Doris Day was the Oscar-nominated actress who passed away in 2019 at the age of 97. She excelled in musicals and romantic comedies, bringing a sense of edge and humor to her squeaky-clean demeanor. Although she made only a handful of movies between 1948 and 1968, several of her titles remain classics. Let’s take a look back at 20 of her greatest films, ranked worst to best.
Born in 1922, Day got her start as a band singer, making her film debut with the musical comedy “Romance on the High Seas” (1948). He vocal talents benefited her in such films as “Calamity Jane” (1953), “Love Me or Leave Me” (1955), and “The Pajama Game” (1957), and she often sang the title tunes to her films.
She is perhaps best remembered for three frothy romantic comedies she made with sly, square-jawed leading man Rock Hudson and sardonic sidekick Tony Randall: “Pillow Talk” (1959), “Lover Come Back” (1961), and “Send Me No Flowers...
Born in 1922, Day got her start as a band singer, making her film debut with the musical comedy “Romance on the High Seas” (1948). He vocal talents benefited her in such films as “Calamity Jane” (1953), “Love Me or Leave Me” (1955), and “The Pajama Game” (1957), and she often sang the title tunes to her films.
She is perhaps best remembered for three frothy romantic comedies she made with sly, square-jawed leading man Rock Hudson and sardonic sidekick Tony Randall: “Pillow Talk” (1959), “Lover Come Back” (1961), and “Send Me No Flowers...
- 3/30/2024
- by Zach Laws and Chris Beachum
- Gold Derby
8 random things that happened on this day, October 14th, in showbiz history
1930 The Gershwin musical Girl Crazy opens on Broadway, introducing the standards "Embraceable You" "But Not For Me" and "I Got Rhythm" into the American songbook. Future movie star Ginger Rogers was in the original cast! It was adapted to film twice, first in 1932 and then with Mickey Rooney & Judy Garland in 1943.
1960 Did you know that Doris Day didn't only make comedies? A thriller called Midnight Lace, was new in theaters that weekend with Doris in danger!
Rex Harrison, John Gavin, Myrna Loy, and Roddy McDowall co-starred and Doris Day was nominated for Best Actress, Drama at the Golden Globes. How about that? If you've seen it do tell...
1930 The Gershwin musical Girl Crazy opens on Broadway, introducing the standards "Embraceable You" "But Not For Me" and "I Got Rhythm" into the American songbook. Future movie star Ginger Rogers was in the original cast! It was adapted to film twice, first in 1932 and then with Mickey Rooney & Judy Garland in 1943.
1960 Did you know that Doris Day didn't only make comedies? A thriller called Midnight Lace, was new in theaters that weekend with Doris in danger!
Rex Harrison, John Gavin, Myrna Loy, and Roddy McDowall co-starred and Doris Day was nominated for Best Actress, Drama at the Golden Globes. How about that? If you've seen it do tell...
- 10/14/2020
- by NATHANIEL R
- FilmExperience
Doris Day finds herself the target of a malevolent murderer in Midnight Lace (1960), the performer’s last dramatic role prior to her retirement from filmmaking just eight years later in With Six You Get Eggroll (1968). Day, despite being best remembered for her bevy of Rock Hudson rom-coms from this period, was a celebrated method performer, and the toll of taking on a terrorized damsel in distress was enough for her to steer clear of venturing further into genre.…...
- 6/25/2019
- by Nicholas Bell
- IONCINEMA.com
Ross Hunter, Hollywood’s glossiest producer and Doris Day, Hollywood’s perennially cheery star, team up for this soap-operatic mix of Gaslight and Sorry, Wrong Number. Day is being stalked by a faceless killer and she finds little solace from her friends and family who assume she’s headed for a nervous breakdown. The dog-eared plot isn’t helped by the upscale decor and high-priced fashion (which are pure Hunter) but Rex Harrison, as Day’s duplicitous hubby, brings a welcome element of creepy ambiguity to the well-photographed (by Russell Metty) proceedings. Remade as a TV movie in 1981.
The post Midnight Lace appeared first on Trailers From Hell.
The post Midnight Lace appeared first on Trailers From Hell.
- 5/22/2019
- by TFH Team
- Trailers from Hell
Yes, Doris Day, who died on May 13 at age 97 after a bout with pneumonia, was the all-American girl next door — but she was so much more. The funny, sunny blonde with the perky disposition, a sprinkle of freckles and a dazzling smile started off as a big band singer whose first hit was 1945’s “Sentimental Journey” with Les Brown & his Band of Renown. She would record more than 650 songs from 1947 to 1967, making her one of the biggest-selling recording artists of the 20th century, and was honored with a Grammy Lifetime Achievement Award in 20008.
But the former Doris Mary Ann von Kappelhoff would make an even bigger splash as a star on the silver screen in a series of romantic comedies opposite Rock Hudson — who would become a lifelong friend — starting with 1959’s “Pillow Talk,” the source of her only Oscar nomination, along with 1961’s “Lover Come Back” and 1964’s “Send Me No Flowers.
