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The Grapefruit treatnent was said to whiten and soften the skin on her elbows.
My club for Thelma Todd has this same picture on the home page.
A Blog For Thelma Todd Thelma Todd was a star of silent movies and later the talkies. She is remembered as much today for her mysterious death as she is for her films. In this blog, we take a look at Thelma Todd, her movies, and various commentaries.
Friday, April 20, 2012
Cover Girl Thelma Todd
Thelma Todd wasn't the cover girl on very many US magazine covers, but there was also the foreign market. Hal Roach's comedies were popular in England, which was why there were English tours by Laurel and Hardy in 1932 and Thelma Todd in 1933. American movie stars and magazines about them were very popular in Latin America, and Thelma Todd would appear on a number of magazines in that area.
Site for Movie Magazines:
Wednesday, April 18, 2012
Hollywood Babylon Covergirl
Kenneth Anger's HOLLYWOOD BABYLON has a photo of Jayne Mansfield on the cover.
Under the old "Hollwoodland" sign ( which today reads just "Hollywood" )
The photo of Jayne Mansfield was famous even before they had it on the cover of that book. There's also a story that goes with it.
In April 1957, there was a dinner party at Romanoff's in Beverly Hills to officially welcome Sophia Loren to Hollywood.
Jayne Mansfield went to the party wearing a dress with a low neckline, which was typical of her.
Being Jayne Mansfield, she struck up a pose or two for the waiting photographers.
some people would like.
Jayne Mansfield site:
http://www.jaynemansfield.com/
Under the old "Hollwoodland" sign ( which today reads just "Hollywood" )
The photo of Jayne Mansfield was famous even before they had it on the cover of that book. There's also a story that goes with it.
In April 1957, there was a dinner party at Romanoff's in Beverly Hills to officially welcome Sophia Loren to Hollywood.
Jayne Mansfield went to the party wearing a dress with a low neckline, which was typical of her.
Being Jayne Mansfield, she struck up a pose or two for the waiting photographers.
Who proceeded to take a series of pictures.
"I've been shown up!"
"What will I do now? This wasn't in the script!"
"This beats me all hollow!"
The Best Man Won!
The photo of Jayne Mansfield was used for the unauthorized US edition of HOLLYWOOD BABYLON that came out in 1956. In 1975, when the authorized edition came out, it was used again even though it had no association with the original version of the book, which was published in France.
I don't find this in the accounts I read on the internet, but Sophia Loren had been exploiting her own breasts and it's been said that Jayne Mansfield was defending the honor of American womanhood. Sort of.
Finally, if anyone feels that Jayne Mansfield was vulgar and Sophia Loren wasn't,
they can take a look at this photo and see that Sophia Loren could be vulgar, too.
This is not my idea of a pretty picture. Sophia Loren is showing her underarm hair and the man in the background adds his own questionable contribution to the picture, as well as to the lake.
I don't hate Sophia Loren, I wouldn't want anyone to get the wrong idea
about
that. But I get tired of stuff where they say she's great and Jayne Mansfield isn't. They
were both famous and they were both popular at the time. You can't change
that later on assome people would like.
THE END
Jayne Mansfield site:
http://www.jaynemansfield.com/
Monday, April 16, 2012
Marie Wilson And My Friend Irma
Marie Wilson played "My Friend Irma" on the radio show and later television. The old Zasu Pitts and Thelma Todd radio series doesn't seem to have been an influence as series' basic situation of the two girls living together with one of them being a screwball was based on MY SISTER EILEEN.
But the MY FRIEND IRMA movie does have some things in common with the Zasu Pitts and Thelma Todd comedies of the 1930's.
My Friend Irma (film)
From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia
| My Friend Irma | |
|---|---|
 Theatrical release poster | |
| Directed by | George Marshall |
| Produced by | Hal B. Wallis |
| Written by | Cy Howard Parke Levy |
| Starring | John Lund Marie Wilson Diana Lynn Don DeFore Dean Martin Jerry Lewis Hans Conreid |
| Distributed by | Paramount Pictures |
| Release date(s) | August 16, 1949 |
| Running time | 102 minutes |
| Language | English |
Plot
The storyline follows two women, Irma Peterson (Marie Wilson) and Jane Stacey (Diana Lynn), who room together in New York. Irma is a somewhat dim-witted blonde who deep down has good intentions. Jane is an amibitious woman who dreams of marrying a rich man. She winds up as a secretary for a millionaire, Richard Rhinelander (Don DeFore).Meanwhile, Irma is in love with Al (John Lund), who is a con-artist looking to get rich quick. Al visits an orange-juice stand and encounters Steve Laird (Dean Martin) singing. He convinces him to leave his job and promises to make him famous. Steve and his partner Seymour (Jerry Lewis) then wind up living at Irma & Jane's apartment through the invitation of Al. She is angry, but Irma convinces her to let them stay. This opens up a romantic arc where Jane and Steve fall in love.
