MM@M: Old Fashioned Sixties Sweethearts

Mad Men at the Movies. Now practically concurrent with episode airings!

Mad Men 4.2 "Christmas Comes But Once a Year"
In this episode SCDP scrambles to make their low budget Christmas party festive for their biggest client Lee Garner Jr.. Don Draper gets drunks and beds his secretary. Awkward! Meanwhile, Freddy Rumsen (Joel Murray) returns with a valuable client in hand. He and his former protege Peggy argue about the Ponds soap campaign. Freddy wants to enlist a celebrity as the spokesperson.

Freddy: Tallulah Bankhead? She's glamorous. She seems more uncompromising than a movie star. She's on Broadway.
Peggy: She never got off Broadway because she's not beautiful enough.
Freddy: Shame on you. C'mon.

[imagining commercial] A little backstage at the makeup mirror with Ponds. Opening night 'The choice of professionals.' It's good, right?
Peggy: All of their research says they're trying to get young women.
Freddy: Young women look up to older women.
Peggy: For beauty tips. Are you joking?

Joking indeed. Here's Tallulah Bankhead in 1930 and again in the 1960s (she died in 1968). She was one of the hardest living, wittiest and most quotable of stars. Glamorous? Yes. A good spokeswoman for clean beauty regimens? Um... No

Later in the episode...

Freddy: On the short list I got Tallulah, Jessica Tandy, Barbara Stanwyck, and Doris Day -- different types.
Peggy: I don't even understand your list. What's wrong with Elizabeth Taylor?
Freddy: Isn't about making old ladies look good?
Peggy: Nothing makes old ladies look good.
Freddy: The Ponds does.

Freddy's wish-list suggests that he goes to the theater a lot (Tandy & Tallulah both being stage rather than movie stars). An argument erupts between them about what young girls want and whether they'll get married or not and such. Peggy, who has just been called "old fashioned" by her boyfriend in a previous scene, deflects the insult Freddy's way.

Peggy: You know, Freddy, I've brought up your name a hundred times to come in and freelance for me. But everyone is right about you. You and your grand dames and your poor old typewriter and your desperate spinsters. You're so old fashioned, you know that?

Hey, if loving grande dames makes you old fashioned, I've been old fashioned since I was five years old! I've always loved theatrical women of a certain age.

In 1964 when this episode takes place, Liz Taylor was a mammoth star and at 32 still the screen's preeminent beauty (Peggy's suggestion makes sense) but it was actually Doris Day, ten years Liz's senior, who was the box office queen. Day was the top earner, male or female, from 1962 through 1964 according to the Motion Picture Almanac, so it's interesting that Day would be grouped in with Freddy's "old fashioned" taste. But I guess the romantic comedy queens, who always seem to be the top earning females no matter the decade, do appeal to the most conventional and traditional of moviegoers... and therefore all age ranges. (It's interesting that Mad Men is suddenly using Peggy and Freddy, two allies, to dramatize the widening generational gap of the tumultous 1960s.)


Liz and Doris are the constants but the sweetheart crown shifts from Debbie Reynolds to Sandra Dee and then, in the mid to late 60s, a real shakeup begins with the musical stars exerting their power be it Ann-Margret, Shirley Maclaine or the tsunami sized arrivals of both Julie Andrews and Barbra Streisand (just a few short years away). Natalie Wood is a constant during the early 60s (the peak of her popularity) but one assumes she just missed these lists since the bulk of each top ten is made up of male stars.

Since we're now writing about the episodes shortly after they air, I thought I'd add three new elements to each write up.

Best Line
Peggy to her horny boyfriend: "You're never going to get me to do anything Swedish people do."

Best Intangible Something
I absolutely love that everyone is going to have to blow Lee Garner Jr. (metaphorically speaking) to keep his business. Consider it Sal's phantom revenge. (For those just joining the series, Sal --who used to be the defacto star of "Mad Men at the Movies" -- lost his job basically because he refused Lee Garner's sexual advances behind the scenes.)

Best Single Moment
Joanie leads a conga line.


This moment was a major hit with fans everywhere if Twitter is any indication. It prompted several amusing online responses including a conga from GIF PARTY and a campaign for an entire episode composed solely of Joanie leading a conga line. Hell, I'd watch!

Other references: (Music) The Beatles | (Myths/Characters) Potemkinville, Rasputin, Santa, Three Wise Men, Hitler, The Tin Man | (Literature) Article "The Swedish Way of Love"... this episode takes place in December 1964 so we're still a couple of years away from the famous I Am Curious (Yellow) film but the "Sexual Revolution" is approaching in America and Sweden was an early influential leader in this regard.