But the former Doris Mary Ann von Kappelhoff would make an even bigger splash as a star on the silver screen in a series of romantic comedies opposite Rock Hudson — who would become a lifelong friend — starting with 1959’s “Pillow Talk,” the source of her only Oscar nomination, along with 1961’s “Lover Come Back” and 1964’s “Send Me No Flowers.
- 5/14/2019
- by Susan Wloszczyna
- Gold Derby
When teenager Doris Mary Ann Kappelhoff sang along to Ella Fitzgerald on the radio, the Cincinnati native could never have predicted that, as Doris Day, she would go on to become one of the 20th century’s most beloved performers, first as a vocalist, then as an actress and then finally as an outspoken champion for the rights of animals.
But it was those radio sing-alongs that inspired Alma Welz Kappelhoff to send her daughter to a vocal coach, and by the time Doris was 17, she was singing for bandleader Barney Rapp, who convinced her to change her name to a more marquee-friendly length.
Day would go on to sing for the likes of Jimmy James and Bob Crosby, but it was her collaboration with Les Brown and His Band of Renown in the late 1940s that would rocket her to national stardom with hits like “Sentimental Journey” and “‘Till the End of Time.
But it was those radio sing-alongs that inspired Alma Welz Kappelhoff to send her daughter to a vocal coach, and by the time Doris was 17, she was singing for bandleader Barney Rapp, who convinced her to change her name to a more marquee-friendly length.
Day would go on to sing for the likes of Jimmy James and Bob Crosby, but it was her collaboration with Les Brown and His Band of Renown in the late 1940s that would rocket her to national stardom with hits like “Sentimental Journey” and “‘Till the End of Time.
- 5/13/2019
- by Alonso Duralde
- The Wrap
Doris Day has died at age 97, her foundation said early on May 13. The actress, singer, and activist was one of the last legends of classic Hollywood, and her intense privacy for the last 30 years of her life only enhanced her mystique.
Day was 22 when she recorded her first number-one hit with “Sentimental Journey;” her final acting credit was the TV series “The Doris Day Show,” which ended its run in 1973. But what she packed into those 30 years is extraordinary: nearly 40 movies and five Billboard #1 hits. Although she started to withdraw from Hollywood in the ’70s, followed by the brief run of a Christian Broadcasting Network talk show in 1985-86, it always felt like there was more to discover in her body of work.
That talk show, “Doris Day’s Best Friends,” was legendary in its own right. In 1985, Rock Hudson, Day’s co-star in frothy comedies such as “Pillow Talk” and “Lover Come Back,...
Day was 22 when she recorded her first number-one hit with “Sentimental Journey;” her final acting credit was the TV series “The Doris Day Show,” which ended its run in 1973. But what she packed into those 30 years is extraordinary: nearly 40 movies and five Billboard #1 hits. Although she started to withdraw from Hollywood in the ’70s, followed by the brief run of a Christian Broadcasting Network talk show in 1985-86, it always felt like there was more to discover in her body of work.
That talk show, “Doris Day’s Best Friends,” was legendary in its own right. In 1985, Rock Hudson, Day’s co-star in frothy comedies such as “Pillow Talk” and “Lover Come Back,...
- 5/13/2019
- by Christian Blauvelt
- Indiewire
Legendary film and TV actress, singer and animal welfare activist Doris Day died on Monday after contracting pneumonia. She was 97.
Famed for her wholesome onscreen persona, Day starred in popular 1950s and ’60s movies such as “Pillow Talk,” Alfred Hitchcock’s “The Man Who Knew Too Much” and “Move Over, Darling.”
The Doris Day Animal Foundation confirmed that its founder had died Monday at her Carmel Valley, California, home. The foundation said she was surrounded by close friends.
Also Read: Peggy Lipton of 'Mod Squad' and 'Twin Peaks' Dies at 72
According to the foundation press statement, nearly 300 fans gathered in Carmel last month to celebrate Day’s birthday on April 3. The actress had been in excellent physical health for her age, until recently contracting a serious case of pneumonia.
Born Mary Ann Von Kappelhoff in Cincinnati, Ohio, she began her singing career at age 15 and soon...
Famed for her wholesome onscreen persona, Day starred in popular 1950s and ’60s movies such as “Pillow Talk,” Alfred Hitchcock’s “The Man Who Knew Too Much” and “Move Over, Darling.”
The Doris Day Animal Foundation confirmed that its founder had died Monday at her Carmel Valley, California, home. The foundation said she was surrounded by close friends.
Also Read: Peggy Lipton of 'Mod Squad' and 'Twin Peaks' Dies at 72
According to the foundation press statement, nearly 300 fans gathered in Carmel last month to celebrate Day’s birthday on April 3. The actress had been in excellent physical health for her age, until recently contracting a serious case of pneumonia.
Born Mary Ann Von Kappelhoff in Cincinnati, Ohio, she began her singing career at age 15 and soon...