After a successful singing debut, Steve gets upset with Jane's wishes to marry a wealthy man and he leaves and returns to the juice stand. Meanwhile, Irma gets into a situation and decides to end her life. However, she finds out a radio station is about to call her for a $50,000 question, so she rushes home to answer the question. She wins the prize and all live happily ever after.
Production
My Friend Irma was filmed from February 22 through April 12, 1949. Although filming was already underway, producer Hal B. Wallis thought it would be a low-risk introduction of the team of Martin & Lewis to the screen. They had been approached by several film studios before signing a five-year contract with Paramount Pictures.Lewis was originally cast to play a comparatively straight role, but after the first day of screen tests it was obvious that he was wrong for the part that the studio had selected for him. Concerned that he would be left out of the film and that they were abandoning the formula that had created the Martin & Lewis team's comedic success ("handsome guy with the monkey"), a frantic Lewis quickly came up with the idea of playing a comical sidekick to Steve, and the character Seymour was written into the script. Lewis reminisces in detail about this career turning point in his book on Martin (Dean and Me) as well as his lengthy online Archive of American Television videotaped interview.
Marie Wilson, Hans Conried, and Gloria Gordon played the same characters in the movie that they did on the radio show. Felix Bressart was cast in the film, but died during filming, Hans Conried took over his role.
Cast
John Lund .......... AlMarie Wilson....... Irma Peterson
Diana Lynn ........ Jane Stacy
Don DeFore ....... Richard Rhinelander III
Dean Martin ....... Steve Laird
Jerry Lewis ........ Seymour
Hans Conried ..... Professor Kropotkin
Kathryn Givney ... Mrs. Rhinelander
Percy Helton ...... Mr. Z. Clyde
Gloria Gordon ..... Mrs. O'Reilly, the Landlady
Sequel
It was followed the following year by a sequel, My Friend Irma Goes West, the only sequel that Martin & Lewis ever made.In pop culture
In the 2002 film Martin and Lewis, a biopic about the comedy team starring Sean Hayes and Jeremy Northam. A scene from the film portrays that Lewis originally wanted to play the role of Al, but Wallis suggested that he play a new character, Seymour, instead, to which Lewis reluctantly agreed.DVD releases
My Friend Irma has been released twice on DVD. It was originally released on a two-film collection with its sequel, My Friend Irma Goes West, on October 25, 2005. A year later it was included on an eight-film DVD set, the Dean Martin and Jerry Lewis Collection: Volume One, released on October 31, 2006.References
- Lewis, Jerry and James Kaplan. Dean & Me (A Love Story). New York: Doubleday, 2005. ISBN 0-7679-2086-4
External links
One of Marie Wilson's first film roles was as "Mary, Quite Contrary" in BABES IN TOYLAND at the Roach studio.
Marie Wilson in background, right, at the end of the movie.
Here we see Marie Wilson with Thelma Todd and Patsy Kelly as well as Jeanette MacDonald at a Hollywood party in 1935.
1936 Patricia Ellis Jeanne Madden Jean Muir Marie Wilson. A display of filters for photography. Marie Wilson's name is behind the first girl on the left, while Marie Wilson herself is on the right.
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Marie Wilson as "Miss Murgatroyd" in SATAN MET LADY, 1936. This was a slightly different remake of THE MALTESE FALCON and Miss Murgatroyd was in place of "Effie".
Marie Wilson and Anne Nagel are so cool in this picture.
Seems to me I've seen that guy somewhere before.
Oh yeh. He was one of Thelma Todd's costars.
The movie version MY FRIEND IRMA had it that the girls' dates were always at Coney Island, something they'd also had in ON THE LOOSE with Thelma Todd and Zasu Pitts. Both movies in fact had the same director, George Marshall. But MY FRIEND IRMA had the same problem on the radio show before the movie was made, too. Still, it was reusing the same situation as well as the same director.
Another site where you can listen to "My Friend Irma" radio show:
BABES IN TOYLAND reviewed at "Scared Silly":
BABES IN TOYLAND Page at Way Out West:
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Sunday, April 15, 2012
Some Roach Publicity
Some Publicity material from the Hal Roach studio.
