Rhapsody in Blue - 1945

Rhapsody in Blue (1945) presents George Gershwin’s piece “Rhapsody in Blue” almost in its entirety.  This, and cameo appearances by some who knew and collaborated with Gershwin: Paul Whiteman, Oscar Levant, and Al Jolson – playing themselves, make this film a worthwhile entry in our series on musicals about composers.  However, it’s so lacking in factual material, or even an interesting fictional tale – that there’s not much else to recommend the movie.

Adding to these detriments is a dour subplot of the main character plodding through life to his well-telegraphed doom.  The film was made some eight years after George Gershwin’s death at the age of 38 from a malignant brain tumor.  The story is told through that lens.  It is less a celebration of his life, ambition, and his prodigious contribution to American music, than it is a quietly haunting march of the walking dead.  Perhaps it was difficult not to film this movie within a prism of grief.

There are bright spots in the film, most notable of which is jazz and classical pianist Hazel Scott, who appeared in a handful of 1940s musicals as a specialty act.  A class act she was: elegant and stunningly beautiful, as well as being sublimely blessed with talent.  She is the most sparkling image in this movie.

Alexis Smith and Joan Leslie are also on hand as George Gershwin’s two (fictional) romantic relationships, with Miss Smith in her customary cool, intelligent beauty role, and Joan Leslie as the loser in the triangle when Gershwin cannot commit to her but seems to forget her in the dust of his ambition. Miss Leslie loses her all-American girlishness in this film that brought her to stardom at Warner’s, and instead appears quite moving and lovely as a sadder-but-wiser woman. 

Robert Alda plays George Gershwin (his screen debut), and though Alda is likable, it’s a performance so low key that it is hard to appreciate what drove this clearly driven man.  Perhaps it is just too difficult to visually depict the inner turmoil and ecstasy of the creative process.

Herbert Rudley is his brother and lyricist Ira, who was his closest relationship.  Sweet and reliable Morris Carnovsky and Rosemary DeCamp are Mama and Papa.

Eddie Marr plays lyricist Buddy De Silva, who we saw portrayed by Gordon MacRae earlier in this series here in The Best Things in Life are Free (1956).

Will Wright plays Rachmaninoff, the thought of which still cracks me up.

Mark Stevens, who we saw earlier in this series in I Wonder Who’s Kissing Her Now has a brief uncredited role as a singer. I’m pretty sure his tenor voice is dubbed here.

When first viewing Rhapsody in Blue years ago, I remember thinking how unrealistically stupid it was that when George Gershwin’s headaches seemed so severe, nobody thought of taking him to a doctor. I have since learned that when he finally did seek medical help in June 1937, he was ironically given a clean bill of health and told that his problem was hysteria.  A month later he fell into a coma and then it was decided that he had a brain tumor.  Gershwin died having emergency surgery.  So what is least believable in old movies is sometimes what we must believe.

The movie takes us from his childhood days in New York, to Tin Pan Alley, Broadway, and Paris, and the Hollywood Bowl.  We are treated to “Swanee,” by a hyperkinetic Jolson, and snippets of “The Man I love” and “Yankee Doodle Blues” from Hazel Scott, a bit of “Embraceable You,” from Joan Leslie, who was unable to finish overcome by her hurt that Gershwin has brought Alexis Smith to a party.  We have Anne Brown and Todd Duncan recreating their Broadway roles as Porgy and Bess, but not enough of them.  Just bits.  We don’t get enough of Gershwin in this movie about Gershwin.

Oscar Levant and Charles Coburn are welcome additions to the cast, as they anchor the dreaminess of the proceedings with invariably caustic but sensible remarks, but as mentioned in our last entry in this series, I Wonder Who’s Kissing Her Now, the film would have been better served – especially with the shocking passing of the man still clearly mourned by the entertainment world – with a greater tribute by just presenting performances of his music, and not reminding us with foreshadowing at every turn that he was doomed to live a short life.

I would have rather had a film that left the audience lost in the rapture of his music, and observing the busy course of his full life, have had the sudden end of his life come as a shock, as indeed it did for people in 1937.  That way we can better appreciate his work, and also share in the sense of loss, coming to understand its magnitude on the American Songbook.

