"Midnight Mary" (MGM 1933, with Franchot, Loretta Young, Ricardo Cortez, Andy Devine and Una Merkel) will be available on DVD on March 24.
It's part of the "Forbidden Hollywood Collection, Volume Three" (available at Amazon) from TCM Archives and Warner Home Video.
DVDTown.com offers a great review here.
This blog post was originally published on my old LiveJournal blog on April 23, 2003.
I was very pleased/excited/grateful this week to receive a rare vhs copy of She Knew All The Answers! It's a loaner from the collection of a local Franchot Fan who has been extremely helpful and kind in sharing her "finds" with me over the years. This is one of the few FT films that I haven't seen, and after guffawing through it tonight, I must say it was well worth the wait.
She Knew All The Answers with Joan Bennett (Columbia/1941)
Franchot plays a stuffy Wall Street investment banker who refuses to allow his charge to marry a chorus girl (played by Joan Bennett) because he assumes she is a gold-digger even though he has never met her. In order to get Franchot to approve of her, Joan tricks him into hiring her on at his firm without telling him who she really is, and of course they end up falling in love.
Despite the predictable storyline, I was completely charmed with Franchot's performance. He portrayed his character's development from a business-minded grouch into a man who discovers his own heart with equal parts humor and vulnerability. Joan wasn't too shabby either, heh. ;)
Sometimes I fell like I'm walking a thin line between reporting what critics said about a film sixty years ago, and editorializing based on how I react to it from a movie fan and FT expert's point of view today. It was fun to watch the tape tonight without sneaking a refresher peek at the review file beforehand. (As it turns out, The New York Times found it agreeable, noting that Franchot was in "fine form.")
Seeing as I'm targeting my book to anyone with Turner Classic Movies on their cable channel lineup, I'm becoming more comfortable with interjecting my own Joe Average takes on Franchot's acting into the text. When I first started this project I felt like I should become a film scholar of sorts and analyze his work like a professional "critic." But in truth, I'm just a fan who likes to be entertained. And tonight, I was. So now I have something else to add to the manuscript - hurrah!
Ever wonder where your favorite classic film star lived and worked, and what the properties look like today? Maybe you're not a old movie buff, and you'd like this type of information for contemporary celebrities?
Then I highly recommend The Movieland Directory, a relatively-new database containing thousands upon thousands of addresses - brought to you by my pals E.J. and Tony, the Brothers Fleming.
Based on E.J.'s expertly-researched book of the same title (an invaluable Hollywood history resource that I've used time and time again) the site contains thousands of addresses dating back to the pioneering days of Tinseltown. It's continually being updated and all addresses are searchable and cross-referenced by person, place, film/tv title and category.
MSN's Virtual Earth provides satellite images for each address, with 45-degree-angle views of buildings and neighborhoods, street map overlays, and the ability to zoom out to see what each property looks like from space.
Additionally, a blog has been recently added where E.J. will be sharing some insights and inside stories behind his research.
Kudos guys on a job very well done! A great site for historians, local lookie-loos and tourists alike.
Found: Mr. Samuel Sylvan Simon, as discussed in the previous post. Thanks to my friend, Mark Masek, for joining me on the adventure today!
Sadly, I've learned that SSS's widow passed away last fall, but I have found information leading to the whereabouts of their son and daughter. They were very young when he died but I'm hoping they will speak with me anyway; perhaps over the years they heard stories about their father and Franchot.
It's mindboggling to fathom that I'm four years older than he was when he died, and that his mortal remains have been in that niche ten years longer than I've been on this earth. I look at his name every day, on the framed poster for I Love Trouble that hangs on the wall next to my desk. Now, he's more real to me.
RIP, Mr. Simon. I promise to take good care of your memory by telling your part in Franchot's story well.
PS-A big THANK YOU to my friend AJ Marik at FindAGrave.com for adding my pictures to SSS's memorial page today, too!
See more photos in this FLG GM 3/19/2006 Flickr Album.
There's nothing like picking up a new scent on the Franchot trail to make a girl feel perky again! Back in November I was 99.9% sure the man shown in a photograph I have with Franchot and Lucille Ball was producer S. Sylvan Simon, one of Franchot's business partners.
Now I know for sure, it's him. YAY!
*Sooo digging the bowtie*
SSS has been on My List for a long while, but since there's always so much on that list, I haven't given him that much attention, sorry to say. Anyway, his name was brought up in the audio version of King Cohn, Bob Thomas' 1967 biography of cranky Columbia Studios chief Harry Cohn (read by John Landis, btw) that I was listening to this weekend. The last time I actually read this book with my own four eyes was way before I started working on Franchot's life story. It's amazing the things you can read and then forget about, not realizing at the time that they'll be important down the road.
