While in Italy in 1966, Holden was responsible for the death of another driver in a drunk-driving incident near Pisa. The moment he discovers that life could be beautiful, Norma slits her wrist with Joes razor. Getty always wanted a pool, the poor dope. This car has been on display at the National Automobile Museum in Turin, Italy since 1972. "I left countless messages but received no answer." Kodak would discontinue to manufacture it altogether in 1953. But before you hear it all distorted and blown out of proportion, before those Hollywood columnists get their hands on it, maybe youd like to hear the facts, the whole truth. The one on the Paramount studio soundstage; the one whose driveway William Holden ducks into at 10060 Sunset Blvd; and the one used for the exteriors, which is the one shown here. Director Cecil B. DeMille, silent film actors Buster Keaton, H. B. Warner, and Anna Q. Nilsson played waxy versions of themselves. This wasn't the original opening and was filmed long after completion of filming. A neglected house gets an unhappy look. Get the best of Den of Geek delivered right to your inbox! In addition to the famous swimming pool, the studio also built sets to exactly duplicate Schwab's Drug Store in Hollywood and the Los Angeles County Morgue. The two stars had never expressed any hostility towards each other over the failure of Cecil B. DeMille and Stroheim made many recommendations to Wilder during the making of the film, including having his character write all of Norma Desmond's fan mail, and, more importantly, to use footage from "Queen Kelly" as an excerpt from one of Desmond's great silent films. Joes voice even starts to take on more and more of her theatrical flourish after too much exposure. Film debut (uncredited) of Yvette Vickers. This still goes on today. Norma is at the edge of insanity through the whole movie, but that doesnt mean shes not fun. ), a woman who trades on charms that have . Salome was a wonderful part for Norma Desmonds celluloid comeback. It was this astonishing footage that rekindled interest in the film. It would not be turned into a motion picture until: The Naked and the Dead (1958). And like the title, Holden seemed to have the looks and muscular build Hollywood craved. He starred in Sam Peckinpahs masterwork Western The Wild Bunch. Holden had another hit with The World of Suzie Wong (1960) with Nancy Kwan, which was shot in Hong Kong. The great big white elephant of a mansion on Sunset Boulevard was actually on Wilshire Boulevard and would be used again as the abandoned mansion in the film Rebel Without a Cause. It was built in 1924 by William Jenkins, at a cost of $250,000. All of the silent film stars mentioned by Norma, Joe, Betty and Max were either dead or no longer active in films by 1950. Getty Mansion aka Norma Desmond's home in "Sunset Boulevard" midway In their scene together in Artie's bathroom Gillis mentions to Betty in his dramatic flirtation about having spent "12 years in the Burmese jungle", when coincidentally, just a few years later his character, Shears, finds himself lost there in David Lean's The Bridge on the River Kwai. She burst into tears upon completion of the scene. The much sought after but highly finicky leading man accepted the role, then backed out. Normand made movies with the likes of Charlie Chaplin and Roscoe Fatty Arbuckle, and lived like life was one Wild Party. Fat Man: "You were murdered?" Strange? The first name of the Joe Gillis character was Dan in an early draft of the screenplay, then altered to Dick, and finally to Joe just before filming began. Even though it wasn't the last scene filmed, Billy Wilder threw a party for her as soon as the shot was finished. Its second owner was Jean Paul Getty, who purchased it for his second wife. She looks like a mannequin of a . Sunset Boulevard, one of Hollywood's most cruelly accurate depictions of itself, is now 65 years oldolder, even, than its main character, who's washed up at 50. She declined the offer. After the. Despite that, von Stroheim "still managed to hit the gates, he had no co-ordination", said Billy Wilder in an interview for the book "Sunset Boulevard: From Movie to Musical". [30] Holden made a Western with Ryan O'Neal and Blake Edwards, Wild Rovers (1971). But it wasn't a mistake. Swanson made the transition to talkies with