“Work is a compulsion.  It’s an obsession,” George says, but the obsession of this movie is not his work; it’s his death.

Come back next Thursday when we cap off this series on musicals about composers with a double-header: a look Cole Porter’s career through Night and Day (1946) and De-Lovely (2004).

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The audio book for Ann Blyth: Actress. Singer. Star. is now for sale on Audible.com, and on Amazon and iTunes.

Also in paperback and eBook from Amazon, CreateSpace, and my Etsy shop: LynchTwinsPublishing.

I Wonder Who's Kissing Her Now - 1947

IWonder Who’s Kissing Her Now (1947) is a delightful scrapbook of turn-of-the-twentieth century song hits by composer Joe Howard.  The biography is typical Hollywood fiction; and one wonders why the Dream Factory even bothered to concoct a biography at all when it seems never to have the intention of telling the facts.  The tunes are the real draw of the show.  If crafting a credible script is difficult for legal reasons, or just the lack of a dramatic story, why not just let the music stand for itself?

We continue our series on musicals about composers.  Looking back to a film we discussed previously, Deep in My Heart (1954), about the life and work of Sigmund Romberg, that was a movie in which a parade of stars took turns singing Romberg’s hits.  The story starring José Ferrer was entertaining (especially his comic masterpiece scene), but using this template of showcasing the music through the talents of a stable of stars would have worked well for I Wonder Who’s Kissing Her Now, certainly preferable to the story that was cobbled together.

Mark Stevens, who played opposite Ann Blyth in Katie Did It (1951) previously discussed here, stars as Joe Howard, an affable composer in Gay Nineties New York City.

June Haver plays his “sister”—the daughter of the man who took him in when he was orphaned as a boy.  June will eventually develop into his love interest, a job she wants sooner rather than later.

She is a bouncy teen, prone to stringing a series of white lies, and her spunk gets her in and out of trouble.  Some of her targeted “innocent” backhanded compliments to various leading ladies who have an eye for Joe are pretty funny.

Her character was made up for the movie, by some sources made up just for her.  

Interestingly, both Mark Stevens and June Haver were second stringers in Hollywood at this time, but putting two second-stringers together make for refreshing exuberance.

She’s a great singer and dancer, and Mark Stevens also shines as a song-and-dance man—pretty impressive for somebody who was also groomed for film noir parts. I am not really certain at this time if Stevens did his own singing (maybe a reader has more information) but since he did start his career as a singer in nightclubs, I’m prepared to believe it is really his voice.  If so, it’s absolutely beautiful.  His singing is one of the very best things about this movie.  I’d love to have the soundtrack.

The songs include “I Wonder Who’s Kissing Her Now,” of course, but also the rousing “Goodbye, My Lady Love” (which, if you are familiar with the stage musical Show Boat, is usually sung by the characters Ellie and Frank in their act), “Honeymoon” (accompanied by a “magic lantern” show so evocative of the era), and ”Hello, My Baby!” (which most of us associate with the singing frog leaping out of the strong box in theWarner Bros. cartoon).

Regarding “Goodbye, My Lady Love,” June Haver is wearing darker body makeup to suggest a “mulatto” character because the song is performed as a cakewalk, in the setting of the period style of entertainment.  Mark Stevens, who leaves the piano to escort her in a few steps and sing of his “heart on fire”, with top hat and cane, is not wearing darker makeup.  Did the southern movie distribution market tremble at the suggestion of this romantic pairing?  Were the miscegenation riot police busy somewhere else burning crosses?  I have to smile, wondering if Hollywood inadvertently pulled a fast one on the racists who were so careful to avoid such cozy interracial images.

Martha Stewart (not that one) and Leonore Aubert play two veteran ladies of the stage who lead Mark Stevens astray for a little while. It’s funny how, along with young June Haver, a trio of women deceive poor Mark.  William Frawley plays Martha's manager, and any movie with him is aces.  We last saw him a few weeks ago in My Wild Irish Rose, and he just seems a natural for this era.  He started in vaudeville in 1914, and though we've seen Mr. Frawley in many movies, and on TV, he seems most natural scowling backstage at a vaudeville theater, cigar in his teeth.  How many times did Fred Mertz reminisce with Ethel about their vaudeville days?  It's just in his blood, and on his face.  He wears it like a carnation in his buttonhole. 

