Kylie

According to the British website metro.co.uk, the Australian-born singer Kylie will be changing her look. "Great news for fans of Kylie ' her UK dates may have sold out in minutes but fans are in for a treat as I reveal she is planning various stage and theatrical looks for her latest stage show, including a nod to the 1920s via Louise Brooks & Jean Harlow."

Movie Made America

Recently finished reading Movie Made America, by Robert Sklar. Its a "cultural history of American movies." Its also one of the best, and most interesting histories of film I have ever read. Highly recommended!

More in Film of the Golden Age

The previous issue of Films of the Golden Age contained an illustrated article on Louise Brooks (by the acclaimed children's book author Jan Wahl). I hope everyone got a copy. It's a swell article.

The current issue, dated Summer 2006, contains three references to the actress, or her films. The first is a letter to the editor by author Dan Navarro commenting on Wahl's piece. The second is an article on Hollywood's Geraghty family. Thomas Geraghty co-wrote the screenplay for the 1926 Brooks' film It's the Old Army Game, and Brooks was acquianted with his wife, actress Carmelita (though that is not mentioned). The third reference comes in an interview with author Richard Lamparski, author of the well known Whatever Became of . . . ? series of books. In the interview, Lamparski comments, "I couldn't have used any of them in the old series. People didn't want to know the things in these stories about their stars. Louise Brooks told me that people don't want the truth about the stars." Lamparski had profiled Brooks in the third book in the series.

[ The magazine also contains an advertisement for a new book on Ford Sterling, who appeared in two films with Brooks. I am looking forward to that book. ]

Incomparable song styles of Louise Brooks

The incomparable song styles of Louise Brooks - cocktail lounge singer in the Chicago area circa 1968. Distinctly different. Who knew?

Bibliographic notes

A few inter-library loans have come in recently - though just as many were "declined" as there were no libraries or archives who had the material I requested. The publications I looked at included two small-town newspapers from Missouri, the St. Joseph News-Press and the Cape Girardeau Southeast Missourian - each of which yielded Denishawn articles and reviews. The Cape Girardeau was especially rich in material - there was even a large front page article on the Denishawn dancers on the day of their performance, and an even larger front page review the day after. I also got some Denishawn articles and reviews from the Niagra Falls Gazette. I also found reviews for a few films in this New York newspaper. I also looked through Nyugat, a publication from Budapest, Hungary - but found nothing. And, my request for the Ottumwa Daily Courier was declined. Does anyone who read this blog live near that Iowa town?

Lately, I have spent a bit of time adding to and updating the bibliographies for The Street of Forgotten Men and Just Another Blonde, as I have acquired a number of scattered articles, reviews and advertisements from other sources.

Anti-Chaplin cartoon

And here's yet another interesting item I ran across at the library last week, and anti-Chaplin cartoon from 1927.