- 5/13/2019
- by Debbie Emery
- The Wrap
Doris Day celebrates her 97th birthday on April 3, 2019. The Oscar-nominated star excelled in musicals and romantic comedies, bringing a sense of edge and humor to her squeaky-clean demeanor. Although she made only a handful of movies between 1948 and 1968, several of her titles remain classics. In honor of her birthday, let’s take a look back at 20 of her greatest films, ranked worst to best.
SEERock Hudson movies: 12 greatest films ranked worst to best
Born in 1922, Day got her start as a band singer, making her film debut with the musical comedy “Romance on the High Seas” (1948). He vocal talents benefited her in such films as “Calamity Jane” (1953), “Love Me or Leave Me” (1955), and “The Pajama Game” (1957), and she often sang the title tunes to her films.
She is perhaps best remembered for three frothy romantic comedies she made with sly, square-jawed leading man Rock Hudson and sardonic sidekick Tony Randall...
SEERock Hudson movies: 12 greatest films ranked worst to best
Born in 1922, Day got her start as a band singer, making her film debut with the musical comedy “Romance on the High Seas” (1948). He vocal talents benefited her in such films as “Calamity Jane” (1953), “Love Me or Leave Me” (1955), and “The Pajama Game” (1957), and she often sang the title tunes to her films.
She is perhaps best remembered for three frothy romantic comedies she made with sly, square-jawed leading man Rock Hudson and sardonic sidekick Tony Randall...
- 4/3/2019
- by Zach Laws and Chris Beachum
- Gold Derby
Lots of musicians have found success on the big screen, bagging some hardware for their efforts to boot. So Lady Gaga wouldn’t be the first singer to win a Golden Globe for acting if she takes home the Best Film Drama Actress prize for “A Star Is Born” — but she would be in that category.
Several performers who first achieved stardom and established themselves as singers have been nominated for Best Film Drama Actress, but none have won. They include Doris Day, Diana Ross, Barbra Streisand, Cher, Courtney Love and Bjork.
See ‘A Star Is Born’ going drama at the Golden Globes is a savvy move for Lady Gaga’s Oscar hopes
Unsurprisingly, singers have won in the Best Film Comedy/Musical Actress category, including Streisand and Cher. Perhaps the mere appearance of the word “musical” in the category title makes the Hollywood Foreign Press Association members more inclined...
Several performers who first achieved stardom and established themselves as singers have been nominated for Best Film Drama Actress, but none have won. They include Doris Day, Diana Ross, Barbra Streisand, Cher, Courtney Love and Bjork.
See ‘A Star Is Born’ going drama at the Golden Globes is a savvy move for Lady Gaga’s Oscar hopes
Unsurprisingly, singers have won in the Best Film Comedy/Musical Actress category, including Streisand and Cher. Perhaps the mere appearance of the word “musical” in the category title makes the Hollywood Foreign Press Association members more inclined...
- 11/30/2018
- by Joyce Eng
- Gold Derby
"Psycho" star John Gavin -- who appeared in several other classics such as "Midnight Lace" and was the Us Ambassador to Mexico under Ronald Reagan -- has died. John -- who played Sam Loomis in the classic horror flick -- died Friday morning ... TMZ has learned. We're told he succumbed to complications from pneumonia and had battled leukemia for a long time. John was first hospitalized just before Christmas and died just before 6 Am Friday at his Beverly Hills home,...
- 2/9/2018
- by TMZ Staff
- TMZ
We have another busy week of Blu-ray and DVD releases to look forward to, with 20 different titles coming home on Tuesday. For those who may have missed it in theaters, Gore Verbinski’s wildly surreal tale of psychological horror, A Cure For Wellness, is coming out on both Blu-ray and DVD courtesy of 20th Century Fox. We also have several indie horror films arriving on June 6th, including The Axe Murders of the Villisca, Aaron’s Blood, Prisoner X, Let Me Make You A Martyr, and Manhattan Undying.
Fahrenheit 451, based on the classic Ray Bradbury story, is being resurrected on DVD in time for its 50th anniversary this week, and for those of you Riverdale fans out there, you might want to check out Mill Creek Entertainment's re-release (this time with digital) of Archie’s Weird Mysteries: The Complete Series.
Other notable home entertainment releases for...
Fahrenheit 451, based on the classic Ray Bradbury story, is being resurrected on DVD in time for its 50th anniversary this week, and for those of you Riverdale fans out there, you might want to check out Mill Creek Entertainment's re-release (this time with digital) of Archie’s Weird Mysteries: The Complete Series.
Other notable home entertainment releases for...
- 6/6/2017
- by Heather Wixson
- DailyDead
Joan Crawford controls every aspect of this glamorous, Oscar nominated noir about a murderous marriage double-cross. Good acting enlivens a by-the-book, gimmick-laden plot, with every moment designed to flatter the star.
Sudden Fear
Blu-ray
The Cohen Film Collection
1952 / B&W / 1:37 flat Academy / 110 min. / Street Date December 13, 2016 / 34.99
Starring Joan Crawford, Jack Palance, Gloria Grahame, Bruce Bennett, Virginia Huston, Touch Connors, Bess Flowers, Taylor Holmes, Lewis Martin, Arthur Space.
