Simone Signoret ~ French Commodity

 Signoret was born Simone-Henriette-Charlotte Kaminker in Wiesbaden, Germany to André and Georgette (Signoret) Kaminker. She was the oldest child of three, with two younger brothers. Her father, a linguist who later worked in the United Nations, was a French-born Jewish army officer of Polish descent^[1], who brought the family to Neuilly-sur-Seine on the fancy outskirts of Paris. Signoret grew up in Paris in an intellectual atmosphere and studied the English language in school, earning a teaching certificate. She tutored English and Latin and worked part-time as a typist for a French collaborationist newspaper, Le Nouveau Temps, run by Jean Luchaire.

Signoret’s sensual features and earthy nature led to type-casting and she was often seen in prostitute roles. She won considerable attention in La Ronde (1950), a film which was banned briefly in New York as immoral. She won further raves, including an acting award from the British Film Academy, for her portrayal of yet another prostitute in Jacques Becker’s Casque d’or (1951). She went on to appear in many notable films in France during the 1950s, including Thérèse Raquin (1953), directed by Marcel Carné, Les Diaboliques (1954), and Les Sorcières de Salem (1956), based on Arthur Miller’s The Crucible.

1958, Signoret went to England to film Room at the Top (1959), which won her numerous awards including the Best Female Performance Prize at Cannes and the Academy Award for Best Actress. She was the only French cinema actress to receive an Oscar until Juliette Binoche in 1997 (Supporting Actress), and the first woman to win the award appearing in a foreign film. She was offered films in Hollywood but turned them down and continued to work in France and England. She played opposite Laurence Olivier in Term of Trial (1962). She did return to America for Ship of Fools (1965) which earned her another Oscar nomination and she went on to appear in several Hollywood films before returning to France in 1969.

Hugh Griffith ~ Supporting Actor

Hugh Griffith began his film career in British films during the late 1940s, and by the 1950s was also appearing in Hollywood films. He also had a successful career as a theatre actor, and in 1958 was nominated for Tony award for his performance in Look Homeward, Angel on Broadway. He won the Academy Award for Best Supporting Actor for his role in Ben-Hur (1959), and received a second nomination for his role in Tom Jones (1963). He appeared as the magistrate in Oliver! in 1968.

Burl Ives ~ Entertainment

In early 1942 Burl Ives was drafted by the military and spent time first at Camp Dix, then at Camp Upton, where he joined the cast of Irving Berlin’s This Is the Army. When the show went to Hollywood, he was transferred to the Army Air Force. He was discharged honorably, apparently for medical reasons, in September 1943. Between September and December 1943, Ives lived in California with actor Harry Morgan, who played Colonel Sherman T. Potter on M*A*S*H many years later. In December 1943, Ives returned to New York City and went to work again for CBS radio for $100 a week.^[9]

On Dec. 6, 1945, Ives married 29-year-old script writer Helen Peck Ehrlich.^[10] The next year, Ives was cast as a singing cowboy in the film Smoky. Other movie credits include East of Eden (1955); Cat on a Hot Tin Roof (1958); The Big Country (1958), for which he won an Academy Award for Best Supporting Actor; and Our Man in Havana (1959), based on the Graham Greene novel; and many others.

Red Buttons ~ Great Comedy Talent

Red Buttons was born Aaron Chwatt on February 5, 1919 in New York City to Jewish immigrants. At sixteen years old, Buttons got a job as an entertaining bellhop at Ryan’s Tavern in City Island, Bronx. The combination of his red hair and the shiny buttoned bellhop uniform inspired orchestra leader Charles “Dinty” Moore to call him Red Buttons, the name under which he would later perform.

After the war, Buttons continued to do Broadway shows. He also performed at Broadway movie houses with the Big Bands. In 1952, Buttons received his own variety series on television – The Red Buttons Show ran for three years, and achieved high levels of success. His catch phrase from the show, “strange things are happening,” entered the national vocabulary briefly in the mid-1950s.

His role in Sayonara was a dramatic departure from his previous work. In that film, he played Joe Kelly, an American airman stationed in Kobe, Japan during the Korean War, who falls in love with Katsumi, a Japanese woman (played by Miyoshi Umeki), but is barred from marrying her by military rules intended to reassure the local populace that the U.S. presence is temporary. His portrayal of Kelly’s calm resolve not to abandon the relationship and touching reassurance of Katsumi impressed audiences and critics alike; both he and Umeki won Academy Awards for the film.

Miyoshi Umeki ~ First Asian Academy Winner

A versatile performer who also had major roles on Broadway and on television, Umeki played Katsumi in “Sayonara,” a tragic drama, based on the novel by James Michener, about American servicemen who fall in love with women they meet while stationed in occupied Japan.

