Paul Newman and his wife Joanne Woodward in 1960
Paul Newman and his wife Joanne Woodward in 1960
Joanne Woodward, Paul NewmanPaul Newman and his wife Joanne Woodward in 1960
Ginger Rogers
Ginger Rogers
This portrait by Nickolaus Murray helps to show the grace and beauty that caught the eye of film producers and helped to launch Ginger Rogers to movie stardom.
Born in Virginia McMath in 1911, Rogers began her career on the vaudeville stage at the age of 14 and in the late 1920's, began appearing in minor film roles. In 1933 came her now historic teaming with Fred Astaire in the RKO film "Flying Down To Rio" and to coin an often-used phrase, "a star was born".
Later in her career, Rogers also proved that she could act as well as dance, appearing in well-received dramas such as 1940's "Kitty Foyle" (for which she won an Oscar) and romantic comedies such as "Roxie Hart" ('42) (which the Oscar-winning film "Chicago" would be partially based on 60 years later...)
Stewart Granger in Unter Geiern
Stewart Granger
English actor Stewart Granger (1913–1993) made over 60 films but is mainly associated with heroic and romantic leading roles. He was quoted: “I've never done a film I'm proud of”. Tall, dark, dignified and handsome, Granger became England's top box office star in the 1940’s which attracted Hollywood's attention.
Greta Garbo 1928 for Vanity Fair
Greta Garbo
Edward Steichen's photographs scanned from Masters of Photography Beaumont and Nancy Newhall Copyright 1958
Alice White
Alice White
Began her show biz career not as an actress, but as a scriptgirl and secretary for such stars as Charlie Chaplin. Warner Brothers envisioned her becoming the next Clara Bow and she was often cast in roles that involved singing and dancing, although she wasn't particularly gifted at either. Starred in films for smaller studios as well as co-starring in films such as "Picture Snatcher" and "Jimmy The Gent" opposite James Cagney.
The Barber Shop
W.C. Fields
Paramount, 1933. Directed by Arthur Ripley. Camera: John W. Boyle. With W.C. Fields, Elise Cavanna, Harry Watson, Dagmar Oakland, Fay Holderness, Gloria Velarde.
On movie sets, W.C. Fields kept a vacuum flask of martinis handy; he referred to it as his "lemonade". One day a prankster switched the contents of the flask, filling it with actual lemonade. Upon discovering the prank, Fields was heard to yell, "Who put lemonade in my lemonade?"
Thelma Todd & Groucho Marx
Groucho Marx, Thelma Todd
In "Horse Feathers", Paramount, 1932. Directed by Norman McLeod. With Groucho Marx, Chico Marx, Harpo Marx, Zeppo Marx, Thelma Todd, David Landau, Florine McKenney, James Pierce, Nat Pendleton, Reginald Barlow, Robert Greig, Ben Taggert, Edward J. LeSaint, Edgar Dearing, Vince Barnett.
Leslie Caron
Leslie Caron
French film actress and dancer Leslie Caron (1931) was one of the most famous Hollywood stars in the 1950’s. She is best known for the waif-like gamines in musical films like Gigi, Lili, and An American in Paris. Since the 1960’s she’s also working in the European cinema.
Brigitte Bardot
Brigitte Bardot
Vintage postcard. Photo: Camera Press.
Brigitte Bardot (1934) was the sex kitten of the European cinema. She was every man's idea of the girl he'd like to meet in Paris
Johnny Hallyday
Johnny Hallyday
French postcard by E.D.U.G., nr. 163. Photo: Sam Lévin.
Flamboyant singer and actor Johnny Hallyday (1943) is the father of French Rock and Roll. He was a European teen idol in the 1960’s with record-breaking crowds and mass hysteria, but he never became popular in the English-speaking market. In recent years he has concentrated on being an actor and appeared in more than 35 films.
George Arliss
George Arliss
British postcard in the 'Famous Film Stars' series by Valentine., nr. 7123G.
