Hollywood Actress: Lizabeth Scott, Evelyn Keyes, Joan Blondell, June Allyson & Dick Powell

In The Actress: Hollywood Acting and the Female Star, (2006), author Karen Hollinger writes: "Cynthia Baron characterizes studio acting as an eclectic mix of pragmatic acting strategies that centered around three major concerns: the actor's adjustment from stage to screen, the development of 'silent thinking' as a way to help formulate appropriate reactions, and the building of a character through careful script analysis, extensive preparation, and often dispassionate execution. She proposes that studio actors developed their craft, not by using a single acting method, but rather by drawing on a complex integration of techniques taken from theater, dance, vaudeville, literature, instinct, and the theories of Stanislavski. With the revival of interest in film noir and its corresponding acting style, beginning in the 1980s, Lizabeth Scott's reputation has risen among critics and film historians."

Jerome Charyn (NYU Press, 1996) wrote in "Movieland: Hollywood and the Great American Dream Culture": "Among the Dolly Sisters and Errol Flynn, Bing Crosby and Dorothy Lamour—all the fluff and exotic pastry that Hollywood could produce—appeared a very odd animal, the dreamwalker, like Alan Ladd, Veronica Lake, and Lizabeth Scott, whose faces had a frozen quality and always looked half-asleep. The dreamwalker seemed to mirror all our own fears." Lizabeth Scott could have had a future as a model, especially after she began appearing in the pages of Harper's Bazaar at the same time as Betty (Lauren) Bacall. Elizabeth Scott considered herself an actress; her first dramatic lead was Sadie Thompson, Jeanne Eagels's signature role, in W. Somerset Maugham's Rain. Since Rain was performed in what was then the equivalent of off Broadway, it went unreviewed. Irving Hoffman, who worked for columnist Walter Winchell, was impressed by her range. 

Producer Hal Wallis knew even earlier that Lizabeth Scott should not be subjected to the kind of portraiture that would make her look exotic but unreal. An editor from Conde Nast, struck by Lizabeth's publicity shots, advised Wallis that she was "something special, what every man in uniform wants his girl friend to look like, a new type of movie girl, and potentially a fine actress." While Lauren Bacall never became a noir icon (never a real femme noire), Lizabeth Scott did, joining the pantheon that included Gloria Grahame, Ann Savage, Jane Greer, and Barbara Stanwyck. In fact, according to Film Noir: An Encyclopedia Reference to the American Style, seven of her twenty-two movies qualify as film noir: The Strange Love of Martha Ivers (1946), Dead Reckoning (1947), I Walk Alone (1948), Pitfall (1948), Too Late for Tears (1949), Dark City (1950), and The Racket (1951). Ironically, her best: Dead Reckoning, Pitfall, and Too Late for Tears, were loanouts. Typecast as the dark lady, Lizabeth Scott never had the chance to display her gift for comedy, which was evident in The Skin of Our Teeth. But that was theater, not film. And theater was the medium for which she was yearning. Source: —"Hal Wallis: Producer to the Stars" (2004) by Bernard F. Dick

Brian Hannan (film researcher for Turner Classic Movies): "In Madcap: The Life of Preston Sturges, author Donald Spoto wrote that Sturges managed “to retain an amusing shot in the early part of the film, an intercut from Dick Powell and Ellen Drew on the rooftop to two snuggling rabbits in a corner cage. This particular visual allusion had been attempted by filmmakers and rejected by censors so often that virtually no director bothered to try to include it any longer. At the preview screening, however, someone nodded and it remained, to the censors’ later chagrin.” Christmas in July (1940) was, in many ways, a breakthrough role for Dick Powell. No longer the boyish singer/dancer of Warner Bros. musicals as Gold Diggers of 1937 and not yet the tough private eye of Murder, My Sweet (1944), Powell was in a career limbo, struggling to redefine his screen persona. Powell emerges in Christmas in July with a new style, one that balances his naive, all-American wholesomeness with bitter cynicism. Powell’s Jimmy MacDonald is just as memorable and iconic as James Stewart’s George Bailey in It’s a Wonderful Life, and his chemistry with Ellen Drew as tender as Stewart's with Donna Reed." Source: cinemasojourns.com

"Edited by the gifted Ellsworth Hoagland (Holiday Inn, Union Station), Christmas in July is a perfectly paced experience. There is not a single scene in the film which feels out of place. While many films can blossom during the first or final act of the story while sagging in the middle section, there is nothing of the sort on display throughout Christmas in July. Each and every frame is with purpose. Featuring stunning black and white cinematography by Victor Milner (Reap the Wild Wind, The Love Parade), Christmas in July is a gorgeous production. From the roof-tops of the opening scenes to the outdoor environments, there is something magical going on here that is truly awe-inspiring. Preston Sturges (Sullivan Travels, Unfaithfully Yours) wrote and directed the film and succeeded in creating another classic. Viewers will easily find the charming love story between Jimmy MacDonald and Betty Casey irresistible. When Jimmy and Betty arrive at the tenement with a caravan of cars bearing gifts, the distribution of presents provides some of the most touching moments in the film such as a wordless shot of a young girl receiving a doll (probably her first one) is one of those little cinematic moments that you'll never forget. At the same time, there's also a wonderful message throughout the film which is perfectly clear: pursue dreams and maybe they could become reality. Christmas in July is a beautiful masterpiece to cherish each Christmas season." Source: www.blu-ray.com

