finally... a smile

 with so much darkness in the land & evil in the world it's tough to be cheerful. so we must find joy where we can & celebrate it as we can.

yesterday it was announced that a local millionaire has purchasd a dying golf course a block from me & has given it to a land trust to be used as a nature preserve. there's already talk of it becoming the Central Park of Palm Springs.

so this morning -- its first full day as Prescott Preserve -- I walk the property as I have before but with a bounce in my step.

I saw "Funny Girl" in previews

 but on opening nite I went to the Winter Garden to gaggle.

in the back of my Playbill I wrote this list of celebs I saw there:

Bette Davis

Lauren Bacall & Jason Robards Jr.

Earl Wilson

Phyllis Newman & Adolph Green

Ethel Merman

Ed Sullivan

Alan Jay Lerner

Maggie Brown

Hoagy Carmichael

Sybil Burton

Johnny Ray

Thomas Dewey

Jimmy Breslin

Jerome Robbins

Tina Louise

Tom Poston

Alfred Leslie

Playbill Piece

 4 months ago was the 60th anniversary of my seeing my first Broadway show. it was "The Aspern Papers." this stage adaptation of the Henry James work featured a trio of international stars: Maurice Evans / Wendy Hiller / Francoise Rosay.

of course I saved the Playbill. as I did for every Broadway show I ever saw. at one time one cd purchase specially embossd binders to hold them. I have 16 holding some 270 programs. over the years I've spent pleasant hours going back to them. often I'll discover years later that I saw a future star in a small role. & of course they were an invaluable source for Alex in Movieland.

however I've begun my 80th year. I've lockd in a depository for my papers & a huge chunk of my art collection already has gone to its forever home. but I still have some collections which deserve preserving. I don't want to repeat the mistake I made before leaving Santa Fe. 2 different local book dealers screwd me. so I decided to turn the Playbills into an art piece. now the real work of dispersing them. like several of my serial pieces it'll take time & ingenuity. but I'm diving in.

poem of the day

 

from my book Still Marching

8 films with 8 cast members I've seen in person

 "It's a Big Country" (1951)

Keefe Brasselle

Van Johnson 

Gene Kelly

Janet Leigh

Frederic March

George Murphy

Keenan Wynn

John Ericson

"The Silver Chalice" (1954)

Paul Newman

Virginia Mayo

Jack Palance

Natalie Wood

Joseph Wiseman

E.G. Marshall

Albert Dekker

Strother Martin

"Designing Woman" (1957)

Gregory Peck

Lauren Bacall

Dolores Gray

Jesse White

Richard Deacon

May McAvoy

Max Showalter

Mario Siletti

"Marjorie Morningstar" (1958)

Natalie Wood

Gene Kelly

Carolyn Jones

Claire Trevor

Jesse White

Paul Picerni

Ruta Lee

Peter Brown

"Imitation of Life" (1959)

Lana Turner

John Gavin

Juanita Moore

Susan Kohner

Dan O'Herlihy

Troy Donahue

Ann Robinson

Jack Weston

"The Satan Bugs" (1965)

George Maharis

Anne Francis

Dana Andrews

Ed Asner

Simon Oakland

James Hong

Harold Gould

Lee Remick

"Hearts of the West" (1975)

Jeff Bridges

Donald Pleasance

Blythe Danner

Alan Arkin

Richard B. Shull

Marie Windsor

Tucker Smith

Granville Van Dusen

"The White Buffalo" (1977)

Charles Bronson

Kim Novak

Stuart Whitman

John Carradine

Ed Lauter

Martin Kove

Clifford A. Pellow

Christopher Cary

my morning Facebook posting

 

dark days

if I were younger 

I'd move to another country 

nap time

 between awake

& asleep

I hear

a mosquito

is it real?

the dark side

 we all present a face to the world. I've often been criticizd for presenting a comic mask. eyes wide & mouth open. that is part of who I am. the joyful part people expect. but every comic mask is twin to a tragic one.

Owen Masterson captures this other mask. here is the pain of heartache & betrayal   depression & death. it's not as comfortable to gaze upon but it's real.

all abt Gar

when I saw "The Underworld Story" last week I was taken by Gar Moore. altho I knew his name & rememberd stills of him in his early Italian films I wasn't familiar with his story.

so I did some snooping. I discoverd that after his Hollywood career ended in 1959 he moved to Palm Springs. he appeard as Emile in a local production of "South Pacific" but apparently kept busy writing & painting (altho I've uncoverd none of either) as well as working in architecture & interior design. sometime in the 60s he & John Morris designd a sun deck for the Charles Farrell House at the Racquet Club but it's been demolishd.

apparently Moore had quite the social life. at a 1969 fundraiser for the Chuck Connors Tournament there was a Ziegfeld Follies tribute in which he playd sheik to the harem girl of Toni Holt. (& Nelda Linsk was a chorus girl.)

