"944"

Do you remember Walter Brennan? Sure you do. No? Well, you should. After all, he spent four decades as sidekick to some of the top stars in the business. If his face isn’t familiar, I’ll bet you’d recognize his voice. Like Cagney, Bogart, and Mr. Magoo, Brennan owned a voice that was unmistakable. It became fodder for comedians and impressionists, and I’m pretty sure one of your uncles took a crack at it, too.    Brennan was the go-to guy when a director needed a town drunk, a good-hearted hobo, a local priest, or a deputy (he was indeed a natural for Westerns). But to say he was merely adept at playing local yokels undermines his achievements in the business. Brennan won the first ever Best Supporting Actor Oscar in 1937, and by 1941 had won it twice more. His feat of winning three Academy Awards wasn’t matched by another actor until Jack Nicholson and Daniel Day-Lewis did it decades later (and Nicholson and Day-Lewis needed a lot more than four years to equal Brennan’s record). To date, Brennan is still the only actor to win three statuettes for Best Supporting Actor. 

Lana Turner, born in Idaho as Julia Jean Mildred Frances Turner (couldn't they make up their minds?), was discovered by an industry insider while enjoying a soda at a Hollywood café. She was only 16, but still, there was something about her. No kidding. Audiences got their first glimpse of Turner in the 1937 thriller "They Won't Forget." Wearing a form-fitting skirt and sweater, her role was brief but memorable, and before long, she became known as "The Sweater Girl." Predictably, a nickname like that aroused attention, particularly among the male population. Apart from her many films, Turner's tumultuous personal life (seven husbands, eight marriages) ensured she was always in the public eye. She once aptly referred to her own journey as "a series of emergencies."

Just like the image of her fragile, unconventional beauty trapped within the glow of a tight spotlight, Judy Garland’s life as a performer was surrounded by a vast darkness. She gave the world her special gift, and it gave back not a shred of happiness. There was an overarching sadness about her that only grew more pronounced as the hard years went by. As Frank Sinatra put it, “When she sang, it always felt like she died a little.”   It was tragic pretty much from the outset. When overbearing show mom Ethel Milne found she was pregnant with her third child by husband Frank Gumm, she attempted to induce miscarriage by throwing herself down a flight of stairs. Failing that, she tried to get an abortion. This desire may have partly stemmed from Ethel’s growing suspicion that her husband was homosexual. Regardless, a family friend finally convinced the couple that this little one would be a blessing. They hoped for a boy. On June 10, 1922 they welcomed their third daughter – Frances Ethel Gumm – the combined hopes of her mother and father right there in her name.

By the time ambitious model-turned-actress Grace Kelly hit Hollywood at the dawn of the ‘50s, she was possessed of near-perfect looks, enormous ambition, a healthy sex drive, and… a major Daddy complex. As stunning and talented as she was, Grace could never seem to please her self-made businessman father, Jack Kelly. Somehow this drew her physically to older men. (I’ll have to ask my shrink how that works).

Though the celebratory pomp won't literally explode (with a 21-cannon salute!) until her "Official" birthday in June, it’s today that Queen Elizabeth II actually turns 90, and she shows no signs of slowing down. Her Majesty still rides horses, carries out Investitures (those big ceremonies where diplomats and Rolling Stone singers become Knights), and brightens over 400 engagements each year with her little-legged corgis and big hats. 

Here’s a film that’s never quite got its due in Alfred Hitchcock’s oeuvre, an atypical feature for “the Master,” which posed a difficult challenge: sustaining tension and intrigue in the most confined of spaces.

You can’t help but be moved by the tragic life of actress Gene Tierney. Though endowed with astonishing beauty and talent that won her early fame, a series of misfortunes would eventually bring her to the brink of suicide.

I first saw what I still consider the quintessential haunted house movie, Robert Wise’s “The Haunting” from 1963, when I was about 11.

Those who remember her only from those endless grocery store checkout line-stories on her health problems, fluctuating weight, friendship with Michael Jackson & Bubbles, or impressive eight marriages (she wed Richard Burton twice), pay attention. Today, we celebrate the film career of a legendary beauty, prodigious talent, and a big personality, Elizabeth Taylor.