25 Oct 2019
Motion Pictures, Radio, Recording, Television Permalink

Lou Costello

October 25, 2019

Louis Francis "Lou" Costello was an American actor and comedian best known as half of the comedy team of Abbott and Costello, with Bud Abbott. Costello was famous for his bumbling, chubby, clean-cut image that has appealed to many Americans over the decades, and for his shouted line of "HEEEEYYY ABBOTT!!."

Lou Costello was born Louis Francis Cristillo in Paterson, New Jersey to an Italian father from Calabria, and a mother of French and Irish ancestry. He attended School 15 in Paterson, NJ and was considered a gifted athlete. He excelled in basketball and reportedly was once the New Jersey state foul shot champion. He also fought as a boxer under the name "Lou King". He took his professional name from actress Helene Costello. "There was a girl named Helene Costello, and I took her name".

In 1927, Costello went to Hollywood to become an actor – but could only find work as a laborer or extra at MGM and Warner Brothers. His athletic skill brought him occasional work as a stunt man, notably in The Trail of '98,. He can also be spotted sitting ringside in the Laurel and Hardy film The Battle of the Century. In 1930, discouraged by his lack of success, he hitchhiked back home but ran out of money in Saint Joseph, Missouri during the Great Depression. He took a job as a Dutch-accented comic at a local burlesque theater. Changing his name to "Costello", he went back to New York and began working in vaudeville and burlesque theaters there.

25 Oct 2019
Recording Permalink

Lou Rawls

October 25, 2019

Louis Allen “Lou” Rawls was an American soul, jazz, and blues singer. He was known for his smooth vocal style: Frank Sinatra once said that Rawls had “the classiest singing and silkiest chops in the singing game”. Rawls released more than 70 albums, sold more than 40 million records, appeared as an actor in motion pictures and on television, and voiced-over many cartoons.

Rawls is the subject of an upcoming biopic, tentatively titled Love Is a Hurtin’ Thing: The Lou Rawls Story. Rawls’ son, Lou Rawls Jr., is the author of the script. Rawls will reportedly be portrayed by the actor Isaiah Washington. Rawls’ favorite expression was “Yeah buddy!”

Rawls was born on December 1, 1933 in Chicago and raised by his grandmother in the Ida B. Wells projects on the city’s South Side. He began singing in the Greater Mount Olive Baptist Church choir at the age of seven and later sang with local groups through which he met future music stars Sam Cooke, who was nearly three years older than Rawls, and Curtis Mayfield.

After graduating from Chicago’s Dunbar Vocational Career Academy, he sang briefly with Cooke in the Teenage Kings of Harmony, a local gospel group, and then with the Holy Wonders. In 1951, Rawls replaced Cooke in the Highway QC’s after Cooke departed to join The Soul Stirrers in Los Angeles. Rawls was soon recruited by the Chosen Gospel Singers and himself moved to Los Angeles, where he subsequently joined the Pilgrim Travelers.

25 Oct 2019
Motion Pictures, Radio, Television Permalink

Louella Parsons

October 25, 2019

Louella Parsons was an American gossip columnist who, for many years, was an influential arbiter of Hollywood mores, often feared and hated by the individuals, mostly actors, whose careers she could negatively impact via her radio show and newspaper columns.

She was born Louella Rose Oettinger in Freeport, Illinois, the daughter of Joshua Oettinger and Helen Stein, both of whom were Jewish. She had two brothers, Edwin and Fred, and a sister, Rae. In 1890, her widowed mother married John H. Edwards. They lived in Dixon, Illinois, later hometown of Ronald Reagan. While still in high school, Parsons obtained her first newspaper job when she became drama editor for the Dixon Morning Star.

She and her first husband, John Parsons, moved to Burlington, Iowa. Her only child, Harriet, who grew up to become a film producer, was born there. While in Burlington, Parsons saw her first motion picture, The Great Train Robbery. When her marriage broke up, Parsons moved to Chicago where she began writing movie scripts for Essanay Studios, once the home of Charlie Chaplin. Her small daughter, Harriet, was billed as "Baby Parsons" in several movies, which included The Magic Wand, written by Louella Parsons. She also wrote a book titled How to Write for the Movies.

25 Oct 2019
Motion Pictures, Recording Permalink

Louis Armstrong

October 25, 2019

Louis Daniel Armstrong nicknamed Satchmo or Pops, was an American jazz trumpeter and singer from New Orleans, Louisiana.

