Sunday, December 29, 2013

Lillian Gish, Burr Tillstrom and Company.with James Patterson as photographer.

 
Their correspondence began in May, 1950 and continued to the mid 1970s. Alex sent several early 1960s era newspaper interviews where Lillian elaborated on her attraction to Tillstrom and Kukla, Fran and Ollie. We're working on the post. Beautiful stationary, isn't it? My Aunt Sally recalled Beulah Witch! If you recall any of the other characters, please comment. We got a nice comment recently in the mail from a Christian Science Monitor reader about an earlier post. And I met a woman whose great, great grandmother wrote a poem on Lillian that appeared in Life and Lillian Gish from the early 1930s. It's digitized and post ready in a day or so as I am off to LA to catch an exhibit at the Grammy Museum.
 
PS: I have a date in a few days with Tom Wopat, whom I saw perform three times in August as the Sheriff in Trip to Bountiful at the Sondheim. He was the only cast member I caught at Stage Door! He's singing at San Francisco's Nikko January 9. We'll have a post.
 
Cheers everybody!



James Patterson soon to be back in New York!

Friday, December 27, 2013

Gish by the Line King


The Line King does Gish! This is from the USO Woman of the Year official program. It was deep, deep in my files. I thought she had signed it but no. Year? Have to check my notes. Maybe '78 or '79. I'll confirm with Larry in LA. What eyes!

BTW, the Line King closes early January. See it while you can!

James Patterson





Lillian Gish Prize Winner Anna Deavere Smith on Art and Human Rights, MArch 9.

Grace Episcopal Cathedral, San Francisco, has just announced this exciting and stimulating program for March:


Art and Human Rights with Gish Prize Winner Anna Deavere Smith, actor and playwright, and Robert McDuffie, violinist Sunday, March 9 at 9:30 a.m. I have my ticket! We'll host the podcast as soon as it goes live. Stay tuned.


James Patterson

Lillian Gish's 100th Film "A Wedding"

 



She was happy to share this. Carol Burnett is in the background. Directed by Robert Altman. It was 1978.

Sunday, December 22, 2013

James Patterson and Harry Carey Jr.

August 5, 2006 3:00 am

An unforgettable morning of old Western imagery

From Mr James Patterson.

Sir, On the morning of July 15, I sat in the historic Castro Theatre in San Francisco watching John Ford's 1917 silent film Bucking Broadway, starring Harry Carey. The actor's son, Harry Carey Jr, was also in the audience.

The film was one of 10 classic silent films screened at the 11th annual San Francisco Silent Film Festival. After the film, the 85-year-old Mr Carey took a seat on stage and talked of his father's long film career.

He also spoke of his roles in Howard Hawks' 1948 Red River and in John Ford's 1956 The Searchers. In both films Carey co-starred with John Wayne.

After his speech, Mr Carey signed his book and posed for photographs. I was delighted to get a photo with him even though I could not keep my eyes open.

Later that morning, I bought my FT to discover Nigel Andrews' Defining Moment column (FT Magazine, July 15/16) on The Searchers. In the film's famous final scene, Wayne stands alone in a doorway, vast western landscape in the background, and grasps his right arm with his left hand.
As Nigel Andrews states in his column, Ford and Wayne paid homage to cowboy Harry Carey who originated the gesture in silent Westerns.

Imagine my surprise to see the column only minutes after speaking with Carey's son. It was a moment and a festival I will never forget.

James Patterson,
Washington, DC 20037, US
(Office was relocating to San Francisco at that time.)


Harry Carey Jr. walked the stairs to get to this stool on the stage. He slipped a bit and said it was "an inelegant entrance." I told him I loved his father in MGM's 1930 "Trader Horn" with the incredibly young and handsome Duncan Renaldo. It was one of the earliest sound films shot largely on location in Africa.

We got to his role as Joshua in "The Whales of August" and he was delighted I recalled him. He as the youngest member of the cast at 66 in 1987. He said it was "a delight" to work with Miss Gish who he called "an outstanding leading lady."

We also recalled his father-in-law character actor Paul Fix, who I met as a child at a Western theme park, of all places, in North Carolina. That story, from the News and Observer, has been digitized and will soon be posted.

Cheers!

