FILM
Orchid Lady of the Screen fired. She is hired back, however, when her publisher thinks a competitor wants her as their columnist. She must choose between Sloan or Jones, the soldier she has fallen in love with. Directed by Peter Godfrey, this will put you in the mood for a snowy weekend in the country.
Miracle on 34th Street
Although there have been four remakes of the film, Miracle on 34th Street (and a Broadway musical version) the classic film, produced in 1946 and directed by George Seaton, is the most loved.
Holiday Classic Movie Takes By Jules Scroggin and Jess LeBeau
Holiday Inn
The holiday season is almost here and we have some great movies that will put you in the mood to reminisce about time with the family, trimming the tree and shopping for presents as well as traditional holiday songs. Holiday Inn encompasses not only the Thanksgiving Day and Christmas holidays but all the holidays throughout the year. Jim Hardy (Bing Crosby) and Ted Hanover (Fred Astaire) are two nightclub entertainers; one sings the other dances. No one can sing “White Christmas” like Bing Crosby. Fred Astaire is incomparable as he dances in powdered wig and does the minuet with Marjorie Reynolds to celebrate Washington’s Birthday. Linda Mason (Reynolds) is a salesgirl who wants to break into show business and thinks her chance is at the Holiday Inn. Both men vie for her attention and so romantic complications ensue. One offers her the quiet life in the country the other the glamour of showbiz. Which does she choose? The movie will leave you guessing until the end. Fred Astaire’s girlfriend in the movie, Lila Dixon, a dancer, (Virginia Dale) follows him to Holiday Inn but he is already in pursuit of Linda (Reynolds). While the movie has the feeling of being filmed entirely on a Hollywood soundstage as many movies of that era did, the inn has the warmth of Bing Crosby sitting by a fire with his thanksgiving dinner served by housekeeper Mamie (character actress Louise Beavers) while snow softly falls outside. Fred Astaire’s urbane charm works well with Crosby’s down-to-earth persona.
Marjorie Reynolds is lovely and sings and dances well enough to keep pace with both men. Irving Berlin’s songs such as “Happy Holiday,” “Easter Parade” and “Be Careful, It’s My Heart,” are timeless and make this a movie for the holidays. Directed by Mark Sandrich, this is a classic.
Christmas in Connecticut
Barbara Stanwyck is a career woman (one that she played in many of her movies) Elizabeth Lane. She is a columnist that writes about cooking with the help of Felix Bassenak (S.Z Sakal), a friend who really can cook. In reality, she knows nothing about cooking or homemaking. When she goes to an opulently appointed Connecticut farm, owned by her friend John Sloan (Reginald Gardiner) to get away for a weekend, her publisher Alexander Yardley, played by Sydney Greenstreet decides to pay her a visit to sample firsthand her renowned cooking. She suddenly finds herself in a predicament in that she must pose as a married woman with a child who can cook first-rate meals and decorate and sew as well. To add to the confusion, Jefferson Jones (Dennis Morgan) arrives as a recovering soldier whose nurse arranges for him to spend the holiday at what he thinks is her farm. A romance develops which is complicated by her deciding to marry Sloan to make her more credible to her publisher who thinks she is married. She must choose between her successful career or marriage and a home with the soldier she has fallen in love with. She uses the neighbor’s baby to appear that she has a child. When Greenstreet sees the baby taken by his real mother he thinks the baby is being kidnapped and calls the police. Stanwyck has to reveal the truth and she is
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Kris Kringle (Edmund Gwenn) portrays the most convincing Santa Claus and he is still who I picture whenever I think of jolly old St. Nicholas. Susan (a young and darling Natalie Wood) whose mother, Doris Walker is Macy’s Day Parade event director (played by Maureen O’Hara) who hires Santa — is not so convinced that Kringle is the real thing. Little Susan is a skeptic through and through as her mother has taught her that there is no such thing as Santa Claus. Fred Gailey (John Payne) who is Doris’s neighbor and an attorney takes Susan to see Santa, a.k.a. Kris Kringle and she begins to think he might really be Santa. Concerned that Kris really thinks he is Santa but who is suffering from delusions and might be harmful, Doris decides to fire him. But, he passes a psychological evaluation by the store’s doctor. Later, he is brought before New York Supreme Court Judge Henry X. Harper (Gene Lockhart) to establish his mental health. Kris is defended by Doris’ good-looking attorney/neighbor (and love interest), Fred Gailey, who presents the judge with childrens’ letters to Santa Claus (delivered to Macy’s Kris Kringle). The post office as an extension of the federal government has acknowledged Kris as Santa, and this is good enough for Judge Harper who dismisses the case. Little Susan has asked Santa for a special Christmas present and she thinks he won’t deliver. She repeats half-heartedly, “I believe, I believe, I believe.” Does her wish come true? Is her faith in Santa justified? Miracle on 34th Street, is the quintessential Christmas holiday movie that rekindles the belief perhaps all of us had in Santa Claus, Sinter Klaas, St. Nicholas, or Kriss Kringle. Do you believe?