The Trespasser in 1929. Bogart took the part hoping it would pair him back up with his wife Lauren Bacall. Erich von Stroheims Max von Mayerling is equally awestruck, still caught in the wake of Normas star dust. The butler stonewalls Joe from the outside world until hes rolling up twenties tight enough snort through to deal with even the shortest withdrawal from the big empty house. Sunset Boulevard turns the tables on film noir by casting Joe in the oldest role on the books. His death certificate makes no mention of cancer. But she wanted to rewrite her dialogue (as was her custom)a nonstarter for Wilder, who seldom let his actors change their lines even slightly from what was on the page. But along with the accolades came a dependence on alcohol that would play a major role in his tragic end. 10 films that began filming without a finished script, Donald Trumps Bad Romance with Hollywood Began Before Parasite, Shazam! [17], Their relationship did not last much beyond the completion of the film. Since 2006, he has overseen the Bayou City History blog, which covers various aspects of Houston's history. The actor-turned-director-turned-actor-again, who had indeed been one of the great silent-filmmakers, winced at playing a character so self-referential and demeaning, but he needed the money. And so tonight, my golden boy, you got your wish". Wilder almost hired Broadway star Marlon Brando, who would make his screen debut in The Men in 1950. She felt that Wilder used her name in a past-tense context, and she was offended. The drugstore where Joe Gillis meets up with his old movie industry friends is Schwab's Pharmacy, then a real pharmacy/soda fountain at the intersection of Sunset Blvd. [47], President Ronald Reagan released a statement: "I have a great feeling of grief. It is also one of the most frequently misquoted movie lines, usually given as, "I'm ready for my close-up, Mr. Sunset Blvd. (1950) - Full Cast & Crew - IMDb All I know is that she's meshuggah, that's all. preppy-3 15 March 2008. ), and he calls her "young fellow." The only extant film elements were 35mm inter-positives struck in 1952, which had undergone a great deal of decay. The car with the massive chrome grill that the repo men drive is a 1948 DeSoto Custom Club Coupe. The murder made it to the late editions, radio, and television because one of the biggest old-time stars was involved. Montgomery Clift was originally cast as the writer but dropped out two weeks before the shoot. Sunset Boulevard is no. She can be seen talking and giggling on the phone during the party. Sondheim respectfully stopped work on the project and, on the same grounds, later declined an offer to write the score for a proposed movie remake., Additional Sources: Bogart was not especially friendly toward Hepburn, who had little Hollywood experience, while Holden's reaction was the opposite, wrote biographer Michelangelo Capua. But it's also a love story, and the love keeps it from becoming simply a waxworks or a freak show. Yes, this is Sunset Boulevard in Los Angeles, California. Art director John Meehan experimented until he came up with the idea to shoot the scene through a mirror at the bottom of the studio water tank. You used to be in silent pictures. And gossip columnist Hedda Hopper (who appears in the movie as herself) wrote that "Billy Wilder was crazy about Evelyn Waugh's book The Loved One, and the studio wanted to buy it.". Neither was The Revengers (1972), another Western. Paramount reunited Bracken and him in Young and Willing (1943). It's not possible to shoot through water and get a clear image beyond. If anything, its observations on the greedy machinations of Tinseltown are truer now than they were in 1950. What is the correct title - "Blvd." Mary Pickford lived in seclusion, away from the public eye, while both Mae Murray and Clara Bow had well documented struggles with mental illness. It was Erich von Stroheim who suggested the revelation that Max was writing all of Norma's fan mail. Unlike the character she played, Gloria Swanson had accepted the fact that the movies didn't want her anymore and had moved to New York, where she worked on radio and, later, television. The film is openly referenced in Soapdish (1991), The Player (1992), Gods and Monsters (1998), Mulholland Drive (2001), Inland Empire (2006) and Be Cool (2005) while the closing scene of Cecil B. Demented (2000) is a direct parody of the final scene of the 1950 classic. Holden, just 63 when he died, had most recently appeared in the Blake Edwards' film "S.O.B." In 1989 the National Film Registry of the Library of Congress selected this as one of 25 landmark films of all time. Ready? Sunset Boulevard Review (1950) Classic Film | William Holden | Gloria Marshman Jr. Sunset Boulevard was the last time Brackett and Wilder collaborated on a film. William Holden says his birthday is December 21st. Marshman was a journalist but both Wilder and Brackett had been impressed by the critique he had given of their earlier film, The Emperor Waltz (1948). There are several references to Gloria Swanson's actual career in the film. But along with the accolades came a dependence on alcohol that would play a major role in his tragic end. Norma, the aging silent-movie star who ensnares down-at-the-heels screenwriter Joe Gillis (William Holden), is the vamp become vampire (look at those clawlike hands! His co-star Barbara Stanwyck, a screen veteran and one of the greatest actors of all time, coached and promoted Holden personally. After working on Sunset Boulevard, Swanson remarked, Bill Holden was a man I could have fallen in love with. The veteran actress particularly wanted to see what Mary Pickford felt and was disappointed to see that she had left. Sunset Boulevard's cinematographer, John Seitz, said Wilder "had wanted to do The Loved One, but couldn't obtain the rights." The film originally opened and closed the story at the Los Angeles County Morgue. They are singing a parody of their song "Buttons and Bows," from The Paleface (1948), for which they won an Oscar in 1949, the year this film was made. Set designer Hans Dreier had in fact been the interior designer for the homes of former silent stars Bebe Daniels, Norma Shearer and Pola Negri. A new 4K high-definition scan was done in 2008 for the film's release on Blu-ray disc. William Holden - Wikipedia The "fee" for renting the Jean Paul Getty mansion was for Paramount to build the swimming pool, which features so memorably. Whether he was the washed up screenwriter of Sunset Boulevard or the reluctant hero of The Bridge on the River Kwai, Holden kept audiences engrossed. are shown stenciled on the curb of that street. Included among the "1001 Movies You Must See Before You Die," edited by Steven Schneider. was better known as the seat of the film industry in 1950, the Los Angeles film industry actually began on Sunset Blvd. "I knew he was off the wagon," she recalled in her memoir "One from the Hart." Holden turned the tables on Lucille Ball when he appeared as a guest star on I Love Lucy at The Brown Derby. Swanson herself reportedly asked him to do it. Everyone had a good laugh, though the record doesn't reflect whether Marshall joined in. The two men never worked together again. Sunset Blvd. (1950) - Sunset Blvd. (1950) - User Reviews - IMDb producer Music by Franz Waxman Cinematography by John F. Seitz . True to character, Von Stroheim refused to leave Paris to attend the Academy Awards ceremony, and declared that his nomination for best supporting actor should've been for best actor. In those days there were no buttons on formal shirts. The latter was shot in Africa and sparked Holden's fascination with the continent that was to last for the rest of his life. The young actor also got to work with George Raft and Humphrey Bogart in the gangsters on parole movie,Invisible Stripes. It also alludes to the fact that Pomona was one of three towns in California's Inland Empire region (Riverside and San Bernardino were the others) that were frequently used during Hollywood's Golden Age for testing preview audiences' reactions to unreleased films. This film is in the Official Top 250 Narrative Feature Films on Letterboxd. This is absolutely true, Nancy Reagan continued consulting her astrologer long after she stopped parking at studio lots. He always wished that I would get an Oscar. "We didn't need dialogue. Taylor had a British accent and the imposter sounded like he came out of Chicagos south side. See, Bettys a message gal, not a virgin, and there are no whores in Hollywood. Despite the 19 year gap in their ages, Holden and Swanson died just 2 years apart from each other- Holden in 1981 at