Showing posts with label Guinn "Big Boy" Williams. Show all posts

Friday, May 8, 2015

PALOOKA Photo

Robert Armstrong, Thelma Todd, and Guinn "Big Boy" Williams in a publicity photo for PALOOKA ( 1934 ).

Saturday, February 21, 2015

Here is more about Hilda Title from Richard Parks. Some of these items have to do with a lawsuit related to a traffic accident that caused her to miss a casting call for MILLION DOLLAR LEGS, a 1939 movie starring Betty Grable. That seems to have ended her acting career.

MILLION DOLLAR LEGS ( 1939 ):
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Million_Dollar_Legs_(1939_film)

A

Thursday, August 7, 2014

Guinn "Big Boy" Williams

Guinn Williams was one of Thelma Todd's costars at the Roach studio.

Guinn "Big Boy" Williams

From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

Guinn Williams
Born	Guinn Terrell Williams Jr. (1899-04-26)April 26, 1899 Decatur, Texas, U.S.
Died	June 6, 1962(1962-06-06) (aged 63) Hollywood, California, U.S.
Occupation	Actor
Years active	1919–1961
Spouse(s)	Barbara Weeks Kathleen Collins Dorothy Peterson (1943-1962) (his death)

Guinn "Big Boy" Williams (April 26, 1899 – June 6, 1962) was an American actor who appeared in memorable westerns such as Dodge City (1939), Santa Fe Trail (1940), and The Comancheros (1961). He was nicknamed "Big Boy" as he was 6' 2" and muscular from years of working on ranches and playing semi-pro and pro baseball.
Williams made his screen debut in the 1919 comedy, Almost A Husband, with Will Rogers and Cullen Landis, and was featured in a large supporting role ten years later in Frank Borzage's Lucky Star with Janet Gaynor and Charles Farrell. Throughout the 1920s Williams would have a string of successful films, mostly westerns.
He then appeared in The Great Meadow alongside Johnny Mack Brown, which was Brown's breakout film. Throughout the 1930s, Williams acted in supporting roles, mostly in westerns, sports, or outdoor dramas. Although not the lead actor in any of them, he was always employed, and was successful as a supporting actor. He often played alongside Hoot Gibson and Harry Carey during that period. In 1941, he became one of many actors cast by Universal Pictures in their large film series, Riders of Death Valley. From the late 1930s to the mid-1940s, Williams appeared in supporting roles in a number of A-pictures, sometimes with high billing, such as in Columbia's first Technicolour film The Desperadoes (1943).
His father, Guinn Williams Sr, represented the 13th Texas Congressional District in the United States House of Representatives from 1922 to 1932. Williams was frequently teamed with Alan Hale, Sr. as sidekicks to Errol Flynn in several of his pictures. In 1960, he was cast in the epic film The Alamo and in Home from the Hill with Robert Mitchum. His last role was opposite his close friend John Wayne and Stuart Whitman in The Comancheros.

Guinn Williams (left) with Alan Hale, Sr., Ronald Reagan and Errol Flynn in Santa Fe Trail' (1940)

He was married to three actresses, the first being silent film actress Kathleen Collins. For a time, he was married to B-movie actress Barbara Weeks. His last wife was Dorothy Peterson, whom he first met in the 1940s.
Williams died unexpectedly of uremic poisoning^[1] on June 6, 1962, aged 63.

Partial filmography[edit]

Rounding Up the Law (1922)
Rose of the Desert (1925)
Polly of the Circus (1932)
The Mystery Squadron (1933)
The Glass Key (1935)
The Law of 45's (1935)
Dodge City (1939)
Blackmail (1939)
The Fighting 69th (1940)
Virginia City (1940)
Santa Fe Trail (1940)
Swamp Water (1941)
The Desperadoes (1943)
Rocky Mountain (1950)
The Hired Gun (1957)
The Alamo (1960)
The Comancheros (1961)

References[edit]

Jump up ^ Big Boy Williams Dies of Poisoning (June 6, 1962)

External links[edit]

* * *

Guinn "Big Boy" Williams appeared in two films with Zasu Pitts and Thelma Todd, CATCH AS CATCH CAN and WAR MAMMAS. He later appeared with Patsy Kelly in her feature film debut at the Roach studio, KELLY THE SECOND. He made all kinds of movies, but is best known today for working in westerns, frequently with Errol Flynn. Williams eventually died of the same condition as Jean Harlow, uremic poisoning.