George Arliss (1868-1946) was the first British actor to win an Academy Award. He was also an author, a playwright, and a Hollywood film maker with an unusual amount of creative control.
Alain Delon
Alain Delon
Dutch postcard by Uitg. Takken, Utrecht, nr. 3980. Photo: N.V. Meteor Film/Speva/Play Art Prod. Publicity still for Christine/Liebelei.
In the late 1950’s and early 1960’s Alain Delon (1935) was the breathtakingly good-looking James Dean of the French cinema. The “male Brigitte Bardot” soon proved to be a magnificent actor in masterpieces by Luchino Visconti and Michelangelo Antonioni. In the late sixties Delon came to epitomise the calm, psychopathic hoodlum in the 'policiers' of Jean-Pierre Melville, staring into the camera like a cat assessing a mouse.
Gaby André
Gaby Andre
French actress Gaby André (1920-1972) was a film star during World War II, who later became the mother of another gorgeous French film star, Carole André.
Albert Préjean
Albert Prejean
French actor Albert Préjean in an image clearly taken from his early sound film, the Franco-German production Sous les toits de Paris (René Clair 1930). Préjean plays a street singer and here distributes the texts of the song 'Sous les toits de Paris'. For a biography and filmography
Iwan Mosjukin
Iwan Mosjukin
Ivan Mozzhukin (1889-1939), spelled Iwan Mosjukin in German, is represented here as Giacomo Casanova. He played the well-known Venetian gentleman, lover, poet and inventor in the homonymous film Casanova (1927), directed by Alexandre Volkoff. For a biography and filmography,
Italian-born French actor and singer Yves Montand
Yves Montand
Gallery for vintage singer Yves Montand
Marcello Mastroianni was Italys favorite leading man in the 1950s
Marcello Mastroianni
Film actor Marcello Mastroianni (1924-1996) was Italy's favorite leading man since the 1950’s, as well as one of the finest actors of the European cinema. In his long and prolific career, Mastroianni almost single handedly defined the contemporary type of Latin lover, then proceeded to redefine it a dozen times and finally parodied it and played it against type.
gallery for vintage actor Marcello Mastroianni
Michèle Morgan
Michele Morgan
Blonde French actress Michèle Morgan (1920) was a classic beauty. She has been one of her country's most popular leading ladies for over five decades. The delicate, sophisticated, and detached star was especially noted for her large, expressive eyes.
Sandra Dickinson as Trillian in the BBC tv version
Sandra Dickinson
Sandra Dickinson who played : Trillian has a degree in mathematics and a doctorate in astrophysics, so when she met Zaphod at a party in Islington, she jumped at the chance to see the galaxy... it was either that or back to the dole queue on Monday.
Easily the most sensible one of the group, it is often quite clear that she knows more about what is going on than either Ford or Zaphod despite their Galactic experience. She alone seems to have some amount of control over Zaphod, as well as constantly doing her best to be nice to Marvin, even after everyone else has given up.
Gallery for british actress Sandra Dickinson
Michael Rennie best known for Klaatu in the science fiction classic The Day the Earth Stood Still 1951
Michael Rennie
English film, television, and stage actor Michael Rennie (1909-1971) was best known for his starring role as the space visitor Klaatu in the science fiction classic The Day the Earth Stood Still (1951).
