Btw, do see ‘Vera Stark’ and ‘Diana Vreeland’

September 28, 2012 by

Amanda Detmer and Sanaa Lathan in the West Coast premiere of Lynn Nottage’s “By the Way, Meet Vera Stark” directed by Jo Bonney at the Geffen Playhouse. Michael Lamont photo.

A b&w movie inspired Pulitzer Prize-winning playwright Lynn Nottage to write her latest work, “By the Way, Meet Vera Stark.” Making its West Coast premiere at the Geffen Playhouse in Westwood, the play runs through Oct. 28.

Says Nottage: “I was watching television late one night when I came across a 1930s film called ‘Babyface,’ which featured a very charming and talented young African-American actress named Theresa Harris. When the film ended, I immediately began roaming the Internet in search of more information. …

“I was struck by my own ignorance, not only about Theresa’s prodigious and eclectic career, but also about a whole generation of African-American screen actors who plied their trade in relative obscurity. My unmitigated curiosity … led me to the actress Vera Stark. Indeed, ‘By the Way, Meet Vera Stark’ pays homage to Theresa Harris and other African-American performers who for decades were relegated to the margins of the frame.”

I saw the play on opening night. Though I thought it faltered a bit in the second act, “Vera Stark” is insightful, witty and visually delightful. Sanaa Lathan leads the excellent cast. You can read the LA Times review here.

And a must-see movie: “Diana Vreeland: The Eye Has to Travel.” I saw this last year at the Chicago Film Festival and Vreeland is a fascinating subject, no matter how you feel about fashion.

I will be posting a longer piece based on my interview with Lisa Immordino Vreeland (Diana’s granddaughter-in-law) but wanted to at least note that it is open in some U.S. cities with more to follow. Why don’t you?

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Film noir gifts for the holidays: Books

December 15, 2011 by

Last week, I was beauty-product happy. This week, it’s all about pages.

Here are my book-buying suggestions and descriptions from their sellers/review highlights.

“Pauline Kael: A Life in the Dark” by Brian Kellow, $27.95
Says fellow film critic Todd McCarthy in The Hollywood Reporter: “Kellow … writes beautifully and dexterously interweaves the story of a career long-thwarted with a sensitive reading of his subject’s youthful enthusiasm and intellectual growth. … Kellow admirably brings Pauline’s wit, insight and passion to life on the page and has made at least one critic nostalgic for the days when heavyweight critical battles raged and at least one of us lived a life worthy of a biography.”

“The Doll: The Lost Short Stories” by Dame Daphne du Maurier, $15
Writing in Elle, Kate Christensen says of du Maurier (who wrote “Rebecca,” “My Cousin Rachel” and “Jamaica Inn”): “It’s all here: her fascination with the interplay between ingénue and femme fatale, her caddish male characters and the clinging females they devastate, and the inevitable disillusionment of innocence. … The stories are not all equally well realized – a few of them feel more like sketches – but the best ones are astonishingly good.”

“Maigret at the Gai-Moulin,” a novel by Georges Simenon, $8
Belgian writer Simenon (1903-89) published his first novel at 17 and wrote more than 200 novels, many featuring a detective named Commissaire Maigret. Says People magazine: “Maigret … ranks with Holmes and Poiret in the pantheon of fictional detective immortals.”

“Marilyn: Intimate Exposures” by Susan Bernard/Bruno Bernard, $35
Hollywood photographer Bruno Bernard’s iconic photograph of Marilyn Monroe standing over the subway grate in a billowing white dress is synonymous with Hollywood glamour. Many of the images in this volume have never before been published.

Gary Cooper

Also includes forewords from Jane Russell, Marilyn’s co-star in “Gentlemen Prefer Blondes,” and Lindsay Lohan as well as excerpts from Bruno’s journal and a frameable print. (Next year is the 50th anniversary of Marilyn’s death.)

“Gary Cooper: An Enduring Style” by Maria Cooper Janis and G. Bruce Boyer, $60
The first monograph focused on the timeless fashion and allure of this leading man who was a fashion inspiration to his Hollywood peers, clothing designers and generations of stylish men. Unpublished, never-before-seen personal photographs, shot primarily by his wife Rocky.