Illustrious film critic James Agee praised greatly It Happened Tomorrow (1944), writing “Students of cinematic style will find many shrewdly polished bits in It Happened Tomorrow to admire and enjoy; and Dick Powell’s graceful sportiness and Linda Darnell’s loveliness are two arresting samples of what wise directing can do. Powell had changed his tuned appearing in Preston Sturges' classic Christmas in July (1940), on his way to his best-known work in film noir. He's wryly funny here, especially when he believes he may be doomed, and has excellent chemistry with Darnell. In the last half-hour, cinemaddicts will know for sure that this film is the work of René Clair, the French cinemagician whose films are among the most inspired screen comedies ever made.” René Clair did admit that, “The last twenty minutes are the best thing I did in Hollywood.” According to the American Film Institute, Frank Capra had purchased the story It Happened Tomorrow from Hugh Wedlock and Harold Snyder and then sold the rights to producer Arnold Pressburger who asked René Clair to take over the project. Source: cinemasojourns.com

Lizabeth Scott's favorite noir film was Pitfall (1948), co-starring Dick Powell. Although Pitfall now ranks as classic noir (French filmmaker Bertrand Tavernier considers it one of the genre's masterpieces), producer Hal B. Wallis could not have known that in 1948; he simply believed that Lizabeth appearing opposite Dick Powell, who showed his macho side in Murder, My Sweet (1944) and Cornered (1945), was right for a movie about a woman who ensnares a respectable married man in a web of deception and murder, from which he emerges repentant but estranged from his wife (Jane Wyatt). Pitfall (1948), directed by Andre de Toth, is an even more caustic examination of the American dream than Double Indemnity, chiefly because its subject is the post-war nuclear family. By February 1953, Lizabeth Scott's stage fright was such that she even hid from her friends. Scott did not renew her Paramount contract in 1954, even before the "Lizabeth Scott in the Call Girls' Call Book" libelous article was published by Confidential magazine's chief editor Howard Rushmore. Between the end of her contract and the damaging exposure by Confidential magazine, she had turned down numerous scripts, including Tennessee Williams' The Rose Tattoo (1955). —Source: "L.A. Noir: The City as Character" (2005) by Alain Silver and James Ursini

French film historian Bertrand Tavernier, in the bonus-disc of The Prowler DVD, refers to the film's "metaphysical decor" and considers The Prowler (1951) “one of the ten best films of the noir genre,” in the 20-minute featurette “The Masterpiece in the Margins: Bertrand Tavernier on The Prowler”. If you listen carefully, you will hear Eddie Muller lobbing questions to Tavernier from behind the camera. "The Prowler" can also be listed as a "film gris" ("grey film"), a term coined by American film critic Thom Andersen, which is a type of film noir that categorizes a series of films (released between 1947 and 1951) in the context of the first wave of the communist investigations of the HUAC. Film gris differs from film noir in the fact the gris films tend to blame collective society rather than the individual. 

Robert Rossen's first experience of directing came when he was called in by Harry Cohn at Columbia to write the script of "Johnny O'Clock" (1947), and when Harry Cohn and the star Dick Powell asked Rossen to direct it. Bertrand Tavernier argued, discussing "Johnny O'Clock", that the film exhibits a 'directorial grace' and 'an invention not shown' in Rossen's later career. Tavernier saw the film as reflecting Rossen's 'Jewish pessimism and idealism,' a combination that was 'perfect for film noir'. Johnny O'Clock played by Dick Powell seems invulnerable, an echo of Bogart's wartime prototype. Yet, he's another Rossen protagonist who will finally have to reconsider the meaning of winning. Rossen's world is pessimistic, and there is no explicit affirmative vision, as in Polonsky's work. Yet, every scene of the film is directed with imagination, hinting at the romanticism beneath the surface, the reluctant altruism that Michael Wood sees as characteristic of the hardboiled American antihero. Dick Powell is the eponymous antihero, a cagey casino manager juggling shady relationships around the roulette. His subzero veneer starts to melt after meeting equally cynical Evelyn Keyes, whose younger sister just got mysteriously offed around Powell's joint. Packed with unexplored existential gambling, conflict, and implacable detective figures, the dramaturgy here is as Dostoevskian-like as his more famous Body and Soul is Odetsian-like.

Nancy Hobson is one of the sexiest roles played by Evelyn Keyes, who looks like a vestal Lana Turner (acting in a delicate, sorrowful way). Her chemistry with Dick Powell is notable, and some of their scenes together dangerously steamy. Both Johnny and Nancy are individualist personalities trying to deny their romance in its initial stage while wisecracking in an atmosphere of gloomy betrayal. -Nancy: "I like you, Johnny O'Clock, if that's what you want to know". -Johnny: "Put it in writing and I'll paste it in my scrapbook". Johnny O’Clock's suave gambler added urbanity to Powell’s tough image, combining a streak of sarcasm with a hint of chivalry in a similar way to Bogart's. 