Reginald Gardner has a brief, but standout role as the real-life partner of Joe Howard, William M Hough (or one partner. Howard worked with several lyricists – at the time this movie was produced, one such person came forward with a lawsuit to demand credit for his part in creating the title song).

The movie is richly filmed with wonderfully staged musical numbers (in Technicolor, despite these black and white studio publicity photos), some cleverly framed shots, and dialogue lines that are treasured reflections of the time – but only if you know the era. Most viewers today might not guffaw over the line, “She’s a beautiful woman, not one of the Cherry Sisters.” If you have never heard of vaudeville’s worst ever act, that might pass right by you. I laughed my head off.  At the time this movie was made, two generations of Americans still remembered. 

Admittedly, I have a fondness for this type of movie, especially when it aspires to nothing more than being an earnest valentine to the subject matter. Deep probing into what haunts composers is best left for documentaries – if there are any. George Jessel, the chief ambassador of vaudeville, produced this movie.  He and director Lloyd Bacon present it with nostalgic affection.  It might well have been better to just give up the pretense about presenting a biography of a composer, and just let his music tell us about him.

Next week, we turn to more musical fare with Alan Alda and Alexis Smith in Rhapsody in Blue (1945), the life and work of George Gershwin.

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The audio book for Ann Blyth: Actress. Singer. Star. is now for sale on Audible.com, and on Amazon and iTunes.

Also in paperback and eBook from Amazon, CreateSpace, and my Etsy shop: LynchTwinsPublishing.

Bathtub scene - Katie Did It - 1951

A single scene in a movie can stand as a metaphor, or in some way, encapsulate the story.  In Katie Did It (1951), a light and pleasant comedy, one charming scene serves both as a metaphor for the story, and also a teasing reference to the real-life reputation of the actress playing her.  It is, however, the audience, more than the actress, who is being teased.

This is our contribution to the “…And Scene!” blogathon hosted by your friend and mine, Janet Sullivan over at her Sister Celluloid bog.

Katie Did It, for those of you who’ve valiantly or just stubbornly followed my blog for the past year, is a movie starring Ann Blyth, and was the one single movie in my year-long attempt to review all her films that I could not obtain—until the final moment when a friend discovered a copy online and sent it to me.  I was actually finishing the manuscript on my book on Ann Blyth’s career when this movie came to me.  

When I quickly shoe-horned that info into the book, I had naively thought myself done at last—until more material from other fans came through on some other aspects of her career, right up until press time.  It was both an exhilarating and nail-biting last few weeks before publication.

This scene from Katie Did It is a bathtub scene.  Hollywood loved bathtub scenes.  I imagine few ever thought Ann Blyth would film one.

Part of a starlet’s job in those days was posing for inevitable publicity photos, from those glossy, goddess-like images airbrushed to unearthly perfection and lit so as to create a perfect fantasy woman on the couch in photographer Ray Jones’ studio on the lot at Universal, to more whimsical poses with skyrockets, bunnies, beach balls, and various holiday-themed props.  Depending on the prop and the pose, the photo could depict a girl-next-door quality, or something bizarrely sexual.  Surprisingly, one can do a lot in the bizarrely sexual arena with a bunny or a beach ball. Not so surprisingly with a skyrocket.

Though Ann Blyth was known for being very cooperative with her studio and soldiered through her publicity chores like a dedicated professional, she refused, as photographer Ray Jones complained, to ever do cheesecake photos.

In Katie Did It, Ann gamely mocks her own reputation. She plays a prim New England librarian who encounters a visiting commercial artist from New York, whose stock in trade is painting scantily clad ladies for girly calendars, and the occasional billboard cutie using sex to sell the product.  Ann, needing money, consents to pose for him.

I discuss the plot in detail in my book, so I won’t go into it here, except to zero in on the bathtub scene.

She goes to the New York apartment of the artist, played by Mark Stevens.  He works at home, currently sketching a female model lounging in a large tub of water with a few lily pads scattered in strategic places.  He is perched on a platform above her, looking down into the tub.  He’s got a great view.  He got the idea to pose his model this way when, earlier in the film, he had discovered Ann, her clothes piled on a rock, swimming in a stream on a hot day.  He is an artist who takes his inspiration where he finds it.  This painting is for a billboard, intending to sell soap to a titillated public.

