

Yet there doesn't seem to be anything manipulative about her, beyond the fact that she knows what she wants and is uncommonly shrewd about how to get it. For Gerry, her sex appeal is merely a practical way to navigate her way through life. She's no guileful seductress; she doesn't go out of her way to vamp men. Nor is she a child-woman, playing dumb and pandering to helpless little-girl male fantasies, but a mature, intelligent, and unaffected woman. When men respond to her attractiveness, she simply goes along with it as a serendipitous opportunity.

This happens time and again—with the Wienie King, the cab driver who takes a shine to her and drives her to Penn Station for free, the rowdy Ale and Quail Club, J. D. Hackensacker. It is exactly this quality in Gerry's personality, her guilt-free willingness to use her natural advantages to get results, that maddens Tom and arouses his jealously. I can't think of a more appropriate choice to play such an original character as Gerry—with her combination of femininity, brains, and playfulness—than Claudette Colbert. For me it's her best role and her most delightful performance.

As a director, Sturges had a brief but illustrious run. Remarkably, he produced his two greatest films in the space of just one year: Sullivan's Travels, which makes a serious statement on the subject of humor, and The Palm Beach Story, which takes the serious subject of sex and makes it as funny as it's ever been in a movie.

This post is part of the Comedy Classics Blogathon sponsored by the Classic Movie Blog Association. The event runs January 22-27. For a complete list of participants and to learn more, click here.

The Final Conclusion - Best Actress 1944

1944

So the much anticipated ranking is:

5. Bette Davis in Mr. Skeffington

Many might disagree with me but I think that Bette Davis was fantastic in Mr. Skeffington. Her over-the-top acting, her insane and brave choices all worked well with me. Even after I finished watchin the movie, I was under the effect of Bette's great performance. Although it's not her best work, it's worth watching.

4. Greer Garson in Mrs. Parkington

I can say that I was so pleasantly surprised and impressed by this performance of the wonderful Greer Garson. Although she did not blow me away totally, I was utterly mesmerized by her unique presence and talent. Garson illuminates the screen with her radiant self and charisma and she creates a wonderful performance as Susie Parkington.

3. Claudette Colbert in Since You Went Away

Although Claudette didn't have the screentime and the screenplay on her side, she still managed to deliver a very emotional and loveable performance as Mrs. Anne Hilton. Claudette's acting is not too sentimental and she's quite heartwrenching occasionally. Had she been given more, she would have been more fantastic (and won the Oscar).

2. Ingrid Bergman in Gaslight

Ingrid Bergman gives a fabulous, extremely memorable performance as Paula a terrified woman on the edge of a total nervous breakdown. Although this is not the type of Bergman's performance that I love obsessedly, I would feel ashamed if I didn't praise her for this work of hers as much as I can. Ingrid's portrayal of this woman is brilliant and really haunting.

1. Barbara Stanwyck in Double Indemnity

But I had to chose Stanwyck's diabolique performance as Phyllis Dietrichson. Stanwyck's performance as the manipulative, irresistable Phyllis Dietrichson is just pitch-perfect. From what I've seen this is absolutely the best work of this silver screen goddess who always blows me away with her wonderful presence and radiant talent. Breathtaking achievement

So I can proudly announce

that my winner is...

Barbara Stanwyck

in

Double Indemnity

Barbara hid a gun in case I picked someone else

Final thoughts: I so needed this year, especially after the awful 1957. All these five women gave fantastic performances and they all would have made worthy winner (except for maybe Bette). I said in my review about Ingrid Bergman that my #1 pick will be a difficult choice. It wasn't to tell the truth. After a while, it was very clear that I would give it to Barbara that scene behind the door is the most significant reason. I mean how could a scene be more brilliant. Ingrid is a great second. I loved Colbert more than it seemed from my review, I think. Garson, poor Garson is fourth once again even though I so loved her. Bette was the obvious fifth, she was the weakest one of this line up (as if I can ever use the word weak in a sentence with this year). Still, the best year so far, I really loved it. And it was great that I was able to cover it first. I usually don't care about it but now I wanted to be the first quite badly. :)

The ranking of the reviewed years:

1. 1944
2. 1969
3. 1974
4. 1989
5. 1959
6. 1964
7. 1939
8. 1977
9. 2010
10. 2009
11. 1980
12. 1941
13. 1963
14. 1966
15. 1973
16. 1990
17. 1978
18. 1954
19. 1948
20. 2002
21. 1957
22. 1940
23. 1998

About the next year: I got requests, but I'm doing the next year because I'm really interested in it. It seems to be a great year and all the movies are available, right now. So I give clues:

• Comedy, THE box-office hit, period pieces

What do you think?