In Dark City Dames: The Wicked Women of Film Noir (2001), Eddie Muller recounts Evelyn Keyes showing him a film poster from Johnny O'Clock hanging on her bedroom's wall, "featuring a youthful golden-maned Evelyn being manhandled by Dick Powell."  Evelyn Keyes, like Claire Trevor in Murder, My Sweet, seemed to harbor a big crush on Dick Powell. Keyes alludes in her memoirs to a brief affair with Powell, but, unlike other actors she had dalliances with, she doesn't offer specifics. While they shooted Mrs Mike in 1949, Dick Powell was reportedly burn-out due to the rumors spread by Confidential magazine of an affair between his wife June Allyson with Dean Martin. 

Vaguely, Keyes insinuates that Powell felt regretful of the affair and "resented it." Anyway, it doesn't sound very serious on neither side, and it was probably only a one time fling. The London Film Review's film critic Derek Winnert (whose articles appeared in The Times and The Guardian, author of The Ultimate Encyclopedia of the Movies in 1995) also mentioned in 2017 the affair between Powell and Keyes in his reviews of Johnny O'Clock and Mrs. Mike, writing: "Dick Powell most memorably played Philip Marlowe in Murder, My Sweet (1944). To the Ends of the Earth (1948) is another outstanding Dick Powell noir. In her 1977 autobiography, Evelyn Keyes said Mrs Mike was her best film. She admitted she had to fend off studio boss Harry Cohn’s advances during her career at Columbia. Among the many Hollywood affairs she recounted was one with Dick Powell." 

Eventually Keyes realized Powell's true love was June Allyson, like Lauren Bacall was Bogart's. Keyes' last role was a small part as Tom Ewell's vacationing wife in Billy Wilder's The Seven Year Itch (1955), which starred Marilyn Monroe. Keyes said: "It was nice to see Marilyn Monroe again. I had often met her at Sam Spiegel’s, but I never really knew what the audience saw in her to make her such a big star. To me, she was just another blonde with a perfect figure and a funny walk. But she turned out to be a wonderful actress." Evelyn Keyes officially retired in 1956. Source: www.derekwinnert.com

At the time to cast Dick Powell as Philip Marlowe appeared absolutely bizarre, and yet when you watch Murder, My Sweet (1944) you cannot imagine anyone else would have done a better job, and indeed Powell was Raymond Chandler's favourite incarnation of his protagonist. Philip Marlowe was able to handle himself to a point, but he was also vulnerable, and Powell could adeptly convey both sides of this personality. The classic milieu of the film noir is so well realised here that newbies can be forgiven for thinking everything is a cliché, but that is simply because they got it so right as it all falls perfectly into place. There's a short speech Ann Grayle gives our hero that sums him up as "some kind of nut," because he stumbles into these dangerous situations without knowing exactly what is going on. Yet we stick with him, we trust him, because Marlowe strikes us as the one individual with integrity when all around him (except Ann) are out for their own selfish gains, and for that at least, this film deserves its status as a noir classic. Source: www.thespinningimage.co.uk

Some of Evelyn Keyes's best performances in film noir were: Face Behind the Mask, Ladies in Retirement, Johnny O’Clock, The Killer That Stalked New York, 99 River Street, and The Prowler. However, Keyes' favorite film was Mrs. Mike, a 1949 drama film set in the Canadian wilderness during the early 1900s, co-starring Dick Powell, and directed by Louis King. Dick Powell was one of the co-producers of Mrs Mike through his company Regal Films. It was also Powell who had personally requested Evelyn Keyes for the leading female role of Kathy Flannigan, after their successful pairing in the previous Johnny O'Clock. Powell is perfect as the noble Sgt. Mike Flannigan. Mrs Mike, released on December 23, 1949, is a beautifully crafted depiction of love, commitment, and duty in the face of great hardships. —"Film and Politics in America: A Social Tradition" (1992) by Brian Neve

Evelyn Keyes' autobiography Scarlett O'Hara's Younger Sister: My Lively Life In and Out of Hollywood was published in 1977. In 1947 a survey of theater owners placed her first on a list of the 10 most promising box‐office personalities. Elizabeth Taylor was in fifth place. Miss Keyes just shrugged: “I had the world by the tail. I could have been an important actress. But I didn't pay my dues.” She said in 1977 that the Columbia Studio head Harry Cohn withdrew his support when she refused to be intimate with him. Cohn was furious after having declared "I love you" to Keyes, whilst she proceeded to needle him by telling Cohn her romances with other actors. Keyes also wrote in her memoir she underwent an abortion just before filming Gone with the Wind, and the experience left her unable to have children. 

