Paul van Yperen's Blog, page 186
August 28, 2020
The World of Rizzoli, Part 2: 1937
Between 1936 and 1943, Rizzoli & C. in Milan was one of the most prominent publishers of film star postcards in Italy. Through the years, Ivo Blom collected many of the wonderful Rizzoli cards with their glamorous portraits and remarkable colours of famous actresses. In a series of posts, Ivo chooses his favourite Rizzoli cards and describes what happed in Italy in this turbulent period. Today Part, 2: postcards from the year 1937.
Italian postcard by Rizzoli & C., Milano, 1937. Photo: Fox.
Simone Simon (1910-2005) was one of the most seductive and brilliant stars of the French cinema of the 1930s and 1950s. In 1936-1937 and during the war years she worked in Hollywood. Publicity dubbed her ‘La Sauvage Tendre’ (The Tender Savage). In 1937, she starred in Seventh Heaven (1937) by Henry King.
Italian postcard by Rizzoli & C. Milano, 1937. Photo: R.K.O.
Mexican and American actress Dolores del Río (1905–1983) was a Hollywood star in the 1920s and 1930s, and one of the most important female actresses of the Golden Age of Mexican cinema in the 1940s and 1950s. Del Río was the first major Latin cross-over star in Hollywood and was considered one of the most beautiful faces that have emerged in the Hollywood cinema. She also appeared in several European films. She acted in 1937 in The Devil's Playground (Erle C. Kenton, 1937).
Italian postcard by Rizzoli, 1937. Photo: Metro-Goldwyn-Mayer.
American actress Joan Crawford (1905-1977) became nationally-known as a flapper by the end of the 1920s. In the 1930s, her fame rivaled, and later outlasted, MGM colleagues Norma Shearer and Greta Garbo . Crawford often played hardworking young women who find romance and success. In 1937, she appeared in The Last of Mrs. Cheyney (Richard Boleslawski, 1937), The Bride Wore Red (Dorothy Arzner, 1937), and Mannequin (Frank Borzage, 1937).
Italian postcard by. Rizzoli, Milano, 1937. Photo: Columbia.
With her round apple-face, big eyes, and charm, French-born Hollywood star Claudette Colbert (1903-1996) was the epitome of chic sophistication. Her comedies It Happened One Night (Frank Capra, 1934) - for which she won the Oscar, Midnight (Mitchell Leisen, 1939), and The Palm Beach Story (Preston Sturges, 1942) are among Hollywood's greatest ever. After more than 60 films, she returned with great success to the theatre and was 84 years old when she won a Golden Globe for the TV mini-series The Two Mrs. Grenvilles (1987). Colbert acted in 1937 in Tovarich (Anatole Litvak, 1937) with Charles Boyer and in two other films
A super production at a new studio complex
The year 1937 was that of the opening of the – still existing - film studio complex of Cinecittà, then outside of Rome, on the Via Tuscolana. The ‘newbies’ of the film school Centro Sperimentale di Cinematografia, founded in 1935 and offering a two-year training, could start working there right away.
A super production at the new complex was the epic film Scipione l’Africano, starring Annibale Ninchi as the stern Scipio, Camillo Pilotto as tough warrior Hannibal, Francesca Braggiotti as the seductive queen Sofonisba, and Fosco Giachetti as her lover and later husband Massinissa, who, yet, must bend to Roman dominance, sacrificing his wife.
The film had huge sets and battle scenes with numerous extras and elephants. Mussolini himself was involved in the production, as he hoped this film would enforce his dream of raising the Third Rome, after that of the Roman emperors and the popes.
Though exported, the film was less successful in foreign countries and it would be the last Antiquity film of the fascist era. Instead, other historical films such as Luis Trenker ’s Condottieri/Military leaders fared much better.
In 1937, the first co-productions with France started, such as Il fu Mattia Pascal/He Was Mattia Pascal by Pierre Chenal, starring Pierre Blanchar , Isa Miranda , and Enrico Glori .
Popular were the Italian comedies with older stage actors who had second careers in the cinema such as Armando Falconi , Angelo Musco, Antonio Gandusio , and Dina Galli , as well as comedies with younger comedians such as Vittorio De Sica and Assia Noris in Il signor Max/Mister Max (Mario Camerini, 1937), Luisa Ferida, Antonio Centa and Leda Gloria in I tre desideri/The Three Wishes (Kurt Gerron, 1937), and Totò in his first film, Fermo con le mani/Hands Off Me! (Gero Zambuto, 1937).
Established opera singers such as Beniamino Gigli and Tito Schipa also started second careers in film, while the new generation who was active in the dramatic genre included Amedeo Nazzari , Caterina Boratto and Maria Denis .
Italian postcard by Rizzoli & C., Milano, 1937.
Elsa Merlini (1903-1983) was a star of the Italian cinema of the 1930's. She excelled in the 'Telefoni Bianchi'(white telephone comedies). Merlini did not act in any film released in 1937, but in 1936 she starred in three films, Ginevra degli Almieri (Guido Brignone, 1936), Non ti conosco più/I Don't Know You Anymore (Nunzio Malasomma, Mario Bonnard, 1936), and 30 secondi d'amore/Thirty Seconds of Love (Mario Bonnard, 1936).
Italian postcard by Rizzoli & C., Milano, 1937.
Assia Noris (1912-1998) is best remembered as the star of several 1930s romantic comedies, directed by Mario Camerini and co-starring Vittorio De Sica . In 1937, she acted in five films (!): Il signor Max/Mister Max (Mario Camerini, 1937), Nina non far la stupida/Nina don't be stupid (Nunzio Malasomma, 1937), Ma non è una cosa seria/But It's Nothing Serious (Mario Camerini, 1937), Una commedia fra i pazzi/A Comedy Among Fools (N.N., 1937), and L'uomo che sorride/The Man Who Smiles (Mario Mattoli, 1937).
Italian postcard by Rizzoli & C., Milano, 1937. Photo: Pasta.
Carla Sveva (?-?) was an Italian film actress, whose short film career took place between 1936 and 1939. She was the love interest and later wife of Giovanni dalla Bande Nere ( Luis Trenker ) in the historical film Condottieri/Giovanni de Medici: The Leader (Luis Trenker, 1937).
Italian postcard by Rizzoli & C. Milano, 1937. Photo: Barzacchi.
Evi Maltagliati (1908–1986) was an Italian stage and screen actress, who worked in Italian cinema between the later 1930s and the early 1970s. Maltagliati acted in no film in 1937, in 1936 she was in I due sergenti/The two sergeants (Enrico Guazzoni, 1937).
Italian postcard by Rizzoli & C., Milano, 1937. Photo: I.C.I.
Elisa Cegani (1911–1996) was one of the most representative actresses of Italian cinema of the 1930s and 1940s. In 1937, Cegani acted in La contessa di Parma/The Duchess of Parma (Alessandro Blasetti, 1937) and Ma non è una cosa seria/But It's Nothing Serious (Mario Camerini, 1937).
The first serious Italian film magazine
Luigi Chiarini, the director of the Centro Sperimentale, founded in 1937 the film journal Bianco e Nero, the organ of the Centro Sperimentale. Though many trade papers and fanzines had existed before, Bianco e Nero was the first serious Italian film magazine focusing on criticism, theory, and pedagogy.
At the 1937 Venice film festival, the award for Best Foreign Film was for Un carnet de bal/Dance Program by Julien Duvivier, starring Marie Bell . The award for Best Italian Film went to Scipione l'africano/Scipio the African by Carmine Gallone. The Volpi Cup for Best Actor went to Emil Jannings for Der Herrscher/The Ruler (Veit Harlan, 1937), and for Best Actress to Bette Davis for Kid Galahad (Michael Curtiz, 1937) and Marked Woman (Lloyd Bacon, 1937).
At the festival, La grande illusion by Jean Renoir was shown, and although it was liked by the international audience, the film was considered as 'too pacifistic' for a release in Italy. Yet, the screening in Venice would be a precursor to a large contingent of French films in Venice one year after, in 1938.
In Hollywood in March 1938, the Academy Awards for the films of 1937 were given to The Life of Emile Zola (Best Picture), Leo McCarey (Best Direction for The Awful Truth), Spencer Tracy (Best Actor for Captains Courageous), and Luise Rainer (Best Actress for The Good Earth).
The Life of Emile Zola by William Dieterle and starring Paul Muni won three awards that year. Apparently, biopics were popular among the Oscar jury, as in 1936 another biopic had won too, The Story of Louis Pasteur, also starring Paul Muni . Luise Rainer also had won the Oscar for 1936 too, for her role of Anna Held in The Great Ziegfeld Story. The 1937 film Lost Horizon, which was popular in Italy too, got Oscars for best art direction and editing.
Internationally, Italy’s reputation shrunk because of its colonial affairs. In 1937, Italy became worldwide known as ruthless against the Ethiopians, when after an assault on the Italian Viceroy Graziani, a massacre under the Ethiopian population took place, killing about 1/5 of the population of Addis Abeba and the whole population of one convent which supposedly had helped the assaulters.
When the League of Nations imposed economic sanctions on Italy’s invasion of Abyssinia, Italy left the League of Nations. Instead, Hitler received Mussolini in 1937 in Germany with a big display of power, and Mussolini was convinced the Germans would be his best ally...
Italian postcard by Rizzoli & C., Milano, 1937. Photo: Pesce.
Francesca Braggiotti (1902-1998) was an Italian dancer and actress. She acted in Scipione l'Africano/Scipio the African (Carmine Gallone, 1937). Married to John Davis Lodge, she left her artistic career after her husband, also an actor, embarked on a political career that led him to become governor and then ambassador.
Italian postcard by Rizzoli, 1937. Photo: Ghergo.
Leda Gloria (1912-1997) was one of Federico Fellini’s favorite film actresses, having a prolific career in the 1930s and 1940s but is also remembered as the wife of Peppone in the Don Camillo films. Gloria also acted in I tre desideri/The Three Wishes (Giorgio Ferroni, Kurt Gerron, 1937).
Italian postcard by Rizzoli, Milano, 1937.
Isa Miranda (1905–1982) was the only international film star produced by the Italian fascist cinema. In 1937, she acted in Scipione l'Africano/Scipio the African (Carmine Gallone, 1937) and Il fu Mattia Pascal/He Was Mattia Pascal (Pierre Chenal, 1937). In Hollywood, she was billed as the ‘Italian Marlene Dietrich’ and played femme fatale roles. Later she became one of the most significant European film actresses during the 1940s and early 1950s.
Italian postcard by Rizzoli & C., Milano, 1937. Photo: Venturini.
The elegant brunette Vanna Vanni (1920-1998), aka Vanna Pegna, was an Italian film actress who peaked in the late 1930s and early 1940s. She mostly played in comedies, many directed by Gennaro Righelli, plus several with the De Filippo family. In 1937, she acted in I fratelli Castiglioni/The Brothers Castiglione (Corrado D'Errico, 1937), Nina non far la stupida/Nina don't be stupid (Nunzio Malasomma, 1937), and L'uomo che sorride/The Man Who Smiles (Mario Mattoli, 1937).
Italian postcard by Rizzoli & C., Milano, 1937. Photo: Demanins.
Isa Pola (1909-1984) was an Italian stage, film and television actress. In the 1930s and 1940s she was a big star in Italian cinema, in films such as La canzone dell'amore/The song of love (Gennaro Righelli, 1930), La telefonista/The switchboard Operator (Nunzio Malasomma, 1932) and I bambini ci guardano/The Children Are Watching Us (Vittorio De Sica, 1943). In 1937, Pola acted in Gli uomini non sono ingrati/Men are not ungrateful (Guido Brignone, 1937) and Sono stato io!/I Was to Blame (Raffaello Matarazzo, 1937).
Check out Part 1, 1936. To be continued!
Italian postcard by Rizzoli & C., Milano, 1937. Photo: Fox.
Simone Simon (1910-2005) was one of the most seductive and brilliant stars of the French cinema of the 1930s and 1950s. In 1936-1937 and during the war years she worked in Hollywood. Publicity dubbed her ‘La Sauvage Tendre’ (The Tender Savage). In 1937, she starred in Seventh Heaven (1937) by Henry King.
Italian postcard by Rizzoli & C. Milano, 1937. Photo: R.K.O.
Mexican and American actress Dolores del Río (1905–1983) was a Hollywood star in the 1920s and 1930s, and one of the most important female actresses of the Golden Age of Mexican cinema in the 1940s and 1950s. Del Río was the first major Latin cross-over star in Hollywood and was considered one of the most beautiful faces that have emerged in the Hollywood cinema. She also appeared in several European films. She acted in 1937 in The Devil's Playground (Erle C. Kenton, 1937).
Italian postcard by Rizzoli, 1937. Photo: Metro-Goldwyn-Mayer.
American actress Joan Crawford (1905-1977) became nationally-known as a flapper by the end of the 1920s. In the 1930s, her fame rivaled, and later outlasted, MGM colleagues Norma Shearer and Greta Garbo . Crawford often played hardworking young women who find romance and success. In 1937, she appeared in The Last of Mrs. Cheyney (Richard Boleslawski, 1937), The Bride Wore Red (Dorothy Arzner, 1937), and Mannequin (Frank Borzage, 1937).
Italian postcard by. Rizzoli, Milano, 1937. Photo: Columbia.
With her round apple-face, big eyes, and charm, French-born Hollywood star Claudette Colbert (1903-1996) was the epitome of chic sophistication. Her comedies It Happened One Night (Frank Capra, 1934) - for which she won the Oscar, Midnight (Mitchell Leisen, 1939), and The Palm Beach Story (Preston Sturges, 1942) are among Hollywood's greatest ever. After more than 60 films, she returned with great success to the theatre and was 84 years old when she won a Golden Globe for the TV mini-series The Two Mrs. Grenvilles (1987). Colbert acted in 1937 in Tovarich (Anatole Litvak, 1937) with Charles Boyer and in two other films
A super production at a new studio complex
The year 1937 was that of the opening of the – still existing - film studio complex of Cinecittà, then outside of Rome, on the Via Tuscolana. The ‘newbies’ of the film school Centro Sperimentale di Cinematografia, founded in 1935 and offering a two-year training, could start working there right away.
A super production at the new complex was the epic film Scipione l’Africano, starring Annibale Ninchi as the stern Scipio, Camillo Pilotto as tough warrior Hannibal, Francesca Braggiotti as the seductive queen Sofonisba, and Fosco Giachetti as her lover and later husband Massinissa, who, yet, must bend to Roman dominance, sacrificing his wife.
The film had huge sets and battle scenes with numerous extras and elephants. Mussolini himself was involved in the production, as he hoped this film would enforce his dream of raising the Third Rome, after that of the Roman emperors and the popes.
Though exported, the film was less successful in foreign countries and it would be the last Antiquity film of the fascist era. Instead, other historical films such as Luis Trenker ’s Condottieri/Military leaders fared much better.
In 1937, the first co-productions with France started, such as Il fu Mattia Pascal/He Was Mattia Pascal by Pierre Chenal, starring Pierre Blanchar , Isa Miranda , and Enrico Glori .
Popular were the Italian comedies with older stage actors who had second careers in the cinema such as Armando Falconi , Angelo Musco, Antonio Gandusio , and Dina Galli , as well as comedies with younger comedians such as Vittorio De Sica and Assia Noris in Il signor Max/Mister Max (Mario Camerini, 1937), Luisa Ferida, Antonio Centa and Leda Gloria in I tre desideri/The Three Wishes (Kurt Gerron, 1937), and Totò in his first film, Fermo con le mani/Hands Off Me! (Gero Zambuto, 1937).
Established opera singers such as Beniamino Gigli and Tito Schipa also started second careers in film, while the new generation who was active in the dramatic genre included Amedeo Nazzari , Caterina Boratto and Maria Denis .
Italian postcard by Rizzoli & C., Milano, 1937.
Elsa Merlini (1903-1983) was a star of the Italian cinema of the 1930's. She excelled in the 'Telefoni Bianchi'(white telephone comedies). Merlini did not act in any film released in 1937, but in 1936 she starred in three films, Ginevra degli Almieri (Guido Brignone, 1936), Non ti conosco più/I Don't Know You Anymore (Nunzio Malasomma, Mario Bonnard, 1936), and 30 secondi d'amore/Thirty Seconds of Love (Mario Bonnard, 1936).
Italian postcard by Rizzoli & C., Milano, 1937.
Assia Noris (1912-1998) is best remembered as the star of several 1930s romantic comedies, directed by Mario Camerini and co-starring Vittorio De Sica . In 1937, she acted in five films (!): Il signor Max/Mister Max (Mario Camerini, 1937), Nina non far la stupida/Nina don't be stupid (Nunzio Malasomma, 1937), Ma non è una cosa seria/But It's Nothing Serious (Mario Camerini, 1937), Una commedia fra i pazzi/A Comedy Among Fools (N.N., 1937), and L'uomo che sorride/The Man Who Smiles (Mario Mattoli, 1937).
Italian postcard by Rizzoli & C., Milano, 1937. Photo: Pasta.
Carla Sveva (?-?) was an Italian film actress, whose short film career took place between 1936 and 1939. She was the love interest and later wife of Giovanni dalla Bande Nere ( Luis Trenker ) in the historical film Condottieri/Giovanni de Medici: The Leader (Luis Trenker, 1937).
Italian postcard by Rizzoli & C. Milano, 1937. Photo: Barzacchi.
Evi Maltagliati (1908–1986) was an Italian stage and screen actress, who worked in Italian cinema between the later 1930s and the early 1970s. Maltagliati acted in no film in 1937, in 1936 she was in I due sergenti/The two sergeants (Enrico Guazzoni, 1937).
Italian postcard by Rizzoli & C., Milano, 1937. Photo: I.C.I.
Elisa Cegani (1911–1996) was one of the most representative actresses of Italian cinema of the 1930s and 1940s. In 1937, Cegani acted in La contessa di Parma/The Duchess of Parma (Alessandro Blasetti, 1937) and Ma non è una cosa seria/But It's Nothing Serious (Mario Camerini, 1937).
The first serious Italian film magazine
Luigi Chiarini, the director of the Centro Sperimentale, founded in 1937 the film journal Bianco e Nero, the organ of the Centro Sperimentale. Though many trade papers and fanzines had existed before, Bianco e Nero was the first serious Italian film magazine focusing on criticism, theory, and pedagogy.
At the 1937 Venice film festival, the award for Best Foreign Film was for Un carnet de bal/Dance Program by Julien Duvivier, starring Marie Bell . The award for Best Italian Film went to Scipione l'africano/Scipio the African by Carmine Gallone. The Volpi Cup for Best Actor went to Emil Jannings for Der Herrscher/The Ruler (Veit Harlan, 1937), and for Best Actress to Bette Davis for Kid Galahad (Michael Curtiz, 1937) and Marked Woman (Lloyd Bacon, 1937).
At the festival, La grande illusion by Jean Renoir was shown, and although it was liked by the international audience, the film was considered as 'too pacifistic' for a release in Italy. Yet, the screening in Venice would be a precursor to a large contingent of French films in Venice one year after, in 1938.
In Hollywood in March 1938, the Academy Awards for the films of 1937 were given to The Life of Emile Zola (Best Picture), Leo McCarey (Best Direction for The Awful Truth), Spencer Tracy (Best Actor for Captains Courageous), and Luise Rainer (Best Actress for The Good Earth).
The Life of Emile Zola by William Dieterle and starring Paul Muni won three awards that year. Apparently, biopics were popular among the Oscar jury, as in 1936 another biopic had won too, The Story of Louis Pasteur, also starring Paul Muni . Luise Rainer also had won the Oscar for 1936 too, for her role of Anna Held in The Great Ziegfeld Story. The 1937 film Lost Horizon, which was popular in Italy too, got Oscars for best art direction and editing.
Internationally, Italy’s reputation shrunk because of its colonial affairs. In 1937, Italy became worldwide known as ruthless against the Ethiopians, when after an assault on the Italian Viceroy Graziani, a massacre under the Ethiopian population took place, killing about 1/5 of the population of Addis Abeba and the whole population of one convent which supposedly had helped the assaulters.
When the League of Nations imposed economic sanctions on Italy’s invasion of Abyssinia, Italy left the League of Nations. Instead, Hitler received Mussolini in 1937 in Germany with a big display of power, and Mussolini was convinced the Germans would be his best ally...
Italian postcard by Rizzoli & C., Milano, 1937. Photo: Pesce.
Francesca Braggiotti (1902-1998) was an Italian dancer and actress. She acted in Scipione l'Africano/Scipio the African (Carmine Gallone, 1937). Married to John Davis Lodge, she left her artistic career after her husband, also an actor, embarked on a political career that led him to become governor and then ambassador.
Italian postcard by Rizzoli, 1937. Photo: Ghergo.
Leda Gloria (1912-1997) was one of Federico Fellini’s favorite film actresses, having a prolific career in the 1930s and 1940s but is also remembered as the wife of Peppone in the Don Camillo films. Gloria also acted in I tre desideri/The Three Wishes (Giorgio Ferroni, Kurt Gerron, 1937).
Italian postcard by Rizzoli, Milano, 1937.
Isa Miranda (1905–1982) was the only international film star produced by the Italian fascist cinema. In 1937, she acted in Scipione l'Africano/Scipio the African (Carmine Gallone, 1937) and Il fu Mattia Pascal/He Was Mattia Pascal (Pierre Chenal, 1937). In Hollywood, she was billed as the ‘Italian Marlene Dietrich’ and played femme fatale roles. Later she became one of the most significant European film actresses during the 1940s and early 1950s.
Italian postcard by Rizzoli & C., Milano, 1937. Photo: Venturini.
The elegant brunette Vanna Vanni (1920-1998), aka Vanna Pegna, was an Italian film actress who peaked in the late 1930s and early 1940s. She mostly played in comedies, many directed by Gennaro Righelli, plus several with the De Filippo family. In 1937, she acted in I fratelli Castiglioni/The Brothers Castiglione (Corrado D'Errico, 1937), Nina non far la stupida/Nina don't be stupid (Nunzio Malasomma, 1937), and L'uomo che sorride/The Man Who Smiles (Mario Mattoli, 1937).
Italian postcard by Rizzoli & C., Milano, 1937. Photo: Demanins.