Claudette Colbert in Since You Went Away

Claudette Colbert received her third and last Best Actress nomination for playing Mrs. Anne Hilton in Since You Went Away. I'm quite sure that Colbert was the third likeliest to win the Oscar as she played in a very actual Selznick movie that got a Best Picture nom, too. I think she had more chance than Davis and Garson because she won the Oscar 10 years before (sooner) than them, plus Mrs. Parkington and Mr. Skeffington were not nominated for Best Picture.

Since You Went Away is a movie that was seemingly inteded to win many Oscars. David O. Selznick was well-known for making long, epic, baity movies and yet Since You Went Away is much more modest than, say, Gone with the Wind. Still, it's very long and it's full of dramatic elements plus there's the Mrs. Miniver factor in it. It's less of a propaganda movie, though and yet it's weaker than that one. Max Steiner won the Oscar for this one and it's a bit awkward that he lost for Gone with the Wind and won for this one. Jennifer Jones is fine in this role though she seems to be just reprising the role of St. Bernadette here. Still, it was a deserved nomination in a weak field. Monty Wooley is quite fine and he might have deserved to be nominated, too.

Claudette Colbert is an actress whom I really don't know. I had only seen It Happened One Night before Since You Went Away and she really impressed me in that one, so I was really looking forward to seeing her again. Vicious gossip columnist Hedda Hopper always spoke about her very fondly (quite a rare thing) and I think I understand why. Claudette's French elegance is combined with so much dignity and that's such a lucky combination. She seems to have had so much dedication to deliver great performances. She's not only beautiful but also has a very uncanny presence. When I see a performer with great presence, I always feel something in my bones. When I see Claudette, it's like eating some really delicious chocolate, which you don't eat up at once but save it so that it lasts longer.

The role of Mrs. Anne Hilton screamed Mrs. Miniver to me so much when I read the synopsis of the story. A strong mother who tries to hold her family together druing WWII. Still, it's so much different. Mrs. Miniver seems to be like a saint who's inaccesible and angelic. She's the perfect person, who keeps her composure even in the toughest situation. Anne Hilton is, however, much more fragile and human. This is not about comparing the performance. It's strictly about the characters. We see Mrs. Hilton's flaws (she even admits them) and even a bit of her laziness. She is used to living this very American and comfortable lifestyle and she doesn't really want to give up and yet she has to make some sacrifices.

The first scenes are the highlights of Colbert's whole performance. They are quite heartbreaking and extremely haunting. It's a really sad scene where she looks at the photo of her husband who went to the war. The whole thing becomes very human and also quite sad. When the movie started, I thought that she would totally blow me away in the end. Unfortunately, she didn't.

That's not her fault really and yet it affects her whole performance. The thing is that this movie is not Claudette's. The most impotant character is by far, Jennifer Jones'. Although Jones was nominated in the supporting category, she has about twice as much screentime as Colbert and sometimes her story-lines overshadow Claudette's. Unfortunately, I might add as I think that Claudette was much better and she had the more interesting character. I think it had much to do with the fact that Selznick really wanted to make Jones a big star (he did succeed, to a degree) and therefore she was given the huge scenes, not Colbert. Too bad, because as I said, Colbert is much more impressive.

Although Claudette doesn't have enough screentime and opportunities, she still manages to become quite great. Her chemistry with Joseph Cotten is just excellent, plus she's very believable as the ordinary mother and wife without becoming annoying. Although Anne is a likeable character, Claudette doesn't make her a saint and therefore she becomes much more realistic.

Fortunately, in the end, Claudette is in the spotlight again. The end of her performance really matches the beginning's greatness and I was quite relieved that she wouldn't leave me unimpressed. The scene when she's looking at her Christmas present is simply breathtaking. Claudette found the good balance there so well and she did not go over-the-top. It's a very emotional moment and I really loved it.