In the film, which starred Marlon Brando, Umeki’s character marries Airman Joe Kelly, played by Red Buttons, against the wishes of the military authorities and local citizens. When Kelly is transferred back to the United States and prevented from taking Katsumi with him, both characters commit suicide.

Buttons also won the best supporting actor award for his performance in the film.

Born on May 8, 1929, in Otaru, Hokkaido, Umeki began her career as a nightclub singer in Japan, billing herself as Nancy Umeki. After making a couple of records there, she attracted the attention of a talent scout, who persuaded her to move to New York City in 1955. Within a year, she had a recording contract and a regular spot on the television variety show “Arthur Godfrey and His Friends.” It was her appearances on that show that led to her role in “Sayonara.”

On television, she was best known as Mrs. Livingston on the situation comedy “The Courtship of Eddie’s Father,” starring Bill Bixby, which ran from 1969 through 1972.

Wendy Hiller ~ Dame of Stage

Wendy started her film career as Eliza Doolittle in the film Pygmalion  with Leslie Howard as Professor Higgins. This performance earned her her first Oscar nomination and became one of her most famous film roles. Her 1939 nomination marked the first time a British actress in a British film had been nominated for an Academy Award. She was also the first actress to curse in a British film, when Eliza utters the line “Not bloody likely, I’m going in a taxi!”. She followed up this success with another Shaw adaptation, Major Barbara with Rex Harrison and Robert Morley, in 1941. Despite her early film success and offers from Hollywood, she returned to the stage full-time after 1945 and only occasionally accepted film roles.

She won the Oscar for Best Supporting Actress in 1959 for the film Separate Tables (1958), as a lonely hotel manageress and mistress of Burt Lancaster. She remained uncompromising in her indifference to film stardom, as evidenced by her surprising reaction to her Oscar win “never mind the honour, cold hard cash is what it means to me.” She received a third Oscar nomination for her performance as the simple, unrefined but dignified Lady Alice More, opposite Paul Scofield as Thomas More, in A Man for All Seasons (1966).

Regarded as one of Britain’s great dramatic talents, she was created an Officer of the British Empire (OBE) in 1971 and raised to Dame Commander (DBE) in 1975. Her style was disciplined and unpretentious, and she disliked personal publicity.

Shelley Winters ~ Diary of Anne Frank

Shelley Winters borrowed her stage name from her favorite poet, Percy Blyhte Shelley, and her mother’s maiden name, Winter. The first studio she signed with reportedly added the final “s,” but it has also been said that she added the “s” herself when she heard that she was being referred to as “Chilly Winter”.

She left school at 15 to work as a counter clerk and model while studying drama and entering beauty pageants, determined to make it as an actress. For her first appearance on Broadway, a 1941 play called The Night Before Christmas, she needed to join the union, Actors Equity, and had to borrow $25 from her sister for dues — a fortune in those days. Winters has since speculated that her sister, then a student nurse, may have sold blood to come up with the cash. Winters headed west in the early 1940s, and first signed with Columbia studios, but was stuck with bit parts. She shared an apartment with Marilyn Monroe; they shared a bathing suit for cheesecake shots and a mink coat for dates. Legend has it that Winters taught Monroe how to “act pretty”, by tilting her head back, lowering her eyes, and ever-so-slightly opening her mouth.

By the 1950’s Shelley was soon tired of the limited roles and began to turn heads with her “serious” roles and in 1959 was cast as Mrs. Petronella Van Daan, Anne Frank’s neighbor with whom they shared a secret home for two years hiding from the Nazi’s.  Her role in this film gave Hollywood a whole new look at who Shelley Winters was and her powerful abilities as an actress.  In one scene she brought the pain of war and the pain of depression to the screen, when milk is spilt on her fur coat.

Shelley would go on to star in at least 25 more films and TV roles and won a second Oscar a few years later.  Even though most remember her in her role in The Poseidon Adventure, this role was a career changing move for Shelley Winters.

Ben-Hur ~ Best Picture 1959

A lot has been said about this film this past week with the passing of Charlton Heston.  Just today I heard that the director’s (William Wyler) son David Wyler is currently in the process of producing and directing a re-make.  Regardless of how many time this story is told (currently three film adaptations, this being the third) none could outshine the 1959 Best Picture version.

Ben-Hur  premiered at Loews Theater in New York City on November 18, 1959. The film went on to win a record of eleven Academy Awards, including Best Picture, a feat equaled only by Titanic (1997) and The Lord of the Rings: The Return of the King (2003).