Friday, December 20, 2013

National Film Registry 2013 Results No Gish

December 19, 2013
 
Dear Readers,
 
The Library of Congress has announced its 2013 choices for the National Film Registry. Among the 25 films selected selected for preservation are three from the silent era: 1919's Constance Talmadge classic “A Virtuous Vamp,” 1920's all-Native American“Daughter of Dawn,” and 1926's Colleen Moore classic“Ella Cinders.” (I've always thought this was Colleen's best film.) Sound films selected include “Forbidden Planet,” a 1956 science fiction production starring my late friend Anne Francis, 1961's Oscar winning “Judgment at Nuremberg,” and Tarantino's 1994 “Plup Fiction.” (Maybe I'll post images of some of Anne's letters.)
 
Not selected this are two classic films I've lobbied with the Library about for many years. “An Unseen Enemy,” the 1912 screen debut of the Gish sisters was directed by D. W. Griffith. A siumple film accessible on YouTube, the movie is historic with its stars and director. Lillian Gish and sister Dorothy began their long and historic screen careers in this film and it should have been selected for perservation during Lillian's lifetime.
 
The second film I lobbied for is Lillian Gish's last film “The Whales of August.” Filmed on remote Cliff Island, off the Maine coast in the Casco Bay, it has been descriubed as a poetic film of two eldery sisters, Gish and Bette Davis, resolving longheld differences as they decide to winter yet again on the island of their youth.
 
“The Whales of August” is historic for many reasons beyond it being Lillian's last film. The casting of Gish, Davis, Ann Southern, Vincent Price and Harry Carey, Jr. in the film was inspired and unforgettable. It was daring in that it did not discuss age via a young actor or actress but actual film elders. Publicity for the included a close up of Gish and Davis with the caption, “Their coming together makes this film stand apart.” (Image below courtesy Columbia Film Department.) It is a beautiul film deserving of Registry status.
 
Interested readers and fans should consider nominating “An Unseen Enemy” and “The Whales of August” for inclusion on 2014's National Film Registry. This can easliy be done by email to dross@LOC.gov and you can make your nomination as simple or as elaborate as you wish. Maybe this time next year, legions of Gish fans will be celebrating even on remote Cliff Island, Maine.



Here's Anne Francis. I miss her! She gave me some great advice in 2005.



I had a great time at Columbia University's Butler Library. I'll post the library mural later as it currently resides on cell. Library was breathtaking as was Rodin's pensieur at Philosophy Hall. It was cold but Ollie's and UNI kept me warm inside.
 
Sincerely,

James Patterson
766 Harrison Street Suite 211
San Francisco CA 94107

National Film Registry Nominations 2014 Feel Free to Copy and Email

                                                             James Patterson, Journalist

Writer/Speaker/Educator

766 Harrison Street Suite 211

San Francisco CA 94107


 “A happy life is one spent learning, earning and yearning.” Lillian Gish (1893-1993)

December 19, 2013


Ms. Donna Ross, Boards Assistant
National Film Preservation Board
Library of Congress
Packard Campus for Audio Visual Conservation
19053 Mt. Pony Road
Culpeper, VA 22701-7551

Dear Ms. Ross,

I nominate two historic films starring Lillian Gish for the 2014 National Film Registry. The two films span Miss Gish’s historic 75 year screen career.

The Gish sisters, Lillian and Dorothy, made their screen debuts in D. W. Griffith’s 1912 “An Unseen Enemy.” In this short film the Gish sisters demonstrated their abilities to effectively express danger in response to menacing robbers.

In 1987 Lillian Gish made her last film, “The Whales of August,” when she was 93. “Their coming together makes this film stand apart,” the publicity went for this late in life screen pairing of Miss Gish and Bette Davis as two elderly sisters finally resolving their lifelong differences as winter approaches. This film is historic because of its cast of elderly veterans and its honest and beautiful depiction of elder dignity.

I hope to see both of these eligible and historic films selected for preservation on the 2014 National Film Registry. If I can provide any additional information, please contact me. Thank you for your work preserving our rich and rewarding film history. Please acknowledge nomination of these films.

Sincerely,
 
James Patterson

Wednesday, November 27, 2013

Silver Screen: Portraits of Aging on Film





Sketch by by friend Lu from Shanghai who attended the series. I'm wearing my Georgetown University Tombs cap and talking with editors as he sketched.






