Book Reviews

The greasepaint mustache, glasses, and long cigar are trademarks of one of the most recognized people in entertainment history: Groucho Marx. His persona was larger than life; his wisecracks left us with a million one-liners. The impression he made on… Continue Reading →

If you’re a classic film fan, you’ve undoubtedly seen the Billy Wilder masterpiece Sunset Boulevard. The film barely made it out of the 1940s to start a new decade, one that would be consumed by the new medium of television.… Continue Reading →

The first time I saw Harpo Marx, I was a young child watching a rerun of I Love Lucy. I remember being spellbound by the famous “mirror scene”, a routine I later learned had been done years before in a… Continue Reading →

As a child, Alma Rubens knew she would be famous. Her ambitions often came at the expense of her parents, John B. and Teresa Hayes Reubens, who worked hard to support her dreams, emotionally and financially. Around the age of… Continue Reading →

George Cukor’s A Star is Born starring Judy Garland and James Mason, released in 1954 by Warner Brothers was, for nearly 30 years, the Holy Grail for film enthusiasts. The 181 minute original release version had been chopped by the… Continue Reading →

She is known the world over as the beautiful witch, Glinda, who shows Dorothy that no matter how far she travels, there is no place like home. But long before this iconic role, she was the toast of Edwardian London,… Continue Reading →

He was a small-town man who lived a Hollywood dream: working for a storied movie studio and married to one of Hollywood’s biggest stars. But the dream turned into a nightmare in 1947 when he testified before the House Un-American… Continue Reading →

In her new memoir/biography My Judy Garland Life, author Susie Boyt identifies “the ‘gotcha moment’ . . . when Judy gets you and that’s just it for life.” I vividly remember mine. It was Sunday, June 22, 1969. I told… Continue Reading →

What would you do if you found out one afternoon that you were the granddaughter of Carole Lombard? For Cass McGowan, professor of film studies at Indiana University, it meant coming to terms with years of her mother’s lies about… Continue Reading →