"You can't go back and make a movie like they made in 1940," she said in 1977. "They blew ‘The Jolson Story’ up to 70 millimeters [wide high-resolution] and tried to bring it out again. It didn't work. Look at People magazine. This whole country is one big gossip column. I suppose I was most influenced by Erica Jong, although my book was also partly written out of my psychoanalysis. I thought, ‘What do I have to offer that would be of interest?’ I'm an American product, the American dream of a few million people. I always played the girl who got the boy in the end." Keyes was protected first by Cecil B. De Mile, who signed her to a personal contract, then by Charles Vidor, who made sure the predatory executives who lunched with Harry Cohn understood that Evelyn Keyes was private property. As her career started to climb, she was more able to protect herself. “As you got more successful, you got more untouchable. God knows, I've never been homesick one day since I left Atlanta. I have no roots. I deliberately set out to destroy them, and did. If there's any such thing as hometown for me, it's Hollywood. I was formed here as an adult.”

Evelyn Keyes expressed her opinion that Mrs. Mike (1949) was her best film. Among her many love affairs in Hollywood she recounted in Scarlett O'Hara's Younger Sister, were those with film producer Michael Todd (who left her for Elizabeth Taylor), actors Glenn Ford, Sterling Hayden, Dick Powell, and Kirk Douglas. She had to regularly fend off Columbia Pictures studio head Harry Cohn's advances during her career at the studio. Keyes was married to businessman Barton Oliver Bainbridge from 1938 until his death from suicide in 1940. Later, she married and divorced director Charles Vidor (1943–1945), director John Huston (1946–1950), and bandleader Artie Shaw (1957–1985). Keyes said of her marriages in 1977: “Actually, none of them were real marriages, they were legalized love affairs.” Then she reconsidered: “No, I was married once. With Artie Shaw, it was really a marriage.” About her four husbands and dozens of lovers, she said: “I wrote about them all with affection.” The only malice in the book, she added, was directed toward Fredric March, with whom she had a small role in her first picture, The Buccaneer (1938). She recoiled with disgust relating an incident in which March invited her to his dressing room with a pretext and then proceeded to harass her. Except for March, Miss Keyes said she was careful not to mention explicitly the name of a man who was married at the time [Dick Powell] or who might be embarrassed by the notoriety. Keyes also became involved with flamboyant producer Mike Todd during the filming of Around the World in 80 Days (1956), playing a cameo role in the movie. 

Before dating Evelyn Keyes, Mike Todd had been married to Dick Powell's ex-wife Joan Blondell (1947–1950). After the filming of Around the World in 80 Days, Todd broke up with Keyes after falling in love with Elizabeth Taylor, whom he married in 1957. The positive thing that came out for Keyes was that she had invested good money in the Todd picture and was financially set for life as a result. Keyes had quit her career when she married Artie Shaw in 1957. The couple separated in the 1970s but did not divorce until 1985. In 2005, Keyes sued Artie Shaw's estate, claiming that she was entitled to one-half of Shaw's estate pursuant to a contract to make a will between them. Shaw died in 2004. In July 2006, a Ventura, California jury unanimously held that Keyes was entitled to one-half of Artie Shaw's estate, estimated in $1,420,000. —Sources: nytimes.com, wikipedia.org

Despite Matthew Kennedy's research in A Life Between Takes (quite a biased biograhy, partly an updated rewrite of Blondell's novel Center Door fancy), not much information seems to be known about the reasons behind the sudden breakdown in the mid '40s of the Powells' previously happy marriage, but Joan Blondell's infatuation with Mike Todd, who would become her third husband, seems to have been a key factor. Incidentally, years later, at the time of Powell's death, Blondell would lament she should never have divorced Powell. In an interview that Glenda Farrell gave to Robert Franklin at Columbia University in 1959, she talked about the differences between comedy and drama, the social and cultural life in Hollywood, her impressions of Joan Blondell, Dick Powell, Mervyn LeRoy and Paddy Chayevsky, among others. 

Farrell considered Blondell "my best friend from Warner studios" and explains both "never fighted over our lines or roles." Blondell co-starred nine times with snappy Glenda Farrell, usually as a street-smart gold-digging duo. Blondell playfully called her friend Bette Davis's four ex-husbands "The Four Skins" since they were all gentiles. The Warner crew thought Blondell had romantic designs on James Cagney and Clark Gable. According to Farrell, the marriage between Blondell and Powell happened due to the many hours both actors shared working at the Warner Bros lot. Also, Blondell mainly craved security by marrying Powell and Farrell called their relationship "a love affair." But she stresses how difficult is to make a marriage between two stars so defined by their careers work out. So Glenda Farrell chose to marry a doctor (Dr. Henry Ross) instead. Source: www.library.columbia.edu

Joan Blondell was finally able to leave her Warner Brothers in 1939. She returned to Broadway in 1943, starring in Mike Todd’s production The Naked Genius as Honey Bee Carroll, a comedy written by Todd's ex-girlfriend, burlesque artist Gypsy Rose Lee. Blondell would be nominated for an Academy Award for Best Supporting Actress in The Blue Veil (1951), despite Bosley Crowther of the New York Times calling the film "a whoppingly banal tear-jerker that will lure multitudes of moviegoers who like nothing better than a good cry." Blondell herself said of The Blue Veil: "That was the worst piece of trash I ever made." When Blondell received news of Mike Todd having died in 1958 in a flight accident, she caustically commented, “I hope the son of a bitch screamed the whole way down.” 

