And here are a few more NBNW pictures.
I love these newspaper headlines. Must have been fun writing and printing them.
If you had your choice of props from your favourite films, what would you choose ?
There’s always the Falcon or the Ruby Slippers on many fans’ lists, but what would you love to have.
That cheque signed by ‘Rick’… CASABLANCA.
Or the Letters of Transit?
I’d take the clock or the sheriff’s badge.HIGH NOON.
From THE LETTER, the letter of course. Held by the widow of the murdered man, the wonderful Gale Sondergaard. It incriminates Bette Davis and she attempts to buy it.
Gale Sondergaard holds the letter.
Herbert Marshall, Bette Davis.
Sterling Hayden.
From Johnny Guitar, I’d take Johnny’s guitar, or Vienna’s red kerchief .
Joan Crawford .JOHNNY GUITAR
Eve’s Sarah Siddons award. ALL ABOUT EVE.
And from NOTORIOUS , how about the key to the wine cellar.
Ingrid Bergman.NOTORIOUS.
First published in 2019, I’ve been reading the 2021 paperback edition of Hitchcock and the Censors by John Billheimer. And what an interesting read it is. How Alfred Hitchcock dealt with the Production Code , circumventing yet placating the censors to whom all screenplays had to be submitted before filming could begin.
The Motion Picture Production Code was an industry set of guidelines for self censorship of content. It lasted from 1934 through to 1968. It was partly begun to avoid government imposed censorship and was preferred by the studios in preference to individual states censoring movies.
Prior to 1934, Will Hays ,president of the Motion Picture Producers and Distributors of America , had formed a committee of studio heads to collaborate on a list of ‘Dont’s’ and ‘Be Carefuls’ reflecting items typically challenged by local censorship boards.
Among the ‘dont’s’ were white slavery, childbirth, nudity,profanity, ridicule of the clergy, make gambling and drunkenness attractive, ridicule of public officials.
The Production Code administration ( led by Joseph Breen from 1934 ) kept meticulous records which are now held at the Margaret Herrick Library of the Motion Picture Association of America.
The author has been able to access these files and presents a detailed picture of how a Hollywood director like Hitchcock managed to deal with these people who determined what the public would be allowed to see on screen.
From a modern perspective, it is fascinating to see how film censorship worked in the classic era, and the time and effort required to maintain what a writer or director wished to show on the screen and yet comply with the Code.
The banks who lent money to the studios required a letter from the Code administration saying scripts were acceptable before filming could be financed.
The British Board of Film Censors pre-dated the Hollywood code by ten years, so Hitchcock had experience of British censorship before he moved to Hollywood.
In the 1930s, the British censors had political considerations as well as social, so The 39 Steps and The Lady Vanishes had villains of unspecified (rather than Third Reich) nationalities.
( In 1933, the BBFC refuses to pass any films that might upset the Nazi regime in Berlin.)
Under the Code, Hitchcock made 27 films, from REBECCA in 1940 to TORN CURTAIN in 1966.
It usually took nearly two months to resolve issues and get final script approval. The Code letter of approval would end with : “You understand of course that our final judgement will be based on the finished picture.”
Thanks to the Code office’s record keeping, we can see the demands imposed on each of Hitchcock’s films and his responses.
Here are some examples of the censorship Hitchcock had to contend with:
We know that working with David O. Selznick was not easy for Hitchcock. Selznick was vocal in his dislike for the Code – “this insane, inane and outmoded code.”
Quoting the author, “Hitchcock was more circumspect, avoiding direct confrontation,proceeding by misdirection, and in the end, manipulating the censors as slyly as he manipulated moviegoers.”
Joan Fontaine, Judith Anderson. REBECCA.
With Rebecca, Joe Breen (head of the Production Code office), even before Selznick purchased the right to “Rebecca “, said, “This man murders his wife, covers up the evidence, identifies another body as his wife’s, remarries, and finally gets off Scot-free. It is a story of high lighted, unpunished murder…..and cannot be approved.”
So Hitchcock and the writers were forced to change the story – ‘Rebecca’ now dies as a result of an accident .
Cary Grant, Joan Fontaine. SUSPICION.
Suspicion was another example of a novel (“Before The Fact”) having to be changed to suit the Code. In the book, the Cary Grant character is a philanderer and embezzler as well as a murderer.
Successful murderers were a Production Code no-no, and RKO were also reluctant to portray Cary Grant as a killer.
The shot of the illuminated fatal glass of milk which Cary takes upstairs to Joan remained in the film but it no longer contained poison .
