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Stepin Fetchit: The First Black Superstar
Article: Flaming Youth and the First Flapper
Written by Edward Lorusso
Background
In the 1920s, the term ?flapper? referred to a new breed of young
women who wore short skirts, bobbed their hair, listened to jazz, and flaunted
their disdain for what was then considered ?decent? behavior. Flappers were
seen as brash. They wore excessive makeup, drank hard liquor, treated sex in a
casual manner, smoked cigarettes and drove cars.
The cinematic image of the flapper was set in 1923 with the success of
a film called Flaming Youth. This
film practically defined the Roaring Twenties and shot Colleen Moore to
superstardom.
The Flapper
The plot was pretty basic: a woman begins living a frivolous lifestyle
because her husband neglects her. Seeing the error of her ways, she tries to
instill old-fashioned values in her youngest daughter Patricia (Colleen Moore),
but heart trouble leads to an early death for the mother. Patricia grows up to
be a flapper.
Patricia
has a series of adventures, including an open affair with her mother?s secret
boyfriend (Milton Sills). But Patricia
is hesitant to marry because of all the unhappy matches around her. She becomes
involved with a musician who traps her on a yacht (she is forced to jump into
the sea). She becomes gravely ill and recovers to marry her mother?s former
lover.
Despite
the ?traditional? ending, Flaming Youth
(novel and film) caused a sensation with its wild new character, one that
reigned throughout the 20s and into early talkies. The flapper practically
replaced the ?vamp? as the screen?s predominant female sex symbol. Moore, who
had been in films since the mid-teens in standard ?leading lady? roles, was
reborn with Flaming Youth. She cut
her hair into her trademark ?Prince Valiant? bob, wore short skirts and long
strings of beads. Talk about a makeover! Although Moore kept the trademark
hair-do, she moved on to a variety of roles for the rest of her career, leaving
the next round of silent flappers to the likes of Louise Brooks, Joan Crawford,
Clara Bow, Marion Davies, and Alice White.
The flapper was important in that it created a new
screen persona. Actresses of the day got away from playing virginal heroines
and spunky little girls. By the time Moore had catapulted to stardom in 1923,
it was already unthinkable that the flapper was the kind of part Mary Pickford
or Lillian Gish could play. And with one movie, their kind of parts became
terribly quaint in a 19th century way. The flapper was a new kind of
woman, one the post-war generation was ready for.
The ads for Flaming Youth were interesting because
they blatantly advertised the sexual content with ?How far can a girl go? She
smoked cigarettes. She drank. She went to petting parties?.?
The scene shown in the above
poster is filled with languid young people lounging together on floor cushions.
This is a far cry from the Victorian world of a generation before. Another
poster below shows Moore with bare shoulders in a cape-like outfit, which she?s
holding open in front.
In her autobiography, Silent Star, published in 1968, Moore
said that Flaming Youth was held over
in most American cities and was a huge hit overseas as well. With her new
superstar status, First National gave Moore a new contract for four films a
year, making $50,000 per picture. In 1924 Moore returned as The Perfect Flapper, marking her last
appearance in this sort of role. Moore would alternate between dramatic films
like So Big and Lilac Time and comedies like Ella
Cinders for the rest of her career.
The novel by Warner Fabian
(real name: Samuel Hopkins Adams) was a sensational best seller that rivaled
the popularity of Edith Hull?s racy novel, The
Sheik. Both books broke 19th century conventions to create new
types of male and female protagonists. But the flapper proved to be the more
durable type; one still recognized 80 years later. Fabian returned to the
flapper theme in The Wild Party, the
talkie debut for Clara Bow.
After a decade of headlines
like the one below from a 1922 New York
Times, the Great Depression temporarily silenced the flapper. Audiences
turned to other types of heroines that better fit the mood of the country. But
the resilient flapper came back in the 60s in the guise of, of all people,
Julie Andrews in Thoroughly Modern Millie,
which later became a hit Broadway musical. As the Flaming Youth poster asked: how far can a girl go?
Sad
Ending
One of the biggest and most influential films of
the 1920s, Flaming Youth ranks among
the most sought after ?lost? films of the silent era. Only one reel of the film
is known to exist (Library of Congress) even though it has been reported that
Moore donated a copy of the film to a museum in the 1960s to coincide with the
publication of Silent Star. That copy
has seemingly disappeared.
Jean Harlow. The name resonates. Platinum Blonde. Blonde Bombshell. The labels applied by press agents during Harlow's seven-year career carry a charge 70 years later. An actress who died in 1937 has currency in 21st-Century culture. Harlow's films make new fans, whether in revival theaters, on cable television, or on DVD. Vintage Harlow photographs sell for as much as $14,000, and camera negatives for as much as $50,000. Chat room fans debate the cause of her husband's suicide and that of her own death. The movies' first blonde sex symbol has become a legend. In fact, Harlow is the very prototype of all the blonde icons who have followed, from Marilyn Monroe to Jayne Mansfield, an original blueprint for glamour and tragedy. In this, the centennial year of Jean Harlow's birth, Harlow expert Darrell Rooney and Hollywood historian Mark Vieira team to present the most beautiful -- and accurate -- book on Harlow ever produced. With more than 280 images, Harlow in Hollywood makes a case for Harlow as an Art Deco artifact in an iconic setting. Harlow in Hollywood is the first book devoted to both the Harlow image and the city that spawned it. Click HERE to order!
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