The November film series included

November 7 - The Whales of August with Lillian Gish, Bette Davis and Ann Southern. (1987)

November 14 - Driving Miss Daisy with Jessica Tandy and Morgan Freeman (1989)

November 21 - Make Way for Tomorrow with Victor Moore, Beulah Bondi, Thomas Mitchell, Louise Beavers as the maid, Gene Morgan and others (1937). This film was inspiration for Tokyo Story by Ozu. (Equinox Flower from 1958 currently, early Dec. 2013, screening at Film Society of Lincoln Center to commemorate Ozu's centennial.) Leo McCarey assisted. No happy ending to this film, but a fade with music of "Let Me Call You Sweetheart." Heartbreaking. A sensitive portrait of an elderly couple in financial difficulty, forced to "temporarily"separate when none of their five children  will take in both parents.

Series was well attended with mostly seniors, some students, my friends from Grace Episcopal, some media, and some special needs friends.


Photo: Sketch from my new friend Lu from Shanghai, China.

Sunday, November 24, 2013

Chaplin's Centennial Year Here We Come


James Patterson in Leister Square with The Little Tramp, 2006. My story was published by Christian Science Monitor. An Exchange of Smiles Between Old Friends.

Sunday, November 17, 2013

Baby Peggy, Lillian Gish and James Patterson


November 16, 2013

Silent screen star Baby Peggy, Diana Serra Cary, celebrated her 95th birthday at the Niles Essanay Silent Film Museum, Fremont, today amid throngs of well-wishers who presented the star with flowers, cards and other small gifts. Baby Peggy began her film career at 19 months. An Amsterdam filmmaker produced a documentary on her in 2012. NESFM in 2013 produced a silent black and white short film homage of a Broncho Billy Anderson film from 1913 with an era camera and starring Ms. Cary. NESFM sold her books at retail and she signed her Hollywood photos for $20.

Cary singed her books and production stills from her movies, posed for photographs, recalled Pola Negri, Rudolph Valentino, Charlie Chaplin, Colonel Tim McCoy, Roddy McDowell, Jackie Coogan and many others.
Cary's titles include 1978's "Hollywood's Children: An Inside Account of the Child Star Era" with a foreword by Kevin Brownlow. The Washington Post said of the book, "An eye-opening wide-angled view. A riveting, discerning account of performing children and their parents." Southern Methodist University Press
Cary wrote "What Ever Happened to baby Peggy?: The Autobiography of Hollywood's Pioneer Child Star" in 2009 with Bear Manor Media. Publisher's Weekly said of the book, "(Cary's) honest and well told account of her unusually rich life, as well as of Hollywood's during its formative years, should interest even those who have never heard of baby Peggy."
Ms. Cary told me she has a new book coming out in 2014, but as a wise author she would not disclose any details. At Niles, she worked non-stop from noon to 5 Pacific but exited before the evening screening of her 1923 “Captain January” with Hobart Bosworth and Irene Rich. She told me it is her favorite film as she got to do "responsible" and "heroic" things in the film. In her 2-reel comedies, more than 50 were made, she said she always played "a mischievous child" for laughs. 
Ms. Cary had several issues of Classic on her table. Photo covers included Baby Peggy (December 1923), Lillian Gish (February 1924) and Dorothy Gish. I searched the February 1924 issue for an article on Lillian and found nothing. The photo cover of Lillian highlights her youth and dramatizes her very small mouth. The cover of Dorothy is rather unflattering I thought.

Lillian Gish cover on Classic, a Brewster publication February 1924

For baby Peggy's 95th birthday.

James Patterson with Baby Peggy, Diana Serra Cary, Niles Essanay Silent Film Museum, Fremont California.
 
 
Beautiful Aurora, who came from Phoenix to celebrate Baby Peggy's birthday, with the Gish sisters

In the December 1923 Classic, combined with Shadowland, a Brewster publication, an article “Questions and Answers,” Harry Carr writes:

“Who is the finest artist in the movies?”


“The Answer: Taking all things into consideration, the finest artist among the men is Charlie Chaplin; Lillian Gish among the women.”

“Lillian Gish is a delineator of characters. Lillian Gish is a great actress in the sense of casting off her own personality and putting on another like a coat.

“Lillian Gish is a not a genius is. She is a master workman.”  (Ed. A sexist reference.)  

“Lillian Gish is always shooting at a mark. She studies the character she is portraying as a surgeon studies a disease. She even figures out in her own mind what such a girl would eat; what she would do on her holidays; what kind of friends she would have. She may never use these points on the screen; but it helps her to get ‘clear under.’”

