#FridayShorts Breakdowns of 1944

#WomenDoingAwesomeThingsWednesday Mae West

• Was arrested along with the cast of "Sex" (1926) when the theater was raided after complaints from religious groups and was sentenced to 10 days for "corrupting the morals of youth." West was incarcerated on Roosevelt Island and served for eight days with two days off for good behavior. 
• Rewrote her own dialogue
• Spotted Cary Grant at Paramount and told one director "if he can talk, I'll take him!" to be her male lead in "She Done Him Wrong" (1933)
• Wrote 7 out of her 13 films
• Has a building named after her after "She Done Him Wrong" (1933) which ended up saving Paramount from bankruptcy
• "She Done Him Wrong" (1933) saved Paramount from bankruptcy, the studio naming a building on its lot after her. 
• Wrote, produced, and directed her first starring role on Broadway with 1926's "Sex" as well as "The Drag" which dealt with homosexuality among many others.
• Bought the Ravenswood apartment building when management barred one of her boyfriends, the African American boxer William "Gorilla" Jones, and lifted the ban herself
• Insisted that Paramount hire Duke Ellington and his orchestra for "Belle of the Nineties" (1934)

Portrayals of Mental Illness/Trauma in Film: Fredric March as Sgt. Al Stephenson in "The Best Years of Our Lives" (1946)

Fredric March had worked as a draftsman in a bank in his hometown of Racine, Wisconsin when his father couldn't afford to put his multiple sons through college at the same time. But March was willing to wait and got another draftsman job at another bank where he worked for two years, which he described as a "wholly uneventful" period. "Following in my brothers' footsteps, I went to the University of Wisconsin, and following my oldest brother's advice, I took commerce." (Tranberg, Charles. Fredric March - a Consummate Actor, 2013) March had competed in Declamatory in his first year and won in March 8, 1917. The campus newspaper, The Daily Cardinal, described him as having "a rich oratorical voice accompanied by platform poise."

In what little time he had left between waiting tables and selling apples and Hershey bars to his fellow brothers in the Alpha Delta Phi fraternity and receiving good grades in his studies, March had joined the drama club "The Edwin Booth Group." A classmate would later recount March as "never being point[ed] out as having special histironic ability. True, he was good looking and did well, but many of the other members had the same qualifications." He also was active in the UW's Corp of Cadets which he had risen in the ranks to First Sergeant in November of 1917. March ended up applying to be an officer the Field Artillery Central Officers Training School. He ended up spending June to July of 1918 at Ford Sheridan in Illinois.

"Then my oldest brother (Harold) advised me to get into artillery. Respecting his judgment in this as I had the matter of taking commerce in college, I went down to Camp Zachary Taylor (located in Louisville, Kentucky) when he was aide to General Austin. After three months, I got my commission as second lieutenant in the artillery. But instead of going over...seas, I was retained as an instructor of equestrianism. [...] After serving a period there, during which time the Armistice was declared and all hopes of covering myself with military glory went glimmering. I was sent to Fort Sill, Oklahoma, to the School of Fire there. It was the most interesting base I was in, patterned after the Napoleonic School of Fire. I was discharged in February 1919."

He went back to UW where he fell headlong into acting then moved to New York

Sergeant Al Stephenson in "The Time of Our Lives" had been an infantry platoon sergeant in the Pacific before finally coming home from the second world war. He finds himself in an airplane with two other veterans returning to their hometown of Boone City. But Stephenson finds it difficult to readjust although his wife and children do their best to make him comfortable. He finds solace in alcohol instead. It doesn't help that at his old banking job, he gets promoted to being in charge of approving servicemen loans under the GI Bill. But he is consistently hounded by his bosses for taking risks on these men when they don't have collateral for a loan in the first place. His drinking keeps getting worse and explodes when he finds himself giving a drunken speech at a public dinner insisting his fellow employees owe it to themselves to providing loans to servicemen and that it is paramount to investing in the country's future.

#RemakeThis A Double Life (1947)

"A Double Life" (1947) ended up banking $1,700,000 at the box office and ranked at #75 among the Top Grossers of 1948. Bosley Crowther at The New York Times described the film as "a modern drama which thoroughly employs the screen to demonstrate the strange exictement and the deathless romance of the theatre" and considers the casting of Ronald Colman in the lead role as "the role of his lengthy career." "The only question is whether Mr. Colman is more spectacular as the mentally distressed star of Broadway or as the bearded Venetian Moor. In either case, he plays an actor cocked and primed for romantic tragedy." Despite the fact that the Caucasian Anthony John in the film is considered to be the longest-running "Othello" in history, in 1945, the often cast Paul Robeson finished a two-year North American tour of the Shakespeare play and making him the longest-running Othello in real life. Homage must be given to this.

John Boyega as Anthony "Tony" John

Mia Wasikowska as Brita

LaKeith Stanfield as Bill Friend

Nicola Peltz as Pat Kroll

Friday Double Feature: Breakdowns of 1942/1942 Warner Brothers Bloopers

#WomanEmpowermentWednesday #SayTheirNames #SilentFilmEdition Ruth Roland

• Was the youngest student at Hollywood High School in 1904/5 and the first homegrown child actress at the school
• Replaced Gene Gauntier as Kalem Studio's new "Kalem Girl"
• Appeared in more 200 films between 1909 and 1927
• Became overseer of "Kalem House" where the studio's actors lived
• Left Kalem Studios for Balboa in 1914 for a three-year contract
• Established her own production company, Ruth Roland Serials, which signed a distribution deal with Pathé, the French film equipment and production company, to make seven successful multi-episode serials
• Left the industry in the '30s and returned to the theater, although making one more film appearance in 1936

#HappyIndependenceDay #HappyJuly4 Lou Gehrig's 4th of July Farewell from "Pride of the Yankees" (1939)