Ann is already embarrassed upon entering, as her plan to sell a song she wrote failed miserably.  Humiliated by that, and by having to go to Mark Stevens to pay her for taking her clothes off, has made this one lousy day.

She can barely negotiate with him, her embarrassment is so acute, and so comic. 

She asks, in a thin, wavering voice “How much…?”

“One hundred dollars a day.”

“Oh, no, I don’t mean about the money.  I meant…” uncomfortably, she waves her gloved hand vaguely around her neckline.

“You’ll be up to your neck in lily pads.”  He sends her to a dressing room to change into a swimsuit, which was more than she was wearing when he spied on her in the stream. 

To the credit of the writers, what makes this movie atypical of the breaking-down-the-prude plot is that Stevens’ character is bemused, understanding, and kindly.  Nor is Ann a prude, as we see in other scenes.  Her character’s motto, indeed, the creed of her small community, is modesty, so when she comes back into Stevens’ living room wearing a bathrobe so big she appears to have no hands, we see she is out of her element.  Stevens has to coax her into the tub like a mother with a shy child.

When she finally slinks out of the robe and slips noiselessly into the tub, while he decorously turns his back, she slides so low under the water that he must now coax her to sit high enough above the water so that he might sketch at least a suggestion of her cleavage.  Miserably, she obeys.  Then he tells her to smile.

“I can’t.”  Her wretchedness is hysterical.

He snaps at her to smile, and she instantly beams a beautiful, 1,000-watt, if insincere, grin.

Then the scene dissolves into a wordless montage, where we see the next day she is more comfortable, and as the days pass, she strides across his living room in her bathing suit like a pro, sliding into the water with athletic grace and posing like the most sexy water nymph to ever play hymns on the organ in a New England church.  They go to lunch together and eat hotdogs bought from a vendor on the street.  She gets mustard on her hand, and he wipes her messy hand with his handkerchief like a big brother.  We know he knows he must be careful in his wooing of this young woman, and we marvel at his canny tact.  His infatuation is a given; she is the one on the fence.

Finally, the painting is completed, and she, still lounging in the tub, marvels at it, “It’s lovely!  I mean, your work of course.”  She has come so far as to be able to see the picture objectively as a work of art, something apart from herself.

In real life, the only time Ann Blyth ever did a cheesecake pose was for the posters to advertise this movie.  One imagines, despite whatever discomfort she might have felt, having declared she would not do cheesecake, that here was a young actress with a sense of humor, not only about herself, but about that most baffling thing in an actor’s career—the audience. 

She once commented, “A good part is just that: a good part.  It has nothing to do with who you really are or how you live your life.”  Like the prim New England librarian, she knew the picture looked like her, but wasn’t really her.

The teasing jest may be at the expense of the modest librarian, and the modest actress playing her, but the joke is ultimately on the audience.

Please visit Sister Celluloid for more great blog posts in this fun marathon.

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Ann Blyth: Actress. Singer. Star. 

The eBook and paperback are available from Amazon and CreateSpace, which is the printer.  You can also order it from my Etsy shop.

If you wish a signed copy, then email me at JacquelineTLynch@gmail.com and I'll get back to you with the details.

Katie Did It - 1951 - A Lost Movie, An Overlooked Career

Katie Did It (1951) has become an elusive sort of “holy grail” quest for me during this year-long series on the career of Ann Blyth.  I left this spot open towards the end of the year figuring I would have either the movie to discuss, or else have a metaphor for reason the bulk of Ann Blyth’s career is largely forgotten and that she is looked upon by those who do recall her work fondly as an “underrated actress.”

Ann plays Katherine Standish, a prudish small-town New England librarian.  Mark Stevens plays a big-city commercial artist who comes to town, causing scandal when he paints Ann in a provocative pose for an advertising campaign.  Directed by Frederick de Cordova, this comedy also features Craig Stevens and Cecil Kellaway.