age 63 and Swanson in 1983 at age 84. William Holden returns to find that Gloria Swanson has tried to slash her wrists in 'Sunset Boulevard', directed by Billy Wilder. After living in the home for a year he moved, and the house sat vacant for a little over a decade, earning the moniker "The Phantom House" in the process. Billy Wilder had worked on a script for a Swanson picture years earlier called "Music in the Air (1934)" and had forgotten about it. She reportedly told Clift shed kill herself if he made the movie. Mrs. Getty divorced her millionaire husband and received custody of the house; it was she who rented it to Paramount for the filming. Stanwyck went to bat for Holden when he was going to be replaced in Golden Boy (1939) and Wilder's collaboration with Holden in the 50s starting with Sunset Boulevard revitalized his career (including the Best Actor Oscar for Stalag 17 (1953). Norma is perceived as the evil force, even if she uses a white phone while Betty is relegated to a poor black phone. Yeah. Buster Keaton appears only in the bridge party scene and utters the word "Pass" twice. The director turned actor was still able to steer the expensive Italian car into the Paramount gate. His Mount Kenya Safari Club in Nanyuki (founded 1959) was popular with the international jet set. Her character's age was 22 but she was 21 at the time of filming. If it were to come to auction in 2021, it would be valued at well over $1M. While Hollywood Blvd. But like so many of the female actors of the era, Holden soon realized it was his physical attributes and not his acting ability that the studio cared about. Sunset Boulevards cinematographer John Seitz said Wilder had wanted to do The Loved One, but couldnt obtain the rights. British author Evelyn Waughs satirical 1948 novel was about a failed screenwriter who lives with a silent film star and works in a cemetery. When he appeared in the innovative Hollywood director Rouben Mamoulian's Golden Boy (1939), he was hailed as exactly that, but had seen his stock fall, largely through his problems with alcohol and a string of unmemorable films in the 1940s. Read more of his work here or find him on Twitter @tsokol. (1950) was plagiarized from other scripts. Gloria Swanson and Nancy Olson also appeared in Airport 1975. I didn't know. Was the inspiration for Metallica's 1997 song "The Memory Remains". Principal photography took place from 11 April to 18 June 1949. Editorial Reviews. After graduating from South Pasadena High School, Holden attended Pasadena Junior College, where he became involved in local radio plays. The whole place seemed to have been stricken with the kind of creeping paralysis, out of beat with the rest of the world, crumbling apart in slow motion. The two starred in the films The Lion (1962) and The 7th Dawn (1964). (The book is about a failed screenwriter who works for a cemetery and lives with a forgotten silent-film star.) In 1972, Holden began a nine-year relationship with actress Stefanie Powers and sparked her interest in animal welfare. Holden appeared uncredited in Prison Farm (1939) and Million Dollar Legs (1939) at Paramount. Wilder and his co-writers reversed several elements, and there was no official connection between the movie and Waugh's book. We had faces" was #13. The first-floor set of Norma Desmond's mansion was also used in the western comedy Fancy Pants (1950) starring Bob Hope and Lucille Ball, giving fans a chance to see it in full color. This page was last edited on 28 February 2023, at 22:44. "[13] And Wilder commented "Bill was a complex guy, a totally honorable friend. Holden was reunited with Wilder in Stalag 17 (1953), for which Holden won the Academy Award for Best Actor. Schwab's was torn down in 1988 to make way for a movie theater and a shopping center. An inventory of his prospects added up to exactly zero. The old movies needed neither color nor dialogue. Winston was one of those who discovered the Golden Boy newcomer and who renamed himin honor of his former spouse!"