Beloved character actor Peter Scolari (b. 1955) has left us too soon and as always I thought I would chime in with an appreciation that fills in some of the more obscure cracks that other eu…
SOURCE: Trav S.D. at 09:54AMYou may be inclined, as I often am, to mix up Jordan Christopher (Jordan Christopher Zankoff, 1940-1996) with Christopher Jones (star of Wild in the Streets). No doubt the two did some scrap…
SOURCE: Trav S.D. at 06:42PMDuring the first year of Covid, we binge watched The Love Boat, and that is how we became aware of Korean American comedian Johnny Yune (Yoon Jong Seung, 1936-2020). I didn’t know it at th…
SOURCE: Trav S.D. at 08:54AMI became aware of John Sheehan (1885-1952) because he co-starred in the 1934 Educational short Trimmed in Furs with Louise Keaton, Buster’s sister. Born in Oakland, Sheehan acted with stoc…
SOURCE: Trav S.D. at 08:54AMSaturday October 23, 12-4pm is Tin Pan Alley Day in NYC! I will now do appropriate homage by supplying you with a clattering cacophony of links. My brand new article for Chelsea Community Ne…
SOURCE: Trav S.D. at 08:54AMDancer and actress Barrie Chase (b. 1933) has MANY notable screen credits but of COURSE we are going to foreground her memorable turn opposite Dick Shawn in It’s a Mad, Mad, Mad, Mad World…
SOURCE: Trav S.D. at 09:06AMThe barriers to resumption of NYC cultural life seem to be rapidly melting as the Covid rate goes down and the vaccination rate (here at least) goes up. This week Chelsea Community News publ…
SOURCE: Trav S.D. at 03:36PMJust some very brief jottings on producer Hal B. Wallis (Aaron Blum Wolowicz, 1898-1986). Wallis’s rapid rise in the movie business was the very definition of what it means to get in on th…
SOURCE: Trav S.D. at 09:03AMOctober 19 is the natal day of the much-missed Divine (Glenn Milstead, 1945-1988). As Lon Chaney was to Todd Browning, so was Divine to John Waters, both muse and star at the heart of his wo…
SOURCE: Trav S.D. at 07:54AMWell pleased we were with yesterday’s Gatsby Fest, organized by Destination Great Neck, a literal stone’s throw from the house where F. Scott Fitzgerald wrote a good chunk of The Great G…
SOURCE: Trav S.D. at 05:42PMOh, how Hollywood loved blonde Northern European model/actresses in the ’60s. I knew of many of them because they were still around in the ’70s when I was a kid, woman like Elke Sommer (…
SOURCE: Trav S.D. at 12:12PMRoy Stewart (1883-1933) starred in over 100 silent films, most of them westerns, but I am personally most interested in the beginning of his career, for that is when he acted in some of the …
SOURCE: Trav S.D. at 02:18PMPhyllis Gordon (1889-1964) was mostly a supporting player during her brief heyday — in our visiually focused age, she is primarily known for a couple of flashy publicity stunts. Gordon was…
SOURCE: Trav S.D. at 02:18PMA few words of apprecation this morning for Ann Guilbert, or Ann Morgan Guilbert (1928-2016). Guilbert enjoyed a sort of charmed career. She went from being a key cast member in the popular …
SOURCE: Trav S.D. at 07:42AMAttention paid today to poet, novelist, historian and activist Helen Hunt Jackson (Helen Maria Jackson, 1830-1885), best known today for her 1884 novel Ramona, which was adopted for the Amer…
SOURCE: Trav S.D. at 09:42AMFrustrating, but amusing — if you Google “Dick Bernie”, you will get pictures of 94 year old Dick Van Dyke championing Bernie Sanders for President, or clips of Bernie Mac saying “Gi…
SOURCE: Trav S.D. at 08:36AMWe are delighted to report that our friend Lynn Sally (whom I initially knew as the burlesque performer “Dr. Lucky”) has just hit the market with a tremendous new book entitled Neo-Burle…
SOURCE: Trav S.D. at 08:36AMI was very jazzed last night to, through the good graces of the estimable Allen Lewis Rickman (Boardwalk Empire, A Serious Man, and the reigning king of Yiddish theatre), attend the invited …
SOURCE: Trav S.D. at 10:42AMI’m pretty sure that I have never heard a better name for a performing little person than Dolleta Boykin (Dolly Dodd, 1881-1948). Not just Doll like the Doll Family, but “Dolletta”, an…
SOURCE: Trav S.D. at 10:42AMI’m not certain if I would otherwise have done a post on singer/actor Yves Montand (Ivo Levi, 1921-1991) before I learned of his early years. In America, we thought of him as one of a hand…
SOURCE: Trav S.D. at 07:24AMThere are fewer than two dozen film acting credits in the dossier of Jean Wallace (Jean Walaceck, 1923-1990). Yet hers is a story worth knowing for show biz buffs I think. Wallace was raised…
SOURCE: Trav S.D. at 11:42AMBuster Brodie (Max Broida, 1885-1948) billed himself as “The Hairless Man”, but he had an additional distinguishing characteristic: he was only 4′ 9 1/2″ tall, making an almost littl…
SOURCE: Trav S.D. at 09:18AMBy happy coincidence, the natal day of Chief Caupolican (Emile Barrangon, 1876-1968) falls on Indigenous Peoples Day this year. Chief Caupolican was believed to have been a member of the Map…
SOURCE: Trav S.D. at 09:18AMWe hope you will forgive the split nature of this portmanteau-post, which is intended to do double duty as a capsule biography of Madame Tussaud (Anna Maria Grosholtz, 1761-1850) and a revie…
SOURCE: Trav S.D. at 04:54PMAlastair Sim (1900-1976) rarely stirred from his “right little, tight little island”, spent more time on stage than screen, and jealously guarded his private life. As a consquence, he is…
SOURCE: Trav S.D. at 02:42PMWe are apt to think of Elmer Calvin “Hank” Patterson (1888-1975) as a rube comedian on account of his long standing role as Fred Ziffel, proprietor of Arnold the Sentient Pig on the Paul…
SOURCE: Trav S.D. at 10:24AMBefore the Floradora Girls, the Ziegfeld Girls, or the Goldwyn Girls, there were the Gaiety Girls. These were the creation of West End impresario George Edwardes (1855-1915). Edwardes had le…
SOURCE: Trav S.D. at 09:32AMIn his day, Hoosier poet James Whitcomb Riley (1849-1916) was known as “America’s Best Loved Poet”. Today, I fear that most English departments regard his work as primitive kitsch and …
SOURCE: Trav S.D. at 07:18PMEvery person who aspires to write film scores should know the name Louis F. Gottschalk (1863-1934). He was the first guy to do it, at least the first to compose complete scores; prior to him…
SOURCE: Trav S.D. at 07:18PMWhile Lyle Tuttle (1931-2019) could easily have exhibited himself in sideshows, he did not. He was a guy who made many sideshow artists possible. Tuttle himself sported a full tattoo “body…
SOURCE: Trav S.D. at 08:32AMThree cheers today for hard-working character actor Jerome Cowan (1897-1972). Cowan appeared in over 200 films and TV productions; if you don’t know the name, I hope you know that face fro…
SOURCE: Trav S.D. at 11:42AM
