News

André Bishop will conclude his 33-year leadership tenure at Lincoln Center Theater in June 2025 at the conclusion of the non-profit theater company’s 40th anniversary 2024-25 season.

Bishop, whose celebrated tenure as Lct’s Artistic Director and more recently Producing Artistic Director included the premieres of such acclaimed new works as Tom Stoppard’s The Coast of Utopia and Arcadia, Christopher Durang’s Vanya and Sonia and Masha and Spike, Wendy Wasserstein’s The Sisters Rosensweig, and The Light in the Piazza by Craig Lucas and Adam Guettel, to name a very few, announced his intended departure today.

“My years at Lincoln Center Theater have been happy ones,” he said in a statement, “and I will miss working with all my friends and colleagues. But the time has come, as it inevitably does, for the next generation to step in and step up. I look forward to that. Lct has...

Plenty of actors have played Abraham Lincoln well, but the actor still most associated with the role is Raymond Massey, who starred in Robert E. Sherwood’s Pulitzer Prizewinning play. The film version was not a hit, as Sherwood’s aim is to capture the melancholy, even the foreboding, of a man who was a natural for politics. In this reading Lincoln tries to resist his ‘call to greatness’ knowing he’s letting himself in for an unhappy life. The Warner Archive’s restoration retrieves the film from old 16mm prints, restoring James Wong Howe’s handsome cinematography.

Abe Lincoln in Illinois

Blu-ray

Warner Archive Collection

1940 / B&w / 1:37 Academy / 110 min. / Spirit of the People / Available at Amazon.com / General site Wac-Amazon / Street Date , 2022 / 21.99

Starring:

Raymond Massey, Gene Lockhart, Ruth Gordon, Mary Howard, Minor Watson, Alan Baxter, Harvey Stephens, Howard da Silva, Dorothy Tree, Louis Jean Heydt, Clem Bevans, Herbert Rudley,...

Looking back from the 21st century, it's hard to see Humphrey Bogart as anything less than a skilled, accomplished actor. With such a wide body of influential work, it's no surprise that Bogart has made a lasting impact and inspired the next generation of actors. But things didn't always look so good for the suave actor, especially when he was just starting out.

Despite the myriad of successes that Bogart would later experience on the big screen, the actor got his start on Broadway, working on plays like "Meet the Wife" and "Invitation to a Murder." Though he worked on a few films during this time, the majority of Bogart's early success came from stage work. However, the sudden onset of heavy debts would soon put the actor under considerable stress, significantly jeopardizing his career.

Bogart's father, Belmont Bogart, passed away in 1934, a very difficult situation under any circumstances. Unfortunately,...

Humphrey Bogart was not one to mince words. He was a plain-spoken man who excelled at playing plain-spoken characters. When he deigned to opine on a particular subject, you could be absolutely certain that you were getting Bogie's unvarnished take. So when the mega-star of "The Maltese Falcon," "Casablanca" and "The Big Sleep" unloaded on the upstart medium that was television in the 1950s, rest assured he meant every withering word.

What prompted Bogie's ire? It started in 1955, when he agreed to star in a televised production of Robert E. Sherwood's drama "The Petrified Forest." Bogart was reprising the role...

The post Humphrey Bogart Would Have Rather 'Dug Ditches' Than Taken His Career To TV appeared first on /Film.

Having paid my 8.50 to see Top Gun: Maverick last weekend, my local cineplex inadvertently improved my appreciation of the film. For three minutes the sound clicked off and, minus dialogue, I was instantly caught up in the soaring jets, hyper-caffeinated cast and the durable charisma of its star. Then sound returned, the story unfolded and reality set in: This is not really a plot but a superbly crafted business plan, half video game and half military recruitment film. It’s the perfect structure for a Tom Cruise genre-bashing blockbuster.

Historians may ultimately cite the movie as a turning point — the film that reignited audiences, young and old, to pay homage to their movie palaces. FiIm critics may also single out the Top Gun sequel as a defiant reinvention of the classic war genre.

Does it measure up to the classics? Sure it does, but only Cruise would set out to...

