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The Little Foxes
''The Little Foxes'' is a 1939 play by Lillian Hellman, considered a classic of 20th century drama. Its title comes from Chapter 2, Verse 15 of the Song of Solomon in the King James version of the Bible, which reads, "Take us the foxes, the little foxes, that spoil the vines: for our vines have tender grapes." Set in a small town in Alabama in 1900, it focuses on the struggle for control of a family business. Tallulah Bankhead starred in the original production as Regina Hubbard Giddens. Plot The play's focus is Southerner Regina Hubbard Giddens, who struggles for wealth and freedom within the confines of an early 20th-century society where fathers considered only sons as their legal heirs. As a result of this practice, while her two avaricious brothers Benjamin and Oscar have wielded the family inheritance into two independently substantial fortunes, she's had to rely upon her manipulation of her cautious, timid, browbeaten husband, Horace. He's no businessman, just her fina ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
The Little Foxes (film)
''The Little Foxes'' is a 1941 American drama film directed by William Wyler. The screenplay by Lillian Hellman is based on her 1939 play ''The Little Foxes''. Hellman's ex-husband Arthur Kober, Dorothy Parker and her husband Alan Campbell contributed additional scenes and dialogue. Plot In 1900, in the cotton country of the deep South, beautiful and brilliant Regina Hubbard Giddens struggles for wealth and freedom within the confines of an early 20th-century society where fathers only considered sons as legal heirs. As a result, thanks to their ruthless tradesman father, her avaricious brothers, Benjamin and Oscar, are independently wealthy, while she is financially dependent upon her sickly husband, Horace, whose severe heart condition has confined him to a sanitarium in Baltimore for several years. When the film begins, the Hubbards are expecting a dinner guest, William Marshall, a prominent businessman from Chicago. Ben and Oscar persuade him to build a cotton mill in th ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Lillian Hellman
Lillian Florence Hellman (June 20, 1905 – June 30, 1984) was an American playwright, prose writer, memoirist and screenwriter known for her success on Broadway, as well as her communist sympathies and political activism. She was blacklisted after her appearance before the House Committee on Un-American Activities (HUAC) at the height of the anti-communist campaigns of 1947–1952. Although she continued to work on Broadway in the 1950s, her blacklisting by the American film industry caused a drop in her income. Many praised Hellman for refusing to answer questions by HUAC, but others believed, despite her denial, that she had belonged to the Communist Party. As a playwright, Hellman had many successes on Broadway, including ''Watch on the Rhine'', ''The Autumn Garden'', '' Toys in the Attic'', ''Another Part of the Forest'', '' The Children's Hour'' and ''The Little Foxes''. She adapted her semi-autobiographical play ''The Little Foxes'' into a screenplay, which starred Bette ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Dorothy Parker
Dorothy Parker (née Rothschild; August 22, 1893 – June 7, 1967) was an American poet, writer, critic, and satirist based in New York; she was known for her wit, wisecracks, and eye for 20th-century urban foibles. From a conflicted and unhappy childhood, Parker rose to acclaim, both for her literary works published in magazines, such as ''The New Yorker,'' and as a founding member of the Algonquin Round Table. Following the breakup of the circle, Parker traveled to Hollywood to pursue screenwriting. Her successes there, including two Academy Award nominations, were curtailed when her involvement in left-wing politics resulted in her being placed on the Hollywood blacklist. Dismissive of her own talents, she deplored her reputation as a "wisecracker." Nevertheless, both her literary output and reputation for sharp wit have endured. Some of her works have been set to music; adaptations included the operatic song cycle '' Hate Songs'' by composer Marcus Paus. Early life and ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Abbie Mitchell