Hitchcock had hoped to get round the censors by having ‘Lina’ ( Joan Fontaine) drink the poison after giving ‘Johnny’ (Cary Grant) a letter to post to her mother explaining he is a killer.
But the objection to having Cary as a murderer won the day , and Hitchcock’s highly dramatic ending to the film was taken away.
Carole Lombard, Robert Montgomery. MR AND MRS SMITH
Mr. And Mrs. Smith was a surprising change for Hitchcock, a romantic comedy, but still the censors found objections:
“The gag with the plumbing must NOT suggest the flushing of the toilet.”
Other objections included the words stinks, old bat, bedroom slippers and a derogatory reference to the Girl Scouts!
Joseph Cotton, Teresa Wright. SHADOW OF A DOUBT.
The Production Code office asked that the word cyanide be replaced by the generic word poison – ”to avoid giving specific aid to any would-be poisoners in the audience.”
Marlene Dietrich. STAGE FRIGHT.
Cole Porter had written ‘The Laziest Gal in Town’ in 1927. Hitchcock suggested it be used as a showcase for Marlene Dietrich in STAGE FRIGHT.
This song became the primary concern of the censors . “The Breen office, finding both the song and the performance offensive, had the chutzpah to edit the lyrics of one of the most accomplished songwriters of the day.”
The words ‘Let’s Misbehave’ would have to be re-written ,and the word ‘Lord’ ,which occurs twice in the refrain, also needed changing. Cole Porter banished the word ‘Lord’ , so Marlene, instead of singing, ‘And Lord knows, it’s not ‘cause I couldn’t’ , sang ‘And You know, it’s not ‘cause I couldn’t.’
Farley Granger, Robert Walker. STRANGERS ON A TRAIN.
Another example of a script change from the original novel source. In the Patricia Highsmith book, the Granger character does commit the second murder. Hitchcock anticipated production Code objections and made the change.
Grace Kelly, Cary Grant. TO CATCH A THIEF
Following the Code review of the first draft of the script, Joe Breen logged several objections:
Excessive bottom pinching…….The casino scene in which Robie drops a chip down the cleavage of a woman gambler……bikini beachwear and ‘undue breast exposure’….just about everything connected with the fireworks scene including all suggestions of an illicit sex relationship.
The tacked- on ending to VERTIGO can be seen as a bonus feature on the remastered dvd. Fortunately it was scrubbed from the domestic release – but it was the ending seen on foreign screens.
(Hitchcock and writer Samuel Taylor had added a scene to the end of the film to satisfy the censors and show that ‘Gavin Elster’ didn’t get away with his wife’s murder.)
Of course, that ending desecrates the perfect downbeat ending of ‘Scottie’ staring down helplessly from the bell tower.
James Stewart. VERTIGO
Incidentally, I have to agree with the following comments of the author about the plot of VERTIGO:
“The idea that a rich man would hire a friend with a fear of heights to follow a double of the man’s wealthy wife so that the double can drop hints of suicidal tendencies and ultimately lead the friend to a location where his fear of heights will cause him to misread the wife’s murder as suicide, is difficult to comprehend, tricky to recount, and painfully high in the implausibility scale…..”
Cary Grant, Eva Marie Saint. NORTH BY NORTHWEST.
The production Code office had concerns ( of course ):
1. The possible homosexuality of Leonard played by Martin Landau.
2. Roger Thornhill’s status as a twice divorced man. We urge that the dialogue about previous marriages and divorces be eliminated.
3. Any hint that Eve Kendall might be a woman of loose morals…..the girl’s line, “I never Make love on an empty stomach” should be omitted . ( Hitchcock overdubbed the line to , “I never Discuss love on an empty stomach.”
Wolfgang Kieling, Paul Newman. TORN CURTAIN.
Surprisingly, or maybe because the power of the Production Code was waning, the gruesome murder of ‘Gromek’ in TORN CURTAIN remained intact – he is stabbed, hit with a shovel and asphyxiated – very slowly.
The Production Code was replaced in 1968 with a rating system that classified films as G ( for general audiences), M ( for mature audiences) and R ( restricted) and X ( no one under 16 admitted).
These are just some of the examples in the book of what may appear ludicrous to us today.
As the author says, “the harm done by the Production Code was incalculable. Although the censors’ prodding stimulated the director’s creativity in a few instances, on balance his movies were damaged by their interference.”
