Spanish postcard by Grafoto, Barcelona, no. 220. Photo: RKO Radio.
For more postcards, a bio and clips check out our blog European Film Star Postcards.
Tags: Carole Landis Carole Landis American Actress Hollywood Movie Star Film Cinema Cine Kino Screen Picture Movie Movies Filmster Star Vintage Postcard Grafoto RKO Radio
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West German postcard by Ufa/Film-Foto, Berlin-Tempelhof, no. FK 3414. Photo: Allianz Film.
Yesterday, 14 February 2025, long-necked, doe-eyed Geneviève Page (1927) died in Paris. The French actress starred in French, Italian, British, and American films during a career spanning fifty years. She often played glamorous roles in costume pictures as a delectable heroine who meets an untimely demise. Page was 97.
Geneviève Page was born Geneviève Bonjean in Paris, France in 1927. Her father was Jacques Paul Bonjean, a well-known French art collector. Her film début was in the murder mystery Pas de pitié pour les femmes/No Pity for Women (Christian Stengel, 1951) starring Simone Renant (AllMovie mentions the documentary Ce Siecle A Cinquante Ans/This Is the Half Century (Denise Tua, 1949) as her first film appearance). It was followed by the adventure comedy Fanfan la Tulipe (Christian-Jaque, 1952) in which she played Madame de Pompadour, alongside Gérard Philipe and Gina Lollobrigida. This Swashbuckler was an enormous popular success and in 1952, it won both the Silver Bear at the Berlin International Film Festival and the Best Director award at the Cannes Film Festival. Since then, Page appeared in French, Italian, British, and American films. In Great Britain, she appeared opposite David Niven in the romantic comedy The Silken Affair (Roy Kellino, 1956). Opposite Robert Mitchum,she played in the American thriller Foreign Intrigue (Sheldon Reynolds, 1956). In France, she co-starred with Jean Marais in the comic fantasy Amour de poche/Girl in His Pocket (Pierre Kast, 1957) and in the spy parody L'honorable Stanislas, Agent Secret/How to Be a Spy Without Even Trying (Jean-Charles Dudrumet, 1963). In Hollywood, she co-starred in the biographical film romance Song Without End a.k.a. The Story of Franz Liszt (1960) produced by Columbia Pictures. It was directed by Charles Vidor, who died during the shooting of the picture and was replaced by George Cukor. The film starred Dirk Bogarde as Franz Liszt, Capucine as Princess Carolyne zu Sayn-Wittgenstein, and Page as Marie d'Agoult. The film won the Best Music Score Academy Award for Morris Stoloff and Harry Sukman and the Golden Globe Award for Best Motion Picture (Musical). Next, she appeared for Samuel Bronston Productions in the historical epic El Cid (Anthony Mann, 1961), a romanticised story of the life of the Christian Castilian knight ‘El Cid’ (Charlton Heston), who in the 11th century fought the North African Almoravides and ultimately contributed to the unification of Spain.
Geneviève Page was a member of the international cast of the American action film Grand Prix (John Frankenheimer, 1966) with James Garner, Eva Marie Saint, and Yves Montand. One of the ten highest-grossing films of 1966, Grand Prix won three Academy Awards for its technical achievements. One of her most famous films is Belle de Jour (Luis Bunuel, 1967). She played Madame Anais, who runs the high-class brothel, where Séverine (Catherine Deneuve) goes to work. Page appeared with Deneuve again when she played Countess Larisch in the romantic tragedy Mayerling (Terence Young, 1968). Billy Wilder cast her as the mysterious villain in his The Private Life of Sherlock Holmes (1970) with Robert Stephens as Sherlock Holmes. In France, she had a small part in the black comedy Buffet Froid (Bertrand Blier, 1979) with Gérard Dépardieu, and a bigger part in the thriller Mortelle Randonnée/ Deadly Circuit (Claude Mille, 1983) with Isabelle Adjani as a serial killer and Michel Serrault as the detective who is on her trail. The film had a total of 916,868 admissions in France. In the US, she appeared in Robert Altman's Beyond Therapy (1987) with Jeff Goldblum and in Altman’s segment of the anthology film Aria (1987). In Italy she starred in the drama Cartoline italiane/Italian Postcards (Memè Perlini, 1987). Besides her film career, Geneviève Page had a long and distinguished career on stage. She was the winner of the 1980 Prix de la meilleure comédienne du syndicat de la critique (Best Actress award of the critics association) for her role in 'Les Larmes amères de Petra von Kant' (The Bitter Tears of Petra von Kant) at the Théâtre national de Chaillot in Paris, and in 1996, she was nominated for the Molière Award (the French equivalent of the Tony Award) for her role in 'Colombe'. She continued to act until 2003. Geneviève Page was married to Jean-Claude Bujard and they had two children.