On Christmas Eve 1951, NBC aired the very first “Hallmark Hall of Fame” with the world premiere of Gian Carlo Menotti’s Christmas opera “Amahl and the Night Visitors.” Rosemary Kuhlman and 12-year-old Chet Allen starred in this Peabody and Christopher Award-winning holiday story of the three Magi who stay with a young physically disabled boy and his widowed mother on their way to Bethlehem to find the Christ child. The presentation was so popular, the cast reprised their roles the following April. The production was done three more times in the 1950s on NBC, but Bill McIver played Amahl because Allen’s voice had changed.

The “Hallmark Hall of Fame,” which would air on NBC, ABC and CBS and is now exclusively on the Hallmark Channel, is the longest-running primetime series in TV history. In the past 70 years it has won over 80 Emmy Awards and dozens of Peabody Awards, Golden Globes,...

A special two-part episode. From the movie Werewolves Within, director Josh Ruben discusses a few of his favorite movies. Then, Werewolves Within writer Mishna Wolff plays a game of “find the woman” in some of her favorite movies.

Show Notes: Movies Referenced In This Episode Josh Ruben:

Werewolves Within (2021)

Werewolves On Wheels (1971) – Adam Rifkin’s trailer commentary

Wrath of Man (2021)

Trapped Ashes (2006)

The ’Burbs (1989) – Ti West’s trailer commentary

The Fly (1986)

To My Great Chagrin: The Unbelievable Story of Brother Theodore (2007)

Road To Perdition (2002)

Stephen King’s Cat’s Eye (1985)

Nightmare On Elm Street Part III: Dream Warriors (1987)

Flight of the Navigator (1986)

Grease (1978)

Honey I Blew Up The Kid (1992)

Big Top Pee-Wee (1988)

A History of Violence (2005)

The Dead (1987)

The Peanut Butter Solution (1985)

Irreversible (2002)

Hunter Hunter (2020)

Man Bites Dog (1992)

The Human Centipede: The First Sequence (2009)

A Serbian Film (2010)

Planes Trains And Automobiles (1987)

Lost In Translation (2003)

JFK (1991)

Home Alone (1990)

The Second Civil War (1997) – Glenn...

Mulan and Star Trek: Deep Space Nine star Rosalind Chao chats about a few of her favorite movies with Josh & Joe.

Show Notes: Movies Referenced In This Episode

Mulan (2020)

The Joy Luck Club (1993)

The Seven Year Itch (1955)

Mary Poppins (1964)

The Sound Of Music (1965)

My Fair Lady (1964)

Gremlins (1984)

Explorers (1985)

Funny Girl (1968)

What’s Up Doc? (1972)

The Heartbreak Kid (1972)

The Graduate (1967)

Midnight Run (1988)

Rosemary’s Baby (1968)

The Lonely Guy (1984)

Waiting For Guffman (1996)

Best In Show (2000)

Hamilton (2020)

Fast Times At Ridgemont High (1982)

Misery (1990)

Paris, Texas (1984)

Buena Vista Social Club (1999)

sex, lies and videotape (1989)

The Shining (1980)

Matewan (1987)

Thousand Pieces of Gold (1990)

Lost In Translation (2003)

Mean Streets (1973)

On The Rocks (2020)

Somewhere (2010)

Adaptation (2002)

Mandy (2018)

Possessor (2020)

Midsommar (2019)

The Wicker Man (1973)

Hereditary (2018)

The Lighthouse (2019)

Other Notable Items

The Scott Alexander podcast episodes

Tfh Guru Larry Karaszewski

Star Trek franchise

The It’s A Small World ride

Disneyland

University of the Arts

Star Trek: The Next Generation (1987-1994)

Star Trek: Deep Space Nine...

Vivien Leigh would’ve celebrated her 105th birthday on November 5, 2018. The two-time Oscar inner made only a handful of films before her untimely death in 1967 at the age of 53. Yet several of those titles remain classics. In honor of her birthday, let’s take a look back at 10 of her greatest films, ranked worst to best.

