Joan Crawford, National Puppy Day, Oscar Nights, and More...
Thursday, March 23, 2017 at 3:00PM Today is both National Puppy Day and the immortal star Joan Crawford's birthday (though the exact date i.e. year is disputed). So here is a photo combining those two wonderful things...
Joan Crawford totally loved dogs. If you do a search for "Joan Crawford puppies" or "Joan Crawford dogs" you will be surprised at how many images come up and from all decades, too, and how relaxed the famously rigid star looks with them in many of the photos...
She had poodles, terriers, you name it. At the peak of her fame in the 1940s (in the middle of her very long career) she had two famous dachshunds (photographed frequently) named "Baby" and "Boopshem." And late in life she was reportedly inseparable from a shih-tzu named "Princess". So it's a bit odd that there are no animals to be seen in her many home scenes in Feud. But then Feud, as I frequently grouse, has no interest in painting a three-dimensional portrait (how does one square, for example, knowledge of her many dogs with the much obsessed over public fascination with her mania about cleanliness and all that plastic covered furniture?). Feud just wants to show her suffering and vanity. Zzzz.
More 'on this day in showbiz history' factoids...
Akira on the set of YOJIMBO which is the first movie of his I ever saw (in college)
1910 Akira Kurosawa, one of the greatest filmmakers of all time, is born in Japan. What's your favorite Kurosawa? Throne of Blood with Ran as runner up is my answer and they're both Shakespeare adaptations which is odd since I'm normally averse to those as there are far too many of them in the world
1929 Happy 88th birthday to Mark Rydell, who directed the Oscar favorite On Golden Pond and also two Bette Midler pictures, The Rose and For the Boys
1942 The great Michael Haneke (Amour, The White Ribbon, Caché) is born in Munich
1948 Oscar nominee Penelope Milford (Coming Home), probably best remembered today as the the grief-exploiting teacher in Heathers, is born
1950 Olivia de Havilland wins her second Best Actress Oscar statue for The Heiress (1949)
... On that same exact day another movie star Frances Farmer is released from Western State Hospital after a nearly five year institutionalization. What happened in the hospital is the subject of much dispute and controversy but as depicted in the biopic Frances (1982) some claim she was repeatedly raped and had a partial lobotomy while inside
1957 Amanda Plummer, "Honey Bunny" from Pulp Fiction (and a shoulda been Oscar nominee for The Fisher King) born to actors Christopher Plummer and Tammy Grimes
1959 Two time Oscar nominee Catherine Keener is born. She was fun in Get Out (2017) wasn't she? She needed that shake up if you ask us
1964 Hope Davis is born
1976 Michelle Monaghan is born
1984 Police Academy is released, becoming a sleeper hit and spawning many needless sequels, six to be exact.
1990 Pretty Woman hits theaters making Julia Roberts into a superstar. An interesting note for all of you Oscar buffs: BOTH of Julia Roberts' Best Actress bids came from films released in March, both arriving an entire year before the Oscar nights in which she'd be honored for them.
1997 Striptease (1996) and Demi Moore are the big "winners" at the Razzies because the Razzies love to punish female movie stars
1998 Titanic performs a near sweep at the 1997 Oscars losing only its two actressing nominations and Best Makeup
1999 Ricky Martin releases "Livin' la Vida Loca" which sells millions and makes him a crossover superstar
2001 Heartbreakers starring Sigourney Weaver and Jennifer Love Hewitt hits theaters
2003 The toned-down 2002 Oscars are held -- weren't they even red carpet free due to the Iraq War?.
Nicole Kidman and Chicago were expected winners but Adrien Brody and Roman Polanski for Actor and Director of The Pianist surprised many.
2012 The Hunger Games debuts to huge numbers, making the world completely unsafe (for a time) from dystopian YA novels as big screen franchises
2018 Yet another big screen adaptation of Robin Hood is expected on this day next year. The latest in what seem like 30+ of them will star Taron Egerton as the heroic thief. It will square off with the live-action/animation hybrid Peter Rabbit starring James Corden and Margot Robbie's voices and Rose Byrne and Domnhall Gleesons's faces.
Reader Comments (19)
1 - I love Chicago, but The Pianist should have won best picture. Two more weeks and it'd have won.