The chariot race in Ben-Hur was directed by Andrew Marton, a Hollywood director who often acted as second unit director on other people’s films. Even by current standards, it is considered to be one of the most spectacular action sequences ever filmed. Filmed at Cinecittà Studios outside Rome long before the advent of computer-generated effects, it took over three months to complete, using 8000 extras on the largest film set ever built, some 18 acres (73,000m²). Eighteen chariots were built, with half being used for practice. The race took five weeks to film. Tour buses visited the set every hour. To give the scene more impact and realism, three lifelike dummies were placed at key points in the race to give the appearance of men being run over by chariots. Most notable is the stand-in dummy for Stephen Boyd’s Messala that gets tangled up under the horses, getting battered by their hooves. This resulted in one of the most grisly death scenes in motion pictures at this time and shocked audiences.

Gigi ~ Best Picture 1958

The idea was proposed by Hollywood producer Arthur Freed during the Philadelphia tryout of My Fair Lady. Lerner owed Arthur one more film based on the contract he had signed with MGM, so he read Colette’s novel and agreed to adapt Gigi for the screen. Lerner had a short list of stars with whom he wished to work before his career was over: Audrey Hepburn (she starred in the non-musical Broadway stage version of Gigi), Fred Astaire , who had worked with Lerner on Royal Wedding), and Maurice Chevalier. After reading the novel, Lerner thought Chevalier would be perfect for the role of Uncle Honoré. However, Lerner was left without a composer. Lerner’s collaborator, Frederick Loewe, had vowed never to work in movies, but he was charmed by the book and agreed to collaborate on the project, working in France. After a few songs were finished, the duo contacted Chevalier, who loved the songs and agreed to act in the film. Hearing a new melody from the bathroom during one session, Lerner jumped up, “[his] trousers still clinging to [his] ankles, and made his way to the living room. ‘Play that again,’ he said. And that melody ended up being the title song for Gigi.”^[1]

The entire film was written, cast, and ready to shoot in four and a half months, except for two songs (“I’m Glad I’m Not Young Any More” and “The Night They Invented Champagne”), which were written in California. Most of the film was shot on location in Paris, but the last few numbers took place in an apartment that MGM decided to construct in the studio in Hollywood. The cast had eight days off between locations, and everyone disappeared except Maurice Chevalier who flew directly to the studio to begin working with Lerner and Loewe on his final songs. At the completion of the film, there was a standard “sneak” preview at a small theater in Santa Barbara. Lerner and Loewe were dissatisfied and offered to buy a percentage of the film, and then to buy the print. (Lerner, pages 175-76). The studio eventually agreed to make changes, and quickly re-shot with some rewritten scenes, re-edited, and re-orchestrated the film. Another preview was held, and the audience reacted not only with appreciation but with affection. The film opened in New York in the spring of 1958 to glowing reviews. The film went on to win the Academy Award for every category in which it was nominated; a total of nine Oscars, more than any other film at that point in Academy Award history. The awards included Best Director, Best Adapted Screenplay, Best Song, and Best Picture. Maurice Chevalier, although not nominated for an acting award, received a Special Award “for all the joy he had brought to the screen during his lifetime.”

The Bridge on the River Kwai ~ Best Picture 1957

One of the most-loved war movies of all time opens in a Japanese prisoner-of-war camp in Burma in 1943, where a battle of wills rages between camp commander Colonel Saito (Sessue Hayakawa) and newly arrived British colonel Nicholson (Alec Guinness). Saito insists that Nicholson order his men to build a bridge over the river Kwai, which will be used to transport Japanese munitions. Nicholson refuses, despite all the various “persuasive” devices at Saito’s disposal. Finally, Nicholson agrees, not so much to cooperate with his captor as to provide a morale-boosting project for the military engineers under his command. The colonel will prove that, by building a better bridge than Saito’s men could build, the British soldier is a superior being even when under the thumb of the enemy. As the bridge goes up, Nicholson becomes obsessed with completing it to perfection, eventually losing sight of the fact that it will benefit the Japanese. Meanwhile, American POW Shears (William Holden, in a role originally slated for Cary Grant), having escaped from the camp, agrees to save himself from a court martial by leading a group of British soldiers back to the camp to destroy Nicholson’s bridge. Upon his return, Shears realizes that Nicholson’s mania to complete his project has driven him mad.

Filmed in Ceylon, Bridge on the River Kwai won seven Academy Awards, including Best Picture, Best Director for the legendary British filmmaker David Lean, and Best Actor for Guinness. It also won Best Screenplay for Pierre Boulle, the author of the novel on which the film was based and who could not speak English; the actual writers were blacklisted writers Carl Foreman and Michael Wilson, who were given their Oscars at the ceremonies in 1985. Wilson did not live to see this; Foreman died the day after it was announced. When the film was restored, their names were added to the credits.