There are no reviews on the IDMb website, only the sound of crickets.  Critic Leonard Maltin, as posted on the TCM page for this movie, says:

“Ann Blyth is perkier than usual as square New England librarian who becomes hep when romanced by swinging New Yorker Stevens.”

Not much to go on, but “perkier than usual” might seem to indicate that Mr. Maltin has actually seen the film himself.  I wonder.  Even the mighty TCM website (on which I confess, like the IDMb website, I have found disappointing errors from time to time) is otherwise silent on this unaccountably obscure film.

In the timeline of Ann’s movie career, Katie Did It is sandwiched between two big hits: the drama Our Very Own (1950) which we discussed here, and the musical, The Great Caruso (1951), which we discussed here.  It seems to have been obscured by them both.

We do have, however, a brief glimpse into the filming of this movie from an article that discussed Ann’s “first day jitters” at the start of a film.

“Everything is fine until the minute I walk on the set for my first shot,” Miss Blyth said, “Then my knees sort of buckle, sweat trickles out on my forehead and my tongue seems to stick to the roof of my mouth…Yet I feel somehow that if I didn’t feel that way, something would be wrong.”

“At the very beginning, Freddie (director Frederick de Cordova) suddenly switched scenes on me,” she said, “Instead of doing the sequence I came prepared for, he announced we’d shoot an entirely different scene.”

It made her so busy learning new lines and shuffling into another costume, that Ann didn’t have time to remember to be jittery.

“Then he told me that this was a deliberate attempt to put me at ease—after we’d made the scene.  I was rather cross about it at first, until I made the discovery that I’d breezed through the almost-unrehearsed sequence with no trouble at all.”

The movie was never released on DVD or VHS, and to my knowledge, has not been shown on TCM, but I hope someone will correct me.  Failing this, I’m hoping that the film may exist in a private collection or somebody’s warehouse or attic in 16mm form.  If so, I’d be interested in buying it.

No film yet, but the metaphor?  I would hesitate to hang Ann Blyth’s current reputation among many to be an underrated or even unremembered actress just over one “lost” film, not when there are so many other movies to give ample evidence of her being a very gifted actress.  But there is something else niggling in her legacy to classic film buffs.

Here I quote from my discussion on my pal John Hayes’ blog Robert Frost’s Banjo a couple months ago:

Blyth is perkier than usual as square New England librarian who becomes hep when romanced by swinging New Yorker Stevens.Blyth is perkier than usual as square New England librarian who becomes hep when romanced by swinging New Yorker Stevens.Blyth is perkier than usual as square New England librarian who becomes hep when romanced by swinging New Yorker Stevens.

This woman had been the flavor of the month all through the late 1940s and most of the 1950s, on enough magazine covers to choke a horse, and as famous in her day as any young star could be.  Today, she is nowhere to be seen in that kitschy souvenir shop universe where classic film fans can easily snag T-shirts and coffee cups and posters of Clark Gable and The Three Stooges, Mae West and Betty Boop, and, of course, the ever-exploitable Marilyn Monroe.   

Where was Ann Blyth?  She never retired from performing.  She had, unlike most other stars of that era, performed in all media from radio to TV to stage, and was successful in all of them.    Far, far more talented than any other 1950s glamour girl, yet she is not as well known today among younger classic film fans.  I wanted to know why.

Not that I am calling for Ann Blyth key chains and Veda Pierce car mats, but if many have forgotten her reputation as one of the best actresses of her generation—and she was clearly regarded as such by her peers and the industry in the late 1940s and early 1950s—then we have also forgotten about her name and face in popular culture as a star.  This lofty place was undeniably due to her exquisite beauty, for the only thing more prized in Hollywood than talent is being photogenic.  

I would compare Ann’s introspective, working from the inside-out skill as an interpretive actress similar to two other actresses slightly older than she: Teresa Wright and Dorothy McGuire, who both conveyed a soulful depth to their characters.  Neither of those two tremendously talented, and very serious actresses, who cared more for their art than for stardom, could reach the power (or were offered the opportunity) of Ann’s evil Veda Pierce, her venial coquetry of Regina Hubbard, or her sleazy-cum-brokenhearted and ultimately reformed characters she played in Swell Guy and A Woman’s Vengeance.  And neither of them sang.  Ann was a most valuable player. 

