Ava Gardner #1

[scriptgirl]

gasoline alley

 

[scriptgirl]

ebay

 

[nmyngan]

ebay

 

[scriptgirl]

ebay

 

[nmyngan]

alamy

 

[scriptgirl]

amana

 

[scriptgirl]

todos

 

[scriptgirl]

ebay

 

[scriptgirl]

When Ava Gardner visited Karachi

It was February 21, 1955 and Ava Gardner was en route to Lahore for the shooting of Bhawani Junction. Her film The Barefoot Contessa was then being shown in a cinema in Karachi and Ava Gardner was a rage among boys and girls because of her surreal beauty and hazel eyes. As a result, her hosts had kept her overnight stopover at Karachi a closely guarded secret.

On a sultry Karachi afternoon when the sea breeze stops blowing, Sultan Ahmad and Asrar Ahmad, chief reporters of the Times of Karachi and Morning News were waiting in this writer’s room in the Press Information Department for copies of a press note which was in the process of being typed. Suddenly the telephone rang and Aslam Ali, press officer of the then chief commissioner asked me if I would like to see Ava Gardner in person.

He soon arrived and Sultan, Asrar and I drove in his car to the airport. When we arrived, Ava Gardner was already in the VIP Lounge. She was grumbling of the humid weather and far from being cheerful. Her managers expressed Miss Gardner’s inability to oblige us with an interview. Nevertheless, we extracted a promise from one of them that Miss Gardner would have an exclusive session with the present journalists the next morning in her suite of rooms in Hotel Metropole. We, in turn, were asked to keep the news of her arrival in Karachi on hold.

When Aslam Ali and I arrived at the hotel the next morning, we found hundreds of boys and girls milling around both the gates trying to gatecrash their entry into the hotel. Ava Gardner’s arrival had hit Karachi like a thunderstorm. Both the lounge and the lobby of the hotel swarmed with journalists, photographers, etc. The hosts and the hotel management refused to bring the celebrated star to the banquet hall for fear of being mobbed.

Mr Douglas, the deputy principal information officer in the PID appeared on the scene and was closeted in a meeting with the producer and director of Bhawani Junction. It was then announced that Miss Gardner would meet only journalists and photographers in a particular suite. Guards were posted at the elevators and stairs and Mr Douglas posted himself at the door of the room where Miss Gardner was in. Many accredited journalists who did not have their press cards on them tried to enter but to no avail. Aslam Ali and this writer were also left high and dry and walked back home in impotent rage. However, as good luck would have it, this writer got an opportunity to meet Ava Gardner twice in more conducive environs.

It was during the shooting of Bhawani Junction that this writer happened to accompany Sardar Bahadur Khan, the then minister for Railways, to Lahore where he was to inaugurate a conference. He was staying as a guest with his friend Rasheedudin, a businessman. His host insisted that I stay on for lunch and excited my curiosity by saying that a film star of great fame and beauty was also going to be there. Presently, Ava Gardner entered the hall chaperoned by one of her managers, clad in a lemon-coloured sari. She appeared to have developed a cozy friendship with Mrs Rasheed.

As the party moved to the banquet hall, I told Miss Gardner at some length the episode of the press conference at Hotel Metropole and she laughed heartily. During lunch, she relished the pulao and kofta curry, refusing to touch anything else. When asked if she liked Lahore, she said she was fascinated by the city, but the people were very poor and shabby!

Fifteen years later, this writer again met Ava Gardner at Begum Iskander Mirza’s flat in Kensington, London. During a chat with Begum Sahiba, Ava Gardner entered the room. She had put on weight and a hectic life and advancing age had left scars around her beautiful hazel eyes. Begum Iskander Mirza introduced us and Miss Gardner looked at me intently. I reminded her of the lunch at Mr Rasheed’s house and she remembered me.

As they were in a hurry, Begum Iskander Mirza directed the driver to take the route to Queen’s Road to drop me at my hotel. Before getting down, I shook her beautiful, manicured hand and looked for the last time at her smiling yet melancholy eyes. Some years later, when I read the news of her death in the newspapers, I felt a personal loss. (DAILY DAWN)



flickr

 

[scriptgirl]

nypl

Gardner, Ava

Gardner, Ava (1922-90) Actress. A Hollywood "love goddess" of the
1940s and 1950s, Gardner was better known for her stardom than her
performances. Her films included "One Touch of Venus" (1948), "Show
Boat" (1951), "The Sun Also Rises" (1957), "On the Beach" (1959),
and "The Life and Times of Judge Roy Bean" (1972), in which she
played the actress Lily LANGTRY. Gardner was married, each time
briefly, to Mickey ROONEY," band leader Artie Shaw, and Frank
SINATRA.

