Showing posts with label Marlene Dietrich. Show all posts
Showing posts with label Marlene Dietrich. Show all posts

Monday, April 24, 2023

Lulu in America : the Lost History of Louise Brooks and Pandora's Box

I have written a long article for Film International focusing on the little documented exhibition history of Pandora's Box in the United States (in the 1930s and 1940s). This lost history includes censorship, wholesale cuts, damning reviews, "thrilling sound effects", adults only screenings, and ads which scream "Sin Lust Evil !" The architect Frank Lloyd Wright, the Little Theater movement, Iris Barry and the NY Museum of Modern Art, Marlene Dietrich, Charlie Chaplin's FBI file, and others also figure in this story.


My article, “'Sin Lust Evil' in America: Louise Brooks and the Exhibition History of Pandora’s Box (1929)", can be found at https://filmint.nu/louise-brooks-and-the-exhibition-history-of-pandoras-box-1929-thomas-gladysz/

This groundbreaking article overturns a couple of long held beliefs: one is that Pandora's Box wasn't shown in the United States following its NYC debut in 1929 until James Card screened it in Rochester, NY in the late 1950s. The second is that G.W. Pabst choose Louise Brooks for the role of Lulu after seeing her in Howard Hawks A Girl in Every Port (1928).

A reminder.  Pandora's Box starring Louise Brooks, will be shown at the Paramount theater in Oakland, California on Saturday, May 6. More about that special screening, which will feature live musical accompaniment, can be found HERE.

THE LEGAL STUFF: The Louise Brooks Society™ blog is authored by Thomas Gladysz, Director of the Louise Brooks Society  (www.pandorasbox.com). Original contents copyright © 2023. Further unauthorized use prohibited. 


Sunday, June 13, 2021

A few fascinating non-Louise Brooks finds

While researching Louise Brooks for my forthcoming book, Around the World with Louise Brooks, I too often come across all sorts of intriguing articles and images which have little or nothing to do with the actress. I try to resist them, and to stay focused on the project at hand. However, sometimes I give in and save something of interest with the intention of sharing. Here are a few recent finds.

The first is a page of delicious images of the lovely Marlene Dietrich, Brooks' one-time rival for the role of Lulu in Pandora's Box. The page comes from Paris-plaisirs : revue mensuelle esthétique et humoristique, a French publication. It dates from April 1930.

If you have seen The Blue Angel, and I hope you have, you will recall that an older character, Professor Immanuel Rath (played by Emil Jannings), was attracted to the youthful Lola Lola (played by Dietrich). 

Speaking of Professors, here is another recent find, a snapshot of Douglas Fairbanks leading a class on film at the University of Southern California. This clipping comes from a French film journal, and dates to February, 1929. I wonder if Fairbanks' son, Doug Jr., who appeared in the 1926 Brooks' film The American Venus, sat in on the class? Whatever the answer, I would guess this class more or less marks the beginning of film studies!

One of my favorite filmmakers of the silent era is Erich von Stroheim. I came across this 1937 article about the director which is essentially an interview -- which I think is fascinating. Too bad von Stroheim and Brooks never worked together. Oh what perverse delights would have resulted.

And for good measure here is something else I spotted on Facebook, a screen capture or film still from Billy Wilder's Menschen am Sonntag (1930), another film you really should see if you haven't. Known as People on Sunday, the film follows a group of residents of Berlin on a summer's day. It is beautiful, and evocative. What I find interesting about the image below are the postcards of film stars thumb-tacked to the wall. Brooks is not among them, but I do spot images of Garbo, Harold Lloyd, and second/third from the pretty actress' nose, Esther Ralston, the star of The American Venus.


Tuesday, May 25, 2021

Too cool Louise Brooks swag from Germany!

Yesterday, I received one of the best packages I have ever received. It came from Benjamin Meissner, a new Facebook friend who I met online during my recent appearance on Karie Bible's Hollywood Kitchen. Benjamin was one of the viewers, a posted some comments and questions which I was happy to answer.

 

In our chat, Benjamin posted a picture of a Louise Brooks picture which he spotted in a hairdresser‘s shop in a city called Flensburg, near the Danish border; he also offered to send me a Louise Brooks pin and postcard, which are available in Germany. Above is a picture of the Brooks photo in a German shop window, followed by a scan of the postcard and pinback button.


I was gobsmacked. The postcard and the pinback button are both very cool! Thank you Benjamin. The postcard is made by a German publisher,Gerstenberg Verlag GmbH (www.gerstenberg-verlag.de). Benjamin also sent me small box set of film star postcards which feature Louise Brooks, Marlene Dietrich, and Charlie Chaplin. Picture first is the Brooks card (which came with matching gold envelopes), followed by the front and back of the postcard box set.



