Poppy (1936 Film)
''Poppy'' is a 1936 comedy film starring W. C. Fields and Rochelle Hudson. The film was based on a 1923 stage revue of the same name starring Fields and Madge Kennedy. This was the second film version of the revue featuring Fields, following '' Sally of the Sawdust'' in 1925 with Carol Dempster in the title role. Plot Eustace McGargle , a con artist, snake oil salesman and shell game trickster, tries to escape the sheriff while taking care of his beloved adopted daughter Poppy, who, after pretending to be an heiress to win an inheritance, is found to be an actual heiress. Cast *W. C. Fields as Professor Eustace McGargle *Rochelle Hudson as Poppy *Richard Cromwell as Billy Farnsworth *Catherine Doucet as Countess Maggi Tubbs DePuizzi *Lynne Overman as Attorney Whiffen *Granville Bates as Mayor Farnsworth *Maude Eburne as Sarah Tucker *Bill Wolfe as Egmont *Adrian Morris as Constable Bowman *Rosalind Keith as Frances Parker *Ralph Remley as Carnival Manager Production Fields was ... [...More Info...]       [...Related Items...]     OR:     [Wikipedia]   [Google]   [Baidu]   |
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Paul Jones (film Producer)
Paul Jones (1901–1968) was an American film producer. His major work was done for Paramount Pictures. Career Jones produced films directed by Preston Sturges and those featuring Bob Hope, Dean Martin and Jerry Lewis. He also produced the Red Skelton comedy ''A Southern Yankee'' (1948) for Metro-Goldwyn-Mayer Metro-Goldwyn-Mayer Studios Inc., also known as Metro-Goldwyn-Mayer Pictures and abbreviated as MGM, is an American film, television production, distribution and media company owned by Amazon through MGM Holdings, founded on April 17, 1924 .... External links * 1901 births 1968 deaths American film producers 20th-century American businesspeople {{US-film-producer-stub ... [...More Info...]       [...Related Items...]     OR:     [Wikipedia]   [Google]   [Baidu]   |
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Snake Oil
Snake oil is a term used to describe deceptive marketing, health care fraud, or a scam. Similarly, "snake oil salesman" is a common expression used to describe someone who sells, promotes, or is a general proponent of some valueless or fraudulent cure, remedy, or solution. The term comes from the "snake oil" that used to be sold as a cure-all elixir for many kinds of physiological problems. Many 19th-century United States and 18th-century European entrepreneurs advertised and sold mineral oil (often mixed with various active and inactive household herbs, spices, drugs, and compounds, but containing no snake-derived substances whatsoever) as "snake oil liniment", making claims about its efficacy as a panacea. Patent medicines that claimed to be a panacea were extremely common from the 18th century until the 20th, particularly among vendors masking addictive drugs such as cocaine, amphetamine, alcohol, and opium-based concoctions or elixirs, to be sold at medicine shows as medic ... [...More Info...]       [...Related Items...]     OR:     [Wikipedia]   [Google]   [Baidu]   |
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American Film Institute
The American Film Institute (AFI) is an American nonprofit film organization that educates filmmakers and honors the heritage of the motion picture arts in the United States. AFI is supported by private funding and public membership fees. Leadership The institute is composed of leaders from the film, entertainment, business, and academic communities. The board of trustees is chaired by Kathleen Kennedy and the board of directors chaired by Robert A. Daly guide the organization, which is led by President and CEO, film historian Bob Gazzale. Prior leaders were founding director George Stevens Jr. (from the organization's inception in 1967 until 1980) and Jean Picker Firstenberg (from 1980 to 2007). History The American Film Institute was founded by a 1965 presidential mandate announced in the Rose Garden of the White House by Lyndon B. Johnson—to establish a national arts organization to preserve the legacy of American film heritage, educate the next generation of filmmaker ... [...More Info...]       [...Related Items...]     OR:     [Wikipedia]   [Google]   [Baidu]   |
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Charlie Chaplin