Sources: AllMovie, Wikipedia, and IMDb.
For more postcards, a bio, and clips check out our blog European Film Star Postcards.
Tags: Geneviève Page Geneviève Page French Actress European Film Star Cinema Film Filmster Star Vintage Postcard R.I.P. UFA/Film-Foto Allianz Film
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East German postcard by Progress-Filmvertrieb, Berlin, no. 2426, 1965. Photo: Geneviève Page in L'honorable Stanislas, l'agent secret (Jean-Charles Dudrumet, 1963).
Yesterday, 14 February 2025, long-necked, doe-eyed Geneviève Page (1927) died in Paris. The French actress starred in French, Italian, British, and American films during a career spanning fifty years. She often played glamorous roles in costume pictures as a delectable heroine who meets an untimely demise. Page was 97.
Geneviève Page was born Geneviève Bonjean in Paris, France in 1927. Her father was Jacques Paul Bonjean, a well-known French art collector. Her film début was in the murder mystery Pas de pitié pour les femmes/No Pity for Women (Christian Stengel, 1951) starring Simone Renant (AllMovie mentions the documentary Ce Siecle A Cinquante Ans/This Is the Half Century (Denise Tua, 1949) as her first film appearance). It was followed by the adventure comedy Fanfan la Tulipe (Christian-Jaque, 1952) in which she played Madame de Pompadour, alongside Gérard Philipe and Gina Lollobrigida. This Swashbuckler was an enormous popular success and in 1952, it won both the Silver Bear at the Berlin International Film Festival and the Best Director award at the Cannes Film Festival. Since then, Page appeared in French, Italian, British, and American films. In Great Britain, she appeared opposite David Niven in the romantic comedy The Silken Affair (Roy Kellino, 1956). Opposite Robert Mitchum, she played in the American thriller Foreign Intrigue (Sheldon Reynolds, 1956). In France, she co-starred with Jean Marais in the comic fantasy Amour de poche/Girl in His Pocket (Pierre Kast, 1957) and in the spy parody L'honorable Stanislas, Agent Secret/How to Be a Spy Without Even Trying (Jean-Charles Dudrumet, 1963). In Hollywood, she co-starred in the biographical film romance Song Without End a.k.a. The Story of Franz Liszt (1960) produced by Columbia Pictures. It was directed by Charles Vidor, who died during the shooting of the picture and was replaced by George Cukor. The film starred Dirk Bogarde as Franz Liszt, Capucine as Princess Carolyne zu Sayn-Wittgenstein, and Page as Marie d'Agoult. The film won the Best Music Score Academy Award for Morris Stoloff and Harry Sukman and the Golden Globe Award for Best Motion Picture (Musical). Next, she appeared for Samuel Bronston Productions in the historical epic El Cid (Anthony Mann, 1961), a romanticized story of the life of the Christian Castilian knight ‘El Cid’ (Charlton Heston), who in the 11th century fought the North African Almoravides and ultimately contributed to the unification of Spain.