Born in British India, Leigh appeared in a number of roles on both the stage and screen in England, including a production of “Hamlet” opposite her husband, Laurence Olivier.

She came to international attention after landing the coveted role of Scarlet O’Hara in David O. Selznick’s massive adaptation of Margaret Mitchell‘s bestseller “Gone with the Wind” (1939). Leigh was far from the first choice to embody the headstrong Southern belle who pines after a married man (Leslie Howard) while wedding another (Clark Gable) against the backdrop of the Civil War. Yet the...

This article marks Part 2 of the Gold Derby series reflecting on films that contended for the Big Five Oscars – Best Picture, Best Director, Best Actor, Best Actress and Best Screenplay (Original or Adapted). With “A Star Is Born” this year on the cusp of joining this exclusive group of Oscar favorites, join us as we look back at the 43 extraordinary pictures that earned Academy Awards nominations in each of the Big Five categories, including the following 11 films that scored a single prize among the top races.

More than eight decades prior to Bradley Cooper’s take on the timeless tale, the first “A Star Is Born” (1937), headlined by Fredric March and Janet Gaynor, became the third motion picture, following “Cimarron” (1931) and “It Happened One Night” (1934), to earn nominations in the Big Five Oscar categories.

At the 10th Academy Awards ceremony, however, neither March nor Gaynor emerged triumphant, losing in their...

The Coen brothers' recent Hail Caesar! may have seemed pretty bold in featuring both a Roman sword-and-sandal epic and a water ballet musical in its story of old Hollywood chicanery, but in 1955 MGM went several steps further in producing Jupiter's Darling, which is simultaneously a Roman epic and a water ballet musical, starring the queen (and sole proponent) of the latter genre, Esther Williams.One of the perplexing things about the genius of the system, whereby a studio apparatus geared to make crowd-pleasing entertainment also produced, on a fairly regular basis, great cinematic art as a kind of incidental by-product (incidental except to the artists employed) is that often the mass audience, which was the ultimate arbiter of taste, would get things badly wrong. Thus Keaton's The General, his bravest and best film, was a commercial flop, and thus the climax of the Williams water-and-song cycle proved to be an...

Norma Shearer films Note: This article is being revised and expanded. Please check back later. Turner Classic Movies' Norma Shearer month comes to a close this evening, Nov. 24, '15, with the presentation of the last six films of Shearer's two-decade-plus career. Two of these are remarkably good; one is schizophrenic, a confused mix of high comedy and low drama; while the other three aren't the greatest. Yet all six are worth a look even if only because of Norma Shearer herself – though, really, they all have more to offer than just their top star. Directed by W.S. Van Dyke, the no-expense-spared Marie Antoinette (1938) – $2.9 million, making it one of the most expensive movies ever made up to that time – stars the Canadian-born Queen of MGM as the Austrian-born Queen of France. This was Shearer's first film in two years (following Romeo and Juliet) and her first release following husband Irving G.

Norma Shearer films Note: This article is being revised and expanded. Please check back later. Turner Classic Movies' Norma Shearer month comes to a close this evening, Nov. 24, '15, with the presentation of the last six films of Shearer's two-decade-plus career. Two of these are remarkably good; one is schizophrenic, a confused mix of high comedy and low drama; while the other three aren't the greatest. Yet all six are worth a look even if only because of Norma Shearer herself – though, really, they all have more to offer than just their top star. Directed by W.S. Van Dyke, the no-expense-spared Marie Antoinette (1938) – $2.9 million, making it one of the most expensive movies ever made up to that time – stars the Canadian-born Queen of MGM as the Austrian-born Queen of France. This was Shearer's first film in two years (following Romeo and Juliet) and her first release following husband Irving G.