Cinematography Charles Lang
Film Editor Leon Barsha
Art Director Boris Leven
Original Music Elmer Bernstein
Written by Lenore Coffee, Robert Smith from a novel by Edna Sherry
Produced by Joseph Kaufman
Directed by David Miller
Reviewed by Glenn Erickson
The Joan Crawford movie Sudden Fear is an efficient and stylish thriller. Although it’s technically film noir, its story of a two-way murder frame-up is sublimated to the actress’s overpowering personality. It’s the first movie where Crawford was able to...
Sudden Fear
Blu-ray
The Cohen Film Collection
1952 / B&W / 1:37 flat Academy / 110 min. / Street Date December 13, 2016 / 34.99
Starring Joan Crawford, Jack Palance, Gloria Grahame, Bruce Bennett, Virginia Huston, Touch Connors, Bess Flowers, Taylor Holmes, Lewis Martin, Arthur Space.
Cinematography Charles Lang
Film Editor Leon Barsha
Art Director Boris Leven
Original Music Elmer Bernstein
Written by Lenore Coffee, Robert Smith from a novel by Edna Sherry
Produced by Joseph Kaufman
Directed by David Miller
Reviewed by Glenn Erickson
The Joan Crawford movie Sudden Fear is an efficient and stylish thriller. Although it’s technically film noir, its story of a two-way murder frame-up is sublimated to the actress’s overpowering personality. It’s the first movie where Crawford was able to...
- 12/3/2016
- by Glenn Erickson
- Trailers from Hell
Coleen Gray in 'The Sleeping City' with Richard Conte. Coleen Gray after Fox: B Westerns and films noirs (See previous post: “Coleen Gray Actress: From Red River to Film Noir 'Good Girls'.”) Regarding the demise of her Fox career (the year after her divorce from Rod Amateau), Coleen Gray would recall for Confessions of a Scream Queen author Matt Beckoff: I thought that was the end of the world and that I was a total failure. I was a mass of insecurity and depended on agents. … Whether it was an 'A' picture or a 'B' picture didn't bother me. It could be a Western movie, a sci-fi film. A job was a job. You did the best with the script that you had. Fox had dropped Gray at a time of dramatic upheavals in the American film industry: fast-dwindling box office receipts as a result of competition from television,...
- 10/15/2015
- by Andre Soares
- Alt Film Guide
Honorary Award: Gloria Swanson, Rita Hayworth among dozens of women bypassed by the Academy (photo: Honorary Award non-winner Gloria Swanson in 'Sunset Blvd.') (See previous post: "Honorary Oscars: Doris Day, Danielle Darrieux Snubbed.") Part three of this four-part article about the Academy of Motion Picture Arts and Sciences' Honorary Award bypassing women basically consists of a long, long — and for the most part quite prestigious — list of deceased women who, some way or other, left their mark on the film world. Some of the names found below are still well known; others were huge in their day, but are now all but forgotten. Yet, just because most people (and the media) suffer from long-term — and even medium-term — memory loss, that doesn't mean these women were any less deserving of an Honorary Oscar. So, among the distinguished female film professionals in Hollywood and elsewhere who have passed away without...
- 9/4/2014
- by Andre Soares
- Alt Film Guide
The self-admitted Hollywood nomad was 67 years old. Susan was likely best known to horror fans for her role as Aunt Cheryl in Night Warning (which also featured a young Bill Paxton), but her genre credentials stretch much, much further than the William Asher directed pic. Susan starred in numerous cult classics and favorably regarded works such as Midnight Lace, What's Up, Hideous Sun Demon, Flesh+Blood, The Offspring, Rockula and Poison Ivy: The New Seduction. Her television work was expansive as well, as she appeared in multiple horror series’ including The Hitchhiker, as well as the insanely popular Tales from the Crypt.
- 6/19/2012
- Best-Horror-Movies.com
As a little girl I loved going to the Studio Drive In in Culver City where we lived.
My older sister and I would get into our pajamas, my little baby brother would be in the car seat for babies in the front seat between the driver and the passenger. We brought out own fried chicken ot eat for dinner. We'd go get popcorn or bonbons or a Holloway sucker (the best!) at the concessions stand ahead of the movies or at the intermission if we were still awake and we'd watch a double bill – usually a western and or a comedy.
When we got older and at the age of 16, we all got cars of our own. Mine was a 53 Ford convertible repainted royal blue. Groups of us would go to the Olympic Drive In and would sneak others in in the trunk.
When I was really little my father and mother would take my sister and me to the movies. I was always making my father take me to the bathroom. That started my habit of sitting on the aisle. As a film buyer it was known as the acquisitions seat, but to my mind, the quick getaway was to the Ladies Room. And as a three or four year old, I was always asking my mother and sister, "is this real?" I was so literal minded as a child I could never figure out why the song said “Let Freedom Ring”. How could Freedom Ring? A ring was jewelry. Ring like a bell…but Freedom is not a bell. Moving on…
We saw this Bob Hope film. He was a gambler. And he put a gun into his mouth. Instead of shooting his brains out, he took a bite and it was chocolate. That really threw my literal mind into a loop. What was real? How did that happen? The movie was called Sorrowful Jones. The joke was something I had a hard time understanding. The same with the silents which we saw at the Silent Movie Theater. Laurel and Hardy were always hitting each other and falling; Charlie Chase was always in trouble as was Charlie Chaplin. I never understood what was funny about all the accidents, falling down, hitting each other and would have terrible anxiety attacks at the silent movies. I liked movies like Francis the Talking Mule. That was funny to my childish mind.