__NOTOC__ Abriea "Abbie" Mitchell Cook (25 September 1884 – 16 March 1960), also billed as Abbey Mitchell, was an American soprano opera singer. She performed the role of Clara in the premiere production of George Gershwin's ''Porgy and Bess'' in 1935, and was also the first to record " Summertime" from that musical. Biography Mitchell was the mixed-race daughter of an African-American mother and a Jewish-German father from New York City's Lower East Side.D. C. Hine, ed., ''Black Women in America, An Historical Encyclopedia''. Carlson Publishing Inc., 1993. . She was reared by a maternal aunt, Alice Payne, in Baltimore, Maryland, where she attended a Catholic convent school.Abbie Mitchell , in ''Notable Black American Women'', Book 1. Gale Research, 1992. Mitchell never completed her formal schooling in Baltimore. Following the dea ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
John Marriott (actor)
John Marriott (September 30, 1893 – April 5, 1977) was an American actor of the stage, film and screen, whose career spanned five decades. His acting career began on the stage in Cleveland, prior to his moving to New York City, where he was a regular performer on the Broadway stage. In the 1940s he also began to perform in films, when he reprised his role from the hit Broadway play, ''The Little Foxes'', in the William Wyler movie of the same name, starring Bette Davis. While he appeared infrequently in films (only ten during his career), he was quite active in theater, both on Broadway and in regional productions. His final performance was on-screen, in the Al Pacino film, ''Dog Day Afternoon''. Life and career 1930s and 1940s Marriott was born in Boley, Indian Territory which is now a part of Oklahoma. He died in Jamaica, Queens, New York City. He began his acting career as a member of the Karamu Players in Cleveland in 1922. He was a member of the Cleveland Playhouse thea ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Dan Duryea
Dan Duryea ( , January 23, 1907 – June 7, 1968) was an American actor in film, stage, and television. Known for portraying a vast range of character roles as a villain, he nonetheless had a long career in a wide variety of leading and secondary roles.Gaita, PaulDan Duryea Biography."''Tunrer Classic Movies''. Retrieved: May 14, 2013. Early life Duryea was born and raised in White Plains, New York. He graduated from White Plains High School in 1924 and Cornell University in 1928. While at Cornell, Duryea was elected into the prestigious Sphinx Head Society, Cornell's oldest senior honor society. He majored in English with a strong interest in drama, and in his senior year succeeded Franchot Tone as president of the college drama society. As his parents did not approve of his choice to pursue an acting career, Duryea became an advertising executive. After six stress-filled years, he had a heart attack that sidelined him for a year. Acting career Stage Returning to his earlie ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Charles Dingle
Charles Dingle (December 28, 1887 – January 19, 1956) was an American stage and film actor. Early life Dingle was born December 28, 1887, in Wabash, Indiana. His father was John Crockett Dingle, and he was said to be a descendant of Davy Crockett. Career Dingle's dramatic debut came in a production of ''Forgiven''. At age 14 he portrayed a 65-year-old man. When he was 18, he became the Woodward Stock Company's leading man. In 1914 he was the Fosberg Players' leading man. He began selling real estate in New Jersey in 1927, but he made his Broadway debut in ''Killers'' in 1928. After that he again sold real estate, but decreasing sales led him back to acting. Better roles followed including Duke Theseus in the 1932 revival of ''A Midsummer Night's Dream'' and Sheriff Cole in '' Let Freedom Ring'' in 1935. He made his musical debut in Irving Berlin's ''Miss Liberty'' in 1950. A veteran of over 50 feature films, he was best known for portraying hard edged businessmen and ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Frank Conroy (actor)
Frank Parish Conroy (14 October 1890 – 24 February 1964) was a British film and stage actor who appeared in many films, notably ''Grand Hotel'' (1932), '' The Little Minister'' (1934) and ''The Ox-Bow Incident'' (1943). Career Born in Derby, England, Conroy began acting on stage in 1908. He acted in Shakespearean plays in England from 1910 until he came to the United States in 1915. He was responsible for building the Greenwich Village Theatre which opened in 1917, and he directed productions of the repertory theater there for three years. He appeared in more than 40 Broadway plays, beginning with ''The Passing Show of 1913'' (1913) and ending with ''Calculated Risk'' (1962). He won a Tony Award for best supporting actor for his performance in Graham Greene's ''The Potting Shed'' (1957). Conroy's work on television included appearances on ''Kraft Theater'' and ''The Play of the Week''. Personal life and death Conroy had a wife, Ruth, and a son, Richard. He died of heart di ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Patricia Collinge