Press books featured a variety of publicity items for the latest release, some of which were even true. Thelma Todd actually did enter films the way this one says.
20th anniversary poster for Hal Roach, featuring an odd green Patsy Kelly.
20th anniversary ad for Hal Roach
Saturday, April 14, 2012
Joyita
The Joyita was a yacht that belonged to Roland West and was used in the 1931 movie CORSAIR. This was the movie in which Thelma Todd was billed as "Alison Loyd".
The movie was not a success. But greater misfortunes for the Joyita were yet to come.
MV Joyita
From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia
MV Joyita was a merchant vessel from which 25 passengers and crew mysteriously disappeared in the South Pacific in 1955. It was found adrift in the South Pacific without its crew onboard. The ship was in very poor condition, including corroded pipes and a radio which, while functional, only had a range of about 2 miles due to faulty wiring. Despite this, the extreme buoyancy of the ship made sinking nearly impossible. Investigators were puzzled as to why the crew didn't remain on board and wait for help.
Vessel description and history
Construction
The 69-foot (21 m) wooden ship was built in 1931 as a luxury yacht by the Wilmington Boat Works in Los Angeles for movie director Roland West. During this period, she made numerous trips south to Mexico and to the 1939-40 Golden Gate International Exposition in San Francisco. During part of this time, Chester Mills was the skipper of the vessel.
After the attack on Pearl Harbor, she was acquired by the United States Navy and taken to Pearl Harbor, Hawaii, where she was outfitted as Patrol Boat YP-108. (Another YP-108 sank near Pearl Harbor, not the Joyita). The Navy used her to patrol the big island of Hawaii until the end of World War II.
Private purchase
Dr. Katharine Luomala, a professor at the University of Hawaii, bought the ship in 1952 and chartered the boat to her friend, Captain Thomas H. "Dusty" Miller, a British-born sailor living in Samoa. Miller used the ship as a trading and fishing charter boat.
The incident at sea
Overdue and disappeared
About 5:00 AM on October 3, 1955, the Joyita left Samoa's Apia harbor bound for the Tokelau Islands, about 270 miles (430 km) away. The boat had been scheduled to leave on the noon tide the previous day but her departure was delayed because her port engine clutch failed. The Joyita eventually left Samoa on one engine. She was carrying 16 crew members and 9 passengers, including a government official, a doctor (Alfred "Andy" Denis Parsons, a World War II surgeon on his way to perform an amputation), a copra buyer, and two children. Her cargo consisted of medical supplies, timber, empty oil drums and various foodstuffs.
The voyage was expected to take between 41 and 48 hours. She was scheduled to return with a cargo of copra. The Joyita was scheduled to arrive in the Tokelau Islands on October 5.
On October 6 a message from Fakaofo port reported that the ship was overdue. No ship or land-based operator reported receiving a distress signal from the crew. A search and rescue mission was launched and, from 6 to 12 October, the Sunderlands of the Royal New Zealand Air Force covered a probability area of nearly 100,000 square miles (260,000 km²) of ocean during the search. But no sign of the Joyita nor any of her passengers or crew were found.
Sighted off-course without passengers or crew
Five weeks later, on November 10, Gerald Douglas, captain of the merchant ship Tuvalu, enroute from Suva to Funafuti sighted the Joyita more than 600 miles (1,000 km) from her scheduled route. The ship was partially submerged and listing heavily (her port deck rail was awash) and there was no trace of any of the passengers or crew; four tons of cargo were also missing. The recovery party noted that the radio was discovered tuned to 2182 kHz, the international marine radiotelephone distress channel.
Condition of the vessel
- Barnacle growth high above the usual waterline on the port side showed that the Joyita had been listing heavily for some time.
- There was some damage to the superstructure. Her flying bridge had been smashed away and the deckhouse had light damage and broken windows. A canvas awning had been rigged on top of the deckhouse behind the bridge.
- The starboard engine was found to be covered by mattresses, while the port engine's clutch was still partially disassembled, showing that the vessel was still running on only one engine.
- An auxiliary pump had been rigged in the engine room, mounted on a plank of wood slung between the main engines. However, it had not been connected.
- The radio on board was tuned to the international distress channel, but when the equipment was inspected, a break was found in the cable between the set and the aerial. The cable had been painted over, obscuring the break. This would severely limit the range of the radio to about 2 miles (5 km).
- The electric clocks on board (wired into the vessel's generator) had stopped at 10:25 and the switches for the cabin lighting and navigation lights were on, implying that whatever had occurred happened at night. The ships' logbook, sextant, mechanical chronometer and other navigational equipment were missing.
