Trade Talk #3

 

What Trades Told: Harlow, Sinatra, Sherlock, and Shirley

SO WHO NEEDS A “BROWNETTE”? --- To present a “New” Jean Harlow was to admit the old Jean Harlow needed newness, old still good so long as old still paid. How successful were film companies at manipulating their public? Harlow reinvented was for sake of rules that were new, as why would it be necessary to change Harlow so long as she kept delivering saucy goods as before? Trouble was she couldn’t, as neither could Mae West, Kay Francis, others who supped at precode table. Once known as edgy, you could not switch sides to serve convention. Old Harlow had to go. They couldn’t even put early stuff with her back on markets, at least intact. Maybe too it was time to soften hard bark she and certainly her platinum hair represented, that by mid-thirties a bent wheel that needed fixing. Modified vehicle would be Riffraff, a “new thrill” that “really makes her just about the most provocative girl on the screen!” Who, however, was kidding whom? A wide public knew by 1935 that pictures had been gelded, this expressed by boos greeting PCA seals to appear in front of features. I wonder if MGM was surprised when Riffraff lost money, which it did. Harlow like or not was a sex figure, ideal for the early thirties, not so useful now. Could browning her hair change public perception, if not rinse Harlow post-Code clean? Better pictures than Riffraff might help, Wife vs. Secretary pointing ways. Her as brownette would suit Wife’s more conservative part. Harlow grip of stardom was no more tenuous than others what with change forced upon the industry, self-censorship a ruinous thing for so many who spoke plainer back when one could. We think best of Harlow on such terms, but take these away and she’s Virginia Bruce, beautiful but vanilla. Why single out Bruce, however, actresses for most part mere utility as studios saw them. To be Harlow and project singular personality was a thing to be treasured, protected if possible. If that could be achieved simply by changing her hair, then bring on the dye.

SINATRA AT LOW TIDE --- No shame for stars landing at Universal-International during the fifties. Most prospered there, some inordinately so. James Stewart probably got his best 50’s money working at Universal. Others lesser lit landed there, if a fall at least a cushioned one, Ann Sheridan, Linda Darnell, names of still enough consequence for all concerned to fare well. Frank Sinatra signing for a single, maybe more (an option not exercised by U-I) was sound business so long as not too much was spent on the vehicle, thrift up to-including what was given Frank in advance, the record uncertain as to percentage if any he’d be entitled to provided the picture made profit. Meet Danny Wilson is up-from-pavement Frank as Danny learning how to be humble as Sinatra did not necessarily do, and if there was plot parallel to the singer’s life, it was broad enough not to rouse then-comment, maybe for fewer caring at such low ebb for Frank. Still he was a star, and many among perceptive knew he’d score again, Meet Danny Wilson distinctly not an engine to push him back up rungs, but no harm done and it pleased at least those who wanted to see-hear Frank on screen doing standards for which he was best liked. On-set tantrums were expected and maybe factored into costs, Sinatra better served than by Double Dynamite a couple of bleak seasons before. Sources say he begged Paramount Theatre management to let him perform live with Meet Danny Wilson, just like old times when he was bobby-sox idol at the same address. They gave him the spot with results OK, but this movie wasn’t one to generate lines down blocks, and I’d doubt anyone seeing it could expect much by way of acclaim. U-I’s trade ad was frisky: you’d think whole of countrywide media was aboard to boost Frank. Imagine if Universal had held Danny Wilson for a year, getting it out after From Here to Eternity and the star’s stunning comeback. What a whale this modesty could then have been, but who saw From Here to Eternity coming, or storm Sinatra would stir with it? Meet Danny Wilson is available on Region Two DVD, enjoyable and valued glimpse at Sinatra still at loose ends but on verge of spectacular rise from ashes.

PUTTING A FACE ON HOLMES --- Remind me again that Sherlock Holmes was not an actual person. Thing is, I want him to have been, and in fact, would have it no other way. Artists rendered the detective early and definitively, Sidney Paget in England, Frederic Dorr Steele in the US. Latter is less remembered, Doyle and Sherlock scholars obvious exception to that rule. Both artists kept to forge that was illustrating in the late nineteenth and early twentieth centuries, this when magazines on either side of the pond thrived in ways hard for us to imagine now that periodicals have gone passed way. Readers were early able to put a face on Holmes and so saw him real as a neighbor down streets. Helping too was William Gillette playing the detective on stage and embodying him best. Gillette befriended Steele, the two serving one-another interests after all, as did John Barrymore and the artist when JB essayed Holmes on film. Steele being Collier magazine’s man put him before a considerable readership, this beginning 1903 when Sherlock Holmes “returned” for thirteen new stories, Doyle reviving the character after error of killing him off, this reversible as some, if few after all, might survive plunge off a waterfall. Steele in all contributed eleven color covers and fifty interior pages, many also tinted as he early explored possibilities in printing. 1939 and Fox’s Hound of the Baskervilles saw Steele as star enough in his field at sixty-six to cooperate re publicity, plus Rathbone was a ringer beside Steele art now gone back a generation. Was Basil early-alert to possibility this part would type him? Being Holmes was much like being stamped for a coin. Once in, you don’t get out. Original stills and lobby cards for Hound are hard to come by, let alone Steele accessories offered to showmen, as here with six glossy images available for publicity. Collier magazines with Steele art are doubtless rare as well, though I know less of how rare or of what value issues might be.

SHIRLEY TEMPLE DONE IN OIL --- Promote a star, do an oil painting. But how often did such things occur? Art here of Shirley Temple at summit must surely have been preserved, if not by the painter, then maybe by Shirley’s family. Did she or they cop it out of Fox dumpsters like Jane Withers later did for treasures the studio tossed? We’re farther out each year from understanding what a true phenomenon Shirley Temple was. She and parents saw it rise and fall. Did Shirley have occasion to see Zanuck in later years, say the fifties, maybe sixties? How interesting such conversation would be, sort of like when Zukor sat opposite Mary Pickford to ruminate over past years, this televised and at You Tube. What valued keepsakes Shirley Temple had were auctioned years ago. I’ve wondered before if once-collectibles, Temple dolls and such, are still collectible. Writing in 2014 of Shirley’s passing, I speculated she was largely forgot by then. On the contrary said a reader, him firm that her films and image were well known even to children thanks to continued and oft-colorized play on cable networks and such. We’re ten years later and I’ll ask again how much if any this star is recalled. It all matters less now than what she meant to a first-run public, enough so to merit publicity elegant as accorded any name before her or since. Where industry goes to effort like this for a trade ad, there is clearly expectation they’ll more than get investment back. For comparison if not contrast, above is a lovely RKO title card from 1947 with nineteen-year-old Shirley Temple. Honeymoon is of delayed marriage and consummation common to alleged comedies from the era. Without knowing, I’ll guess more-than-seasoned Shirley offered performing tips to still-green Guy Madison, whose second starring role this was.