Thursday, 14 January 2021—DAY FOUR

 

Hello everyone.  Welcome to the dreaded Thursday edition of BOOKMAN'S MOVIE SCREENSHOT GAME.  

Before we get to those screenshots, let's recap yesterday's lineup.

1.

It Happened One Night (1934)

2.

Mister Roberts (1955)

3.

My Man Godfrey (1936)

4.

Psycho (1960)

5.

The King's Speech (2010)

6.

Stagecoach (1939)

7.

Wuthering Heights (1939)

8.

Schindler's List (1993)

9.

All About Eve (1950)

10.

Charade (1963)

Congratulations to catbert and Fred for once again correctly identifying all 10 movies.  And a shoutout to Ruth for coming very close.

ON THIS DAY IN MOVIE HISTORY, January 14 …

Bebe Daniels in 42nd Street (1933).

… Bebe Daniels was born Phyllis Virginia Daniels in 1901 in Dallas, Texas.  She and her parents moved to California in her toddler years, and she began her acting career on stage at the age of four.  Her first screen appearance came at age nine in a short film, The Courtship of Miles Standish (1910).  Between 1910 and 1930, Daniels appeared in 208 films, including a series of 49 Harold Lloyd shorts in which Lloyd played a hapless character named Luke.

Her first big break came when Paramount Pictures did not renew her contract in 1929 and she signed with RKO.  She then starred in successful musicals like Rio Rita (1929)  and Love Comes Along (1930).  Her second big break came when RKO failed to renew her contract and she signed with Warner Brothers.

Warner provided Daniels with her two most memorable roles.  In 1931, she played Brigid O'Shaughnessey in the first filmed version of The Maltese Falcon.  (This version follows Dahsiell Hammett's novel more closely than the 1941 John Huston classic.  Also, this 1931 version being pre-Code, the sexual relationship between O'Shaugnessey and Spade is more obvious, as is the true relationship between Gutman and Wilmer.)  And in 1933 she starred in one of the great pre-Code talkies and one of the few pre-Code musicals you can find on Blu-ray, 42nd Street.

Meanwhile, Daniels married fellow actor Ben Lyon in 1930.  They had one child on their own and then adopted another.  They moved to London in 1935, after which Daniels made only a handful of movies, all in the UK.  She spent most of the remainder of her career working with her husband at the BBC, first on radio and then on the telly.

Bebe Daniels died in London in 1971, was cremated there, and her remains were brought to the U.S. where she was interred.  Lyon died in 1979, was cremated, and was interred next to his wife.

And here are today's buffer images.

All right, are you ready to play?  Then let's play!  Good luck and have fun.

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Wednesday, 13 January 2021—DAY THREE

 

Hello everyone, and welcome to the Wednesday edition of BOOKMAN'S MOVIE SCREENSHOT GAME.  Today's game should be a ramp up to tomorrow's dreaded Thursday edition.  And while we're time-traveling, here are the correct titles to yesterday's movies.

1.

The Departed (2006).

2.

Big (1988)

3.

Guess Who's Coming to Dinner (1967)

4.

The Fugitive (1993)

5.

Damn Yankees! (1958)

6.

Rollerball (1975)

7.

Silver Linings Playbook (2012)

8.

Blade Runner (1982)

9.

Blue Velvet (1986)

10. 

American Beauty (1999)

Congratulations to catbert and Fred for correctly identifying all 10 movies.

ON THIS DAY IN MOVIE HISTORY, JANUARY 13 …

… Gwen Verdon was born in 1925 in Culver City, California.  Diagnosed with rickets at age three, her mother enrolled her in dancing school, hoping the exercise would straighten her misshapen legs.  She worked hard and appeared in musical productions throughout her childhood, intending to become a professional.  But a teenage pregnancy, followed by a shotgun marriage, interrupted her career.  The marriage lasted five years.

