| Jennifer
Jones News
2008
• 2006 • 2004
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• 1995
(Note:
An article about Jennifer Jones will appear in the May issue of
Film Comment by film scholar Miriam Bale)
Tribute
to Jennifer Jones at the Film Society of Lincoln Center
Saint
and Sinner: The Tempestuous Career of Jennifer Jones
May 16-24 at the Walter Reade Theater
NEW YORK,
April 23, 2008––The Film Society of Lincoln Center
returns to the Golden Age of Hollywood this spring, beginning
with Saint and Sinner: The Tempestuous Career of Jennifer
Jones at the Walter Reade Theater, May 16–24.
Opening with comedy auteur Ernst Lubitsch’s late masterpiece
Cluny Brown and including a new 35mm restoration of Michael
Powell and Emeric Pressburger’s Gone to Earth,
the series presents 14 classic films starring the award-winning
1940s and ’50s actor. Several special guests will introduce
selected films, including critics Molly Haskell and Andrew Sarris,
historian and Turner Classic Movies host Robert Osborne, Academy
Award-winning film editor Thelma Schoonmaker, producer Daniel
Selznick and Jennifer Jones biographer Edward Z. Epstein.
In addition
to spotlighting the myriad roles Jones portrayed throughout her
career, Saint and Sinner showcases some of cinema’s
most inventive and exciting directorial talents. These include
John Huston (Beat the Devil), Vincente Minnelli (Madame
Bovary), King Vidor (Duel in the Sun, Ruby Gentry),
William Wyler (Carrie), and Henry King, who directed
Jones in her first starring role, an Academy Award-winning performance
as a saintly French peasant persecuted for her reports of angelic
visitations in The Song of Bernadette.
“Jennifer
represented a woman of mystery,” says Joanna Ney, producer
of arts programming at the Film Society and the curator of the
series. “Her sui generis performances captured compassionate,
vulnerable and sometimes bitter heroines who were also—though
they did not mean to be—femme fatales, because her feminine
drive challenged the guy in question.”
Jennifer
Jones was born Phylis Isley in Tulsa, Okla., in 1919, taking the
experiences of her childhood in a show business family to New
York’s American Academy of Dramatic Arts. Though she met
and married her first husband, actor Robert Walker, in New York
in 1939, her attempts at breaking onto the stage were short-lived:
Jones appeared in her first Hollywood film, New Frontier,
a B-movie Western starring John Wayne, the same year as her wedding.
Soon discovered by mogul David O. Selznick, she rocketed to stardom
in The Song of Bernadette.
She soon
displayed a gift for comedy starring alongside Charles Boyer in
1946’s Cluny Brown (also showing as part of the
upcoming Film Society series “Charles Boyer and The Art
of Seduction,” May 23-27), as well as a remarkable talent
for melodrama, captivating audiences with her depictions of psychological
turmoil and vulnerability in such films as Madame Bovary
(1949), Gone to Earth (1950) and Carrie (1952).
Henry Koster’s Good Morning, Miss Dove (1955) attracted
Jones’s most remarkable advocate, author Henry Miller, who
praised the “other-worldly world” in which Jones lived
onscreen. “A world not unknown to tigers, llamas, unicorns
and the like. Thank God I have not yet seen all the films in which
Jennifer Jones starred...To me she is like a coin fresh from the
mint, whether playing the angel, the minx or just her thousand
year old self.”
Yet, the public
interest in Jones’s relationship with Selznick often outpaced
her reputation as talented and distinctive actress. The pair married
in 1949, while Jones appeared in such Selznick-produced projects
as Since You Went Away (1944), the boldly sexual Duel
in the Sun (1946) and Portrait of Jennie (1948).
She earned four additional Oscar nominations, the last coming
in 1956 for Love is a Many-Splendored Thing. Jones and
Selznick remained married until Selznick’s death in 1965.
By the late
’60s, Jones had virtually retired from Hollywood acting.
She married millionaire art collector Norton Simon in 1971, three
years before her final onscreen appearance in The Towering
Inferno. She remains active advocating for the rights of
the mentally ill and as a director of the Norton Simon Museum
in Pasadena.
A series
pass is available for Saint and Sinner: The Tempestuous Career
of Jennifer Jones combined with the Film Society’s
following series, “Charles Boyer an the Art of Seduction.”