Gloria Stuart Centennial (And The 25 Oldest Living Oscar Nominees!)

One hundred years ago on this very day 30s actress Gloria Stuart was born in Santa Monica. Happy birthday Gloria! Stuart made her name on James Whale's pictures like The Old Dark House (fun movie) and The Invisible Man before her screen career petered out in the 1940s. Then, über famously, James Cameron resurrected her to play the 100 year old survivor of Titanic. And the best part... she's still with us today!


Were you confused like Britney Spears when she tossed the Heart of the Ocean back into it in Titanic? Do you think Kate Winslet hopes to grow up to look just like her?

"I don't want to achieve immortality through my work. I want to achieve it through not dying."
-Woody Allen

Since Gloria is not the oldest living Oscar nominee, it's list time. Who's still with us? (If I forgot anyone, do let me know in the comments.)

The Oldest Living Oscar Nominees

1. Robert F Boyle (Honorary Winner and 4 time nominee as Art Director Fiddler on the Roof) is nearing 101.
   Update: August 1st, 2010 (RIP). What a career he had.
   
2. Luise Rainer (2 time winner The Good Earth & The Great Ziegfield) is 100½.
3. Gloria Stuart (nominee Titanic) is 100 exactly.Update Sept 26, 2010: (RIP). a long life well -travelled.
   
4. Douglas Slocombe (3 time nominee) cinematographer of Raiders of the Lost Ark among other classics.
5. Kevin McCarthy (nominee Death of a Salesman) is 96.
   Update: Sept 11, 2010: RIP
6. Olivia de Havilland (2 time winner The Heiress & To Each His Own) is 94. Yes, she still hopes to publish memoirs and no, she's not the only surviving Gone With the Wind cast member.
   
7. Kirk Douglas (Honorary Oscar and 3 time nominee), Spartacus himself, is 93.

8. Ernest Borgnine (winner Marty) is 93.
9. Celeste Holm (winner Gentleman's Agreement) is 93.
10. Joan Fontaine (winner Suspicion) is 92. Yes, it's true. She and sister Olivia de Havilland are still not speaking.
11. Tom Daly (5 time nominee) this Canadian producer nominated in short film and documentary categories just turned 92.
    
12. Joyce Redman (2 time nominee Tom Jones) is 91. [Trivia note: Tom Jones is the only film to have ever won three nominations in Supporting Actress. Pity that Robert Altman's Nashville didn't repeat the trick.]
    
13. Dino de Laurentiis (Thalberg winner and a producing winner for La Strada) is almost 91.
14. Michael Anderson (nominee, directed Around the World in 80 Days) is 90.
    
15. Ravi Shankar (nominee, the co-composer for Gandhi) is 90.
16. Ray Harryhausen (Gordon Sawyer Award recipient), the f/x legend, just turned 90.
17. Mickey Rooney (Honorary Oscar and 4 time nominee) is 89.
18. Joe Mantell (nominee Marty) is 89.
    
19. Carol Channing (nominee Thoroughly Modern Millie) is 89. "Razzzzzbbberrries!"
    

20. Hal David (winner "Raindrops Keep Falling on My Head" from Butch Cassidy and the Sundance Kid) is 89.
21. Deanna Durbin (Juvenile Award winner) is 88. She was only 18 when she won her Juvenile statue (shared with Mickey Rooney) but she retired from the screen just nine years later.
    
22. Doris Day (nominee Pillow Talk) is 88. There's a few Facebook groups trying to get her an honorary Oscar. Filmmaker Douglas McGrath pushed for it, too. [Trivia note: There is some controversy about Doris Day's exact age. But most sources now claim she was born in 1922 so she would have turned 88 this past April.
    
23. Mihalis Kakogiannis (3 time nominee, all nominations from Zorba the Greek) just turned 88.
    
24. Eleanor Parker (3 time nominee Caged) just turned 88. She's best remembered today as the (not totally) wicked would be stepmother in The Sound of Music but that doesn't paint the whole picture at all. Isn't it time for renewed interest in her career? Smart cinephiles think so.
    
25. Blake Edwards (Honorary Oscar and nominee for Victor/Victoria), aka Mr Julie Andrews, is almost 88.
26. Norman Lear (television giant who was Oscar nominated for writing Divorce, American Style), one day younger than Blake Edwards, is also almost 88
27. Jackie Cooper (nominee Skippy) is 87. Trivia note: He is the youngest Best Actor nominee of all time, having been up for the prize when he was but 9 years old. He's likely to keep that Oscar record. The closest anyone ever got was Mickey Rooney -- also on this list -- at the age of 19.
    
    but I couldn't stop there. Partially because I missed a handful of people. Partially because I definitely have undiagnosed untreated OCD. Carpal tunnel syndrome here I come. It's a top 40!
    