She returned to her passion and appeared on stage and in small film roles.  She also taught dancing to various stars, including Jane Russell and Marilyn Monroe for their work in Gentlemen Prefer Blondes (1953).  She caught her first big break that same year when she was cast as Claudine in the Cole Porter Broadway musical, Can-Can, for which she won her first Tony Award.  Her biggest break came two years later when she won the role of the captivating Lola in the Broadway musical Damn Yankees!  She won her second Tony and reprised the role in the film version in 1958.  She also fell for the show's choreographer Bob Fosse.  They married in 1960.

In 1966, Verdon originated the role of Charity in Fosse's Broadway hit Sweet Charity, in which she introduced the world to "Hey Big Spender" and the show-stopper "If My Friends Could See Me Now."

Fosse's overbearing and explosive personality along with his repeated infidelities caused a permanent separation in 1971 but he and Verdon never divorced.  In fact they continued to work together.  Verdon helped choreograph the film musical that earned Fosse his only Oscar, directing Caberet in 1972.  She then continued her career on the stage, originating the Broadway role of Roxie Hart in Fosse's Chicago in 1975, playing opposite Chita Rivera as Velma Kelly.

She died in her sleep on October 18, 2000.

Here are today's buffer images.

Cary Grant, Irene Dunne, and Randolph Scott in My Favorite Wife (1940)

Jean Harlow and Lee Tracy in Bombshell (1933)

All right, are you ready to play?  Then let's play!  Good luck and have fun!

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Tuesday, 12 January 2021—DAY TWO

 

Welcome back, movie buffs.  This is the first of two Tuesday editions of BOOKMAN'S MOVIE SCREENSHOT GAME.  Today's game should be slightly more challenging than yesterday's.  But speaking of yesterday's game, here are the correct titles for yesterday's movies.

1.

Gone with the Wind (1939)

2.

The Silence of the Lambs (1991)

3.

Raiders of the Lost Ark (1981)

4.

Batman (1989)

5.

Jaws (1975)

6.

Butch Cassidy and the Sundance Kid (1969)

7.

Lincoln (2012)

8.

Lady and the Tramp (1955)

9.

Dances with Wolves (1990)

10.

Ferris Bueller's Day Off (1986)

Yesterday's image from Lincoln (2012) appears misleading upon reflection, and I am removing it belatedly from the lineup.  Congratulations to catbert, Ruth, and Fred for correctly identifying all nine of the remaining movies.

ON THIS DAY IN MOVIE HISTORY,

January 12 …

William Powell and Luise Rainer in The Great Ziegfeld (1936),

… the legendary actor Luise Rainer was born in 1910 in Düsseldorf, Germany. She studied acting under Max Reinhardt and acted in several of his stage productions in Germany before being "discovered" by M.G.M. scouts in 1935.  Louis B. Mayer signed her to a three-year contract.  The Hollywood press dubbed her "the next Garbo."

She was the first actor in film history to win back-to-back Oscars for leading performances—Best Actress of 1936, for her portrayal of Anna Held in her second American film, The Great Ziegfeld; and Best Actress of 1937, for her performance opposite the great Paul Muni in the adaptation of Pearl S. Buck's Pulitzer-Prize winning novel, The Good Earth.  Rainer was married to playwright Clifford Odets at the height of his career and was active with him in left-wing causes.

Until his death in 1937, "the boy genius," Irving Thalberg, was her protector at M.G.M.  And she needed one.  She used her Oscar statuettes as doorstops.  She refused to cater to M.G.M.'s or Hollywood's image of how a star should look in public—appearing without makeup, wearing dilapidated clothing, including trousers.  Among other things, she said, "Stardom is bad because Hollywood makes too much of it."  Her left-wing politics also hurt her with studio boss Louis B. Mayer.  Without Thalberg around to plead her case, Mayer did not renew her contract in 1938. She all but walked away from Hollywood at that point.  She died in 2014 having acted in only three theatrical films since 1938.

Here are today's buffer images.

All right, are you ready to play?  Then let's play!  Good luck and have fun!

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