In 1965, Blondell was in the running to replace Vivian Vance as Lucille Ball's sidekick on the hit CBS television comedy series The Lucy Show. Unfortunately, after filming her second guest appearance as Joan Brenner (Lucy's new friend from California), Blondell walked off the set, accusing Lucille Ball of having criticized her performance in front of the studio audience. Probably, Lucille Ball (a long time friend of June Allyson) was fed-up with Blondell's sense of entitlement. 

During years, Blondell had ranted that Powell had left her for June Allyson, with some insiders saying: "Can you imagine? I mean no offense but, yuck. I think it's like trading a diamond pendant for this beige Ann Taylor skirt.” Ironically, June Allyson became temporarily the stepmother of Blondell's daughter Ellen Powell (who'd suffered mental breakdowns), which exacerbated Blondell's animosity. Jane Wilkie (Allyson's maid of honor) was angry about Blondell's bad attitude towards Allyson, since Blondell (who had to wait two years to marry Mike Todd, after his first wife conceded him a divorce), now was bent on winning Powell back, which was impossible. "June Allyson was Dick Powell's true love," remarked Wilkie. "He had many chances of two-timing her, but as far as I know, I think he was faithful to Junie." —Source: "Confessions of an ex-fan magazine writer" (1985) by Jane Wilkie 

Dick Powell in The Dark Side of the Screen

Among his many interesting achievements, as a musical star in the '30s, Dick Powell introduced several Harry Warren standards which have become part of the "Great American Songbook," including "I'll String Along With You" in TWENTY MILLION SWEETHEARTS (1934), "I Only Have Eyes For You" from DAMES (1934), "I've Got My Love to Keep Me Warm" in ON THE AVENUE (1937), and "You Must Have Been a Beautiful Baby" in HARD TO GET (1938). Once Powell parted company with Warner Bros. after NAUGHTY BUT NICE (1939), he spent the next few years appearing in a handful of comedies at a variety of studios. Some of these films were indifferent, but there were also two sterling classics: Preston Sturges' CHRISTMAS IN JULY (1940), in which Powell believes he's won a fortune in a contest, and Rene Clair's fantasy IT HAPPENED TOMORROW (1944), in which he receives newspapers which can predict the future. In 1944, Powell accomplished one of the most amazing transformations in the history of the movies: The onetime baby-faced singer became hardboiled, sarcastic Philip Marlowe in MURDER, MY SWEET (1944), and now Powell was the tough, hard-edged, darkly funny star of film noir. 

Dick Powell also seems to have been universally admired by his colleagues, not always an easy feat while maintaining a high-powered career in the entertainment industry. Behind the scenes, there are many stories underscoring Powell's reputation as a savvy, supportive colleague. Joyce Holden, Powell's costar in YOU NEVER CAN TELL (1951), echoed those sentiments in a 2008 interview for Films of the Golden Age. When the interviewer, Tom Weaver, noted she had stolen some scenes from Powell, she replied, "But he would let you steal from him, he allowed it... That's the kind of guy he was." 

Joyce Holden also added another fascinating insight: "You know who really directed the film ["You Never Can Tell"]? Dick Powell. Absolutely. Every shot, I saw him conferring with Lou Breslow, the credited director. Dick was very circumspect, but it was very obvious that he had the ideas, the set-ups, the little innuendos. Dick really was a brilliant person. He was extremely talented." 

When Alan K. Rode of the Film Noir Foundation introduced a 2012 screening of PITFALL (1948), he shared that he had recently interviewed Powell's PITFALL costar, Lizabeth Scott, and she'd said that Powell had been kind and a joy to work with, and she termed her experience making PITFALL with Dick Powell "delicious." Another compliment came from actress Jean Porter Dmytryk, who was the wife of the director of MURDER, MY SWEET and who also acted in Powell's CRY DANGER (1951), saying: "Dick Powell was so many things. First of all, he was the best businessman of any of the actors in Hollywood. I enjoyed working with Dick in his film CRY DANGER and appreciated his Eagle Scout attitude." Dick Powell was quoted by Tony Thomas in a 1961 'Films in Review' profile as saying, "I saw no reason why an actor should restrict himself to one particular phase of the business." When co-star Richard Erdman was interviewed about CRY DANGER (1951) at UCLA Film Festival in 2011, he said Dick Powell was always generous and supportive. In his personal life, while a marriage to Warner Bros. costar Joan Blondell petered out after a few years, he found lasting happiness with June Allyson, whom he married in 1945.

What is Altman saying in The Long Goodbye? That Marlowe’s code is no longer applicable to the cynical seventies? That trust and loyalty are irrelevant and misplaced feelings, and have no part in the life of a private eye? Elliot Gould’s sloppy Marlowe is deliberately a far cry from the sartorial neatness of Bogart and Dick Powell. Behaving altogether with a cuteness that would have given Bogart the shudders, Gould plays Marlowe as a mumbler who lives in a pig sty and holds absent-minded conversations with his cat. This Marlowe gets his revenge at the end, in a radical and quite unexpected gesture, when he kills his betraying friend and then walks away, seemingly purged, an act of cold-blooded murder that Chandler’s Marlowe would never commit. 