Eric Alexander Rennie was born in Idle, now a Bradford suburb, in 1909 as the son of James Rennie, who operated a century-old wool mill, and Edith Dobby Rennie. His great-great grandfather, named John Rennie, designed and built New London Bridge. Eric was educated at The Leys, a private school in the city of Cambridge. He worked as car salesman and manager of his uncle's rope factory, before he turned to acting. In 1935 he adopted the professional name Michael Rennie. “Handsome but hollow”, according to Hal Erickson (All Movie Guide), Rennie gained experience in acting technique while touring the provinces in British repertory. At the age of 28, he was noticed by Gaumont British, which arranged a screen test. He first appeared onscreen as the stand-in for Robert Young in Secret Agent (1936, Alfred Hitchcock). Between 1936 and 1940 he appeared in minor unbilled roles in ten additional films. Shortly after the outbreak of the Second World War in September 1939, the 1.93 m tall Rennie began to receive offers for larger film roles, starting with his first (small) billed performance in the wartime morale booster The Big Blockade (1940, Charles Frend) starring Michael Redgrave. Six films later, however, Michael Rennie also had his first film lead. The suspense drama Tower of Terror (1941, Lawrence Huntington), released shortly after Pearl Harbor, was styled in the manner of a horror film and starred Wilfrid Lawson as a mad Dutch lighthouse keeper in Nazi-occupied Netherlands, while second-billed Rennie and third-billed Movita had the romantic leads. His career was interrupted by war service. He joined the Royal Air Force in 1941, and would become a flight instructor for over two years. With the Second World War's end in May 1945, Rennie began to be seen as a potential star as a result of his roles in two vehicles for Britain's most popular star of the era, Margaret Lockwood: the musical I'll Be Your Sweetheart (1945, Val Guest) and, most prominently, the sensual costume adventure The Wicked Lady (1945, Leslie Arliss). The latter turned out to be the year's biggest box office hit, subsequently being listed ninth on a list of top ten highest-grossing British films. He also had a single prominent scene as a commander of Roman centurions in Caesar and Cleopatra (1946, Gabriel Pascal), starring Vivien Leigh and Claude Rains. Second leads and then leads in seven other British films produced between 1946 and 1949 followed.
Michael Rennie, along with Jean Simmons and James Mason, was one of a number of British actors offered Hollywood contracts in 1949–50 by 20th Century-Fox's studio head, Darryl F. Zanuck. The first film under his new contract was the British-filmed Medieval period adventure The Black Rose (1950, Henry Hathaway), starring Tyrone Power. Rennie's second Fox film, the Film-Noir The 13th Letter (1951, Otto Preminger) was a remake of the French film Le Corbeau/The Raven (1943, Henri-Georges Clouzot). His next film gave him first billing and assured him screen immortality. The Day the Earth Stood Still (1951, Robert Wise) was the first post war ‘A’ science-fiction film. According to Wikipedia it is “A serious, high-minded exploration of humanity's place in the universe and our responsibility to maintain peaceful coexistence, it has remained the gold standard for the genre of the era.” Convinced that it had a potential leading man under contract, the studio decided to produce a version of Les Miserables (1952, Lewis Milestone) as a vehicle for him. Rennie's performance was respectfully, but not enthusiastically, received by the critics. Ultimately, Les Misérables turned in an extremely modest profit and put an end to any further attempts to promote the 43-year-old Rennie as a future star. He was, however, launched on a thriving career as a top supporting actor. He co-starred with Jean Simmons in the 20th Century-Fox epic The Robe (1953, Henry Koster) and also appeared in its sequel, Demetrius and the Gladiators (1954, Delmer Daves). Rennie was billed fourth and third, respectively, playing the Apostle Peter, who provides affirmation in the new faith, as Jean and Richard Burton become martyrs for Christianity. The final film that cast Michael Rennie with Jean Simmons was Desiree (1954, Henry Koster) with Marlon Brando as Napoleon. As French marshal Jean-Baptiste Bernadotte, who becomes King Charles XIV John of Sweden, Rennie marries Jean's Désirée, but her true love always remains with Napoleon. His career began to decline, film opportunities were less appealing and gradually he slipped away from cinema screens. Among his fil;m roles were The Rains of Ranchipur (1955, Jean Negulesco) with Lana Turner, and The Lost World (1960, Irwin Allen), the adaptation of Sir Arthur Conan Doyle's tale of a jungle expedition that finds prehistoric monsters in South America. In 1959, Rennie became a familiar face on television, taking the role of soldier of fortune Harry Lime in 76 episodes of The Third Man (1959-1965), a British-American syndicated tv series very loosely based on the character previously played by Orson Welles.
