Instagram Goodies: Marlon, Natalie, Faye, Dancer in the Dark

Just some yummies spotted on Instagram we thought you might enjoy...

Marlon Brando wardrobe reference for "Mutiny on the Bounty" (1962).

A photo posted by The Academy (@theacademy) on Nov 25, 2016 at 12:48pm PST

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On a Clear Day You Can See Anniversaries Forever

On this day in showbiz history...

1886 Spring Byington is born in Colorado Springs. Goes on to supporting actress glory in Hollywood including Marmee in Little Women (1933, her feature debut) and an Oscar nomination as the eccentric hobbyist mom in You Can't Take It With You (1938). Curiously her screen daughter in that best picture winner Jean Arthur, an even bigger star, shares her same birthday (for the year of 1900)
1888 Thomas Edison files a patent for the Optical Phonograph (an early step in creating the cinema)
1903 Author and screenwriter Nathanael West is born in NYC. Movies adapted from his work include Lonelyhearts (1958) and The Day of the Locust (1975)
1915 One of the world's most celebrated playwrights, Arthur Miller, is born. His classics include Death of a Salesman, The Crucible and A View From the Bridge. After marrying movie star Marilyn Monroe, he wrote The Misfits (1961) for her which would eerily (considering its elegiac tone) be the last film for both her and co-star Clark Gable and one of the very last for Montgomery Clift who was born on this same day in 1920...

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Best Shot(s): Gentlemen Prefer Blondes

Commence squealing. For what could be more delightful than an evening with two perfect musical comedy performances? It's time to talk Gentlemen Prefer Blondes starring Jane Russell and Marilyn Monroe. The film, currently streaming on Netflix, was the runner up in our Readers Choice polling for Hit Me With Your Best Shot.

GENTLEMEN PREFER BLONDES
20th Century Fox. Released on July 15th, 1953 in New York
Director: Howard Hawks; Cinematographer: Harry J Wild 
Starring: Jane Russell as 'Dorothy', Marilyn Monroe as 'Lorelei', Charles Coburn as 'Piggy', Elliott Reid as 'Malone', Tommy Noonan as 'Esmond Jr'

Howard Hawk's classic was not the first iteration of the story. It was based on the stage musical which itself was based on a book which had already spawned two non-musicals. The 1949 stage musical, a huge hit on Broadway, had introduced Carol Channing to the world. New star Marilyn Monroe got Channing's  star-making "Lorelei" role for the screen. (The same thing would happen to Channing sixteen years later with her other signature role Hello Dolly) But sometimes a movie turns out so spectacularly well that it's impossible to imagine it existing in any other shape than the one it's in, all other versions prior or subsequent feel like faint cultural echoes. 

Best Shots after the jump...

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Hump Day Link Night

Vanity Fair Brie Larson reportedly frontrunner to play Captain Marvel. I'll believe that movie when I see it.
Boy Culture 90 things Marilyn Monroe would have done if she'd lived to be 90 today
The Playlist Susanne Bier, the Oscar winning Danish director of Brothers and After the Wedding fame, is rumored to be in the running to direct the next Bond film
Screencraft Do professional readers only read the first ten pages of each screenplay in their stacks? If you're an aspiring screenwriter you should read this.
Variety Jake Gyllenhaal to star in The Division, an adaptation of a video game

 

People Archives Mark Harris pointed us to this amazing profile of Sandy Dennis, Oscar-winner and crazy cat lady from 1989 
Vox has a detailed analysis and cool sortable list of all major TV characters who died this season, As per usual they're still killing off minorities in disproportionate numbers. Out of the 234 characters that died 29 of them were LGBT and 59 were people of color. 
Interview Mag Did you know that Debbie Reynolds and Carrie Fisher are the stars of a new documentary? It'll play on HBO later this year
Towleroad President Obama issues 2016 Pride Month Proclamation. We'll be celebrating here to throughout the month 
Twitter so i played one of those "like this and I will" games and had to reveal 25 crushes from my life. It was fun!  

That Carney/Keira Situation
An update...
Directors and actors came forward to defend Keira Knightley after John Carney's recent remarks about herskill and their time together on Begin Again which we discussed on the most recent  Film Experience Podcast. John Carney has since issued this very self-deprecating public apology.

From a director who feels like a complete idiot. pic.twitter.com/vfO8m4U2Hl

— John Carney (@jayceefactory) June 1, 2016

On This Day: Marilyn Mania and Sarah Connor x 3

May your 19th be beautiful.

On this day in history as it relates to the movies...

1536 Anne Boleyn is beheaded. Her tragedy is later reenacted by hundreds of actresses on tv, stage and film including Natalie Portman, Vanessa Redgrave, Helena Bonham Carter, and Genevieve Bujold (Oscar nomination).
1836 Cynthia Ann Parker is kidnapped in Texas during an Indian raid after her family is slaughtered. That's a tough break but not many people get to live on in history through multiple classics albeit under pseudonyms like "Debbie Edwards" (Natalie Wood in The Searchers) and "Stands With Fist" (Mary McDonnell in Dances With Wolves). 
1925 Malcolm X is born. 67 years later Denzel Washington wins his second Oscar playing him (Shut up! This is our preferred version of history because Al Pacino in Scent of a Woman. Ugh, really?)
1941 Nora Ephron is born spewing witticisms.

1958 Attack of the 50 Foot Woman is released in movie theaters.
1962 Marilyn Monroe, who looms larger than 50 Feet in the American consciousness, sings happy birthday to President John F Kennedy 
1978 Thank God It's Friday released. Out-discoed in collective disco-movie memories by Can't Stop the Music, two years later.
1982 Rebecca Hall is born. Remains underappreciated 34 years later

1984 It is a very very bad day to be named "Sarah Connor" in Los Angeles. Unless you're unlisted. [src]
1989 Legendary bad movie Road House opens in theaters
1992 Sam Smith is born. 24 years later he tortures global audiences with an off-key rendition of a song no one likes and Hollywood hands him the Oscar -anything to make him stop.
1999 Star Wars: the Phantom Menace opens in theaters which is something like discovering a razor blade in your Halloween candy. Jar Jar Binks is the razor blade. Nostalgia is the candy.
2017 Baywatch: The Movie opens. God help us all.

and finally...

2154 Jake Sully will arrive in his wheelchair on Pandora and meet his Avatar. Just in time for James Cameron to be cryogenically unfrozen and announce that he's starting production on Avatar 2 and Avatar 3. For real this time, promise.