“I think her work in Broken Blossoms was the higest point in which scrren acting has ever been lifted.”

Carr said the most intelligent woman on the screen was “between Mary Pickford and Louise Fazenda.” He called Pickford “a captain of finance.”

In its back pages, Classic had the following ads:

“Earn Money at Home You can make $15 or $60 weekly in your spare time writing show cards.” The company was West-Argus Show Card Service in Toronto.

“Learn Photo Play Writing. From John Emerson and Anita Loos two the world’s most famous, most successful, highest paid screen writers. They have written photo plays for Mary Pickford, Douglas Fairbanks, and Dorothy and Lillian Gish,” and many others

Another advert urged readers to consider a career in “Cartoon drawings.”

All photos courtesy Niles Essanay Silent Film Museum.

James Patterson


PS Our office recently sent thanks out to Alexander Kogun, Jr., whose studio is in Long Island City, New York. We interviewed him on his restoration work on Mayerling with Audrey Hepburn and The Trip to Bountiful with Lillian Gish. Kogan is legal owner of these early TV productions and hundreds more. He had the vision kinescopes could be restored to broadcast quality and marketed.

Friday, November 8, 2013

A View of the Pitkin House from Whales of August 1987


One view of the Pitkin House in 1987, we were standing at the point. Notes to come as continue the digitization of all the old files and photos. The old chap told us not to throw "any damn cigarette butts" on his yard. More to come.
I had a lousy camera that day but a better one the next day. At the small store by the dock, we sat and chatted with a Census taker who worked the islands in the Casco Bay. My son ran to pet a goose who did not want to be petted and extended its neck and tried to bite him. The island taxi didn't look all that dependable so we walked from the dock to the Pitkin House on the far side of Cliff Island. The island US Post Office startled me in its design. One must walk across a bridge over a rather steep gorge to enter the PO. The island's small church was vacant most of the time. We saw islanders emptying their lobster traps for Portland restaurants. More photos and notes to come.

James Patterson
  

Harry Carey Jr. and James Patterson at San Francisco Silent Film Festival 2006



James Patterson with Harry Carey, Jr. at the San Francisco Silent Film Festival 2006. Notes from the screening and comment with the Financial Times to be added soon.

Tuesday, November 5, 2013

Actress Lillian Gish, director Spike Lee and writer James Patterson

James Patterson with Spike Lee at MoMA for the Gish Award. October 30, 2103. Lee said the Gish Award of $300,000 would go a "Spike Lee joint."




Photo: Actress Lillian Gish, film director Spike Lee, supporting player James Patterson, MoMA, Oct 30, 2013.

"Would you believe that Lillian Gish starred in two of the most important films that impacted me while I was studying film at NYU? Those great films are D.W. Griffith's Birth of a Nation and Charles Laughton's Night of the Hunter. Isn't it funny sometimes how life works? How ironic life can be? God can be a trickster.

Peace and love to the Gish sisters and the Gish Prize Trust."

-Spike Lee
New York, 2013

Lee's NYU colleagues praised him for his "ferocity in filmmaking" and for taking film in a direction "Hollywood would not go."

In remarks, Lee said the telephone call notifying him he would receive the Gish Prize "was a good phone call to have" as he was fundraising for a new film.

While D. W. Griffith was "a cinematic genius" who "invented stuff we're still using" the film ["The Birth of a Nation'] was a recruitment tool for the Klan." (For about 75 years, according to a colleague at San Francisco State University Film Department.) Lee said his first film was "The Answer" about a black man who signed onto a remake of "The Birth of a Nation" thinking he could effect a better outcome.

A scene from "Do the Right Thing" (finger rings) was "straight from James Agee" in "The Night of the Hunter." (Moving from a scene of brutality to a scene of fragility. As in focusing on Robert Mitchum singing on the tree stump then on Miss Gish singing in her rocking chair while holding her rifle.)

Lee said his parents were instrumental in getting him interested in the arts. He said him mom was always taking him to museums when he wanted to play street games with his pals. "I was raised in the days when a kid did what his parents told him to do" and he went to the museums. He also went on movie dates with his mom.

In his NY Public School, he didn't mention which number, art was required and he played a musical instrument. "Art, music and gym are now off PS curriculum," he said. "Obesity has run amok in the African American community." He added, "The arts keep us humane."

The cash prize was "nearly $300,000" Ms. Elias said to audience applause. She also handed Lee the medal with Dorothy and Lillian's profiles.