[3]. There were no shortage of suspects. "[13] Paramount reunited him with Nancy Olson, one of his Sunset Boulevard costars, in Union Station (1950). Sunset Boulevard mixed fiction with the realities of filmmaking. Prior to joining the Houston Chronicle, Gonzales worked as a night cops reporter at The. The restoration was performed at Lowry Digital by Barry Allen and Steve Elkin. For the cover photo of the very first issue, in April 1951, of what many consider the most important film magazine of all time, the Paris-based "Cahiers du Cinema, " the editors chose the image of Gloria Swanson and William Holden in her screening room. He followed it with a romantic comedy, Dear Ruth (1947) and he was one of many cameos in Variety Girl (1947). Billy Wilder's 1978 Flop Fedora Is a Sorry Footnote to Sunset Boulevard The California license plate on Gillis' Plymouth, 4D R 116, appears to be a legal and current registration for 1949. His characters were always angling for something, whether it was silk stockings in a POW Camp in Stalag 17 from 1953, which won him a Best Actor Oscar, or to clear impersonation charges in in The Bridge on the River Kwai (1957) with Alec Guinness. The name "Norma Desmond" was chosen from a combination of silent-film star Norma Talmadge and silent movie director William Desmond Taylor, whose still-unsolved murder is one of the great scandals of Hollywood history. Holden was born William Franklin Beedle, Jr., on April 17, 1918, in O'Fallon, Illinois, son of Mary Blanche Beedle (ne Ball), a schoolteacher, and her husband William Franklin Beedle, an industrial chemist. The name was then changed to Millman and finally to Sheldrake and was played by Fred Clark. Norma Talmadge and Constance Talmadge were famous for owning downtown real estate in Los Angeles and San Diego. Hedda Hopper: at the top of the stairwell as Norma descends toward the cameras. New York-born novelist and screenwriter Brackett was head of the Screen Actors Guild in the late 1930s, and president of the Academy of Motion Picture Arts and Sciences from 1949 to 1955. She was disappointed to see that all the parts she was offered subsequently were watered-down versions of Norma Desmond. Hack screenwriter Joe Gillis (William Holden) accidentally falls in with faded screen legend Norma Desmond (Gloria Swanson). Youre killing yourself for an empty house. According to both versions of the morgue prologue script, Gillis' body is admitted on 5/17/49 (as indicated by a toe tag). [40], Holden had a daughter born in 1937 from his relationship with actress Eva May Hoffman. (1940) followed by the role of George Gibbs in the film adaptation of Our Town (1940), done for Sol Lesser at United Artists.[8]. One of the few showy bits of camerawork in the film is near the beginning, when the corpse floating in Norma Desmond's pool is seen from underneath. William Holden had a similar trajectory as a young artist in Hollywood. (She liked it.). The movie's line "All right, Mr. DeMille, I'm ready for my close-up." He received an eight-month suspended sentence for vehicular manslaughter. The studio needed an actor who the audience could believe wrote a story about Okies in the Dust Bowl that played on a torpedo boat by the time it hit the screen. On the Columbia lot is an assistant director and scout named Harold Winston. Not everyone felt the same way, however. 25 on AFI's list of all-time great leading men. Norma Desmond says that she paid $28,000 for the Isotta-Fraschini car in 1929. About 28:00 in, when Max is playing the organ, it is the same chords that Captain Nemo (James Mason) plays on his organ aboard the Nautilus in "20,000 Leagues Under The Sea." So she lands his head on a golden tray, kissing his cold, dead lips. He contributed to Altvariety, Chiseler, Smashpipe, and other magazines. A Western at MGM, Escape from Fort Bravo (1953) did much better, and the all-star Executive Suite (1954) was a notable success. In fact, such was the buzz about the film during production that the viewing of the dailies became one of the hottest tickets on the lot. His height was 1.8 m tall and weighed 89 kg. That should make the young blond Paramount actress-turned-script reader Betty Schaefer (Nancy Olson) the virgin in the virgin/whore dynamic that film noir so often (and happily) deals in. Also, the house didn't have a pool, so Paramount paid to have one installed on the condition that if Mrs. Getty didn't like it, they'd remove it after filming was over. In 1969, Holden made a comeback when he starred in director Sam Peckinpah's graphically violent Western The Wild Bunch,[4] winning much acclaim. The part was only Nancy Olson's third film