Sir Charles Spencer Chaplin Jr. (16 April 188925 December 1977) was an English comic actor, filmmaker, and composer who rose to fame in the era of silent film. He became a worldwide icon through his screen persona, the Tramp, and is considered one of the film industry's most important figures. His career spanned more than 75 years, from childhood in the Victorian era until a year before his death in 1977, and encompassed both adulation and controversy. Chaplin's childhood in London was one of poverty and hardship. His father was absent and his mother struggled financially — he was sent to a workhouse twice before age nine. When he was 14, his mother was committed to a mental asylum. Chaplin began performing at an early age, touring music halls and later working as a stage actor and comedian. At 19, he was signed to the Fred Karno company, which took him to the United States. He was scouted for the film industry and began appearing in 1914 for Keystone Studios. He soon de ... [...More Info...]       [...Related Items...]     OR:     [Wikipedia]   [Google]   [Baidu]   |
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Graham Greene
Henry Graham Greene (2 October 1904 – 3 April 1991) was an English writer and journalist regarded by many as one of the leading English novelists of the 20th century. Combining literary acclaim with widespread popularity, Greene acquired a reputation early in his lifetime as a major writer, both of serious Catholic novels, and of thrillers (or "entertainments" as he termed them). He was shortlisted for the Nobel Prize in Literature several times. Through 67 years of writing, which included over 25 novels, he explored the conflicting moral and political issues of the modern world. He was awarded the 1968 Shakespeare Prize and the 1981 Jerusalem Prize. He converted to Catholicism in 1926 after meeting his future wife, Vivien Dayrell-Browning. Later in life he took to calling himself a "Catholic agnostic". He died in 1991, at age 86, of leukemia, and was buried in Corseaux cemetery. Early years (1904–1922) Henry Graham Greene was born in 1904 in St John's House, a ... [...More Info...]       [...Related Items...]     OR:     [Wikipedia]   [Google]   [Baidu]   |
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The Spectator
''The Spectator'' is a weekly British magazine on politics, culture, and current affairs. It was first published in July 1828, making it the oldest surviving weekly magazine in the world. It is owned by Frederick Barclay, who also owns ''The Daily Telegraph'' newspaper, via Press Holdings. Its principal subject areas are politics and culture. It is politically conservative. Alongside columns and features on current affairs, the magazine also contains arts pages on books, music, opera, film and TV reviews. Editorship of ''The Spectator'' has often been a step on the ladder to high office in the Conservative Party in the United Kingdom. Past editors include Boris Johnson (1999–2005) and other former cabinet members Ian Gilmour (1954–1959), Iain Macleod (1963–1965), and Nigel Lawson (1966–1970). Since 2009, the magazine's editor has been journalist Fraser Nelson. ''The Spectator Australia'' offers 12 pages on Australian politics and affairs as well as the full UK maga ... [...More Info...]       [...Related Items...]     OR:     [Wikipedia]   [Google]   [Baidu]   |
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Frank Nugent
Frank Stanley Nugent (May 27, 1908 – December 29, 1965) was an American screenwriter, journalist, and film reviewer, who wrote 21 film scripts, 11 for director John Ford. He wrote almost a thousand reviews for ''The New York Times'' before leaving journalism for Hollywood. He was nominated for an Academy Award in 1953 and twice won the Writers Guild of America Award for Best Written American Comedy. The Writers Guild of America, West ranks his screenplay for ''The Searchers'' (1956) among the top 101 screenplays of all time. Early life and film criticism Nugent was born in New York City on May 27, 1908, the son of Frank H. and Rebecca Roggenburg Nugent. He graduated from Regis High School in 1925 and studied journalism at Columbia University, graduating in 1929, where he worked on the student newspaper, the ''Columbia Spectator''. He started his journalism career as a news reporter with ''The New York Times'' in 1929 and in 1934 moved to reviewing films for that newspaper. A ... [...More Info...]       [...Related Items...]     OR:     [Wikipedia]   [Google]   [Baidu]   |
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The New York Times