Mr. Billheimer also makes a important point about what might have been:
”We know what the censors kept out of Hitchcock’s films, but we’ll never know what an unfettered Hitchcock might have accomplished, or what the missing pieces cost the moviegoing public.”
Some of the Code censorious words and ideas seem crazy to us today. The very idea that a group of people should decide what the public should see or not see – the one that stands out for me is from SHADOW OF A DOUBT – the word ‘ cyanide’ couldn’t be used because “it might give specific aid to would-be poisoners in the audience.”!
If you are a Hitchcock fan, or just interested in Hollywood history, this book is a must-read, with a chapter on each film.
John Billheimer can be seen discussing his book in March, 2020 at the Poisoned Pen Bookstore on You Tube.
But I hope any re-issues of the book will find a better cover illustration. (Psycho shower scene I suppose).
Can I also recommend, for all things Hitchcock, the website The Hitchcock Zone .
Birthday wishes to Henry Silva who was 93 last month.
Born in New York, Henry attended the Actors Studio and started on television in 1950 and was active for the next 50 years, finally retiring after the “Ocean’s 11” remake in 2001.
Totally ruthless as one of the killers in The Tall T.
Henry Silva, Frank Sinatra, Laurence Harvey.
Having appeared in the Sinatra starrer, “Ocean’s 11”, Henry also had a part in “The Manchurian Candidate” and Sinatra’s “Sergeants 3”.
Henry starred in Johnny Cool in 1963.
Has anyone seen this one?
With Elizabeth Montgomery. “Johnny Cool.”
Henry as ‘Mr.Moto’ in “The Return of Mr.Moto”, made in England by Lippert Films.
Henry ( who spoke Italian and Spanish) got starring roles in Europe in the 60s and 70s.
He played Doc Holliday in a “Wagon Train” episode in 1965.
As ‘Doc Holliday’
The films of Henry Silva that I particularly like are THE TALL T , THE BRAVADOS ( as the only outlaw to survive Gregory Peck’s vendetta) , and THE MANCHURIAN CANDIDATE.
He had a brooding presence and personality and even in small roles, you remembered him.
REAR WINDOW (1954):
Stella (Thelma Ritter): “Let’s go down to the garden and find out what’s buried there.”
Lisa (Grace Kelly): “Why not. I always wanted to meet Mrs. Thorwald.”
THE MAN WHO CAME TO DINNER (1942):
Sheridan Whiteside ( Monty Woolley) to Nurse Preen ( Mary Wickes): “Go in and read the life of Florence Nightingale and learn how unfitted you are for your chosen profession.”
JOHNNY GUITAR (1954):
Vienna (Joan Crawford): “If you remember, Mr. McIvers gave me twenty four hours to close.
I drew out my own money, paid off my boys and I’m closed. You can’t buy a drink or turn a card.
“I’m sitting in my own house, minding my own business,playing my own piano. I don’t think you can make a crime of that.”
THE HEIRESS:
Catherine Sloper (Olivia de Havilland)
“He’s grown greedier over the years. Before he only wanted my money, now he wants my love as well.
Well, he came to the wrong house – and he came twice. I shall see that he does not come a third time.”
Montgomery Clift.
Monthomery Clift watches a scene from the film.
CAIRO:
Robert Young: “Have you ever been in San Francisco?”
Jeanette MacDonald: “Yes, once with Gable and Tracy, and the joint fell apart.”
Robert Young, Jeanette MacDonald
GARDEN OF EVIL:
Fiske (Richard Widmark): “She took four men like us to a mountain of gold.
Hooker (Gary Cooper): “She took what there was.”
Fiske: Yeah, that’s true. The barrel was empty. She scraped the bottom.”
Gary Cooper,Richard Widmark
NINOTCHKA:
Ninotchka (Greta Garbo): ”We don’t have men like you in my country.”
Leon (Melvyn Douglas): Thank you.”
Ninotchka: “That’s why I believe in the future of my country.”
PEOPLE WILL TALK:
Shunderson (Finlay Currie):
Professor Elwell, you’re a little man. It’s not that you are short. You’re little in the mind and in the heart.
Tonight you tried to make a man little whose boots you couldn’t touch if you stood on tiptoe on the top of the highest mountain in the world.
And as it turned out, you’re even littler than you were before.”
Finlay Currie, Hume Cronyn
And surely one of the most misleading and clever opening scenes in a movie- LAURA (1944):
Waldo Lydecker (Clifton Webb): “I shall never forget the weekend Laura died…….with Laura’s horrible death, I was alone….”