- A doctor's bag was found on deck containing a stethoscope, a scalpel and four lengths of blood-stained bandages.
Maritime inquiry
A subsequent inquiry found that the vessel was in a poor state of repair, but determined that the fate of the passengers and crew was "inexplicable on the evidence submitted at the inquiry". An especially inexplicable point was that the three liferafts the Joyita carried were missing, but it would not make sense for the crew and passengers to voluntarily abandon the vessel. Fitted out for carrying refrigerated cargo, the Joyita had 640 cubic feet (18 m3) of cork lining her holds, making her virtually unsinkable. In addition, further buoyancy was provided by a cargo of empty fuel drums.The inquiry was only able to establish the reasons for the vessel becoming flooded. It found that the vessel would have begun to flood due to the fractured cooling pipe. The bilge pumps were unserviceable due to becoming blocked. The Joyita lacked watertight bulkheads or subdivisions in the bilges. The water would have gradually flooded the lower decks. As the vessel began to sink lower into the water, the one remaining engine would not have been able to maintain enough speed to steer. The Joyita then fell beam-on to a heavy swell and took on the heavy list it was found with. While flooded to an extent which would sink a conventional vessel, the Joyita stayed afloat due to her cork-lined hull and cargo of fuel drums.
The inquiry also placed much of the responsibility for the events on Miller. They found him reckless for setting out on an ocean-going voyage with only one engine and numerous minor faults, and negligent for failing to provide a working radio or properly equipped lifeboat. He was also in breach of maritime law, since he had allowed Joyita's license to carry fare-paying passengers to lapse.
The inquiry made no mention of the used medical equipment found on board.
Theories
The Joyita is sometimes referred to as the "Mary Celeste of the South Pacific" and has been the subject of several books and documentaries offering explanations that range from rational and conventional to supernatural and paranormal.[citation needed]Numerous theories for the disappearance of the Joyita's crew and passengers have been advanced. Many were circulated at the time of the event, and several others have been put forward since.[citation needed]
Given the fact that the hull of the Joyita was sound and her design made her unsinkable, a main concern of investigators was determining why the passengers and crew did not stay on board if the events were simply triggered by the flooding in the engine room.[citation needed]
Captain injured theory
Captain Miller was well aware of the vessel's ability to stay afloat, leading some to speculate that Miller had died or become incapacitated for some reason (someone on board was injured- hence the bloodstained bandages). Without him to reassure the other people on board, they had panicked when the Joyita began to flood and had taken to the liferafts. However, this in itself would not account for the missing cargo and equipment, unless the vessel had been found abandoned and had her cargo removed.A friend of Miller's, Captain S. B. Brown, was convinced that Miller would never have left the Joyita alive, given his knowledge of her construction. He was aware of tension between Miller and his American first mate, Chuck Simpson. Brown felt that Miller and Simpson's dislike of each other came to blows and both men fell overboard or were severely injured in a struggle. This left the vessel without an experienced seaman and would explain why those remaining on board would panic when the ship began to flood.
The "Japanese did it" and the piracy theories
The Fiji Times and Herald quoted at the time from an "impeccable source" to the effect that the Joyita had passed through a fleet of Japanese fishing boats during its trip and "had observed something the Japanese did not want them to see." Others theorize that modern sea pirates attacked the vessel, killed the 25 passengers and crew (and cast their bodies into the ocean), and stole the missing four tons of cargo.The Daily Telegraph theorised that some still-active Japanese forces from World War II were to blame for the disappearances, operating from an isolated island base.
There was still strong anti-Japanese feeling in parts of the Pacific, and in Fiji there was specific resentment of Japan being allowed to operate fishing fleets in local waters. Such theories suddenly gained credence when men clearing the Joyita found knives stamped 'Made in Japan'. However, tests on the knives proved negative and it turned out the knives were old and broken- quite possibly left on board from when the Joyita was used for fishing in the late 1940s.