'Saint Joan': Constance Cummings as the George Bernard Shaw heroine. Constance Cummings on stage: From sex-change farce and Emma Bovary to Juliet and 'Saint Joan' (See previous post: “Constance Cummings: Frank Capra, Mae West and Columbia Lawsuit.”) In the mid-1930s, Constance Cummings landed the title roles in two of husband Benn W. Levy's stage adaptations: Levy and Hubert Griffith's Young Madame Conti (1936), starring Cummings as a demimondaine who falls in love with a villainous character. She ends up killing him – or does she? Adapted from Bruno Frank's German-language original, Young Madame Conti was presented on both sides of the Atlantic; on Broadway, it had a brief run in spring 1937 at the Music Box Theatre. Based on the Gustave Flaubert novel, the Theatre Guild-produced Madame Bovary (1937) was staged in late fall at Broadway's Broadhurst Theatre. Referring to the London production of Young Madame Conti, The...

Billy Wilder directed Sunset Blvd. with Gloria Swanson and William Holden. Billy Wilder and Charles Brackett movies Below is a list of movies on which Charles Brackett and Billy Wilder worked together as screenwriters, including efforts for which they did not receive screen credit. The Wilder-Brackett screenwriting partnership lasted from 1938 to 1949. During that time, they shared two Academy Awards for their work on The Lost Weekend (1945) and, with D.M. Marshman Jr., Sunset Blvd. (1950). More detailed information further below. Post-split years Billy Wilder would later join forces with screenwriter I.A.L. Diamond in movies such as the classic comedy Some Like It Hot (1959), the Best Picture Oscar winner The Apartment (1960), and One Two Three (1961), notable as James Cagney's last film (until a brief comeback in Milos Forman's Ragtime two decades later). Although some of these movies were quite well received, Wilder's later efforts – which also included The Seven Year Itch...

Raymond Massey ca. 1940. Raymond Massey movies: From Lincoln to Boris Karloff Though hardly remembered today, the Toronto-born Raymond Massey was a top supporting player – and sometime lead – in both British and American movies from the early '30s all the way to the early '60s. During that period, Massey was featured in nearly 50 films. Turner Classic Movies generally selects the same old MGM / Rko / Warner Bros. stars for its annual “Summer Under the Stars” series. For that reason, it's great to see someone like Raymond Massey – who was with Warners in the '40s – be the focus of a whole day: Sat., Aug. 8, '15. (See TCM's Raymond Massey movie schedule further below.) Admittedly, despite his prestige – his stage credits included the title role in the short-lived 1931 Broadway production of Hamlet – the quality of Massey's performances varied wildly. Sometimes he could be quite effective; most of the time, however, he was an unabashed scenery chewer,...

Teresa Wright in 'Shadow of a Doubt': Alfred Hitchcock heroine (image: Joseph Cotten about to strangle Teresa Wright in 'Shadow of a Doubt') (See preceding article: "Teresa Wright Movies: Actress Made Oscar History.") After scoring with The Little Foxes, Mrs. Miniver, and The Pride of the Yankees, Teresa Wright was loaned to Universal – once initial choices Joan Fontaine and Olivia de Havilland became unavailable – to play the small-town heroine in Alfred Hitchcock's Shadow of a Doubt. (Check out video below: Teresa Wright reminiscing about the making of Shadow of a Doubt.) Co-written by Thornton Wilder, whose Our Town had provided Wright with her first chance on Broadway and who had suggested her to Hitchcock; Meet Me in St. Louis and Junior Miss author Sally Benson; and Hitchcock's wife, Alma Reville, Shadow of a Doubt was based on "Uncle Charlie," a story outline by Gordon McDonell – itself based on actual events.

‘Rome, Open City’ movie returns: 4K digital restoration of Roberto Rossellini masterpiece at London’s BFI Southbank (photo: Anna Magnani in ‘Rome, Open City’) A restored digital print of Roberto Rossellini’s best-known film, Rome, Open City / Roma, città aperta is currently enjoying an extended run — until April 5, 2014 — at London’s BFI Southbank. Inspired by real-life events and made right after the liberation of Rome, Rome, Open City stars Aldo Fabrizi, Anna Magnani, Marcello Pagliero, and Maria Michi. Though not a local box office hit at the time of its release, Rome, Open City, shot with a minuscule budget in the ravaged streets of Rome, became one of the most influential movies ever made. Its raw look, "documentary" feel, and scenes shot on location (though studio sets were used as well) inspired not only other Italian directors of the post-war years, but filmmakers everywhere, including those in Hollywood (e.g.