Clifton Webb.
Tim Holt, Humphrey Bogart, Walter Huston.
Mary Astor chooses a record. Wonder what it is.
Gregory Peck, Virginia Mayo. CAPTAIN HORATIO HORNBLOWER.
Autographed image of Irene Dunne.
An autumnal look for Barbara Stanwyck.
Ginger Rogers relaxes at home.1939 .
Another interesting webinar this month from Kensington and Chelsea library. A talk on the career of David Niven by Simone Adams.
David Niven (1910-1983) sometimes claimed he was born in Scotland, but his place of birth was London and he came from an aristocratic family.
After training as an army officer, he joined the Highland Light Infantry but still managed to socialise with the rich and famous. I’m not clear how it came about, but apparently David met Barbara Hutton at a social event and she paid for a trip to the United States for him.
A young officer.
David left the army in 1933 and goes to America where he is welcomed by the English colony in Hollywood. As far as we know, acting was learned ‘on the job’. He wasn’t an instant star, starting off as an extra in Cleopatra, Mutiny On The Bounty.
Landing a contract with Sam Goldwyn (with a starting salary of $100 a week), David started to get good supporting ,then leading roles in films like CHARGE OF THE LIGHT BRIGADE, DAWN PATROL, THE PRISONER OF ZENDA , WUTHERING HEIGHTS.
When war broke out in 1939, he immediately returned to England and joined the army again.
In 1940 he married Primula Rollo and they had two children, David Jr. And Jamie.
In Britain he made several films including The First of the Few, The Way Ahead, A Matter of Life and Death.
With Kim Hunter. A MATTER OF LIFE AND DEATH
Primmie and David
Tragically, Primmie died in an accident whilst at a party at Tyrone Power’s house in 1946.
Two years later, David married again, a Swedish model named Hjordis and they were together till his death.
With Hjordis
With the war’s end, David went back to Hollywood and continued working for Sam Goldwyn. However, he wasn’t happy with some of the roles assigned to him. He didn’t like either Bonnie Prince Charlie or The Elusive Pimpernel.
In 1950 David left Goldwyn and had a brief fallow period before hitting his stride again. By the mid 50s he was on top again, winning an Oscar for Separate Tables in 1958.
With Wendy Hiller.SEPARATE TABLES.
He got into television, forming Four Star Productions with Dick Powell, Ida Lupino, Charles Boyer. And he wrote two very successful memoirs, “The Moon’s a Balloon” and “Bring on the Empty Horses”. And he proved a funny raconteur on TV talk shows.
Sadly, in 1981, David developed motor neurone disease and died in Switzerland in 1983.
My thanks to Niven expert, Simone Adams for her excellent talk and the film clips she showed, including that scene in the cave in THE GUNS OF NAVARONE, where David explodes against Gregory Peck as to how they deal with spy, Gia Scala.
The Guns of NAVARONE
I didn’t know David had played Bertie Wooster in the Fox ‘B’, Thank You,Jeeves”. Sounds fun.
My favourite Niven films are probably “A Matter of Life and Death”, “Carrington V. C.”, “Ask Any Girl, “Please Dont Eat the Daisies” and “The Guns of NAVARONE.”
I look forward to the next Classic Hollywood themed webinar from the library. Thanks to all, and an enjoyable question and answer at the end of the webinar.
The famous low angle shot of Greenstreet
The Maltese Falcon is so memorable, none more so than the fabulous Sydney Greenstreet (1879-1954) as Kaspar Gutman .
Gutman’s search for the Falcon is all consuming and Greenstreet delivers some great lines of dialogue:
“The best goodbyes are short. Adieu.”
“I’m a man who likes talking to a man who likes to talk.”
To which Sam Spade replies: “Swell, will we talk about the black bird.”
Gutman philosophises :
“I do like a man who tells you right out he’s looking out for himself. Don’t we all.”
Amazing to realise this was Sydney Greenstreet’s movie debut at the age of 62. Small wonder he was Oscar nominated. He is simply superb as the obsessed seeker of the Falcon. Kent born Greenstreet had a long stage career (he debuted on Broadway in 1907) and his acting talents translated surprisingly easily to the film camera. He seems completely at home and commands the screen whenever he appears.
Sydney subsequently made 24 films between 1940 and 1949 , when he retired . He had been married since 1918 and had one son.
Gutman is a villain , but a villain who is jovial and eloquent. Even at the end of the film, his cool demeanour only disappears briefly while he is unwrapping what he believes is the bejewelled Falcon. But it’s a fake.