By P.A. Geddie Corinne Mae Griffith was born November 21, 1894, in Texarkana, to Ambolina Ghio and John Lewis Griffith. She became a popular star of the silent movies beginning in 1916. At the height of her popularity, she was known as the “Orchid Lady of the Screen,” and was widely considered the most beautiful woman in the era of silent films. “Black Oxen” in 1924 was one of her most popular films. In 1925 she made the film “DeClasse” in which a young extra named Clark Gable appeared. Griffith received an Academy Award nomination for her work in “The Divine Lady” which released in 1929. She appeared in more than 60 features during her movie career and was listed as executive producer on 11 of them.
The tabloid magazines of the day were kind to her: “... she is innocence personified... no one would be apt to tell a risque story in front of Corinne Griffith... furthermore, she is reserved. In a land where last names are forgotten overnight, she is still ‘Miss Griffith.’” When sound on film began creating “talkies” in the late 1920s, that somewhat ended Corinne Griffth’s film career as she couldn’t sing, or even talk very well. Sound did not embrace her in the same way the silent films had. Her last Hollywood film released in 1930. After appearing in an English film in 1932, she retired. She appeared in one final film, “Paradise Alley,” the Hugo Haas potboiler. It wasn’t long, though, before it was clear that the silent film star beauty also had brains. She went on to be a successful writer and amassed a fortune as an astute businesswoman, primarily in real estate. Griffith published more than a dozen books including two best sellers. One was Papa’s Delicate Condition which was made into a movie starring Jackie Gleason in 1963. The story centers around the Griffith family in turn-of-the-century small-town Texas, and six-year-old “Corrie” that adores her eccentric, over-thetop father. Not amused by his shenanigans, his wife takes the kids and goes to her father’s house in Texarkana. Papa buys a circus and they all go to Texarkana and win back his family. Perhaps the strangest thing about Griffith in her real life story is a period beginning in 1966 when she claimed she was not Corinne Griffith but the actress’ younger (20 years) sister who had taken her place upon the famous sister’s “death.” She was married for a few days to her fourth husband, Broadway actor Danny Scholl, who was 27 years younger, before filling for an anullment. She even testified in court, that she was her own sister. Contradictions by fellow actors that had known her since the twenties did not shake her story. Even as late as 1974 an editor of Photoplay Magazine said Griffith was still claiming that she was her own younger sister. This part of her life inspired the Tom Tryon novel “Fedora” that was later filmed by Billy Wilder and released in 1979, coincidentally, the year of her death.
Her other marriages were to actor Webster Campbell (1920-23), producer Walter Morosco (1924-34) and to the owner of the Washington Redskins football team George Preston Marshall (1936-58). Some of Griffith’s family are buried in Sacred Heart Cemetery in Texarkana including her grandparents Anthony and Augusta Ghio who have a great story of their own that takes place in Jefferson and then in Texarkana. Corinne Griffith made her grand exit July 13, 1979, in Santa Monica, California. One of the richest women in America at the time, she left an estate of $150 million.
Check out this slide show with music on Corinne Griffith and there are also several clips from her movies on YouTube. youtube.com/ watch?v=iwujLttHBQk
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