Italian postcard in the '100 Artisti del Cinema' series by Edizione ELAH 'La Casa delle caramelle', no. 29. Photo: Warner Bros. Edward Everett Horton in It's Love I'm After (Archie Mayo, 1937). The Italian film title was Avventura a mezzanotte.
It seemed like American actor Edward Everett Horton (1886-1970) appeared in just about every Hollywood comedy made in the 1930s. He was always the perfect counterpart to the great gentlemen and protagonists of the films. Horton specialised in the fretful, woebegone 'Nervous Nellie' types.
Edward Everett Horton Jr. was born in 1886 in Brooklyn, New York City, to Isabella S. (Diack) and Edward Everett Horton, a print typesetter for the New York Times. He was the eldest of four children; George, Winter Davis, and Hannahbelle were his siblings. The family remained close throughout their lives. Edward's mother lived with him until she died at the age of 101. His brothers and sister also spent their later years residing at his Encino estate. Edward was a student at Oberlin College in Ohio. However, he was asked to leave after he climbed to the top of a building and, after a crowd gathered, threw off a dummy, making them think he had jumped. He then studied business at both Polytechnic Institute and Columbia. At Columbia, however, he joined the university's drama club and that changed the direction of his life. He quickly decided on an acting career rather and he left Columbia before graduating. In 1907, he joined the Dempsey Company, a stock company on Staten Island. There he performed in several Gilbert and Sullivan light operas, including 'The Mikado'. His rich baritone singing voice enabled him to appear in chorus on Broadway and he joined the prestigious Louis Mann company, playing in stock and learning his new trade. He went on to join several theatre companies in the 1910s, including the Orpheum Players in Philadelphia, The Baker Stock Company in Oregon, and the Crescent Theatre in Brooklyn. In the 1920s he acted in and managed the Majestic Theater in Los Angeles with his brother and business manager, George. He made his film debut in the comedy Too Much Business (1922). In only his fourth film, Horton struck gold as a screen comedy performer with his starring role as the butler in the Western comedy Ruggles of Red Gap (James Cruze, 1923) opposite Ernest Torrence. Charles Laughton would play Ruggles in the 1935 version. Horton portrayed the lead role of an idealistic young classical composer in the drama Beggar on Horseback (James Cruze, 1925) with Esther Ralston. Unlike many of his silent-film colleagues, the stage-trained Horton had no problems in adapting to the sound, despite - or perhaps because of - his quavering, slightly effeminate voice. He appeared in such early talkies as the horror film The Terror (Roy Del Ruth, 1928) with May McAvoy and Louise Fazenda, and Sonny Boy (Archie Mayo, with child star Davey lee and Betty Bronson, 1929).
Edward Everett Horton played the role of Professor Nick Potter in Holiday (Edward H. Griffith, 1930) and again in the remake, Holiday (George Cukor, 1938) starring Katharine Hepburn and Cary Grant. He also made an impact playing The Mad Hatter in Alice in Wonderland (Norman Z. McLeod, 1933). Other classics in which he played character roles are The Front Page (Lewis Milestone, 1931) with Adolphe Menjou and Pat O'Brien, The Gay Divorcee (Mark Sandrich, 1934) with Fred Astaire and Ginger Rogers, Top Hat (Mark Sandrich, 1935) again with Astaire and Rogers, and Here Comes Mr. Jordan (Alexander Hall, 1941). Horton cultivated his own special variation of the double-take (an actor's reaction to something, followed by a delayed, more extreme reaction). In Horton's version, he smiled ingratiatingly and nodded in agreement with what just happened; then, when realisation set in, his facial features collapsed entirely into a sober, troubled mask. From 1932 to 1938 he worked often with Ernst Lubitsch such as on Trouble in Paradise (Ernst Lubitsch, 1932), Design for Living (Ernst Lubitsch, 1933), and The Merry Widow (Ernst Lubitsch, 1934) starring Maurice Chevalier and Jeanette MacDonald. Later he worked with Frank Capra on Lost Horizon (Frank Capra, 1937) as the erratic paleontologist, Alexander P. Lovett, and Arsenic and Old Lace (Frank Capra, 1944). During the 1950s, Horton embraced the new medium of television with enthusiasm. His television career started in 1949 in the drama 'The Man Who Came to Dinner' and he appeared regularly on the small screen for the next 20 years in programs such as I Love Lucy (1952), The Red Skelton Hour (1957-1962), Dennis the Menace (1962-1963), Burke's Law (1963-1965), and Batman (1966). He gained a completely new fanbase as the storyteller in the animated series Fractured Fairy Tales (1959-1962). He was also the befuddled Hekawi medicine man Roaring Chicken on the Western comedy series F Troop (1965). His later feature films include Pocketful of Miracles (Frank Capra, 1961) starring Bette Davis and Glenn Ford, the highly successful It's a Mad, Mad, Mad, Mad World (Stanley Kramer, 1963) with Spencer Tracy, and Sex and the Single Girl (Richard Quine, 1964), starring Tony Curtis and Natalie Wood. His last film role was in the comedy Cold Turkey (Norman Lear, 1971), in which his character sat in a wheelchair and communicated only through facial expressions. Horton died before the film was released. During his long career, he appeared in more than 120 films and never tied himself down with a long-term contract to any single studio. He remained a freelancer throughout his long career. In the theatre, he appeared in a number of revivals of the comedy play 'Springtime for Henry' beginning in the 1930s and extending into the 1960s. He played the part of the effete Henry Dewlip more than 3,000 times. At the age of 84, Edward Everett Horton died of cancer in 1970 in Encino, Los Angeles. He is interred at Forest Lawn, Glendale, CA. According to an in-depth article by Eve Golden in Classic Images magazine, Edward's longtime companion was actor Gavin Gordon, who was 15 years his junior. Not much was ever documented on the couple. They had appeared together in a 1931 production of Noël Coward's 'Private Lives' and acted in one film together, Pocketful of Miracles (Frank Capra, 1961). For his contribution to the motion picture industry, Edward Everett Horton has a star on the Hollywood Walk of Fame at 6427 Hollywood Boulevard.