Joan Fontaine today: One of the best actresses of the studio era has her ‘Summer Under the Stars’ day Joan Fontaine, one of the few surviving stars of the 1930s, is Turner Classic Movies’ "Summer Under the Stars" star today, Tuesday, August 6, 2013. I’m posting this a little late in the game: TCM has already shown six Joan Fontaine movies, including the first-rate medieval adventure Ivanhoe and the curious marital drama The Bigamist, directed by and co-starring Ida Lupino, and written by Collier Young — husband of both Fontaine and Lupino (at different times). Anyhow, TCM has quite a few more Joan Fontaine movies in store. (Photo: Joan Fontaine publicity shot ca. 1950.) (TCM schedule: Joan Fontaine movies.) As far as I’m concerned, Joan Fontaine was one of the best actresses of the studio era. She didn’t star in nearly as many movies as sister Olivia de Havilland, perhaps because...

When you’re looking to put together a movie collection, it doesn’t hurt if you happen to be Warner Brothers. If the collection you’re after is classic gangster movies, you’re really in luck.

For fans of the genre, especially those looking to upgrade titles to Blu-Ray, the new Ultimate Gangsters Collection: Classics is one you’ve got to get your hands on. Not only do you get some of the films that helped create the genre, and have become the foundation upon which countless movies are built, but the extras are worth the price on their own.

The collection here comes at you like a history lesson, not just of the genre, but of film. Little Caesar, with Edward G. Robinson setting the stage for all future gangsters with “short man syndrome,” but struggling mightily against the production theories of the day, is not only a classic treasure,...

Ultimate Gangster Collection — Classics

Little Caesar

The Public Enemy

The Petrified Forest

White Heat

Due Out: May 21, 2013

The “Ultimate Gangster Collection: Classics“ and “Ultimate Gangster Collection: Contemporary” are available on Blu-ray 5/21

Who’S It For?

This collection is for anyone who gets excited for a gangster flick. The look of each film is fantastic, especially considering the age of these movies. Just being able to own (and compare) Little Caesar and The Public Enemy is worth the price alone. Little Caesar has every single cliché that Hollywood is still using for its gangster films. It doesn’t hold up compared to modern movies, but that’s the point of watching it. With Little Caesar these aren’t exactly clichés, but new attempted techniques. The Public Enemy completely holds up. It’s an amazing character study brought to life by the brilliant Cagney. Seeing the intro, explaining that Hollywood is against...

Nikolaj Arcel is set to direct Dreamworks' remake of Alfred Hitchcock's 1940 Rebecca film, scripted by Steven Knight (Eastern Promises). Deadline reports that Tim Bevan and Eric Fellner's Working Title are producing the film. The original was adapted by Philip MacDonald and Michael Hogan, from the screen play by Robert E. Sherwood and Joan Harrison, based on the Daphne Du Maurier novel. Sir Laurence Olivier and Jane Fontaine starred in the film which tells of a naive young woman marries a rich widower and settles in his gigantic mansion, she finds the memory of the first wife maintaining a grip on her husband and the servants.

Nikolaj Arcel is set to direct Dreamworks' remake of Alfred Hitchcock's 1940 Rebecca film, scripted by Steven Knight (Eastern Promises). Deadline reports that Tim Bevan and Eric Fellner's Working Title are producing the film. The original was adapted by Philip MacDonald and Michael Hogan, from the screen play by Robert E. Sherwood and Joan Harrison, based on the Daphne Du Maurier novel. Sir Laurence Olivier and Jane Fontaine starred in the film which tells of a naive young woman marries a rich widower and settles in his gigantic mansion, she finds the memory of the first wife maintaining a grip on her husband and the servants.

With Father’s Day coming up, it makes perfect sense for Warner Bros. to look to the past, and release two impressive Blu-ray collections. Ultimate Gangster Collection Classic and Ultimate Gangster Collection Contemporary should make plenty of men happy*.