The fundamental objection to The Long Goodbye, which included professionals such as director Joseph Mankiewicz and film critics, was that Elliott Gould's performance as Marlowe was no match for the likes of Bogart and Powell, whom they had seen essay the role in the course of the film festival. Asked later if she thought Elliott Gould was miscast in the role, screenwriter Leigh Brackett responded, "I thought he did a beautiful job, except that he was not hardboiled enough."

The actor whose record in noir most closely approximates Humphrey Bogart’s is Dick Powell (even surpassing Robert Mitchum). Powell had earned a reputation in the thirties' musicals as a crooner with an engaging personality and a charismatic singing style. By the mid-forties he was eager to change his image, and he sensed that the current noir phase offered him an appropriate opportunity. He played Philip Marlowe (before Bogart) in the 1944 film version of Murder, My Sweet. Raymond Chandler later said that Powell came closest to his own idea of Marlowe. If anything, Powell is even dryer in the part than Bogart, erasing entirely the crooner’s geniality that had made him a popular fixture in Warner musicals. The only echo of the earlier Powell is the actor’s physical grace—he has a dancer’s flowing ease. However, Powell’s voice is flat, his face taut and frozen in the masklike noir vein, and he plays Marlowe as a blunt, no-nonsense professional. He is guarded and sardonic, and yet he is capable of projecting an aura of integrity. Dmytryk concurred that Powell played Marlowe "as Chandler visualized him, with a patina of toughness only skin deep:" 

Beneath Marlowe's tough exterior, Powell neatly implies in his superbly underplayed performance, is a humanity that can be reached. He is the tough-but-vulnerable hero, tossing off the biting Chandler wisecracks to cover up his tender spots. Then, too, Claire Trevor, as the bewitching platinum blonde temptress who is deadlier than any male, played the dangerous noir siren Helen Grayle to perfection. Like Bogart, Powell fits so snugly into Marlowe’s character that the audience is unaware that he is acting: his is the kind of style that conceals style. As Chandler’s private eye, he is noir’s perfect tough guy, yet the toughness is never insisted on, it's simply there as a natural part of the character. Through it all, Powell remains a model of the Hemingway code of grace under pressure, his irony a shield against constant mischance. Powell's work is spare and subtly stylized, and like Bogart, Powell is at the top of his form as the ironic observer, maintaining a skeptical distance even from his own misfortunes as he trades cracks with his adversaries, the police, and with the two-timing dames that he is wise to. 

Chandler himself characterized Philip Marlowe as a loser, Leigh Brackett pointed out, at least in a society where money alone is the measure of success. But Marlowe is "a man who is pure in heart, who is decent and honorable and cannot be bought. He is incorruptible:' Brackett continued. In fact, Brackett bought Chandler's description of Marlowe as a modern-day knight: "Here is the knight in shining armor with a shabby trench coat and snap-brim felt hat. I think he is a universal folk hero who does not change through the ages:' except that he carries a gun rather than a sword. "I think the concept was damn good, a very moral concept:' Chandler said that Marlowe, as he had drawn him in his novels, would indeed look plain foolish in the corrupt modern world that we live in. Certainly Marlowe is thought of as a chump, who is out of touch with the times, by several of the characters he encounters in his journey. Film critic David O'Brien says Chandler's conception of Philip Marlowe is "a study of a moral and decent man cast adrift in the selfish, self-obsessed society where lives can be thrown away without a backward glance, and any notions of friendship or loyalty are meaningless." —Sources: "Creatures of Darkness: Raymond Chandler, Detective Fiction, and Film Noir" (2003) by Gene D. Phillips and "The Dark Side of the Screen" (2008) by Foster Hirsch

A Fairy Tale for Grown-Ups (The Princess and the Goblin): Dick Powell, Mary Martin, Jean Arthur

Researchers at a British university found that men with higher IQs place greater value on monogamy and sexual exclusivity than their less intelligent peers. But the connection between conventional sexual morality and intelligence is not mirrored in women, it seems. The researchers could find no evidence that clever women are more likely than the general population to remain faithful. The patterns were uncovered by Dr Satoshi Kanazawa of the London School of Economics and Political Science in a paper published in the March edition of the journal Social Psychology Quarterly. He concluded: "As the empirical analysis shows, more intelligent men are more likely to value monogamy and sexual exclusivity than less intelligent men." Dr Kanazawa claims that the correlation between intelligence and monogamy in men has its origins in evolutionary development. Source: www.telegraph.co.uk

"I've had all the fun," F. Scott Fitzgerald said, "but in my heart I can't stand this casual business. With a woman, I have to be emotionally in it up to my eyebrows, or it's nothing. When I love, I love. It has to be my life." -"F. Scott and Zelda Fitzgerald" (1984) by James R. Mellow

James Stewart: “I loved being in pictures. Right away. All that stuff ya hear ’bout how the big studio was nothing but an enormous factory—this just isn’t true… it was wonderful.” His nonsexual on-screen persona had by now led Mayer to wonder if, in fact, there was something “wrong” with him. Whereas other MGM names had to be literally pried loose from the bevy of starlets they were bedding, despite the fact most stars were all married—such as Clark Gable; Franchot Tone, whose suavity had led him into the arms of some of Hollywood’s most fabulous beauties; Spencer Tracy, a known womanizer from the moment he first stepped on a sound stage — Jimmy kept himself away from all of that, preferring the company of one steady woman. 