Sources: Chris Whiteley (Hollywood's Golden Age), Volker Boehm (IMDb), Wikipedia, and IMDb.
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Italian postcard in the '100 Artisti del Cinema' series by Edizione ELAH 'La Casa delle caramelle', no. 34. Photo: Warner Bros. Fernand Gravey in The King and the Chorus Girl (Mervyn Le Roy, 1937).
Fernand Gravey (1905-1970) was an elegant Franco-Belgian stage, screen, and television actor, successfully working in Belgium, France, England, and Hollywood. He was also a war hero, who was active as a member of the French Intelligence and in particular for the Foreign Legion during the Second World War.
While Fernand Gravey’s mother, Fernande Depernay, had been Alfred Machin’s favorite actress in the films he directed at the Belge Cinéma Film, Gravey’s father Georges Mertens was not only an actor but also the director of the Théatre des Galeries in Brussels. Little Ferdinand Mertens, born 25 December 1905, started to act already at the age of five, under the direction of his father. In 1913-1914 he performed as child actor in five films by Machin: Saïda a enlevé Manneken-Pis, Un épisode de Waterloo, Monsieur Beulemeester, garde civique, Trente ans ou la vie d’un joueur (all 1913) and La Fille de Delft/A Tragedy in the Clouds (1914), which co-starred a very young Blanche Montel. During the First World War young Mertens stayed in Britain, where he started to get interested in the stage, became sportive and a passionate horse rider, and perfected his English; the latter would become an important asset in his international career and shaped his image as the gentleman of the screen. In the late 1920s, he went to Paris where he took the nom of Fernand Gravey and became known in vaudeville, alongside his female partners such as Arletty, Jane Renouardt (whom he married in 1928 according to Wikipedia; IMDb dates it 1936 though) and Cora Lynn (later known as Edwige Feuillère). Gravey’s debut in sound cinema came in 1930 with his role Armand Petitjean in L'amour chant (Robert Florey, 1930), one of several films at the Paris sound studio of Paramount. For years Gravey was the smiling, refined actor in boulevard comedies on the screen, often directed by René Guissart.
His success in the genre – which included the French version of Ludwig Berger’s Ich bei Tag und du bei Nacht (1932) - provided Fernand Gravey with the leading roles in two British comedies directed by Herbert Wilcox, Bitter Sweet (1933) and The Queen's Affair, both with Anna Neagle co-acting. The success of both films made Gravey a British star, while Hollywood got interested in his talents. Gravey first went back to France, continuing his career there in films such as the circus film Variétés (Nicholas Farkas), which co-starred Jean Gabin and Annabella. In 1936 Gravey was finally won over to leave for Hollywood but instead of a studio contract, he signed an exclusive contract with director Mervyn LeRoy. In Hollywood, he changed his name to Gravet instead of Gravey and debuted in a Warner musical comedy The King and the Chorus Girl (1937), based on a script by Groucho Marx and Norman Krasna, and starring Joan Blondell, Jane Wyman, and Edward Everett Horton. Shortly after Gravey acted in another Warner comedy directed by LeRoy, Fools for Scandal (1938), which starred Carole Lombard and Ralph Bellamy, and with music by Richard Rodgers and Lorenz Hart, but the film was less successful. In the same year, Gravey signed a contract with MGM and obtained the role of Johann Strauss in Julien Duvivier’s The Great Walzer (1938), an epic and romantic biopic of the Austrian composer and conductor. Gravey did a splendid performance as Strauss, with Luise Rainer as his sweet wife Poldi Vogelhuber and Miliza Korjus playing his mistress Carla Donner. The super-production was a big success and turned Gravey into one of the best-paid stars in Hollywood.