Insurance fraud theory
It was also revealed that Miller had amassed large debts after a series of unsuccessful fishing trips on Joyita. However, it would have been difficult to see the events surrounding the Joyita as insurance fraud, given that no seacocks were found open and the ship would be almost impossible to scuttle. Also, Miller was relying on Joyita being chartered for regular runs between Samoa and Tokelau- these government charters would have quickly cleared his debts.Mutiny theory
One of Joyita's owners after the events of 1955, travel-writer Robin Maugham, spent many years investigating his vessel's past, and published his findings as The Joyita Mystery in 1962. Maugham agreed that events were started by the flooding from the broken cooling pipe and the failure of the pumps. The mattresses found covering the starboard engine were used either in an attempt to stem the leak or to protect the electrical switchboard from spray kicked up by the engine's flywheel as the water level rose. At the same time, the Joyita encountered increasingly heavy swells and squally weather.Miller, knowing the Joyita to be unsinkable and desperate to reach his destination to clear his debt, pressed on. However, Simpson, and possibly other crew members, demanded that he turned back. This effectively led to mutiny and Miller and the crew struggled, during which Miller sustained a serious injury. By now the ship was entering heavier weather, with winds around 40 mph (64 km/h), and with one engine and a flooded bilge, was beginning to labour. The flooding in the engine room would have eventually caused the starboard engine to fail, also cutting all the vessel's electrical power. Simpson was now in control and made the decision to abandon ship, taking the navigational equipment, logbook and supplies, as well as the injured Miller, with them. It still seems unlikely that Simpson would choose to abandon a flooded but floating ship to take to small open rafts in the Pacific Ocean.
Maugham proposed that they sighted a nearby island or reef and tried to reach it, but in the strong winds and seas the rafts were carried out to sea, leaving the Joyita drifting and empty. The damage to the lightly built superstructure was caused by wave damage while the vessel was drifting in heavy seas.
Joyita after 1955
In July 1956, Joyita was auctioned off by her owners for £2425 to a Fiji Islander, David Simpson. He refitted and overhauled her and she went to sea again that year. However, she was surrounded by legal disputes over the transfer of her registry from the USA to Britain without permission. In January 1957 she ran aground while carrying 13 passengers in the Koro Sea. She was repaired and in October 1958 began a regular trade between Levuka and Suva.She ran aground again in November, 1959 at Vatuvalu.[citation needed]
She floated off, but while heading for port, began to ship water through a split seam. The pumps were started, but it became clear that the valves for the pump had been installed the wrong way, meaning that water was pumped into the hull, not out. Now with a reputation as an 'unlucky ship' and with a damaged hull, she was abandoned by her owners and beached. She was stripped of useful equipment and was practically a hulk when she was bought by Robin Maugham in the early 1960s.
References
- John Harris (1981) Without Trace: the Last Voyages of Eight Ships. London: Methuen ISBN 0-7493-0043-4
- Robin Maugham (1962) The Joyita Mystery. London: Max Parrish & Co ISBN 0-906754-59-3
- Stephen Noakes (1965) "The Marie Céleste of the South Pacific (Joyita)", in: Wide World Magazine, January 1965
- John Pinkney, World's Greatest Mysteries. Five Mile Press ISBN 978-1-74211-664-8
- David G. Wright (2002) Joyita: Solving the Mystery. Auckland: Auckland University Press ISBN 1-86940-270-7
External links
Chief Body at the wheel of the Joyita, 1942
Charlie ( The Cook ) with Thanksgiving Turkey Aboard The Joyita.
WW II US Navy emblem for Joyita, with Bugs Bunny
Joyita listing to one side in the Pacific Ocean after the Passengers and crew vanished in 1955.
Joyita was practically unsinkable, but doesn't look it in these photos.
1958 - Joyita after being salvaged, Walu Bay, Suva
The name "Joyita" is Spanish for "Little Jewel". It was actually named after Jewel Carmen, with whom Roland West was involved. People also associated the Joyita with Thelma Todd and there were stories that when West sold it some of her posessions were still on board. Because the Joyita was supposed to be an unlucky ship, people also thought that Thelma Todd had been a victim of some sort of jinx on the vessel, and because it was used as a patrol boat at Pearl Harbor during World War II, some people linked it to the Japanese attack that flung the US into the war. I would call it coincidence, but ill fortune did befall many people who were associated with the Joyita, some of who aren't mentioned in histories of the vessel. In his autobiography MY WONDERFUL WORLD OF SLAPSTICK, Buster Keaton spoke of going on board the Joyita to talk with Roland West shortly before his career went on the skids.
But everything in life that goes wrong doesn't have to be caused by things like unlucky ships.
The Joyita Mystery, Pt. I:
Joyita Mystery, Pt. II:
Joyita sites:
http://www.creationtrek.com/AVIATION/joyita.htm
http://www.navsource.org/archives/14/31108.htm
Chester Morris
http://www.chester-morris.com/index.php
CORSAIR:
http://www.apocalypselaterfilm.com/2010/09/corsair-1931.html
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