During the 1960’s, Michael Rennie continued his television career, with guest appearances on such series as The Barbara Stanwyck Show (1961), Route 66 (1961); Alfred Hitchcock Presents (1962); Perry Mason (1963), Bonanza (1965); Lost in Space (1966); Batman (1966; as the villainous Sandman); I Spy (1967), The Man from U.N.C.L.E. (1967) and The F.B.I. (1967-1969). He made his only Broadway appearance in Mary, Mary (1961) playing Dirk Winsten, a jaded movie star. It ran for a very successful 1,572 performances, but Rennie stayed with the play less than five months. When Warner Brothers cast the film version in 1963, Rennie, along with leading man Barry Nelson and supporting actor Hiram Sherman were the only Broadway cast members to transfer to the big screen. Debbie Reynolds was given the title role and Mervyn LeRoy directed the production, which opened at Radio City Music Hall. While the film disappeared from cinemas by the end of 1963, the Broadway version continued for another full year. Rennie moved from Los Angeles to Geneva, Switzerland in 1968. His final seven feature films were filmed in Britain, Italy, Spain, and, in the case of The Surabaya Conspiracy (1969, Wray Davis), The Philippines. His final film was the Spanish-West-German-Italian Sci-Fi horror film Los monstruos del terror/Assignment Terror (1970, Tulio Demicheli) of which IMDb-user Noel commented: “Edward D Wood Jr ... move over”. In 1971 he journeyed to his mother's home in Harrogate, Yorkshire at a time of family grief following the death of his brother. It was there that he suddenly died of an emphysema-induced heart attack, two months before his 62nd birthday. Michael Rennie was married twice: first to Joan England (1938–1945), then to actress Maggie McGrath (1947–1960); their son, David Rennie, is an English circuit judge in Lewes, Sussex, England. Both marriages ended in divorce. He had a second son, John Marshall Rennie, with longtime companion Renee Gilbert Taylor. Professionally, his son went by John M. Taylor. In 1958, director Otto Preminger named Rennie as a third party to his countersuit of adultery against his wife during divorce proceedings.
Sources: Lyn Hammond (IMDb), Hal Erickson (All Movie Guide), Wikipedia, BritMovie.co.uk and IMDb.
Gallery for vintage actor Michael Rennie
Luana Walters in Thundering Hoofs (1942)
Luana Walters
Luana Walters (July 22, 1912-May 19, 1963) was a motion picture actress from Los Angeles, California. Walters was an expert horsewoman which led to her discovery as an actress at a rodeo in Palm Springs, California. She won a woman's bucking contest which was being watched by a movie scout, who noticed her. Her film career began when she visited a friend on a United Artists lot. Douglas Fairbanks Sr. was excited about her screen possibilities and arranged for a film test. However, only three days later Fairbanks went to Europe, and the test was never completed. Not long afterwards Joe Schenck saw Walters on the dance floor at the Cocoanut Grove in Los Angeles, California. After viewing the abbreviated test made by Fairbanks, Schenck offered her a contract with United Artists. The studio did not make a movie in the next six months so Walters' option was not taken up. Walters' screen credits start with an uncredited role in Reaching For The Moon (film) (1930)
Anthony Quinn was a Mexican-American actor
Anthony Quinn
Anthony Quinn (April 21, 1915 – June 3, 2001) was a Mexican-American actor, as well as a painter and writer. He starred in numerous critically acclaimed and commercially successful films, including Zorba the Greek, Lawrence of Arabia, The Guns of Navarone, The Message and Federico Fellini's La strada. He won the Academy Award for Best Supporting Actor twice; for Viva Zapata! in 1952 and Lust for Life in 1956. Quinn was born Antonio Rodolfo Quinn Oaxaca in Chihuahua, Chihuahua, Mexico, during the Mexican Revolution. His mother, Manuela "Nellie" Oaxaca, was of Aztec ancestry. His father, Francisco Quinn, an Irish Mexican, was also born in Mexico. Frank Quinn rode with Pancho Villa, then later moved to Los Angeles and became an assistant cameraman at a movie studio. In Quinn's autobiography The Original Sin: A Self-Portrait by Anthony Quinn he denied being the son of an "Irish adventurer" and attributed that tale to Hollywood publicists source