Here we see Janet Gaynor lifted off the floor by Guinn as they dance in LUCKY STAR ( 1929 ).

CATCH AS CATCH CAN - Marshall Neilan, Thelma Todd, Guinn "Big Boy" Williams, Zasu Pitts

With Zasu Pitts in another publicity picture for CATCH AS CATCH CAN.

Reblogged from http://www.gettyimages.co.uk/detail/news-photo/stage-and-screen-personalities-pic-circa-1931-american-news-photo/78978966

A photo from a polo game in 1934,

with a caption which mentions Hal Roach.

With Patsy Kelly in her KELLY THE SECOND ( 1936 ), which also featured Pert Kelton.

As a boxer again in PARDON OUR NERVE, 1939, with June Gale and Lyn Bari.

Guinn Williams with Ann Sheridan and Victor Jory in DODGE CITY, 1939.

With Lupe Velez in SIX LESSONS FROM MADAME LA ZONGA ( 1941 )

With Judy Canova in SINGING IN THE CORN ( 1946 ).

Guinn is perhaps best known for the many westerns he appeared in. Here is a picture from 1933

and another from the forties.

Lobby card for THE EAGLE'S CLAW ( 1924 ) a silent movie in which Guinn starred.

Poster for KELLY THE SECOND.

KELLY THE SECOND lobby cards.

Guinn "Big Boy" Williams:
http://www.b-westerns.com/bigboy.htm

http://smmercury.com/2012/08/23/bartee-haile-big-boy-williams-has-eerie-premonition-of-his-death/

A

Wednesday, August 6, 2014

HORSE FEATHERS And THE COLLEGE WIDOW

The movie HORSE FEATHERS, in which Thelma Todd is called a "college widow", was a parody of an earlier film that was actually called THE COLLEGE WIDOW.

Reblogged from http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0017767/

The Marx Brothers did it better.

1 March 2005 | by F Gwynplaine MacIntyre (Minffordd, North Wales) – See all my reviews

'The College Widow' is an obscure comedy which is notable for inspiring a much better-known (and much funnier) comedy. The Marx Brothers' classic 'Horse Feathers' is largely a parody of this movie. 'Horse Feathers' (1932) featured much dialogue about Thelma Todd's character being a 'college widow', but did not offer to translate this term: audiences in 1932 were expected to know what a college widow was ... because of this movie, and because of the original stage play by George Ade, who invented the term.

George Ade (1866-1944) would now be completely forgotten, except for the fact that his surname keeps turning up in crossword puzzles. In the first two decades of the 20th century, he was an extremely popular American author, best known for writing fables combining fairytale-like characters with cynical narration and dialogue rendered in Jazz Age slang.

The action of 'The College Widow' takes place mostly at Atwater College, which could more accurately be called Jerkwater College. This is an American movie about college, so of course everyone in this movie -- including the college faculty -- are only interested in football. (Classes? What classes?) Vivacious young Jane Witherspoon is the daughter of the college's president. Atwater's football team isn't winning many games, so Professor Jellicoe persuades Jane to vamp the gridiron stars of other colleges -- especially rival Stanley University -- and seduce them into enrolling at Atwater. Her father has no discernible objection to pimping his daughter for the sake of a football trophy. Star athlete Billy Bolton is about to enrol at Stanley, his wealthy father's alma mater. Jane seduces Billy, and -- bob's your uncle -- he's soon wearing Atwater strip. Of course, the climax of the film is the big game between Atwater and Stanley. (How did Ade's play manage this on stage?) Several scenes in 'The College Widow' are clear templates for specific scenes in 'Horse Feathers', notably a scene in which Jane purposely falls out of a canoe to attract a burly football player. I suspect that S.J. Perelman -- principal scriptwriter on 'Horse Feathers', whose fondness for college humour is well known -- takes the credit for the parody. If 'The College Widow' were a drama, it might be able to withstand the scathing parody of the Marx Brothers. But this movie is a (very weak) comedy, and I can't help noticing that the Marx boys' parody is much funnier than the comedy they were sending up in the first place.