    
28. Arthur Penn (3 time nominee, directed Bonnie & Clyde) is 87. I know I've given this book a million plugs but you must read "Pictures at a Revolution" for a detailed fascinating account of how that landmark movie was constructed. Choosing a director wasn't the least bit simple. And directing Warren Beatty isn't so simple either. Penn did it twice.
    
29. Juanita Moore (nominee Imitation of Life *see it* It's a beauty) is 87.
30. Valentina Cortese (nominee Day for Night) is 87. She holds the extremely rare honor of a supporting acting nomination from a foreign language film. Those are so very infrequent.
    
31. Franco Zeffirelli (2 time nominee, director of Romeo and Juliet), another Italian (!), is 87.
    
32. Charles Durning (2 time nominee, The Best Little Whorehouse in Texas) is 87.
33. Richard Attenborough (2 time winner, director of Gandhi) is 86.
34. Cliff Robertson (winner Charly) is 86.
35. Glynis Johns (nominee The Sundowners) is 86
    We're glad she got that one last burst of mid 90s comedy gold in While You Were Sleeping and especially The Ref. Well done, Sister Suffragrette ♪ ! Unfortunately, she's been little seen since.
36. Arthur Hiller (Hersholt Huminatarian winner, nominee for Love Story) is 86.
37. Ron Moody (nominee Oliver!) is 86. For a recent article on this underappreciated sixties musical, click here.
38. Stanley Donen (Honorary Oscar) is 86. He's one of the best musicals director, most famous for that thrilling barn sequence in Seven Brides for Seven Brothers and the entirety of Singin' in the Rain.
39. Sidney Lumet (Honorary Oscar, plus 5 time nominee) just turned 86 last week. His classics include 12 Angry Men, Network, The Verdict and Dog Day Afternoon and he's also the man behind the extremely undervalued Running on Empty (1988). The best part is that he's still active. He recently made Before the Devil Knows You're Dead.
    
40. Eva Marie Saint (winner On the Waterfront) turned 86 today, so we'll bookend with this other birthday girl. Happy birthday, Eva! Don't forget your gloves when you leave the party tonight.
    

Big screen actress icons I had to pass up for this list included Jane Russell, Maureen O'Hara, and Esther Williams. All are still among the living but none were ever Oscar nominated and haven't been given Honorary Awards. What a world, what a world. Christopher Lee, is another biggie that's never been nominated. He still works so consistently at 88 that it's possible they'll yet find a way to nominate him. Next up for Lee is Martin Scorsese's The Invention of Hugo Cabret.

Carol Channing for Exit Music!

♥♥♥♥♥♥♥♥♥♥♥

Further Reading? Try this substantial Gloria Stuart tribute at Ehrensteinland and if you're in LA, please note that AMPAS will be honoring Stuart's centennial at the Samuel Goldwyn theater on July 22nd.
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Where My Girls At?

A link roundup, actress style


The Classics
NY Times Douglas McGrath demands a special Oscar for Doris Day. Time to give her her due
Film Art "Tell, Don't Show" David Bordwell examines a great scene with Liv Ullmann and Bibi Andersson in Persona to illustrate the power of extended monologues
Gawker Susan Sarandon shtupping the ping pong kid?
The Independent Elizabeth Taylor's White Diamonds is still the top celebrity scent. Talk about staying power. La Liz has been raking in the dough from that single career move for almost 20 years now. How many diamonds has she bought with the haul?
I Need My Fix "Cher (!) Films Burlesque"... though be warned. 'Fix' gets the headline all fucked up and adds several letters inbetween "Ch" and "r"... confusing the true story here: CHER ! Making a movie again.
Style List Catherine Deneuve's 60's era magnificence is still inspiring fashionistas


The Now
contact music Toni Collette to be honored by Nicole Kidman at a special Aussie Expat event in LA on Golden Globe weekend
LA Times Julianne Moore, still hoping for Oscar nom #5, says you should never take employment for granted
Huffington Post I avoid the People's Choice Awards like the Bubonic plauge but Nicole Kidman looked so good. What ever possessed her to stay blonde for so long? So glad the red is hangin on
Pop Matters Big Love returns. It's Amanda Seyfried's last season. Sissy Spacek is guest starring

The Stage
London Travel Julie Andrews is doing a one-off show this summer
Theater Mania and Isabelle Huppert is doing Streetcar in Paris in the spring. I expect a full report from one of you French readers. Comprenez-vous?