*Women are also allowed to be happy by this news.

Here is the news release…

Burbank, Calif., March 11, 2013 – As part of the studio’s 90th Anniversary celebration, eight of Warner Bros. Pictures’ greatest gangster films – from Edward G. Robinson’s 1931 classic Little Caesar to Martin Scorsese’s Oscar-winning masterpiece The Departed– will now be available in two Blu-ray sets May 21. Released to coincide with Father’s Day gift-giving, the WB genre greats, along with one of Paramount’s best gangster films, will be offered in the Ultimate Gangster Collection: Classic and Ultimate Gangster Collection: Contemporary.

The four films in the Classic Collection have been remastered for their Blu-ray debuts. They include...

Rebecca

Directed by Alfred Hitchcock

Written by Robert E. Sherwood

1940, USA

Another crucial film in the villain’s gallery (believe it or not there is a method to my madness) that haunts Hitchcock’s career is Rebecca, his first American film since his emigration in 1939, just as Europe was plunged into inferno and genocide. Based on the novel of Daphne du Maurier whom Hitchcock had previously adapted with Jamaica Inn the year before and would return to again with the avian carnage of The Birds a quarter of a century later Rebecca is a dark, sweeping, gothic romance of an innocent and slightly naive woman swept into the arms of high society and privilege, of dark secrets and forbidden desires locked in remote rooms and fragile hearts. Famously the film won the Academy Award for best picture and began a rather tortured working collaboration between Hitchcock and the prodigious American super-producer David O.

Emmy-winning CBS reporter Mike Wallace, a key member of the "60 Minutes"team has died. He was 93 years-old. Mr. Wallace, who passed away Saturday night, had a long broadcast journalism career that spanned more than half a century. The Associated Press reports Mr. Wallace died at a care facility in New Canaan, Conn. CBS announced the newsman's death on "CBS Sunday Morning," and a prepared obituary was aired as part of "Face of Nation." Wallace earned 20 Emmys, including a lifetime achievement nod in 2003, as well as a Peabody Award and a Robert E. Sherwood Award during his career. A rep for "60 Minutes" said the program will devote its April 15 edition to a tribute...

Every month the Sound On Sight staff bands together to tackle a specific filmmaker, event and/or some sort of movie related theme. This month our focus shifts towards the “Master of Suspense”, Alfred Hitchcock.

Rebecca

Directed by Alfred Hitchcock

Screenplay by Robert E. Sherwood

U.S.A., 1940

The inspiration to write about Rebecca and how it treats its female character came after reading a fascinating article from a fellow Sound on Sight contributor, Cath Murphy, who earlier this month wrote The Trouble With Hitchcock, which explored the clues to the director’s possible misogynistic tendencies. It was a great read and in no way is the current article meant to serve specifically as a rebuttal post.

When asked to name a few of the terrific thespians which graced the screen for Alfred Hitchcock during the director’s illustrious career, John Stewart, Cary Grant, Gregory Peck and Laurence Olivier are...

Hollywood has been running out of ideas since filmmakers started making movies in Hollywood. Even the first "official" movie made in Hollywood proper, Cecil B. DeMille's 1914 Western The Squaw Man, wasn't an original story. DeMille's Western was based on Edwin Milton Royle's play. And prior to that, there had been movie shorts with titles such as The Squaw and the Man (1910), Cow-boy and the Squaw (1910), and The Squaw Man's Sweetheart (1912). So, no one should be too surprised that remakes, adaptations, and reboots have been Hollywood staples for decades. And here's another remake in the works: DreamWorks and Working Title Films are to revisit (or reboot, as the case may be) Alfred Hitchcock's 1940 Best Picture Oscar winner Rebecca, which starred Laurence Olivier and Joan Fontaine. As per Variety, Eastern Promises' screenwriter Steven Knight will use Daphne Du Maurier's novel as the source for the project, sort...