 

[scriptgirl]

Entertainment Weekly
Ava Gardner defined a new sexuality for post-WWII America: As
elegant as a martini glass, she was frank and impulsive, yet
coolly jaded as well. She also had a beauty to make famous men
swoon: Her husbands included Mickey Rooney, bandleader Artie
Shaw, and Frank Sinatra (in a way, she personifies the smoky
feminine ideal of the Chairman's great '50s albums). Underneath
the glamorous poise, though, was a talent underrated even by
herself. To Joseph Mankiewicz, who directed her as a
gypsy-turned-Hollywood star in 1954's The Barefoot Contessa, she
said, "Hell, Joe, I'm not an actress, but I think I understand
this girl. She's a lot like me." As if that isn't what acting is
all about. --TB

 

[scriptgirl]

film journal
The Life and Times of Judge Roy Bean (1972, DVD, Warner Home Video); Getting the facts about the real Roy Bean today is as difficult as getting justice west of the Pecos in the 1880s. Director John Huston, though, is more interested in presenting the legend, with the help of the popular Paul Newman, who had already made Butch Cassidyand the Sundance Kid. For those who think of the judge as the Walter Brennan type or the Edgar Buchanan type (the equally fine character actor who starred in the 1950s TV series Judge Roy Bean, available on DVD from Entertainment Distributing), Newman might seem like a stretch. Yet the genial Newman shines as the main character in this tall tale that includes a performing bear (who dares to breathe on a portrait of the idolized Lillie Langtry), Bad Bob the Albino (Stacy Keach in a platinum wig), the Reverend LaSaIIe (Anthony Perkins), Marie Elena (Victoria Prinicipal) and Ava Gardner (who as Lillie Langtry visits Bean's Texas
town in the film's epilogue). It's robust fun, with some somber moments.The Life and Times of Judge Roy Bean

 

[scriptgirl]

Filipino Express

IS it true that there can only be one great love in our lives - whether or not it has a happy ending? Quite often great romances have tragic endings as in the Emily Bronte's novel Wuthering Heights or Margaret Mitchell's Gone With the Wind.

As Valentine's Day approaches, I dedicate this piece to the incurable romantics. As in my previous

column, my topic must necessarily be about the legendary love stories on and off screen.

It gets fascinating when our celluloid heroes and heroines do fall in-love. In Hollywood in particular, there were such dalilances then and now.

Worth mentioning is that of Clark Gable and Carol Lombard. The actor was at the peak of his career after giving life to the character of Rhett Buttler in Gone With the Wind, when he married the blond beauty.

The couple settled in San Fernando Valley but the bUss was shortiived as the actress was killed in a plane crash during World War II. Though Gable remarried, Lombard remained the unforgettable one.

And then, there was Frank Sinatra and his big romance with Ava Gardner for whom he left his wife, Nancy to marry the film goddess. Although the actor-crooner and the fiery beauty parted ways eventaally, their hearts remained entwined. She spent the rest of her days in Spain then in her later years, moved to London, where she died. It was Sinatra who took care of bringing her home. Flying Gardner's remains back to North Carolina where she was interred.

And, the Spencer Tracy-Katharine Hepburn tandem. They teamed up in nine featares, most memorable was "Guess Who's Coming to Dinner" with Sydney Portier. As a practicing Roman Catholic, Spencer never divorced his wife but when he passed away, Hepburn was by his side.