The pass admits one person to a total of five titles in the two
series, May 16–27. They are $40; $30 for Film Society members,
and available only at the Walter Reade Theater box office (cash
only).
Single screening
tickets for the series are $11; $7 for Film Society members, students
and children (6-12, accompanied by an adult); and $8 for seniors
(62+). They are available at both the Walter Reade Theater box
office and online at www.filmlinc.com.
The Film
Society of Lincoln Center was founded in 1969 to celebrate American
and international cinema, to recognize and support new directors,
and to enhance the awareness, accessibility and understanding
of film. Advancing this mandate today, the Film Society hosts
two distinguished festivals: the New York Film Festival, which
annually premieres the best films from around the world and has
introduced the likes of François Truffaut, R.W. Fassbinder,
Jean-Luc Godard, Pedro Almodóvar, Martin Scorsese, and
Wong Kar-Wai to the United States, and New Directors/New Films,
co-presented by the Museum of Modern Art, which focuses on emerging
film talents. Since 1972 when the Film Society honored Charles
Chaplin, the annual Gala Tribute celebrates an actor, filmmaker
or industry leader who has helped distinguish cinema as an art
form. Additionally, the Film Society presents a year-round calendar
of programming at its Walter Reade Theater and offers insightful
film writing to a worldwide audience through Film Comment magazine.
Please note:
Due to construction work taking place around Lincoln Center, access
to the Walter Reade Theater is at 165 West 65th Street close to
Amsterdam Avenue. Once there, take the escalator, elevator or
stairs to the upper level.
Schedule at a Glance (Detailed Program Information Follows)
Friday, May 16
3:00 pm Ruby Gentry, 82m, with New Frontier, 54m
6:15 pm Cluny Brown, 100m
8:30 pm Duel in the Sun, 140m
Saturday, May 17
1:30 pm Since You Went Away, 172m
4:50 pm Ruby Gentry, with New Frontier
8:15 pm Gone to Earth, 110m
Sunday, May 18
1:30 pm The Song of Bernadette, 156m
4:30 pm Good Morning, Miss Dove, 107m
6:40 pm Portrait of Jennie, 86m
8:30 pm Carrie, 118m
Monday, May 19
1:00 pm Gone to Earth
3:15 pm Portrait of Jennie
Tuesday, May
20
1:00 pm Carrie
3:30 pm Beat the Devil, 89m
Wednesday, May 21
1:00 pm Madame Bovary, 115m
3:30 pm Duel in the Sun
6:15 pm Beat the Devil
8:15 pm Madame Bovary
Thursday, May 22
8:00 pm Tender Is the Night, 146m
Friday, May
23
2:30
pm Since You Went Away
6:00 pm Good Morning, Miss Dove
Saturday, May 24
2:30 pm Love Is a Many-Splendored Thing, 102m
Saint and Sinner: The
Tempestuous Career of Jennifer Jones
Detailed Program and Schedule Information
Beat
the Devil
John Huston, UK/US/Italy, 1953; 89m
Tue May 20: 3:30pm; Wed May 21: 6:15pm
This wacky film came
from a madcap production bordering on chaos. The treatment, written
by the book’s author Claud Cockburn, was scrapped and Huston
went on location without a script. At Selznick’s recommendation,
Truman Capote re-wrote the film as shooting progressed; a few
pages of dialogue were delivered to the director just before the
cameras rolled. The actors are said to have improvised many of
the scenes, not knowing what motivated their characters. But no
matter. Over the past decades the film has gained a cult status
and is still hugely entertaining.
The plot, such as it is, revolves around a fortune-hunting couple––Humphrey
Bogart and Gina Lollobrigida (struggling with her English)––
who join forces with a derelict group of men (Robert Morley and
Peter Lorre are priceless) to find a uranium-rich plot of land
in an African country. While waiting for their ship to depart
Italy, they run into another scheming couple (Edward Underdown
and Jennifer Jones), and they all race to lay claim to an elusive
fortune. Jones, sporting a blond wig and sunglasses, is easily
the scene-stealer of the film. She invests her character with
a Noel Coward-ish charm and an outrageous penchant for concocting
the biggest lies with the greatest aplomb.
