Oscar History
Film Bitch History
Welcome

The Film Experience™ was created by Nathaniel R. All material herein is written by our team. (This site is not for profit but for an expression of love for cinema & adjacent artforms.)

Follow TFE on Substackd

Powered by Squarespace
Keep TFE Strong

We're looking for 500... no 390 SubscribersIf you read us daily, please be one.  

I ♥ The Film Experience

THANKS IN ADVANCE

What'cha Looking For?
Subscribe

Entries in Ava Gardner (17)

Wednesday
Sep232020

Mickey @ 100: From "National Velvet" to "The Black Stallion"

Here's Baby Clyde to conclude our brief Mickey Rooney Centennial celebration

Many years ago, as a Golden Age Hollywood obsessed tween, I dragged my poor brother up to London with me so we could stand outside the stage door of the Savoy Theatre. The West End debut of the smash hit Broadway revue Sugar Babies was playing and it starred the legendary Mickey Rooney and Ann Miller ...from actual HOLLYWOOD!!!

As a little kid from a decidedly un-glamourous council estate, who spent all his spare time poring over books about old movies stars, this was too good an opportunity to miss. It didn’t turn out quite as I’d planned. We arrived at the stage door with plenty of time before the show began to find a handful of like minded saddos also waiting. They informed us that Miss Miller was already inside which was of course unfortunate, but Mickey was still to arrive. A little while later he did...

Click to read more ...

Thursday
Jul042019

Beauty Break: Happy 4th of July

We wish we were feeling more festive today and could shout "Happy Fourth of July !!!" with enthusiasm but the USofA hasn't felt like something to celebrate lately what with concentration camps for children, a would be fascist and friend o' dictactors as President. The next election (and a real Captain America) can't come soon enough!

That said, if you appreciate movies / moviestars for their escapist value, WHICH WE DEFINITELY DO, let's briefly forget our collective troubles by staring at them in their red white and blues. We've shared some of these images before but such is also the natural of holidays... TRADITION. Enjoy the views after the jump...

Click to read more ...

Monday
Nov072016

On This Day: Marie Curie, Steve McQueen, Bush v Gore

On this day in showbiz history... 

15 Agrippina the Younger, the sister of the infamous Caligula and wife of Claudius is born. She's been played in movies for film and television by actresses like Barbara Young (I Claudius), Lori Wagner (Caligula), and Ava Gardner (A.D.) among others
1867 Pioneering physicist Marie Curie is born in Poland. 76 years later her biopic Madame Curie is nominated for 7 Oscars including Best Picture and Best Actress (Greer Garson). It's worth noting that there's a new Polish biopic about her life opening next month in Europe starring Karolina Gruszka 
1874 Political cartoonist Thomas Nast first uses the elephant to symbolize the Republican party in an illustration...

Click to read more ...

Monday
Oct172016

On a Clear Day You Can See Anniversaries Forever

On this day in showbiz history...

1886 Spring Byington is born in Colorado Springs. Goes on to supporting actress glory in Hollywood including Marmee in Little Women (1933, her feature debut) and an Oscar nomination as the eccentric hobbyist mom in You Can't Take It With You (1938). Curiously her screen daughter in that best picture winner Jean Arthur, an even bigger star, shares her same birthday (for the year of 1900)
1888 Thomas Edison files a patent for the Optical Phonograph (an early step in creating the cinema)
1903 Author and screenwriter Nathanael West is born in NYC. Movies adapted from his work include Lonelyhearts (1958) and The Day of the Locust (1975)
1915 One of the world's most celebrated playwrights, Arthur Miller, is born. His classics include Death of a Salesman, The Crucible and A View From the Bridge. After marrying movie star Marilyn Monroe, he wrote The Misfits (1961) for her which would eerily (considering its elegiac tone) be the last film for both her and co-star Clark Gable and one of the very last for Montgomery Clift who was born on this same day in 1920...

Click to read more ...

Wednesday
Jul022014

Podcast Part 2: A Smackdown Conversation w/ Melanie Lynskey

ICYMI  Part One of this Podcast & The Smackdown Itself

Starring: Actress Melanie Lynskey, the original creator of the Smackdowns Brian Herrera (aka StinkyLulu), and your regulars Nathaniel R,  Joe Reid and Nick Davis

Smackdown 1964 - A Companion Conversation Pt. 2
00:01 Back From Intermission & Joe freaks out over Hush...Hush, Sweet Charlotte
04:05 Bette Davis and Baby Jane
07:30 Agnes Moorehead totally divides us
13:30 The Night of the Iguana and its repressed lesbian
16:30 Melanie talks subtext, chemistry and shares an acting pet peeve
20:50 Nathaniel demands a remake and we cast it
24:00 Ava Gardner and Richard Burton GIF-ables
31:20 Not Nominated: Glynis Johns, Irene Papas, and Gloria Foster
34:10 A parting question for Melanie Lynskey

You can listen at the bottom of the post or download the conversation on iTunes. Continue the conversation in the comments.

THANKS AGAIN TO OUR GUEST MELANIE LYNSKEY 
Her new film Happy Christmas (co-starring Anna Kendrick, Joe Swanberg, and Lena Dunham) is currently available OnDemand and iTunes and opens in limited theatrical release at the end of July.

Anna Kendrick & Melanie Lynskey in Happy Christmas (2014)

(It's funny and endearing. Writer/Director Joe Swanberg really loves his characters and his actual baby son is one of the best babies you'll ever see in a movie -- so much personality!)

Smackdown 64 Companion. Part 2