He’s been searching for the Falcon for 17 years, and indicates he’ll start again ( he seems to be well funded!) – except of course Sam Spade turns him in to the police.
By gad, he is a character. You almost wish he could continue his search for the black bird.
Ruth Harriet Louise ( self portrait 1928)
Ruth Harriet Louise (1903-1940) photographed some of the biggest stars in Hollywood in the 1920s. She joined MGM at the age of 22 and became the only woman working as a portrait photographer at a Hollywood studio.
Born Ruth Goldstein in New York, Ruth followed her brother Mark ( director Mark Sandrich) to Hollywood and set up her own portrait studio.
Ruth’s cousin, Carmel Myers, asked Ruth to photograph her whilst Carmel was making BEN HUR in 1925. Louis B. Mayer was impressed and Ruth went to work at MGM.
Carmel Myers
Ruth ran MGM’s portrait studio from 1925 to 1930. Garbo selected her as her exclusive portrait photographer. Clarence Sinclair Bull ran the Stills dept ( taking photographs on the film sets), while Ruth reported directly to Howard Strickling, head of MGM publicity.
In the 1920s, Hollywood was still generally hospitable to woman professionals – and many studio employees and executives were young, like Ruth.
However, in 1930 George Hurrell became the chief MGM portrait photographer and Ruth’s contract was not renewed.
I don’t know the exact circumstances as to why, suddenly,Ruth’s work was devalued to the extent she lost her job. I’ve read top MGM star ,Norma Shearer,preferred Hurrell’s photos.
She was only 25 and yet there is little evidence of her working in the 1930s. Could it be she chose family life after the tough routine at MGM. Her husband was director Leigh Jason (his films include “The Mad Miss Manton “, “The Bride Walks Out” and “Out of the Blue”.)
Ruth had a son who died aged 6 in 1938, and only two years later Ruth died a few days after giving birth to a second son who also died. She was 37 years old.
Garbo
Myrna Loy
William Haines
Bessie Love
John Gilbert
Ramon Novarro
Ruth with Joan Crawford
Mark Sandrich, Ruth Harriet Louise, Leigh Jason. 1928.
Joan Crawford posing as ‘Hamlet’!
Dressed in homage to John Barrymore, 6 stills of Joan Crawford by Ruth appeared in a 1929 edition of Motion Picture magazine under the caption, To wed, or not to wed! ( just before Joan’s marriage to Douglas Fairbanks Jr.)
(John Barrymore had played Hamlet on stage in the early 1920s. In 1933, two short scenes from “Hamlet” were shot in Technicolor for a possible film version . Barrymore was 51 and the proposal for a film was not taken forward.
In the few clips on You Tube, Barrymore is seen with Donald Crisp, Reginald Denny, Irving Pichel.)
The short announcement of Ruth’s departure from MGM.
Nice to see that Ruth’s career is documented in this book, RUTH HARRIET LOUISE AND HOLLYWOOD GLAMOUR PHOTOGRAPHY (2002).
The book makes the point – “…..the extraordinary fact is that she was the most reproduced photographer in America during her tenure at MGM.”
Ruth’s brother ,Mark Sandrich ( the original family name was Sendreich), with Irving Berlin, Ginger Rogers, Fred Astaire on the set of CAREFREE.
Mark had directed 5 of the Astaire/ Rogers films and had started work on BLUE SKIES in 1946 when he died suddenly.
(Mark’s son, Jay Sandrich, died this month aged 89. Jay won many Emmies for his television direction. )
Mark Sandrich
Sandrich’s fedora hat was a constant on his sets.
Mark Sandrich, George Gershwin
“Shine on Harvest Moon” is a ballad written in 1908 by Nora Bayes and Jack Norworth, a vaudevillian duo who premiered it in The Ziegfeld Follies of 1908.
The original sheet music from 1908.
It became a song for the ages, recorded by many singers including Ruth Etting, Bing Crosby, Rosemary Clooney.
Laurel and Hardy did it beautifully in “Flying Deuces” (1939)
In 1944, the fictionalised lives of Bayes and Norworth was filmed as “Shine on Harvest Moon”, with Ann Sheridan and Dennis Morgan. (Nobody can really explain why Ann Sheridan’s singing was dubbed by Lynn Martin.)
Dennis Morgan, Ann Sheridan
Love this number from NANCY GOES to RIO (1950), with Ann Sothern, Jane Powell and a surprisingly nimble Louis Calhern.