For those wonderful Disney cartoons like Cinderella or Alice in Wonderland, Robin Hood or Peter Pan, my father would take us to Beverly Hills and we would stand in line for the Fine Arts Theater. At the corner was a shoe store which only sold sample sizes (4 ½). I would admire their high heeled shoes and couldn’t wait for the time that I would be older and could wear them. Fortunately, when my foot hit the 4 ½ size, I was in high school and so I could buy the shoes for all the formal dances we attended.
Fine Arts Theater
Every Saturday my sister and I, and later my brother would go to the ten-cent Saturday afternoon matinee at the Meralta with a newsreel, previews, cartoon, and a main feature. The Meralta introduced me to The Dream of Wild Horses.[1]"Meralta" was derived from owners' Pearl Merrill and Laura Peralta's surnames. They lived above the new plush theater. But the movies there were mostly horror and genre. My brother always went there for the latest horror film.
Meralta Theater, Culver City
If we didn’t go to the Meralta, we’d go to the Culver. When we were looking to meet other kids from other schools, we'd go to the much fancier Culver Theater.
The Culver had great films, like Little Women, Gone with the Wind, Gentlemen Prefer Blonds, How to Marry a Millionaire, River of No Return, There’s No Business Like Show Business, Easter Parade, A Date with Judy (My sister’s name!), The Three Musketeers, Words and Music, Force of Evil, Neptune’s Daughter, Adam’s Rib, Showboat, An American in Paris, Lili, Giant, Rebel Without a Cause. Looking at this list, except for the Marilyn Monroe movies which 20th Century Fox owned and the two James Dean films which Warner Bros. owned, all of the films were MGM films. That makes perfect sense because Culver City was a company town.
The Culver also had “loges”. These were fancier red velvet seats with ashtrays above the large aisle you would find on entering the theater and choosing your seat – below unless you went up to the loge. There teenagers would "make out" and bad girls and guys would smoke (Excuse my racism, but as a Jew growing up in a working class wasp neighborhood, I learned these kids were either Pachucos or white trash.) Not that we were such good Jewish kids...there weren’t any Jewish kids that I knew of who went to the movies. My friends were my school friends, and they were all white working class kids. If people weren’t working for Hughes Aircraft, they were in the crafts at MGM. We had one bit actor living down the street named Cameron Mitchell. And it was a pretty racist neighborhood…anti-Semitism was learned at home and in Sunday Schools where kids invited me (called a Christ Killer) to learn about bringing Jesus into my heart and there were no blacks that I ever saw. The Pachucos lived in another neighborhood and we’d see them in the movies, shopping or at the middle and high school next to my elementary school. Asians? There might have been a Chinese restaurant, but I don’t recall seeing Asians in school or at the theater or shopping.
Jewish kids made up my group of friends when I got to junior high and we had moved to Beverlywood from Culver City; 90% of the school was Jewish. Our parents would still drop us at the movies and we would go to Saturday matinees at the Picfair on Pico and Fairfax which eventually burned down around the time of the Watts Riots, or to the Lido on Pico.
The Picfair Theater burned down in 1965.
We’d see Academy Award winning films at the Pickfair. We'd cry at Carousel, Oklahoma, Midnight Lace, Peyton Place, Imitation of Life. Great films! Or we'd sometimes go to the other theater in Pico called Lido. It was just so boring. Maybe they showed Marty there or Country Girl and I wasn't up for slow drama.
For really fancy movies which held premieres, like Around the World in 80 Days, we would go to the Carthay Circle Theater. Of course I’d go in the days after the premiere itself. Rarely – though sometimes we’d go to the Hollywood palaces, Grauman’s Chinese, The Egyptian or Pantages Theaters on Hollywood Boulevard. The best thing about Grauman’s Chinese was the ladies room with a room filled with mirrors and little alcoves to sit and put on lipstick. They even had lipstick blotters, white heavy weight paper shaped like your lips to blot the lipstick.
In 1959 The Fine Arts Theatre 8556 Wilshire Boulevardin Beverly Hills showed Room at the Top, (‘The Most Daring Film in a Decade’), and it played there for over six months. I was in the 10th grade and went to see it. I liked it but am not sure how much I understood.