Food was superb! Plenty of liquor! Unfortunately, I spent most of my time talking with friends from St. Bart's rather than eating and drinking. I talked with a woman who taught private school in Manhattan. Her husband worked for the Norman Vincent Peale estate in Manhattan. We had a brief conversation about Lillian's contributions to Guideposts in 1949 and 1982.

James Patterson

Sunday, October 6, 2013

Letterhead and Brochures Received.

brett.hldn@gmail.com < brett.hldn@gmail.com> Fri, Jul 5, 2013 at 2:42 PM
To: James Patterson <jamespatterson705@gmail.com>
Hi, Jim.

I'll send you some letterhead, but the brochures won't be ready until the end of August and our history brochure is being edited.

Look forward to seeing you in August.

My best,

Brett

Sent from my Verizon Wireless Phone
[Quoted text hidden]


James Patterson < jamespatterson705@gmail.com> Fri, Jul 5, 2013 at 6:31 PM
To: "brett.hldn@gmail.com" <brett.hldn@gmail.com>
Thank you Dr. Holden. I'll need to use a computer while I'm on campus. I assume the BGSU library has computers. Will I need a pass to enter and use the library computers? If yes, can you get a pass for me? I suggest we create a donor form for the LOC event. It can be a simple page a person will fill out and mail in a donation to the Gish Theater and it can have a phone number people can call to make a phone donation. What do you think? The blog is LDGish.blogspot.com. Postings to come. The Film Forum is screening a new restoration of Intolerance and I've been invited to it August 2. All this stuff will be on the blog.
 
 
James Patterson

San Francisco Examiner 400-word!! Review on Intolerance October 5 at the Castro Theater

Flawless restoration showcases D.W. Griffith’s epic, repentant ‘Intolerance’ 


click to enlargeIntolerance
  • Courtesy photo
  • D.W. Griffith’s 1916 epic “Intolerance” — including famed scenes of Babylon — remains awe-inspiring nearly a century after it was made.
By 1916, director D.W. Griffith had earned a reputation as “superman of the movies” on the success of his 1915 Civil War epic “The Birth of a Nation,” which glorified the Ku Klux Klan and depicted blacks in such brutally offensive images, many cities banned the film.
For his next film, Griffith had a breathtakingly original concept. “Intolerance,” screening once Saturday in a stunning new digital 167-minute restoration at the Castro Theatre, was not a huge financial success for Griffith but it influenced an industry and put an iconic sign on the Hollywood hill.

To see the film today is to marvel at Hollywood’s grandeur before Hollywood existed, and grandeur was still unknown except to Griffith.

“Intolerance,” which early critics said “advanced the art of the motion picture one step further,” boldly told four stories of intolerance from different epochs.

The stories are connected in short scenes as the legendary Lillian Gish, nearly wrapped from head to foot, patiently rocks a symbolic cradle with a Walt Whitman-inspired title card: “Out of the cradle endlessly rocking.”

The film opens with the “modern story” of young love amid labor turmoil and the harshness of poverty in early America.

“Intolerance” is also central to the film’s crucifixion of Christ and St. Bartholomew’s massacre in France.

The most famous images of early cinema come from the Babylon sequences. Griffith spared no expense to construct Babylon, including the famous Babylon wall over a mile in length and 200 feet high. The Babylonian sets were so massive it was almost impossible for early cameras to film them.

The famous Babylonian court scene with hundreds of people moving about and sculptures of winged elephants has provoked gasps and applause from audiences since 1916, and the scene is marvelously restored. Upon seeing the magnificence of Griffith’s Babylon, words such as “sweep” and “awe-inspiring” entered the lexicon of film criticism.

The battle scenes of “Intolerance” are not for the squeamish. During the siege of Babylon, the screen is filled with people being realistically crushed, speared and decapitated, though the headless body stands a bit too long. We see brief glimpses of frontal nudity in a bathing scene.

After the initial run of “Intolerance,” Griffith released the modern story and the Babylonian story as individual films. Reconstruction and previous restorations of “Intolerance” created new interest in the film over the years. This flawless restoration is the most exciting recent development in the film’s long life.

REVIEW
Intolerance

Starring Lillian Gish, Miriam Cooper, Elmer Clifton, Constance Talmadge

Directed by D.W. Griffith

Written by D.W. Griffith, Tod Browning

Not rated

Running time 2 hours, 47 minutes

Note: “Intolerance” screens at noon Saturday at the Castro Theatre, 429 Castro St., S.F.; tickets are $11.