“Diana Vreeland: The Eye Has to Travel” by Lisa Immordino Vreeland, $55
From Town & Country: “Before there was Daphne Guinness, before there was Lady Gaga, there was the original style setter. A new book takes a look at the career and influence of the woman who made fashion modern.”

Lisa Immordino Vreeland runs her own fashion design and production consulting business. She is the producer of a documentary film about Diana Vreeland, and is married to Vreeland’s grandson Alexander.

“Christian Louboutin,” $150
Red rules in more than 300 pages of the legendary designer’s work. Read more about him and his career here.

“Works on Paper” by David Lynch, $195
A collection of more than 500 drawings, dating from the 1960s by the renowned American film director, offers a unique glimpse into the artist’s creative process.

If you are in the LA area, treat yourself to a trip to Dragon Books, 2954 Beverly Glen Circle, 310-441-8545. There, you’ll find an inscribed first edition of 1984’s “Things I Did … and Things I Think I Did” by director Jean Negulesco (“The Mask of Dimitrios,” “Humoresque,” “Johnny Belinda” and “How to Marry a Millionaire,” along with many others); $150.

Also: a first edition of Don Allen’s “François Truffaut” from 1974, signed by Truffaut; $1,500.

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CIFF roundup: more neo noirs, After Dark and documentaries

October 28, 2011 by

"Once Upon a Time in Anatolia" is a nod to Leone.

There was something for every cinephile’s taste at the Chicago International Film Festival. Here are a few more impressions.

Turkish director Nuri Bilge Ceylan earned much praise from critics for his nod to Sergio Leone, “Once Upon a Time in Anatolia,” a slow-burn search for a buried body led by a police team, a forensic doctor and a prosecutor with the killer in tow.

As the hunt drags on (the killer can’t remember the exact location), other secrets emerge from these richly drawn characters. Starring Muhammet Uzuner, Yilmaz Erdogan and Taner Birsel.

Riley Keough

“The Good Doctor” (US) might make you think twice about heading to the ER. Orlando Bloom is Dr. Martin Blake, ambitious, hard-working and a bit of a fish out of water as an Englishman working in California. He also has a pesky habit of playing God.

It’s intriguing, to be sure, but a shame that we never get any sense of why Blake goes to the dark side. Riley Keough co-stars as his trusting teenage patient; Taraji P. Henson is the head nurse, Michael Peña is the partying orderly. Directed by Ireland’s Lance Daly.

After Dark
The fest’s After Dark horror-movie lineup, full of guts, gore and zombies galore, was expanded to 17 films and for the first time these titles were part of the official competition. Highlights included “Rabies,” Israel’s first slasher film and the first Cuban zombie film, Alejandro Brugues’ “Juan of the Dead,” which was an audience favorite.

I couldn’t fit “Juan” into my schedule, but enjoyed “Rabies” by Navot Papushado and Aharon Keshales, a former critic. An ill-fated walk in the woods leads a man to beg for help from four strangers. At the same time, a Good Samaritan in another part of the woods sees the work of a crazed killer firsthand (his beautiful dog is slain) and tries to prevent more harm. Cops are called too but to no avail. Extremely entertaining with a whip-smart script.

Far less entertaining and rather a let-down was “The Whisperer in the Darkness” (US), from director Sean Branney with a screenplay by Andrew Leman based on an H.P. Lovecraft story. Shot in black and white as an ode to 1930s horror flicks, “Whisperer” is a movie you’re really hoping to like. Unfortunately, the stilted acting, tepid direction and feeble script all keep the movie earth-bound and draggy.

Documentaries
In a world where individualism is on the wane, welcome inspiration for living your own personal dream comes from fashion icon and legendary editor Diana Vreeland. Drink in her influence when you see “Diana Vreeland: The Eye Has to Travel” (US), a movie full of personal history, pure whimsy and gorgeous images. No matter where you fall on the style spectrum, you’ll enjoy this first-rate film by Lisa Immordino Vreeland, who won the fest’s Silver Hugo for her work.