Isa Pola (1909-1984) was an Italian stage, film and television actress. In the 1930s and 1940s she was a big star in Italian cinema, in films such as La canzone dell'amore/The song of love (Gennaro Righelli, 1930), La telefonista/The switchboard Operator (Nunzio Malasomma, 1932) and I bambini ci guardano/The Children Are Watching Us (Vittorio De Sica, 1943). In 1937, Pola acted in Gli uomini non sono ingrati/Men are not ungrateful (Guido Brignone, 1937) and Sono stato io!/I Was to Blame (Raffaello Matarazzo, 1937).
Check out Part 1, 1936. To be continued!
August 27, 2020
Alf Blütecher
Alf Blütecher (1880-1959) was a Norwegian actor who acted in more than 80 silent films. He first worked for the Danish company Nordisk between 1914 and 1919, under the direction of e.g. Holger-Maden and Robert Dinesen. He subsequently had a career in Germany, where he also often worked under the direction of Danish film directors.
German postcard by Hermann Leiser, Berlin-Wilm., no. 5044. Photo: Nordisk.
German postcard by Photochemie, Berlin, no. K. 2148. Photo: Nordisk. Lilly Jacobsson as Marya, the Martian leader's daughter, Gunnar Tolnaes as Avanti Planetaros, and Alf Blütecher as his friend Dr. Krafft in Himmelskibet/Das Himmelschiff/A Trip to Mars (Holger-Madsen, 1918).
German postcard by Ross Verlag, Berlin, no. 995/2. Photo: Atelier Balazs, Berlin.
The mysterious stranger
Alf Wiborg Blütecher was born in 1880 in Lardal, Norway. His parents were Hjalmar Ingjald Frithjof Blütecher and Anna Dorothea Magdalena Wiborg.
He began his career at the theatre in Bergen in 1904/1905 and then appeared in the home province: in Trondheim, Stavanger, and at 'Den nationale Scene' in Bergen again. One of his most famous stage roles was that of Peer Gynt in the eponymous play by Henrik Ibsen.
Eventually, Blütecher moved to Denmark, which was an important center of the early silent film era. There he became a busy film actor from 1913. He played medium-sized and leading roles, such as Mephisto, the mysterious stranger in Holger-Madsen's eponymous film Den mystiske fremmede/A Deal with the Devil (1914), starring Olaf Fönss . It meant for Blütecher his first outstanding character role.
In particular, he was made famous by his depiction of Arno von Dotzky, the first husband of Martha (Augusta Blad), the main character in Ned med våbnene!/Lay Down Your Arms! (Holger-Madsen, 1914), the film adaptation of Bertha von Suttner's novel 'Die Waffen Nieder!'.
In addition to Holger-Madsen, Robert Dinesen became Alf Blütecher's most important director, but he also acted several times in productions by the Danes A. W. Sandberg and August Blom.
Blütecher's roles ranged from the actor Poul Walter in En skæbne/A Fate (Margrete Bähncke, 1915), Jules Petit in I farens stund/In the Father's Hour (Robert Dinesen, 1915), the detective Tom Atkins in Juvelerernes skræk/The Horror of the Jewelers (Alexander Christian, 1915), to the chief of police Sylvester Jackson in Manden med de ni fingre/The Man with the Missing Finger, part 1 and II (A.W. Sandberg, 1915).
Other roles were the chief of account Halling in Alfred Cohn's Brandmandens datter/The Firefighter's Daughter (Alfred Cohn, 1915), squire Fasting in For sin faders skyld/For the Sake of his Father (Holger-Madsen, 1916), Colonel Lord Emmerich Douglas in Tempeldanserindens elskov/The Bayadere's Revenge (Holger-Madsen, 1915), and astronomer Professor Elvin Ross in I stjernerne står det skrevet/The New Star (Hjalmar Davidsen, 1915). But Blütecher also played engineers, botanists, plantation workers and in particular: doctors - again and again.
German postcard by Ross Verlag, Berlin, no. 628/4. Photo: Hella Moja Film. Hella Moja and Alf Blütecher in Das Spiel von Liebe und Tod (Urban Gad, 1919).
German postcard by Photochemie, Berlin, no. K. 3131. Photo: Nordisk. Asta Nielsen and Alf Blütecher in Mod lyset/Fackelträger/Towards the Light (Holger-Madsen, 1919).
German postcard by Photochemie, Berlin, no. K. 2134. Photo: Nordisk. Publicity still for Himmelskibet/Das Himmelschiff (Holger-Madsen, 1918) with Lilly Jacobsson as Marya, the Martian leader's daughter, Gunnar Tolnaes as Avanti Planetaros, and Alf Blütecher as his friend Dr. Krafft. Here the Martians, led by their leader (Philip Bech) and his daughter Marya, offer the earthlings their - vegetarian - food.
A Trip to Mars
Until shortly after the end of the First World War, Alf Blütecher was visible in a plethora of Danish productions - mostly dramatic and melodramatic stories - by the Nordisk film company.
Memorable was his part as ship's mate Reymers in Verdens Undergang/The End of the World (August Blom, 1916), an S-F classic precursor of films such as Deep Impact (Mimi Leder, 1998). The film depicts a worldwide catastrophe when an errant comet passes by Earth and causes natural disasters and social unrest. Director Blom and his crew created special effects for the comet disaster using showers of fiery sparks and shrouds of smoke. The film attracted a huge audience because of fears generated during the passing of Halley's comet six years earlier, as well as the ongoing turbulence and unrest of World War I.
Another important role was that of Dr. Krafft in another S-F film Himmelskibet/A Trip to Mars (Holger Madsen, 1918), starring Gunnar Tolnaes as Avanti Planetaros, who discovers that Mars is a pacifist planet.
One of Blütecher's last Danish films at Nordisk was Mod lyset/Towards the Light (Holger-Madsen, 1918), in which he played a caring, honest priest who hosts the homeless, opposite Asta Nielsen as an idle aristocrat who comes to know fraud, hardship, and loss, and repents. It was Nielsen's last Danish film.
Finally, like many of his colleagues from Copenhagen before him, Alf Blütecher followed a call to Germany in autumn 1919. In 1915, he had already a first German collaboration in the Hella Moja vehicle, Das Spiel mit dem Tode/Das Spiel von Liebe und Tod (Urban Gad, 1915; but released only in 1919).
In 1919, he took over the leading role in Fritz Bernhardt's Darwin (1920) in Hamburg. The following year, after another film in the Hanseatic city, Der Staatsanwalt/The Public Prosecutor (Paul Otto, 1920), Blütecher went to Berlin via Munich where he appeared in Das Rätsel im Menschen/The Riddle in Humans (Konrad Leitner, 1920).
In Berlin, he worked again and again under direction of Danish colleagues. With Urban Gad, he made the horror film Die Insel der Verschollenen/The Island of the Lost (1921), with Svend Gade the rural drama Das Geheimnis von Brinkenhof/The Secret of Brinkenhof (1923) as the partner of Henny Porten , and again with Holger-Madsen Zaida, die Tragödie eines Modells/Zaïda (1923), with Gertrud Welcker.
Blütecher returned to filming in Copenhagen for the comedy En nat i København/A Night in Copenhagen (Eduard Schnedler-Sørensen, 1923), to Hamburg for Die letzte Maske/The Last Mask (Emmerich Hanus, 1924) and to Munich for Der Favorit der Königin/The Queen's Favorite (Franz Seitz, 1922).
Afterward, the Norwegian only had supporting roles, e.g. in films by Viktor Janson and Friedrich Zelnik , but he had a last major part in the German late silent film Die Sünde der Lissy Krafft/The Sin of Lissy Krafft (F.W. Andersen, 1930), with Maly Delschaft in the title role.
An accident as a result of which he struggled with persistent hearing loss suddenly ended Blütecher's film career. He then returned to his Norwegian homeland, settled in Oslo, and ended up by hiring himself to the local post office.
Alf Blütecher died in 1959 in Oslo, Norway. He was 79.
German postcard by Photochemie, Berlin, no. K. 2161. Photo: Nordisk. Publicity still for Himmelskibet/Das Himmelschiff (Holger-Madsen, 1918) with Gunnar Tolnaes as Avanti Planetaros, Philip Bech as the Martian leader, Lilly Jacobsson as Marya, the Martian leader's daughter, Alf Blütecher (kneeling) as his friend Dr. Krafft and Nils Asther as the fallen Martian.
German postcard by Photochemie, Berlin, no. K. 2152. Alf Blütecher as Dr. Krafft, Zanny Petersen as Corona Planetaros, Lilly Jacobsson as Marya, Gunnar Tolnaes as Avanti Planetaros, and Nicolai Neiiendam as professor Planetaros, father of Corona and Avanti, in the Danish science-fiction film Himmelskibet/A Trip to Mars (Holger-Madsen, 1918).
German postcard by Verlag Hermann Leiser, Berlin, no. 7480. Photo: Nordisk.
Full version of Mod lyset/Fackelträger/Towards the Light (Holger-Madsen, 1919). Source: PBT PBT (YouTube).
Sources: Wikipedia (German and English), and .
German postcard by Hermann Leiser, Berlin-Wilm., no. 5044. Photo: Nordisk.
German postcard by Photochemie, Berlin, no. K. 2148. Photo: Nordisk. Lilly Jacobsson as Marya, the Martian leader's daughter, Gunnar Tolnaes as Avanti Planetaros, and Alf Blütecher as his friend Dr. Krafft in Himmelskibet/Das Himmelschiff/A Trip to Mars (Holger-Madsen, 1918).
German postcard by Ross Verlag, Berlin, no. 995/2. Photo: Atelier Balazs, Berlin.
The mysterious stranger
Alf Wiborg Blütecher was born in 1880 in Lardal, Norway. His parents were Hjalmar Ingjald Frithjof Blütecher and Anna Dorothea Magdalena Wiborg.
He began his career at the theatre in Bergen in 1904/1905 and then appeared in the home province: in Trondheim, Stavanger, and at 'Den nationale Scene' in Bergen again. One of his most famous stage roles was that of Peer Gynt in the eponymous play by Henrik Ibsen.
Eventually, Blütecher moved to Denmark, which was an important center of the early silent film era. There he became a busy film actor from 1913. He played medium-sized and leading roles, such as Mephisto, the mysterious stranger in Holger-Madsen's eponymous film Den mystiske fremmede/A Deal with the Devil (1914), starring Olaf Fönss . It meant for Blütecher his first outstanding character role.
In particular, he was made famous by his depiction of Arno von Dotzky, the first husband of Martha (Augusta Blad), the main character in Ned med våbnene!/Lay Down Your Arms! (Holger-Madsen, 1914), the film adaptation of Bertha von Suttner's novel 'Die Waffen Nieder!'.
In addition to Holger-Madsen, Robert Dinesen became Alf Blütecher's most important director, but he also acted several times in productions by the Danes A. W. Sandberg and August Blom.
Blütecher's roles ranged from the actor Poul Walter in En skæbne/A Fate (Margrete Bähncke, 1915), Jules Petit in I farens stund/In the Father's Hour (Robert Dinesen, 1915), the detective Tom Atkins in Juvelerernes skræk/The Horror of the Jewelers (Alexander Christian, 1915), to the chief of police Sylvester Jackson in Manden med de ni fingre/The Man with the Missing Finger, part 1 and II (A.W. Sandberg, 1915).
Other roles were the chief of account Halling in Alfred Cohn's Brandmandens datter/The Firefighter's Daughter (Alfred Cohn, 1915), squire Fasting in For sin faders skyld/For the Sake of his Father (Holger-Madsen, 1916), Colonel Lord Emmerich Douglas in Tempeldanserindens elskov/The Bayadere's Revenge (Holger-Madsen, 1915), and astronomer Professor Elvin Ross in I stjernerne står det skrevet/The New Star (Hjalmar Davidsen, 1915). But Blütecher also played engineers, botanists, plantation workers and in particular: doctors - again and again.
German postcard by Ross Verlag, Berlin, no. 628/4. Photo: Hella Moja Film. Hella Moja and Alf Blütecher in Das Spiel von Liebe und Tod (Urban Gad, 1919).
German postcard by Photochemie, Berlin, no. K. 3131. Photo: Nordisk. Asta Nielsen and Alf Blütecher in Mod lyset/Fackelträger/Towards the Light (Holger-Madsen, 1919).
German postcard by Photochemie, Berlin, no. K. 2134. Photo: Nordisk. Publicity still for Himmelskibet/Das Himmelschiff (Holger-Madsen, 1918) with Lilly Jacobsson as Marya, the Martian leader's daughter, Gunnar Tolnaes as Avanti Planetaros, and Alf Blütecher as his friend Dr. Krafft. Here the Martians, led by their leader (Philip Bech) and his daughter Marya, offer the earthlings their - vegetarian - food.
A Trip to Mars
Until shortly after the end of the First World War, Alf Blütecher was visible in a plethora of Danish productions - mostly dramatic and melodramatic stories - by the Nordisk film company.
Memorable was his part as ship's mate Reymers in Verdens Undergang/The End of the World (August Blom, 1916), an S-F classic precursor of films such as Deep Impact (Mimi Leder, 1998). The film depicts a worldwide catastrophe when an errant comet passes by Earth and causes natural disasters and social unrest. Director Blom and his crew created special effects for the comet disaster using showers of fiery sparks and shrouds of smoke. The film attracted a huge audience because of fears generated during the passing of Halley's comet six years earlier, as well as the ongoing turbulence and unrest of World War I.
Another important role was that of Dr. Krafft in another S-F film Himmelskibet/A Trip to Mars (Holger Madsen, 1918), starring Gunnar Tolnaes as Avanti Planetaros, who discovers that Mars is a pacifist planet.
One of Blütecher's last Danish films at Nordisk was Mod lyset/Towards the Light (Holger-Madsen, 1918), in which he played a caring, honest priest who hosts the homeless, opposite Asta Nielsen as an idle aristocrat who comes to know fraud, hardship, and loss, and repents. It was Nielsen's last Danish film.
Finally, like many of his colleagues from Copenhagen before him, Alf Blütecher followed a call to Germany in autumn 1919. In 1915, he had already a first German collaboration in the Hella Moja vehicle, Das Spiel mit dem Tode/Das Spiel von Liebe und Tod (Urban Gad, 1915; but released only in 1919).
In 1919, he took over the leading role in Fritz Bernhardt's Darwin (1920) in Hamburg. The following year, after another film in the Hanseatic city, Der Staatsanwalt/The Public Prosecutor (Paul Otto, 1920), Blütecher went to Berlin via Munich where he appeared in Das Rätsel im Menschen/The Riddle in Humans (Konrad Leitner, 1920).
In Berlin, he worked again and again under direction of Danish colleagues. With Urban Gad, he made the horror film Die Insel der Verschollenen/The Island of the Lost (1921), with Svend Gade the rural drama Das Geheimnis von Brinkenhof/The Secret of Brinkenhof (1923) as the partner of Henny Porten , and again with Holger-Madsen Zaida, die Tragödie eines Modells/Zaïda (1923), with Gertrud Welcker.
Blütecher returned to filming in Copenhagen for the comedy En nat i København/A Night in Copenhagen (Eduard Schnedler-Sørensen, 1923), to Hamburg for Die letzte Maske/The Last Mask (Emmerich Hanus, 1924) and to Munich for Der Favorit der Königin/The Queen's Favorite (Franz Seitz, 1922).
Afterward, the Norwegian only had supporting roles, e.g. in films by Viktor Janson and Friedrich Zelnik , but he had a last major part in the German late silent film Die Sünde der Lissy Krafft/The Sin of Lissy Krafft (F.W. Andersen, 1930), with Maly Delschaft in the title role.
An accident as a result of which he struggled with persistent hearing loss suddenly ended Blütecher's film career. He then returned to his Norwegian homeland, settled in Oslo, and ended up by hiring himself to the local post office.
Alf Blütecher died in 1959 in Oslo, Norway. He was 79.
German postcard by Photochemie, Berlin, no. K. 2161. Photo: Nordisk. Publicity still for Himmelskibet/Das Himmelschiff (Holger-Madsen, 1918) with Gunnar Tolnaes as Avanti Planetaros, Philip Bech as the Martian leader, Lilly Jacobsson as Marya, the Martian leader's daughter, Alf Blütecher (kneeling) as his friend Dr. Krafft and Nils Asther as the fallen Martian.
German postcard by Photochemie, Berlin, no. K. 2152. Alf Blütecher as Dr. Krafft, Zanny Petersen as Corona Planetaros, Lilly Jacobsson as Marya, Gunnar Tolnaes as Avanti Planetaros, and Nicolai Neiiendam as professor Planetaros, father of Corona and Avanti, in the Danish science-fiction film Himmelskibet/A Trip to Mars (Holger-Madsen, 1918).
German postcard by Verlag Hermann Leiser, Berlin, no. 7480. Photo: Nordisk.
Full version of Mod lyset/Fackelträger/Towards the Light (Holger-Madsen, 1919). Source: PBT PBT (YouTube).
Sources: Wikipedia (German and English), and .
August 26, 2020
Photo by Atelier Bieber
Atelier Bieber was one of Germany's oldest photo studios. The studio was founded in 1853 by a Jewish woman, Emilie Bieber, one of the first German photographers. Originally, the studio was located in Hamburg. Emilie was succeeded by her nephew Leonard Berlin, who opened another studio in Berlin, also under the name Atelier Bieber. During the 1910s and the 1920s, many German stars and directors of the stage and the cinema were photographed here.
German postcard by Ross Verlag, no. 1822, 1927-1928. Photo: E. Bieber, Berlin. Collection: Didier Hanson.
Russian born actress Barbara von Annenkoff appeared as an elegant lady in German films of the 1920s and 1930s.
German postcard by Ross Verlag, no. 3278/1, 1928-1929. Photo: Atelier Bieber, Berlin.
Petite Italian actress and author Marcella Albani (1899-1959) appeared in 50 films from 1919 on. She was especially successful as an elegant Latin lady in the German silent cinema.
German postcard by Ross Verlag, no. 3635/2, 1928-1929. Photo: Atelier Bieber, Berlin.
Among the Italian divas, Maria Jacobini (1892-1944) was an island of serenity, as the late film historian Vittorio Martinelli expressed it. She was the personification of goodness, of simple love. Her weapon was her sweet and gracious smile. In some Italian and later also in some German films, however, she could play as well the vivacious lady, the femme fatale, the comedienne, the hysterical victim, and the suffering mother or wife.
German postcard by Ross Verlag, no. 4056/2, 1929-1930. Photo: Atelier Bieber, Berlin.
Ruth Weyher (1901-1983) was a German actress of the silent cinema, famous for films like Schatten//Shadows (1923), Die keusche Susanne/The Girl in the Taxi (1926) and Geheimnisse einer Seele/Secrets of a Soul (1926).
German postcard by Ross Verlag, no. 4383/1, 1929-1930. Photo: Atelier Bieber.
Elegant German actress Claire Rommer (1904-1996) appeared in about 50 German film productions during the 1920s and the early 1930s. Her successful career suddenly ended with the seizure of power by the Nazis.
One of a small group of women who pursued a trade
Little is known about the life of Emilie Bieber. Wikipedia notes that she was born in 1810 in Hamburg. Only when she was over 40 did she appear as the founder of a photographic studio. In early February 1853, Emilie opened with Adelgunde Köttgen a 'Daguerreotype studio' on the top floor of Gr. Bäckerstraße 26 in Hamburg. The collaboration was short-lived, as Koettgen and her family moved to Düsseldorf in the spring of 1854.
Emilie Bieber took over the studio as the sole owner under the name 'Atelier E. Bieber. Emilie specialised in hand-coloured portraits that could not be recognized as photographs when viewed briefly. After gaining some years of experience and improving the technical possibilities, Emilie Bieber presented her portraits at the first "International Photographic Exhibition" in Berlin in 1865, which the Photographic Association Berlin had organised.
Bieber belonged to a small group of women who pursued a trade. She was involved in the Hamburg women's movement. In the 1850s she was on the board of a kindergarten and was friends with Emilie Wüstenfeld, a German women's rights activist and philanthropist who campaigned for girls' education and female vocational training.
In 1868 Emilie Bieber bought a house at Neuer Jungfernstieg 20 in Hamburg and set up a photographic studio there. Her brother-in-law Julius Berlin was temporarily registered as a resident at both addresses. His son Leonard Berlin later succeeded Emilie Bieber.
Around the age of 65, Emilie Bieber retired from daily work. Her nephew Leonard had entered the photographic studio in 1862. In 1869, the studio presented itself for the first time abroad at the 8th exhibition for photography in Paris, which was organised by the Société française de photographie. Several presentations at international exhibitions followed, such as in 1870 in Paris and at the World Exhibition in 1873 in Vienna.
German postcard by Verlag Hermann Leiser, Berlin, no. 8614, 1916. Photo: Hofphot. E. Bieber, Hamburg. Collection: Didier Hanson.
German postcard by Verlag Hermann Leiser, Berlin, no. 8615. Photo: Hofphot. E. Bieber, Hamburg. Collection: Didier Hanson.
German actor-director Max Reinhardt (1873-1943) was one of the great innovators of the theatre. He also directed several films, including Sumurûn (1910) and Das Mirakel (1912). In 1934, he went into exile and made in Hollywood A Midsummer Night's Dream (1935).
German postcard by Louis Blumenthal, Berlin, no. 7381. Photo: E. Bieber, Hofphotograph, Berlin and Hamburg.
Rudolph Schildkraut (1862-1930) was an Austrian film and theatre actor. From 1905 on, he was one of the most important actors in the ensemble of Max Reinhardt. Schildkraut played in some 28 German and Austrian films in the 1910s. In 1920 he moved to the USA.
German postcard by Ross Verlag, no. 23/1, 1925-1935. Photo: Atelier Bieber, Berlin.
Romanian born actor and director Lupu Pick (1886-1931) started as a silent film actor in German film in 1910, but from 1918 he would also become a prolific film director, known for e.g. his Kammerspielfilms Scherben (1921) and Sylvester (1924).
German postcard by Ross Verlag, no. 1089/1, 1927-1928. Photo: Atelier Bieber, Berlin.
Austrian actor Friedrich Zelnik or Frederic Zelnik (1885-1950) was also one of the most important producers-directors of the German silent cinema. Already in the early 1910s, he became a film star in Germany, but during the 1920s he had his greatest successes there as director-producer of operetta style costume films starring his wife, Lya Mara . A critical success was his drama Die Weber/The Weaver (1927). After 1933, he worked in Great-Britain and he also directed two films in the Netherlands.
