Hollywoodland

Mar

 

We had the full group dancing last night on Dancing with the Stars.

Here’s my scoreboard:
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Mar

 

This was a busy day in Hollywood history.

In 1874, Harry Houdini was born. What does a stage magician/escape artist have to do with Hollywood, you ask? He starred in 6 silent movies, directed 2, and wrote & produced 1. Maybe he’ll make a cameo appearance in Second Reel. :)

In 1887, actor Roscoe Fatty Arbuckle was born. He was a talented silent movie actor, director, and screenwriter. Unfortunately, nowadays, he’s mainly remembered for the scandal that ended his acting career. In 1921, at the height of his career (he was making $1 million/year), he took a break from filming a movie and took a trip to San Francisco where he and some friends decided to throw a party. One of the attendees was an actress named Virginia Rappe. She became ill and died of peritonitis. But Rappe’s manager & a friend of hers claimed Arbuckle had raped her and caused her death. His trial (or trials, rather, since the first two ended in a mistrial) was a Major Media Event. He was eventually acquitted (after only a 6 minute deliberation) and received a written apology from the jury (which took 5 of the 6 minutes to write). But his career was ruined forever. He continued to direct some comedies under the pseudonym William Goodrich until his death in 1933.

It’s also the birthday of Norman Fell who was born in 1924 and Disney animator Ub Iwerks who was born in 1901.

Mar

 

I’ve discovered a new research tool that I’ve quickly beomce addicted to. Google’s Book Search. Now, they have some current books that have way too many “sample” pages online, IMO. That said, however, they also have a ton of out-of-print books from the 19th & early 20th Century that you can see the entire contents of. *swoon* Lots of lovely research material!!! And some of them are offered as PDF files, so you can download them! :whoo:

Busy night tonight on TV. Dancing with the Stars is on for two hours, then we also have Cities of the Underworld, Deal or No Deal, New Amsterdam, Ancient Discoveries, and much to my shock and delight a new episode of CSI: Miami!

Reading: Another Day, Another Dungeon by Greg Costikyan. It’s funny fantasy full of puns and Dungeons & Dragons-type references.

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