I found an address on Paseo De Anza for him in an old undated phone book online.

for a time Moore was engaged to Madga Gabor. then in June 1971 the local paper reportd on a party at the new home socialite Margaret Pigott Sinek bought on Stevens. it sd they announced their marriage wd happen later in the month at her home in Winnetka IL. guests at the party included the widows of William Powell & Lew Landers. Sinek -- widow of a prominent Chicago business exec -- was a member of the board of the American Cancer Society & an arts benefactor. she was Moore's 4th wife. he had a heart attack in Palm Springs & died in Loma Linda in 1985.

I also discoverd a letter he wrote late in life from the Winnetka house in which he claims to have been on the Hollywood blacklist without knowing it. not sure how that cd be.

anyway...... he was a handsome man. when I go to estate sales in town I'll have to look out for paintings.

as I age

it seems repetition & rime become part of life. today I went to our historic Plaza Theater for an offering in a local music festival. it was Dee Dee Bridgewater & she was sublime. I first heard her at Kent State in 1973. she was young & I was young. I got to talk with her during that visit. I still remember us at the bottom of that large staircase in the Student Center but I no longer recall a single moment of our conversation. abt a year & a half later I saw her on Broadway in her Tony-winning role in "The Wiz." then on Broadway again in 1979 & yet another musical on stage in Century City in 1982. the next 2 times were jazz concerts: Albuquerque (1998) & Santa Fe (2011). & now...... today. as all of the other times I heard her she was at the top of her form. I'm not a big fan of scat singing but she is such a master my face was one big smile thruout. it's not fair to comment on a single song when she gave everything to each one. however I must mention her "Honeysuckle Rose." it was a one-act play in the middle of the show. she rivals Anita O'Day whose interpretation has long been my favorite. so the concert was memorable on its own. but the fact that I've heard Bridgewater so many memorable times in nearly a half century adds significance for me. she repeats over the years in a way I love.

(H. Les Brown photo borrowd from Facebook)

Digit Print Bookmarks

I love the creative process. this morning I had to cut a sheet of card stock to make the smaller canvases for my "Circles" series. from each sheet there remains a pair of strips. I throw nothing away because I find often even strips inspire new pieces. this morning I lookd at the longer of the excess pieces from my cutting. it's 8 1/2" x 1." my fresh eye saw a bookmark. I checkd the pile of earlier cuttings & found I had 20. a lovely number for a new project. mind began grinding. what to put on these bookmarks. stains perhaps. or stamps. or tiny heads. at one moment I was bending over. I saw my bare feet. & there it was. I'd print each toe & finger. the next step was what to use to make the digit prints. after some pondering I rememberd a long-ago gift from my dear Cynthia. a bottle of Rubinato black ink made in Italy for Cavallini & Co of San Francisco. then the real work. what seemd so easy in the thinking took much longer. & it was a bit messy. but making art often is. the actual prints vary in quality. some much better than others. but I'm happy with the result. I'll put one in "Billy's Chest." a pair will go in the career archives I've been assembling for collectors I have yet to meet. & then the remaining will find their ways into the books of others.

 

Judy Henske (1936-2022)

 

I dreamt

 I finally got an Anna May Wong quarter but it was a mistake. her name was on it but not her face. it made me sad that I didn't see her but glad that such a possible rarity wd be worth something.

but awake I know that whenever her quarter does come to me it will be worth something to me.

from the rubble comes a poem

 Caterpillar crushes red tile roof

of abandond inn

is this the casita

in which Tab & Tony

fled the paparazzi?

I observe

from across the street

as bulldozer pounds history into dust

every scoop hides whispers

but my ears are eager

to hear each story 

war

 the butchery in Ukraine continues to depress me

"Bound by Mail"

 because of the pandemic MoCa Cleveland turnd their exhibition "Bound" into a book. & I'm honord to have a book of mine in the "exhibit." yes.... you can still order it. so when you go to the Crisis Chronicles Press website you can order both the opening installment of my epic Alex in Movieland as well as the new book carrying the name of this blog.

when a blog begets a book

 

(Crisis Chronicles Press)