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Hollywood Legends
Winnie Lightner: Tomboy of the Talkies
Winnie Lightner (1899-1971) stood out as the first great female comedian of the talkies. Blessed with a superb singing voice and a gift for making wisecracks and rubber faces, she rose to stardom in vaudeville and on Broadway. Then, at the dawn of the sound era, she became the first person in motion picture history to have her spoken words, the lyrics to a song, censored.
In Winnie Lightner: Tomboy of the Talkies, David L. Lightner shows how Winnie Lightner's hilarious performance in the 1929 musical comedy Gold Diggers of Broadway made her an overnight sensation. She went on to star in seven other Warner Bros. features. In the best of them, she was the comic epitome of a strident feminist, dominating men and gleefully spurning conventional gender norms and moral values. So tough was she, the studio billed her as "the tomboy of the talkies."
When the Great Depression rendered moviegoers hostile toward feminism, Warner Bros. tried to craft a new image of her as glamorous and sexy. Executives assigned her contradictory roles in which she was empowered in the workplace but submissive to her male partner at home. The new persona flopped at the box office, and Lightner's stardom ended. In four final movies, she played supporting roles as the loudmouthed roommate and best friend of actresses Loretta Young, Joan Crawford, and Mona Barrie.
Following her retirement in 1934, Lightner faded into obscurity. Many of her films were damaged or even lost entirely. At long last, this biography gives Winnie Lightner the recognition she deserves as a notable figure in film history, in women's history, and in the history of show business.
In Winnie Lightner: Tomboy of the Talkies, David L. Lightner shows how Winnie Lightner's hilarious performance in the 1929 musical comedy Gold Diggers of Broadway made her an overnight sensation. She went on to star in seven other Warner Bros. features. In the best of them, she was the comic epitome of a strident feminist, dominating men and gleefully spurning conventional gender norms and moral values. So tough was she, the studio billed her as "the tomboy of the talkies."
When the Great Depression rendered moviegoers hostile toward feminism, Warner Bros. tried to craft a new image of her as glamorous and sexy. Executives assigned her contradictory roles in which she was empowered in the workplace but submissive to her male partner at home. The new persona flopped at the box office, and Lightner's stardom ended. In four final movies, she played supporting roles as the loudmouthed roommate and best friend of actresses Loretta Young, Joan Crawford, and Mona Barrie.
Following her retirement in 1934, Lightner faded into obscurity. Many of her films were damaged or even lost entirely. At long last, this biography gives Winnie Lightner the recognition she deserves as a notable figure in film history, in women's history, and in the history of show business.
- GenresBiography
288 pages, Hardcover
Published December 14, 2016
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Displaying 1 - 2 of 2 reviews
December 16, 2016
GNAB I received a free electronic copy of this biography from Netgalley, David C. Lightner, and University Press of Mississippi in exchange for an honest review. Thank you, for sharing your work with me!
This is an excellent look into the life of Winnie Lightner, following her through vaudville and the 'talkies' and told with respect and joy. With her story comes an interesting look into the lives of those who fashioned 'entertainment' through the early part of the twentieth century, and the effects of the economy and the world on what was deemed acceptable entertainment. I found the Hollywood censorship rather disconcerting - the art of taking the best and hobbling their work seems still to be a deciding factor in what we are dished up at the movie house or on TV. I wish there were more surviving film of Winnie - she sounds like my kind of gal.
pub date Dec 6, 2016
University Press of Mississippi
This is an excellent look into the life of Winnie Lightner, following her through vaudville and the 'talkies' and told with respect and joy. With her story comes an interesting look into the lives of those who fashioned 'entertainment' through the early part of the twentieth century, and the effects of the economy and the world on what was deemed acceptable entertainment. I found the Hollywood censorship rather disconcerting - the art of taking the best and hobbling their work seems still to be a deciding factor in what we are dished up at the movie house or on TV. I wish there were more surviving film of Winnie - she sounds like my kind of gal.
pub date Dec 6, 2016
University Press of Mississippi
Displaying 1 - 2 of 2 reviews