Carrie
William Wyler, US, 1952; 118m
Introduced by Robert Osborne
Sun May 18: 8:30pm; Tue May 20: 1:00pm
This resplendent yet suitably dark adaptation of Dreiser’s
novel Sister Carrie, about two mismatched individuals confined
by a rigid class structure against which they recklessly rebel,
was written by husband-and-wife team Ruth and Augustus Goetz and
features two finely tuned characterizations by Laurence Olivier
and Jennifer Jones. In costumes by Edith Head, Jones’s Carrie
Meeber is a beautiful and gutsy girl whose sights are set on the
stage. Living meagerly with her sister in Chicago, she is taken
up by a good-time Charlie (Eddie Albert) who introduces her to
George Hurstwood (Olivier), a dapper restaurant manager saddled
with a rich, cold-hearted wife (Miriam Hopkins) and two children.
Smitten with Carrie, Hurstwood risks everything to keep her in
the style to which she would like to become accustomed, and a
tragedy unfolds. This stylish and emotionally compelling drama
is beautifully directed by Wyler (Wuthering Heights), with a heart-rending
performance by Olivier that is nothing short of miraculous. Jones
is no less impressive; as one critic said, “she looks as
if she stepped right out of the pages of the book.” Film
historian Robert Osborne will introduce the screening on Sunday,
May 18.
Cluny
Brown
Ernst Lubitsch, US, 1946; 100m
Introduced by Molly Haskell and Andrew Sarris
Fri May 16: 6:15pm
Ernst Lubitsch’s
late masterpiece Cluny Brown is a little-known, sophisticated
comedy romance with serious overtones and performances that bubble
with charm and wit. Cluny (Jennifer Jones), a plumber’s
niece sent to work as a servant at an English country estate,
refuses to acknowledge her station in life. She finds a kindred
spirit in Professor Belinski (Charles Boyer), a European intellectual
on the run from the Nazis. The two displaced souls form a bond,
though Cluny focuses her attentions on Mr. Wilson (the hilarious
Richard Haydn, who enlivened many Hollywood films in the ‘40s),
a pompous chemist attached to the apron strings of his dour mother
(the great Una O’Connor). Jones and Boyer, two utterly different
actors, are beautifully in-sync in this amusing tale of manners
and mores in upper crust England, as the two outsiders try to
accommodate themselves in an uncomfortable world where rule breakers
are not meant to dally with rule makers. Critics Molly Haskell
and Andrew Sarris will introduce the screening on Friday, May
16.
Duel
in the Sun
King Vidor, US, 1946; 140m
Introduced by biographer Edward Z. Epstein
Fri May 16: 8:30pm; Wed May 21: 3:30pm
Big, brawling,
engrossing and bizarre, Duel in the Sun was David O. Selznick’s
bid for a repeat success after his bonanza Gone with the Wind,
this time with Jennifer Jones starring as the torrid Pearl Chavez.
While nothing can match Wind for grandeur and romance, Duel in
the Sun is remarkable in its own way, “a lavish, sensual
spectacle, so heightened it becomes a cartoon of passion,”
as Pauline Kael wrote. The story, based on the “hot”
novel by Niven Busch, captures the feuding McCanleses, a ranching
family headed by patriarch Jackson (Lionel Barrymore) and his
long-suffering wife Laura Belle (Lillian Gish). King Vidor infuses
the expansive story with an undercurrent of social realism—the
tyranny of an older generation and the irresponsibility of the
new–– while the shoot-out finale still astonishes
with its operatic intensity. An uncredited Josef von Sternberg
also provided ideas, and, needless to say, Selznick’s thumbprint
is omnipresent: Cruelty and passion go hand in hand in this strangely
affecting and delirious romantic western affectionately (and derisively)
labeled “Lust in the Dust.” Co-starring Gregory Peck
as the spoiled Lew; Joseph Cotten as Jesse, the upstanding son;
and Walter Huston in an amusing cameo as The Sinkiller. Edward
Z. Epstein, author of Portrait of Jennifer: A Biography of
Jennifer Jones will introduce the screening on Friday, May
16.