In high school we discovered Le Chein Andalou and the Coronet and Baronet theater where Charles Laughton had played in Brecht's premiere play Galileo produced by John Houseman. Sometimes they didn't have enough foreign films (like one about a woman who turned into a panther at night) and they'd show psychological teaching films like "Folie a Deux" when madness is shared by two, in this 20 minute short it was a mother and daughter. They'd show films on Schizophrenia, etc. and it made me want to study psychology. We saw all of Bergman, Renoir and saw La Strada and La Dolce Vida. When I moved back east and went to Brandeis then movie going got great! Truffaut, Godard, Chabrol, Wajda's Ashes and Diamonds. After that I saw every Wajda film and even knew how to pronounce his name. But after Man of Marble or Man of Steel I started to get disinterested. I have no idea what theaters we went to in Cambridge or New York except for the Bleecker Street Theater where we’d often go for the weekend.
For dates we’d go up the street (Beverwil) to Beverly Hills to the Beverly Theater or the Beverly Canon. There they had programs printed for the movies (The Young Lions). Afterward we’d go to Blum’s[2] for their crunchy cake or Wil Wrights Ice Cream Parlor for ice cream sundaes.
And a theater we would always forget except when some exceptional foreign film was showing there, was the Vagabond, way down on Wilshire Blvd. toward downtown.
[1]Wikipedia: The 1953 children's film Crin-Blanc, English title White Mane, portrayed the horses and the region. A short black-and-white film directed by Albert Lamorisse, director of Le ballon rouge (1956), Crin-blanc won the 1953 Prix Jean Vigo and the short film Grand Prix at the 1953 Cannes Film Festival, as well as awards at Warsaw and Rome.[10] In 1960 Denys Colomb Daunant, writer and actor for Crin-blanc, made the documentary Le Songe des Chevaux Sauvages, "Dream of the Wild Horses". It featured Camargue horses and slow motion photography, and won the Small Golden Berlin Bear at the 1960 Berlin International Film Festival.[11]
[2]Blum's was a pink spun sugar fantasy come to life. It had a gift shop. It had shocking pink banquettes. It had surly waitresses. And it had cake. Not those plastic looking, multi colored and tasteless layered cakes offered in cafes around Union Square. No. They had Blum's Famous Coffee Crunch cake. (This legendary cake is so memorable that Nancy Silverton has included a recipe for it in her latest cookbook.)
Blum's was partly a restaurant for the ladies who didn't work and spent their days going downtown to shop, meet friends and get home before the children came home from school. (http://www.culinarymuse.com/2005/10/blums_where_are.html)...
My older sister and I would get into our pajamas, my little baby brother would be in the car seat for babies in the front seat between the driver and the passenger. We brought out own fried chicken ot eat for dinner. We'd go get popcorn or bonbons or a Holloway sucker (the best!) at the concessions stand ahead of the movies or at the intermission if we were still awake and we'd watch a double bill – usually a western and or a comedy.
When we got older and at the age of 16, we all got cars of our own. Mine was a 53 Ford convertible repainted royal blue. Groups of us would go to the Olympic Drive In and would sneak others in in the trunk.
When I was really little my father and mother would take my sister and me to the movies. I was always making my father take me to the bathroom. That started my habit of sitting on the aisle. As a film buyer it was known as the acquisitions seat, but to my mind, the quick getaway was to the Ladies Room. And as a three or four year old, I was always asking my mother and sister, "is this real?" I was so literal minded as a child I could never figure out why the song said “Let Freedom Ring”. How could Freedom Ring? A ring was jewelry. Ring like a bell…but Freedom is not a bell. Moving on…
We saw this Bob Hope film. He was a gambler. And he put a gun into his mouth. Instead of shooting his brains out, he took a bite and it was chocolate. That really threw my literal mind into a loop. What was real? How did that happen? The movie was called Sorrowful Jones. The joke was something I had a hard time understanding. The same with the silents which we saw at the Silent Movie Theater. Laurel and Hardy were always hitting each other and falling; Charlie Chase was always in trouble as was Charlie Chaplin. I never understood what was funny about all the accidents, falling down, hitting each other and would have terrible anxiety attacks at the silent movies. I liked movies like Francis the Talking Mule. That was funny to my childish mind.
For those wonderful Disney cartoons like Cinderella or Alice in Wonderland, Robin Hood or Peter Pan, my father would take us to Beverly Hills and we would stand in line for the Fine Arts Theater. At the corner was a shoe store which only sold sample sizes (4 ½). I would admire their high heeled shoes and couldn’t wait for the time that I would be older and could wear them. Fortunately, when my foot hit the 4 ½ size, I was in high school and so I could buy the shoes for all the formal dances we attended.
Fine Arts Theater
Every Saturday my sister and I, and later my brother would go to the ten-cent Saturday afternoon matinee at the Meralta with a newsreel, previews, cartoon, and a main feature. The Meralta introduced me to The Dream of Wild Horses.[1]"Meralta" was derived from owners' Pearl Merrill and Laura Peralta's surnames. They lived above the new plush theater. But the movies there were mostly horror and genre. My brother always went there for the latest horror film.
Meralta Theater, Culver City
If we didn’t go to the Meralta, we’d go to the Culver. When we were looking to meet other kids from other schools, we'd go to the much fancier Culver Theater.
