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Franklin Pangborn
Franklin Pangborn (January 23, 1889 – July 20, 1958) was an American comedic character actor famous for playing small but memorable roles with comic flair. He appeared in many Preston Sturges movies as well as the W. C. Fields films '' International House'', ''The Bank Dick'', and ''Never Give a Sucker an Even Break''. For his contributions to motion pictures, Pangborn received a star on the Hollywood Walk of Fame at 1500 Vine Street on February 8, 1960. Early years Pangborn was born in Newark, New Jersey. During World War I, he served for 14 months with the 312th Infantry in Europe. Career An encounter with actress Mildred Holland when he was 17 led to Pangborn's first professional acting experience. He was working for an insurance company when she learned about his ambitions for acting and offered him an extra's position with her company at $12 per week, initially during his two weeks' vacation. That opportunity grew into four years' touring with Holland and her troupe. Fol ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Topper Takes A Trip
''Topper Takes a Trip'' is a 1938Some sources, such as Turner Classic Movies, say 1939. According to the Internet Movie Database, the film was released in New York City on 29 December 1938, and in the United States in January 1939. The exact year is contingent on the source's precise definition of a release date. film directed by Norman Z. McLeod. It is a sequel to the 1937 film '' Topper''. Constance Bennett, Roland Young, Billie Burke, and Alan Mowbray reprised their roles from the earlier film; only Cary Grant was missing (other than in a few shots taken from ''Topper''). A ghost tries to reunite a couple who she had a hand in splitting up in the prior film. It was followed by another sequel, ''Topper Returns'' (1941). Plot summary To gain entry to Heaven, ghost Marion Kerby (Constance Bennett) has to do some good on earth. That means reuniting a divorcing couple, Cosmo (Roland Young) and Clara Topper (Billie Burke). To be fair, Marion played a part in their troubles: Clara m ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
George McFarland
George McFarland (October 2, 1928 – June 30, 1993) was an American actor most famous for starring as a child as Spanky in the ''Our Gang'' series of short-subject comedies of the 1930s and 1940s. The ''Our Gang'' shorts were later syndicated to television as ''The Little Rascals''. Early life McFarland was born in Dallas, Texas, on October 2, 1928, to Virginia Winifred (née Phillips) and Robert Emmett McFarland. He had three siblings: Thomas ("Tommy", who appeared in a few ''Our Gang'' episodes as "Dynamite"), Amanda, and Roderick ("Rod"). He attended Lancaster High School in Lancaster, Texas. Before joining the ''Our Gang'' comedies, "Sonny", as he was called by his family, modeled children's clothing for a Dallas department store and was also seen around the Dallas area on highway billboards and in print advertisements for Wonder Bread. This established Sonny early on in the local public's eye as an adorable child model and provided experience before cameras. Career ''Ou ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Jack Paar
Jack Harold Paar (May 1, 1918 – January 27, 2004) was an American talk show host, author, radio and television comedian, and film actor. He was the second host of ''The Tonight Show'' from 1957 to 1962. ''Time'' magazine's obituary of Paar reported wryly, "His fans would remember him as the fellow who split talk show history into two eras: Before Paar and Below Paar." Early life and education Paar was born in 1918 in Canton, Ohio, the son of Lillian M. (Hein) and Howard Paar. He moved with his family to Jackson, Michigan, about south of Lansing, as a child. As a child, he developed a stutter, which he learned to manage. He contracted tuberculosis when he was 14 and left school at 16. Career Early career He first worked near home as a radio announcer at WIBM in Jackson, Michigan. As a radio announcer he was known to stop by the newspaper stand in front of the Jackson Citizen Patriot and pick up a freshly published copy of that local newspaper before going on to work where he ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
This Is Your Life (American Franchise)
''This Is Your Life'' is an American reality documentary series broadcast on NBC radio from 1948 to 1952, and on NBC television from 1952 to 1961. It was originally hosted by its creator and producer Ralph Edwards. In the program, the host surprised guests and then took them through a retrospective of their lives in front of an audience, including appearances by colleagues, friends, and family. Edwards revived the show in 1971–1972, and Joseph Campanella hosted a version in 1983. Edwards returned for various specials in the late 1980s. Concept The idea for ''This Is Your Life'' arose while Edwards was working on game show ''Truth or Consequences''. He had been asked by the United States Army to "do something" for paraplegic soldiers at Birmingham General Army Hospital, a California Army rehabilitation hospital in Van Nuys, Los Angeles (a site later converted into a high school). Edwards chose a "particularly despondent young soldier and hit on the idea of presenting his life ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
The Red Skelton Show
''The Red Skelton Show'' is an American television comedy/variety show that aired from 1951 to 1971. In the decade prior to hosting the show, Richard "Red" Skelton had a successful career as a radio and motion pictures star. Although his television series is largely associated with CBS, where it appeared for more than sixteen years, it actually began and ended on NBC. During its run, the program received three Emmy Awards, for Skelton as best comedian and the program as best comedy show during its initial season, and an award for comedy writing in 1961. In 1959 Skelton also received a Golden Globe for Best TV Show. Origins: 1950s Red Skelton's network television program began at the start of the 1951 fall season on NBC (for sponsor Procter & Gamble). The MGM agreement with Skelton for television performances did not allow him to go on the air before September 30, 1951. After two seasons on Sunday nights, the program was picked up by CBS in the fall of 1953 and moved to Tuesda ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