Late to the Comment Party? No Biggie

Some of you may have noticed that any articles that have slipped off the front page now have moderated comments. I was forced to do this by huge waves of spam hitting my blog -- it's getting worse all the time actually, dozens of spam comments to be weeded out every day. But I'm delighted that people still comment on older articles. Two recent comments I wanted to draw attention to:

anonymous (sign your names people, it takes all of 1.5 seconds) on the casting of the August: Osage County movie

You know Doris Day has been itching to come back to do a film....and what a way of coming back to movies...also Im surprised no one has mentioned Beth Grant (from Sordid Lives) or even Delta Burke

I can't imagine that Doris Day wants to work again. A Doris Day return would be an event regardless of the vehicle. Her last feature film With Six You Get Eggroll was released 41 years ago. After that she did five years of her own TV show and then retired at 51. She's 87 years old now. That's not exactly young but if Estelle Parsons can travel the country doing a 3 hour play twice a day at the age of 82... maybe there's a lot of elderly actresses still spry enough for a good movie role, should any screenwriters bother to write them. Still, I worry when actors retire. 'If you rest, you rust' and all of that. But wouldn't it be fun to see Doris Day one more time on the big screen? Especially in a comedy.

janelia commented on the Precious review, and I'm glad she did

I am all for Meryl winning Best Actress. I have now watched Meryl, Carey and Gabourey and I honestly think Meryl gave the best performance of these three. Sure, it was a lightweight movie, but that doesn't mean Meryl's performance is lightweight. I remember a youtube video from way back when showing clips of Oscar winning actresses that all had crying scenes and people wondered if an actress could win without a dramatic screaming and crying scene. I think one can make the argument that it takes more effort to win over an audience without the sympathy factor. We always lament the crowning of Oscar bait roles, but then we complain when there is a contender that isnt the typical Oscar type?

She makes a great point. This is totally and always the case when a "lighter" performance gets recognized in any way. So Oscar is damned if they do and damned if they don't. We have to get beyond our hangups about tears equalling great acting, in order to see that each character makes different demands of the actor playing them. I don't personally think the Julia Child performance is the best of the year but it is super fun and besides, preferences and predictions are different things. Curiously, literally every Oscar pundit I've talked to online or in person thinks I'm crazy in my firm suspicion that Meryl Streep will win this year. I guess I'll either have the last laugh or I'll look, well, crazy. Either way is fine; you have to call it like you see it and give yourself plenty of rope to hang or else it's no fun to swing.
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Having a Laugh

Musical of the Month: Calamity Jane

Musicals always raise the spirits, don't they?

I mean musicals that don’t dramatize the slow creep of the Nazi party across Weimar era Germany. Or musicals that don't involve bloody racial conflicts on Manhattan’s West Side. Or musicals that don't torment blind single mothers on death row… Let's restate: Musicals are sometimes cheerful. I need a cheerful one right now.

See, it's been a tough week. Things haven’t been going well for me technologically speaking –this DVD player I use keeps freezing on me and refusing to play DVDs. What gives? It did this when I tried to review The Car, too -- and don't even mention "time management" to me. I’m apologizin’ straight away that this post is very short and open-ended (make sure to check out my musical pard'ners at other blogs below). Deadlines surround me. I had but three hours of sleep last night and back to the office I went.

Doris Day kicks off this month's featured movie singing with her fellow travellers on a horse driven carriage way back in the 1870-something. Flash forward 138 years and it's corporate America that's singing "whip crack away" to me. They ain't as cheerful about it as Ms. Doris Day.

Beautiful sky! A wonderful day!
Whip crack-away!, Whip crack-away!, Whip crack-away!

So thank god for musicals and their bright colors, catchy songs and high spirited dancing. I need them. From its first frames Calamity Jane conspires to put a smile on my face. It’s not content to just throw up a huge colorful title. This 1953 musical adds a chorus of swelling voices to sing that very title to me --just in case I'm illiterate like those Deadwood settlers. They sing her name like they're speeding over a hill in their own carriage. It's got a big rise and fall. Yes, phantom chorus, sing to me! Drug me up with that musical cheer. I'll join in as soon as we get to a number I recognize.

Alas, my DVD player isn't playing and I'm denied again. [Editor's note: This is the last scheduled posting that shall be ruined by said problem. I just need a free day to find a solution and I haven't had one in a couple of weeks.] The real reason I wanted to kick off this series with Calamity Jane was that I was dying to see it again. How foregrounded are the fascinating homo undercurrents I remember thinking about once I saw The Celluloid Closet in 1995. I'll have to read the other posts in this mini-celebration to find out. Doris Day was never a Judy Garland but Calamity Jane's most famous song "Secret Love" was understandably a major gay anthem back in its day, descriptive of and embraced by the GLBT community before there was really such a thing as being "out".