Court photographer
In 1875, Emilie Bieber was appointed 'Hof-Photographin' (court photographer) by Crown Princess Victoria. In 1877, when Emilie Bieber celebrated the 25th anniversary of her studio, Atelier Bieber counted 30 employees. These employees included Arnold Mocsigay, who was in charge from 1869 to 1897, Max Jaffé and Johann Hamann, who worked as a retoucher in the late 1870s.
Emilie Bieber was 65 in 1875 and retired. In 1884, Emilie Bieber passed away in her hometown Hamburg. She was interred at the Jüdischer Friedhof Ohlsdorf, a Jewish cemetery in the Ohlsdorf district of Hamburg. After Emilie's death in 1884, her nephew Leonard Berlin (1841-1930) took over the studio "at her will".
In 1887 he was awarded the title of professor by Ernst II Duke of Saxony-Coburg and Gotha. This was followed by further awards such as court photographer, Saxony-Ernestine House Order II. Class and appointment to the court council.
In 1890 he opened a second studio under the name Atelier Bieber - but in Berlin. In 1892 he moved to Berlin with the family. In 1865 Leonard had married Marianne Meyer from Copenhagen in Hamburg.
The Berlin Atelier Bieber was highly regarded. 'Tout Berlin' liked to be photographed by Bieber. In 1910 Leonard retired but the open trading company 'E. Bieber, photographic studio in Hamburg and Berlin' continued. Even in retirement, Leonard Berlin initially remained connected to his profession. He was a curator for the photographic royal schools in Berlin and was a member of the Hamburg and Prussian Chamber of Experts for Works of Fine Arts.
The Hamburg studio was taken over by his son Emil Bieber, who had been a partner since 1902. His photos were greatly appreciated. In 1938, he left Hamburg to protect himself and his family from persecution. The branch in Berlin was taken over in 1910 by the merchant Julius Rosenberg, who in 1918 became the k.k. Court photographer. Atelier Bieber continued at Leipziger Strasse 124 in Berlin until 1929.
German postcard by Verlag Herm. Leiser, Berlin-Wilm., no. 4838. Photo: Atelier E. Bieber, Berlin.
Margarete Schön (1895-1985) is best known for her role as Kriemhild, the beautiful but revengeful princess of Burgundy in Fritz Lang’s silent epic Die Nibelungen (1924). The career of this German stage and film actress spanned nearly fifty years.
Austrian postcard by Iris-Verlag, Berlin, no. 5379. Photo: Bieber, Berlin. Collection: Didier Hanson.
Olaf Fjord (1897-1945) was an Austrian film actor, director, and producer. He appeared in numerous Austrian, German, French, and Czech silent films.
Austrian postcard by Iris Verlag, no. 5381. Photo: E. Bieber, Berlin.
Dita Parlo (1908-1971) was a popular European film star in the late 1920s and early 1930s. She inspired both Dita Von Teese and Madonna, who used Parlo's name & character from L'Atalante for her controversial Sex book and Erotica album.
German postcard by Ross Verlag, Berlin, no. 3635/1, 1928-1929. Photo: Atelier Bieber, Berlin.
Among the Italian divas, Maria Jacobini (1892-1944) was an island of serenity. She was the personification of goodness, of simple love. Her weapon was her sweet and gracious smile. In some Italian and later also in some German films, however, she could play as well the vivacious lady, the femme fatale, the comedienne, the hysterical victim, and the suffering mother or wife.
German postcard by Ross Verlag, no. 3637/1, 1928-1929. Photo: Atelier Bieber, Berlin.
Dignified German-Russian actress Olga Tschechova (1897-1980) was one of the most popular stars of the silent film era. She remained a mysterious person throughout her life, and reportedly, she was a Russian agent in Nazi Germany.
German postcard by Ross Verlag, no. 4665/1, 1929-1930. Photo: Atelier Bieber, Berlin.
German actress Hilda Rosch only appeared in eight films between 1928 and 1931.
German postcard by Ross Verlag, no. 5129/1, 1930-1931. Photo: E. Bieber, Hamburg.
If Weimar cinema had one film star, then it was Emil Jannings (1884-1950) for sure. He was a great actor in the silent era and won the first Oscar for Best Actor. Too bad that during the Third Reich, he worked as a board member for the Ufa propaganda machine.
German postcard by Ross Verlag, no. 6527/1, 1931-1932. Photo: Bieber, Berlin.
Dark and gorgeous looking actor F ra nz Lederer (1899–2000) had a successful film and stage career, first in Europe, then in the United States as Francis Lederer .
German postcard by Das Programm von Heute für Film und Theater G.m.b.H., Berlin. Photo: Bieber, Berlin/Ross Verlag.
German stage and film actress Heli Finkenzeller (1914-1991) had her greatest successes in popular Ufa comedies of the 1930s and 1940s. After the war, she often played mother roles.
Source: Wikipedia (German).
German postcard by Ross Verlag, no. 1822, 1927-1928. Photo: E. Bieber, Berlin. Collection: Didier Hanson.
Russian born actress Barbara von Annenkoff appeared as an elegant lady in German films of the 1920s and 1930s.
German postcard by Ross Verlag, no. 3278/1, 1928-1929. Photo: Atelier Bieber, Berlin.
Petite Italian actress and author Marcella Albani (1899-1959) appeared in 50 films from 1919 on. She was especially successful as an elegant Latin lady in the German silent cinema.
German postcard by Ross Verlag, no. 3635/2, 1928-1929. Photo: Atelier Bieber, Berlin.
Among the Italian divas, Maria Jacobini (1892-1944) was an island of serenity, as the late film historian Vittorio Martinelli expressed it. She was the personification of goodness, of simple love. Her weapon was her sweet and gracious smile. In some Italian and later also in some German films, however, she could play as well the vivacious lady, the femme fatale, the comedienne, the hysterical victim, and the suffering mother or wife.
German postcard by Ross Verlag, no. 4056/2, 1929-1930. Photo: Atelier Bieber, Berlin.
Ruth Weyher (1901-1983) was a German actress of the silent cinema, famous for films like Schatten//Shadows (1923), Die keusche Susanne/The Girl in the Taxi (1926) and Geheimnisse einer Seele/Secrets of a Soul (1926).
German postcard by Ross Verlag, no. 4383/1, 1929-1930. Photo: Atelier Bieber.
Elegant German actress Claire Rommer (1904-1996) appeared in about 50 German film productions during the 1920s and the early 1930s. Her successful career suddenly ended with the seizure of power by the Nazis.
One of a small group of women who pursued a trade
Little is known about the life of Emilie Bieber. Wikipedia notes that she was born in 1810 in Hamburg. Only when she was over 40 did she appear as the founder of a photographic studio. In early February 1853, Emilie opened with Adelgunde Köttgen a 'Daguerreotype studio' on the top floor of Gr. Bäckerstraße 26 in Hamburg. The collaboration was short-lived, as Koettgen and her family moved to Düsseldorf in the spring of 1854.
Emilie Bieber took over the studio as the sole owner under the name 'Atelier E. Bieber. Emilie specialised in hand-coloured portraits that could not be recognized as photographs when viewed briefly. After gaining some years of experience and improving the technical possibilities, Emilie Bieber presented her portraits at the first "International Photographic Exhibition" in Berlin in 1865, which the Photographic Association Berlin had organised.
Bieber belonged to a small group of women who pursued a trade. She was involved in the Hamburg women's movement. In the 1850s she was on the board of a kindergarten and was friends with Emilie Wüstenfeld, a German women's rights activist and philanthropist who campaigned for girls' education and female vocational training.
In 1868 Emilie Bieber bought a house at Neuer Jungfernstieg 20 in Hamburg and set up a photographic studio there. Her brother-in-law Julius Berlin was temporarily registered as a resident at both addresses. His son Leonard Berlin later succeeded Emilie Bieber.
Around the age of 65, Emilie Bieber retired from daily work. Her nephew Leonard had entered the photographic studio in 1862. In 1869, the studio presented itself for the first time abroad at the 8th exhibition for photography in Paris, which was organised by the Société française de photographie. Several presentations at international exhibitions followed, such as in 1870 in Paris and at the World Exhibition in 1873 in Vienna.
German postcard by Verlag Hermann Leiser, Berlin, no. 8614, 1916. Photo: Hofphot. E. Bieber, Hamburg. Collection: Didier Hanson.
German postcard by Verlag Hermann Leiser, Berlin, no. 8615. Photo: Hofphot. E. Bieber, Hamburg. Collection: Didier Hanson.
German actor-director Max Reinhardt (1873-1943) was one of the great innovators of the theatre. He also directed several films, including Sumurûn (1910) and Das Mirakel (1912). In 1934, he went into exile and made in Hollywood A Midsummer Night's Dream (1935).
German postcard by Louis Blumenthal, Berlin, no. 7381. Photo: E. Bieber, Hofphotograph, Berlin and Hamburg.
Rudolph Schildkraut (1862-1930) was an Austrian film and theatre actor. From 1905 on, he was one of the most important actors in the ensemble of Max Reinhardt. Schildkraut played in some 28 German and Austrian films in the 1910s. In 1920 he moved to the USA.
German postcard by Ross Verlag, no. 23/1, 1925-1935. Photo: Atelier Bieber, Berlin.
Romanian born actor and director Lupu Pick (1886-1931) started as a silent film actor in German film in 1910, but from 1918 he would also become a prolific film director, known for e.g. his Kammerspielfilms Scherben (1921) and Sylvester (1924).
German postcard by Ross Verlag, no. 1089/1, 1927-1928. Photo: Atelier Bieber, Berlin.
Austrian actor Friedrich Zelnik or Frederic Zelnik (1885-1950) was also one of the most important producers-directors of the German silent cinema. Already in the early 1910s, he became a film star in Germany, but during the 1920s he had his greatest successes there as director-producer of operetta style costume films starring his wife, Lya Mara . A critical success was his drama Die Weber/The Weaver (1927). After 1933, he worked in Great-Britain and he also directed two films in the Netherlands.
Court photographer
In 1875, Emilie Bieber was appointed 'Hof-Photographin' (court photographer) by Crown Princess Victoria. In 1877, when Emilie Bieber celebrated the 25th anniversary of her studio, Atelier Bieber counted 30 employees. These employees included Arnold Mocsigay, who was in charge from 1869 to 1897, Max Jaffé and Johann Hamann, who worked as a retoucher in the late 1870s.
Emilie Bieber was 65 in 1875 and retired. In 1884, Emilie Bieber passed away in her hometown Hamburg. She was interred at the Jüdischer Friedhof Ohlsdorf, a Jewish cemetery in the Ohlsdorf district of Hamburg. After Emilie's death in 1884, her nephew Leonard Berlin (1841-1930) took over the studio "at her will".
In 1887 he was awarded the title of professor by Ernst II Duke of Saxony-Coburg and Gotha. This was followed by further awards such as court photographer, Saxony-Ernestine House Order II. Class and appointment to the court council.
In 1890 he opened a second studio under the name Atelier Bieber - but in Berlin. In 1892 he moved to Berlin with the family. In 1865 Leonard had married Marianne Meyer from Copenhagen in Hamburg.
The Berlin Atelier Bieber was highly regarded. 'Tout Berlin' liked to be photographed by Bieber. In 1910 Leonard retired but the open trading company 'E. Bieber, photographic studio in Hamburg and Berlin' continued. Even in retirement, Leonard Berlin initially remained connected to his profession. He was a curator for the photographic royal schools in Berlin and was a member of the Hamburg and Prussian Chamber of Experts for Works of Fine Arts.
The Hamburg studio was taken over by his son Emil Bieber, who had been a partner since 1902. His photos were greatly appreciated. In 1938, he left Hamburg to protect himself and his family from persecution. The branch in Berlin was taken over in 1910 by the merchant Julius Rosenberg, who in 1918 became the k.k. Court photographer. Atelier Bieber continued at Leipziger Strasse 124 in Berlin until 1929.
German postcard by Verlag Herm. Leiser, Berlin-Wilm., no. 4838. Photo: Atelier E. Bieber, Berlin.
Margarete Schön (1895-1985) is best known for her role as Kriemhild, the beautiful but revengeful princess of Burgundy in Fritz Lang’s silent epic Die Nibelungen (1924). The career of this German stage and film actress spanned nearly fifty years.
Austrian postcard by Iris-Verlag, Berlin, no. 5379. Photo: Bieber, Berlin. Collection: Didier Hanson.
Olaf Fjord (1897-1945) was an Austrian film actor, director, and producer. He appeared in numerous Austrian, German, French, and Czech silent films.
Austrian postcard by Iris Verlag, no. 5381. Photo: E. Bieber, Berlin.
Dita Parlo (1908-1971) was a popular European film star in the late 1920s and early 1930s. She inspired both Dita Von Teese and Madonna, who used Parlo's name & character from L'Atalante for her controversial Sex book and Erotica album.
German postcard by Ross Verlag, Berlin, no. 3635/1, 1928-1929. Photo: Atelier Bieber, Berlin.
Among the Italian divas, Maria Jacobini (1892-1944) was an island of serenity. She was the personification of goodness, of simple love. Her weapon was her sweet and gracious smile. In some Italian and later also in some German films, however, she could play as well the vivacious lady, the femme fatale, the comedienne, the hysterical victim, and the suffering mother or wife.
German postcard by Ross Verlag, no. 3637/1, 1928-1929. Photo: Atelier Bieber, Berlin.
Dignified German-Russian actress Olga Tschechova (1897-1980) was one of the most popular stars of the silent film era. She remained a mysterious person throughout her life, and reportedly, she was a Russian agent in Nazi Germany.
German postcard by Ross Verlag, no. 4665/1, 1929-1930. Photo: Atelier Bieber, Berlin.
German actress Hilda Rosch only appeared in eight films between 1928 and 1931.
German postcard by Ross Verlag, no. 5129/1, 1930-1931. Photo: E. Bieber, Hamburg.
If Weimar cinema had one film star, then it was Emil Jannings (1884-1950) for sure. He was a great actor in the silent era and won the first Oscar for Best Actor. Too bad that during the Third Reich, he worked as a board member for the Ufa propaganda machine.
German postcard by Ross Verlag, no. 6527/1, 1931-1932. Photo: Bieber, Berlin.
Dark and gorgeous looking actor F ra nz Lederer (1899–2000) had a successful film and stage career, first in Europe, then in the United States as Francis Lederer .
German postcard by Das Programm von Heute für Film und Theater G.m.b.H., Berlin. Photo: Bieber, Berlin/Ross Verlag.
German stage and film actress Heli Finkenzeller (1914-1991) had her greatest successes in popular Ufa comedies of the 1930s and 1940s. After the war, she often played mother roles.
Source: Wikipedia (German).
August 25, 2020
Lori Nelson (1933-2020)
Last Sunday, 23 August 2020, beautiful blonde American actress and former model Lori Nelson (1933) passed away. She started acting at the age of 2 and was Miss Encino at age 17. Nelson played the lead in several Universal films of the 1950s and is best known for her roles in B-films like the 3D fantasyRevenge of the Creature (1955) and Day the World Ended (1955). After several years at Universal, she freelanced in films and TV. She was 87.
British postcard in the Celebrity Autograph Series by L.D. Ltd., London, no. 165. Photo: Universal-International.
Santa Fe's most talented and beautiful child
Dixie Kay Nelson was born in Santa Fe, New Mexico, in 1933. Nelson was the daughter of Mr. and Mrs. R.A. Nelson. She began her career at the age of 2 appearing in local theatre productions. She was voted Santa Fe's most talented and beautiful child, and toured the state billed as 'Santa Fe's Shirley Temple '.
When Nelson was 4 years old, her family moved to Encino, California. At the age of 5, she won the title of 'Little Miss America'. During her childhood, she toured veteran's hospitals entertaining patients, acted in productions of little theatres, and modeled for photographers. At age 7, Nelson contracted rheumatic fever which left her bedridden for four years. After she recovered, she returned to pageants and won the title of Miss Encino at age 17.
After graduating from Canoga Park High School, Nelson worked as a model. In 1950, agent Milo O. Frank Jr. saw her performing in a little theatre production. He took the 17 years-old to Universal to meet with casting people. Nelson trained with the studio dramatic coach, enacted a scene for the front office, and ultimately was offered a seven-year contract.
Universal considered the names Dixie Walker and Dixie Nelson before settling on the screen name Lori Nelson. She made her film debut in the Western Bend of the River (Anthony Mann, 1952), starring James Stewart. Later that year, she appeared as Rosie Kettle in the comedy film Ma and Pa Kettle at the Fair (Charles Barton, 1952), the fourth installment of Universal-International's Ma and Pa Kettle franchise starring Marjorie Main and Percy Kilbride.
This was followed by a supporting role in Francis Goes to West Point (Arthur Lubin, 1952) starring Donald O'Connor and Francis the talking mule (with the voice of Chill Wills). The following year she appeared in the romantic drama All I Desire (Douglas Sirk, 1953), starring Barbara Stanwyck . In 1955, Nelson guest-starred in two episodes of It's a Great Life and reprised her role as Rosie Kettle in Ma and Pa Kettle at Waikiki (Lee Sholem, 1955).
That same year, she co-starred in the Creature From the Black Lagoon sequel Revenge of the Creature (Jack Arnold, 1955) with John Agar. It marked Clint Eastwood 's film debut. Her supporting roles in films also included the low-budget Sci-Fi story Day the World Ended (1955), directed by Roger Corman, and a big-budget Paramount Pictures Western spoof, Pardners (Norman Taurog, 1956), starring Dean Martin and Jerry Lewis in one of their final films together.
Nelson had a featured role in the Film Noir I Died a Thousand Times (Stuart Heisler, 1955), a remake of High Sierra (Raoul Walsh, 1954). She also starred in Destry (George Marshall, 1954), an almost scene-for-scene remake of Destry Rides Again (1939) with Marlene Dietrich and James Stewart and also directed by George Marshall.
French postcard by Editions P.I., Paris, no. 826, offered by Les Carbones Korès "Carboplane". Photo: Paramount Pictures, 1956.
The untamed sister of Mamie van Doren
Lori Nelson was one of the leads in Mohawk (Kurt Neumann, 1956), an 18th-century adventure story starring Scott Brady and Rita Gam . Nelson had top billing in the street-racing film Hot Rod Girl (Leslie H. Martinson, 1956), also starring Chuck Connors. The following year she co-starred opposite Mamie Van Doren as two sisters who are sentenced to work on a 'punishment' farm in Untamed Youth (Howard W. Koch, 1957).
On television, Nelson co-starred with Van Johnson and Claude Rains in the television film The Pied Piper of Hamelin (Bretaigne Windust, 1957), which aired on NBC as a Thanksgiving Day television special. She was cast in one of the three lead roles in the syndicated sitcom How to Marry a Millionaire (1957-1958), based on the 1953 film of the same name starring Marilyn Monroe , Betty Grable , and Lauren Bacall. Nelson starred as Greta Hanson, a brainy psychology major who works as an usher on a television game show. The series also starred Barbara Eden and Merry Anders.
Nelson opted to leave the series after the first season and her character was written out. After leaving the series, Nelson continued with guest roles on Wagon Train (1959), Tales of Wells Fargo (1959), The Tab Hunter Show (1960-1961), and Laramie (1961).
She took a ten-year break from acting in 1961 and returned with a guest role in the sitcom Family Affair (1971). Since then, Nelson worked sporadically. She made only three on-screen appearances in the 1990s including a role in the direct-to-video release Mom, Can I Keep Her? (1998). Her last role to date was in the ultra-low-budget Science-Fiction and horror-comedy fan-film The Naked Monster (Ted Newsom, 2005), in which she reprised her Revenge of the Creature role.
In the early 1950s, Nelson dated actor Tab Hunter . The relationship was fodder for gossip columnists at the time and there was speculation that the two would marry. In his 2005 autobiography, 'Tab Hunter Confidential: The Making of a Movie Star', Hunter admitted he considered marrying Nelson but was still struggling to come to terms with his true sexuality. While Hunter was dating Nelson, he was also secretly involved with figure skater Ronald Robertson. The two eventually stopped dating but remained friendly. Hunter later cast Nelson in two guest-starring roles on his NBC sitcom The Tab Hunter Show.
In 1960, Nelson married composer Johnny Mann in Los Angeles. The couple had two daughters, Lori Susan and Jennifer, before divorcing in 1973. In 1983, Nelson married a police officer, Joseph J. Reiner. Lori Nelson passed away on Sunday 23 August 2020, aged 87. She had been suffering from Alzheimer's disease for several years and died at her home in the Porter Ranch section of Los Angeles.
British postcard in the Greetings series. Photo: Universal-International.
Sources: (IMDb), The Hollywood Reporter, Wikipedia, and .
British postcard in the Celebrity Autograph Series by L.D. Ltd., London, no. 165. Photo: Universal-International.
Santa Fe's most talented and beautiful child
Dixie Kay Nelson was born in Santa Fe, New Mexico, in 1933. Nelson was the daughter of Mr. and Mrs. R.A. Nelson. She began her career at the age of 2 appearing in local theatre productions. She was voted Santa Fe's most talented and beautiful child, and toured the state billed as 'Santa Fe's Shirley Temple '.
When Nelson was 4 years old, her family moved to Encino, California. At the age of 5, she won the title of 'Little Miss America'. During her childhood, she toured veteran's hospitals entertaining patients, acted in productions of little theatres, and modeled for photographers. At age 7, Nelson contracted rheumatic fever which left her bedridden for four years. After she recovered, she returned to pageants and won the title of Miss Encino at age 17.
After graduating from Canoga Park High School, Nelson worked as a model. In 1950, agent Milo O. Frank Jr. saw her performing in a little theatre production. He took the 17 years-old to Universal to meet with casting people. Nelson trained with the studio dramatic coach, enacted a scene for the front office, and ultimately was offered a seven-year contract.
Universal considered the names Dixie Walker and Dixie Nelson before settling on the screen name Lori Nelson. She made her film debut in the Western Bend of the River (Anthony Mann, 1952), starring James Stewart. Later that year, she appeared as Rosie Kettle in the comedy film Ma and Pa Kettle at the Fair (Charles Barton, 1952), the fourth installment of Universal-International's Ma and Pa Kettle franchise starring Marjorie Main and Percy Kilbride.