And, who can forget the Richard Burton and Elizabeth Taylor. Their passionate romance was ignited in Rome during the filming of the epic Cleopatra with Taylor in the title role and he as Marc Anthony. Both were married at the time but soon divorced their spouses. They married in 1964, then divorced and re-married in Africa in 1975 which again ended in divorce. Together, they became the most famous of couples. Costarring in eight more motion pictures: the VIPs, The Sandpiper, Doctor Faustas, The Comedians, Boom, Hammersmith is Out The Taming of the Shrew and Who's Afraid of Virginia Wootf. And Divorce His, Divorce Hers, their one movie for television. At 76, the British-born Elizabeth has been made Dame of the British Empire. She has outiived Richard, but her deathwish is to be buried beside Burton in his birthplace, Wales in the UK

There was also that great romance between Sir Lawrence OUvier of Hamlet fame and Vivien Leigh who immortalized Scarlett O'Hara in Gone With the Wind. The duo teamed up in plays but this did not last too long nor did their marriage after the intense emotions subsided and her mental health declined.

One more for the books is the lifelong attachment between Joe DiMaggio and Mar: ilyn Monroe. Their marriage did not last but their love did. After her death reportedly caused by drug overdose in 1962, DiMaggio sent roses to her tomb daily for 20 years.

Now, for the happy endings. Humphrey Bogart and Lauren Bacali who remained married util his death in 1957. They starred together in "The Big Sleep". Last but not the least is union of awardwinning actors Paul Newman and Joanne Woodward who tied the knot in 1958 and have remained we to this day.

In the Philippine movie scenario, the team that had a truly happy ending was that of Pancho Magalona and Tita Duran PPancho who's s real name was Enrique Magalona was the son of Philippine Senator Enrique Magalona of Negros Occidental. When he joined the movies via Sampaguita Pictures in the '50s, he was teamed up with a lovely and demure Bicolana actress, Tita Duran. Their team ' is unique in that it endured on and off the screen. And.so did their marriage which was lasted for the rest of their lives. In later years, they had a TV show titled Pancho Loves Tita. No wonder when she passed on, he soon followed.

Incidentally, a book titled Portraits of Love which explores 10 great love stories (with 200 photos) including Burton and Taylor, Bogart and Bacali is out

 

[scriptgirl]

Al Bawaba
stylish spain at the intercontinental madrid
Byline: By Al-Bawaba Reporters
Type: News

stylish spain at the intercontinental madrid

When planning a luxury weekend away in Spain's vibrant capital, follow in the footsteps of the stars and stay at the fabulous, five- star InterContinental Madrid. The hotel offers first-class amenities and service all with a touch of glamour and sophisticated tranquillity; an elegant lobby dome, the summer terrace, delectable cuisine, the exclusive Club InterContinental and a chic top-floor day spa with a treatment list unrivalled in the city. With all this to offer, it's no wonder some of the world's glitterati, including Sophia Loren and Ava Gardner, have made it their home when in Madrid.
The 91 Club InterContinental rooms, suites and three Presidential Suites offer upgraded facilities and amenities. The suites' design and style is more plentiful with oversized furniture and bedding creating a large sense of luxury and space with a sophisticated living area for in-room entertaining.

The Club guests can enjoy the facilities of the exclusive Club InterContinental Lounge. A combination of Art Deco, Asian and contemporary European design, guests can take advantage of complimentary services including private check-in, internet connection, private breakfast, complimentary all day refreshments, afternoon teas, snacks and pre-dinner drinks.

While the chic, 8th floor spa Spa Connection is unrivalled in the city with a treatment list that combines Thai and Balinese massage, Ayurvedic therapies, and Stone Therapy. A fabulous, exotic-style space with dark wooden decking and calming pale green dcor, there are four treatment rooms, an outdoor relaxation terrace with amazing views across the city, two Thai therapists and small but well- equipped gym with sauna and steam room. Products used are the contemporary Dr Hauschka and Kanebo.

Wining and Diningdiscerning and demanding guests won't be disappointed with the eclectic gastronomic offerings. El Jardin with its outdoor terrace, offers a fabulous combination of Mediterranean, international and local cuisine the strawberry gazpacho and the souffls are simply divine! Sunday Brunch is hugely popular and well- known throughout the capital with an array of dishes accompanied by live music. The trendsetters head to Bar 49 for cocktails and tapas while those seeking a comfortable environment at any time of day, should head for El Caf with its sprawling views of the terrace.

City Experiencesthe hotel prides itself on being able to accommodate guests' requirements and offer fabulous experiences in the vibrant capital. Along with all the sights and first-class shopping, the InterContinental Madrid offers unique guest experiences. These include an authentic night of 'tapeo' across the capital where guests can discover Madrid's vibrancy, energy, culture and massive enthusiasm for food and drink; a guided, personal shopper; the opportunity to enter the world of renowned Spanish impressionist, Sorolla with a visit to his house and museum and much more.