In the later scenes, when Jane Witherspoon is stigmatised as a 'college widow', Dolores Costello seems to be playing a role that would have been better suited to Clara Bow ... who typically played a virtuous girl who (through misunderstandings) was publicly perceived as a slut.

I keep expecting a revival of interest in silent-film actress Dolores Costello, if only because she's Drew Barrymore's grandmother. If a Costello revival ever arrives, it shouldn't centre on 'The College Widow': Costello is quite pretty here, but vapid. Her energy seems forced, as if she feels a need to signal the audience that she doesn't *really* want to come the slut for these brawny linebackers. Buster Collier is much better as her forward-passing swain. The 'Robert Ryan' who plays a footballer in this movie is not the famous actor of that name. Guinn Williams, whom I'm always glad to see, is quite funny here as a befuddled Stanley steamer, I mean a Stanley teamer. If I had never seen 'Horse Feathers', I might have rated 'The College Widow' 6 out of 10. Under the circumstances, I won't go higher than 4 points.

* * *

Guinn "Big Boy" Williams was one of Thelma Todd's costars in her series at the Roach studio in the thirties, appearing in CATCH AS CATCH CAN and WAR MAMMAS, and would later appear with Patsy Kelly in KELLY THE SECOND. He would go on to greater fame in other roles at other studios.

College Widow:
https://allthetropes.orain.org/wiki/College_Widow

THE COLLEGE WIDOW, 1915:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_College_Widow_(1915_film)

http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0005106/

http://books.google.com/books?id=pJCSEI8bJFkC&pg=PA172&lpg=PA172&dq=the+college+widow+1915+ethel+clayton&source=bl&ots=_x3IAgEKyP&sig=tlc4yiZ14S_HrSfgTLNVh8WOnW8&hl=en&sa=X&ei=vzziU-X5JM6vyASCyYGgAw&ved=0CDoQ6AEwBA#v=onepage&q=the%20college%20widow%201915%20ethel%20clayton&f=false

THE COLLEGE WIDOW, 1927:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_College_Widow_(1927_film)

http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0017767/

Dolores Costello:
http://www.goldensilents.com/stars/dolorescostello.html

Guinn "Big Boy" Williams:
http://www.imdb.com/name/nm0930711/

A

Friday, March 15, 2013

The Thelma Todd Series At The Roach Studio

The series that began with Zasu Pitts and Thelma Todd as a team would change over the years and the tail end of the series had a story that focused on Rosina Lawrence, who by that time had become a regular.

Pitts and Todd

From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

Pitts and Todd were a comedy duo from the 1930s, put together by Hal Roach as the female counterpart to Laurel and Hardy.^[1] The duo consisted of actresses Zasu Pitts and Thelma Todd.

History

Roach had previously paired Anita Garvin and Marion Byron together in 1928 and 1929 but only three films resulted.^[2] Both Pitts and Todd had been working with Roach in various short films and feature films previously. The duo worked together for 17 short films. Stan Laurel and Oliver Hardy made a guest appearance in Pitts and Todd's 1931 short On the Loose. The 1930 Leroy Shield song "Beautiful Lady" was used as the theme song for the Pitts and Todd films.^[3] The team's 1932 short film Show Business was directed by Jules White and was later re-worked as a Three Stooges Columbia short A Pain in the Pullman from 1936.^[4]^[5]
In mid-1933, ZaSu Pitts left the Hal Roach studios and Patsy Kelly was brought in as Thelma Todd's new partner. This team filmed 21 more short films together until Todd's death in 1935. The next pairing was Patsy Kelly and Pert Kelton for one short, and then Kelly and Lyda Roberti for two shorts and one feature film, Nobody's Baby. Roberti died in 1938 at age 31.
In 1941, ZaSu Pitts and Patsy Kelly made their only appearance together in the feature film Broadway Limited. The duo echo Laurel and Hardy in one sequence when sharing a bed with a baby and a leaking hot water bottle.^[6]