So, to sum up, this is great work by Claudette Colbert. Although she didn't have the screentime and the screenplay on her sider, she still managed to deliver a very emotional and loveable performance as Mrs. Anne Hilton. Claudette's acting is not too sentimental and she's quite heartwrenching occasionally. Had she been given more, she would have been fantastic (and won the Oscar). But this way, she's "just" extremely great.

First I wanted to give her a very strong 4 but I compared her to the ladies who got 4s but she was way better, better even than some of the 4.5 ladies, so... :D

And I must add: I LOVE DOING THIS YEAR! So far, it has been full of present surprises. And there's Bette, Ingrid and Barbara still left. LOVE IT! LOVE IT! LOVE IT! :)

The Next Year

1944

So the nominees were:

• Ingrid Bergman in Gaslight
• Claudette Colbert in Since You Went Away
• Bette Davis in Mr. Skeffington
• Greer Garson in Mrs. Parkington
• Barbara Stanwyck in Double Indemnity

I can't wait to see all of the performances. It's going to be a tough battle between Bergman and Stanwyck and I haven't even seen the others who might just outdo both of them. Oh, so exciting! :)

What do you think? The predicting contest is on.

I Met Him in Paris

Director Ernst Lubitsch once famously said, “I’ve been to Paris, France and I’ve been to Paris Paramount. Paris Paramount is better.”

Despite its title, only a small portion of Paramount’s “I Met Him in Paris” (1937) takes place in the title city, but its there in all its glory.

Paris Paramount is where the world’s most beautiful and sophisticated people wear the latest fashions, drink and say witty things to each other. No one talks politics, there’s no war, and there’s no poverty or unemployment. Of course there’s no unemployment – someone has to keep those massive Art Deco apartments and nightclubs gleaming.

In “I Met Him in Paris” Claudette Colbert plays Kay Harding, a fashion buyer for a New York apartment store who has been saving for four years for a Paris vacation. She has an OK time, but misses the companionship of someone who speaks English. One night in a bar she meets two Americans, George Potter (Melvyn Douglas) and Gene Anders (Robert Young.) Soon the two men are vying for her affections and the three of them decide to vacation together in Switzerland. Separate rooms in the hotel of course.

While “I Met Him in Paris” is a fine title, a more accurate title would be “I Vacationed with Two Men in Switzerland.” However, that would have never made it past the Hays Office.

Paramount Switzerland is every bit as wonderful as Paramount Paris. Even the outdoor bar is staffed by a waiter wearing a tuxedo. In one of my favorite scenes, Douglas and Colbert are skating together at the outdoors skating rink and she says she hasn’t had breakfast yet. Douglas calls for a waiter and the tuxedo-clad waiter skates up to them and takes their order for coffee and orange juice. I don’t even like winter sports, but I want to stay at that resort.

The film itself is most agreeable concoction. There’s little doubt who’s going to wind up with the fair Claudette in the end, especially when Gene’s wife (Mona Barrie) shows up. Oh, there’s a third suitor (Lee Bowman, as ineffectual as ever) but he’s such a mope there’s never a question that she and Melvyn Douglas will wind up together.

The more I see Melvyn Douglas in these light comedy roles, the more I appreciate him. He did a million of them and I think it’s because he never overshadows his leading ladies. Whether he’s playing against Irene Dunne, Rosalind Russell, Joan Blondell, Joan Crawford, Claudette Colbert and, of course, Greta Garbo, he never takes the limelight away from them. Bette Davis liked playing with George Brent for the same reason.

But Douglas is a better actor than Brent, with a twinkle in his eye and the slight twitch of a smile as he teases his leading ladies. He appreciates them as the great ladies they are but can’t resist bringing them down a peg.

There’s a surprising amount of slapstick comedy on hand here as the three engage in all manners of winter sports. My favorite scenes involve novice skier Robert Young constantly being overtaken by a group of skiers who can’t resist yodeling as they ski down a hill. The more they yodel, the more annoyed Young becomes. (Can’t blame him there).

Another amusing sequence has the three on a bobsled. Well, really two, because Young, the brakeman, has fallen off the back as they’re pushing off. And then Douglas and Colbert start going really fast. She falls off, and can’t scramble up the ice-crusted bobsled run. She’s trapped in the run’s narrow confines and off in the distance she can hear another bobsled barreling towards her. It’s comedy as suspense, and it’s probably the best bobsled sequence until 007 raced after Blofeld in “On Her Majesty’s Secret Service” (1969).