 

[scriptgirl]

Film Quarterly
Hemingway's "The Killers" and Heroic Fatalism: From Page to Screen (Thrice); Booth, Philip
Literature/Film Quarterly 01-01-2007



Heroic fatalism, or fatalistic heroism, a dignified, graceful acceptance of one's circumstances in the face of personal disaster up to and including one's death, is a theme that surfaces in Ernest Hemingway's short story "The Killers" and elsewhere in his short fiction and novels. That theme is pointedly explored in three films adapted from the story. Robert Siodmak's feature, a black-and-white film noir starring Burt Lancaster, Ava Gardner, and Edmond O'Brien, was released in 1946, followed a decade later by Andrei Tarkovsky's black-and-white short, made while the revered Russian director was still in film school. Don Siegel's color made-for-television adaptation, with Lee Marvin, CIu Galager, John Cassavetes, Angie Dickinson, and Ronald Reagan, played theaters in 1964.

The Hemingway character most willing, and perhaps even most eager, to accept his own terrible destiny is Ole Andreson, a former boxer also referred to as the Swede, in "The Killers." The character, according to "The Art of the Short Story," an essay Hemingway wrote while in Spain during May and June 1959, was inspired by "Agile" Andre Anderson, bom in Denmark. Anderson, on one occasion, beat his opponent after agreeing to throw a fight, as Hemingway told Gene Tunney, a heavyweight boxing champion of the late '20s: "All afternoon he had rehearsed taking a dive, but during the fight he had instinctively thrown a punch he didn't mean to" (Young 35). The boxer had knocked down Jack Dempsey in a 1916 bout that ended in no decision, and was shot to death a decade later in a Chicago cabaret.

The story, written in Madrid (Flora, Ernest 139) and originally titled "The Matadors," was first published in March 1927 in Scribners. The magazine, which had rejected Hemingway's story "An Alpine Idyll," accepted "The Killers" in late August 1926 for $200. Hemingway told F. Scott Fitzgerald that he had sent the story merely "to see what the alibi would be" if it were rejected. Fitzgerald, who at the time was earning $3,000 per story from The Saturday Evening Post, wrote a note of encouragement to his friend and rival: "I hope the sale of 'The Killers' will teach you to send every story either to Scribners or an agent" (Donaldson 101).

"The Killers," which was included in the collection Men Without Women, published in October 1927, and in The Nick Adams Stories (1972), marked Adams's final appearance as an adolescent in the interrelated stories. The sole Adams story not set in Michigan, it was moved from Petoskey, a resort town in that state, where Hemingway had lived after World War I, to the Illinois city of Summit, a suburb of Chicago. The relocation, closer to the nexus of criminal activities in the Midwest, adds verisimilitude to the story, as Flora notes in Hemingway's Nick Adams: "Petoskey is far removed from the centers of boxing, and an unlikely place for a boxer who gets in wrong to be waiting to be murdered. Readers associate such events with big cities-especially Chicago" (97).

The story, at surface level, is straightforward. Two hired killers, Al and Max, dressed in long coats and derby hats and described as looking like "a vaudeville team" (219), walk into a small-town diner. The two proceed to question, taunt, and psychologically terrorize George, the establishment's operator; his friend Nick Adams, the sole customer at the moment; and Sam, the African-American cook. Al takes Nick and Sam to the kitchen at the rear of the diner and ties them up, and Max reveals the gunmen's plans to kill Andreson. The killers finally leave, giving Nick time to run up the street to Hirsch's rooming-house, where the Swede is a boarder. Nick, against the advice of the scared but pragmatic Sam, frantically warns Andreson of the impending arrival of Al and Max. But the Swede, described as lying on a bed too small for the body of a former heavyweight, insists that any efforts on his part would be futile. He refuses to take action, and offers a
cryptic explanation-his crime, and impending punishment, relates to a mistake in judgment made a long time ago. He says he fell in with a bad crowd: "I got in wrong" (221). For the last act, Nick and George, back at the diner, bemoan Andreson's fate. George suggests that the Swede must have "double-crossed somebody" in Chicago (222), and Adams vows to leave Summit.