Geneviève Page was a member of the international cast of the American action film Grand Prix (John Frankenheimer, 1966) with James Garner, Eva Marie Saint, and Yves Montand. One of the ten highest-grossing films of 1966, Grand Prix won three Academy Awards for its technical achievements. One of her most famous films is Belle de Jour (Luis Bunuel, 1967). She played Madame Anais, who runs the high-class brothel, where Séverine (Catherine Deneuve) goes to work. Page appeared with Deneuve again when she played Countess Larisch in the romantic tragedy Mayerling (Terence Young, 1968). Billy Wilder cast her as the mysterious villain in his The Private Life of Sherlock Holmes (1970) with Robert Stephens as Sherlock Holmes. In France, she had a small part in the black comedy Buffet Froid (Bertrand Blier, 1979) with Gérard Dépardieu, and a bigger part in the thriller Mortelle Randonnée/ Deadly Circuit (Claude Mille, 1983) with Isabelle Adjani as a serial killer and Michel Serrault as the detective who is on her trail. The film had a total of 916,868 admissions in France. In the US, she appeared in Robert Altman's Beyond Therapy (1987) with Jeff Goldblum and in Altman’s segment of the anthology film Aria (1987). In Italy she starred in the drama Cartoline italiane/Italian Postcards (Memè Perlini, 1987). Besides her film career, Geneviève Page had a long and distinguished career on stage. She was the winner of the 1980 Prix de la meilleure comédienne du syndicat de la critique (Best Actress Award of the critics association) for her role in 'Les Larmes amères de Petra von Kant' (The Bitter Tears of Petra von Kant) at the Théâtre national de Chaillot in Paris, and in 1996, she was nominated for the Molière Award (the French equivalent of the Tony Award) for her role in 'Colombe'. She continued to act until 2003. Geneviève Page was married to Jean-Claude Bujard and they had two children.
Sources: AllMovie, Wikipedia, and IMDb.
For more postcards, a bio, and clips check out our blog European Film Star Postcards.
Tags: Geneviève Page Geneviève Page French Actress European Film Star Cinema Film Filmster Star Vintage Postcard R.I.P. Progress L'honorable Stanislas, l'agent secret 1963 Letter
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German postcard by Photochemie, Berlin, no. K. 146. Photo: A. Binder, Berlin.
Sybil Smolowa (1886-1972) was an Austrian-Czech dancer and film actress. In the 1910s and 1920s, she appeared in several Danish and German silent films.
Sybil Smolowa or Sibyl Smolová was born Anna Marie Josefa Smolová in 1886 in Chlumetz an der Cidlina, Austria-Hungary (according to IMDb, she was born in Prague). She was the daughter of the innkeeper Benjamin Smola and his wife Anna, née Jarkovská, and grew up in the small village of Val in the foothills of the Orlické Mountains. She studied fine arts in Dresden and Vienna and took acting lessons with Karel Želenský. In 1910 she appeared - at that time still as Anneta Smolová - at literary evenings in the context of the Moderní revue in Prague, attracting the attention of Franz Kafka and Max Brod, who considered her “a particularly great talent”. The Czech writer Miloš Marten dedicated two works to her and suggested the stage name, Sibyl. Through the mediation of the playwright František Zavřel, Smolowa soon received an engagement with Max Reinhardt in Berlin, where she again attracted the interest of leading figures in the artistic scene. Alfred Kerr described his meeting with her, which was arranged by Edgar Varèse, in the magazine Pan. Klabund dedicated two poems to her as well as his story 'The Illness', whose main character, the fictional actress Sybil Lindquist, is probably a homage to her. Sybil Smolowa was engaged at the Lessing Theater in Berlin. After playing Solveig in a performance of 'Peer Gynt', she was engaged for the leading female role in the sensational Science Fiction film Der Schienenweg unterm Ozean / The Railway under the Ocean (Siegfried Dessauer, Kurt Matull, 1914), based on the novel 'Der Tunnel' (1913) by Bernhard Kellermann. The production costs totalled around 180,000 Marks. Actor-director Friedrich Zelnik spotted her and she appeared opposite him in the film Seelen, die sich nachts begegnen / Souls who Meet at Night (Eugen Illés, 1915), produced by the Danish studio Atlantic. Smolowa played a rich girl who gets 'in shame' (pregnant). Happily, she meets a student (Zelnik) who takes care of her and teaches her to love. From then on, the white-blonde artist found her main activity in silent films, where she preferred to play “strong dramatic, very fantastic roles for women and girls” (Die Frau im Film, p. 22).