The reason I was listening to it was because I went to the library for some other books and the audio box caught my eye, so on a whim I checked it out. I love this book because Bob Thomas writes it in a style that is easily readable, short chapters, lots of anecdotes, funny as hell. Harry Cohn was once named The Meanest Man in Hollywood by a national magazine and his response to that was laughing his ass off. "I don't get ulcers, I give them," he once said. Yet, he would do the kindest things for people while denying he was a nice guy. The man's been dead for over 40 years and some people still hate him. I love him, I think he's one of the most interesting Hollywood moguls ever.
So anyway, my audio detour brought SSS back to my attention *love when that happens* and got me all atwitter so I started digging around anew. Through Ancestry.com I discovered that "S." stands for Samuel, which then lead me to other various records about him. He's even had a FindAGrave.com record since 2003, thanks to my graving buddy Tony Scott. I don't even think I looked there for in the past - hoping, deep down, that he was still alive. Unfortunately he died in 1951, at the age of 41, from a heart attack.
I called Forest Lawn Glendale to get his exact location as it wasn't listed on the FindAGrave entry, and luckily he wasn't on the Celebrity Do Not Reveal list. Better still, he's in the Great Mausoleum and I love having a valid reason to get past security. Good ole Uncle Samuel! ;) I'm going to run out there in the near future to say hello, leave a flower, take a photo for the site and hopefully pick up some additional vibes, err, clues.
PS-Another weird coincidence: as I was listening to the Cohn tape in which SSS is mentioned, I was working on a Buried Treasures entry for Lucille Ball. SSS produced several films for her including The Fuller Brush Man and the one she did with Franchot, Her Husband's Affairs. Love that synchronicity!
Mr. & Mrs. Kent Modglin are two people I've been trying to track down for some time now.
They were friends with Franchot during his Barbara Payton period, and were photographed visiting him in the hospital after his fisticuffs with Tom Neal over Bab's hand in marriage.
Sadly, I've recently confirmed that Mr. Modglin passed away years before I ever thought about writing a book. The Missus remains a question mark, but assumed deceased as well.
As far as I know, they had no children to trace who might still remember stories told. However, my research reveals that they did have a lucrative poodle back in 1957:
Franchot sure seemed to know some interesting people. *adding this to the list of court files I have to track down for more details* LOL!
For the record:
boo·dle
n. Slang
1. Money, especially counterfeit money.
2. Money accepted as a bribe.
3. Stolen goods; swag.
Talk about your synchronicity, this weekend I've been focusing on Jean Wallace's portion of the Franchot biography manuscript and lo-and-behold, I won this photo of her on Ebay tonight!
It's a promotional portrait for Blaze of Noon (Parmamount, 1947) and I think it really captures her sultry essence. I haven't bid on very many photos recently because I'm budgeting my funds for other types of research material. But I just loved this photo, and am very happy to have secured it.
Jean was a natural beauty, and looked just as gorgeous sans make-up and in her every day duds. She married Franchot, who was twice her age, just after she turned 18. Although Jean enjoyed acting, her true passion was raising her family, including her son and my friend, Pat Tone. Her brother, dear Uncle Jack, recently reminded me that she was never without a studio contract during her heyday, and would go long stretches of time without making a film while happily being a stay-at-home mom and still getting paid her salary. My kind of business woman!
Sadly, Jean passed away suddenly, at home, in 1990 on her favorite of all holidays, Valentine's Day. Among Franchot's personal papers and mementos, I found a card that was once attached to Valentine flowers he had sent to her from Alexander Florists in Beverly Hills. In his own handwriting, it was addressed to Mrs. Franchot Tone and it read, "My only love - ever - Franchot." It made me all *mushy* inside just to see and hold it.
Franchot and Jean had a lot of ups and downs during their seven year marriage, and subsequent life-long friendship and co-parenting experience, but that's what makes them so interesting to me. Jean had a marvelous sense of humor and it was never dull when she was around. She and Franchot loved, fought and made up passionately.
Despite some of the tense, dramatic and painful moments, her part in Franchot's life story has been a joy to write about because of her fascinating, multi-dimensional personality. She was so much more than just a pretty face.
For more information about Franchot, please visit FranchotTone.com, the official website of this fascinating and underrated actor.
