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Two Girls And A Sailor
''Two Girls and a Sailor'' is a 1944 American musical film directed by Richard Thorpe and starring Van Johnson, June Allyson and Gloria DeHaven. Set on the American homefront during World War II, it's about two singing sisters who create a lavish canteen to entertain members of the military, thanks to financial contributions from a mysterious donor. The picture features a host of celebrity performances, including Jimmy Durante doing his hallmark "Inka Dinka Doo", Gracie Allen (in her final film role), and Lena Horne. Richard Connell and Gladys Lehman were nominated for the Academy Award for Best Original Screenplay. Plot Two sisters, Jean and Patsy Deyo, are born into a vaudeville family, and when they grow up, start an act themselves. One night, they invite a bunch of servicemen to their apartment. They are both attracted to a sailor named Johnny. Jean points out to Johnny an unused nearby warehouse they wish they could make into a canteen to entertain the troops. An anonymous b ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Richard Thorpe
Richard Thorpe (born Rollo Smolt Thorpe; February 24, 1896 – May 1, 1991) was an American film director best known for his long career at Metro-Goldwyn-Mayer. Biography Born Rollo Smolt Thorpe in Hutchinson, Kansas, Richard Thorpe began his entertainment career performing in vaudeville and onstage. In 1921 he began in motion pictures as an actor and directed his first silent film in 1923. He went on to direct more than one hundred and eighty films. He worked frequently at the Poverty Row studio Chesterfield Pictures during the 1930s. The first full-length motion picture he directed for MGM was ''Last of the Pagans'' (1935) starring Ray Mala. At MGM, he teamed up with producer Pandro S. Berman in the 1950s, with whom he made several films, including '' Ivanhoe'' (1952), ''The Prisoner of Zenda'' (1952), '' Knights of the Round Table'' (1953), '' All the Brothers Were Valiant'' (1953) and ''The Adventures of Quentin Durward'' (1955). After directing ''The Last Challenge'' in 19 ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Vaudeville
Vaudeville (; ) is a theatrical genre of variety entertainment born in France at the end of the 19th century. A vaudeville was originally a comedy without psychological or moral intentions, based on a comical situation: a dramatic composition or light poetry, interspersed with songs or ballets. It became popular in the United States and Canada from the early 1880s until the early 1930s, but the idea of vaudeville's theatre changed radically from its French antecedent. In some ways analogous to music hall from Victorian Britain, a typical North American vaudeville performance was made up of a series of separate, unrelated acts grouped together on a common bill. Types of acts have included popular and classical musicians, singers, dancers, comedians, trained animals, magicians, ventriloquists, strongmen, female and male impersonators, acrobats, clowns, illustrated songs, jugglers, one-act plays or scenes from plays, athletes, lecturing celebrities, minstrels, and movies. A ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Virginia O'Brien
Virginia Lee O'Brien (April 18, 1919 – January 16, 2001) was an American actress, singer, and radio personality known for her comedic singing roles in Metro-Goldwyn-Mayer musicals of the 1940s. Life and career O'Brien primarily performed in comedic roles during the height of her formal film career. This was in part due to her intentionally humorous singing style, which involved her singing in a deadpan manner, with no facial expressions and very little movement– reportedly she stumbled upon this "gimmick" by accident during a stage show when she became virtually paralyzed with stage fright before singing a number in the Los Angeles stage production ''Meet the People''. The audience found the performance to be hilarious and she was soon hired to repeat this performance in a number of movies beginning in 1940, for which she gained the nicknames "Frozen Face" and "Miss Ice Glacier" amongst others. When she was not singing, her acting style was just as emotive as other actresses ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
José Iturbi