Saturday, October 5, 2013

Lillian Gish, James Patterson, Esquire, Bowling Green St. Univ. (Ohio) and Controversy of "A Happy life ..."

2 messages

Ralph Wolfe < wolferh1931@yahoo.com> Tue, Sep 10, 2013 at 8:53 AM
Reply-To: Ralph Wolfe <wolferh1931@yahoo.com>
To: "jamespatterson705@gmail.com" <jamespatterson705@gmail.com>
Tuesday, 9/10/13, Hi Jim:  Thanks for letter to the Sentinel-Tribune. In all conversations and in print please use the official name of the theater: The Dorothy and Lillian Gish Film Theater.  James Frasher tells me that Miss Gish never said "A happy life is one spent learning, earning and yearning."  I think he would know better than any one else. Ralph


James Patterson < jamespatterson705@gmail.com> Tue, Sep 10, 2013 at 9:36 AM
To: Ralph Wolfe <wolferh1931@yahoo.com>
The quote is on the Internet. If you Google Lillian Gish Quotes it will come up. The last I heard from the paper is they would not use the letter as it was too long. They wanted me to edit it but I never got back to them. I guess they finally decided to do. I'll take a look at it and see what  it says.
 
Cheers,
 
Jim Patterson
 
 
How many votes on this being the most famous quote by Miss Gish? Vote multiple times as I like metrics I can report.
 
James Patterson
Happy Life to All!

Wednesday, October 2, 2013

St. Bart's birthday for Lillian Gish


James Patterson, Writer/Speaker

766 Harrison Street Suite 211

San Francisco, CA 94107


 

“A happy life is one spent learning, earning and yearning.” Lillian Gish (1893-1993)

 

 
October 14, 2013

St. Bart’s
325 Park Avenue at 51st Street
New York, NY 10022

Dear Sirs,

I am writing to contribute $50 in memory of Miss Lillian Gish’s birthday October 14. It was a blessing to know Miss Gish and her life has been a constant source of inspiration to me. Kindly use the contribution in a manner that would honor Miss Gish’s love of learning, performing and worshiping.

The above quote is from Esquire December 1969. As I have written in the past, I frequently meditate on the quote in times of personal challenge.

At present, I am experiencing a difficult personal and professional crisis and I kindly ask for your prayers as I attempt to heal from great betrayal by persons I once respected.

Thank you for your prayers and for being my favorite church when I am in New York.

Prayerfully,


James Patterson


Wednesday, September 25, 2013

A 1916 Portrait of Lillian Gish from American Magazine

When Jon from UCLA sent an article titled "A Portrait of Lillian Gish" I expected a long article. The article was indexed "A Portrait of Lillian Gish" from American Magazine, published in New York.

Page 33 has a striking nearly full page close up photograph of Miss Gish. It is striking because she is so young and beautiful. She would have 23 at the time, assuming 1893 as her accurate birth year. Many sources still list 1896, but you can't correct the world. One can only work and write for accuracy and ignore fools who argue.

The title below the photo read: "Lillian Gish--Star in "The Birth of a Nation."

The brief text reads: "Lillian Gish started her stage career when she was six years old in an old fashioned melodrama called "The Little Red Schoolhouse." A few years later her skill as a dancer attracted the attention of Sarah Bernhardt, then on one of her farewell tours.

"The Divine Sarah" engaged her for two seasons. Miss Gish happened into a motion picture studio one eventful day with her friend Mary Pickford. D,.W. Griffith, the famous producer, saw a future in her face and signed her forthwith."

Published American Magazine, New York, 1916. No credits are given for photo or text.

In other and later writings Miss Gish wrote and said she began her stage career at five. There is another fact here I need to check with Professor Affron about. More later.

James Patterson who spends a happy life learning, earning and yearning.
Adviser, Dorothy and Lillian Gish Theater 2005-2013

Breitbart Discussion on early Dignity of Lillian Gish Actress and Person

Breitbart on the early issue of Lillian Gish and dignity. Facts, theory, application and discussion mode is on:

The Gishes found themselves competing against a bevy of other young actresses, all rather interchangeable. One of the company’s other ingénues, Miriam Cooper, remembered that “[Griffith] liked his young ladies to be thin, ethereal types. I don’t think there was a big bosom in the bunch. We were all flat as pancakes.” To set themselves apart, Lillian and Dorothy soon developed into convenient stereotypes -- the younger sister specialized in humor and sass and fun, and the older [Lillian] frequently epitomized solemnity, grace and dignity.