Sybil Smolowa co-starred with Eduard von Winterstein, Erika Glässner and Reinhold Schünzel in the silent German drama Werner Krafft (Carl Froelich, 1916), produced by Oskar Messter. In Sweden, Smolowa made Vägen utför / The Road Downhill (Georg af Klercker, 1916) and I mörkrets bojor / In the Fetters of Darkness (Georg af Klercker, 1917). Then followed films like Im Schatten des Glücks / In the Shadow of Happiness (Robert Leffler, 1919), and in the two-partner Kinder der Finsternis / Children of Darkness (Ewald André Dupont, 1922) with Grit Hegesa and Hans Mierendorff. From the mid-1920s, things became quieter for the Czech actress, who shifted the focus of her artistic activities back to the stage. She performed at the Deutsches Theater Berlin, Renaissance Theater, and Theater in der Klosterstraße. After the Nazis seized power, she remained in the German capital and appeared in two of Frank Wysbar's films the lesbian-themed sound film Anna und Elisabeth / Anna and Elisabeth (Frank Wysbar, 1933) with Dorothea Wieck and Hertha Thiele, and the Horror film Fährmann Maria / Ferryman Maria (Frank Wysbar, 1934) starring Sibylle Schmitz. In 1934, she was also heard in a live radio reading of detective plays. After her Berlin apartment was bombed out in an air raid in 1943, she returned to her homeland and initially went to Prague. After the end of the war, she moved back to Val, where she joined the local amateur theatre group. Sybil Smolowa spent the last years of her life with her niece in Prague. She died in 1972 in the Bohnice Psychiatric Clinic in Prague, Czechoslovakia, and was buried in the Krem.
Source: Wikipedia (German and English) and IMDb.
And, please check out our blog European Film Star Postcards.
Tags: Sybil Smolova Sybil Smolova Austrian Actress Cinema Film Filmster Star Vintage Postcard Photochemie Binder Alex BInder Sepia Silent
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West-German postcard by Krüger, no. 902 / 198. Photo: Gerard Decaux. Jayne Mansfield and Mickey Hargitay.
Some Hollywood stars were much more popular in Europe than at home. A fabulous example is sweet Jayne Mansfield (1933-1967), one of Hollywood's original platinum blonde bombshells. Although most of her American films did not do much at the European box offices, Jayne was a sensation whenever she came to Europe to promote her films. During the 1960s, when Hollywood lost interest in her, Jayne continued to appear cheerfully in several European films.
