5 random things that happened on this day, January 27th, in showbiz history
1939 Idiots Delight starring Norma Shearer and Clark Gable opens in theaters. It was their final picture together but Mr Gable had in fact become a star IN a Norma Shearer picture: A Free Soul (1931). Jesse James starring Tyrone Power was also released on this day during "Hollywood's Greatest Year"...
1960 Cash McCall, a romantic comedy starring James Garner and Natalie Wood opens. It with a very annoying rhyming tagline on the poster.
This fellow - he's a zillionaire...
But this girl - she keeps giving him the air!
Why should it be?
People, you gotta see!
It's the new year's big bright
romantic delight
Or, on a different poster...
That fabulous billion dollar whirl
Cash McCall - The guy who'd buy the ball park
to get to first base with this girl!
1984 Woody Allen's Broadway Danny Rose and Steve Martin's The Lonely Guy both open in movie theaters. A year later the film would receive two Oscar nominations: Best Director and Best Screenplay... but sadly Mia Farrow was passed over for one of her very best performances.
1995 Before Sunrise opens becoming beloved by those who discovered it... but nobody knew it would become a trilogy of enormous depth and endurance; It was truly a gift that kept on giving. The romantic comedy Miami Rhapsody starring Sarah Jessica Parker in what was surely her most gargantuan hair phase also opened (Sex & The City was right around the corner but we didn't know it then but maybe SJP did)
2004 Oscar nominations were announced for the films of 2003 providing us with the single biggest shock we've ever experienced on Oscar nomination: City of God, a critical darling from very early in the 2003 release year, that had been past over for a foreign-language film nomination at the previous Oscars was suddenly up for four Oscars including Best Director. Nobody saw it coming. Don't believe anyone who says otherwise because the internet is very fond of revisionist histories!
Today's Birthday Suit
HAPPY DONNA REED CENTENNIAL
The Oscar and Globe winning star of The Donna Reed Show, From Here to Eternity, and It's a Wonderful Life was born one-hundred years ago today in Iowa.
Bonus Birthday Suit: Alan CummingOther showbiz birthdays today:
Tony winner Alan Cumming star of stage and screen and fabulous queer icon (Cabaret, Anniversary Party, X2, Burlesque), Oscar nominee Rosamund Pike (Gone Girl, An Education), Oscar nominee and dancing icon Mikhail Baryshnikov (The Turning Point, Sex & The City), Sabu (The Thief of Bagdad, Black Narcissus, The Jungle Book), Bergman regular Ingrid Thulin (Cries and Whispers, Wild Strawberries), moviebuff/comedian Patton Oswalt (Young Adult, Ratatouille), Tamlyn Tomita (The Karate Kid Pt II, Teen Wolf), James Cromwell (Babe, Succession), MIA Bridget Fonda (A Simple Plan, Scandal), Mimi Rogers (The Rapture, Door in the Floor), Susanna Thompson (Once and Again, Dragonfly), John Witherspoon (Friday, The Boondocks), Director Todd Louiso (Hello I Must Be Going, Love Liza), Troy Donahue (A Summer Place, Cry Baby), Devin Druid (Louder than Bombs, 13 Reasons Why), and comic book legend Frank Miller.