Alfred Hitchcock’s 1940 suspense drama Rebecca was recognized as one of Hollywood’s best a long time ago but that didn’t stop DreamWorks and Working Title Films from announcing a new remake of Daphne du Maurier’s best-selling novel about the young wife of a British landowner haunted by the memory of her husband’s beautiful first wife. Variety reported today that writer and director Steven Knight signed on to adapt Du Maurier’s novel and promised a new adaptation truer in spirit to Du Maurier’s story than the script Robert E. Sherwood and Joan Harrison wrote for Hitchcock.

Alfred Hitchcock’s 1940 suspense drama Rebecca was recognized as one of Hollywood’s best a long time ago but that didn’t stop DreamWorks and Working Title Films from announcing a new remake of Daphne du Maurier’s best-selling novel about the young wife of a British landowner haunted by the memory of her husband’s beautiful first wife. Variety reported today that writer and director Steven Knight signed on to adapt Du Maurier’s novel and promised a new adaptation truer in spirit to Du Maurier’s story than the script Robert E. Sherwood and Joan Harrison wrote for Hitchcock.

Alfred Hitchcock’s 1940 suspense drama Rebecca was recognized as one of Hollywood’s best a long time ago but that didn’t stop DreamWorks and Working Title Films from announcing a new remake of Daphne du Maurier’s best-selling novel about the young wife of a British landowner haunted by the memory of her husband’s beautiful first wife. Variety reported today that writer and director Steven Knight signed on to adapt Du Maurier’s novel and promised a new adaptation truer in spirit to Du Maurier’s story than the script Robert E. Sherwood and Joan Harrison wrote for Hitchcock.

Philip French enjoys an account of Humphrey Bogart's journey from a troubled, wealthy family to movie royalty

Born in the last days of the Victorian era into a well-established New York family, Humphrey Bogart went from riches to even greater riches as he became one of Hollywood's highest-paid actors. His father was a wealthy, Yale-educated doctor addicted to alcohol and morphine, his mother a successful magazine illustrator and heavy drinker, and they were constantly at each other's throats. Emerging from this troubled household Humphrey became a rebellious figure at his exclusive prep school and then in the navy, where he acquired the famous scar on his upper lip, possibly when struck while escorting a fellow sailor to jail but, more likely, in a brawl – certainly not, as claimed, in battle. He was later to remark that he was "Democrat in politics, Episcopalian by upbringing, dissenter by disposition".

He sampled...

Director Peter Bogdanovich.

Interviewing Peter Bogdanovich for the April 2002 issue of Venice Magazine was a thrill for me. Like Francis Coppola, John Frankenheimer, and William Friedkin before him, Bogdanovich was one of those filmmakers whose one-sheets hung on my bedroom walls growing up. Plus the fact that he himself had a renowned career as a film historian and interviewer of his own childhood heroes, such as John Ford, Howard Hawks, Orson Welles, and dozens of others, made our talk a real feast.

Not long after the article was printed, I received a letter with a New York City postmark. The note enclosed said simply: “Dear Alex, thanks for doing your homework so well, and thanks for the good vibes. All the best to you of love and luck, Peter Bogdanovich.”

Our chat remains one of my favorites during my 15 year tenure as a film writer. --A.S.

Peter Bogdanovich’S...

With all the consternation lately over the supposed death of film criticism, there’s been a lot of pushback from some quarters, from those who appear to consider themselves lovers of film and film criticism who nevertheless celebrate what looks like the end of an institution. Critics today are, these alleged purists maintain, too personal, too political, too damn opinionated, and this is why the art and craft is dying. If only all these critics who are losing their jobs had been like the objective, professional critics of old, these folks insist, criticism would be flourishing. For the Love of Movies: The Story of American Film Criticism should be required viewing for anyone who wants to comment on the state of film criticism today: as critic turned filmmaker Gerald Peary’s documentary demonstrates, the field has been chock full of personality clashes, political posturing, conflicts of interest, and damned opinionated voices since forever.