Gallery for Mexican-American actor Anthony Quinn
Mae Murray actress 1914
Mae Murray
Mae Murray (May 10, 1889 – March 23, 1965) was an American actress, dancer, film producer, and screenwriter. Murray rose to fame during the silent film era and was known as "The Girl with the Bee-Stung Lips" and "The Gardenia of the Screen". Born Marie Adrienne Koenig in Portsmouth, Virginia, she first began acting on the Broadway stage in 1906 with dancer Vernon Castle. In 1908, she joined the chorus line of the Ziegfeld Follies, moving up to headline by 1915. Murray became a star of the club circuit in both the United States and Europe, performing with Clifton Webb, Rudolph Valentino, and John Gilbert as some of her many dance partners. In 1908, she was briefly married to stockbroker William M. Schwenker, Jr. In 1916, she married Olympic bob sled champion Jay O'Brien and made her motion picture debut in To Have and to Hold that same year. She became a major star for Metro-Goldwyn-Mayer, starring with Rudolph Valentino in The Delicious Little Devil and Big Little Person in 1919 source
Rita Hayworth 1940s glamour queen
Rita Hayworth
Rita Hayworth October 17, 1918 – May 14, 1987, was an American film actress and dancer who attained fame during the 1940s not only as one of the era's top stars, but also as a great sex symbol, most notably in Gilda (1946). She appeared in 61 films over 37 years and is listed as one of the American Film Institute's Greatest Stars of All Time. Born Margarita Carmen Cansino in Brooklyn, New York City, she was the daughter of flamenco dancer Eduardo Cansino, Sr., with sephardic origins (his cousin was the Jewish Spanish writer Rafael Cansinos Assens) from Castilleja de la Cuesta (Seville), and Ziegfeld girl Volga Hayworth who was of Irish and English descent. She was raised as a Roman Catholic. Her father wanted her to become a dancer while her mother hoped she would become an actress. Her grandfather, Antonio Cansino, was the most renowned exponent in his day of Spain's classical dances; he made the bolero famous. His dancing school in Madrid was world famous. Rita Hayworth lapsed into a semicoma in February 1987. She died at age 68 from complications associated with Alzheimer's disease a few months later on May 14, 1987. A funeral service was held on May 19, 1987, at the Church of the Good Shepherd in Beverly Hills. Pallbearers included actors Ricardo Montalbán, Glenn Ford, Don Ameche, agent Budd Burton Moss, and the choreographer Hermes Pan. She was interred in Holy Cross Cemetery, Culver City. Her headstone includes the inscription: "To yesterday's companionship and tomorrow's reunion."
Gallery for vintage actress Rita Hayworth
Joyce Grenfell
Joyce Grenfell
Peter Sellers best known for Chief Inspector Clouseau in The Pink Panther series of films
Peter Sellers
Peter Sellers 8 September 1925 – 24 July 1980, CBE, was a British film actor, comedian and singer. He performed in the BBC Radio comedy series The Goon Show, featured on a number of hit comic songs and became known to a world-wide audience through his many film characterisations, among them Chief Inspector Clouseau in The Pink Panther series of films. Born in Portsmouth, Sellers made his stage debut at the Kings Theatre, Southsea, when he was two weeks old. He began accompanying his parents in a variety act that toured the provincial theatres. He first worked as a drummer and toured around England as a member of the Entertainments National Service Association. He developed his mimicry and improvisational skills during a spell in Ralph Reader's wartime Gang Show entertainment troupe, which toured Britain and the Far East. After the war, Sellers made his radio debut in ShowTime, and eventually became a regular performer on various BBC radio shows. During the early 1950s, Sellers, along with Spike Milligan, Harry Secombe and Michael Bentine, took part in the successful radio series The Goon Show, which ended in 1960. Sellers began his film career during the 1950s
Gallery for vintage comedian Peter Sellers
Esma Cannon
Esma Cannon