"The Killers," like many of Hemingway's short stories, gains maximum dramatic impact from the minimum. Al, Max, George, Nick, Sam, Andreson, and Mrs. Bell, the manager of the boarding house, are the sole characters. The story's four scenes are bolstered by very little physical description, of either characters or locales, as demonstrated by a passage regarding the exterior of the diner: "Outside it was getting dark. The street-light came on outside the window" (215). The dialogue, particularly that between the killers and between the killers and their hostages, relies on notably short, clipped sentences, offering the sensation of words being spit out and exchanged rapidly, like machine-gun fire. The technique was common to the era's hardboiled fiction.

The horror of the story, frontloaded with characters inspired by Hemingway's experiences with low-level criminals in Kansas City (Berman 79), stems in part from the waiting forced upon George, Nick, and Sam. The three, facing the threat of bodily harm, are harassed for more than two hours while the hit men wait to see if the Swede will show up to eat at the diner, as is his habit. When George, informed of the killers' intentions to terminate Andreson, asks Max what the killers will do with their trio of temporary hostages, the answer he gets is frighteningly noncommittal: "'That'll depend,' Max said. 'That's one of those things you never know at the time'" (218). Al and Max would not have anything to lose by getting rid of those to whom they have revealed their evil intentions; in one respect, they would gain an advantage, by eliminating the witnesses to the crime. Thus, the diner denizens' brush with death is made all the more horrifying. Al, speaking
to Max, is notably reluctant to leave the diner without cleaning up what he perceives as an unnecessarily messy situation: "'I don't like it,' said Al. 'It's sloppy. You talk too much.'" A moment later, he offers another hint that the captives have had a close brush with death: "'So long, bright boy,' he said to George. 'You got a lot of luck'" (219).

Andreson's decision to choose death by opting not to flee seems incomprehensible to Nick; the latter asks, repeatedly, if something might be done to save Andreson's life, and the Swede replies, again and again, that nothing can be done to change his fate. According to Hal Blythe and Charlie Sweet, "Ole is passive and deterministic; in his refusal to act, he accepts that death is imminent [...]" (37). His resolve, although leaving too many questions unanswered, is portrayed as admirable and mature, and his violent death is in keeping with themes that are recurrent in Hemingway's work, according to Soviet literary critic Ivan Kashkin: "For Hemingway, life is inseparable from death and is a fight at close quarters in which his heroes overcome not only the fear of death but the fear of life's intricacies and the disintegration threatening the individual" (qtd. in Parker 492-93).

Andreson's decision to calmly, coolly wait on his own execution triggers the action and informs the central themes in both feature-length film adaptations of the story. Each film, clearly cashing in on the cachet of the author's name, is titled Ernest Hemingway's The Killers.

Hemingway's work, by the mid-1940s, had been utilized as the source for feature films on three occasions, twice under the auspices of Paramount Pictures. A Farewell to Arms, with Gary Cooper and Helen Hayes in the lead roles, was released in 1932, landed in 1933 on the Motion Picture Herald's roster of "box office champions" and generated substantial publicity for the author (Leff). The film, directed by Frank Borzage, won Oscars for cinematography and sound and was additionally nominated for best picture and best art direction. Hemingway characters again visited the big screen eleven years later, with the commercially successful For Whom the Bell Tolls, starring Gary Cooper and Ingrid Bergman, and directed by Sam Wood. That movie also received Academy Awards attention, with nine nominations; Katina Paxinou won an Oscar for best supporting actress. To Have and Have Not, a Warner Bros. picture with Humphrey Bogart and Lauren Bacall, directed by Howard
Hawks, with contributions to the script by William Faulkner, was released in 1944, to similar box-office success (Alpi 153).

The 1946 version of The Killers was helmed by Mark Hellinger, an independent Hollywood producer affiliated with Universal, and formerly contracted to Warner Bros. Hellinger's experiences as a hard-living New York entertainment journalist and short-story writer with Broadway and Mob connections had informed his work as a writer on The Roaring Twenties (1939) and as an associate producer on They Drive by Night (1940) and High Sierra (1941), all released by Warner Bros. and directed by Raoul Walsh (Alpi 153).