Coming to prominence in the 1920s as an "inventive" cornet and trumpet player, Armstrong was a foundational influence on jazz, shifting the music's focus from collective improvisation to solo performers. With his distinctive gravelly voice, Armstrong was also an influential singer, demonstrating great dexterity as an improviser, bending the lyrics and melody of a song for expressive purposes. He was also greatly skilled at scat singing, or vocalizing using syllables instead of actual lyrics.

Renowned for his charismatic stage presence and deep, instantly recognizable voice almost as much as for his trumpet-playing, Armstrong's influence extends well beyond jazz music, and by the end of his career in the 1960s, he was widely regarded as a profound influence on popular music in general.

Armstrong often stated in public interviews that he was born on July 4, 1900, a date that has been noted in many biographies. Although he died in 1971, it was not until the mid-1980s that his true birth date of August 4, 1901 was discovered through the examination of baptismal records.

25 Oct 2019
Motion Pictures, Television Permalink

Louis B. Mayer

October 25, 2019

Louis Burt Mayer was a Belarus-born American film producer. He is generally cited as the creator of the “star system” within Metro-Goldwyn-Mayer in its golden years. Known always as Louis B. Mayer and often simply as “L.B.”, he believed in wholesome entertainment and went to great lengths so that MGM had “more stars than there are in the heavens”.

Born Lazar Meir to a Jewish family in Minsk, today the capital of Belarus, then part of the Russian Empire, capital of the Minsk Province. His actual birthdate is unknown; a patriotic Mayer chose July 4 when he became an American citizen, to honor his adopted country. Mayer emigrated with his family to Saint John, New Brunswick, Canada when he was still very young, and Mayer attended school there. His father started a scrap metal business, J. Mayer & Son. His parents, Sarah and Jacob Mayer, had five children: Yetta, Ida, Louis, Jerry and Rudolph. In 1904, the 19-year-old Mayer left Saint John for Boston, where he continued for a time in the scrap metal business, married, and took a variety of odd jobs to support his family when his junk business lagged.

Mayer renovated the Gem Theater, a rundown, 600 seat burlesque house

in Haverhill, Massachusetts, which he reopened on November 28, 1907 as the Orpheum, his first movie theater. To overcome the unfavorable reputation that the building once had in the community, Mayer decided to debut with the showing of a religious film. Years later, Mayer would say that the premiere at the Orpheum was From the Manger to the Cross, although most sources place the release date of that film as 1912. Within a few years, he owned all five of Haverhill’s theaters, and, with Nathan H. Gordon, created the Gordon-Mayer partnership that controlled the largest theater chain in New England.

25 Oct 2019
Motion Pictures, Radio Permalink

Lois Weber

October 25, 2019

Lois Weber was an American silent film actress, producer and director, and was the first woman to direct a full-length feature film when she directed The Merchant of Venice in 1914.

Weber was born in Allegheny, Pennsylvania, where she was apparently an excellent pianist. She ran away from home hoping to pursue a singing career in New York City. After leaving home she lived in poverty and worked as a street-corner evangelist, preaching and singing hymns in New York and Pittsburgh. In 1905 she joined the Gaumont Film Company as an actor, and in 1906 married Gaumont manager Phillips Smalley.

In 1908 she landed a role in a film she had written called Hypocrites, which was directed by Herbert Blaché, husband of famous early filmmaker Alice Guy. Hypocrites was also the title of a 1915 film that Weber wrote, directed, produced — and starred in — which addressed social themes and moral lessons considered daring for the time. These films included abortion and birth control in Where Are My Children?, capital punishment in The People vs. John Doe, and alcoholism and drug addiction in Hop, the Devil's Brew. Because of their controversial nature, her films were often successful at the box office.

In 1916 she became Universal Studios' highest-paid director, and in 1917 she formed her own production company, Lois Weber Productions. Lois Weber was the only woman granted membership in the Motion Picture Directors Association. Film director John Ford worked with Weber as her assistant before making films on his own. One of Weber's most successful films from this period was The Blot with Claire Windsor and Louis Calhern, one of five films of Weber's released through Paramount Pictures.

25 Oct 2019
Motion Pictures, Recording Permalink

Lois Wilson

October 25, 2019

Lois Wilson was an American actress best known for her work during the silent film era.

Born in Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania, Wilson’s family moved to Alabama when she was still very young. After becoming a schoolteacher, Wilson moved to California when she won a beauty contest put on by Universal Studios in 1915. Upon arriving in Hollywood, she secured a small part in The Dumb Girl of Portici, which starred the ballerina Anna Pavlova.