By Wrap Staff

The diabolical Dr. No has died. Joseph Wiseman, who played the sinister title character in the first James Bond movie, was 91. The Canadian-born actor had been in declining health for the last several years, according to his daughter Martha Graham Wiseman. Wiseman had a long career on stage and screen before appearing opposite Sean Connery in 1962’s “Dr. No.” He made his Broadway debut in 1938 in Robert E. Sherwood's "Abe Lincoln in Illino...

Intiman Theatre and Town Hall Seattle?s Center for Civic Life will co-present a dramatic reading of selections from the Lincoln-Douglas Debates on Tuesday, September 22 from 7:30-9 pm as part of Intiman?s American Cycle series and its production of Robert E. Sherwood?s play Abe Lincoln in Illinois. Actors Erik Lochtefeld and R. Hamilton Wright will take a night off from rehearsal to read the words of Abraham Lincoln and Stephen A. Douglas, the characters they will play in Intiman?s forthcoming production.

Intiman Theatre, under the leadership of Artistic Director Bartlett Sher and Managing Director Brian Colburn, announces its upcoming Front Porch Theater series of readings from Robert E. Sherwood's Abe Lincoln in Illinois. The Pulitzer Prize-winning play, which will be produced as part of Intiman's American Cycle in the fall, is an epic drama about the man who became president, spanning the years in which Lincoln grew to take responsibility for his conscience and his country.

Intiman Theatre, under the leadership of Artistic Director Bartlett Sher and Managing Director Brian Colburn, announces the first public events scheduled for its new American Cycle, which launches this fall with Robert E. Sherwood's play Abe Lincoln in Illinois, directed by Sheila Daniels. Intiman's largest annual initiative, the American Cycle includes productions of great American stories and free-standing programs that offer opportunities for people to talk, laugh, argue and ask questions about how ideas of the play on the Intiman stage connect to our shared history, their own experiences and the challenges of our lives today.

Intiman Theatre, under the leadership of Artistic Director Bartlett Sher and Managing Director Brian Colburn, announces the first public events scheduled for its new American Cycle, which launches this fall with Robert E. Sherwood's play Abe Lincoln in Illinois, directed by Sheila Daniels. Intiman's largest annual initiative, the American Cycle includes productions of great American stories and free-standing programs that offer opportunities for people to talk, laugh, argue and ask questions about how ideas of the play on the Intiman stage connect to our shared history, their own experiences and the challenges of our lives today.

The Rules of the Game by Jean Renoir Film Gone with the Wind d: Victor Fleming; scr: Sidney Howard Le Jour se lève / Daybreak d: Marcel Carné; scr: Jacques Viot, Jacques Prévert Midnight d: Mitchell Leisen; scr: Billy Wilder, Charles Brackett Mr. Smith Goes to Washington d: Frank Capra; scr: Sidney Buchman Ninotchka d: Ernst Lubitsch; scr: Billy Wilder, Charles Brackett, Walter Reisch The Old Maid d: Edmund Goulding; scr: Casey Robinson The Rains Came d: Clarence Brown; scr: Philip Dunne, Julien Josephson La Règle du jeu / The Rules of the Game d: Jean Renoir; scr: Jean Renoir, Carl Koch The Women d: George Cukor; scr: Anita Loos, Jane Murfin Laurence Olivier, Merle Oberon in Wuthering Heights Check These Out Bachelor Mother d: Garson Kanin; scr: Norman Krasna Beau Geste d: William A. Wellman; scr: Robert Carson Hello Janine d: Carl Boese; scr: Hans Fritz Beckmann, Karl Georg Külb The...

Intiman Theatre, under the leadership of Artistic Director Bartlett Sher and Managing Director Brian Colburn, announces that Abe Lincoln in Illinois will conclude its 2009 season - the year of the Lincoln Bicentennial - under the direction of Sheila Daniels, Intiman's Associate Director. Robert E. Sherwood's epic play, winner of the Pulitzer Prize, will launch Intiman's second American Cycle, a series of large-cast plays and free community programs. Through great plays and conversations at Intiman and throughout the Puget Sound region, the American Cycle bring artists and audiences together to share the issues and hopes we feel in our community and as citizens of our country at this moment in its history.