Hellinger's first choice for director was Siegel, a busy second-unit director best known for directing the Oscar-winning 1945 documentary Hitler Lives, a treatise on the continuing influence of Hitler's ideas in postwar Europe. Siegel, though, could not easily or inexpensively be released from his contract with Warner Bros. to work for Siodmak at Universal: "(Jack) Warner, who hated Hellinger and loathed me, said an immediate, 'No,' and hung up," Siegel writes in his autobiography (235).

The script, begun by Siegel, was also worked on by Richard Brooks, a publicist, and, finally, by filmmaker John Huston, a Warner Bros. employee, under the supervision of Anthony Veiller, according to Siodmak biographer Deborah Lazaroff Alpi. Veiller, a Hollywood veteran and uncredited contributor to Gunga Din (Stevens, 1939), received screenwriting credit, but Huston was solely responsible for the third and final draft of the script, as Siodmak told the Los Angeles Times in 1951 : "The script was in fact by Huston. His name didn't appear on the credits because he was under contract to another studio at the time, but he wrote the script for us in his spare afternoons-with Tony Veiller cracking the whip occasionally" (Alpi 154).

Huston, who wrote and directed the 1941 noir classic The Maltese Falcon, wanted to direct The Killers, but he disagreed with Hellinger about several issues related to the structure of the film. So the job went to Siodmak, a Memphis-born, German-bred filmmaker who had already directed several much-admired noirs, including Phantom Lady (1944), and the financially and critically successful The Spiral Staircase (1945), a favorite of Hellinger's (Alpi 154).

The Killers, marked by several resemblances to Siodmak's earlier German-made crime films, including Sturme der Leidenschaft (1932) and Der Mann, der seinen Mörder sucht (1931), represented common ground for Siodmak and Hellinger. Both men were fascinated by the workings of the criminal underworld, as Alpi suggests:

Like Hellinger, Siodmak was interested in character more than anything else, and for his first Hollywood gangster film he was determined to abandon the black-and-white portraits that suffused much of the gangster films of the [']30s, which to him presented "types and not characters" for a deeper, more complex portrait of the workings of the criminal mind." (154)

Siodmak's film, which marked the first screen appearance of the Nick Adams character, opens with an image of two shadowy figures seated in the front seat of a moving car. They are photographed from behind, offering a view of the men and their hats, the white line, and the road ahead. Then a sign appears-"Brentwood, New Jersey. Drive Carefully." Next appears a shot of a cityscape, with a diner to the far right of the frame, and long shadows stretching toward the bottom. The credits play over this shot, as killers Al (Charles McGraw) and Max (William Conrad) walk toward the screen, peering into the windows of a gas station. Dressed in derbies and long coats, they step from the darkness into the light and back into the darkness again.

Woody Bredell's high-contrast cinematography, enhanced throughout by low-key lighting, offers a moody intensity that is reminiscent of the work of Fritz Lang, F. W. Murnau, and G. W. Pabst. These filmmakers are among the German expressionists whose 1920s work had so heavily influenced Siodmak, as noted by Raymond Borde and Etienne Chaumeton in their groundbreaking 1955 study, A Panorama of American Film Noir (79). That quality is in keeping with the noir tradition, as crime novelist and screenwriter Stuart Kaminsky notes in a videotaped interview included on the Criterion Collection DVD, which contains all three versions of the movie: "It's in some ways very typical of what would be called a film noir. It's dark. Most of it is shot on sets, which are very carefully illuminated. Siodmak's style of darkness is actually written into the script."

 

[scriptgirl]

Ebay

 

[scriptgirl]

ebay

 

[scriptgirl]

Wonderful news for Ava Fans!
This documentary should air later this year on Turner Classic Movies.
source: hollywood reporter

Lady of Spain

Spanish director Isaki Lacuesta ("The Legend of Time") has signed on to direct the documentary "Ava," about film legend Ava Gardner, for Turner Classic Movies, he said at the San Sebastian International Film Festival. The main focus of the project will be the 15-year period Gardner spent in Spain and will include as-yet-unseen footage of the actress from that time. TCM's U.S. and European channels will co-produce "Ava," with TCM Spain acting as executive producer on the project, which is set to begin early next year.

 

[Ziegfeld Girl]

^ How exciting! I hope it screens on TCM in Australia.

 

[scriptgirl]

ebay