Jayne Mansfield was born Vera Jayne Palmer in Bryn Mawr, Pennsylvania, in 1933. She was the only child of Herbert William, a successful attorney of German ancestry, and Vera Jeffrey Palmer of English descent. While attending the University of Texas at Austin, Mansfield won several beauty contests. However, her prominent breasts were considered problematic and led to her losing her first professional assignment—an advertising campaign for General Electric. A natural brunette, Mansfield had her hair bleached and coloured platinum blonde when she moved to Los Angeles. She posed nude for the February 1955 issue of Playboy, modelling in pyjamas raised so that the bottoms of her breasts showed. This helped launch Mansfield's career, and that year, she became a major Broadway star as Marilyn Monroe-like actress Rita Marlowe in the Broadway version of George Axelrod's play 'Will Success Spoil Rock Hunter?' This role won her a contract at 20th Century Fox. The following year, she reprised the role in the film version, Will Success Spoil Rock Hunter? (Frank Tashlin, 1957), with Tony Randall, and became a major Hollywood star. She showcased her comedic skills in The Girl Can't Help It (Frank Tashlin, 1956), and her dramatic assets in The Wayward Bus (Victor Vicas, 1957) opposite Joan Collins. Hal Erickson at AllMovie: “Despite good dramatic performances in such films as The Wayward Bus (1957), Kiss Them for Me (1957), and The Burglar (1957), Mansfield was forever typed as a parody of Marilyn Monroe.” By the late 1950s, with the decrease in the demand for big-breasted blonde bombshells and the increase in the negative backlash against her over-publicity, she became a box-office has-been.
While Hollywood studios lost interest in her, Jayne Mansfield’s film career continued in Europe with films in the United Kingdom, Italy, Germany, and Greece. 20th Century Fox loaned her out for the British Neo-Noir thriller Too Hot to Handle/Playgirl After Dark (Terence Young, 1960). Jayne played a nightclub dancer opposite Leo Genn, Karlheinz Böhm and Christopher Lee. In Britain, she also appeared in The Challenge/It Takes a Thief (John Gilling, 1960) with Anthony Quayle and Carl Möhner. Hollywood sent her to Italy for Gli amori di Ercole/The Loves of Hercules (Carlo Ludovico Bragaglia, 1960) opposite muscleman and husband Mickey Hargitay. Bruce Eder at AllMovie: “A fairly lavishly produced but otherwise relatively undistinguished sword-and-sandal adventure.” After her contract with 20th Century Fox ended, she made in Germany Heimweh nach St. Pauli/Homesick for St. Pauli (Werner Jacobs, 1963) starring Schlager star Freddy Quinn, and Einer frisst den anderen/Dog Eat Dog (Gustav Gavrin, 1964). Mark Deming at AllMovie describes the latter as an “offbeat but stylish crime drama”. At the time, she was photographed in Germany by legendary glamour photographer Bernard of Hollywood (a.k.a. Bruno Bernard) , which resulted in a series of very sexy and popular postcards. Jayne moved on to Italy for the comedies L'Amore Primitivo/Primitive Love (Luigi Scattini, 1964), and Panic Button (George Sherman, Giuliano Carnimeo, 1964) with Maurice Chevalier. During the 1960s, Mansfield remained a highly visible celebrity, through her publicity antics and daring performances in international nightclubs. In early 1967, she filmed her last screen role: a cameo in A Guide for the Married Man (Gene Kelly, 1967), a comedy starring Walter Matthau. Mansfield had taken her professional name from her first husband, public relations professional Paul Mansfield, with whom she married in 1950 at age 16, and with whom she had a daughter. She was the mother of three children from her second marriage to actor–bodybuilder Mickey Hargitay (1958-1964). She married her third husband, Italian-born film director Matt Cimber/Matteo Ottaviano in 1964, and separated from him in 1966. Mansfield and Cimber had a son. In 1967, while driving to a club engagement in New Orleans, Jayne Mansfield died in a car accident. She was only 34 years old at the time. Her fourth child, Mariska Hargitay, would later become a well-known TV actress.
Sources: Hal Erickson (AllMovie), Joel Nickerson (IMDb), Mark Deming (AllMovie), Bruce Eder (AllMovie), Wikipedia, and IMDb.
And, please check out our blog European Film Star Postcards.
Tags: Jayne Mansfield Jayne Mansfield American Actress Hollywood Movie Star Bombshell Platinum Blonde Mickey Hargitay Mickey Hargitay Bodybuilder Actor Husband Wife Couple Film Cinema Star Filmster Vintage Postcard Krüger Gerard Decaux
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