Despite his American success Fernand Gravey longed for France and went back in 1939, shortly before the German Occupation. Shortly after his return, he acted in the French film noir Le dernier tournant (Pierre Chenal, 1939), the first film adaptation of James M. Cain’s The Postman Always Rings Twice, which co-starred Corinne Luchaire as Cora and Michel Simon as Nick. In the following years Gravey appeared in melodramas such as Paradis perdu (1940) by Abel Gance and La Nuit fantastique (1941) by Marcel L'Herbier, and in historical adventure films such as Le Capitaine Fracasse (Abel Gance, 1943), but more important Gravey was involvement at the front of the Second World War, working for the French Intelligence and in particular for the Foreign Legion, under his original name of Fernand Mertens. With the Legion he participated in military campaigns in France and Germany, receiving honorary dismissal in 1945, with the grade of reserve lieutenant. He also became a French citizen and in 1952 Gravey was awarded the title of Première Classe d'Honneur of the Foreign Legion. After a gradual return to the screen, in 1950 Gravey had an excellent opportunity to excel as Charles Breitkpof, the frivolous and mature seducer who in his turn is cheated by his wife Emma (Danielle Darrieux) in the daring and sophisticated La Ronde (1950) by Max Ophüls, based on Arthur Schnitzler’s play Reigen. In the same year, Gravey returned to the stage for Harvey by Mary Chase and all during the 1950s he alternated the stage with the screen, often playing the elegant gentleman and reckless bon-vivant. In 1954 he also played Molière in Sacha Guitry’s historical super-production Si Versailles m’étais conté/Royal Affairs in Versailles (1954). While he continued his career on stage, his screen roles became rarer in the 1960s. Among his last English language performances were How to Steal a Million (William Wyler, 1966) starring Audrey Hepburn and shot in Europe, La Bataille de San Sebastian/Guns for San Sebastian (Henri Verneuil, 1968) and the Giraudoux adaptation La Folle de Chaillot/The Madwoman of Chaillot (Bryan Forbes, 1969), in which Gravey played the police inspector. His last screen performance Gravey did in the crime story L’Explosion (Marc Simenon, 1971), which was released after Gravey’s death. Fernand Gravey died in Paris on 2 November 1970, because of an infarct, and was buried in the cemetery of Saint-Cloud. His wife, former silent film actress Jane Renouardt (1890-1972), survived him only two years.
Sources: Wikipedia (French, Italian, and English), and IMDb.
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Italian postcard in the '100 Artisti del Cinema' series by Edizione Elah 'La Casa delle Caramelle', no. 30. Photo: Warner Bros. Photo: Warner Bros. Publicity still for They Won't Forget (Mervyn LeRoy, 1937). Vendetta is the Italian title for the film.
Lana Turner (1921-1995) was one of the most glamorous superstars of Hollywood's golden era. One of her first lead roles was in Dancing Co-Ed (1939), a vehicle for bandleader Artie Shaw. The two married a year later. Dubbed 'the Sweater Girl' by the press, Turner became a popular pin-up, especially with American soldiers fighting overseas. In 1941 she starred opposite Clark Gable in Honky Tonk, her first major hit. Upon separating from Shaw, Turner married actor Stephen Crane, but when his earlier divorce was declared invalid, a media frenzy followed. Her most sultry and effective turn to date was the femme fatale in The Postman Always Rings Twice (1946). The film was a tremendous success, and it made Turner one of Hollywood's brightest stars. After a sabbatical, she returned with Peyton Place (Mark 1957). Turner's performance won an Academy Award nomination. The following year she made international headlines when her lover, gangster Johnny Stampanato, was stabbed to death by her teenage daughter, Cheryl Crane. Crane was eventually acquitted on the grounds of justifiable homicide, but Turner's reputation took a severe beating. Douglas Sirk's tearjerker Imitation of Life (1959) was Turner's last major hit. Her final film, Witches' Brew, a semi-comic remake of the 1944 horror classic Weird Woman, was shot in 1978 but not widely released until 1985. In 1982, she published an autobiography, Lana: The Lady, the Legend, the Truth, and also began a stint as a semi-regular on the TV soap opera Falcon Crest. After spending the majority of her final decade in retirement, Lana Turner died in 1995, at the age of 74.
Source: Jason Ankeny (AllMovie).
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Italian postcard in the Artisti del Cinema Series, no. 100, by Edizione ELAH, La vasa delle Caramelle. Photo: Warner Bros. Publicity still for They Won't Forget (Mervyn LeRoy, 1937).
The career of English stage and film actor Claude Rains (1889-1967) spanned 47 years. In Hollywood he was a supporting actor who achieved A-list stardom. With his smooth distinguished voice he could portray a wide variety of roles, ranging from villains to sympathetic gentlemen. He is best known as the title figure in The Invisible Man (1933), as wicked Prince John in The Adventures of Robin Hood (1938), as a corrupt senator in Mr. Smith Goes to Washington (1939), and, of course, as Captain Renault in Casablanca (1942).
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Italian postcard by Edizione ELAH in the series Artisti del Cinema, no. 100. Photo: Warner Bros. Publicity still for Tovarich (Anatole Litvak, 1937).
Suave and sophisticated French actor Charles Boyer (1899-1978) began his career in French silent films and in 1936 he became an international star with his role in Mayerling opposite Danielle Darrieux. His long career earned him the title of 'the last of the cinema's great lovers'.
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