This was followed by a supporting role in Francis Goes to West Point (Arthur Lubin, 1952) starring Donald O'Connor and Francis the talking mule (with the voice of Chill Wills). The following year she appeared in the romantic drama All I Desire (Douglas Sirk, 1953), starring Barbara Stanwyck . In 1955, Nelson guest-starred in two episodes of It's a Great Life and reprised her role as Rosie Kettle in Ma and Pa Kettle at Waikiki (Lee Sholem, 1955).
That same year, she co-starred in the Creature From the Black Lagoon sequel Revenge of the Creature (Jack Arnold, 1955) with John Agar. It marked Clint Eastwood 's film debut. Her supporting roles in films also included the low-budget Sci-Fi story Day the World Ended (1955), directed by Roger Corman, and a big-budget Paramount Pictures Western spoof, Pardners (Norman Taurog, 1956), starring Dean Martin and Jerry Lewis in one of their final films together.
Nelson had a featured role in the Film Noir I Died a Thousand Times (Stuart Heisler, 1955), a remake of High Sierra (Raoul Walsh, 1954). She also starred in Destry (George Marshall, 1954), an almost scene-for-scene remake of Destry Rides Again (1939) with Marlene Dietrich and James Stewart and also directed by George Marshall.
French postcard by Editions P.I., Paris, no. 826, offered by Les Carbones Korès "Carboplane". Photo: Paramount Pictures, 1956.
The untamed sister of Mamie van Doren
Lori Nelson was one of the leads in Mohawk (Kurt Neumann, 1956), an 18th-century adventure story starring Scott Brady and Rita Gam . Nelson had top billing in the street-racing film Hot Rod Girl (Leslie H. Martinson, 1956), also starring Chuck Connors. The following year she co-starred opposite Mamie Van Doren as two sisters who are sentenced to work on a 'punishment' farm in Untamed Youth (Howard W. Koch, 1957).
On television, Nelson co-starred with Van Johnson and Claude Rains in the television film The Pied Piper of Hamelin (Bretaigne Windust, 1957), which aired on NBC as a Thanksgiving Day television special. She was cast in one of the three lead roles in the syndicated sitcom How to Marry a Millionaire (1957-1958), based on the 1953 film of the same name starring Marilyn Monroe , Betty Grable , and Lauren Bacall. Nelson starred as Greta Hanson, a brainy psychology major who works as an usher on a television game show. The series also starred Barbara Eden and Merry Anders.
Nelson opted to leave the series after the first season and her character was written out. After leaving the series, Nelson continued with guest roles on Wagon Train (1959), Tales of Wells Fargo (1959), The Tab Hunter Show (1960-1961), and Laramie (1961).
She took a ten-year break from acting in 1961 and returned with a guest role in the sitcom Family Affair (1971). Since then, Nelson worked sporadically. She made only three on-screen appearances in the 1990s including a role in the direct-to-video release Mom, Can I Keep Her? (1998). Her last role to date was in the ultra-low-budget Science-Fiction and horror-comedy fan-film The Naked Monster (Ted Newsom, 2005), in which she reprised her Revenge of the Creature role.
In the early 1950s, Nelson dated actor Tab Hunter . The relationship was fodder for gossip columnists at the time and there was speculation that the two would marry. In his 2005 autobiography, 'Tab Hunter Confidential: The Making of a Movie Star', Hunter admitted he considered marrying Nelson but was still struggling to come to terms with his true sexuality. While Hunter was dating Nelson, he was also secretly involved with figure skater Ronald Robertson. The two eventually stopped dating but remained friendly. Hunter later cast Nelson in two guest-starring roles on his NBC sitcom The Tab Hunter Show.
In 1960, Nelson married composer Johnny Mann in Los Angeles. The couple had two daughters, Lori Susan and Jennifer, before divorcing in 1973. In 1983, Nelson married a police officer, Joseph J. Reiner. Lori Nelson passed away on Sunday 23 August 2020, aged 87. She had been suffering from Alzheimer's disease for several years and died at her home in the Porter Ranch section of Los Angeles.
British postcard in the Greetings series. Photo: Universal-International.
Sources: (IMDb), The Hollywood Reporter, Wikipedia, and .
August 24, 2020
L'Occident (1928)
The French silent film L'Occident/The West by Henri Fescourt premiered on 26 September 1928 at the Paris cinema Marivaux. The leading actors were Jaque Catelain, Claudia Victrix, and Lucien Dalsace. The film was part of a wave of French Orientalist films in the early 1920s. For the premiere at the Marivaux, Europe published a series of postcards, and the journal La Petite Illustration had a special issue with the same photos. We translated the photo captions and added them below in the card descriptions.
French postcard by Europe. Photo: still for L'Occident (Henri Fescourt, 1928). Europe. Caption: Hassina joins Taïeb in a deserted room.
French postcard for L'Occident (Henri Fescourt, 1928). Photo: Cinema Europe. Caption: The Escape of the Looters. The left side of the card was printed out of focus.
Her love for a Roumi is bigger than her desire for revenge
L'Occident/The West was based on the play by Henri Kistemaeckers who also scripted the film. The film was produced by Société des Cinéromans, and distributed by Pathé Consortium Cinéma. The sets were designed by Robert Gys.
A French squadron before the coast of Morocco tries to prevent rebel gangs from attacking the caravans but is afraid to kill loyal citizens by bombing. So Captain Jean Cadière ( Lucien Dalsace ), who knows the local language and customs, is sent on a secret mission. He also substitutes for his young protégé, lieutenant Arnaud de Saint-Guil ( Jaque Catelain ).
The next morning, Hassina (Claudia Victrix), a captive of the tribe of Zerreth-Hama, finds Cadière at a well, bitten by a snake. Because of an old prediction, she believes he is her chosen one, so she saves him by sucking out his poison, considers him her master, and brings his papers to the French vessel. Arnaud is impressed by the mysterious woman.
The tribe leader, Taïeb (Hugues de Bagratide), discovers his stallion has been used and female traces are found, but only Hassina's little sister Fathima (Andrée Rolane) is discovered. When Taïeb threatens to burn Fathima if Hassina and Cadière don't come out, and his men attack the couple, the marine starts to fire its guns. The tribe flees, but Taïeb manages to kidnap Fathima.
The wounded Hassina is taken away, while the French soldiers lift their guns in homage. Hassina is taken to Toulon, deplores the loss of her sister, and understands her lover is a 'roumi', a French soldier. Cadière takes Hassani to the vast villa of his aunt Aline (Jane Méa), who adopts her, learns her French and music, but Hassani remains quiet and unhappy.
She has gotten a note that the roumi killed her sister, so she is torn between her family and her new lover. Instead, Fathima is not dead but also in Toulon, forced by Taïeb to dance every night in a den. When one night he treats her brutally, sailors, among whom Le Goff, an aid of Cadière, defend her. Meanwhile, Arnaud is troubled, not only because he is fed up with the army, but also because he is passionately in love with Hassina and hates Cadière.
At the betrothal party of Cadière and Hassani, Taïeb appears in disguise and pushes Hassani to avenge her sister, but her love is bigger than her desire for revenge. Arnaud leaves the army. Cadière's aid Le Goff finds Fathima and Taïeb, and after a struggle, the Moroccan confesses his crimes. Cadière himself prevents Arnaud of abducting Hassani and appeals to his conscience, so the latter returns to the army and abstains from committing a crime. Cadière also renders Hassani her sister, so that all ends well.
French postcard by Europe, no. 41. Photo: still for L'Occident (Henri Fescourt, 1928). Caption: Taïeb forces young Fathima to dance in a den in Toulon.
French postcard by Europe. Photo: still for L'Occident (Henri Fescourt, 1928). Caption: The hour of prayer of the tribe of Zerrath-Hama.
A wave of French Orientalist films
Cinémagazine wrote about the first night in Le Marivaux: "It was a great first. Marivaux welcomed Tout-Paris in a brand new room, with new painting and armchairs. They presented L'Occident [The West]. This film, the first part of which was set in Morocco, had to be Moroccan, it was not only by its images but also by the Nuba and the trumpets of the 6th and the 24th regiment of Spahis who, on the stage, let us hear the most ardent marches of their vibrant repertoire, which thrilled all those who were cavaliers of spahis ... even when, like me, they became territorial.
In the armchairs, on the balcony, in the boxes, the Tout-Paris: artists, people of the world, journalists and writers - shimmering toilets, tuxedos or black clothes. Mr. Painlevé, Minister of War, and General Carence seemed to encourage all the directors of the West. to show our soldiers the 'wheat' in action while in his chair, Mr. Steeg, resident general of France in Morocco, continuator and director, talked about the fruits of the efforts by Drude, Amade, and Lyautey. General Decoin, commanding the division of Spahis at Compiegne, could not find any criticism for the charge of spahis carried on the screen, while Charles Pathé, in the box of M. Sapene, applauded the Provence in action. In short, a beautiful room, a chic room - a room of a grand first night."
On the film itself, Cinémagazine wrote: " Mr. Henry Kistemaeckers has somewhat modified the script of his play, 'The West', created by Suzanne Desprez, which was already shot by Capellani with Nazimova. (...) The film ends with a wedding or an American kiss, which could have been frankly ridiculous, but the last image fades on words of forgiveness and sweetness, heavy with fatality and love, a prelude to other words. (...)
Claudia Victrix played Hassina. A heavy task to be true. This artist, rich in intelligent sensitivity, succeeded in conveying the conflict of the Moroccan primitive torn between her love for the roumi, her conqueror, and the atavism of her race. Towards her, Jaque Catelain , a young lieutenant, proves to be tender, while Lucien Dalsace plays a bitter, violent officer, fearless, and without reproach.
H. de Bagratide, a past master in the art of make-up, deserves a special mention for his composition of the role of Taïeb. Paul Guidé was able to command the battleship Provence with authority and Renée Veller, one of the winners of the last contest of Cinémagazine , as a painful fiancee shows us an upset face - which is beautiful. The little Andrée Rolane, already so appreciated, embodies gracefully the character of Fathima, the young sister of Hassina. Let's also quote Mrs. Jeanne Méa, MM. Liévin, Terrore, Labry, Raymond Guérin. But among the performers of the film, it would be unfair not to mention our sailors, our spahis, the Senegalese riflemen, and the men of the foreign legion who, in an admirably settled fight, jostled Taieb's looters.
The staging is by Henri Fescourt, a master to whom we owe the Miserables. It deserves to be praised. The fight, as we have said, is admirable of truth, but the director also knew how to use the constructions of the fleet, their guns pointing in the sky, of their life finally to make intensely a work where those of the hinterland play such a beautiful role. Finally, in the first part, there are Moroccan landscapes that recall the most beautiful shots of Les Miserables."
Richard Abel was in his book French Cinema: The First Wave, 1915-1929 quite critical of the colonial, stereotypical and Western ideology of the film, in which one of the questions is whether an Oriental woman can become a Western woman, while the lead is played by a Western actress (and Abel wasn't convinced of Victrix' play). Years after, director Fescourt himself recognised that none of the directors of the climactic battle scene - filmed in "the best western-style" as Abel writes - asked themselves at the time whether the local extras playing the retreating Moroccan crowds might have been unhappy with their roles.
Abel situates L'Occident within the wave of French Orientalist films after the success of L'Atlantide/Lost Atlantis (Jacques Feyder, 1921), with examples such as Visages voilés... âmes closes/The Sheik's Wife (Henry Roussel, 1921), Le Sang d'Allah/Passions of Araby (Luitz-Morat, Alfred Vercourt, 1922), Sables/Sand (Dimitri Kirsanoff, 1929), and Maman Colibri/Mother Hummingbird (Julien Duvivier, 1929). He also notes that it is remarkable that - possibly led by the negative public reactions to the war - French silent filmmakers hardly treated the war between the French foreign legion and the Moroccans, ending with the surrender of the Riftians in 1926.
French postcard by Europe, no. 62. Photo: still for L'Occident (Henri Fescourt, 1928). Caption:: The caïd Taïeb has decided to burn alive young Fathima.
Cover of the French journal La Petite Illustration, no. 398, 8 September 1928. It was a special issue on L'Occident (Henri Fescourt, 1928).
Sources: Cinémagazine, no 40, 5 October 1928, Fondation- Jerome Seydoux - Pathe, Richard Abel (French Cinema: The First Wave, 1915-1929), and IMDb.
French postcard by Europe. Photo: still for L'Occident (Henri Fescourt, 1928). Europe. Caption: Hassina joins Taïeb in a deserted room.
French postcard for L'Occident (Henri Fescourt, 1928). Photo: Cinema Europe. Caption: The Escape of the Looters. The left side of the card was printed out of focus.
Her love for a Roumi is bigger than her desire for revenge
L'Occident/The West was based on the play by Henri Kistemaeckers who also scripted the film. The film was produced by Société des Cinéromans, and distributed by Pathé Consortium Cinéma. The sets were designed by Robert Gys.
A French squadron before the coast of Morocco tries to prevent rebel gangs from attacking the caravans but is afraid to kill loyal citizens by bombing. So Captain Jean Cadière ( Lucien Dalsace ), who knows the local language and customs, is sent on a secret mission. He also substitutes for his young protégé, lieutenant Arnaud de Saint-Guil ( Jaque Catelain ).
The next morning, Hassina (Claudia Victrix), a captive of the tribe of Zerreth-Hama, finds Cadière at a well, bitten by a snake. Because of an old prediction, she believes he is her chosen one, so she saves him by sucking out his poison, considers him her master, and brings his papers to the French vessel. Arnaud is impressed by the mysterious woman.
The tribe leader, Taïeb (Hugues de Bagratide), discovers his stallion has been used and female traces are found, but only Hassina's little sister Fathima (Andrée Rolane) is discovered. When Taïeb threatens to burn Fathima if Hassina and Cadière don't come out, and his men attack the couple, the marine starts to fire its guns. The tribe flees, but Taïeb manages to kidnap Fathima.
The wounded Hassina is taken away, while the French soldiers lift their guns in homage. Hassina is taken to Toulon, deplores the loss of her sister, and understands her lover is a 'roumi', a French soldier. Cadière takes Hassani to the vast villa of his aunt Aline (Jane Méa), who adopts her, learns her French and music, but Hassani remains quiet and unhappy.
She has gotten a note that the roumi killed her sister, so she is torn between her family and her new lover. Instead, Fathima is not dead but also in Toulon, forced by Taïeb to dance every night in a den. When one night he treats her brutally, sailors, among whom Le Goff, an aid of Cadière, defend her. Meanwhile, Arnaud is troubled, not only because he is fed up with the army, but also because he is passionately in love with Hassina and hates Cadière.
At the betrothal party of Cadière and Hassani, Taïeb appears in disguise and pushes Hassani to avenge her sister, but her love is bigger than her desire for revenge. Arnaud leaves the army. Cadière's aid Le Goff finds Fathima and Taïeb, and after a struggle, the Moroccan confesses his crimes. Cadière himself prevents Arnaud of abducting Hassani and appeals to his conscience, so the latter returns to the army and abstains from committing a crime. Cadière also renders Hassani her sister, so that all ends well.
French postcard by Europe, no. 41. Photo: still for L'Occident (Henri Fescourt, 1928). Caption: Taïeb forces young Fathima to dance in a den in Toulon.
French postcard by Europe. Photo: still for L'Occident (Henri Fescourt, 1928). Caption: The hour of prayer of the tribe of Zerrath-Hama.
A wave of French Orientalist films
Cinémagazine wrote about the first night in Le Marivaux: "It was a great first. Marivaux welcomed Tout-Paris in a brand new room, with new painting and armchairs. They presented L'Occident [The West]. This film, the first part of which was set in Morocco, had to be Moroccan, it was not only by its images but also by the Nuba and the trumpets of the 6th and the 24th regiment of Spahis who, on the stage, let us hear the most ardent marches of their vibrant repertoire, which thrilled all those who were cavaliers of spahis ... even when, like me, they became territorial.
In the armchairs, on the balcony, in the boxes, the Tout-Paris: artists, people of the world, journalists and writers - shimmering toilets, tuxedos or black clothes. Mr. Painlevé, Minister of War, and General Carence seemed to encourage all the directors of the West. to show our soldiers the 'wheat' in action while in his chair, Mr. Steeg, resident general of France in Morocco, continuator and director, talked about the fruits of the efforts by Drude, Amade, and Lyautey. General Decoin, commanding the division of Spahis at Compiegne, could not find any criticism for the charge of spahis carried on the screen, while Charles Pathé, in the box of M. Sapene, applauded the Provence in action. In short, a beautiful room, a chic room - a room of a grand first night."
On the film itself, Cinémagazine wrote: " Mr. Henry Kistemaeckers has somewhat modified the script of his play, 'The West', created by Suzanne Desprez, which was already shot by Capellani with Nazimova. (...) The film ends with a wedding or an American kiss, which could have been frankly ridiculous, but the last image fades on words of forgiveness and sweetness, heavy with fatality and love, a prelude to other words. (...)
Claudia Victrix played Hassina. A heavy task to be true. This artist, rich in intelligent sensitivity, succeeded in conveying the conflict of the Moroccan primitive torn between her love for the roumi, her conqueror, and the atavism of her race. Towards her, Jaque Catelain , a young lieutenant, proves to be tender, while Lucien Dalsace plays a bitter, violent officer, fearless, and without reproach.
H. de Bagratide, a past master in the art of make-up, deserves a special mention for his composition of the role of Taïeb. Paul Guidé was able to command the battleship Provence with authority and Renée Veller, one of the winners of the last contest of Cinémagazine , as a painful fiancee shows us an upset face - which is beautiful. The little Andrée Rolane, already so appreciated, embodies gracefully the character of Fathima, the young sister of Hassina. Let's also quote Mrs. Jeanne Méa, MM. Liévin, Terrore, Labry, Raymond Guérin. But among the performers of the film, it would be unfair not to mention our sailors, our spahis, the Senegalese riflemen, and the men of the foreign legion who, in an admirably settled fight, jostled Taieb's looters.
The staging is by Henri Fescourt, a master to whom we owe the Miserables. It deserves to be praised. The fight, as we have said, is admirable of truth, but the director also knew how to use the constructions of the fleet, their guns pointing in the sky, of their life finally to make intensely a work where those of the hinterland play such a beautiful role. Finally, in the first part, there are Moroccan landscapes that recall the most beautiful shots of Les Miserables."
Richard Abel was in his book French Cinema: The First Wave, 1915-1929 quite critical of the colonial, stereotypical and Western ideology of the film, in which one of the questions is whether an Oriental woman can become a Western woman, while the lead is played by a Western actress (and Abel wasn't convinced of Victrix' play). Years after, director Fescourt himself recognised that none of the directors of the climactic battle scene - filmed in "the best western-style" as Abel writes - asked themselves at the time whether the local extras playing the retreating Moroccan crowds might have been unhappy with their roles.
Abel situates L'Occident within the wave of French Orientalist films after the success of L'Atlantide/Lost Atlantis (Jacques Feyder, 1921), with examples such as Visages voilés... âmes closes/The Sheik's Wife (Henry Roussel, 1921), Le Sang d'Allah/Passions of Araby (Luitz-Morat, Alfred Vercourt, 1922), Sables/Sand (Dimitri Kirsanoff, 1929), and Maman Colibri/Mother Hummingbird (Julien Duvivier, 1929). He also notes that it is remarkable that - possibly led by the negative public reactions to the war - French silent filmmakers hardly treated the war between the French foreign legion and the Moroccans, ending with the surrender of the Riftians in 1926.
French postcard by Europe, no. 62. Photo: still for L'Occident (Henri Fescourt, 1928). Caption:: The caïd Taïeb has decided to burn alive young Fathima.
Cover of the French journal La Petite Illustration, no. 398, 8 September 1928. It was a special issue on L'Occident (Henri Fescourt, 1928).
Sources: Cinémagazine, no 40, 5 October 1928, Fondation- Jerome Seydoux - Pathe, Richard Abel (French Cinema: The First Wave, 1915-1929), and IMDb.
August 23, 2020
Igo Sym
Handsome and athletic Austrian-Polish actor Igo Sym (1896-1941) played classy gentlemen, aristocrats, and army officers in Polish, Austrian and German films of the 1920s. After the German Invasion of Poland, he co-operated with the Nazis and in 1941 he was killed by members of the Polish resistance movement.
Austrian postcard by Iris Verlag, no. 5051. Photo: Sascha-Film.
German postcard by Ross Verlag, no. 3121/1, 1928-1929. Photo: Messtro-Sascha Film.
German postcard by Ross Verlag, no. 4065/1, 1929-1930. Photo: SF (Strauss-Film). Igo Sym in Spelunke/Spunk (E.W. Emo, 1929).
Tailcoat and uniform
Karol Juliusz ‘Igo’ Sym was born in Innsbruck, Austria in 1896.
During World War I, he served in the Austrian Army, becoming a lieutenant. After the war, he served in the Polish infantry until 1921, then took up the job of a civil servant.
His film debut took place in 1925, in the horror film Wampiry Warszawa/The Vampires of Warsaw (Wiktor Bieganski, 1925) of which no copy has been saved.
He also appeared in films like O czym sie nie mysli/That Which is Unthinkable (Edward Puchalski, 1926), and Kochanka Szamoty/Szamota's Mistress (Leon Trystan, 1927) starring diva Helena Makowska .
A handsome and athletic man, Sym usually played classy gentlemen, aristocrats, and army officers, dressed in tailcoat and uniform. In 1927 he left for Vienna, where he signed an exclusive contract with Sascha–Filmstudios AG.
To his well known silent Austrian films belong Pratermizzi (Karl Leiter, Gustav Ucicky, 1927) featuring Anny Ondra , Café Elektric/Cafe Electric (Gustav Ucicky, 1927) with Marlene Dietrich , and Erzherzog Johann (Max Neufeld, 1929) with Xenia Desni .
He then moved to Berlin where he featured in such films as Spelunke/Dives (E.W. Emo, 1929), Adieu Mascotte (Wilhelm Thiele, 1929) and Wenn du einmal dein Herz verschenkst/When You Give Your Heart Once (Johannes Guter, 1929), both opposite Lilian Harvey .