After appearing in several films at various studios, Wilson settled in at Paramount Pictures in 1919, where she remained until 1927. She was a WAMPAS Baby Star of 1922, and all told, appeared in 150 movies. Her most recognized screen portrayals are Molly Wingate in The Covered Wagon and Daisy Buchanan in the silent film version of The Great Gatsby. She acted opposite such leading male stars of her era as Rudolph Valentino and John Gilbert.

Wilson played both romantic leads and character parts. Despite making a successful transition to sound, Wilson was dissatisfied with the roles she received in the 1930s and she soon retired in 1941, making only three films after 1939. Lois ventured to Broadway and television following her final role in The Girl From Jones Beach with Ronald Reagan. Wilson played in the network soap operas The Guiding Light in and The Edge of Night. She portrayed featured character roles.

25 Oct 2019
Motion Pictures Permalink

Lon Chaney, Sr.

October 25, 2019

Lon Chaney, nicknamed “The Man of a Thousand Faces,” was an American actor during the age of silent films. He was one of the most versatile and powerful actors of early cinema. He is best remembered for his characterizations of tortured, often grotesque and afflicted characters, and his groundbreaking artistry with film makeup.

Lon Chaney was born Leonidas Frank Chaney in Colorado Springs, Colorado, to Frank H. Chaney and Emma Alice Kennedy; his father had mostly English and some French ancestry, and his mother was of Irish descent. Both of Chaney’s parents were deaf, and as a child of deaf adults Chaney became skilled in pantomime. He entered a stage career in 1902, and began traveling with popular Vaudeville and theater acts. In 1905, he met and married 16-year-old singer Cleva Creighton and in 1906, their first child and only son, Creighton Chaney was born. The Chaneys continued touring, settling in California in 1910.

Marital troubles developed and in April 1913, Cleva went to the Majestic Theater in downtown Los Angeles, where Lon was managing the Kolb and Dill show, and attempted suicide by swallowing mercury bichloride. The suicide attempt failed and ruined her singing career; the ensuing scandal and divorce forced Chaney out of the theater and into film.

The time spent there is not clearly known, but between the years 1912 and 1917, Chaney worked under contract for Universal Studios doing bit or character parts. His skill with makeup gained him many parts in the highly competitive casting atmosphere. During this time, Chaney befriended the husband-wife director team of Joe De Grasse and Ida May Park, who gave him substantial roles in their pictures, and further encouraged him to play macabre characters.

25 Oct 2019
Motion Pictures, Television Permalink

Loretta Young

October 25, 2019

Loretta Young was an American actress. Starting as a child actress, she had a long and varied career in film from 1917 to 1953. She won the 1948 best actress Academy Award for her role in the 1947 film The Farmer’s Daughter, and received an Oscar nomination for her role in Come to the Stable, in 1950.

Young then moved to the relatively new medium of television, where she had a dramatic anthology series called The Loretta Young Show, from 1953 to 1961. The series earned three Emmy Awards, and reran successfully on daytime TV and later in syndication. A devout Catholic, Young worked with charities after her acting career.

She was born in Salt Lake City, Utah as Gretchen Michaela Young, of Luxembourgian descent. At confirmation, she took the name Michaela. She and her family moved to Hollywood when she was three years old.

Young and her sisters Polly Ann and Elizabeth Jane worked as child actresses, of whom Loretta was the most successful. Young’s first role was at the age of three, in the silent film The Primrose Ring. The movie’s star Mae Murray so fell in love with Young that she wanted to adopt her. Although her mother declined, Young was allowed to live with Murray for two years. During her high school years, Young was educated at Ramona Convent Secondary School.

25 Oct 2019
Motion Pictures, Television Permalink

Lorne Greene

October 25, 2019

Lorne Greene, was the stage name of Lyon Himan Green, OC, a Canadian actor.

His television roles include Ben Cartwright on the western Bonanza, and Commander Adama in the science fiction TV Series Battlestar Galactica. He also worked on the Canadian television nature documentary series Lorne Greene's New Wilderness, and in television commercials as a dog food spokesman.

Greene was born in Ottawa, Ontario to Russian Jewish immigrants, Daniel and Dora Green. He was called "Chaim" by his mother, and his name is shown as "Hyman" on his school report cards. In his biography, the author, his daughter Linda Greene Bennett, stated that it was not known when he began using "Lorne", nor when he added an "e" to Green.

Greene began acting while attending Queen's University in Kingston, where he also acquired a knack for broadcasting with the Radio Workshop of the university's Drama Guild on the campus radio station CFRC. He gave up on a career in chemical engineering and, upon graduation, found a job as a radio broadcaster for the Canadian Broadcasting Corporation .