Werner Herzog

Werner Herzog’s “Into the Abyss” (US) looks at the far-reaching repercussions of a 2001 murder case in which three people were killed, one man was executed and another is serving a 40-year prison sentence.

Herzog told the Los Angeles Times: “I think in this particular case, with this very senseless crime, so senseless it’s staggering, what fascinated me was that it points to a decay in family values and the cohesion of society, all these things that looked so big and beyond this case. It was not a question of proving [the perpetrators’] guilt or innocence.” Enthralling throughout.

Werner Herzog image from The Guardian; Riley Keough image from 411mania

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On the radar: Books, a blogathon and a bash; Billy Wilder, Bono and Bogart

August 29, 2011 by

Must-read material: The Fatal Gift of Beauty: The Trials of Amanda Knox by Nina Burleigh. Knox and Raffaele Sollecito were convicted of murdering Meredith Kercher, a British student who died on Nov. 1, 2007 in Perugia, Italy. They are appealing their convictions. As Burleigh told Elle magazine: “She was investigated, arrested and convicted as part of a massive multicultural misunderstanding, abetted by her own quirky personality. … Your identity as a young, attractive woman does not belong to you.”

Diana Vreeland

Diana Vreeland invented the concept of a fashion editor, putting her indelible stamp on Harper’s Bazaar from 1936 to 1962 and Vogue, where she became editor-in-chief, from 1962 to 1971. In the September issue of Harper’s, Lisa Immordino Vreeland conjures a portrait of the famous sartorial icon. When Carmel Snow offered her the Harper’s job, Diana Vreeland replied, “But Miss Snow, except for my little lingerie shop in London, I’ve never worked. I’ve never been in an office in my life. I’ve never dressed until lunch.”

Lauren Bacall

Immordino Vreeland’s book, Diana Vreeland: The Eye Has to Travel will be published on Oct. 1. (I hope the copy editor for the book was better than the one at Harper’s; there were two glaring errors in that piece.) It was during Vreeland’s tenure at Harper’s that Lauren Bacall’s career was launched after appearing on the cover, shot by Louise Dahl-Wolfe, in March 1943.

Happy birthday, Mr. Ray: In honor of director Nicholas Ray, who would have turned 100 on Aug. 7, Tony Dayoub of Cinema Viewfinder is running a Nicholas Ray Blogathon Sept. 5-8. Ray directed many noirs (“They Live By Night,” “Knock on Any Door,” “A Woman’s Secret,” “In a Lonely Place,” “Born to be Bad,” “On Dangerous Ground,” “Bigger Than Life”). I look forward to submitting my piece and reading other contributors’ work.

Go on, it’s good for the economy: FNO returns on Sept. 8! Fashion’s Night Out is a global initiative created in 2009 as a partnership between American Vogue, the Council of Fashion Designers of America, NYC & Company, and the City of New York to celebrate fashion, restore consumer confidence, boost the industry’s economy, and put the fun back in shopping. Find out what’s going on in your city and check out the merch.

With love from USPS: Billy Wilder gets his own stamp starting next year. Wilder won Academy Awards for directing “The Lost Weekend” and “The Apartment.”

Other Wilder favorites include: “Some Like It Hot,” “Double Indemnity,” “Sunset Blvd.,” “Ace in the Hole,” “Irma la Douce,” “Sabrina” and “The Seven Year Itch.” Part of a four-stamp Great Film Directors series, Frank Capra, John Ford and John Huston will also be honored.

Doc takes center stage: The Toronto International Film Festival runs from Sept. 8-18. The opening night film is “From the Sky Down,” Academy Award-winning filmmaker Davis Guggenheim’s documentary about Irish band U2. It’s the first time in 36 years that the festival will open with a documentary.

Bogey as Spade and Marlowe: The American Cinematheque’s Aero Theatre in Santa Monica is showing on Sept. 8: “The Maltese Falcon” (1941, John Huston) and “The Big Sleep” (1946, Howard Hawks). Double crossing, dubious motives and dry wit abound.

Diana Vreeland photo by Horst P. Horst

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