There seems to some dispute as to where these outdoor scenes were filmed. IMDB says Sun Valley, Idaho, but the DVD says Lake Placid, New York, site of the 1932 Olympics. Regardless of which one it was, it's a fine substitute for Switzerland, with able assistance from the always reliable Paramount set decorators.

“I Met Him in Paris” is an agreeable concoction. Not the most memorable comedy of the era, but a most enjoyable one. It’s fun seeing the trio of stars take some well-executed pratfalls in the snow, and it’s the type of movie one happily watches with a smile on one’s face, and one that lingers pleasantly in the memory. Good show.

Without Reservations

Produced by RKO, “Without Reservations” (1946) is a modestly amusing comedy, passable entertainment and a pleasant time waster. I didn’t regret watching it, but it’s one I won’t be returning to anytime soon. The director is Mervyn LeRoy, hardly known for his light touch, so that doesn’t help matters either. The movie might – just might - have worked with a more age appropriate leading lady.

In this case, said lady is Claudette Colbert, a favorite of mine, but not here. She’s too matronly and experienced for the role. Lest I be accused of ageism, I just don’t think Colbert fits the role here of a hugely successful author who has a somewhat naïve view of the world and the way adults interact with each other.

Colbert plays Christopher “Kit” Madden, author of "Here is Tomorrow", a massive best seller seemingly being read by the entire population. I’m not sure what it’s about, but it appears to be a love story with heavy philosophic overtones set during World War II. Madden is on her way to Hollywood to supervise the casting of the movie version (has this EVER happened in Hollywood?) and looks to have Cary Grant and Lana Turner signed for the lead roles. Grant backs out, and the picture needs a new leading man.


Madden thinks an unknown should play the male lead (shades of the search for Scarlett O’Hara) and finds the personification of her male character in the form of Rusty Thomas (John Wayne), a Marine on leave. Rusty and his Marine buddy Dink (Don DeFore) are on the same cross country train as Kit. She’s incognito, a wise choice since Rusty makes contemptuous comments on “Here is Tomorrow” which he read while convalescing at a hospital.

Rusty thinks the characters in the book spend too much time pontificating and talking. When she tries to defend the characters, a bemused Rusty says, “He’s a man, right? And she’s a woman?” He then puts his hands in the air, as if to say, “What else needs to be explained?”

After telling the studio she has the perfect guy to play the lead, she is told by the studio not to lose him. Traveling cross country by train and automobile,, the trio have many adventures and some romantic complications before all is set right back in Hollywood.

There are a few amusing cameos on hand, including Jack Benny, Dolores Moran, Louella Parsons and yes, Cary Grant. I’ve always thought it a shame that Grant and Colbert never made a movie together, especially since they were both under contract to Paramount in the early 1930s. So it’s a real treat to see them share screen time together here, even if it is for only 10 or 15 seconds. Alas, this would be their only screen appearance together.

The film is also an interesting addition in Wayne’s career. He had some of his most interesting roles in RKO films, though not always in good films. But just look at some of the films he made under the RKO logo: the very good colonial American adventure “Alleghany Uprising” (1939); the charming romantic comedy “A Lady Takes A Chance” (1943) with Jean Arthur; the exceptional mystery western “Tall in the Saddle” (1944); and playing a wife-neglecting, egotistical engineer in “Tycoon” (1947). He had a good role in the World War II drama “Flying Leathernecks” (1951), directed by Nicholas Ray, of all people.

Also released by RKO were two of his very best films, two entries in John Ford’s cavalry trilogy, “Fort Apache” (1948) and the sublime “She Wore a Yellow Ribbon.” (1949).

Of course RKO was also where he made his most notorious film “The Conqueror” (1956), with Wayne as Genghis Khan. (At least the Victor Young score for it is good).

“Without Reservations” is likely the least of these RKO offerings, but it does afford Wayne the rare opportunity to star in a light romantic comedy. He’s good too, not too surprising to those of us who have seen Wayne do comedy scenes in other movies. It’s an interesting role in his career, if one of his least physical.