Gone
to Earth Restored Print
Michael Powell & Emeric Pressburger, UK, 1950; 110m
Introduced by Thelma Schoonmaker
Sat May 17: 8:15pm; Mon May 19: 1:00pm
For this Technicolor
foray into romantic drama, the unbeatable team of Powell and Pressburger
adapted Mary Webb’s novel about a 19th-century Welsh gypsy
girl and her conflict between propriety, love and independence.
Headstrong Hazel Woodus (Jones) has an affinity for wild things
and cannot resist adventure, even after she has settled into a
passionless marriage with a minister (Cyril Cusack) who lives
with his mother (Sybil Thorndike). A tug-of-war soon develops
between Hazel’s affection for her husband and her carnal
desire for the rakish Jack Reddin (David Farrar). This spectacularly
beautiful film, shot by Christopher Challis with art direction
and production design by the Academy Award-winning team Arthur
Lawson and Hein Heckroth (The Red Shoes), is part fairy tale,
part Victorian melodrama and utterly breathtaking to behold. Jones
is impressive in a role virtually impossible to pull off, and
she gets wonderful support from the all-British and Welsh cast.
Thelma Schoonmaker, Oscar-winning editor and widow of Michael
Powell, will introduce the screening on Saturday, May 17.
Good
Morning, Miss Dove
Henry Koster, US, 1955; 107m
Sun May 18: 4:30pm; Fri May 23: 6:00pm
Miss Dove (Jones) is
an inspirational teacher who governs her New England classroom
by strict disciplinary rules. A distaff Mr. Chips with precise
Victorian speech and manners, she is respected and feared by several
generations of students. When she is suddenly hospitalized, the
concerned bystanders rally round to await the outcome, as the
teacher’s life unfolds in flashback.
Shot in color and Cinemascope, unabashedly sentimental yet never
stooping to the maudlin, Good Morning, Miss Dove was
hugely popular with audiences when it opened at the Roxy Theater
in New York. Jones’s remarkable performance made a surprising
impression on one admirer in particular: author Henry Miller.
“Had I seen nothing more than Good Morning, Miss Dove, I
would never have forgotten her,” he wrote. “I wait
to see Jennifer Jones, always certain of being thrilled and enchanted.”
Love
Is a Many-Splendored Thing
Henry King, US, 1955; 102m
Introduced by Daniel Selznick
Sat May 24: 2:30pm
Jones stars as Han
Suyin, a widowed Eurasian doctor who falls in love with American
news correspondent Mark Elliot (William Holden). The attraction
is mutual, but Elliot can’t obtain a divorce from his unhappy
wife. This barrier combines with the disapproval of Suyin’s
tradition-bound relatives and Hong Kong’s rigid racial laws
to force the couple into a clandestine romance, conducted mostly
on a grassy, windswept hill. As the film's memorable tagline puts
it, "In each other’s arms…they found a love that
defied 5,000 years of tradition!” Jones is radiant in this
romantic adaptation of Suyin's autobiographical novel, filmed
on location in Hong Kong by Jones-favorite Henry King (The Song
of Bernadette). She received her fifth Academy Award nomination
for her performance, while the film scored Oscars for costume
design, score and a title song written by Sammy Fain and Paul
Francis that was on in everyone’s lips in 1955. Leon Shamroy
provided the breathtaking color photography. Author and producer
Daniel Selznick, son of David O. Selznick, will introduce the
screening.
Madame
Bovary
Vincente Minnelli, US, 1949; 115m
Wed May 21: 1:00pm and 8:15pm
With the exception
of a heavy-handed framing device involving Gustave Flaubert’s
obscenity trial, Vincente Minnelli’s Madame Bovary
is the most faithful and affecting film version of the great 19th
century novel. Jones, allegedly fearful of taking on such a complex
role, is simply ravishing. The film perfectly captures Emma’s
girlish enthusiasm; her yearning and discontent; her insistent
desire to have it all regardless of the cost; and her final, brutally
punishing descent into tragedy. Possessing a seemingly intuitive
understanding of Flaubert’s work, Jones projects all of
her character’s contradictions–– warmth, vanity
(her extravagant shopping sprees are a hedonistic delight), the
desire but inability to be a good wife and mother, and an uncontrollable
romanticism when faced with a handsome new lover (Louis Jourdain)––in
a powerful performance that hits all the marks. Minnelli’s
exquisite ballroom waltz is a marvel of cinematography, choreography
and Jones’s delirious excitement. Co-starring Van Heflin,
Gene Lockhart, and James Mason as Flaubert, with a powerful score
by Miklós Rózsa.
