Source: Heritage Auctions |
![]() |
Helen Hayes with her Oscar for Best Actress for her performance in the 1931 The Sin of Madelon Claudet . |
Source: Heritage Auctions |
![]() |
Helen Hayes with her Oscar for Best Actress for her performance in the 1931 The Sin of Madelon Claudet . |
Director of such classics as The Letter (1940), The Best Years of Our Lives (1946), The Heiress (1949) and Ben Hur (1959), William Wyler was known for his penchant for retakes. Actors mockingly called him "once more Wyler", "40-take Wyler" or even "90-take Wyler". Always looking for the perfect shot and determined to bring out the best in his actors, Wyler had them repeat the same lines, make the same movements or gestures through numerous retakes. His theory was that after a large number of takes actors would become so irritated and exasperated that they would no longer "act" but give the natural performance he was looking for.
![]() |
William Wyler and Bette Davis on the set of Jezebel |
Bette Davis did some of her best work with Wyler. Their first film together was Jezebel (1938), followed by The Letter (1940) and The Little Foxes (1941). Bette said that prior to working with Wyler she had never done more than two takes in a film. On Jezebel's first day of shooting, however, Wyler let her do as much as forty-five takes. In her first scene with the riding crop, the director felt that Bette's gestures were too theatrical and then made her repeat the scene over and over again until she dropped her mannerisms and gave him the shot he wanted. While his directing style often drove Bette and other actors to exasperation as well as exhaustion, Wyler ultimately got the best performances out of them. Bette won her second Oscar for Jezebel and later gave the director full credit: "It was all Wyler. I had known all the horrors of no direction and bad direction. I now knew what a great director was and what he could mean to an actress".
![]() |
Wyler watches as Henry Fonda and Bette Davis play a scene in Jezebel |
During the filming of Jezebel, it was not only Bette Davis but also leading man Henry Fonda who was forced by Wyler to do numerous retakes (of one scene even forty). A few weeks into production, Fonda's retakes caught the attention of producer Hal Wallis who was worried about going over schedule and over budget. Wallis wondered whether Wyler held a grudge against Fonda over Margaret Sullavan —both men had been married to the actress— and if that was the reason why he made Fonda do so many takes. About the subject Wallis sent a memo to associate producer Henry Blanke in early November 1937. (Actually Fonda and Wyler liked each other and became friends.) A few months later, the producer sent Blanke another memo, seeing that Wyler had not changed his ways and was still shooting multiple takes.
DATE: November 4, 1937
SUBJECT: "Jezebel"
TO: Blanke
FROM: Wallis
Do you think Wyler is mad at Henry Fonda or something because of their past? It seems that he is not content to okay anything with Fonda until it has been done ten or eleven takes. After all, they have been divorced from the same girl, and by-gones should be by-gones. I wonder if he wouldn't be satisfied to okay a fourth take or a fifth take occasionally. I am sure Fonda is a good actor, and I think if we will try printing up an occasional third or fourth take, after Wyler has okayed a tenth or an eleventh take, you will find that the third or fourth is just as good.
Possibly Wyler likes to see these big numbers on the slate, and maybe we could arrange to have them start with number "6" on each take, then it wouldn't take so long to get up to nine or ten. Will you please talk to Wyler and see if you can influence him a little on this score.
Hal Wallis
_____
DATE: January 8, 1938
SUBJECT: "Jezebel"
TO: Blanke
FROM: Wallis
In spite of hell and high water and everything else, Wyler is still up to his old tricks. In last night's dailies, he had two takes printed of the scene where Donald Crisp leaves the house and Davis comes down the stairs and finds out that Pres [Henry Fonda] is coming. The first one was excellent, yet he took it sixteen times.
Doesn't this man know that we have closeups to break up a scene of this kind, and with all of the care he used in making the closeups, certainly he must expect that we would use the greater portion of the scene in closeup. Yet, he takes the time to make sixteen takes of a long shot. What the hell is the matter with him anyhow — is he absolutely daffy? Is he on the level when he says he is going to speed up and try to get through? If he is, this is a poor indication of it. Will you please tell him I said so.