German postcard by Ross Verlag, no. 117/4. Photo Brix. Henny Porten-Froehlich-Produktion. Henny Porten and Igo Sym in Die Herrin und ihr Knecht (Richard Oswald, 1929), a drama taking place at the German-Russian border shortly before and during the First World War.
German postcard by Ross Verlag, no. 3826/1, 1928-1929. Photo: Kipho Production.
German postcard by Ross Verlag, no. 4540/1, 1929-1930. Photo: Harlip, Berlin.
German postcard by Ross Verlag, no. 4593/1, 1929-1930. Photo: Ufa. Lilian Harvey and Igo Sym in Adieu Mascotte (Wilhelm Thiele, 1929).
Singing Saw
At the beginning of the 1930s, Igo Sym starred in films like Gigolo/Handsome Gigolo, Poor Gigolo (Emmerich Hanus, 1930) opposite Anita Dorris , Das alte Lied/The Old Song (Erich Waschneck, 1930) with Lien Deyers , Kasernenzauber (Carl Boese, 1931) with Truus van Aalten and Ein Auto und kein Geld/An Auto and No Money (Jacob Fleck, Luise Fleck, 1932).
In 1932 he returned to Poland and settled in Warsaw. He appeared in the romance Palac na kólkach/Palace on wheels (Ryszard Ordynski, 1932), the entertaining cabaret thriller Szpieg w masce/The Spy in the Mask (Mieczyslaw Krawicz, 1933) starring famous singer Hanka Ordonówna, and the drama Przebudzenie/Awakening (Aleksander Ford, 1934).
Unexpectedly, he then concentrated on stage work in Warsaw’s theatres. He would play in revues and operettas, singing, dancing, and accompanying himself by playing the singing saw.
When the 'Deutsches Reich' invaded Poland in 1939, Sym signed the 'Reichliste' and took part as 'Volksdeutscher' in re-structuring the Polish theatre life. He became in charge of the German theatres in Warsaw.
In late 1939, Sym also became a Gestapo agent. According to preserved documents, the actor had been cooperating with Berlin before 1 September 1939. At the beginning of the war, he helped to organise a trap, in which Hanna ‘Hanka’ Ordonówna was caught.
Ordonówna had been Sym’s pre-war partner on the screen and his friend from Warsaw’s theatres. She was hiding for the Nazis but arranged one day to meet Sym at her old residence. There she was arrested by the waiting Gestapo. They put her in prison in Pawiak, but she would survive the war and died in 1950.
Polish resistance quickly found out about Sym’s involvement, and a group of agents, led by Teatr Komedia actor Roman Niewiarowicz, started to trace his activities.
German postcard by Ross Verlag, no. 4165/1, 1929-1930. Photo: Ufa.
German postcard by Ross Verlag, no. 4739/1, 1929-1930. Photo: Ufa.
Austrian postcard by Iris Verlag, no. 625. Photo: Sascha.
French postcard by Editions E.C. Paris, no. 782, 1929-1930. Photo: H. Casparius.
Collaborator
In 1940, Igo Sym successfully tried to win Polish actors to play in the German propaganda film Heimkehr/Homecoming (Gustav Ucicky, 1941). He didn’t appear in this production himself but he did play secondary roles in Zlota maska/The Golden mask (Jan Fethke, 1939) and Zona i nie zona/Wife and no wife (Emil Chaberski, 1939).
In early 1941, the headquarters of the underground Polish resistance group Związek Walki Zbrojnej (ZWZ) decided to liquidate the collaborator. Sym’s behaviour was loudly trumpeted by the Nazis, and his assassination would show the Poles that the underground movement was active, always ready to punish all traitors.
At first, the ZWZ planned to poison the actor but later decided to shoot him instead. On the morning of 7 March 1941, two Polish agents knocked at the door of Sym’s apartment in Warsaw. They told Sym that they were mailmen, carrying a dispatch. One of the agents shot Sym with a Vis pistol. Sym was struck in the heart and died on the spot. He was 44.
On the same day, German loudspeakers on the streets announced that hostages had been taken as revenge for Sym’s death. Then, posters appeared on the walls stating that more hostages would be taken and curfew would be enforced from 8 p.m. to 5 a.m. The Nazis threatened to shoot all hostages unless those responsible for the assassination were found.
All theatres were closed, and about 120 people were arrested, including teachers, physicians, lawyers, and actors. The population of Warsaw was given three days to find Sym's murderers. As nobody was found, on 11 March, 21 hostages were executed in Palmiry. Several actors were also arrested and sent to Auschwitz, among them such notable figures as directors Stefan Jaracz and Leon Schiller.
German postcard by Ross Verlag, no. 6506/1, 1931-1932. Photo: Film-Foto, Warszawa (Warsaw).
German postcard by Ross Verlag, no. A 1523/1, 1937-1938. Photo: Willi Forst-Film. Igo Sym in Serenade (Willi Forst, 1937).
Igo Sym sings 'Na całe życie' in Zona i nie zona/Wife and no wife (1939). Source: Stare Melodie (YouTube).
In 1927, Igo Sym learned Marlene Dietrich to play the Singing Saw (Singende Säge) while they worked together in Vienna. She played it in 1944 on the American radio with Paul Laval & his Band. Source: Rudi Polt (YouTube).
Sources: Thomas Staedeli (Cyranos), Wikipedia, and .
Austrian postcard by Iris Verlag, no. 5051. Photo: Sascha-Film.
German postcard by Ross Verlag, no. 3121/1, 1928-1929. Photo: Messtro-Sascha Film.
German postcard by Ross Verlag, no. 4065/1, 1929-1930. Photo: SF (Strauss-Film). Igo Sym in Spelunke/Spunk (E.W. Emo, 1929).
Tailcoat and uniform
Karol Juliusz ‘Igo’ Sym was born in Innsbruck, Austria in 1896.
During World War I, he served in the Austrian Army, becoming a lieutenant. After the war, he served in the Polish infantry until 1921, then took up the job of a civil servant.
His film debut took place in 1925, in the horror film Wampiry Warszawa/The Vampires of Warsaw (Wiktor Bieganski, 1925) of which no copy has been saved.
He also appeared in films like O czym sie nie mysli/That Which is Unthinkable (Edward Puchalski, 1926), and Kochanka Szamoty/Szamota's Mistress (Leon Trystan, 1927) starring diva Helena Makowska .
A handsome and athletic man, Sym usually played classy gentlemen, aristocrats, and army officers, dressed in tailcoat and uniform. In 1927 he left for Vienna, where he signed an exclusive contract with Sascha–Filmstudios AG.
To his well known silent Austrian films belong Pratermizzi (Karl Leiter, Gustav Ucicky, 1927) featuring Anny Ondra , Café Elektric/Cafe Electric (Gustav Ucicky, 1927) with Marlene Dietrich , and Erzherzog Johann (Max Neufeld, 1929) with Xenia Desni .
He then moved to Berlin where he featured in such films as Spelunke/Dives (E.W. Emo, 1929), Adieu Mascotte (Wilhelm Thiele, 1929) and Wenn du einmal dein Herz verschenkst/When You Give Your Heart Once (Johannes Guter, 1929), both opposite Lilian Harvey .
German postcard by Ross Verlag, no. 117/4. Photo Brix. Henny Porten-Froehlich-Produktion. Henny Porten and Igo Sym in Die Herrin und ihr Knecht (Richard Oswald, 1929), a drama taking place at the German-Russian border shortly before and during the First World War.
German postcard by Ross Verlag, no. 3826/1, 1928-1929. Photo: Kipho Production.
German postcard by Ross Verlag, no. 4540/1, 1929-1930. Photo: Harlip, Berlin.
German postcard by Ross Verlag, no. 4593/1, 1929-1930. Photo: Ufa. Lilian Harvey and Igo Sym in Adieu Mascotte (Wilhelm Thiele, 1929).
Singing Saw
At the beginning of the 1930s, Igo Sym starred in films like Gigolo/Handsome Gigolo, Poor Gigolo (Emmerich Hanus, 1930) opposite Anita Dorris , Das alte Lied/The Old Song (Erich Waschneck, 1930) with Lien Deyers , Kasernenzauber (Carl Boese, 1931) with Truus van Aalten and Ein Auto und kein Geld/An Auto and No Money (Jacob Fleck, Luise Fleck, 1932).
In 1932 he returned to Poland and settled in Warsaw. He appeared in the romance Palac na kólkach/Palace on wheels (Ryszard Ordynski, 1932), the entertaining cabaret thriller Szpieg w masce/The Spy in the Mask (Mieczyslaw Krawicz, 1933) starring famous singer Hanka Ordonówna, and the drama Przebudzenie/Awakening (Aleksander Ford, 1934).
Unexpectedly, he then concentrated on stage work in Warsaw’s theatres. He would play in revues and operettas, singing, dancing, and accompanying himself by playing the singing saw.
When the 'Deutsches Reich' invaded Poland in 1939, Sym signed the 'Reichliste' and took part as 'Volksdeutscher' in re-structuring the Polish theatre life. He became in charge of the German theatres in Warsaw.
In late 1939, Sym also became a Gestapo agent. According to preserved documents, the actor had been cooperating with Berlin before 1 September 1939. At the beginning of the war, he helped to organise a trap, in which Hanna ‘Hanka’ Ordonówna was caught.
Ordonówna had been Sym’s pre-war partner on the screen and his friend from Warsaw’s theatres. She was hiding for the Nazis but arranged one day to meet Sym at her old residence. There she was arrested by the waiting Gestapo. They put her in prison in Pawiak, but she would survive the war and died in 1950.
Polish resistance quickly found out about Sym’s involvement, and a group of agents, led by Teatr Komedia actor Roman Niewiarowicz, started to trace his activities.
German postcard by Ross Verlag, no. 4165/1, 1929-1930. Photo: Ufa.
German postcard by Ross Verlag, no. 4739/1, 1929-1930. Photo: Ufa.
Austrian postcard by Iris Verlag, no. 625. Photo: Sascha.
French postcard by Editions E.C. Paris, no. 782, 1929-1930. Photo: H. Casparius.
Collaborator
In 1940, Igo Sym successfully tried to win Polish actors to play in the German propaganda film Heimkehr/Homecoming (Gustav Ucicky, 1941). He didn’t appear in this production himself but he did play secondary roles in Zlota maska/The Golden mask (Jan Fethke, 1939) and Zona i nie zona/Wife and no wife (Emil Chaberski, 1939).
In early 1941, the headquarters of the underground Polish resistance group Związek Walki Zbrojnej (ZWZ) decided to liquidate the collaborator. Sym’s behaviour was loudly trumpeted by the Nazis, and his assassination would show the Poles that the underground movement was active, always ready to punish all traitors.
At first, the ZWZ planned to poison the actor but later decided to shoot him instead. On the morning of 7 March 1941, two Polish agents knocked at the door of Sym’s apartment in Warsaw. They told Sym that they were mailmen, carrying a dispatch. One of the agents shot Sym with a Vis pistol. Sym was struck in the heart and died on the spot. He was 44.
On the same day, German loudspeakers on the streets announced that hostages had been taken as revenge for Sym’s death. Then, posters appeared on the walls stating that more hostages would be taken and curfew would be enforced from 8 p.m. to 5 a.m. The Nazis threatened to shoot all hostages unless those responsible for the assassination were found.
All theatres were closed, and about 120 people were arrested, including teachers, physicians, lawyers, and actors. The population of Warsaw was given three days to find Sym's murderers. As nobody was found, on 11 March, 21 hostages were executed in Palmiry. Several actors were also arrested and sent to Auschwitz, among them such notable figures as directors Stefan Jaracz and Leon Schiller.
German postcard by Ross Verlag, no. 6506/1, 1931-1932. Photo: Film-Foto, Warszawa (Warsaw).
German postcard by Ross Verlag, no. A 1523/1, 1937-1938. Photo: Willi Forst-Film. Igo Sym in Serenade (Willi Forst, 1937).
Igo Sym sings 'Na całe życie' in Zona i nie zona/Wife and no wife (1939). Source: Stare Melodie (YouTube).
In 1927, Igo Sym learned Marlene Dietrich to play the Singing Saw (Singende Säge) while they worked together in Vienna. She played it in 1944 on the American radio with Paul Laval & his Band. Source: Rudi Polt (YouTube).
Sources: Thomas Staedeli (Cyranos), Wikipedia, and .
August 22, 2020
Leonardo DiCaprio
American actor Leonardo DiCaprio (1974) has often played unconventional parts, particularly in biopics and period films. His role in the blockbuster Titanic (1998) cemented DiCaprio's reputation as a teen heartthrob. He became one of the biggest movie stars thanks to his films with the directors Martin Scorsese, Christopher Nolan, and Quentin Tarantino. He won an Oscar and a Golden Globe Award for The Revenant (2015) as well as two other Golden Globes for The Aviator (2004) and The Wolf of Wall Street (2013).
Vintage postcard by One. Photo: David LaChapelle, 1995.
British postcard by The Alternative Picture Co., no. RCL845. Photo: David LaChapelle, 1995.
Vintage postcard. Photo: David LaChapelle, 1995.
Handpicked by Robert De Niro out of 400 young actors
Leonardo Wilhelm DiCaprio was born in Los Angeles, in 1974. He is the only child of Irmelin (née Indenbirken), a legal secretary, and George DiCaprio, an underground comix writer, publisher, and distributor of comic books. His parents separated when he was a year old.
When his older stepbrother earned $50,000 for a television commercial, DiCaprio, fascinated with this, decided to become an actor. At age 14, he began his career by appearing in television commercials such as for Matchbox cars by Mattel, which he considered his first role.
In 1989, he played the role of Glen in two episodes of the television show The New Lassie. Leo played recurring roles in various television series, such as the sitcom Parenthood (1990-1991) based on the successful comedy film of the same name.
He made his film debut as the stepson of an evil landlord in the low-budget horror direct-to-video film Critters 3 (Kristine Peterson, 1991). He was handpicked by Robert De Niro out of 400 young actors to play the lead role in the biographical coming-of-age drama This Boy's Life (Michael Caton-Jones, 1993) with De Niro as his stepfather, and Ellen Barkin as his mother. Critic Roger Ebert in 1993: "Toby is played by Leonardo DiCaprio, a relative newcomer (he's done TV, and had the lead in Critters III). The movie is successful largely because he is a good enough actor to hold his own in his scenes with De Niro, so that the movie remains his story, and isn't upstaged by the loathsome but colorful Dwight."
In 1993, DiCaprio co-starred as the intellectually disabled brother of Johnny Depp 's character in What's Eating Gilbert Grape (Lasse Hallström, 1993), a comic-tragic odyssey of a dysfunctional Iowa family. The film became a critical success, earning DiCaprio a National Board of Review Award for Best Supporting Actor and nominations for an Oscar and a Golden Globe. The 19-years-old was hailed as an actor to watch.
His next films were the Western The Quick and the Dead (Sam Raimi, 1995) with Sharon Stone , the biopic The Basketball Diaries (Scott Kalvert, 1995) in which he played a teenage Jim Carroll as a drug-addicted high school basketball player and writer, and the erotic drama Total Eclipse (Agnieszka Holland, 1995), a fictionalised account of the homosexual relationship between Arthur Rimbaud (DiCaprio) and Paul Verlaine (David Thewlis).
In 1996, DiCaprio appeared opposite Claire Danes in Baz Luhrmann's Romeo + Juliet, an abridged modernisation of William Shakespeare's romantic tragedy of the same name. The project grossed $147 million worldwide and earned DiCaprio a Silver Bear for Best Actor at the 1997 Berlin International Film Festival.
DiCaprio then achieved international fame as a star in the epic romance Titanic (James Cameron, 1997), opposite Kate Winslet . Roger Ebert in his review: "James Cameron's 194-minute, $200 million film of the tragic voyage is in the tradition of the great Hollywood epics. It is flawlessly crafted, intelligently constructed, strongly acted and spellbinding. If its story stays well within the traditional formulas for such pictures, well, you don't choose the most expensive film ever made as your opportunity to reinvent the wheel." Against expectations, Titanic went on to become the highest-grossing film to that point, eventually grossing more than $2.1 billion in box-office receipts worldwide. DiCaprio turned into a superstar, resulting in intense adoration among teenage girls and young women in general that became known as "Leo-Mania".
Vintage postcard. Leonardo DiCaprio in Romeo + Juliet (Baz Luhrmann, 1996).
Vintage postcard. Leonardo DiCaprio in Romeo + Juliet (Baz Luhrmann, 1996).
British postcard by Memory Card, no. 434. Leonardo DiCaprio and Claire Danes in Romeo + Juliet (Baz Luhrmann, 1996).
Vintage postcard by 7up, no DD 2079B. Photo: Twentieth Century Fox and Paramount. Leonardo DiCaprio in Titanic (James Cameron, 1997).
German postcard by Sunburst Merchandising GmbH, Osnabrück / Ana Anakos AG, München. Photo: Paramount / Fox, 1998. Leonardo DiCaprio and Kate Winslet in Titanic (James Cameron, 1997).
A Golden Raspberry Award for Worst Screen Couple
Leonardo DiCaprio played a self-mocking role as a badly behaved movie star in Woody Allen's caustic satire of the fame industry, Celebrity (1998). It was a small appearance. That year, he also starred in the dual roles of the villainous King Louis XIV and his secret, sympathetic twin brother Philippe in The Man in the Iron Mask (Randall Wallace, 1998). The film received mixed to negative response, but became a box office success, grossing $180 million internationally. DiCaprio was awarded a Golden Raspberry Award for Worst Screen Couple for both incarnations the following year. Also, his next film, The Beach (Danny Boyle, 2000), proved to be a disappointment both financially and artistically. However, DiCaprio soon bounced back.
In 2002, he starred in two successful features in which he demonstrated his range as an actor. The first was the biographical crime drama Catch Me If You Can (Steven Spielberg, 2002), based on the life of Frank Abagnale Jr., who before his 19th birthday committed check fraud to make millions in the 1960s. The film received favourable reviews and was an international success, becoming DiCaprio's highest-grossing release since Titanic with a total of $351 million worldwide.
The second was the historical drama Gangs of New York (Martin Scorsese, 2002) with Cameron Diaz and Daniel Day-Lewis. It is a sprawling tale of gangland violence in early America. The film marked his first of many collaborations with legendary director Martin Scorsese. Gangs of New York earned a total of $193 million worldwide and received mostly positive reviews.
DiCaprio played eccentric and reclusive billionaire genius Howard Hughes in The Aviator (Martin Scorsese, 2004), which DiCaprio also co-produced. Perry Seibert at AllMovie : "Though the film feels a bit overlong, it never loses the audience's interest, thanks in large part to DiCaprio's determined blue eyes. Those eyes are always able to communicate the intensity of Hughes' feelings -- be it his passion for women and aviation, or his fear of losing control." In 2005, DiCaprio was named the commander of the Ordre des Arts et des Lettres for his contributions to the arts. He next played a mercenary in the political thriller Blood Diamond (Edward Zwick, 2006).
DiCaprio played an undercover cop opposite Jack Nicholson and Matt Damon in the crime saga The Departed (Martin Scorsese, 2006). Perry Seibert at AllMovie : "Leonardo DiCaprio deserves much praise for his excellent work in the film. He broods and goes for the big emotions when it is appropriate, but for the most part, he serves as the quiet center of this film. He delivers a monologue in the middle of the movie where he explains that no matter what tension surrounds him, no matter how fast his heart beats, his hands remain still. That remains true throughout the picture, but DiCaprio compensates for this control by letting his eyes do much of the work. During moments of openness, his bearing and his posture don't change, but his eyes convey just enough vulnerability for the audience to register his inner experiences, both with regard to the specific scene and to the double-life that is slowly eating him alive." Budgeted at $90 million, the film grossed $291 million and emerged as DiCaprio and Scorsese's highest-grossing collaboration to date.
He reunited with Kate Winslet in the romantic drama Revolutionary Road (Sam Mendes, 2008). DiCaprio is the founder of Appian Way Productions — a production company that has produced some of his films and the documentary series Greensburg (2008–2010) — and the Leonardo DiCaprio Foundation, a non-profit organisation devoted to promoting environmental awareness.
German postcard by Sunburst Merchandising GmbH, Osnabrück / Ana Anakos AG, München. Photo: Paramount / Fox, 1998. Publicity still for Titanic (James Cameron, 1997).
British postcard by Twentieth Century Fox / 7up, no. DD 2079A. Photo: Paramount / Fox. Kate Winslet and Leonardo DiCaprio in Titanic (James Cameron, 1997).
British postcard by the London Postcard Company, no. MG 2004 (Series 1 of 9), Portrait #6. Photo: United Artists. Leonardo DiCaprio as King Louis in The Man in the Iron Mask (Randall Wallace, 1998).
French postcard by Sonis, no. C. 854. Photo: United Artists. Gabriel Byrne, Leonardo DiCaprio, John Malkovich, Gérard Depardieu, and Jeremy Irons in The Man in the Iron Mask (Randall Wallace, 1998).
Vintage postcard. Photo: United Artists. Leonardo DiCaprio and Anne Parillaud in The Man in the Iron Mask (Randall Wallace, 1998).
Scorsese - Nolan - Tarantino - Luhrmann
In the next decade, Leonardo DiCaprio continued to play challenging and even iconic roles. He collaborated for a fourth time with Martin Scorsese in the psychological thriller Shutter Island (Martin Scorsese, 2010), based on the novel of the same name by Dennis Lehane. The film was another commercial success, grossing $294 million worldwide.
DiCaprio then starred as Dom Cobb in the complex Science-Fiction thriller Inception (Christopher Nolan, 2010). Cobb enters the dreams of others to obtain information that is otherwise inaccessible. For his role, DiCaprio earned $50 million - his highest payday yet. Perry Seibert at AllMovie : "Half the reason a director casts a powerful figure like DiCaprio is to help the viewer through all the information. Sure, DiCaprio has the chops to play a haunted man with magnetic vulnerability -- much as he did in Shutter Island -- and Inception is another chance to appreciate why he's on the short list of genuine movie stars. But his engaging presence also helps sell the movie's insanely intricate plot developments; since Cobb always seems like he knows exactly what's going on, we trust that it all makes sense."