June Allyson and Jimmy Stewart’s on-screen chemistry was real. They had known each other before either of them was married to their current spouses—Jimmy Stewart to Gloria Hatrick, June Allyson to actor Dick Powell. Jimmy and Allyson had dated in 1940, and at one point they maybe considered marriage. Allyson recollected, “I knew Jimmy before he married Gloria. With my cooking, it’s a good thing he didn’t marry me. The poor dear weighed only 154 pounds before he was married and he was all of 6 feet 2 or 3 inches tall. Jimmy seldom took his dates to nightclubs. Instead, he fed them steak that he grilled himself in his own backyard. If they didn’t like that and wanted the limelight, they were not for him. Gloria was the perfect choice. They were both so suited to each other—both slim and dignified and both with the same sense of humor.” Without question, on screen at least, the key to the successful pairing of Jimmy and June lay in their wholesomeness rather than any sexual chemistry. "USA Today" wrote: "It's hard to believe that anyone as famous as James Stewart could get by so scandal-free. Just try to scrape off any dust, let alone dirt, from this devout Presbyterian and conservative republican." 

The ongoing screen “affair” between Stewart and Allyson became something of a joke in both the Dick Powell/June Allyson and Jimmy Stewart/Gloria Stewart households, a joke, that is, with a slight pinch. This is how Allyson recalled that period: “When Richard [Powell] and I got together with our friends Jimmy and Gloria Stewart, Richard kidded Jimmy and me about the string of hit movies that had made us the reigning romantic team in Hollywood. As Gloria put it, jokingly, but with just a bit of an edge, ‘June is Jimmy’s perfect wife in movies and I’m his imperfect wife.’ And one time Richard at a banquet said in front of our whole table, ‘June here must be a good wife. Jimmy Stewart has married her three times.’” 

Stewart did not marry until his forties, which attracted a significant amount of contemporary media attention; gossip columnist Hedda Hopper called him the "Great American Bachelor". Regardless, he had many romantic relationships. Stewart and Ginger Rogers had a relationship in 1935 while Henry Fonda was dating Rogers' good friend Lucille Ball. During production of The Shopworn Angel (1938), Stewart dated actresses Norma Shearer and Loretta Young. While filming Destry Rides Again (1939), Stewart had an affair with his co-star Marlene Dietrich, who barely mentioned him in her memoir and waved him off as a one-time affair. Stewart's first interaction with his future wife, Gloria Hatrick McLean, was at Keenan Wynn's Christmas party in 1947. A year later, Gary Cooper and his wife Veronica, invited Hatrick and Stewart to a dinner party, and the two began dating. A former model, Hatrick was divorced with two children. Stewart and Hatrick were married at Brentwood Presbyterian Church in 1949. After the death of his stepson Ronald in Vietnam in 1969, Stewart brooded constantly and when he did go out, it was mostly to play golf with Fred MacMurray, Dick Powell, and sometimes with President Richard Nixon. Jimmy Stewart, Fred MacMurray and Dick Powell were Republican, all three had conformed to their 'nice guy' archetype, they weren't particularly cozy with the press, they had taken risky shifts in their film careers (especially Powell), and had played opposite some of the most gorgeous leading ladies of their era. Some examples:

Fred MacMurray and Claudette Colber in "The Gilded Lily" (1935) directed by Wesley Ruggles

James Stewart and Claudette Colbert in "It's a Wonderful World" (1939) directed by W.S. Van Dyke

After filming The Secret Heart (1946) together, Claudette Colbert and co-star, June Allyson, became great friends. Colbert became godmother to Allyson's daughter, Pamela Powell in 1949.

James Stewart and Jean Arthur in "Mr. Smith Goes to Washington" (1939) directed by Frank Capra

Fred MacMurray and Jean Arthur in "Too Many Husbands" (1940) directed by Wesley Ruggles

Dick Powell and Mary Martin (doppelganger and alleged lover of Jean Arthur) in "True to Life" (1943) directed by George Marshall

Producer Paul Gregory (The Night of the Hunter) called Mary Martin "a very difficult woman, an angel with lots of demons" who constantly bickered with her husband Richard Halliday. Paul Gregory, Janet Gaynor's last husband, disliked Mary Martin so much (for quite complicated reasons), he wouldn't even tell her where Gaynor had been buried after a car accident in San Francisco. In "Diary of a Mad Playwright: Perilous Adventures on the Road with Mary Martin and Carol Channing" (2002) by James Kirkwood. Although warned that she was a prize they might do better not to win, Kirkwood and his associates not only got Martin for the Legends Broadway tour, they got much more than they bargained for. Although noted for her cheerful stage presence, Mary Martin proved to be one tough cookie, making--and getting--a host of demands that few companies would tolerate. 