Hal Wallis
While the Daily Production Reports showed that there had been an attempt to speed up production, by then the film was already going over budget. Wallis consequently threatened to fire Wyler and bring in William Dieterle to replace him. Bette, who had started an affair with Wyler, wouldn't stand for it and went to studio boss Jack Warner, pleading to let Wyler stay on. She promised to work late every night and start again early in the morning, whatever it took to finish the picture. Warner let Wyler stay but the director wouldn't work any faster and Jezebel eventually went 28 days over its original 42-day schedule. As said, Bette won an Oscar for her performance, and Fay Bainter also won the statuette for Best Supporting Actress. The film itself ended up being both a critical and commercial success.
![]() |
Bette, Henry and Willy while filming Jezebel |
On 29 March 1981, the musical Woman of the Year opened at the Palace Theatre on Broadway. Based on the 1942 George Stevens' film of the same name, the musical starred Lauren Bacall in the role of famous tv personality Tess Harding. (When Katharine Hepburn played Tess in the film, she was a newspaper columnist.) While Bacall earned rave reviews and a Tony Award for her role, she didn't stay with the show for its entire two-year run. In June 1982, Bacall left the production and was replaced by Raquel Welch (who had previously filled in for Bacall during her vacation in December 1981) and for the final month of the show Debbie Reynolds took over the role from a pregnant Welch. Woman of the Year eventually closed on 13 March 1983 after a total of 770 performances.
![]() |
Above: After performing in Woman of the Year at the Broadway Palace Theatre, Debbie Reynolds returns for a curtain call. |
Today's letter made me read up on Bella Darvi, an actress I had not heard of before. She had a very brief Hollywood career in the 1950s. This is her (tragic) story.
Bella Darvi was born Bajla Węgier in Poland in 1928. Her parents were Jewish and immigrated to France in the 1930s. As a teenager during WWII Darvi was interned in a concentration camp for several years. She survived, but her brother Robert who was also in a camp died there. In 1950, Darvi married businessman Alban Cavalcade and moved with him to Monaco, where she became addicted to gambling. A year later, she met 20th Century-Fox studio boss Darryl Zanuck and his wife Virginia in Paris. The couple took her under their wing, paid off her gambling debts and eventually brought her to the States.
In 1952, Darvi divorced her husband and went to live with the Zanucks at their house in Santa Monica. She was encouraged to pursue an acting career and, at the suggestion of Mrs Zanuck, changed her last name from Węgier to Darvi (derived from Darryl and Virginia). Darvi took acting lessons and in 1953 signed a long-term contract with 20th Century-Fox. Hedda Hopper called the aspiring actress "an exciting new personality" and predicted that she would not only "make a splash" in her first film but also that she would be one of the "stars of 1954".
In 1935, while under contract to MGM, David O. Selznick was assigned to produce the next Greta Garbo picture. After being head of production at RKO, Selznick had joined MGM in 1933 and was given his own production unit, alongside the unit headed by Irving Thalberg. Prior to his film with Garbo, Selznick had already produced a string of successful films for MGM, including Dinner at Eight (1933) and David Copperfield (1934).
Greta Garbo was already a star by the time she and Selznick worked together. With her role in Anna Christie (1930) Garbo had made a successful transition from silent films to talkies and other successes soon followed, like Mata Hari (1931) and Grand Hotel (1932). For her project with Selznick the actress wanted to play the titular role in a new film adaptation of Leo Tolstoy's Anna Karenina. Garbo had played Anna in the 1927 silent film Love but, unhappy with the film's tacked-on ending, she was eager to reprise the role in a production that would stay closer to Tolstoy's novel.