Also, unlike those two ladies, Ann actually was as much a “star” as a dedicated actress, who, despite pursuing her purposeful private life with unruffled determination, still seemed to enjoy being a movie star and attending industry functions, cooperative with the publicity department and whatever the studio asked of her.  You can rub elbows with her on the TCM Classic Cruise in two weeks.

She never shirked autograph hounds, but patiently tackled every slip of paper that was shoved in front of her, leaving that bold, elegant signature that, like her beliefs, her manners, and her sense of responsibility, never wavered. 

But, though we might dispense with souvenir kitsch, we also are left a surprisingly scant discography.  Music is a marketable product that lifts the soul and does not just collect dust.  This woman was a beautiful singer, with a trained voice, but where are all the albums?  Celebrities who could sing cranked them out, and those who could not sing still unaccountably found themselves with record deals.  To my knowledge, Ann had made few records.  I have read of her intention to make albums, particularly a collection of Irish songs, and including at least one with her brother-in-law, Dennis Day.  Do they exist?

At the 32^nd Academy Awards held on April 4, 1960, Ann Blyth accepted the Oscar® for Documentary Short Subject won by Bert Haanstra for Glass (which I’ve never seen, but even so, I can’t believe it beat out Donald in Mathmagicland, which we covered here.  No really, I’m serious.  Really.  Stop laughing.)

Mitzi Gaynor handed the statue to Ann, and for a moment, Ann Blyth fans, and perhaps even herself, had a fleeting and thrilling vision of the formerly nominated actress (in the Best Supporting category for Mildred Pierce) to finally get her due.  But Ann herself slapped down that daydream and remarked, though clearly excited to be holding the award, “Gee, I guess this is the closest I’ll ever be to getting one.”

Many superb actors and actresses finished their careers without an Oscar®, but we film buffs remember, most defiantly, who they are.  (This clip from the award ceremony is currently on YouTube here.  Scroll to 18:00.)

Surely, being overlooked, or even unknown today, doesn’t all boil down to a film career that lasted only 13 years?  Grace Kelly’s career was even shorter.  Audrey Hepburn’s film appearances stretched over more decades, but she made less films.  Though both were Oscar® winners, deservedly so for those winning roles, neither enjoyed the range of roles, or displayed the acting range of Ann Blyth; neither possessed her powerful lyric soprano (both gamely tried musicals, but had weak, if pleasant, singing voices); and neither, despite their obvious radiant beauty, were more beautiful.  But they had long ago reached icon status and stayed there.

Both gave up films—for long periods or forever—and abandoned Hollywood for Europe.  Ann never walked away from her career, she only modified it to her personal tastes and her family’s needs.  (And her home, for decades, remained in North Hollywood, only a few miles from the studios.)

Is her forgotten status due, perhaps, to a combination of circumstances unique to Hollywood—that because the quiet stability of her private life did not make headlines she therefore couldn’t be exploited for profit, because the bulk of her films are hardly, if ever, shown today, and because, unlike those tragic stars who died young, or younger, she outlived all her co-stars?

Had she done more television, she might have regained recognition among younger audiences. (For instance, like Angela Lansbury, who without Murder She Wrote might be known only to classic film buffs and theatre fans, but not have household name recognition in the U.S. and around the world.) Still, though her staunch fans might mourn her lack of icon status, I doubt Ann would.  Truly, she got the best of the bargain in a rich and rewarding private life—long and happy marriage, five children, ten grandchildren, life-long friends in and out of the entertainment industry, charitable work—and satisfying career in proportions she could deal with, and never expressed regret. 

Have a look at the two videos below at the wedding of the year where the movie star becomes a bride.

The wedding and reception footage begins in this second video at 1:38. Before that we have a glimpse of Stanwyck on location.  This shutterbug really got around.

We have a few more TV appearances to discuss the rest of this month, and then a few more films to round out the series in the coming weeks that demonstrate a variety of genres: a western, a war picture, a bio-pic, musicals…and a look at her “third act” career—as a singer in concerts and nightclubs.

Come back next week to 1979, when Ann and fellow Hollywood star Don Ameche come under scrutiny in a murder only Jack Klugman can solve in an episode of Quincy, M.E.