Portrait
of Jennie
William Dieterle, US, 1948; 86m
Sun May 18: 6:40pm; Mon May 19: 3:15pm
Based on the
novella by Robert Nathan, Portrait of Jennie is a romantic
fantasy for the ages that has gathered a hefty cult with time.
The ethereal film (aided by Dmitri Tiomkin’s score, after
Debussy) follows penniless, struggling artist Eben Adams (Joseph
Cotten) and the strange girl (Jones) he meets in Central Park.
She seems to age each time he sees her. Is she real? Isn’t
the real Jennie Appleton long dead? Why has she entered his life?
These questions remain as elusive as the girl herself, whose portrait
Eben is compelled to paint.
Eben and Jennie’s story is a good example of David O. Selznick’s
determination to showcase the unusual talents of his latest star.
Jones enriches the slender tale with her otherworldly presence
as well as a contradictory matter-of-factness, as if these events
had to be real. Lucinda Ballard’s costumes for Jones create
a timeless air. Cotten, one of Jones’s favorite co-stars,
is splendid, along with Ethel Barrymore and Lillian Gish as a
sympathetic art dealer and a helpful mother superior who try to
solve his problems.
Ruby
Gentry
King Vidor, US, 1952; 82m
SCREENING WITH
New Frontier, aka Frontier Horizon
George Sherman, US, 1939; 54m
Fri May 16: 3:00pm; Sat May 17: 4:50pm
A narrow-minded town
in the Southern bayou is the setting for this moody, romantic
melodrama about an unconventional backwoods girl (a sultry Jennifer
Jones) who values her independence and follows her heart right
into a dark labyrinth of prejudice, hypocrisy and scandal. Harboring
a powerful love for Boake Tackman (a rugged Charlton Heston),
scion of a decaying blueblood clan, Ruby is too spirited and passionate
to hide her feelings, especially when the upwardly mobile Boake
plans to marry a more appropriate social equal. Enraged, Ruby
takes revenge by accepting an offer of marriage from tycoon Jim
Gentry (Karl Malden), and the die is cast for events to spring
out of control. With an award-winning score featuring Larry Adler
on harmonica, this no-holds-barred love story follows a pattern
of desire and revenge that played out successfully in Duel in
the Sun, making Jennifer Jones the most beautiful involuntary
sinner in screen history.
The final
entry in a classic B-movie serial about a trio of cowboys known
as The Three Mesquiteers, New Frontier stars John Wayne
in a story of manifest destiny colliding with the cruel hand of
industrial progress. He’s joined onscreen by newcomer Phylis
Isley, four years before she won an Oscar as Jennifer Jones.
Since
You Went Away
John Cromwell, US, 1944; 172m
Sat May 17: 1:30pm; Fri May 23: 2:30pm
An epic of
home and hearth based on a collection of letters written by Ohio
newspaper columnist Margaret Buell Wilder to her husband fighting
in World War II, Since You Went Away represents both
a Rorschach test of the period’s family values and an optimism
that turned bitter two years later in William Wyler’s more
realistic The Best Years of Our Lives. Claudette Colbert leads
the star-studded cast as a capable and courageous wife, the mother
of two grown daughters: the glowing Jane (Jones) and the zesty
Bridget (Shirley Temple), both on the verge of their first romantic
escapades. David O. Selznick wrote and produced the film, which
won the Academy Award for Best Score (Max Steiner) and earned
eight other nominations, including Best Picture, Best Actress
(Colbert) and Best Supporting Actress (Jones); the scene at the
railroad station when Jane says goodbye to her fiancé (Robert
Walker) is an unforgettable vignette, made even more poignant
by the estranged couple’s ironic reunion in casting. Since
You Went Away was a smash hit with audiences, grossing well over
four million dollars at a time when movie ticket prices were as
low as 25 cents. Co-starring Joseph Cotten, Hattie McDaniel, Agnes
Moorehead and Oscar-nominee Monty Woolley.