Selznick was far from enthusiastic, however, about making Anna Karenina with Garbo. He very much wanted her to play in a contemporary drama and the project he had in mind was Dark Victory, a 1934 play written by George Brewer Jr. and Bertram Bloch, which had starred Tallulah Bankhead on Broadway. Trying to convince Garbo to choose Dark Victory over Anna Karenina, Selznick wrote her a letter in January 1935, his impassioned plea ultimately proving fruitless. Garbo didn't like Dark Victory and was intent on doing Anna Karenina. Seeing that her contract gave her the right to decline any project she disliked, Selznick had no choice but to accept Garbo's decision.
January 7, 1935Miss Greta GarboLa Quinta, CaliforniaDear Miss Garbo:I was extremely sorry to hear this morning that you had left for Palm Springs, because we must arrive at an immediate decision, which, I think, will have a telling effect on your entire career.As I told you the other day, we have lost our enthusiasm for a production of Anna Karenina as your next picture. I personally feel that audiences are waiting to see you in a smart, modern picture and that to do a heavy Russian drama on the heels of so many ponderous, similar films, in which they have seen you and other stars recently, would prove to be a mistake. I still think Karenina can be a magnificent film and I would be willing to make it with you later, but to do it now, following the disappointment of Queen Christina and The Painted Veil, is something I dislike contemplating very greatly.Mr. Cukor shares my feeling and it seems a pity that we must start our first joint venture with you with such a lack of enthusiasm and such an instinct of dread for the outcome. If we make the picture, Mr. Cukor and I will put our very best efforts into it and I am sure we could make a fine film, hopefully one excellent enough to dissipate the obvious pitfalls of the subject from the viewpoint of your millions of admirers. But I do hope you will not force us to proceed.
We have spent some time in searching for a comedy and although several have been brought to me, there are none I feel sufficiently important enough to justify the jump into comedy; to say nothing of the difficulty of preparing a comedy in the limited time left to us.
Therefore, since you feel that you must leave the end of May and cannot give us additional time, we have been faced with the task of finding a subject that could be prepared in time and which might inspire us with a feeling that we could make a picture comparable to your former sensations and one that would, at the same time, meet my very strong feeling that you should do a modern subject at this particular moment in your career. The odds against our finding such a subject were very remote and I was very distressed and felt there was no alternative left to us but to proceed with Karenina. Now, however, I find that if I act very quickly, I can purchase Dark Victory, the owners of which have resisted offers from several companies for many months. The play is at the top of the list at several studios and if we do not purchase it, the likelihood is that it will be purchased at once for Katharine Hepburn. The owner of the play, Jock Whitney, is leaving for New York tomorrow and it would be a pity if we were delayed in receiving your decision concerning it .... Therefore, I have asked Salka to see you and to bring you this letter and to tell you the story— which I consider the best modern woman's vehicle, potentially, I've read since A Bill of Divorcement and which I think has the makings of a strikingly fine film. Mr. Cukor and many others share this opinion ....
Fredric March will only do Anna Karenina if he is forced to by his employers, Twentieth Century Pictures. He has told me repeatedly that he is fed up on doing costume pictures; that he thinks it a mistake to do another; that he knows he is much better in modern subjects and that all these reasons are aggravated by the fact that Anna Karenina would come close on the heels of the Anna Sten- [Rouben] Mamoulian- [Samuel] Goldwyn picture, We Live Again, from Resurrection [Leo Tolstoy's 1899 novel], a picture which has been a failure and in which March appeared in a role similar to that in Karenina. Mr. March is most anxious to do a modern picture and I consider his judgment about himself very sound. We are doubly fortunate in finding in Dark Victory that the male lead is also strikingly well suited to Mr. March.
For all these reasons, I request and most earnestly urge you to permit us to switch from Anna Karenina to Dark Victory and you will have a most enthusiastic producer and director, respectively, in the persons of myself and Mr. Cukor.
I have asked Salka to telephone me as soon as she has discussed the matter thoroughly with you, and I can say no more than that I will be very disappointed, indeed, if you do not agree with our conclusions.