But Claudette seems too worldly for the role. I never bought her as a woman who philosophizes relationships the way her character does here. While not a big enough star at the time to topline a movie, I’m thinking someone like RKO contract player Barbara Hale would have been more appropriate – young enough to genuinely believe what she writes about and one who takes a wide-eyed and impressionable view of the world.

As an added bonus, there is a nice performance by one of my favorite 1940s starlets, Dona Drake. She’s very amusing as a fiery Mexican girl who takes a shine to Rusty after the trio stops at her family’s farm.

Not so appealing is Anne Triola, as Consuela “Connie” Callaghan, an annoying and painfully unfunny train passenger. I wasn’t familiar with her at all, and based on her performance here, I won’t be seeking out other performances by her anytime soon. According to IMDB she only has five films to her credit, so I won’t be missing out on much.

Maid of Salem

Claudette Colbert and Fred MacMurray were a very popular screen team in Hollywood’s Golden Era. They’re not as remembered as other classic screen teams, mainly because their films have not been so readily available. Almost all their films were made at Paramount, which of all the major studios, is least represented on DVD and video, and television showings were even rarer (unless its a DeMille, Preston Sturges, Marx Bros. or W.C. Fields title). You always had to hunt for Paramount oldies.

I can remember a short period in the 1970s when Channel 44, a UHF station in Chicago, showed sub par prints of movies like Alan Ladd in “Beyond Glory” (1948) and “Chicago Deadline” (1949), and yes, Colbert and MacMurray in “The Gilded Lily” (1935). They were screened once or twice before retreating into the vaults, never to be seen again. Even with the advent of home video and cable TV, many of these titles remain elusive.

Colbert and MacMurray appeared in seven movies together between 1935 and 1949. All are in the comedy or romantic comedy genre save for one, “Maid of Salem” (1937) a highly fictionalized, though engrossing, look at the Salem witch trials.

Every stern-faced extra in Hollywood was called on to portray Salem’s villagers, self-righteous Puritans who see satanic activity in every act of kindness or every smile. When Colbert’s character enjoys a nighttime rendezvous with a man in a dark cloak, the spying villagers automatically assume its Satan himself, roaming the countryside at night and trying to corrupt every God-fearing creature in sight. (Note: it’s really secret sweetheart Fred MacMurray).

No individuality is allowed in dour Salem. Colbert is called out at Sunday services for daring to wear a colorful, frilly bonnet. Director Frank Lloyd creates some interesting lighting effect here, with Colbert ablaze with light amid her fellow Puritans. In that church scene, she’s lit like Mary in “The Song of Bernadette” (1943).

“Maid of Salem” is best appreciated for its wonderful Who’s Who roster of character actors. We enjoy ripe performances by the likes of Gale Sondergaard (an ideal, repressed Puritan), Edward Ellis, Beulah Bondi, Donald Meek, E.E. Clive, Halliwell Hobbes and Russell Simpson. Sorely missed is Charles Middleton, who was born to play a stern-visaged Puritan. I wonder why he isn’t here. We also get future Bowery Boy Bennie Bartlett, Virginia Weidler and Bonita Granville.

One of the most underrated performances from that era is Bonita Granville in “These Three” (1936), as a truly horrendous brat whose hateful gossip causes irreparable harm to three people. So good was she that she pretty much repeated the same performance a year later in “Maid of Salem” as one of the young Salem girls who fake attacks of possession and other maladies to draw attention to themselves (and to stave off boredom, no doubt).

I like both Colbert and MacMurray but they’re actually the least effective part of the movie. While both had played period before, here they seem too modern, though Colbert does make the loveliest Puritan, even when facing hanging as a witch. MacMurray overacts throughout, something long time viewers of “My Three Sons” would find unimaginable.

The film’s best performance is by Madame Sul-Te-Wan as the slave Tituba, who thinks her fortune telling activities are harmless until witch hysteria sweeps Salem. She has an unforgettable scene where she can see where her interrogation is headed, starts panicking and, wild-eyed, begins naming every name she can think of.

Director Frank Lloyd is somewhat forgotten today. I wonder if there’s some resentment at his winning the Best Director Oscar in 1933 for “Cavalcade”, a Best Picture winner that is considered one of Oscar’s most ignoble. Lack of availability of much of his work doesn’t help, though his work on the magnificent sea epic “Mutiny on the Bounty” (1935) should always be treasured.