The
Song of Bernadette
Henry King, US, 1944; 156m
Sun May 18: 1:30pm
Based on Franz
Werfel’s hugely popular novel, The Song of Bernadette
was David O. Selznick’s special project and Jones, his 24-year-old
discovery, had the inside track despite the availability of other,
better-known actresses. The gamble paid off: Jennifer Jones astonished
the movie world with her radiant performance as Bernadette Soubirous,
a 19th-century French peasant girl who claimed to receive visitations
from The Lady and faced persecution as a lunatic and liar by her
disbelieving community.
Few films about faith achieve a sense of spirituality that reaches
believers and non-believers alike, and much of the credit for
this achievement here goes to Jones. She is the calm, unwavering
heart of the storm, as the villagers—the Dean of Lourdes
(Charles Bickford), the cold-hearted prosecutor (Vincent Price)
and a vitriolic nun (Gladys Cooper)––make Bernadette’s
life hell. The film was nominated for twelve Oscars, winning four:
art direction, cinematography (Arthur C. Miller), score (Alfred
Newman, though Stravinsky was the original hire), and Best Actress.
The award turned Jones into an overnight sensation. Co-starring
Anne Revere, Lee J. Cobb and a pregnant Linda Darnell as the Virgin
Mary, barely recognizable through all the veils.
Tender
Is the Night
Henry King, US, 1962; 146m
Introduced by Daniel Selznick
Thu May 22: 8:00pm
Screenwriter Ivan Moffat reported in David Thomson’s book
Showman that “David [Selznick] and Jennifer [Jones]
lived a life of considerable unreality, each giving the other
the illusion of what they wanted themselves to be.” An apt
description of the lead characters in this under-seen film, a
mostly faithful adaptation of Fitzgerald’s novel.
Nicole (Jones) and Dick Diver (Jason Robards, Jr.) are a couple
of wealthy expatriates who can’t live together and can’t
live apart; every night is a party that ends in disaster. But
that’s life on the Riviera in the 1920s, at least in this
lavish film, in which opulent sets, a beautiful score (the great
Bernard Herrmann), gorgeous costumes (Pierre Balmain for the leading
women) and stunning cinematography (Leon Shamroy) are catnip for
the less well-traveled. Jones, sporting a killer jazz-age hairdo
courtesy of George Masters, is not only stunning but extremely
effective with her mercurial mood swings that perfectly register
Nicole’s insecurity and instability. Robards is excellent
as Dick, not as romantic as Cary Grant or Montgomery Clift (both
were suggested by Selznick) but with a wry, solicitous disenchantment.
Joan Fontaine as Nicole’s sister Baby enlivens every scene
in which she appears. Author and producer Daniel Selznick, son
of David O. Selznick, will introduce the screening.
Film
fest focuses on Jones, Selznick
Norfolk,
Virginia, July 9, 2006
A FILM FESTIVAL
to showcase one of the more intriguing partnerships in film
history opens Monday, led by Virginian-Pilot movie critic Mal
Vincent.
A rare theatrical
screening of the spectacle "Duel in the Sun," starring
Jennifer Jones and produced by David O. Selznick, opens the
festival at 7:15 p.m.
It is the
first of six features in the Jennifer Jones-David O. Selznick
Film Festival, which runs for six consecutive Monday nights
at the Naro Expanded Cinema in Norfolk.
Jones, who
earned five Academy Award nominations and one subsequent Oscar,
remains one of the more mysterious and complex actresses in
film lore because she has seldom granted interviews. Her last
film was "The Towering Inferno" in 1974, yet her place
in film history grows. She now is chairman of the board of the
Norton Simon Museum in Pasadena, Calif., and is active in social
and charitable causes. She has been invited to the festival.
As the producer
of "Gone With the Wind" and "Rebecca," which
won best-picture Oscars for 1939 and 1940, Selznick was the
most powerful man in Hollywood when he signed the girl from
Oklahoma to an exclusive contract. She was married (to actor
Robert Walker) and the mother of two sons when she met the producer.
He spent the rest of his life promoting and managing her career.
They were married from 1949 until his death in 1965 - years
that included the major films of her career. Her marriage to
millionaire art collector Norton Simon came later.
"Duel
in the Sun," a steamy western released in 1946 about a
young woman who comes between two brothers, was initially panned
by critics but became a box office success. It has gained respect
over the years, and director Martin Scorsese said it influenced
film forever. It was made for the sole purpose of changing Jennifer
Jones' saintly image, which she acquired from playing the lead
role in "The Song of Bernadette."