Now I shout it from the highest hills
I even told the golden daffodil.
At last my heart's an open door.
And my secret love's no secret anymore

Imagine how thrilling, how moving this fantasy wish fulfillment in a song must have been in the 1950s when the reality was almost always the closet?

Just a brief cursory "scene selection" tour through this Technicolor Deadwood has convinced me that what the world really needs is a gay remake or perhaps a meta drag version for the new millenium. The latter would be vaguely Victor/Victoria-esque only in this case it'd be a thinkier spin "a man pretending to be a woman who everyone thinks of as a man" rather than the fully comedic 82 version

"A woman pretending to be a man pretending to be a woman?!? Preposterous! No one will believe it."
"Exactly. That's why it will work!"

And whether this imaginary "Jane" is a 50s tomboy or an effeminate man playing a tomboy "she's" got an interesting thing for "Wild Bill", don'cha know. When we first see Bill Hickok, Calamity veritably shimmies at him despite her objections to immodest ladies of entertainment and sings enthusiastically about "his gun with 27 notches"

Jane after checking out Bill's gun: "I'm glad to say he's a
very good friend of mine." (hee)

I love their relationship. I never watched HBO's Deadwood but catching glimpses of Howard Keel and Doris Day's mostly platonic (brotherly?) romance in this musical makes me curious to see how other artists have treated this mythic pairing. Like Bonnie & Clyde, Wild Bill Hickok and Calamity Jane have been mythologized for a long time. No one who can separate the fact from the fiction is still alive. What was going on there? It's ripe for multiple interpretations. Did they really have a child together as Jane later claimed? It's a complicated affair. The true details of this love (reciprocal or otherwise) are secret.

The golden daffodils aren't talking.

For more on Calamity Jane, say...

"Howdy Pardners!"
Movies Kick Ass gender roles & revisionist westerns in Calamity Jane & Johnny Guitar
Spartickes "That ain't all she ain't!"
StinkyLulu delivers a cheeky funny audiovisual meditation
Criticlasm "You make no sense at all, but you’re a rollicking good old time."
Stinky Bits unedited ramblings on the butch/femme lesbian romance within the film


Next time... Those few brave souls who participated in the first installment will be voting on the movie to be featured on September 6th. The options are: Fred & Ginger in Swing Time (1936), the non-stop dancing of The Red Shoes (1948), Gene Kelly's On the Town (1949), Bollywood classic Mother India (1957), Off Broadway transfer Little Shop of Horrors (1986) or Christian Bale hoofin' it through Newsies (1992). We'll announce the winner in a few days.

Love Musicals?

Yippeeeee! It's the "Musical of the Month"

(Update: The celebration of CALAMITY JANE has arrived)

I miss group love-ins and I miss musicals (haven't watched one in too long). I was tired of blog-a-thons but a movie o' the month is like a mini-thon only more reg'lar like and therefore (theoretically) less planning / scheduling / brainstorming heavy. Horror fans have Final Girl's great "Film of the Month" party (I'm going to pipe in this month for The Car (1977) I think. Why not stretch?). But what do fans of song and dance get? Zip! So The Film Experience will be correcting that. On the 6th of every month, we'll cover one and link up to any musically inclined or stretching blogs who want to speak out on their "Secret Love" (i.e. musicals)

August 6th Calamity Jane (1953)
Why Calamity Jane? Why not?! I'm not that familiar with Doris Day and I didn't want to kick it off with a musical people still talk about consistently. Who knows... maybe we'll even get Deadwood fans participating' for contemporary comparison's sake.


If you'd like to join the Musical of the Month club shoot me an e-mail and I'll send you a reminder as we get closer. On the day of the 'big bonanza musical extravaganza', I'll link up to all participating blogs/sites. Just like a blog-a-thon which I'm pretending this isn't. So there. (If you plan to participate feel free to place any of these images or animated gifs on your blog or webpage to advertise your participation)

Otherwise... Yes I am aware that I still have a backlog of movies I promised to write about --namely Maurice, A Touch of Evil, Moulin Rouge!, Sweet Bird of Youth, Darling, Jeunet & Caro and Julia... My goal is to get to all of them before August 29th. Somehow. Then and only then can The Film Experience arise from the ashes of backlog like the glorious phoenix it wants and deserves to be.