Movies Til Dawn

TIS AUTUMN UPDATE My documentary "Tis Autumn: The Search For Jackie Paris" will, apparently, have a slow theatrical rollout over the next few months, thanks largely to the positive reviews it received in New York and a lot of web-interest from jazz fans all over the place. As bookings come in (there are only two 35mm prints that will be in circulation at any given time) I'll post them on this blog. Additionally you can always go to www.TisAutumnTheMovie.com for screening information. Also: a two part interview with me about the movie has been posted on Marc Myers blog Jazz Wax (part one ran yesterday, 12/27). Marc's blog is essential reading for any jazz fan. All right. Enough about me. Below is a one of the earliest and best appearences on film of the as-yet-to-become-legendary Bing Crosby that we have. The film is "Reaching For The Moon", a 1930 musical with songs (and story) by Irving Berlin, starring Douglas Fairbanks Sr. (in one of his rare talkie app...

Apropos of my post (12/20) on Dixie Lee Crosby, I thought we'd investigate who exactly her as yet unknown (but infamous in other ways) boyfriend/soon to be husband/soon to be major celebrity figure was at this time in their mutual lives (1929). Though this "Bing" Crosby fellow who was by no means as successful as the young Dixie Lee, he would woo and win the young Fox starlet and soon, alas, eclispse and crush her in every possible way. In the mid 1920's, Harry Lillis "Bing" Crosby, from Spokane Washington, was the member of a vocal duo act with Al Rinker, a fellow Spoaknian who Bing hooked up with in the mid twenties and who encouraged Bing to abandon his law studies for an unpromising show-biz career. By chance, they caught the eye of Paul Whiteman, then one of the leading popular bandleaders of the day, who added a third member, Harry Barris, and dubbed them the "the Rhythm Boys". Their recordings with the Whiteman band created quite a stir (a...

It's Christmas Eve as I write this and, with loads to wrap, buy and cook, I'll keep it brief. Below is the complete "Brats", Laurel and Hardy's brilliantly funny 1930 short comedy where, with the help of a couple of modest in-camera superimpositions and a lot of magnificent oversized sets, they play their own children. This has always been, along with "The Music Box", my favorite L&H short and, to me, represents them at their zenith. The craft and thought that went into the making of their comedies is here represented at its peak. I've never seen many on-set stills of the Laurel and Hardy movies (perhaps none were thought necessary at the time?) and I'd certainly love to see what the set of this movie looked like. Indeed, I think "Brats" would join that shortlist of movies which I would, if given the appropriate time-machine, choose to visit the sets of. (The others are "Citizen Kane", "To Have And Have Not", ...

I was going to remain in the GF's of the GG era mode and write about the great Susan Hayward. But then, whilst looking at her filmography, I came across a title that I'd forgotten about but dimly recall seeing on late night KTLA "Movies Til Dawn" programming; a haunting film called "Smash-Up: The Story Of A Woman" (1947). In it, Hayward stars as a singer who marries an entertainer who suddenly becomes incredibly successful--more so than either could ever have imagined. The pressures of his sudden fame and her descent into obscurity (and her role as "backstage wife") lead her into the arms of John Barleycorn--aka: acute alcoholism. The film was written by John Howard Lawson (shortly to become one of the original Hollywood Ten, blacklisted due to his membership in the Communist party) from a story by Dorothy Parker. It was widely known at the time, though, that Parker had based the story on the marriage of Bing Crosby and his wife Dixie Lee. Bing ...

"Macao" , a 1952 semi-noir starring Jane Russell and Robert Mitchum and directed by the fast-fading Josef Von Sternberg, used to turn up quite regularly on the old AMC (the pre-commercials, Bob Dorian era incarnation of the channel). I remember finding it amusingly sordid and somewhat perplexingly off-kilter--scenes not really going where you'd think, the whole enterprise having the aura of being somewhat improvised (somewhat like "Gilda"--see 11/7 and 11/9 posts). Recently, I read two accounts of the end of the Howard Hughes-era at RKO. One, in Lee Server's marvelous biography of Mitchum, detailed the making of "His Kind Of Woman"-also co-starring Russell and Mitchum and directed by John Farrow and then re-directed almost entirely (in three seperate attempts due to cast changes provoked by Hughsian whim) by Richard Fleischer. The other, detailing the extensive revisions in "Macao" is in Bernard Eisenschitz's meticulous biography ...

Should you find yourself stuck in the town of Santa Maria California and looking for something to do with your evening, why not go to the Radisson Hotel (the one by the airport) and catch the local lounge act. Sound iffy? Well, what if the local entertainment was none other than Jane Russell, age eighty-six, who is apparently still going strong and happy to be performing even if the venue probably isn't quite what she's used to. Read this article and tell me you're not a wee bit curious about Jane's act. (By the way: a few months ago I was trying to count the last living stars of the 'golden era' and could only come up with Kirk Douglas and Jerry Lewis. The Self Styled Siren quickly reminded me of the De Havilland girls--Olivia and her sister Joan Fontaine--who are both hovering around the age of ninety and still not on speaking terms. But we both appeared to have forgotten Jane. And, for that matter, Richard Widmark.) Jane Russell, Miss "Double Dynamit...

No, I didn't in fact get that review, but I have reason to be modestly proud of the reception of my three and half years in the making documentary "Tis Autumn: The Search For Jackie Paris", which opened last Friday in New York City to all around (mostly) excellent reviews. But what can you do with good reviews, other than plaster them on a DVD box? Truthfully, you still need a MetroCard to get a ride on the subway, and most people who run snooty restaurants still won't let you in without a reservation and a jacket. You can, however, post them on your blog and that's what I intend to do. First up is the most recent review, from yesterdays edition of the trade mag The Hollywood Reporter. Want more? I rather like this piece from TV Guide. John Andersen in Newsday weighs in with an opinion that, frankly, I agree with. But who doesn't delight in the isolated pan amongst the glowing notices? Alas, I've yet to get a flat out pan on this movie (thought the TimeO...

In the run-up to the December 7th premiere of my documentary "Tis Autumn: The Search For Jackie Paris" (at the Cinema Village in New York), I've been doing press, organizing events and in general not been entirely myself, hence the paucity of posts in the past two weeks. Movies Til' Dawn (should anyone care) will return to its regularly scheduled program of pithy observations on old movies, music, dance and all the stuff that makes life worth living. In the meantime, allow me to PLUG MY MOVIE. Here's a nice interview with me conducted via e-mail with a guy in Japan. On Friday, December 7th, I'll be a guest on Leonard Lopate's interview show. It airs in New York on WNYC, but he's also heard around the globe via XM Satellite Radio. And for those who missed it when I posted it a couple of months ago, here's the trailer to the movie. To anyone reading this who's in the great city of New York, please come by the Cinema Village on opening weekend...