He was an executive producer for George Clooney's political drama The Ides of March (George Clooney, 2011) with Ryan Gosling. This was an adaptation of Beau Willimon's play 'Farragut North'. In 2012, DiCaprio starred as a plantation owner, Calvin Candie, in Quentin Tarantino's Spaghetti Western, Django Unchained (2012). DiCaprio's next role was as the millionaire Jay Gatsby in Baz Luhrmann's The Great Gatsby (2013), an adaptation of F. Scott Fitzgerald's 1925 novel of the same name.
That year he also starred in the biopic The Wolf of Wall Street (Martin Scorsese, 2013), based on the life of stockbroker Jordan Belfort, who was arrested in the late 1990s for securities fraud and money laundering. Perry Seibert at AllMovie : "when Jordan, after taking too many powerful quaaludes, has a physical breakdown and must drive back home while suffering seizures. DiCaprio, as he does throughout the movie, throws himself into this scene with the commitment of a silent-era comic. It's hard to think of another A-list leading man so willing to make himself look ridiculous, and working with someone he trusts as much as Scorsese only inspires him to push even further. It's an outrageously funny sequence, one that few actor/director combinations would have the talent to execute this well."
The film earned him a Golden Globe and Oscar nominations for Best Actor and Best Picture. Next, DiCaprio was an executive producer on Virunga (Orlando von Einsiedel, 2014), a British documentary film about four people fighting to protect the world's last mountain gorillas from war and poaching. The film was nominated for an Academy Award for Best Documentary Feature.
In 2015, DiCaprio produced and played frontiersman and fur trapper Hugh Glass in Alejandro G. Iñárritu's survival drama The Revenant, situated in the 1820s. Daniel Gelb at AllMovie : "He's never been more committed to a role -- we see him bearded and bloodied, reserved and delirious -- and he delivers a stunning performance. Glass is pushed to the brink of physical and mental anguish, and DiCaprio makes us feel every shred of his pain."
Built on a budget of $135 million, the well-received film grossed $533 million worldwide. Di Caprio nabbed his sixth Oscar nomination for the film and finally landed his first win, for Best Actor. The film also earned him numerous other awards, including a Golden Globe, a BAFTA, a SAG and a Critic's Choice Award for Best Actor. For the next three years, DiCaprio narrated documentaries and served as a producer for films.
DiCaprio returned to acting following a break of four years in Quentin Tarantino's comedy-drama Once Upon a Time in Hollywood (2019), as a fading Hollywood actor opposite Brad Pitt as his stuntman. Taking place in 1969, the saga gives a great behind-the-scenes look at the end of Hollywood's Golden Age. For his leading role, DiCaprio received nominations for an Oscar, a Golden Globe, and a BAFTA Award for Best Actor. The film earned a total of $374 million against its $90-million budget.
Leonardo DiCaprio's personal life is the subject of widespread media attention. He rarely gives interviews and is reluctant to discuss his private life. Among his former girlfriends are Brazilian model Gisele Bündchen, Israeli model Bar Refaeli, and German model Toni Garrn. His current girlfriend is Argentine-born model Camila Morrone. Their age difference is 22 years.
French postcard by Forum Cartes et Collections, Nouaillé, no. 35. Cannes (06), 2003. Photo: Anne-Christine Poujoulat-STF. Caption: The director Martin Scorsese (middle), the actor Leonardo DiCaprio (left) and the actress Cameron Diaz pose for the photographers before a screening of Gangs of New York on 20 May 2002 during the 55th Cannes Film Festival.
British postcard by Heroes Publishing Ltd., London, no SFC 3025.
Vintage card.
Vintage postcard by Too much!
Vintage postcard. Photo: 20th Century Fox. Jamie Kennedy, Zak Orth, Leonardo DiCaprio, Dash Mihok, and Harold Perrineau in Romeo + Juliet (Baz Luhrmann, 1996). Caption: Montague. Quarrel I Will Back Thee.
Sources: Roger Ebert, Perry Seibert (AllMovie), Biography.com, Wikipedia and .
Vintage postcard by One. Photo: David LaChapelle, 1995.
British postcard by The Alternative Picture Co., no. RCL845. Photo: David LaChapelle, 1995.
Vintage postcard. Photo: David LaChapelle, 1995.
Handpicked by Robert De Niro out of 400 young actors
Leonardo Wilhelm DiCaprio was born in Los Angeles, in 1974. He is the only child of Irmelin (née Indenbirken), a legal secretary, and George DiCaprio, an underground comix writer, publisher, and distributor of comic books. His parents separated when he was a year old.
When his older stepbrother earned $50,000 for a television commercial, DiCaprio, fascinated with this, decided to become an actor. At age 14, he began his career by appearing in television commercials such as for Matchbox cars by Mattel, which he considered his first role.
In 1989, he played the role of Glen in two episodes of the television show The New Lassie. Leo played recurring roles in various television series, such as the sitcom Parenthood (1990-1991) based on the successful comedy film of the same name.
He made his film debut as the stepson of an evil landlord in the low-budget horror direct-to-video film Critters 3 (Kristine Peterson, 1991). He was handpicked by Robert De Niro out of 400 young actors to play the lead role in the biographical coming-of-age drama This Boy's Life (Michael Caton-Jones, 1993) with De Niro as his stepfather, and Ellen Barkin as his mother. Critic Roger Ebert in 1993: "Toby is played by Leonardo DiCaprio, a relative newcomer (he's done TV, and had the lead in Critters III). The movie is successful largely because he is a good enough actor to hold his own in his scenes with De Niro, so that the movie remains his story, and isn't upstaged by the loathsome but colorful Dwight."
In 1993, DiCaprio co-starred as the intellectually disabled brother of Johnny Depp 's character in What's Eating Gilbert Grape (Lasse Hallström, 1993), a comic-tragic odyssey of a dysfunctional Iowa family. The film became a critical success, earning DiCaprio a National Board of Review Award for Best Supporting Actor and nominations for an Oscar and a Golden Globe. The 19-years-old was hailed as an actor to watch.
His next films were the Western The Quick and the Dead (Sam Raimi, 1995) with Sharon Stone , the biopic The Basketball Diaries (Scott Kalvert, 1995) in which he played a teenage Jim Carroll as a drug-addicted high school basketball player and writer, and the erotic drama Total Eclipse (Agnieszka Holland, 1995), a fictionalised account of the homosexual relationship between Arthur Rimbaud (DiCaprio) and Paul Verlaine (David Thewlis).
In 1996, DiCaprio appeared opposite Claire Danes in Baz Luhrmann's Romeo + Juliet, an abridged modernisation of William Shakespeare's romantic tragedy of the same name. The project grossed $147 million worldwide and earned DiCaprio a Silver Bear for Best Actor at the 1997 Berlin International Film Festival.
DiCaprio then achieved international fame as a star in the epic romance Titanic (James Cameron, 1997), opposite Kate Winslet . Roger Ebert in his review: "James Cameron's 194-minute, $200 million film of the tragic voyage is in the tradition of the great Hollywood epics. It is flawlessly crafted, intelligently constructed, strongly acted and spellbinding. If its story stays well within the traditional formulas for such pictures, well, you don't choose the most expensive film ever made as your opportunity to reinvent the wheel." Against expectations, Titanic went on to become the highest-grossing film to that point, eventually grossing more than $2.1 billion in box-office receipts worldwide. DiCaprio turned into a superstar, resulting in intense adoration among teenage girls and young women in general that became known as "Leo-Mania".
Vintage postcard. Leonardo DiCaprio in Romeo + Juliet (Baz Luhrmann, 1996).
Vintage postcard. Leonardo DiCaprio in Romeo + Juliet (Baz Luhrmann, 1996).
British postcard by Memory Card, no. 434. Leonardo DiCaprio and Claire Danes in Romeo + Juliet (Baz Luhrmann, 1996).
Vintage postcard by 7up, no DD 2079B. Photo: Twentieth Century Fox and Paramount. Leonardo DiCaprio in Titanic (James Cameron, 1997).
German postcard by Sunburst Merchandising GmbH, Osnabrück / Ana Anakos AG, München. Photo: Paramount / Fox, 1998. Leonardo DiCaprio and Kate Winslet in Titanic (James Cameron, 1997).
A Golden Raspberry Award for Worst Screen Couple
Leonardo DiCaprio played a self-mocking role as a badly behaved movie star in Woody Allen's caustic satire of the fame industry, Celebrity (1998). It was a small appearance. That year, he also starred in the dual roles of the villainous King Louis XIV and his secret, sympathetic twin brother Philippe in The Man in the Iron Mask (Randall Wallace, 1998). The film received mixed to negative response, but became a box office success, grossing $180 million internationally. DiCaprio was awarded a Golden Raspberry Award for Worst Screen Couple for both incarnations the following year. Also, his next film, The Beach (Danny Boyle, 2000), proved to be a disappointment both financially and artistically. However, DiCaprio soon bounced back.
In 2002, he starred in two successful features in which he demonstrated his range as an actor. The first was the biographical crime drama Catch Me If You Can (Steven Spielberg, 2002), based on the life of Frank Abagnale Jr., who before his 19th birthday committed check fraud to make millions in the 1960s. The film received favourable reviews and was an international success, becoming DiCaprio's highest-grossing release since Titanic with a total of $351 million worldwide.
The second was the historical drama Gangs of New York (Martin Scorsese, 2002) with Cameron Diaz and Daniel Day-Lewis. It is a sprawling tale of gangland violence in early America. The film marked his first of many collaborations with legendary director Martin Scorsese. Gangs of New York earned a total of $193 million worldwide and received mostly positive reviews.
DiCaprio played eccentric and reclusive billionaire genius Howard Hughes in The Aviator (Martin Scorsese, 2004), which DiCaprio also co-produced. Perry Seibert at AllMovie : "Though the film feels a bit overlong, it never loses the audience's interest, thanks in large part to DiCaprio's determined blue eyes. Those eyes are always able to communicate the intensity of Hughes' feelings -- be it his passion for women and aviation, or his fear of losing control." In 2005, DiCaprio was named the commander of the Ordre des Arts et des Lettres for his contributions to the arts. He next played a mercenary in the political thriller Blood Diamond (Edward Zwick, 2006).
DiCaprio played an undercover cop opposite Jack Nicholson and Matt Damon in the crime saga The Departed (Martin Scorsese, 2006). Perry Seibert at AllMovie : "Leonardo DiCaprio deserves much praise for his excellent work in the film. He broods and goes for the big emotions when it is appropriate, but for the most part, he serves as the quiet center of this film. He delivers a monologue in the middle of the movie where he explains that no matter what tension surrounds him, no matter how fast his heart beats, his hands remain still. That remains true throughout the picture, but DiCaprio compensates for this control by letting his eyes do much of the work. During moments of openness, his bearing and his posture don't change, but his eyes convey just enough vulnerability for the audience to register his inner experiences, both with regard to the specific scene and to the double-life that is slowly eating him alive." Budgeted at $90 million, the film grossed $291 million and emerged as DiCaprio and Scorsese's highest-grossing collaboration to date.
He reunited with Kate Winslet in the romantic drama Revolutionary Road (Sam Mendes, 2008). DiCaprio is the founder of Appian Way Productions — a production company that has produced some of his films and the documentary series Greensburg (2008–2010) — and the Leonardo DiCaprio Foundation, a non-profit organisation devoted to promoting environmental awareness.
German postcard by Sunburst Merchandising GmbH, Osnabrück / Ana Anakos AG, München. Photo: Paramount / Fox, 1998. Publicity still for Titanic (James Cameron, 1997).
British postcard by Twentieth Century Fox / 7up, no. DD 2079A. Photo: Paramount / Fox. Kate Winslet and Leonardo DiCaprio in Titanic (James Cameron, 1997).
British postcard by the London Postcard Company, no. MG 2004 (Series 1 of 9), Portrait #6. Photo: United Artists. Leonardo DiCaprio as King Louis in The Man in the Iron Mask (Randall Wallace, 1998).
French postcard by Sonis, no. C. 854. Photo: United Artists. Gabriel Byrne, Leonardo DiCaprio, John Malkovich, Gérard Depardieu, and Jeremy Irons in The Man in the Iron Mask (Randall Wallace, 1998).
Vintage postcard. Photo: United Artists. Leonardo DiCaprio and Anne Parillaud in The Man in the Iron Mask (Randall Wallace, 1998).
Scorsese - Nolan - Tarantino - Luhrmann
In the next decade, Leonardo DiCaprio continued to play challenging and even iconic roles. He collaborated for a fourth time with Martin Scorsese in the psychological thriller Shutter Island (Martin Scorsese, 2010), based on the novel of the same name by Dennis Lehane. The film was another commercial success, grossing $294 million worldwide.
DiCaprio then starred as Dom Cobb in the complex Science-Fiction thriller Inception (Christopher Nolan, 2010). Cobb enters the dreams of others to obtain information that is otherwise inaccessible. For his role, DiCaprio earned $50 million - his highest payday yet. Perry Seibert at AllMovie : "Half the reason a director casts a powerful figure like DiCaprio is to help the viewer through all the information. Sure, DiCaprio has the chops to play a haunted man with magnetic vulnerability -- much as he did in Shutter Island -- and Inception is another chance to appreciate why he's on the short list of genuine movie stars. But his engaging presence also helps sell the movie's insanely intricate plot developments; since Cobb always seems like he knows exactly what's going on, we trust that it all makes sense."
He was an executive producer for George Clooney's political drama The Ides of March (George Clooney, 2011) with Ryan Gosling. This was an adaptation of Beau Willimon's play 'Farragut North'. In 2012, DiCaprio starred as a plantation owner, Calvin Candie, in Quentin Tarantino's Spaghetti Western, Django Unchained (2012). DiCaprio's next role was as the millionaire Jay Gatsby in Baz Luhrmann's The Great Gatsby (2013), an adaptation of F. Scott Fitzgerald's 1925 novel of the same name.
That year he also starred in the biopic The Wolf of Wall Street (Martin Scorsese, 2013), based on the life of stockbroker Jordan Belfort, who was arrested in the late 1990s for securities fraud and money laundering. Perry Seibert at AllMovie : "when Jordan, after taking too many powerful quaaludes, has a physical breakdown and must drive back home while suffering seizures. DiCaprio, as he does throughout the movie, throws himself into this scene with the commitment of a silent-era comic. It's hard to think of another A-list leading man so willing to make himself look ridiculous, and working with someone he trusts as much as Scorsese only inspires him to push even further. It's an outrageously funny sequence, one that few actor/director combinations would have the talent to execute this well."
The film earned him a Golden Globe and Oscar nominations for Best Actor and Best Picture. Next, DiCaprio was an executive producer on Virunga (Orlando von Einsiedel, 2014), a British documentary film about four people fighting to protect the world's last mountain gorillas from war and poaching. The film was nominated for an Academy Award for Best Documentary Feature.
In 2015, DiCaprio produced and played frontiersman and fur trapper Hugh Glass in Alejandro G. Iñárritu's survival drama The Revenant, situated in the 1820s. Daniel Gelb at AllMovie : "He's never been more committed to a role -- we see him bearded and bloodied, reserved and delirious -- and he delivers a stunning performance. Glass is pushed to the brink of physical and mental anguish, and DiCaprio makes us feel every shred of his pain."
Built on a budget of $135 million, the well-received film grossed $533 million worldwide. Di Caprio nabbed his sixth Oscar nomination for the film and finally landed his first win, for Best Actor. The film also earned him numerous other awards, including a Golden Globe, a BAFTA, a SAG and a Critic's Choice Award for Best Actor. For the next three years, DiCaprio narrated documentaries and served as a producer for films.
DiCaprio returned to acting following a break of four years in Quentin Tarantino's comedy-drama Once Upon a Time in Hollywood (2019), as a fading Hollywood actor opposite Brad Pitt as his stuntman. Taking place in 1969, the saga gives a great behind-the-scenes look at the end of Hollywood's Golden Age. For his leading role, DiCaprio received nominations for an Oscar, a Golden Globe, and a BAFTA Award for Best Actor. The film earned a total of $374 million against its $90-million budget.
Leonardo DiCaprio's personal life is the subject of widespread media attention. He rarely gives interviews and is reluctant to discuss his private life. Among his former girlfriends are Brazilian model Gisele Bündchen, Israeli model Bar Refaeli, and German model Toni Garrn. His current girlfriend is Argentine-born model Camila Morrone. Their age difference is 22 years.
French postcard by Forum Cartes et Collections, Nouaillé, no. 35. Cannes (06), 2003. Photo: Anne-Christine Poujoulat-STF. Caption: The director Martin Scorsese (middle), the actor Leonardo DiCaprio (left) and the actress Cameron Diaz pose for the photographers before a screening of Gangs of New York on 20 May 2002 during the 55th Cannes Film Festival.
British postcard by Heroes Publishing Ltd., London, no SFC 3025.
Vintage card.
Vintage postcard by Too much!
Vintage postcard. Photo: 20th Century Fox. Jamie Kennedy, Zak Orth, Leonardo DiCaprio, Dash Mihok, and Harold Perrineau in Romeo + Juliet (Baz Luhrmann, 1996). Caption: Montague. Quarrel I Will Back Thee.
Sources: Roger Ebert, Perry Seibert (AllMovie), Biography.com, Wikipedia and .
August 21, 2020
The World of Rizzoli, Part 1: 1936
During the dictatorship of Benito Mussolini, Rizzoli in Milan was one of the most prominent publishers of film star postcards in Italy. Director was Angelo Rizzoli, who also was a film producer. Through the years, Ivo Blom collected many of the Rizzoli cards with their glamorous portraits and remarkable colours. Ivo is not only interested in the cards because of their beauty, but also because they illustrate the story of the Italian film industry between 1936 and 1943 in an original way. In a series of posts, Ivo chooses his favourite Rizzoli cards and describes what happed in Italy in this turbulent period.
Italian postcard by Rizzoli & C., Milano, 1936. Photo: Fox - 20th Century.
American actress Gloria Stuart (1910-2010) was initially known for her roles in Pre-Code films, including James Whale's horror films The Old Dark House (1932) and The Invisible Man (1933). Later in life, she would garner renewed fame for her portrayal of Rose DeWitt Bukater in James Cameron's Titanic (1997). In 1935, she had success with Busby Berkeley's Gold Diggers of 1935 and the following year, she co-starred with Shirley Temple in Poor Little Rich Girl (Irving Cummings, 1936).
Italian postcard by Rizzoli & C., Milano, 1936. Photo: Radio Pictures (RKO).
American actress and singer Irene Dunne (1898-1990) was a top Hollywood star between the 1930s and the early 1950s. During her career, she got five Oscar nominations but never won one. In 1936, Dunne was the star of the musical Show Boat (James Whale, 1936).
Italian postcard by Rizzoli & C., Milano, 1936. Photo: Fox - 20th Century.
Barbara Stanwyck (1907-1990) was an American film and television star, known during her 60-year career as a consummate and versatile professional with a strong, realistic screen presence. By 1944 Stanwyck had become the highest-paid woman in the United States. She was a favourite of her directors including Cecil B. DeMille, Fritz Lang, and Frank Capra. After a short but notable career as a stage actress in the late 1920s, she made 85 films in 38 years in Hollywood, before turning to television.
Italian postcard by Rizzoli, 1936. Photo: Metro-Goldwyn-Mayer. Wallace Beery in Westpoint of the Air (Richard Rosson, 1935).
American actor Wallace Beery (1885-1949) is best known for his portrayal of Bill in Min and Bill opposite Marie Dressler, as Long John Silver in Treasure Island, as Pancho Villa in Viva Villa!, and his titular role in The Champ, for which he won the Academy Award for Best Actor. Beery appeared in some 250 films in a 36-year career. He and Barbara Stanwyck co-starred in 1936 in A Message to Garcia (George Marshall, 1936).
Italian postcard by Rizzoli & C., Milano, 1936. Photo: 20th Century Fox.
Petite Janet Gaynor (1906-1984) was the innocent-eyed, round-faced Hollywood star who won the first Academy Award for best actress for her roles in three silent films. She went on to become a popular leading lady in talking pictures. By 1934 she was receiving a yearly salary of $252,583 from Fox, making her Hollywood's most highly paid actress. Her films in these years include Change of Heart (John G. Blystone, 1934), The Farmer Takes a Wife (Victor Fleming, 1935), and Small Town Girl (William A. Wellman, 1936).
The publishers
In the 1920s and 1930s two Milanese editorial companies, Rizzoli and Mondadori, took the lead in founding a series of women magazines, using the new technique of the rotogravure.
In particular, Rizzoli made its mark with illustrated magazines such as Novella, afterward taken over by Mondadori, and becoming one of the leading women’s magazines.
To Rizzoli’s new magazines were added Cinema Illustrazione (with later merged with Cinema Illustrato), Lei (which became Annabella in 1938), Omnibus, and Oggi. In the 1930s Rizzoli also took over another important film magazine, Cine-Romanzo (founded in 1929).
Cine-Romanzo and Cine-Illustrazione had a strong focus on Hollywood and the life of the stars, both on the set and in private life.
Italian postcard by Rizzoli & C., Milano, 1936. Photo: Metro-Goldwyn-Mayer.
Maurice Chevalier (1888-1972) was a French actor, singer, and entertainer. His trademark was a casual straw hat, which he always wore on stage with a cane and a tuxedo. In 1934, he appeared in the MGM musical The Merry Widow (Ernst Lubitsch, 1934) opposite Jeanette MacDonald. The two repeated their roles in the French version, La Veuve joyeuse (Ernst Lubitsch, 1935). For other studios, he appeared in the multi-language films Folies Bergère de Paris/L'homme des Folies Bergère (Roy Del Ruth, Marcel Achard, 1935), and The Beloved Vagabond/Le vagabond bien-aimé (Kurt (Curtis) Bernhardt, 1936).
Italian postcard by Rizzoli & C., Milano, 1936. Photo: Metro-Goldwyn-Mayer.
Red-headed and blue-green eyed operatic singer Jeanette MacDonald (1903-1965) was discovered for the cinema by Ernst Lubitsch, who cast her opposite Maurice Chevalier in The Love Parade (1929) and later in The Merry Widow (1934). 'The Iron Butterfly' also co-starred with Nelson Eddy in a string of successful musicals including Naughty Marietta (W.S. Van Dyke, 1935) and Rose-Marie (W.S. Van Dyke, 1936). And she played opposite Clark Gable in San Francisco (W.S. Van Dyke, 1936).
Italian postcard by Rizzoli, 1936. Photo: Metro-Goldwyn-Mayer.