Esma Ellen Charlotte Cannon (27 December 1905 – 18 October 1972) was a diminutive Australian-born character actress, who moved to Britain in the early 1930s. Her film debut was an uncredited part in The Man Behind the Mask (1936); she was first credited in The Last Adventurers (1937), and she appeared in 64 films over the next 26 years. She had small parts in three early Powell and Pressburger films: The Spy in Black (1939), Contraband (1940) and A Canterbury Tale (1944), Holiday Camp (1947) and, towards the end of her career, appeared in Inn for Trouble (1960), Doctor in Love (1960), Raising the Wind (1961), What a Carve Up! (1961), Over the Odds (1961), We Joined the Navy (1962), On the Beat (1962), Nurse on Wheels (1963) and Hide and Seek (1964). In Holiday Camp she gave a fine dramatic performance of a pathetic and sad spinster who is lured to her death and is the murder victim, this was quite away from her usual silly little person-type comedy part source
Shirley Temple aged 8
Shirley Temple
Shirley Jane Temple (born April 23, 1928) is an American film and television actress, singer, dancer, autobiographer, and former U.S. Ambassador to the United Nations, Ghana and Czechoslovakia. She began her film career in 1932 at the age of three, and in 1934, skyrocketed to superstardom in Bright Eyes, a feature film designed specifically for her talents. She received a special Academy Award in February 1935, and film hits such as Curly Top and Heidi followed year after year during the mid to late 1930s. Licensed merchandise that capitalized on her wholesome image included dolls, dishes, and clothing. Her box office popularity waned as she reached adolescence, and she left the film industry at the age of 12 to attend high school. She appeared in a few films of varying quality in her mid to late teens, and retired completely from films in 1950 at the age of 21. She was the top box-office draw four years in a row (1935–38) in a Motion Picture Herald poll source
Gallery for vintage child actress Shirley Temple
Ann Blyth
Ann Blyth
Ann Marie Blyth (born August 16, 1928) is an American actress and singer, often cast in Hollywood musicals, but also successful in dramatic roles. Her performance as Veda Pierce in the 1945 film Mildred Pierce was nominated for an Academy Award for Best Supporting Actress. Blyth was born in Mount Kisco, New York, to parents who divorced shortly after her birth. She was raised a devout Roman Catholic by her mother. Blyth began her acting career initially as "Anne Blyth," changing the spelling of her name back to the original (Ann) at the beginning of her film career. Her first acting role was on Broadway in Watch on the Rhine (from 1941 until 1942). She was signed to a contract with Universal Studios, and made her film debut in Chip Off the Old Block in 1944. In musical films such as Babes on Swing Street, and Bowery to Broadway (both 1944), she played the part of the sweet and demure teenager. On loan to Warner Brothers, Blyth was cast against type as Veda Pierce source
Maria Perschy
Maria Perschy
Austrian actress Maria Perschy (1938-2004) was the sexy leading lady of many European films of the late 1950’s before she made a short career in Hollywood in films by John Huston and Howard Hawks. In the 1970’s she appeared in Spanish and Italian low-budget horror films and she became a cult figure.
Petula Clark
Petula Clark
French postcard by Editions P.I., Paris, nr. 1107. Photo: Ektachrome Kasparian.
Singer, actress and composer Petula Clark (1932) is the most successful British female solo recording artist. She began as as Britain's Shirley Temple, and appeared in over 30 films. During the 1960’s she became internationally known for her upbeat hits, including the evergreen Downtown.
Gustav Fröhlich played Freder Fredersen in the classic Metropolis 1927
Gustav Frohlich
Smart German actor Gustav Fröhlich (1902-1987) played Freder Fredersen in the classic Metropolis (1927) and became a popular star in light comedies. After the war he tried to escape from the standard roles of a charming gentleman with the part of a doomed painter in Die Sünderin (1951), but the effort went down in a scandal.
Gallery for vintage German actor Gustav Fröhlich
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