Filmography

ZaSu Pitts and Thelma Todd

Let’s Do Things (MGM, 1931)
Catch As Catch Can (MGM, 1931)
The Pajama Party (MGM, 1931)
War Mamas (MGM, 1931)
Seal Skins (MGM, 1932)
On the Loose (MGM, 1932)
Red Noses (MGM, 1932)
Strictly Unreliable (MGM, 1932)
The Old Bull (MGM, 1932)
Show Business (MGM) (1932)
Alum and Eve (MGM, 1932)
The Soilers (MGM, 1932)
Sneak Easily (MGM, 1933)
Asleep In the Feet (MGM, 1933)
Maids à la Mode (MGM, 1933)
Bargain of the Century (MGM, 1933)
One Track Minds (MGM, 1933, with Spanky McFarland)

Thelma Todd and Patsy Kelly

Beauty and the Bus (MGM, 1933)
Backs To Nature (MGM, 1933)
Air Fright (MGM, 1933)
Babes In the Goods (MGM, 1934)
Soup and Fish (MGM, 1934)
Maid In Hollywood (MGM, 1934)
I’ll Be Suing You (MGM, 1934)
Three Chumps Ahead (MGM, 1934)
One Horse Farmers (MGM, 1934)
Opened By Mistake (MGM, 1934)
Done In Oil (MGM, 1934)
Bum Voyage (MGM, 1934)
Treasure Blues (MGM, 1935)
Sing, Sister, Sing (MGM, 1935)
The Tin Man (MGM, 1935)
The Misses Stooge (MGM, 1935)
Slightly Static (MGM, 1935)
Twin Triplets (MGM, 1935)
Hot Money (MGM, 1935)
Top Flat (MGM, 1935)
All American Toothache (MGM, 1935)

Patsy Kelly and Pert Kelton

Pan Handlers (MGM, 1936)

Patsy Kelly and Lyda Roberti

Hill Tillies (MGM, 1936)
At Sea Ashore (MGM, 1936)
Nobody’s Baby (MGM, 1937)

ZaSu Pitts and Patsy Kelly

Broadway Limited (United Artists, 1941)

Notes

^ Maltin, Leonard (1970). Movie Comedy Teams. New York, NY: Signet Book. pp. p. 141. ISBN:0451044530.
^ Mitchell, Glenn (1998). A-Z Of Silent Film Comedy: An Illustrated Companion. London: Batsford. pp. p. 95. ISBN:0713479396.
^ Mitchell, Glenn (1995). The Laurel & Hardy Encyclopedia. London: Bath Press. pp. p. 186. ISBN:0713477113.
^ http://stoogeworld.com/_Videography/Filmography/PaininthePullman.htm
^ Solomon, Jon (2001). The Complete Three Stooges: The Official Filmography and Three Stooges Companion. Glendale, CA: Comedy III Productions, Inc.. pp. p. 88. ISBN:0971186804.
^ Mitchell, Glenn (1995). The Laurel & Hardy Encyclopedia. London: Bath Press. pp. p. 150. ISBN:0713477113.

* * *

Zasu Pitts and Thelma Todd were a success at a time when some of Roach's other efforts to start a new series failed to catch on. But the demand for Zasu Pitts in features was so great that Roach couldn't afford to keep her in the series, leading to her being replaced with Patsy Kelly. This was something the studio arranged: Thelma Todd had no choice in the matter and in fact was gone on a trip to England to promote THE DEVIL'S BROTHER while the negotiations were going on. Thelma Todd would remain friends with Zasu Pitts after the switch.