The Culver had great films, like Little Women, Gone with the Wind, Gentlemen Prefer Blonds, How to Marry a Millionaire, River of No Return, There’s No Business Like Show Business, Easter Parade, A Date with Judy (My sister’s name!), The Three Musketeers, Words and Music, Force of Evil, Neptune’s Daughter, Adam’s Rib, Showboat, An American in Paris, Lili, Giant, Rebel Without a Cause. Looking at this list, except for the Marilyn Monroe movies which 20th Century Fox owned and the two James Dean films which Warner Bros. owned, all of the films were MGM films. That makes perfect sense because Culver City was a company town.
The Culver also had “loges”. These were fancier red velvet seats with ashtrays above the large aisle you would find on entering the theater and choosing your seat – below unless you went up to the loge. There teenagers would "make out" and bad girls and guys would smoke (Excuse my racism, but as a Jew growing up in a working class wasp neighborhood, I learned these kids were either Pachucos or white trash.) Not that we were such good Jewish kids...there weren’t any Jewish kids that I knew of who went to the movies. My friends were my school friends, and they were all white working class kids. If people weren’t working for Hughes Aircraft, they were in the crafts at MGM. We had one bit actor living down the street named Cameron Mitchell. And it was a pretty racist neighborhood…anti-Semitism was learned at home and in Sunday Schools where kids invited me (called a Christ Killer) to learn about bringing Jesus into my heart and there were no blacks that I ever saw. The Pachucos lived in another neighborhood and we’d see them in the movies, shopping or at the middle and high school next to my elementary school. Asians? There might have been a Chinese restaurant, but I don’t recall seeing Asians in school or at the theater or shopping.
Jewish kids made up my group of friends when I got to junior high and we had moved to Beverlywood from Culver City; 90% of the school was Jewish. Our parents would still drop us at the movies and we would go to Saturday matinees at the Picfair on Pico and Fairfax which eventually burned down around the time of the Watts Riots, or to the Lido on Pico.
The Picfair Theater burned down in 1965.
We’d see Academy Award winning films at the Pickfair. We'd cry at Carousel, Oklahoma, Midnight Lace, Peyton Place, Imitation of Life. Great films! Or we'd sometimes go to the other theater in Pico called Lido. It was just so boring. Maybe they showed Marty there or Country Girl and I wasn't up for slow drama.
For really fancy movies which held premieres, like Around the World in 80 Days, we would go to the Carthay Circle Theater. Of course I’d go in the days after the premiere itself. Rarely – though sometimes we’d go to the Hollywood palaces, Grauman’s Chinese, The Egyptian or Pantages Theaters on Hollywood Boulevard. The best thing about Grauman’s Chinese was the ladies room with a room filled with mirrors and little alcoves to sit and put on lipstick. They even had lipstick blotters, white heavy weight paper shaped like your lips to blot the lipstick.
In 1959 The Fine Arts Theatre 8556 Wilshire Boulevardin Beverly Hills showed Room at the Top, (‘The Most Daring Film in a Decade’), and it played there for over six months. I was in the 10th grade and went to see it. I liked it but am not sure how much I understood.
In high school we discovered Le Chein Andalou and the Coronet and Baronet theater where Charles Laughton had played in Brecht's premiere play Galileo produced by John Houseman. Sometimes they didn't have enough foreign films (like one about a woman who turned into a panther at night) and they'd show psychological teaching films like "Folie a Deux" when madness is shared by two, in this 20 minute short it was a mother and daughter. They'd show films on Schizophrenia, etc. and it made me want to study psychology. We saw all of Bergman, Renoir and saw La Strada and La Dolce Vida. When I moved back east and went to Brandeis then movie going got great! Truffaut, Godard, Chabrol, Wajda's Ashes and Diamonds. After that I saw every Wajda film and even knew how to pronounce his name. But after Man of Marble or Man of Steel I started to get disinterested. I have no idea what theaters we went to in Cambridge or New York except for the Bleecker Street Theater where we’d often go for the weekend.
For dates we’d go up the street (Beverwil) to Beverly Hills to the Beverly Theater or the Beverly Canon. There they had programs printed for the movies (The Young Lions). Afterward we’d go to Blum’s[2] for their crunchy cake or Wil Wrights Ice Cream Parlor for ice cream sundaes.
And a theater we would always forget except when some exceptional foreign film was showing there, was the Vagabond, way down on Wilshire Blvd. toward downtown.
[1]Wikipedia: The 1953 children's film Crin-Blanc, English title White Mane, portrayed the horses and the region. A short black-and-white film directed by Albert Lamorisse, director of Le ballon rouge (1956), Crin-blanc won the 1953 Prix Jean Vigo and the short film Grand Prix at the 1953 Cannes Film Festival, as well as awards at Warsaw and Rome.[10] In 1960 Denys Colomb Daunant, writer and actor for Crin-blanc, made the documentary Le Songe des Chevaux Sauvages, "Dream of the Wild Horses". It featured Camargue horses and slow motion photography, and won the Small Golden Berlin Bear at the 1960 Berlin International Film Festival.[11]
[2]Blum's was a pink spun sugar fantasy come to life. It had a gift shop. It had shocking pink banquettes. It had surly waitresses. And it had cake. Not those plastic looking, multi colored and tasteless layered cakes offered in cafes around Union Square. No. They had Blum's Famous Coffee Crunch cake. (This legendary cake is so memorable that Nancy Silverton has included a recipe for it in her latest cookbook.)