Her demands also extended to the script, casually tossing lines she didn't like, and demanding re-writes. Martin also had significant difficulty in learning her lines, and throughout the rehearsal and preview process frequently errupted in tears and threats to quit. Channing also felt (with some justification) that everyone from the writer to the director to the producer was babying Martin to her own expense, a circumstance that led to repeated blow outs. Eventually Channing bonded with Martin by refusing to continue the tour without Martin, rejecting her possible replacement for Ann Miller. 

One night, sharing a dressing room, James Kirkwood listened to Mary Martin confessing to Carol Channing the ways she felt she was "different", and how favored a certain kind of man who was a good listener. Channing talked about her second husband Alexander Carson, a private detective. Martin said she had been smitten with Dick Powell (her co-star in Happy Go Lucky and True to Life). Martin reportedly said: "Dick was going to marry Mary Brian, but Joan played her cards well. Mike Todd gifted her  a mink coat and she went to New York. I think Joan broke his heart. We were good friends for years. One night Dick invited me to his apartment. He was great in bed and all, but I couldn't leave Richard [Halliday]." 

Were Jean Arthur and Mary Martin lovers? It was a hot topic of Hollywood speculation for years. Mary Martin, despite not being considered a sex-symbol, was in fact disconcertingly pretty with great legs. Martin’s personality gave warmth and demanded it in return. She was emotionally more suited to success in the theater than Hollywood. Mary Martin had accidentally won a singing contest, and eventually ended up on Broadway singing Cole Porter's "My Heart Belongs To Daddy". Legend has it that Mary was then so prudish and inexperienced, she did not understand the bawdy nature of Porter's lyrics. Later in life, Martin told her grand-daughter she never understood them! Several years in Hollywood proved fruitless and left Martin disoriented. But much of David Kaufman's biography is devoted to Mary's strange, complex, and co-dependent relationship with her second husband Richard Halliday. Mary Martin was hiding an important aspect of herself, although her lesbian inclinations were well known in Broadway circles. True to its fairy-tale title this book by Paul Rosner takes as its subject matter the most unreal place that has ever existed: Hollywood. What the book really examines is the notion of "star quality": what is it, where does it come from, what are its components, can you fake it? The two central female characters are actresses, one a "bubbling, cottonheaded southern belle, a personality actress with no personality"; the other a sophisticated, successful diva with a vulnerability that has become her on-screen trademark. The heart of the plot is the relationship that develops between them, and the notion that it might be possible for one woman to don the personality of another and carry it further than the first is capable to take it herself. Rosner, one feels, wants to create monsters but cannot: even his minor characters when they are behaving at their most petty and egocentric, soar above stereotype and take hold of our sympathies. Little wonder that this has been hailed as one of the best novels about Hollywood that has ever been written. I believe the book stands along other great novels like "The Day of the Locust" and "What Makes Sammy Run?" —"A Fairy-Tale for Grown-ups" (2001) by David Potter 

Written by first-time novelist Paul Rosner, the book was a thinly-veiled treatment of the alleged lesbian relationship between Jean Arthur and Mary Martin, and it became an instant source of underground conversation within the entertainment world. It tells the story of two women, Maureen Covillion and Josie Miller. Maureen (like Mary Martin) gains notice as a singer in New York revues, comes to Hollywood in the late thirties and returns to New York in the late-forties to become the queen of the Broadway musical. While in Hollywood, Maureen falls in love with her female idol, Josie Miller, an enigmatic and publicity-shy star whose odd, cracked voice and deft comic talent playing secretaries and shopgirls have made her one of the world's top female film stars. Maureen achieves a similar level of stardom by borrowing and eventually usurping Josie's personality as her own. Meanwhile, Josie suffers an emotional breakdown as a result of their relationship and divorces her husband, a movie producer and her erstwhile career manager. After her divorce, Josie flees Hollywood to live out her life as a recluse by the ocean, making only a fleeting and abortive comeback attempt in the theater. 

To people such as Hollywood writer George Eells, the book appeared to confirm the stories he had been hearing for years. Eells was a close friend of Martin's but never knew if the rumors about her and Arthur were true; when the book came out, Hollywood's insiders told each other that it validated what they'd been saying all along. An avid fan of Arthur's films, Rosner created the Josie Miller character based on his conception of what Jean Arthur was really like, while his inspiration for Maureen Covillion came from his observation that Mary Martin borrowed much of Arthur's personality in the course of building her own career. "I'd always wanted to do a book about one person assuming another person's identity and improving on it," Rosner said, and when he saw Mary Martin on Broadway as Peter Pan, it suddenly dawned on him how much she looked and acted like Jean Arthur. —Jean Arthur: The Actress Nobody Knew (1999) by John Oller