"Duel
in the Sun" achieved that purpose. It was banned by censors
and the Catholic Church, although it was tame by today's standards.
The all-star
cast includes Gregory Peck, Virginia's own Joseph Cotten (a
native of Pet ersburg), Lionel Barrymore, Lillian Gish, Butterfly
McQueen, Herbert Marshall and Charles Bickford, with narration
by Orson Welles.
All screenings
will include discussions before and after the films, led by
Vincent. He will give talks on the real-life as well as the
on-screen intrigue of the Jones- Selz?nick pairing.
Naro managers
said the search for theatrical prints of the films has been
exhaustive, and this is likely the last time any of the films
will be seen in a theater and on the big screen.
The festival
will continue on July 24 with the MGM production "Madame
Bovary," in which Jones stars with Van Heflin and Louis
Jordan. "Love Is a Many Splendored Thing" screens
on July 31.
Aug. 7 is
North Carolina night with "Ruby Gentry" starring Jones
and Charlton Heston in a drama set in a small North Carolina
seaport town.
The families
of military veterans are honored with a screening of Selznick's
World War II drama of the home front, "Since You Went Away,"
on Aug. 14. It stars Jones with her then-husband Walker .
The festival
will close Aug. 21 with the film that made Jones a star and
won her the Academy Award, "The Song of Bernadette."
The complete
schedule is as follows:
July 17
– Duel in the Sun
July 24
Madame Bovary
July 31
Love is a Many-Splendored Thing
Aug. 7 Ruby
Gentry
Aug. 14
Since You Went Away
Aug. 21
Song of Bernadette
Selznick/Jones
home featured in new book
| HOLLYWOOD
LIFE features photos from LIFE photographer Eliot Elisofon
and contains 4 full page color photos of David Selznick
and Jennifer Jones' famous home on Tower Road (which sadly
is no longer in existence). In addition, there are essays
written about these fabulous homes. Of particular interest
here is an interview with Brooke Hayward (wife of Dennis
Hopper and daughter of Margaret Sullavan and Leland Hayward)
who lived in the guest house at Tower Road for several months
following a fire that destroyed her own home. She writes: |
|
"There
were these upside down Italian carafes suspended in ornamental
wrought iron holders with red wine poised on one side and white
wine on the other. You stuck your glass underneath whichever
color you wanted and a button released the wine. It was the
first time I'd really had expensive wine and normally when you
have really expensive wine, the wine bottle is put on the table
so you can see the label. Not here. Jennifer would never appear
at these parties until quite late in the evening. David O. would
assign a guest to be the hostess at each table. He was a fabulous
host. He just loved giving parties. We'd have dinner and Jennifer
would appear around dessert time, because she would have been
downstairs endlessly changing outfits. But then she would make
this fabulous entrance in this glamorous, gorgeous dress. She'd
sort of swish around down this long room saying hello. She would
not sit down. Then she'd go down to change again. Often, I saw
her in three or four different outfits by the end of the evening.
It was fabulous because it was everything that was left of old
Hollywood."
Another
snippet by designer Leonard Stanley:
"...Tony
(Duquette) and I were up at the Selznick's talking about doing
a few things in the living room. Jennifer went downstairs and
came back dragging on the floor four Charles James ball gowns
and the most beautiful dress from Christian Dior's second collection.
It was tulle and blue satin, and she said, "Well, I'll
never wear them again. Why don't we cut them up and make pillows."
Tony said, "Jennifer, these Charles James belong in a museum!"
David
O. Selznick Gets Hollywood Walk of Fame Star
by BOB THOMAS,
Associated Press Writer
Oct. 27,
2004
Even though
he produced "Gone with the Wind" and other movie classics,
David O. Selznick never had his own star on Hollywood's Walk
of Fame.
That oversight
was corrected Tuesday when the Producers Guild sponsored the
late producer's star on Hollywood Boulevard, a half-block from
Grauman's Chinese theater where many of his films played.
"David
Selznick should have been among the first 1,500 names when the
Walk of Fame was started in 1960," commented Walk impresario
Johnny Grant, adding that the event finally "remedied that
unbelievable omission."