2 - Striptease is one of the worst movies I've ever pais to see in a movie theater. It deserves punishing.
3 - Love Hope Davis. Love American Splendor. Love Giamatti.
4 - We should have a Beast vs Beast, Kurosawa edition: Lade Kaede in Ran vs Lady Washizu in Throne of Blood.
5 - Favorite Kurosawas in this order: Masterpieces: Throne of Blood, High and Low, Ran, Seven Samurai. Incredible:The Hidden Fortress, Kagemusha, Yojimbo, Sanjuro, Red Beard. Everybody loves it, but I'm not sure. Only good for me: Rashomon, Dreams. I don't get: Ikiru, Madadayo, I hate: The Lower Dephts
Rashomon is one of my holy trinity of films that tower above everything else for me (the others being 2001 and La Strada).
Trying to put the Kurosawa films I've seen in order (I'll have to break up the masterpiece category in three groups, as almost half his films I've seen would end up in the 'masterpiece' group otherwise):
Full-fledged masterpieces with whistles, bells on, and everything else you could hope for:
1. Rashomon
2. Seven Samurai
Full-fledged masterpieces:
3. Throne of Blood
4. Ikiru
5. Ran
Assorted masserpieces:
6. High and Low
7. Dodesukaden
8. The Hidden Fortress
Very good, not quite masterpieces:
9. Yojimbo
10. Redbeard
11. Kagemusha
Quite good:
12. Dersu Uzala
13. Drunken Angel
Okay:
14. Sanjuro
15. The Bad Sleep Well
16. The Lower Depth
17. Stray Dog
Meh:
18. Rhapsody in August
19. Dreams
Oh, and do you mind if I throw in that Ugo Tognazzi was born on this day in 1922?
Happy birthday, Catherine Keener! You did for teacups what Jaws and Psycho did for water.
Kurosawa has been one of those whose movies I like and admire, but they just don't really do it for me. I've seen "Dersu Uzala", "Ran", "Rashomon", "Hidden Fortress", and "Seven Samurai". I'm quite interested in giving "Ikiru" a chance, but Cal's ranking isn't promising.
I'll always stand by the fact Roberts totally deserved her 1990 Oscar nomination,My favourite A Star Is Born kinda performance,I know her time as BO Movie Star has passed but peopleforget how big a deal she and Demi were in the 90's.
I LOVE Heartbreakers! That's one comedy that gets funnier each time I watch it. Sigourney Weaver is highly undervalued as a comedic actress and this film also contains Jennifer Love Hewitt's best performance.
@Markgordonuk - totally. i agree
It's too bad Heartbreakers wasn't better. It had so much potential.
Can we have a HEARTBREAKERS retrospective?? :-)
Better still a Julia retrospective or a posterized she so deserves it
Wait! Wasn't Renée the frontrunner?
I think Crawford believed in discipline for doggies too... JC loved to demonstrate how her last poodle could pee on command!
Just watched On Golden Pond. I like Fonda's win, especially as a career win, but baffled at how Hepburn won a record 4th. I guess they thought it was too soon to give Meryl or Keaton a second one?
She won the Oscar for the looOOOooOons
@Arlo- whenever I go outside I use that quote and no one knows what I'm talking about. Sigh
I've never been able to decide if Livin' la Vida Loca is gloriously inane or just inane. I know it's catchy, that's for sure.
Resisting the urge to go in and edit this article and put that gif of Taron Egerton gawking up at Hugh Jackman right there at the end. The one where you can literally spot the moment when he tells himself to pick his jaw up off the floor and stop drooling in front of the cameras.
glenn -- which gif is this? point me to it.
This one... https://www.queerty.com/find-someone-looks-way-taron-egerton-looks-hugh-jackman-20170317
I guess Rashomon and Shichinin no Samurai are Kurosawa's best films, but they left me kind of cold. My favorites are probably still Ran and Tengoku to Jigoku.
And the Oscars 14 years ago were pretty significant for me. I didn't really care about Chicago winning or the Pianist surprising in certain categories. The only category that mattered to me was Sen to Chihiro no Kamikakushi (Spirited Away) winning the Oscar for Best Animated Feature. Once that happened, everything else was peachy keen.
Arlo -- Tell me about it. Ole Marsha's #1 performance imo.