Most cordially and sincerely yours,
Source: Memo from David O. Selznick (1972); selected and edited by Rudy Behlmer.
_____
Selznick purchased the rights to Dark Victory and tried to get Merle Oberon for the female lead after Garbo had turned it down. Oberon was not available, however, and since Selznick was also facing problems with the script he eventually sold the property to Warner Bros in 1938. In the end, Dark Victory (1939) was made with Bette Davis and George Brent in the leads. Directed by Edmund Goulding, the film was a big hit.
Garbo got what she wanted and made Anna Karenina (1935) with Selznick. As her leading man Fredric March was cast, against his own wishes but at the insistence of his studio. (Selznick initially wanted Clark Gable but he was not interested.) Since George Cukor was not keen on doing the project, Clarence Brown was hired to direct. Anna Karenina became both a critical and commercial success. The film is the only collaboration between Selznick and Garbo.
By the mid-1920s, Norma Shearer was one of MGM's biggest stars and had every intention to remain one. For that purpose she regularly visited the office of Irving Thalberg (head of production at MGM), complaining about the routine films in which she was cast and pleading to be given better roles. Thalberg listened to Norma's complaints but said that MGM knew best and that the films they had chosen for her had ultimately made her a star.
Attracted from the start by Thalberg's charm and commanding presence, Norma soon became romantically interested in her boss. While Thalberg didn't feel the same way about Norma, the two started going out together from July 1925 onwards (their first public appearance together was at the premiere of Charlie Chaplin's The Gold Rush). At the time Thalberg was still involved with Constance Talmadge and Rosabelle Laemmle, yet on occasion asked Norma to be his date. "When Rosabelle or Constance are away, or someone stands him up, I'm always available. I'll break a date any time to be with him", Norma had said to Irene Selznick, referring to herself as "Irving's spare tire". Norma waited patiently, which eventually paid off. After dating on and off for two years, she and Irving were married on 29 September 1927 and had two children, Irving Jr. (b. 1930) and Katharine (b. 1935). The marriage lasted until 1936 when Thalberg suddenly died as a result of a congenital heart defect, aged 37.
DEAREST CUTEST SWEETNESS DARLING ANGEL BUNNY HOPE YOU HAVE MISSED ME AS I HAVE MISSED YOU LOVE PAPA
HAVE FORD TRUCK FROM STUDIO MEET US PASADENA FIND OUT HOW LATE TRAIN IS SO LITTLE CUTIE DON'T WAIT LOVE=IRVING
Source: Bonhams
In order to marry Thalberg, Norma first converted to Judaism. The couple married at the Temple B'nai Brith in Beverly Hills. Above is their certifcate of marriage, dated 29 September 1927. Witnesses to the wedding were MGM boss Louis B. Mayer and studio attorney Edwin J. Loeb. (Source: Heritage Auctions) |
Four times in Oscar history, the awards ceremony was not held as scheduled but postponed to a later date. The first time was in 1938 due to the floods in Los Angeles; the second time in 1968 after the assassination of Dr. Martin Luther King; again in 1981 after the assassination attempt on President Ronald Reagan, and finally last year due to the Covid crisis.
Sammy Davis Jr. and Martin Luther King sharing a laugh in 1965 |
The 40th Academy Awards ceremony was scheduled for 8 April 1968 but eventually took place two days later. On 4 April Dr. Martin Luther King had been assassinated and many stars wanted to attend his funeral which was held on 9 April. Among the stars were four African-Americans who were to take part in the Oscar ceremony, i.e. Sammy Davis Jr., Louis Armstrong, Sidney Poitier and Diahann Carroll (the first two as performers, the latter two as presenters). The four had informed the Academy that they would not appear at the Oscars if the scheduled date of 8 April was maintained. On The Tonight Show Davis stated: "I certainly think any black man should not appear. I find it morally incongruous to sing Talk To The Animals while the man who could make a better world for my children is lying in state." (Talk To The Animals was the nominated song from Doctor Dolittle which Davis would perform at the ceremony and which eventually won the Oscar for Best Song.) Faced with the possible absence of several of the ceremony's key players, Gregory Peck, then president of the Academy, held an emergency meeting with the Board of Governors who unanimously decided to postpone the Oscars by two days. With the news of the delayed ceremony, Davis, Poitier, Armstrong and Carroll all announced their return to the show.
