Saturday, May 24, 2014

FABULOUS FILMS OF THE '50S: THE PAJAMA GAME (1957)


The Classic Movie Blog Association is hosting a Fabulous Films of the '50s blogathon from May 22 - 26. This is my entry for the event - click here for links to all participating member blogs.
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Doris Day began to make her way as a big band singer in 1939. She scored several million-selling records during her singing career, beginning with "Sentimental Journey," her hit with Les Brown’s band in 1945. Her next million-seller came in 1948 with “It’s Magic,” but her biggest hits were songs from two of her popular mid-‘50s films, “Secret Love” from Calamity Jane (1953) and “Que Sera, Sera” from The Man Who Knew Too Much (1955). Day’s last hit single, Everybody Loves a Lover was released in 1959. Coincidentally, Pillow Talk, a frothy sex comedy, and a new direction in type for her, was also released in 1959 and it would change the course of her career. For the next four years she would reign as queen of the box office starring in bubbly romcoms, most often opposite Rock Hudson.

While she was still churning out hit records in the '50s, Day starred in a movie that was all but forgotten once her screen persona shifted and she became the super-feminine, stylishly gowned and bouffantly coiffed icon of the early ‘60s. The Pajama Game (1957) is an overlooked and underappreciated pièce de résistance of a musical that contains one of Day’s most captivating performances – along with 11 songs, quite a few of them show-stoppers…and more.

Sunday, May 4, 2014

Tyrone Power and Loretta Young: The Romantic Comedies of 1937


Once upon a time there was a feudal kingdom known as 20th Century Fox and in it lived a handsome prince and a beautiful princess… 

A too-fanciful opening? Maybe not, given that the prince and princess in this particular tale are Tyrone Power and Loretta Young. Talented, in the blossom of youth and blessed with storybook good looks, the two were becoming the American equivalent of royalty – Hollywood movie stars - when they first began working together in the 1930s. Under contract to Fox, the pair first shared the screen (along with Janet Gaynor, Constance Bennett, Don Ameche and Paul Lukas), if just barely, in Ladies in Love (1936), a Budapest-set precursor to 1953’s Bacall/Monroe/Grable vehicle How to Marry a Millionaire. The movie was a success, the studio deemed Power and Young a matched set, and in 1937 starred them opposite each other in three lighthearted screwball comedies in rapid succession.

POWER-MAD, the Tyrone Power Centenary Blogathon


He rose to movie stardom at the ripe young age of 22 and remained an international star for another 22 years, until his sudden death in 1958. During those two-plus decades, Tyrone Power was top-billed in hit films of many genres, from romantic comedy to disaster epic, musical, costume drama, western, adventure, wartime drama, swashbuckler, prestige literary adaptation, biopic, courtroom drama and even film noir. He also made time to serve as a pilot in the Marine Corps during World War II and to carve out a stage career for himself after the war. His wedding in Rome to his second wife, Linda Christian, caused a near-riot. When he collapsed and died, at age 44, while filming a King Vidor-directed biblical epic in Spain, it was headline news around the world. His private funeral in Hollywood was attended by filmdom's great luminaries and his burial was a mob scene of frenzied fans.

Today, May 5th, 2014, marks the 100th anniversary Tyrone Power’s birth, and my co-host, Patti of They Don’t Make ‘Em Like They Used To, and I are celebrating with this blogathon honoring his life and career.


Click on the links below for contributions from participating bloggers. And thanks to everyone who is taking part for joining in to pay tribute to one of the true legends of Hollywood's Golden Age.

In addition, today Movies, Silently takes a look at one of the silent films of Tyrone Power, Sr., Sweet Alyssum (1915), released when Ty, Jr. was just a year old...

 

Thursday, May 1, 2014

A Tyrone Power Centennial



This month brings the 100th anniversary of the birth of legendary actor Tyrone Power, “The King of 20th Century Fox."  As part of a nationwide centennial celebration, The Northbrook Public Library in Northbrook, IL, welcomes actress Taryn Power-Greendeer on May 2nd at 2:00 p.m. in the Multi-Media Department.  The daughter of Tyrone Power and actress Linda Christian, Taryn was only 5 when her father died at the age of 44 in 1958.  She will talk about growing up as the daughter of a film idol and the process of learning how to separate the man from the myth.  A feature of her talk will be the fascinating search she and her older sister, Romina, undertook in an attempt to discover the real Tyrone Power.  A Limited First Edition of Searching for My Father, Tyrone Power by Romina Power, available only at centennial events, will be on sale at the event.