Eileen Cecilia "Patricia" Collinge (September 20, 1892 – April 10, 1974) was an Irish-American actress and writer. She was best known for her stage appearances, as well as her roles in the films ''The Little Foxes'' (1941) and ''Shadow of a Doubt'' (1943). She was nominated for an Academy Award and won a NBR Award for ''The Little Foxes''. Early life Collinge was born in Dublin to F. Channon Collinge and Emmie (née Russell) Collinge. She was educated there first by a governess and then at a girls' school. She took dance and piano lessons, which held no interest for her, and determined to be an actress. Stage career Collinge first appeared on the stage in 1904 in ''Little Black Sambo and Little White Barbara'' at the Garrick Theatre in London. She immigrated to the United States with her mother in 1907. Soon after, she appeared as a flower girl in ''The Queens of the Moulin Rouge'' (1908) and as a supporting player in ''The Thunderbolt'' (1910) starring Louis Calvert, whic ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Playbill
''Playbill'' is an American monthly magazine for theatergoers. Although there is a subscription issue available for home delivery, most copies of ''Playbill'' are printed for particular productions and distributed at the door as the show's program. ''Playbill'' was first printed in 1884 for a single theater on 21st Street in New York City. The magazine is now used at nearly every Broadway theatre, as well as many Off-Broadway productions. Outside New York City, ''Playbill'' is used at theaters throughout the United States. As of September 2012, its circulation was 4,073,680. History What is known today as ''Playbill'' started in 1884, when Frank Vance Strauss founded the New York Theatre Program Corporation specializing in printing theater programs. Strauss reimagined the concept of a theater program, making advertisements a standard feature and thus transforming what was then a leaflet into a fully designed magazine. The new format proved popular with theatergoers, who s ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Herman Shumlin
Herman Shumlin (December 6, 1898, Atwood, Colorado – June 4, 1979, New York City) was a prolific Broadway theatre, Broadway Theatre director, theatrical director and theatre producer, theatrical producer beginning in 1927 with the play ''Celebrity'' and continuing through 1974 with a short run of ''As You Like It'', notably with an all-male cast. He was also the director of two movies, including ''Watch on the Rhine'' (1943), which he first directed and produced on Broadway in 1941. During a Broadway career lasting 47 years, he was the director, producer or both of 45 productions, including three separate productions of ''The Corn Is Green'' (1940, 1943, and 1950). Other productions include ''The Little Foxes'' (1939), ''Watch on the Rhine'' (1941), and ''Inherit the Wind (play), Inherit the Wind'' (1955). ''Inherit the Wind'' ran for 806 performances, and was Inherit the Wind (1960 film), made into a movie in 1960 starring Spencer Tracy, Fredric March, and Gene Kelly, and has be ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Bette Davis
Ruth Elizabeth "Bette" Davis (; April 5, 1908 – October 6, 1989) was an American actress with a career spanning more than 50 years and 100 acting credits. She was noted for playing unsympathetic, sardonic characters, and was famous for her performances in a range of film genres, from contemporary crime melodramas to historical films, suspense horror, and occasional comedies, although her greater successes were in romantic dramas. A recipient of two Academy Awards, she was the first thespian to accrue ten nominations. Bette Davis appeared on Broadway in New York, then the 22-year-old Davis moved to Hollywood in 1930. After some unsuccessful films, she had her critical breakthrough playing a vulgar waitress in ''Of Human Bondage'' (1934) although, contentiously, she was not among the three nominees for the Academy Award for Best Actress that year. The next year, her performance as a down-and-out actress in ''Dangerous'' (1935) did land Davis her first Best Actress nomination, ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