Someone who also wanted the Oscars to be postponed was Barbra Streisand, who was also scheduled to be a presenter at the ceremony. This is the telegram Barbra sent to Gregory Peck two days after King's assassination.
Source: oscars.org |
Barbra Streisand with Gregory Peck at the 1969 Golden Globes |
Basil Rathbone as (from left to right) Sherlock Holmes, Sir Guy of Gisbourne in The Adventures of Robin Hood and Murdstone in David Copperfield. |
The luxurious Savoy Hotel in London was home to many classic Hollywood stars, including Marlene Dietrich. Dietrich loved the Savoy and lived at the hotel on and off throughout her career for extended periods of time. Her good relationship with the hotel abruptly ended in 1975, however, after she had been accused of stealing the hotel's cutlery. While the actress was indignant at being accused (see the letter below), according to a 2011 article in the Daily Mail she did have a habit of stealing cutlery from the Savoy as well as silver salt and pepper pots delivered to her suite via room service. In her book Marlene Dietrich: The Life (1992), Maria Riva confirmed that her mother had kleptomaniac habits. Dietrich used to nick the clothes which she wore for her various film roles, said Riva, and she also took gloves, scarves, handbags and hats.
July 1949, Marlene Dietrich at the Savoy in London, waving to fans outside. Dietrich was in London for the shooting of Hitchcock's Stage Fright (1950). |
This is Marlene Dietrich's letter to the manager of the Savoy Hotel, written on 16 April 1975. I don't know what the hotel's reaction was, but apparently a reply was sent to Dietrich a month later.
Source: Gotta Have Rock and Roll
Transcript:
16 April 1975
Dear Mr. Griffin,
What a shame that after all these years the haggling over hotel hardware should be the termination of my relationship with the Savoy Hotel. For no matter how much I have loved this hotel in the past, being accused of "stealing" certainly makes it impossible for me to ever reside there again.
Actually the situation is so ludicrous that it has taken me some time to realize that you really meant such an insult.
Assuming that I would wish to travel around the world with my luggage full of cutlery — I assure you that it would be of stirling and not your tawdry stuff! What happens, once the tables have been pushed into corridors in a frenzy to get rid of them after waiting for hours for the atrociously bad room service pick-up, should have nothing to do with your guests.
So we have come to the operative word, "Guest". I thought I, and the many friends I encourage to stay at the Savoy, were considered GUESTS, not thieves!
I shall certainly now inform them of their new status should they ever decide to stay at the Savoy Hotel, which, of course, I shall never do again!
Ms Marlene Dietrich
Dietrich talking to the press at the Savoy in July 1949 |
Born in Hungary as Manó Kertész Kaminer, director Michael Curtiz arrived in Hollywood in 1926 at age 39. Having already directed numerous films in Europe, Curtiz was signed to a contract by Warner Bros, the studio where he would make nearly all of his Hollywood films. While Curtiz didn't have a signature style like some of his peers (like Alfred Hitchcock or Frank Capra), he was a versatile director who could handle a variety of genres, including adventure, western, musical, drama, comedy and film noir. A lot of films that are now considered classics were directed by Curtiz, among them The Adventures of Robin Hood (1938), Casablanca (1942), Yankee Doodle Dandy (1942), Mildred Pierce (1945) and White Christmas (1954).
On the set of Gold Is Where You Find It with Olivia de Havilland, George Brent and Mike Curtiz. |
I wish you best of luck —
Ingrid Bergman
Humphrey Bogart, Ingrid Bergman and Mike Curtiz on the set of Casablanca. |
Mike Curtiz and Rosalind Russell on the set of Roughly Speaking. |