My thanks to the gang at the Classic Movie Blog Association for voting this Year of Ann Blyth series as the Best Movie Series for 2014.  Congratulations to all the winners and nominees in all categories.

And congratulations to the three winners of my recent Goodreads Giveaway, who will each receive a paperback copy of my book on classic films: Movies in Our Time - Hollywood Mirrors and Mimics the Twentieth Century.

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CriticalPast.com
Hartford Courant, July 9, 1950, Part II, page 15, syndicated UP article.

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As  most of you probably know by now, this year's TCM Classic Cruise will set sail (proverbially) in October, and one of the celebrity guests is Ann Blyth.

Ann will be doing a couple hour-long conversation sessions, and will also be on hand for a screening of Mildred Pierce.

Have a look here for the rest of the schedule and events with the other celebrity guests. Unfortunately, the cruise is booked, so if' you're late, you can try for the waiting list.

I, sadly, am unable to attend this cruise, but if any reader is going,  I invite you (beg you) to share your experiences and/or photos relating to Miss Blyth on this blog as part of our year-long series on her career.  I'd really appreciate your perspective on the event, to be our eyes and ears.  Thanks.
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 THANK YOU....to the following folks whose aid in gathering material for this series has been invaluable:  EBH; Kevin Deany of Kevin's Movie Corner; Gerry Szymski of Westmont Movie Classics, Westmont, Illinois; and Ivan G. Shreve, Jr. of Thrilling Days of Yesteryear.  And thanks to all those who signed on as backers to my recent Kickstarter campaign.  The effort failed to raise the funding needed, but I'll always remember your kind support.

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TRIVIA QUESTION:  I've recently been contacted by someone who wants to know if the piano player in Dillinger (1945-see post here) is the boogie-woogie artist Albert Ammons. Please leave comment or drop me a line if you know.

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UPDATE:  This series on Ann Blyth is now a book - ANN BLYTH: ACTRESS. SINGER. STAR. -

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The audio book for Ann Blyth: Actress. Singer. Star. is now for sale on Audible.com, and on Amazon and iTunes.

Also in paperback and eBook from Amazon, CreateSpace, and my Etsy shop: LynchTwinsPublishing.

 "Lynch’s book is organized and well-written – and has plenty of amusing observations – but when it comes to describing Blyth’s movies, Lynch’s writing sparkles." - Ruth Kerr, Silver Screenings

"Jacqueline T. Lynch creates a poignant and thoroughly-researched mosaic of memories of a fine, upstanding human being who also happens to be a legendary entertainer." - Deborah Thomas, Java's Journey

"One of the great strengths of Ann Blyth: Actress. Singer. Star. is that Lynch not only gives an excellent overview of Blyth's career -- she offers detailed analyses of each of Blyth's roles -- but she puts them in the context of the larger issues of the day."- Amanda Garrett, Old Hollywood Films

"Jacqueline's book will hopefully cause many more people to take a look at this multitalented woman whose career encompassed just about every possible aspect of 20th Century entertainment." - Laura Grieve, Laura's Miscellaneous Musings''

"Jacqueline T. Lynch’s Ann Blyth: Actress. Singer. Star. is an extremely well researched undertaking that is a must for all Blyth fans." - Annette Bochenek, Hometowns to Hollywood

Ann Blyth: Actress. Singer. Star. 
by Jacqueline T. Lynch

The first book on the career of actress Ann Blyth. Multitalented and remarkably versatile, Blyth began on radio as a child, appeared on Broadway at the age of twelve in Lillian Hellman's Watch on the Rhine, and enjoyed a long and diverse career in films, theatre, television, and concerts. A sensitive dramatic actress, the youngest at the time to be nominated for her role in Mildred Pierce (1945), she also displayed a gift for comedy, and was especially endeared to fans for her expressive and exquisite lyric soprano, which was showcased in many film and stage musicals. Still a popular guest at film festivals, lovely Ms. Blyth remains a treasure of the Hollywood's golden age.

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A new collection of essays, some old, some new, from this blog titled Movies in Our Time: Hollywood Mimics and Mirrors the 20th Century is now out in eBook, and in paperback here.