Also worth mentioning is the production design of the film, with its recreation of Salem. Hans Drier, Paramount’s ace designer, provided a wonderful village setting. It must have cost Paramount a pretty penny, as they probably thought not much use would be gotten out of it after filming was over. Movies about colonial America rarely fared well, so Hollywood was loath to make them.

“Maid of Salem” remains a worthy effort, especially considering it was produced under the watchful eye of the Hays Office. According to the Production Code, religion and religious figures should not be portrayed in a negative light. Well that’s out the window with this film, as it suggests that the repression of the Puritans and their church-based society was largely responsible for the doings at Salem.

Postscript: Speak of the devil. Just hours after I posted this, I read that the new DVD collection under the TCM Vault Series will be titled Colbert & MacMurray Romance Collection. Due on November 15, the collection will include the aforementioned "The Gilded Lily" (1935), "The Bride Comes Home" (1935) and "Family Honeymoon" (1949).

The Palm Beach Story

“The Palm Beach Story” (1942) is another delightful piece of cinema courtesy of the great writer/director Preston Sturges. Eccentricity is the norm here, and the film boasts so many delightful sequences, actors and quotable lines that I barely know where to begin. (Word of caution: I’ll be using the word eccentric a lot in this review.)

Geraldine Jeffers (Claudette Colbert) is love with her inventor husband Tom (Joel McCrea), but he cant’ find financing for his inventions, they are behind in their rent, and she yearns for the finer things in life. Showing up to look at their apartment is a bizarre little man with a big hat and a walking stick who calls himself The Wienie King (Robert Dudley, pictured), an eccentric millionaire who takes a great liking to Geraldine and pays off their back rent and gives her some money to get them back on their feet.

Tom is suspicious of their unforeseen windfall and fights with Geraldine. Even though they are still very much in love, they decide to divorce. Geraldine takes off for Palm Beach by train where she is made mascot of a group of eccentric men called the Ale and Quail Club, who think nothing of using their private railroad car as target practice. Ale and Quail Club members include many familiar faces including William Demarest, Jack Norton, Robert Greig, Roscoe Ates, Dewey Robinson and Chester Conklin (contemporary audiences know him as the old-time fire chief who refuses to give up his horse-drawn fire wagons in the Three Stooges short “Flat Foot Stooges” (1938).

Escaping the insanity of the Ale and Quail Club, she meets John D. Hackensacker III (Rudy Vallee), one of the world’s richest men, when she breaks his glasses (twice) after stepping on his face to climb into an upper berth of the railroad car.

Vallee is hilarious as Hackensacker and it ushered in a whole new career for him after his popularity waned from strong popularity in the early 1930s. (He initiated the singing into the megaphone gimmick). Seemingly oblivious to the insanity around him, he takes Geraldine to Palm Beach where he introduces her to his sister, the five-times divorced Princess Centimillia (Mary Astor) and her latest conquest Toto (Sig Arno), who doesn’t speak a word of English.

Even though Geraldine is seeking a divorce, she still believes in Tom and his inventions and seeks to have Hackensacker loan her $99,000 for his inventions.

In the meantime, Tom has met the Wienie King who convinces him he is still in love with his wife and gives him the funds to fly down to Palm Beach and bring her back. He meets her in Palm Beach while she is with Hackensacker and Centimillia, and shocked to see him, introduces him to them as her brother. Of course Centimillia is smitten with Tom and more complications until the most satisfying, and clever wrap-up.

“The Palm Beach Story” is one of the great pieces of screwball comedy. The opening sequence, which I won’t go into, is very clever, and the Wienie King is a classic character. The Ale and Quail Club sequence is comedy gold.

For me, the one drawback is McCrea. I like McCrea in westerns and even in other dramas, but here he’s Mr. Glum and Gloomy to the point where I never understood what Geraldine saw in Tom. McCrea and Sturges had enjoyed a big success a year earlier with “Sullivan’s Travels” and Sturges liked to work with people he liked, but I’ve always felt McCrea was miscast here.

I can see why he was hired, as both he and Colbert are the models of normalcy while all the insanity ranges about him, but he’s too grouchy. Perhaps Fred MacMurray would have been a better choice here.

“The Palm Beach Story” would normally rate four stars, but because of McCrea’s portrayal, it only gets a still more than respectable three and a half stars.