Intl. Notebook

October 4 2018

PERFECT QUEMISTRY

The women they talked about then.

It took us a while but we finally find out where the covers of O Seculo Ilustrado we’ve been sharing came from. They originate at a Wordpress blog called Ilustração Portugueza. It hasn’t been active since January 2017, so it looks like we missed our chance to send them some traffic, but at least the images remain up for now. The above cover hit newsstands today in 1947 and features a triptych of Vera Zorina, Yvonne DeCarlo, and Lucille Ball labeled as “Tres mulheres de quem se fala,” which means “Three women we’re talking about.” They were so good we’re still talking about a couple of them. If you want to see the other covers we posted just click the magazine’s keywords below.

Portugal, O Seculo Ilustrado, Vera Zorina, Yvonne DeCarlo, Lucille Ball

Hollywoodland

September 5 2017

NOW YOU V IT

You know how movie stars sometimes say they wish they could be anonymous? Welcome to the cover of V.

This issue of V was published today in 1948 and features art by Jean David, which accompanies, as always, celeb content and bit and pieces of French culture. As we’ve noted before, writers like Hilary Conquest and others often don’t bother to identify the movie stars in these issues because they’re ancillary to the text. For example, the story “Pour l’amour de Tex Julia,” talks about actual women of the Old West, with photos of Jane Russell and others serving merely to illustrate. However the magazine does at least identify Barbara Bates, Juliette Greco, Yvonne DeCarlo, and Olga San Juan. You can probably guess where we’re heading with all this—the person on the cover is unidentified. The editors always did this, and it’s a bit maddening. Yes, we know—we should recognize this person, us being a nostalgia website and all, but there are a lot of vintage actresses. It’s difficult to know all their faces definitively. Have an idea on this one? Drop us a line.

France, Warner Bros., V Magazine, Jean David, Jane Russell, Barbara Bates, Juliette Greco, Yvonne DeCarlo, Olga San Juan, magazine art

Vintage Pulp

August 31 2017

WHAT A DOPPIO

Why did Lancaster cross the mob? To get to DeCarlo's side.

This is a beautiful poster for Doppio Gioco, better known as the U.S. film noir Criss Cross, with Burt Lancaster and Yvonne DeCarlo. We were unable to determine who painted the piece, but it’s a bang-up job. As for the movie, Burt Lancaster comes up with one of the classic terrible ideas in film noir history, and that’s really saying something, because the genre practically hinges on cockamamie schemes. We talk about it in our brief write-up of the film here. Doppio Gioco opened In Italy today in 1949.

Italy, Doppio Gioco, Criss Cross, Burt Lancaster, Yvonne DeCarlo, poster art, cinema, film noir

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HISTORY REWIND

The headlines that mattered yesteryear.

February 12

1961—Soviets Launch Venus Probe

The U.S.S.R. launches the spacecraft Venera 1, equipped with scientific instruments to measure solar wind, micrometeorites, and cosmic radiation, towards planet Venus. The craft is the first modern planetary probe. Among its many achievements, it confirms the presence of solar wind in deep space, but overheats due to the failure of a sensor before its Venus mission is completed.

February 12

1994—Thieves Steal Munch Masterpiece

In Oslo, Norway, a pair of art thieves steal one of the world’s best-known paintings, Edvard Munch’s “The Scream,” from a gallery in the Norwegian capital. The two men take less than a minute to climb a ladder, smash through a window of the National Art Museum, and remove the painting from the wall with wire cutters. After a ransom demand the museum refuses to pay, police manage to locate the painting in May, and the two thieves, as well as two accomplices, are arrested.

February 11

1938—BBC Airs First Sci-Fi Program

BBC Television produces the first ever science fiction television program, an adaptation of a section of Czech writer Karel Capek’s dark play R.U.R., aka, Rossum’s Universal Robots. The robots in the play are not robots in the modern sense of machines, but rather are biological entities that can be mistaken for humans. Nevertheless, R.U.R. featured the first known usage of the term “robot”.

February 10

1962—Powers Is Traded for Abel

Captured American spy pilot Gary Powers, who had been shot down over the Soviet Union in May 1960 while flying a U-2 high-altitude jet, is exchanged for captured Soviet spy Rudolf Abel, who had been arrested in New York City in 1957.

February 9

1960—Woodward Gets First Star on Walk of Fame

Actress Joanne Woodward receives the first star on the Hollywood Walk of Fame, the Los Angeles sidewalk at Hollywood Boulevard and Vine Street that serves as an outdoor entertainment museum. Woodward was one of 1,558 honorees chosen by the Hollywood Chamber of Commerce in 1958, when the proposal to build the sidewalk was approved. Today the sidewalk contains more than 2,800 stars.

February 9

1971—Paige Enters Baseball Hall of Fame

Satchel Paige becomes the first player from America’s Negro Baseball League to be voted into the Major League Baseball Hall of Fame in Cooperstown, New York. Paige, who was a pitcher, played for numerous Negro League teams, had brief stints in Cuba, Mexico, Puerto Rico, and the Major Leagues, before finally retiring in his mid-fifties.