The Ritz Brothers
The Ritz Brothers were an American family comedy act who performed extensively on stage, in nightclubs and in films from 1925 to the late 1960s. A fourth brother, George, acted as their manager. Early life The four brothers were born to Austrian-born Jewish haberdasher Max Joachim and his wife Pauline, only three of them performed together. They also had a sister Gertrude. All three brothers were born in Newark, New Jersey. The family name was Joachim (pronounced "jo-ACK-him", Harry explained on a Joe Franklin TV interview), but the eldest brother Al, a vaudeville dancer, adopted a new professional name after he saw the name "Ritz" on the side of a laundry truck. Jimmy and Harry followed suit when the brothers formed a team. The Ritzes emphasized precision dancing in their act, and added comedy material as they went along. By the early 1930s they were stage headliners. Movie career In 1934 Educational Pictures, producers of short subjects, hired "The Three Ritz Brothers" to ma ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Harold Lloyd
Harold Clayton Lloyd, Sr. (April 20, 1893 – March 8, 1971) was an American actor, comedian, and stunt performer who appeared in many silent comedy films.Obituary ''Variety'', March 10, 1971, page 55. One of the most influential film comedians of the silent film era, Lloyd made nearly 200 comedy films, both silent and "talkies", between 1914 and 1947. His bespectacled "Glass" character was a resourceful, ambitious go-getter who matched the zeitgeist of the 1920s-era United States. His films frequently contained "thrill sequences" of extended chase scenes and daredevil physical feats. Lloyd hanging from the hands of a clock high above the street (dangerous, but risk exaggerated by camera angles) in ''Safety Last!'' (1923) is considered one of the most enduring images in cinema. Lloyd performed lesser stunts himself, despite having injured himself in August 1919 while doing publicity pictures for the Roach studio. An accident with a bomb mistaken as a prop resulted in th ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Wuhu
Wuhu () is a prefecture-level city in southeastern Anhui province, China. Sitting on the southeast bank of the Yangtze River, Wuhu borders Xuancheng to the southeast, Chizhou and Tongling to the southwest, Hefei city to the northwest, Ma'anshan city to the northeast, Jiangsu Province to the east, and is approximately southwest of Nanjing. With the urbanization trend in the southern part of Nanjing, a conurbation between Nanjing, Maanshan and Wuhu is in building with more than 10,660,000 inhabitants. Administration The prefecture-level city of Wuhu administers 8 county-level divisions, including 5 districts, 1 county, and 1 county-level city. *Defunct - Sanshan District Climate Demographics Population As of the 2020 Chinese census, Wuhu had a total population of 3,644,420 inhabitants whom 1,622,799 lived its built-up (or metro) area made of Jiujiang District, Jinghu District and Yijiang District. The city has over 47 ethnic minorities present — the largest being the ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Autogyro
An autogyro (from Greek and , "self-turning"), also known as a ''gyroplane'', is a type of rotorcraft that uses an unpowered rotor in free autorotation to develop lift. Forward thrust is provided independently, by an engine-driven propeller. While similar to a helicopter rotor in appearance, the autogyro's rotor must have air flowing across the rotor disc to generate rotation, and the air flows upwards through the rotor disc rather than down. The autogyro was invented by Spanish engineer Juan de la Cierva in an attempt to create an aircraft that could fly safely at low speeds. He first flew one on 9 January 1923, at Cuatro Vientos Airfield in Madrid. The aircraft resembled the fixed-wing aircraft of the day, with a front-mounted engine and propeller. Cierva's autogyro is considered the predecessor of the modern helicopter. The success of the autogyro garnered the interest of industrialists and under license from Cierva in the 1920s and 1930s, the Pitcairn & Kellett compan ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Production Code
The Motion Picture Production Code was a set of industry guidelines for the self-censorship of content that was applied to most motion pictures released by major studios in the United States from 1934 to 1968. It is also popularly known as the Hays Code, after Will H. Hays, president of the Motion Picture Producers and Distributors of America (MPPDA) from 1922 to 1945. Under Hays's leadership, the MPPDA, later the Motion Picture Association of America (MPAA) and the Motion Picture Association (MPA), adopted the Production Code in 1930 and began rigidly enforcing it in 1934. The Production Code spelled out acceptable and unacceptable content for motion pictures produced for a public audience in the United States. From 1934 to 1954, the code was closely identified with Joseph Breen, the administrator appointed by Hays to enforce the code in Hollywood. The film industry followed the guidelines set by the code well into the late 1950s, but it began to weaken, owing to the combined ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
LGBT Stereotypes
Stereotypes about lesbian, gay, bisexual and transgender (LGBT) people are based on their sexual orientations, gender identities, or gender expressions. Stereotypical perceptions may be acquired through interactions with parents, teachers, peers and mass media, or, more generally, through a lack of firsthand familiarity, resulting in an increased reliance on generalizations. Negative stereotypes are often associated with homophobia, lesbophobia, gayphobia, biphobia, or transphobia. Positive stereotypes, or counterstereotypes, also exist. In general Media The media has made some progress toward more equitable representation of members of the LGBT community. While there may not be many prominent LGBT characters in the current mainstream media, the community has achieved significant milestones in recent years. In 2016, ''Moonlight,'' a coming-of-age drama about a young African American man's struggle with identity and sexuality, became not only the first LGBT movie to win the Aca ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