Thank you Benjamin Meissner, Louise Brooks and film fan extraordinaire!
BTW:
Benjamin is a BIG classic Hollywood fan and president of the international Marilyn Monroe fan club "Some Like It Hot" in Germany with members all over the world.
https://the-international-marilyn-monroe-fan-club-germany.jimdosite.com

Monday, April 21, 2014

Kino Venus, a Polish thriller with a Louise Brooks-like character

Kino Venus is the name of a Polish thriller set in 1930s Lublin which may feature a Louise Brooks and/or a Marlene Dietrich inspired character. The book's author is Marcin Wroński. I was alerted to Kino Venus after coming across a reference to the actresses on a French bookseller's webpage.

Has anyone read these books? I found three different covers while searching online. They sound intriguing.

Below is biographical information on the author from his website. And here is a the author's Wikipedia page in Polish.

Marcin Wroński (b. 1972, Lublin, Poland) studied Polish literature and language at the Catholic University of Lublin. Before devoting himself wholeheartedly to becoming a writer he worked as a columnist, a radio journalist, a secondary school teacher and an editor at various Polish publishing houses.

Wroński’s debut book appeared in 1992. Since then he has published six novels. He has also written many short stories and articles, cabaret sketches, essays and plays. In his work, Wroński combines literary tradition with elements from mass culture, whereby the complex Polish-Jewish-Russian-German history of his native city of Lublin often plays a role.

In Poland he is known mainly as the author of historic crime fiction featuring Police Commissioner Zygmunt Maciejewski as the main character. So far, he has published in the series Morderstwo pod cenzurą ("Murder Under Censorship", 2007), Kino Venus ("Cinema Venus", 2008), A na imię jej będzie Aniela ("And She Shall Be Called Aniela", 2011) and Skrzydlata trumna ("The Flying Coffin", 2012). Wroński also wrote a political thriller about contemporary Poland: Officium Secretum. Pies Pański ("Officium Secretum. Domini Cane", 2010). The 5th retro crime novel featuring Maciejewski is Pogrom w przyszły wtorek ("Pogrom on the Next Tuesday")

Morderstwo pod cenzurą, Kino Venus and Officium Secretum were nominated to the ‘Great Calibre Prize’ (the most prestigious prize for authors of crime fiction in Poland). The Russian rights for these books were sold to Gesharim/Bridges of Culture Publishing in Moscow. Studio Kalejdoskop, a Polish production company, has bought the film rights.

In 2009 Marcin Wroński was awarded the honorary title of Bene Meritus Terrae Lublinensi (Meritiorious for Lublin's Region) for the way in which he managed to conjure up the history of Lublin in his novels about 'Zyggie' Maciejewski. In 2012 he was awarded the Medal of the Mayor of Lublin.

Monday, May 3, 2004

Marlene Dietrich and Louise Brooks

Some time ago, I came across an obscure drawing by the Polish writer Bruno Schulz (1892 - 1942) which I believe depicts Louise Brooks and Marlene Dietrich. If it is not them, then it bears a striking resemblance to the two cinematic femme fatales, Lulu and Lola.

Bruno Schulz is known for his short stories, and he is considered one of the great Polish writers of the 20th century. His brief literary career ended during World War II when he was gunned down by a German officer. John Updike, an admirer, has described the author as "one of the great transmogrifiers of the world into words." [Schulz's most famous work, The Street of Crocodiles (1934), was itself transmogrified into a 1986 film by the Brother's Quay. It is extraordinary - one of the most memorable and poetic films I have ever seen!] 



Schulz was also gifted artist. The drawing that I came across, which dates from 1930 but is now lost and only exists in reproduction, does seem to depict Brooks and Dietrich. In the title of the drawing, the two women are termed "temptresses." The standing Brooks figure is garbed in showgirl attire, a la Pandora's Box, while the Dietrich figure is seated with legs crossed, a la The Blue Angel. Perhaps I am wrong, but this image seems another link between the mythic characters of Lulu and Lola. 

Sunday, May 2, 2004

Marlene Dietrich

Yesterday, I finished reading Marlene Dietrich: Life and Legend by Steven Bach. Wow! What an amazing life and what a remarkable biography. I was especially impressed with the scholarship (both quantity and quality) that went into writing this book. This engrossing biography is especially good on Dietrich's early life and career - and the background on German life and culture in the first decades of the 20th century is excellent. Highly recommended.



I think - in down-deep, subtle ways, Marlene Dietrich and Louise Brooks were similar sorts of people. Or at least similarly motivated. Both were very beautiful, sexually driven, and drawn to powerful men. (And both men and women were drawn to them.) Both projected their selves into their characters and onto the screen. Both sought to shape their legacies. Both scrubbed floors in atonement. (Their is also a subtle link between their two most famous roles as well:  Lulu = Lola. Dietrich, as everyone knows, was offered the role that Brooks would play - the role of Lulu - in Pandora's Box. A year later, Dietrich would go on to play Lola in the similarly themed film, The Blue Angel. G.W. Pabst directed Brooks, and Josef von Sternberg directed Dietrich: each director was a kind of Svengali to the actress.)

Has anyone else read this biography of Dietrich (or other books on the actress)? Any comments on the similarities between Lulu and Lola, the Blue Angel? 
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