José Iturbi Báguena (28 November 189528 June 1980) was a Spanish conductor, pianist and harpsichordist. He appeared in several Hollywood films of the 1940s, notably playing himself in the musicals ''Thousands Cheer'' (1943), '' Music for Millions'' (1944), ''Anchors Aweigh'' (1945), ''That Midnight Kiss'' (1949), and ''Three Daring Daughters'' (1948), his only leading role. Biography Born in Valencia, Spain, Iturbi showed a talent for classical music at an early age, and began musical studies there. He later moved to Paris in order to proceed with his studies with Victor Staub at the Paris Conservatory on a scholarship from the Diputació de Valencia. At this time, he also undertook studies in keyboard technique and interpretation with the harpsichordist Wanda Landowska. His worldwide concert tours, beginning around 1912, were very successful. He made his American debut in New York City in 1929. Between 1911 and 1937, he was the frequent accompanist to the Spanish violinist ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Amparo Iturbi
Amparo Iturbi Báguena (12 March 1898 – 22 April 1969) was a Spanish pianist. Early career Amparo Iturbi Báguena was born in Valencia, Spain, one of four children of Ricardo Iturbi (a piano tuner) and Teresa (Baguena) Iturbi. The younger sister of José Iturbi, she gave her debut concert at age 15 in Barcelona. In 1925, she gave her first important concert outside Spain. She played in Paris, at the Salle Gaveau. This was followed by dual piano recitals with José, touring Italy, Switzerland, Belgium, the Netherlands, and England. She accompanied the famous Catalan soprano Maria Barrientos. It was not until 1937 that she first played in the United States. She had one daughter, also named Amparo, by a brief marriage. The younger Amparo led an internationally renowned flamenco troupe and taught dance. Amparo Iturbi was a pioneer of the Spanish piano repertoire in the U.S., until the arrival of Alicia de Larrocha in 1965. Film career She had guest roles, playing herself, a ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Albert Coates (musician)
Albert Coates (23 April 1882 – 11 December 1953) was an English conductor and composer. Born in St. Petersburg, Saint Petersburg, where his English father was a successful businessman, he studied in Russia, England and Germany, before beginning his career as a conductor in a series of German opera houses. He was a success in England conducting Richard Wagner, Wagner at the Royal Opera House, Royal Opera House, Covent Garden in 1914, and in 1919 was appointed chief conductor of the London Symphony Orchestra. His strengths as a conductor lay in opera and the Russian repertory, but he was not thought as impressive in the core Austro-German symphonic repertory. After 1923 he failed to secure a permanent conductorship in the UK, and for much of the rest of his life guest-conducted in continental Europe and the US. In his last years he conducted in South Africa, where he died at 71. As a composer, Coates is little remembered, but he composed seven operas, one of which, ''Pickw ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Ben Blue
Ben Blue (born Benjamin Bernstein; September 12, 1901 – March 7, 1975) was a Canadian-American actor and comedian who had a career that spanned nearly 50 years. Early life He was born Benjamin Bernstein in Montreal, Quebec on September 12, 1901 to David Asher Bernstein and Sadie Goldberg. He was Jewish. Blue emigrated to Baltimore, Maryland at the age of nine, where he won a contest for the best impersonation of Charlie Chaplin. Career At the age of fifteen he was in a touring company and later became a stage manager and assistant general manager. He became a dance instructor and nightclub proprietor. In the 1920s Blue joined a popular orchestra, Jack White and His Montrealers. The entire band emphasized comedy and would continually interact with the joke-cracking maestro. Blue, the drummer, would sometimes deliver corny jokes while wearing a ridiculously false beard. The band emigrated to the United States and appeared in two early sound musicals — the Vitaph ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Harry James
Harry Haag James (March 15, 1916 – July 5, 1983) was an American musician who is best known as a trumpet-playing band leader who led a big band from 1939 to 1946. He broke up his band for a short period in 1947 but shortly after he reorganized and was active again with his band from then until his death in 1983. He was especially known among musicians for his technical proficiency as well as his Tone (musical instrument), tone, and was influential on new trumpet players from the late 1930s into the 1940s. He was also an actor in a number of films that usually featured his band. Early life Harry James was born in Albany, Georgia, United States, the son of Everett Robert James, a bandleader in a traveling circus, the Mighty Haag Circus, and Myrtle Maybelle (Stewart), an acrobat and horseback rider. He started performing with the circus at an early age, first as a contortionist at age of four, then playing the snare drum in the band from about the age of six. It was at this age ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Donald Meek