''The New York Times'' (''the Times'', ''NYT'', or the Gray Lady) is a daily newspaper based in New York City with a worldwide readership reported in 2020 to comprise a declining 840,000 paid print subscribers, and a growing 6 million paid digital subscribers. It also is a producer of popular podcasts such as '' The Daily''. Founded in 1851 by Henry Jarvis Raymond and George Jones, it was initially published by Raymond, Jones & Company. The ''Times'' has won 132 Pulitzer Prizes, the most of any newspaper, and has long been regarded as a national " newspaper of record". For print it is ranked 18th in the world by circulation and 3rd in the U.S. The paper is owned by the New York Times Company, which is publicly traded. It has been governed by the Sulzberger family since 1896, through a dual-class share structure after its shares became publicly traded. A. G. Sulzberger, the paper's publisher and the company's chairman, is the fifth generation of the family to head the pa ... [...More Info...]       [...Related Items...]     OR:     [Wikipedia]   [Google]   [Baidu]   |
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Adrian Morris (actor)
Adrian Michael Morris (January 12, 1907 – November 30, 1941) was an American actor of stage and film, and a younger brother of Chester Morris. As a child, Morris performed with his family in a vaudeville act. In his short career as a Hollywood character actor, he appeared in over 70 films, including ''Dirigible'' (1931), ''Me and My Gal'' (1932), ''Bureau of Missing Persons'' (1933), ''The Big Shakedown'' (1934), '' The Fighting Marines'' (1935), ''The Petrified Forest'' (1936), '' There Goes the Groom'' (1937), ''Angels with Dirty Faces'' (1938), ''Gone With the Wind'' (1939), ''The Grapes of Wrath'' (1940), and '' Blood and Sand'' (1941). Early life and family Adrian Morris was born in Mount Vernon, New York, one of four surviving children of Broadway stage actor William Morris and stage comedic actress Etta Hawkins. His siblings were screenwriter-actor Gordon Morris (1898–1940), actor Chester Morris (1901–1970), and actress Wilhelmina Morris (1902–1971 ... [...More Info...]       [...Related Items...]     OR:     [Wikipedia]   [Google]   [Baidu]   |
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Maude Eburne
Maude Eburne (born Maud Eburne Riggs, November 10, 1875 – October 15, 1960) was a Canadian character actress of stage and screen, known for playing eccentric roles. Early years Eburne was born the daughter of John and Mary Riggs, in Bronte-on-the-Lake, Ontario. She studied elocution in Toronto. The death of Eburne's father in 1901 was a catalyst for her entry into acting as a profession. She said that he would not have approved a stage career for her and added, "If my father knew I was on the stage, he would not rest in peace." Career Eburne began her career in stock theater in Buffalo, New York. Her early theater work was in Ontario and New York City, debuting on Broadway to great acclaim as "Coddles" in the 1914 farce ''A Pair of Sixes''. "When I first came to New York... I said I didn't want to be beautiful young girls or stately leading women, but wanted parts that had something queer in them, especially if there were dialect." She continued to play mainly humoro ... [...More Info...]       [...Related Items...]     OR:     [Wikipedia]   [Google]   [Baidu]   |
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Granville Bates
Granville Bates (January 7, 1882 – July 8, 1940) was an American character actor and bit player, appearing in over ninety films. Biography Bates was born in Chicago in 1882 to Granville Bates, Sr., a developer and builder, and Adaline Bates (née Gleason). He grew up in the Lakeview neighborhood of Chicago on the southeast corner of Evanston (now Broadway) Ave. and Oakdale Ave. in a townhouse that his father later demolished, along with all of the others on the block, to redevelop as a four-story commercial building with apartments above. Bates began his film career in the 1910s with Essanay Studios of the Chicago film industry, and his World War I draft Registration Card listed him as a travelling actor for Francis Owen & Co. He appeared on Broadway in the late 1920s and early 1930s, notably in the original production of '' Merrily We Roll Along'' (1934) by George S. Kaufman and Moss Hart. He was also the Conductor in the original production of ''Twentieth Century'' ( ... [...More Info...]       [...Related Items...]     OR:     [Wikipedia]   [Google]   [Baidu]   |