Blum's was partly a restaurant for the ladies who didn't work and spent their days going downtown to shop, meet friends and get home before the children came home from school. (http://www.culinarymuse.com/2005/10/blums_where_are.html)...
- 3/27/2012
- by Sydney Levine
- Sydney's Buzz
Turner Classic Movies (TCM), Sony Masterworks and Warner Home Video (Whv) are teaming up on a multi-tiered celebration of one of Hollywood’s most beloved stars: Doris Day. The celebration includes a new four-movie DVD package of memorable Day performance from Whv (in stores now); a brand new double CD set from Sony Masterworks (releasing April 3), with a collection of 31 songs curated by Day herself; and a five-night salute on TCM (April 2-6) This multi-pronged Doris Day tribute is timed to coincide with her birthday on April 3.
.I am so thrilled to have the opportunity to work with Sony Music on this collection of my recordings. I sang hundreds of songs, but because I was so busy singing, I rarely had the time to be involved in the compilation of the albums. So in this collection are some of my favorites, ones that I loved singing, and I hope you like them too,...
.I am so thrilled to have the opportunity to work with Sony Music on this collection of my recordings. I sang hundreds of songs, but because I was so busy singing, I rarely had the time to be involved in the compilation of the albums. So in this collection are some of my favorites, ones that I loved singing, and I hope you like them too,...
- 3/14/2012
- by Michelle McCue
- WeAreMovieGeeks.com
Doris Day may have been — once again — absurdly bypassed by the Academy of Motion Picture Arts and Sciences' Board of Governors, but at least she'll be getting some much deserved recognition from the Los Angeles Film Critics Association (Lafca). Day, 87, has been named the recipient of the L.A. Critics' Career Achievement Award of 2011 — or 2012, as the ceremony will take place early next year. (This year's winners will be announced on December 11.) The first Lafca award winners were announced in 1975. The annual Career Achievement Award was instituted the following year. Since then, a mere four women have been recognized for their contributions to the motion picture industry: actresses Barbara Stanwyck (1981) and Myrna Loy (1983), editor Dede Allen (1999), and now Doris Day. Male recipients — sometimes two per year — range from auteur John Cassavetes to comedian/auteur Jerry Lewis, from producer John Calley to silent-era pioneer Allan Dwan, from animator Chuck Jones to filmmaker Akira Kurosawa.
- 10/30/2011
- by Andre Soares
- Alt Film Guide
Doris Day, Duffy Doris Day, 87, and Duffy in a new photo to be used by Sony Music to promote Day's upcoming record "My Heart," the legendary actress-singer's 29th album and her first after a seventeen-year hiatus. "My Heart" is to be released in the United Kingdom on Sept. 5. It'll be available on CD and digital-download formats. "It was brought to my attention that the recordings were in storage and Sony was interested in releasing them," Day explained. "So I listened to them and at first had some misgivings, but after they were re-mastered, I liked them and hoped my fans would too." Day added that "these are the tunes that reflect my love of animals and my love for my son." The album features the track "Life Is Just a Bowl of Cherries," produced by Day's son Terry Melcher, who died of cancer in 2004. Doris Day, who began her film...
- 8/31/2011
- by Andre Soares
- Alt Film Guide
This gripping thriller, part of the BFI's Bogarde retrospective, daringly smashed through 1961's homosexual taboos, but has weathered best as a study of blackmail and paranoia
As part of a retrospective season dedicated to that utterly unique English actor Dirk Bogarde, BFI Southbank is this week screening his 1961 film Victim. Bogarde stars as Melville Farr, a brilliant, upwardly mobile barrister with a dark past: he's an in-the-closet gay man who risks exposure (in the days when it was illegal) by taking on a homosexual blackmail ring. It was co-written by Janet Green – a thriller/whodunnit specialist who counted Midnight Lace among her credits – and directed by Basil Dearden.
What a gripping film – melodramatic and self-conscious, yes, but forthright and bold. Its tendency to show homosexuality as a tragic, pitiable quirk of nature may now look like condescension, but for the time this was real risk-taking. It has some of the...
As part of a retrospective season dedicated to that utterly unique English actor Dirk Bogarde, BFI Southbank is this week screening his 1961 film Victim. Bogarde stars as Melville Farr, a brilliant, upwardly mobile barrister with a dark past: he's an in-the-closet gay man who risks exposure (in the days when it was illegal) by taking on a homosexual blackmail ring. It was co-written by Janet Green – a thriller/whodunnit specialist who counted Midnight Lace among her credits – and directed by Basil Dearden.
What a gripping film – melodramatic and self-conscious, yes, but forthright and bold. Its tendency to show homosexuality as a tragic, pitiable quirk of nature may now look like condescension, but for the time this was real risk-taking. It has some of the...
- 8/8/2011
- by Peter Bradshaw
- The Guardian - Film News
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