American actress Norma Shearer (1902-1983) was the 'First Lady of MGM'. She won a beauty contest at age fourteen. Her first talkie was The Trial of Mary Dugan (Bayard Veiller, 1929). Four films later, she won an Oscar for The Divorcee (Robert Z. Leonard, 1930). In 1936 Shearer starred opposite Leslie Howard in Romeo and Juliet (George Cukor, 1936), for which she got her fifth Oscar nomination.
Italian postcard. Rizzoli & C., Milano, 1940. London Films.
Indian-born British actress Merle Oberon (1911-1979) had her breakthrough as Anna Boleyn in Alexander Korda's The Private Life of Henry VIII (1933). She played leading roles in such British films as The Scarlet Pimpernel (Alexander Korda, 1934), before she travelled to Hollywood to star in classics as The Dark Angel (Sidney Franklin, 1935) and Wuthering Heights (William Wyler, 1939). Oberon also starred in 1936 in These Three (William Wyler, 1936) and Beloved Enemy (H.C. Potter, 1936).
Italian postcard by Rizzoli & C., Milano, 1936. Photo: Universal.
Hungarian-born singer and actress Márta Eggerth (1912-2013) maintained a global career for over 70 years. She was the popular and talented star of 30 German and Austrian operetta films of the 1930s. Many of the 20th century's most famous operetta composers, including Franz Lehár, Fritz Kreisler, Robert Stolz, Oscar Straus, and Paul Abraham, composed works especially for her. In 1936, Eggerth starred in Das Hofkonzert/The Court Concert (Detlef Sierck a.k.a. Douglas Sirk, 1936). Later, she continued her career with her partner Jan Kiepura in the US.
The film industry
In the 1930s Hollywood reigned on the Italian screens, despite the revival of the Italian film industry in the early 1930s. The industry revived thanks to private initiative, mainly by producer Stefano Pittaluga, who revived the old Cines in 1930 and equipped it for sound cinema.
Gradually the Italian State stimulated the film industry as well, inspired by Hollywood and Germany. The Venice film festival was founded in 1932 (the oldest European film festival). In 1935, the new film school Centro Sperimentale was founded, the first film academy of Western Europe.
A separate section on film was founded at the Ministry of Press and Propaganda, stimulating national production but also strictly controlling the output by severe censorship of scripts and films. In Italy, there was state censorship instead of the auto-censorship of the major studios in the US under the Production Code.
Yet, the old Cines studio burned down in 1935, creating a big gap in film production. This was partly filled up by a film studio outside of Rome, between Pisa and Livorno, the so-called Pisorno Studios at Tirrenia, near the Tuscan coast. This complex was built 1933-1934 as a competitor to the Cines, supported by the fascist state.
In the mid-1930s, the Pisorno studios reigned, but after the opening of Cinecittà Studios in Rome (1937), also backed by the regime, and the founding of the Roman company Scalera (1938), they got fierce competition.
Italian postcard by Rizzoli & C., Milano, 1936. Photo: Warner Bros.
American actress Joan Blondell (1906–1979) performed in more than 100 films and on television for five decades, often as the wisecracking blonde. Examples of her films are Dames (Ray Enright, Busby Berkeley, 1934), Bullets or Ballots (William Keighley, 1936) and Gold Diggers of 1937 (Lloyd Bacon, 1936).
Italian postcard by Rizzoli & C., Milano, 1936. Photo: Columbia EIA.
American actress Ann Sothern (1909-2001) had a career on stage, radio, film, and television, that spanned nearly six decades. For Columbia, she starred in such films as the mystery Grand Exit (Erle C. Kenton, 1935), and the crime drama You May Be Next! (Albert S. Rogell, 1936).
Italian postcard by Rizzoli, Milano, 1936.
María Denis (1916-2004) was one of the most popular stars of the Italian cinema under the Fascist rule. Very successful were her Telefoni Bianchi-films of the 1930s. Charges of collaboration tarnished her career after the war. Controversial are her claims that she had not been the mistress of Nazi police chief Pietro Koch and just used his infatuation with her to help anti-fascists get released, especially film director Luchino Visconti. In 1936, Denis appeared in Joe il rosso/Joe the Red (Raffaello Matarazzo, 1936).
Italian postcard by Rizzoli, Milan, 1936-XV.
Paola Barbara (1912-1989) was an Italian actress who acted in over 60 films but also worked on stage and for television. She is best known for the film La peccatrice (Amleto Palermi, 1940). Barbara started her film career in films such as Campo di maggio/100 Days of Napoleon (Giovacchino Forzano, 1936)
Italian postcard by Rizzoli & C., Milano, 1936.
Elisa Cegani (1911–1996) was one of the most representative actresses of Italian cinema of the 1930s and 1940s. Cegani co-starred with Amedeo Nazzari in Cavalleria/Cavalry (Goffredo Alessandrini, 1936).
A crucial year
1936 was a crucial year: the Spanish Civil War broke out, the Olympic Games took place in Germany: in Garmisch-Partenkirchen during the winter and in Berlin during the summer, countries started building up their navies, and Hitler occupied the Rhine territories.
Italy conquered Abyssinia and crowned the king to Emperor of Ethiopia, the German-Italian pact was signed, and Fiat launched its first 500 ‘Topolino’ car. And the Venice Film Festival used for the first time an International Jury, while the prestige of the event was consolidated with the presence of many important guests.
In Venice were such directors as Frank Capra who presented Mr. Deeds Goes to Town/È arrivata la felicità with Gary Cooper and John Ford who presented Mary of Scotland/Maria di Scozia with Katharine Hepburn , but also Max Ophüls with La tendre ennemie/La nostra compagna, René Clair with The Ghost Goes West/Il fantasma galante with Robert Donat and Jean Parker, Josef von Sternberg with The King Steps Out/Desiderio di re, and Marcel L'Herbier with Veille d’armes/Sacrifice of Honor with Annabella .
The greatest public success, however, was the result of the Italian star Amedeo Nazzari . The Mussolini Cup for the best Italian film was awarded to Augusto Genina's Lo squadrone bianco/The White Squadron, starring Nazzari. The cup for the best foreign film would see the triumph of Der Kaiser von Kalifornien by and with the Süd-Tirolian actor Luis Trenker .
The best actors of this edition were Paul Muni , awarded for The Life of Doctor Pasteur, and Annabella , the protagonist of Veille d’armes. That same year in Hollywood, the Oscars went to The Great Ziegfeld, Frank Capra, Paul Muni , and Luise Rainer, the star of The Great Ziegfeld.
Italian postcard by Ed. Rizzoli, Milano, 1936.
Assia Noris (1912-1998) is best remembered as the female star of the 1930s romantic comedies by Mario Camerini. Noris had in 1935 success with Darò un milione/I'll Give a Million (Mario Camerini, 1935), and two years later again with Il signor Max/Mister Max (Mario Camerini, 1937). In both comedies, she co-starred with Vittorio De Sica .
Italian postcard by Rizzoli, Milano, 1936.
Silvana Jachino (1916-2004) was an Italian stage and film actress, who was successful and popular in the 1930s and 1940s. She started her career in 1936 in such films as Cavalleria/Cavalry (Goffredo Alessandrini, 1936).
Italian postcard by Rizzoli S.C., Milano, 1936.
Italian director Vittorio De Sica (1901-1974) is well-known as a leading figure in the postwar Neorealist movement. De Sica directed 34 feature films, for which he won numerous international prizes including four Oscars. As an actor, he made more than 150 films and is best known for his bright and charming roles in earthy comedies opposite sex goddesses Gina Lollobrigida and Sophia Loren . In the 1930s De Sica started in film as a popular matinee idol, after a career in music-hall and on the radio.
Italian postcard by Rizzoli & Co, Milano, 1936.
Elsa Merlini (1903-1983) was a star of the Italian cinema of the 1930s. She excelled in the so-called 'telefoni bianchi' (white telephone comedies). With Vittorio de Sica , she co-starred in 1936 in the musical comedy Non ti conosco più/I Don't Know You Anymore (Nunzio Malasomma, Mario Bonnard, 1936).
Italian postcard by Rizzoli & C., Milano, 1936.
Little known Hilda Springher (1909-1978) was an actress who played in six Italian sound films from the 1930s, within the genre of the 'Telefoni Bianchi' comedies. She did also vaudeville with Macario, Dapporto, and Wanda Osiris.
Italian postcard by Rizzoli & C., Milano, 1936. Photo: 20th Century Fox.
American film actress Rochelle Hudson (1916–1972) appeared in Hollywood films from the early 1930s through the 1960s. Her roles went from ingenue to leading lady to character actress. She is best remembered for co-starring in the tense and gripping social drama Wild Boys of the Road (William A. Wellman, 1933), playing Cosette in Les Misérables (Richard Boleslawski, 1935), as the older sister of Shirley Temple in Curly Top (Irving Cummings, 1935), and as Natalie Wood's mother in Rebel Without a Cause (Nicholas Ray, 1955).
To be continued.
Italian postcard by Rizzoli & C., Milano, 1936. Photo: Fox - 20th Century.
American actress Gloria Stuart (1910-2010) was initially known for her roles in Pre-Code films, including James Whale's horror films The Old Dark House (1932) and The Invisible Man (1933). Later in life, she would garner renewed fame for her portrayal of Rose DeWitt Bukater in James Cameron's Titanic (1997). In 1935, she had success with Busby Berkeley's Gold Diggers of 1935 and the following year, she co-starred with Shirley Temple in Poor Little Rich Girl (Irving Cummings, 1936).
Italian postcard by Rizzoli & C., Milano, 1936. Photo: Radio Pictures (RKO).
American actress and singer Irene Dunne (1898-1990) was a top Hollywood star between the 1930s and the early 1950s. During her career, she got five Oscar nominations but never won one. In 1936, Dunne was the star of the musical Show Boat (James Whale, 1936).
Italian postcard by Rizzoli & C., Milano, 1936. Photo: Fox - 20th Century.
Barbara Stanwyck (1907-1990) was an American film and television star, known during her 60-year career as a consummate and versatile professional with a strong, realistic screen presence. By 1944 Stanwyck had become the highest-paid woman in the United States. She was a favourite of her directors including Cecil B. DeMille, Fritz Lang, and Frank Capra. After a short but notable career as a stage actress in the late 1920s, she made 85 films in 38 years in Hollywood, before turning to television.
Italian postcard by Rizzoli, 1936. Photo: Metro-Goldwyn-Mayer. Wallace Beery in Westpoint of the Air (Richard Rosson, 1935).
American actor Wallace Beery (1885-1949) is best known for his portrayal of Bill in Min and Bill opposite Marie Dressler, as Long John Silver in Treasure Island, as Pancho Villa in Viva Villa!, and his titular role in The Champ, for which he won the Academy Award for Best Actor. Beery appeared in some 250 films in a 36-year career. He and Barbara Stanwyck co-starred in 1936 in A Message to Garcia (George Marshall, 1936).
Italian postcard by Rizzoli & C., Milano, 1936. Photo: 20th Century Fox.
Petite Janet Gaynor (1906-1984) was the innocent-eyed, round-faced Hollywood star who won the first Academy Award for best actress for her roles in three silent films. She went on to become a popular leading lady in talking pictures. By 1934 she was receiving a yearly salary of $252,583 from Fox, making her Hollywood's most highly paid actress. Her films in these years include Change of Heart (John G. Blystone, 1934), The Farmer Takes a Wife (Victor Fleming, 1935), and Small Town Girl (William A. Wellman, 1936).
The publishers
In the 1920s and 1930s two Milanese editorial companies, Rizzoli and Mondadori, took the lead in founding a series of women magazines, using the new technique of the rotogravure.
In particular, Rizzoli made its mark with illustrated magazines such as Novella, afterward taken over by Mondadori, and becoming one of the leading women’s magazines.
To Rizzoli’s new magazines were added Cinema Illustrazione (with later merged with Cinema Illustrato), Lei (which became Annabella in 1938), Omnibus, and Oggi. In the 1930s Rizzoli also took over another important film magazine, Cine-Romanzo (founded in 1929).
Cine-Romanzo and Cine-Illustrazione had a strong focus on Hollywood and the life of the stars, both on the set and in private life.
Italian postcard by Rizzoli & C., Milano, 1936. Photo: Metro-Goldwyn-Mayer.
Maurice Chevalier (1888-1972) was a French actor, singer, and entertainer. His trademark was a casual straw hat, which he always wore on stage with a cane and a tuxedo. In 1934, he appeared in the MGM musical The Merry Widow (Ernst Lubitsch, 1934) opposite Jeanette MacDonald. The two repeated their roles in the French version, La Veuve joyeuse (Ernst Lubitsch, 1935). For other studios, he appeared in the multi-language films Folies Bergère de Paris/L'homme des Folies Bergère (Roy Del Ruth, Marcel Achard, 1935), and The Beloved Vagabond/Le vagabond bien-aimé (Kurt (Curtis) Bernhardt, 1936).
Italian postcard by Rizzoli & C., Milano, 1936. Photo: Metro-Goldwyn-Mayer.
Red-headed and blue-green eyed operatic singer Jeanette MacDonald (1903-1965) was discovered for the cinema by Ernst Lubitsch, who cast her opposite Maurice Chevalier in The Love Parade (1929) and later in The Merry Widow (1934). 'The Iron Butterfly' also co-starred with Nelson Eddy in a string of successful musicals including Naughty Marietta (W.S. Van Dyke, 1935) and Rose-Marie (W.S. Van Dyke, 1936). And she played opposite Clark Gable in San Francisco (W.S. Van Dyke, 1936).
Italian postcard by Rizzoli, 1936. Photo: Metro-Goldwyn-Mayer.
American actress Norma Shearer (1902-1983) was the 'First Lady of MGM'. She won a beauty contest at age fourteen. Her first talkie was The Trial of Mary Dugan (Bayard Veiller, 1929). Four films later, she won an Oscar for The Divorcee (Robert Z. Leonard, 1930). In 1936 Shearer starred opposite Leslie Howard in Romeo and Juliet (George Cukor, 1936), for which she got her fifth Oscar nomination.
Italian postcard. Rizzoli & C., Milano, 1940. London Films.
Indian-born British actress Merle Oberon (1911-1979) had her breakthrough as Anna Boleyn in Alexander Korda's The Private Life of Henry VIII (1933). She played leading roles in such British films as The Scarlet Pimpernel (Alexander Korda, 1934), before she travelled to Hollywood to star in classics as The Dark Angel (Sidney Franklin, 1935) and Wuthering Heights (William Wyler, 1939). Oberon also starred in 1936 in These Three (William Wyler, 1936) and Beloved Enemy (H.C. Potter, 1936).
Italian postcard by Rizzoli & C., Milano, 1936. Photo: Universal.
Hungarian-born singer and actress Márta Eggerth (1912-2013) maintained a global career for over 70 years. She was the popular and talented star of 30 German and Austrian operetta films of the 1930s. Many of the 20th century's most famous operetta composers, including Franz Lehár, Fritz Kreisler, Robert Stolz, Oscar Straus, and Paul Abraham, composed works especially for her. In 1936, Eggerth starred in Das Hofkonzert/The Court Concert (Detlef Sierck a.k.a. Douglas Sirk, 1936). Later, she continued her career with her partner Jan Kiepura in the US.
The film industry
In the 1930s Hollywood reigned on the Italian screens, despite the revival of the Italian film industry in the early 1930s. The industry revived thanks to private initiative, mainly by producer Stefano Pittaluga, who revived the old Cines in 1930 and equipped it for sound cinema.
Gradually the Italian State stimulated the film industry as well, inspired by Hollywood and Germany. The Venice film festival was founded in 1932 (the oldest European film festival). In 1935, the new film school Centro Sperimentale was founded, the first film academy of Western Europe.
A separate section on film was founded at the Ministry of Press and Propaganda, stimulating national production but also strictly controlling the output by severe censorship of scripts and films. In Italy, there was state censorship instead of the auto-censorship of the major studios in the US under the Production Code.
Yet, the old Cines studio burned down in 1935, creating a big gap in film production. This was partly filled up by a film studio outside of Rome, between Pisa and Livorno, the so-called Pisorno Studios at Tirrenia, near the Tuscan coast. This complex was built 1933-1934 as a competitor to the Cines, supported by the fascist state.
In the mid-1930s, the Pisorno studios reigned, but after the opening of Cinecittà Studios in Rome (1937), also backed by the regime, and the founding of the Roman company Scalera (1938), they got fierce competition.
Italian postcard by Rizzoli & C., Milano, 1936. Photo: Warner Bros.
American actress Joan Blondell (1906–1979) performed in more than 100 films and on television for five decades, often as the wisecracking blonde. Examples of her films are Dames (Ray Enright, Busby Berkeley, 1934), Bullets or Ballots (William Keighley, 1936) and Gold Diggers of 1937 (Lloyd Bacon, 1936).
Italian postcard by Rizzoli & C., Milano, 1936. Photo: Columbia EIA.
American actress Ann Sothern (1909-2001) had a career on stage, radio, film, and television, that spanned nearly six decades. For Columbia, she starred in such films as the mystery Grand Exit (Erle C. Kenton, 1935), and the crime drama You May Be Next! (Albert S. Rogell, 1936).
Italian postcard by Rizzoli, Milano, 1936.
María Denis (1916-2004) was one of the most popular stars of the Italian cinema under the Fascist rule. Very successful were her Telefoni Bianchi-films of the 1930s. Charges of collaboration tarnished her career after the war. Controversial are her claims that she had not been the mistress of Nazi police chief Pietro Koch and just used his infatuation with her to help anti-fascists get released, especially film director Luchino Visconti. In 1936, Denis appeared in Joe il rosso/Joe the Red (Raffaello Matarazzo, 1936).
Italian postcard by Rizzoli, Milan, 1936-XV.
Paola Barbara (1912-1989) was an Italian actress who acted in over 60 films but also worked on stage and for television. She is best known for the film La peccatrice (Amleto Palermi, 1940). Barbara started her film career in films such as Campo di maggio/100 Days of Napoleon (Giovacchino Forzano, 1936)
Italian postcard by Rizzoli & C., Milano, 1936.
Elisa Cegani (1911–1996) was one of the most representative actresses of Italian cinema of the 1930s and 1940s. Cegani co-starred with Amedeo Nazzari in Cavalleria/Cavalry (Goffredo Alessandrini, 1936).
A crucial year
1936 was a crucial year: the Spanish Civil War broke out, the Olympic Games took place in Germany: in Garmisch-Partenkirchen during the winter and in Berlin during the summer, countries started building up their navies, and Hitler occupied the Rhine territories.
Italy conquered Abyssinia and crowned the king to Emperor of Ethiopia, the German-Italian pact was signed, and Fiat launched its first 500 ‘Topolino’ car. And the Venice Film Festival used for the first time an International Jury, while the prestige of the event was consolidated with the presence of many important guests.
In Venice were such directors as Frank Capra who presented Mr. Deeds Goes to Town/È arrivata la felicità with Gary Cooper and John Ford who presented Mary of Scotland/Maria di Scozia with Katharine Hepburn , but also Max Ophüls with La tendre ennemie/La nostra compagna, René Clair with The Ghost Goes West/Il fantasma galante with Robert Donat and Jean Parker, Josef von Sternberg with The King Steps Out/Desiderio di re, and Marcel L'Herbier with Veille d’armes/Sacrifice of Honor with Annabella .
The greatest public success, however, was the result of the Italian star Amedeo Nazzari . The Mussolini Cup for the best Italian film was awarded to Augusto Genina's Lo squadrone bianco/The White Squadron, starring Nazzari. The cup for the best foreign film would see the triumph of Der Kaiser von Kalifornien by and with the Süd-Tirolian actor Luis Trenker .
The best actors of this edition were Paul Muni , awarded for The Life of Doctor Pasteur, and Annabella , the protagonist of Veille d’armes. That same year in Hollywood, the Oscars went to The Great Ziegfeld, Frank Capra, Paul Muni , and Luise Rainer, the star of The Great Ziegfeld.
Italian postcard by Ed. Rizzoli, Milano, 1936.
Assia Noris (1912-1998) is best remembered as the female star of the 1930s romantic comedies by Mario Camerini. Noris had in 1935 success with Darò un milione/I'll Give a Million (Mario Camerini, 1935), and two years later again with Il signor Max/Mister Max (Mario Camerini, 1937). In both comedies, she co-starred with Vittorio De Sica .
Italian postcard by Rizzoli, Milano, 1936.
Silvana Jachino (1916-2004) was an Italian stage and film actress, who was successful and popular in the 1930s and 1940s. She started her career in 1936 in such films as Cavalleria/Cavalry (Goffredo Alessandrini, 1936).
Italian postcard by Rizzoli S.C., Milano, 1936.
Italian director Vittorio De Sica (1901-1974) is well-known as a leading figure in the postwar Neorealist movement. De Sica directed 34 feature films, for which he won numerous international prizes including four Oscars. As an actor, he made more than 150 films and is best known for his bright and charming roles in earthy comedies opposite sex goddesses Gina Lollobrigida and Sophia Loren . In the 1930s De Sica started in film as a popular matinee idol, after a career in music-hall and on the radio.
Italian postcard by Rizzoli & Co, Milano, 1936.
Elsa Merlini (1903-1983) was a star of the Italian cinema of the 1930s. She excelled in the so-called 'telefoni bianchi' (white telephone comedies). With Vittorio de Sica , she co-starred in 1936 in the musical comedy Non ti conosco più/I Don't Know You Anymore (Nunzio Malasomma, Mario Bonnard, 1936).
Italian postcard by Rizzoli & C., Milano, 1936.
Little known Hilda Springher (1909-1978) was an actress who played in six Italian sound films from the 1930s, within the genre of the 'Telefoni Bianchi' comedies. She did also vaudeville with Macario, Dapporto, and Wanda Osiris.
Italian postcard by Rizzoli & C., Milano, 1936. Photo: 20th Century Fox.
American film actress Rochelle Hudson (1916–1972) appeared in Hollywood films from the early 1930s through the 1960s. Her roles went from ingenue to leading lady to character actress. She is best remembered for co-starring in the tense and gripping social drama Wild Boys of the Road (William A. Wellman, 1933), playing Cosette in Les Misérables (Richard Boleslawski, 1935), as the older sister of Shirley Temple in Curly Top (Irving Cummings, 1935), and as Natalie Wood's mother in Rebel Without a Cause (Nicholas Ray, 1955).