appearance. Billy Wilder and Charles Brackett met with Greta Garbo and tried to convince her to make a comeback in the role of Norma Desmond. He was perfection on and off-screen. Holden was a bit of an anti-hero, or at least a very flawed hero. That's the end.". The exterior shots were of a house located not on Sunset but Irving Boulevard, near the corner of Wilshire, owned by the J. Paul Getty family. Only 950 were made from 1924 to 1931. This is an old film which has been made into a musical. Also in 1969, Holden starred in director Terence Young's family film L'Arbre de Nol, co-starring Italian actress Virna Lisi and French actor Bourvil, based on the novel of the same name by Michel Bataille. She can sense the hot spot of every light and has never lost the wonderment of movies. In fact, Billy Wilder and Charles Brackett even went to Pickfair to pitch the story to Pickford, but her horrified reaction as the story progressed made them stop halfway through and apologize to her. He rose to prominence with his role in the movie "Sunset Boulevard" (1950), which landed him his first Best Actor Oscar nomination. But when Sondheim pitched the idea to Billy Wilder at a party, Wilder said, "You can't write a musical about Sunset Boulevard. "I know how it's going to be," Holden said (per The Huntsville Item). When Norma Desmond visits her old friend at Paramount, she affectionately calls him "Mr. DeMille" (not Cecil or C.B. She refuses to believe that she's no longer remembered and will never make another movie. His deal was considered one of the best ever for an actor at the time, with him receiving 10% of the gross, which earned him over $2.5 million, however, Holden stipulated that he should only receive a maximum of $50,000 per year from the film. Read and download theDen of Geek SDCC 2019 Special Edition Magazineright here! This was the last major Hollywood feature film to be shot on nitrate stock. Queen Kelly nearly ruined both of their careers after Joe Kennedy, JFKs dad who produced the film, replaced von Stroheim as director because Swanson complained about the racy material. Watch 'Sunset Boulevard (1950)' Online Streaming (Full Movie) | PlayPilot William Holden, original name William Franklin Beedle, Jr., (born April 17, 1918, O'Fallon, Illinois, U.S.found dead November 16, 1981, Santa Monica, California), American film star who perfected the role of the cynic who acts heroically in spite of his scorn or pessimism. Confess, Peavey, he laughed in the ghosts face. Well, in the end, he got himself a poolonly the price turned out to be a little high, so Paramount paid to have one installed on the condition that if Mrs. Getty didnt like it, theyd remove it after filming was over. White, pink, or maybe bright flaming red. Swanson argued that a woman like Norma would have been obsessed with her appearance and would have done her utmost not to look old. Billy Wilder originally wanted another silent star, Pola Negri, to take the part of Norma Desmond. But it wasn't a bullet from the gun of an aging movie queen that tragically ended his life, but rather, a rug, per The New York Times. She lives in a crumbling old mansion with her butler Max (Erich von Stroheim). Make-up designer Wally Westmore found that Gloria Swanson's face belied her age and wanted to make her look older. Wilder and Brackett told everyone at Paramount and the Production code that the screenplay was based on the story A Can of Beans by Wilder, Brackett, and D.M. Sunset Boulevard told an old familiar story. Gloria Swanson brings sunshine into every room as silent screen idol Norma Desmond. Since he had classic good looks, an expressive voice, and was an excelle He rejects her. Swanson was told "She can't show herself, Gloria, she's too overcome. Hola, identifcate . Joe Gillis mentions that the painting of wild horses that covers the projection screen in Norma Desmond's mansion was given to her by "some Nevada Chamber of Commerce." At the time this movie was made, the incident was still quite recent. Seitz had used a similar technique on Double Indemnity (1944). Marlon Brando was considered, but the producers thought he was too much of an unknown as a film actor. [44] After his death, Powers set up the William Holden Wildlife Foundation at Holden's Mount Kenya Game Ranch.
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