The series with Patsy Kelly continued to be a success, but the replacement of Zasu Pitts with Patsy Kelly would have been seen as a something of a decline at the time. The series continued to be popular and was one of the more successful series at the Roach studio. There was some talk of using Thelma Todd and Patsy Kelly* in feature films during the later part of the series, but it was not to be, as Thelma Todd died while they were still turning out two-reelers. Patsy Kelly would make the feature KELLY THE SECOND in 1936: also in the cast was Pert Kelton, who would be paired with Kelly in the next two-reeler, PAN HANDLERS. Lyda Roberti was then teamed with Patsy Kelly in AT SEA ASHORE and HILL TILLIES, followed by the feature NOBODY'S BABY. There would be one more movie with Patsy Kelly and Lyda Roberti, PICK A STAR. Roberti's heart condition had begun to affect her career and she only had a few scenes in this movie: she would appear in only one more - WIDE OPEN FACES - in 1938. Rosina Lawrence, who had become a regular in the series, had a bigger part in this one. Roach evidently had big hopes for her, but later said that it just didn't work out.

BROADWAY LIMITED with Zasu Pitts and Patsy Kelly, had another blonde in it, Marjorie Woodworth. But she wasn't really supposed to be a member of a comedy team, she was just another cast member in the same movie.

Publicity photo for Thelma Todd around the time her series began with Zasu Pitts.

STRICTLY UNRELIABLE With Bud Jamison

WAR MAMMAS With Guinn "Big Boy" Williams

Set during the first World War, this would be the only film in the series not set during the period in which it was made.

Thelma Todd, Zasu Pitts, George Marshall

Director Gus Meins with Thelma Todd and Patsy Kelly. Note overhead microphone and fill light next to movie camera.

Thelma Todd, Patsy Kelly, and Gus Meins With Wind Machine

Birthday Party For Patsy Kelly

KELLY THE SECOND

KELLY THE SECOND featured Pert Kelton as well as Patsy Kelly.

Patsy Kelly and Pert Kelton went on to appear together in one two-reel comedy, PAN HANDLERS.

Rosina Lawrence was also in the cast of PAN HANDLERS: she would be back in NOBODY'S BABY and would have a major role in PICK A STAR.

Lyda Roberti And Patsy Kelly

Front row: Stan Laurel, Patsy Kelly, Oliver Hardy, Lyda Roberti. Back Row: Director Gus Meins and L.A. French, supervisor of the Laurel and Hardy company.

NOBODY'S BABY

Lyda Roberti On The Set Of NOBODY'S BABY.

Patsy Kelly, Lyda Roberti, film director Gus Meins and

L.A. French, supervisor of the Laurel-H

PICK A STAR

Rosina Lawrence is billed above Lyda Roberti

Rosina Lawrence, Jack Haley, And Patsy Kelly

Lyda Roberti in a scene where she's being filmed in a scene as "Dagmar", the movie star.

BROADWAY LIMITED

Marjorie Woodworth at left, Patsy Kelly and Zasu Pitts at right.

Leonard Maltin's book MOVIE COMEDY TEAMS discussed the team of Zasu Pitts and Thelma Todd ( along with it's later incarnations ) along with such well known comedy teams as Laurel and Hardy, Abbott and Costello, The Marx Brothers, and The Three Stooges.

According to this book, there was some talk of Patsy Kelly and Zasu Pitts being teamed again for a television program almost twenty years after BROADWAY LIMITED, but nothing came of it.

*Roach also talked about pairing Patsy Kelly with Oliver Hardy and Spanky McFarland in a new series called "The Hardy Family": nothing ever came of this and that series seems to have been proposed as a sort of a threat during negotiations with Stan Laurel.

Zasu Pitts And Thelma Todd