Thomas Donald Meek (14 July 1878 – 18 November 1946) was a Scottish-American actor. He first performed publicly at the age of eight and began appearing on Broadway in 1903. Meek is perhaps best known for his roles in the films '' You Can't Take It with You'' (1938) and ''Stagecoach'' (1939). He posthumously received a star on the Hollywood Walk of Fame in 1960. Early years Meek was born in Glasgow to Matthew and Annie Meek. In the 1890s, the Meek family emigrated to Canada and then to the United States. By 1900, they were living in Philadelphia where Meek was employed as a dry goods salesman, according to the United States census of that year with Meek later working on stage. Career Meek's Broadway credits include ''Take My Tip'' (1932), ''After Tomorrow'' (1931), ''Oh, Promise Me'' (1930), ''Broken Dishes'' (1929), in which he starred with a young Bette Davis, ''Jonesy'' (1929), ''Mr. Moneypenny'' (1928), ''The Ivory Door'' (1927), ''My Princess'' (1927), ''Spread Eagle ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Frank Jenks
Frank Jenks (November 4, 1902 – May 13, 1962) was an acid-voiced American supporting actor of stage and films. Biography Early years Jenks was born in Des Moines, Iowa, and his mother gave him a trombone when he was 9 years old. By his late teens he was playing with Eddie Peabody and his band. Later, he became a studio musician in Hollywood, California. Movie career Jenks began in vaudeville and went on to a long career in movies and television, mostly in comedy. He was one of the more familiar faces and voices of the Hollywood Studio era. For almost ten years beginning in the early 1920s, Jenks was a song and dance man in vaudeville. In 1933, when sound films had become the norm, and Broadway actors were moving to Hollywood in droves, Jenks's flat, sarcastic delivery landed him a film career. Usually a supporting actor, Jenks did appear occasionally as a film lead for low-budget films for PRC. Jenks appeared in not a few classics. In the Cary Grant-Rosalind Russell c ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Henry O'Neill
Henry O'Neill (August 10, 1891 – May 18, 1961) was an American film actor known for playing gray-haired fathers, lawyers, and similarly dignified roles during the 1930s and 1940s. Early years He was born in Orange, New Jersey. Career O'Neill began his acting career on the stage, after dropping out of college to join a traveling theatre company. He served in the Navy in World War I, after which he worked at several jobs, including being an usher in a funeral home. Eventually, he returned to the stage. His Broadway debut came in ''The Spring'' (1921), and his final Broadway appearance was in ''Shooting Star'' (1933). He also acted with the Provincetown Players and the Celtic Players. In the early 1930s he began appearing in films, including ''The Big Shakedown'' (1934), the Western ''Santa Fe Trail'' (1940), the musical ''Anchors Aweigh'' (1945), ''The Green Years'' (1946), and ''The Reckless Moment'' (1949). His last film was ''The Wings of Eagles'' (1957), starring J ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Henry Stephenson
Henry Stephenson (born Harry Stephenson Garraway; 16 April 1871 – 24 April 1956) was a British actor. He portrayed friendly and wise gentlemen in many films of the 1930s and 1940s. Among his roles were Sir Joseph Banks in ''Mutiny on the Bounty'' (1935) and Mr. Brownlow in '' Oliver Twist'' (1948). Life and career Stephenson was born to British parents in Grenada, British West Indies and educated in England. He started acting in his twenties. He appeared on British and American stages and made his Broadway debut in 1901, playing the messenger in ''A Message from Mars'' starring Charles Hawtrey. In the following decades, he performed in more than 30 Broadway plays. Stephenson made his film debut in 1917 and appeared in a few silent films, but made his mark mostly as an elderly man in sound films. Between 1931 and 1932, he appeared in the successful Broadway play ''Cynara'' with over 200 performances. He came to Hollywood for the film version of '' Cynara'', starring Ronal ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
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