Movies Til Dawn

Of all forms of fame, theatrical fame is the most fleeting. The stars of yesteryear in film are still available for us to see and--in many cases--admirer. But the theater--which, through the twenties and much of the thirties, was considered several rungs above movies in terms of sophistication and seriousness--left little behind aside from the texts of the plays and some productions stills. One must trust the opinions of those who were there as to who were, in fact, the geniuses of the medium. Broadway's most famous and beloved personality of the 1920's wasn't Al Jolson or Eddie Cantor or the Marx Brothers. It was a woman named  Marilyn Miller  and while it's possible to view her today--she made precisely three movies during the tumultuous transition from silents to sound--what's not possible is to comprehend the enormity of her popularity, her daunting and much beloved persona. For Miller, like Gertrude Lawrence a bit later, personified Broadway--she defi...

"I am just back from a weekend at Joe Cook's with Connelly, Ross, Chasen, etc. Very good time. Dinner every night at midnight, barbecued spare-ribs and the like, with a show before dinner in Joe's personal opera house. It seats nine people, including the chair in the box. I had that seat. It is the only seat that has opera glasses attached to it. It was not a restful week-end, as so many of the seats exploded when you sat down on them, but I had a good time. " (Alexander Woolcott in a letter to Harpo Marx, October 3, 1932) Chances are, if you are reading this weblog, that you will know at least a couple of the above referenced names. Certainly Harpo Marx's still thuds resoundingly when dropped. Woolcott lives on primarily as the inspiration for the main character in George S. Kaufman and Moss Hart's still very funny (and very often revived) "The Man Who Came To Dinner." If you've gotten that far, you probably can infer that Ross is ...