Daniel Selznick,
who unveiled the star, admitted that "my father's feelings
were hurt that he wasn't included."
Two performers
from "Gone with the Wind" were among the small gathering
in front of the Roosevelt Hotel: Ann Rutherford, who played
Scarlett's sister, and Cammee King, the ill-fated young daughter
of Scarlett and Rhett Butler.
Rutherford
read letters from Olivia de Havilland, the wistful Melanie,
Selznick widow Jennifer Jones, and Rhonda Fleming, who was discovered
by the producer. "This giant among creators," de Havilland
wrote from Paris, "has enriched the lives of generation
after generation."
Rutherford
was asked if it was true that the actresses in "Gone with
the Wind" wore silk petticoats under their hoop skirts.
"Absolutely," she replied. "I told David he could
save a lot of money if he used flannel petticoats as I did in
westerns. He said maybe the audience wouldn't see the petticoats,
but the actresses would know they were silk."
Son of pioneer
filmmaker Lewis J. Selznick, David Selznick grew up in the movie
business and at 29 headed production at RKO studio when "King
Kong" was made and Katharine Hepburn became a star. He
moved to MGM, run by his father-in-law Louis B. Mayer, and produced
"David Copperfield," "Dinner at Eight,"
"Anna Karenina" and "A Tale of Two Cities."
Selznick
formed his own company, brought Alfred Hitchcock and Ingrid
Bergman to Hollywood, and made such films as "A Star Is
Born," "Rebecca," "Spellbound," "Duel
in the Sun" as well as "Gone with the Wind."
He died in 1965.
Jennifer
at the 75th Academy Awards!
It was very exciting
to see Jennifer, along with 58 previous Oscar winners,
in a special tribute at this year's Academy Awards ceremonies.
She looked wonderful! The tribute was in honor of the
Academy's 75th anniversary and was introduced by Olivia
de Havilland (looking fabulous herself at 86). |
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JJ's
first award?
Here's an interesting
bit of trivia - Bill Mayrath writes to me and sends this photo
of an award given to Phylis Isley by Pawnee Bill who had a Wild
Wild West Show that competed with and later merged with Buffalo
Bill. The award reads:
"On the 12th day of July,
1939, by authority of the Pawnee Indian Council and the Chiefs
of the Skidi Band of Pawnees - Phylis Isley was inducted into
the Pawnee Tribe for her distinguished accomplishments in the
entertainment world, reflecting great credit upon her native
state of Oklahoma and is hereby given the Indian name of "Red
Star".
Thank you Bill! And if anyone
would like a larger sized photo of the award (that you can actually
read), drop me an e-mail and I will forward it to you.
AFI Chooses Top
100 Romantic Films
"Love is a Many Splendored
Thing" was chosen as one of the Top 100 films (it ranked
#85). Hard to believe that "Portrait of Jennie" didn't
make it! (although it and "Love Letters" were among
the 400 films nominated). You can see AFI's complete list on
their web site
Jones
attends Peck wedding
(VARIETY, Sept. 17, 2001)
THEY FLEW IN FROM ALL OVER, but then were unable to wing out.
For the wedding of Cecilia Peck to Daniel Voll, guests arrived
from as far away as Bali and as near as Mexico for the Sept.
8 ceremony at the home of her parents Veronique and Gregory
Peck. Most of the guests were the close friends of the couple
but the showbiz contingent included Lauren Bacall and Jennifer
Jones Simon as well as the Pecks' poker-playing pals Barbara
Sinatra, Angie Dickinson, Felicia Lemmon and Pat and Larry Gelbart.
The ring bearer was the wedding couple's 2½-year-old son Harper
for the service performed by Rev. Jim Cavanaugh of St. Jerome's.
(Army Archerd)
Jones
to host Norton Simon Documentary event
Excerpted
from Variety, Nov. 28, 2000
Candice
Bergen, Gregory Peck and Jennifer Jones Simon will host guests
at the world premiere of "The Art of Norton Simon," the 30-minute
docu directed by Davis Guggenheim, produced by Charles Guggenheim
at the inauguration of the newly renovated Norton Simon Museum
Theater. The galleries, recently renovated by Frank Gehry, will
be open to guests … (Army Archerd) |