To be continued.
August 20, 2020
Evi Maltagliati
Evi Maltagliati (1908–1986) was an Italian stage and screen actress, who worked in Italian cinema between the later 1930s and the early 1970s.
Italian postcard by Rizzoli & C., Milano, 1938. Photo: Manenti Film.
Italian postcard by ASER, no. 322. Photo: Vaselli / Juventus Film. Evi Maltagliati in Il nemico/The enemy (Guglielmo Giannini, 1943).
A midsummer night's dream
Evi, originally Evelina, Maltagliati was born in Florence on 11 August 1908.
She made her debut on the stage at the age of fifteen in the company of Dina Galli . With a strong dramatic temperament, she also stood out for her eclecticism and worked with the biggest names in the theatre: from Maria Melato to Max Reinhardt.
In 1933, Max Reinhardt entrusted her with the role of Titania in his Italian staging of 'A Midsummer Night's Dream' with a.o. Carlo Lombardi, Cele Abba, Giovanni Cimara, Nerio Bernardi , Rina Morelli, Luigi Almirante, and Memo Benassi at the Boboli Gardens in Florence.
On stage, Maltagliati also worked with Gino Cervi , Sergio Tofano, and Carlo Ninchi . She set up a company of young talents: Vittorio Gassman , Tino Buazzelli, and Nino Manfredi .
She often acted in films and later on also for television, playing in several television dramas including Il romanzo di un giovane povero/The novel of a poor young man (Silverio Blasi, 1957) and La figlia del capitano/The captain's daughter (Leonardo Cortese, 1965). She was also active as a voice actress.
Italian postcard by S.A. Grafitalia, Milano (Milan). Photo: Film Lux. Evi Maltagliati as the Nun of Monza in I promessi Sposi/The Spirit and the Flesh (Mario Camerini, 1941), adapted from the classic novel 'I promessi sposi' (The Betrothed) by Alessandro Manzoni.
Italian postcard by S.A. Grafitalia, Milano (Milan), no. 10. Photo: Film Lux. Publicity still for I Promessi Sposi/The Spirit and the Flesh (Mario Camerini, 1941). Dina Sassoli as Lucia Mondella and Eva Maltagliati as the Nun of Monza.
The nun of Monza
In 1934 Evi Maltagliati debuted on the silver screen in La fanciulla dell'altro mondo/The Girl from the Other World (Gennaro Righelli, 1934).
In Alessandro Blasetti's Aldebaran (1935), she is the frivolous wife of a navy commander ( Gino Cervi ), who must choose between duty and his wife's jealousy. The film was an attempt by Blasetti to make a more commercial film after the badly received propaganda film Vecchia Guardia.
In I due sergenti/The Two Sergeants (Enrico Guazzoni, 1936), Maltagliati is the British femme fatale who seduces a French soldier ( Antonio Centa ) to steal an important document from his superior ( Gino Cervi ).
In Jeanne Doré (Mario Bonnard, 1938), she is a married woman whose lover ( Leonardo Cortese ) has killed a man for her. In the Manzoni adaptation, I promessi sposi/The Spirit and the Flesh (Mario Camerini, 1941), she played the Nun of Monza.
In Sissignora (Ferdinando Maria Poggioli, 1941), she plays a widow who leaves her child in the custody of a young girl ( Maria Denis ), not telling her the child has chickenpox, thus infecting the girl, who eventually dies of it.
Italian postcard for the Italian sound film Sissignora (Ferdinando Maria Poggioli, 1941), starring Maria Denis . Here with Evi Maltagliati and Silverio Pisu.
Italian photo. There are a few possibilities here: either this is Evi Maltagliati opposite Filippo Scelzo in 'Cesare' by Gioacchino Forzano in 1939 or 1949.
Buried alive
After the war, Evi Maltagliati, now of mature age, often played mothers in films, e.g. the mother of Milly Vitale in the tearjerker La sepolta viva/Buried Alive (Guido Brignone, 1949), the mother of Yvonne Sanson in Brignone's melodrama Noi peccatori/We sinners (Guido Brignone, 1953), and the mother of Franco Interlenghi in Michelangelo Antonioni's I vinti/The Vanquished (1953),
Later, she was also the mother of Ulysses ( Kirk Douglas ) in Ulisse/Ulysses (Mario Camerini, 1954), and the mother of Virna Lisi in Il padrone delle ferriere/The master of ironworks (Anton Giulio Majano, 1959).
In the early sixties, Maltagliati was still visible in various films, including a return to her former role of the nun of Monza. However, this time she was the abbess in La monaca di Monza/The Nun of Monza (Carmine Gallone, 1962), while the title role was for Giovanna Ralli .
Maltagliati played her final film role in the French film L'affaire Dominici/The Dominici Affair (Claude Bernard-Aubert, 1972), starring Jean Gabin .
Evi Maltagliati died in Rome in 1986, at the age of 77. She was married to comedian Eugenio Cappabianca.
Italian postcard by Rizzoli & C. Milano, 1937. Photo: Barzacchi.
Italian postcard by Bromostampa, Milano.
Sources: Wikipedia (Italian), and .
Italian postcard by Rizzoli & C., Milano, 1938. Photo: Manenti Film.
Italian postcard by ASER, no. 322. Photo: Vaselli / Juventus Film. Evi Maltagliati in Il nemico/The enemy (Guglielmo Giannini, 1943).
A midsummer night's dream
Evi, originally Evelina, Maltagliati was born in Florence on 11 August 1908.
She made her debut on the stage at the age of fifteen in the company of Dina Galli . With a strong dramatic temperament, she also stood out for her eclecticism and worked with the biggest names in the theatre: from Maria Melato to Max Reinhardt.
In 1933, Max Reinhardt entrusted her with the role of Titania in his Italian staging of 'A Midsummer Night's Dream' with a.o. Carlo Lombardi, Cele Abba, Giovanni Cimara, Nerio Bernardi , Rina Morelli, Luigi Almirante, and Memo Benassi at the Boboli Gardens in Florence.
On stage, Maltagliati also worked with Gino Cervi , Sergio Tofano, and Carlo Ninchi . She set up a company of young talents: Vittorio Gassman , Tino Buazzelli, and Nino Manfredi .
She often acted in films and later on also for television, playing in several television dramas including Il romanzo di un giovane povero/The novel of a poor young man (Silverio Blasi, 1957) and La figlia del capitano/The captain's daughter (Leonardo Cortese, 1965). She was also active as a voice actress.
Italian postcard by S.A. Grafitalia, Milano (Milan). Photo: Film Lux. Evi Maltagliati as the Nun of Monza in I promessi Sposi/The Spirit and the Flesh (Mario Camerini, 1941), adapted from the classic novel 'I promessi sposi' (The Betrothed) by Alessandro Manzoni.
Italian postcard by S.A. Grafitalia, Milano (Milan), no. 10. Photo: Film Lux. Publicity still for I Promessi Sposi/The Spirit and the Flesh (Mario Camerini, 1941). Dina Sassoli as Lucia Mondella and Eva Maltagliati as the Nun of Monza.
The nun of Monza
In 1934 Evi Maltagliati debuted on the silver screen in La fanciulla dell'altro mondo/The Girl from the Other World (Gennaro Righelli, 1934).
In Alessandro Blasetti's Aldebaran (1935), she is the frivolous wife of a navy commander ( Gino Cervi ), who must choose between duty and his wife's jealousy. The film was an attempt by Blasetti to make a more commercial film after the badly received propaganda film Vecchia Guardia.
In I due sergenti/The Two Sergeants (Enrico Guazzoni, 1936), Maltagliati is the British femme fatale who seduces a French soldier ( Antonio Centa ) to steal an important document from his superior ( Gino Cervi ).
In Jeanne Doré (Mario Bonnard, 1938), she is a married woman whose lover ( Leonardo Cortese ) has killed a man for her. In the Manzoni adaptation, I promessi sposi/The Spirit and the Flesh (Mario Camerini, 1941), she played the Nun of Monza.
In Sissignora (Ferdinando Maria Poggioli, 1941), she plays a widow who leaves her child in the custody of a young girl ( Maria Denis ), not telling her the child has chickenpox, thus infecting the girl, who eventually dies of it.
Italian postcard for the Italian sound film Sissignora (Ferdinando Maria Poggioli, 1941), starring Maria Denis . Here with Evi Maltagliati and Silverio Pisu.
Italian photo. There are a few possibilities here: either this is Evi Maltagliati opposite Filippo Scelzo in 'Cesare' by Gioacchino Forzano in 1939 or 1949.
Buried alive
After the war, Evi Maltagliati, now of mature age, often played mothers in films, e.g. the mother of Milly Vitale in the tearjerker La sepolta viva/Buried Alive (Guido Brignone, 1949), the mother of Yvonne Sanson in Brignone's melodrama Noi peccatori/We sinners (Guido Brignone, 1953), and the mother of Franco Interlenghi in Michelangelo Antonioni's I vinti/The Vanquished (1953),
Later, she was also the mother of Ulysses ( Kirk Douglas ) in Ulisse/Ulysses (Mario Camerini, 1954), and the mother of Virna Lisi in Il padrone delle ferriere/The master of ironworks (Anton Giulio Majano, 1959).
In the early sixties, Maltagliati was still visible in various films, including a return to her former role of the nun of Monza. However, this time she was the abbess in La monaca di Monza/The Nun of Monza (Carmine Gallone, 1962), while the title role was for Giovanna Ralli .
Maltagliati played her final film role in the French film L'affaire Dominici/The Dominici Affair (Claude Bernard-Aubert, 1972), starring Jean Gabin .
Evi Maltagliati died in Rome in 1986, at the age of 77. She was married to comedian Eugenio Cappabianca.
Italian postcard by Rizzoli & C. Milano, 1937. Photo: Barzacchi.
Italian postcard by Bromostampa, Milano.
Sources: Wikipedia (Italian), and .
August 19, 2020
Photo by Pinto
All the stars of the silent Italian cinema seemed to visit Studio Pinto in Rome. Their portraits by Pinto graced many postcards by Ed. A. Traldi in Italy, but can also be found on several Ross Verlag postcards. Little is known about the studio.
Italian postcard by Ed. A. Traldi, Milano, no. 306. Photo: Pinto, Roma.
During the first quarter of the twentieth century, Francesca Bertini (1892-1985) was a majestic diva of the Italian silent cinema. She often played the 'femme fatale', with men devouring eyes, glamorous attire, clenched fists, and in opulent settings...
Italian postcard by Ed. A. Traldi, Milano, no. 5. Photo: Pinto, Roma.
Livio Pavanelli (1881-1958) was an Italian actor of the Italian and in particular German silent cinema. He also worked in Italian sound cinema as an actor and as a production manager. He directed four Italian films, both in the silent and the sound era.
Italian postcard by Ed. A. Traldi, Milano, no. 35. Photo: Pinto, Roma.
Mario Parpagnoli (?-?) was an Italian actor and director, whose career peaked in the Italian silent cinema of the late 1910s and early 1920s.
Italian postcard by Ed. A. Traldi, Milano, no. 313. Photo: Pinto, Roma.
Tilde Kassay (1887-1964), was an Italian silent film actress. Between 1915 and 1921 she played in 17 films directed by the greatest directors of the time, in particular Camillo De Riso , Gustavo Serena , and Giulio Antamoro.
Italian postcard by Ed. A. Traldi, Milano, no. 314, Photo: Pinto, Roma.
Claretta Rosaj aka Clarette Rosaj and Claretta Rosay (1893-?) was an Italian actress, who peaked in Italian silent cinema between 1918 and 1923.
Italian postcard by Ed. A. Traldi, Milano, no. 318. Photo: Pinto, Roma.
Bianca Stagno Bellincioni (1888-1980) was an Italian actress and soprano.
Italian postcard by Edizione A. Traldi, Milano, no. 321. Photo: Pinto, Roma.
Vera Vergani (1894-1989) was an Italian stage and film actress. She not only performed in the first stagings of Luigi Pirandello’s plays but in 1916-1921 she also knew a career as an actress in the Italian silent cinema.
Italian postcard by Ed. A. Traldi, Milano, no. 336. Photo: Pinto, Roma.
Mina d'Orvella (?-?) is a little known actress who had a short but intense career in the Italian silent cinema in the years 1919-1921.
Italian postcard by Ed. A. Traldi, Milano, no. 377. Photo: Pinto, Roma.
Fascinating and enigmatic Pina Menichelli (1890-1984) was the most bizarre Italian diva of the silent era. With her contorted postures and disdainful expression, she impersonated the striking femme fatale.
Italian postcard bt Ed. A Traldi, Milano, no. 399. Photo: Pinto, Roma.
Cecyl Tryan (1897-?) had a prolific career in the Italian silent cinema, from 1913 until the late 1920s. She first starred at Cines, later also at companies like Gladiator Film and Fert.
Italian postcard by Ed. A. Traldi, Milano, no. 409. Photo: Pinto, Roma.
Italian postcard by Ed. A. Traldi, Milano, no. 410. Photo: Pinto.
Fascinating and enigmatic Pina Menichelli (1890-1984) was the most bizarre Italian diva of the silent era. With her contorted postures and disdainful expression, she impersonated the striking femme fatale.
Italian postcard by Ed. A. Traldi, Milano, no. 437. Photo: Pinto, Roma.
Elena Sangro (1896-1969) was one of the main actresses of the Italian cinema of the 1920s. In spite of the general film crisis then, she made one film after another. She was also one of the first female directors and she had a famous affair with the poet and writer Gabriele D'Annunzio.
Italian postcard by Ed. A. Traldi, Milano, no. 609. Photo: Pinto, Roma.
Edy Darclea (1895-?) was an Italian actress who was active in Italian and foreign silent cinema in the late 1920s and early 1920s.
Italian postcard by Ed. Traldi, no. 634. Photo: Pinto, Roma.
Maria Roasio (?-?) was an Italian actress, who acted in the late 1910s and early 1920s in Italian silent cinema, in particular at Ambrosio.
Italian postcard by Ed. A. Traldi, Milano, no. 865. Photo: Pinto, Roma. Rina De Liguoro as Anita Garibaldi in Anita/Il romanzo d'amore dell'eroe dei due mondi (Aldo De Benedetti, 1926).
Italian postcard by Ed. A. Traldi, Milano, no. 882. Photo: Pinto, Roma.
Rina De Liguoro (1892-1966) had her breakthrough with the epic Messalina (1924). It was the start of a prolific career in Italian silent cinema in the 1920s with Quo vadis? (1924) and Gli ultimi giorni di Pompeii (1926). In the late 1920s, she also performed in Germany and France, e.g. in Casanova (1927). Invited to Hollywood in 1930, she had only minor parts there, but she pursued a career as a piano player. She returned to Italy in 1939. Her last role was that of Burt Lancaster 's table companion at the ball in Luchino Visconti's Il Gattopardo (1963).
Italian postcard by Ed. A. Traldi, Roma. Photo: Pinto, Roma.
Hesperia (1885-1959), was one of the Italian divas of the silent screen. She often worked with director Baldassarre Negroni, who later became her husband.
Italian postcard by Ed. Traldi, Milano. Photo: Pinto, Roma.
Alfonso Cassini (1858-1921) was an Italian actor of theater and silent cinema.
Italian postcard by Ed. Vettori, Bologna, no. 352. Photo Pinto, Roma. André Habay is misspelled here as 'Kabaj'.
André Habay aka Andrea Habay (1883-1941) was an actor in Italian silent cinema, mainly in modern dramas and diva films such as Sangue blu (1914) and Rapsodia satanica (1917), but also in epics such as Quo vadis? (1925).
Italian postcard by Ed. Vettori, Bologna, no. 402bis. Foto: Pinto, Roma.
Leda Gys (1892-1957) was an Italian actress of the silent screen. Often she played pathetic roles of the romantic and innocent young woman, the victim of loose mothers, unfaithful husbands, adventurers, etc. Her claim to fame came in particular with the film Christus (Giulio Antamoro, 1916), shot in Egypt and Palestine, where Gys performed the Madonna.
German postcard by Ross Verlag, no. 3902/1, 1928-1929. Photo: Pinto, Rome.
Rina De Liguoro (1892-1966).
Italian postcard by Ed. A. Traldi, Milano, no. 306. Photo: Pinto, Roma.
During the first quarter of the twentieth century, Francesca Bertini (1892-1985) was a majestic diva of the Italian silent cinema. She often played the 'femme fatale', with men devouring eyes, glamorous attire, clenched fists, and in opulent settings...
Italian postcard by Ed. A. Traldi, Milano, no. 5. Photo: Pinto, Roma.
Livio Pavanelli (1881-1958) was an Italian actor of the Italian and in particular German silent cinema. He also worked in Italian sound cinema as an actor and as a production manager. He directed four Italian films, both in the silent and the sound era.
Italian postcard by Ed. A. Traldi, Milano, no. 35. Photo: Pinto, Roma.
Mario Parpagnoli (?-?) was an Italian actor and director, whose career peaked in the Italian silent cinema of the late 1910s and early 1920s.
Italian postcard by Ed. A. Traldi, Milano, no. 313. Photo: Pinto, Roma.
Tilde Kassay (1887-1964), was an Italian silent film actress. Between 1915 and 1921 she played in 17 films directed by the greatest directors of the time, in particular Camillo De Riso , Gustavo Serena , and Giulio Antamoro.
Italian postcard by Ed. A. Traldi, Milano, no. 314, Photo: Pinto, Roma.
Claretta Rosaj aka Clarette Rosaj and Claretta Rosay (1893-?) was an Italian actress, who peaked in Italian silent cinema between 1918 and 1923.
Italian postcard by Ed. A. Traldi, Milano, no. 318. Photo: Pinto, Roma.
Bianca Stagno Bellincioni (1888-1980) was an Italian actress and soprano.
Italian postcard by Edizione A. Traldi, Milano, no. 321. Photo: Pinto, Roma.
Vera Vergani (1894-1989) was an Italian stage and film actress. She not only performed in the first stagings of Luigi Pirandello’s plays but in 1916-1921 she also knew a career as an actress in the Italian silent cinema.
Italian postcard by Ed. A. Traldi, Milano, no. 336. Photo: Pinto, Roma.
Mina d'Orvella (?-?) is a little known actress who had a short but intense career in the Italian silent cinema in the years 1919-1921.
Italian postcard by Ed. A. Traldi, Milano, no. 377. Photo: Pinto, Roma.
Fascinating and enigmatic Pina Menichelli (1890-1984) was the most bizarre Italian diva of the silent era. With her contorted postures and disdainful expression, she impersonated the striking femme fatale.
Italian postcard bt Ed. A Traldi, Milano, no. 399. Photo: Pinto, Roma.
Cecyl Tryan (1897-?) had a prolific career in the Italian silent cinema, from 1913 until the late 1920s. She first starred at Cines, later also at companies like Gladiator Film and Fert.
Italian postcard by Ed. A. Traldi, Milano, no. 409. Photo: Pinto, Roma.
Italian postcard by Ed. A. Traldi, Milano, no. 410. Photo: Pinto.
Fascinating and enigmatic Pina Menichelli (1890-1984) was the most bizarre Italian diva of the silent era. With her contorted postures and disdainful expression, she impersonated the striking femme fatale.
Italian postcard by Ed. A. Traldi, Milano, no. 437. Photo: Pinto, Roma.
Elena Sangro (1896-1969) was one of the main actresses of the Italian cinema of the 1920s. In spite of the general film crisis then, she made one film after another. She was also one of the first female directors and she had a famous affair with the poet and writer Gabriele D'Annunzio.
Italian postcard by Ed. A. Traldi, Milano, no. 609. Photo: Pinto, Roma.
Edy Darclea (1895-?) was an Italian actress who was active in Italian and foreign silent cinema in the late 1920s and early 1920s.
Italian postcard by Ed. Traldi, no. 634. Photo: Pinto, Roma.
Maria Roasio (?-?) was an Italian actress, who acted in the late 1910s and early 1920s in Italian silent cinema, in particular at Ambrosio.
Italian postcard by Ed. A. Traldi, Milano, no. 865. Photo: Pinto, Roma. Rina De Liguoro as Anita Garibaldi in Anita/Il romanzo d'amore dell'eroe dei due mondi (Aldo De Benedetti, 1926).
Italian postcard by Ed. A. Traldi, Milano, no. 882. Photo: Pinto, Roma.
Rina De Liguoro (1892-1966) had her breakthrough with the epic Messalina (1924). It was the start of a prolific career in Italian silent cinema in the 1920s with Quo vadis? (1924) and Gli ultimi giorni di Pompeii (1926). In the late 1920s, she also performed in Germany and France, e.g. in Casanova (1927). Invited to Hollywood in 1930, she had only minor parts there, but she pursued a career as a piano player. She returned to Italy in 1939. Her last role was that of Burt Lancaster 's table companion at the ball in Luchino Visconti's Il Gattopardo (1963).
Italian postcard by Ed. A. Traldi, Roma. Photo: Pinto, Roma.
Hesperia (1885-1959), was one of the Italian divas of the silent screen. She often worked with director Baldassarre Negroni, who later became her husband.
Italian postcard by Ed. Traldi, Milano. Photo: Pinto, Roma.
Alfonso Cassini (1858-1921) was an Italian actor of theater and silent cinema.
Italian postcard by Ed. Vettori, Bologna, no. 352. Photo Pinto, Roma. André Habay is misspelled here as 'Kabaj'.
André Habay aka Andrea Habay (1883-1941) was an actor in Italian silent cinema, mainly in modern dramas and diva films such as Sangue blu (1914) and Rapsodia satanica (1917), but also in epics such as Quo vadis? (1925).
Italian postcard by Ed. Vettori, Bologna, no. 402bis. Foto: Pinto, Roma.
Leda Gys (1892-1957) was an Italian actress of the silent screen. Often she played pathetic roles of the romantic and innocent young woman, the victim of loose mothers, unfaithful husbands, adventurers, etc. Her claim to fame came in particular with the film Christus (Giulio Antamoro, 1916), shot in Egypt and Palestine, where Gys performed the Madonna.
German postcard by Ross Verlag, no. 3902/1, 1928-1929. Photo: Pinto, Rome.
Rina De Liguoro (1892-1966).
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