Tuesday, September 24, 2013

Lillian Gish and James Patterson agree "A Happy Life is one spent learning, earning and yearning."

September 24, 2013

Lillian Gish: [American author and journalist] Christopher Morley [author of Kitty Foyle] once described a happy life as one spent learning, earning and yearning. The earning portion of this simple formula for living began early in my life. I made my debut in the theater at the age of five, not out of choice, but because I had to earn a living. My sister Dorothy and I received our "on-the-spot learning" from our wise young mother. As our theater group toured America, she would take us to places such as Plymouth Rock, Bunker Hill, Gettysburg, a history book under her arm. In Detroit, we would goo through automobile factories. In the South, we would learn firsthand of cotton, from seeing it picked in the fields to its emergence from the factory as a dress.

My "learning" was continued by lucky association with D. W. Griffith. Then the picture was important, not the players. I researched periods of history, designed costumes, studied hairstyles, edited film, and before I was twenty directed a five-reel picture for Paramount. Everyone had a part in the creative process of film making. Today, much of this spirit has been lost.

Through the "yearning" to be better at my job, I learned to take the responsibility of work. Lloyd George once told Mr. Griffith that he had the greatest power of the over men's minds that the world had ever seen. Who can measure the power of the thrill that encircled the world last summer when we saw the picture from the other side of the moon, focusing on that galaxy, never before seen of endless other worlds, suns and moons on into infinity. Then to hear a man's voice say, "That's one small step for man--one giant leap for mankind."

Power without responsibility creates havoc. Griffith told us to remember that when we stood before a camera.

I would add to Mr. Morley's statement that a happy life should be in balance, that one must live equally in the mind, body and spirit. And temper this with, "What you get is a living, what you give is a life."

Published New York 1969

Many thanks to colleagues, too many to mention, at UCLA, Niles Silent Film Museum, Museum of Modern Art, Library of Congress National Film Preservation Packard Campus, George Washington University's Gelman Library, San Francisco Main Library, San Francisco Chronicle, and attorney Jesse Tissott. It's amazing what can be done and what is going to be done when a reputation is at stake. Thank you all! Now for the next chapter. I have loads more to write about this and comments to make about it. Deadlines, meetings and media events take me away.

(Note: There are two facts in Miss Gish's above essay, I must check with Professor Affron about.) I am thinking a clarification may be needed. More later. Jim, ever the fact checker. 415-516-3493

Curt, at 8 am send fax to President Mary Ellen Mazey, Ph.D., 220 McFall Center, Bowling Green State University, Bowling Green, OH 43403. The Columbus fax transmitted yesterday. Conference call today. Total post maybe tomorrow.

The original Christopher Morley (1890-1957) quote is "There are three ingredients in the good life: learning, earning and yearning." Kitty Foyle was published in 1937 and was a very successful film for Ginger Rogers.

Miss Gish published her autobiography in 1969 and reflected on the Morley quote as she wrote the book with co-author. The influence of the Morley quote is clear throughout the book.

Monday, September 16, 2013

Lillian Gish would have loved L'avventura's restoration! James Patterson

Screening September 24 at the famous Castro Theater in San Francisco!
Buy your tickets soon.


 

TUESDAY SEPTEMBER 24 ANTONIONI DOUBLE FEATURE
L'AVVENTURA 2:00, 7:00 New Restoration! A girl mysteriously disappears on a yachting trip. While her lover and her best friend search for her across Italy, they begin an affair. Michelangelo Antonioni’s penetrating study of the idle upper class offers stinging observations on spiritual isolation and the many meanings of love. Gabriele Ferzetti and Monica Vitti star in this milestone of film grammar of which Martin Scorsese proclaimed, "Changed my perception of cinema and the world around me, and made both seem limitless." In Italian with English subtitles. (1960, 145 min, 35mm)
+ RED DESERT 4:40, 9:40
Antonioni’s spellbinding first color film is a provocative look at the spiritual desolation of the technological age. A disaffected woman, hauntingly portrayed by Antonioni muse Monica Vitti, wanders through a bleak industrial landscape beset by power plants and environmental toxins, and tentatively flirts with her husband’s coworker, played by Richard Harris. With one startling, painterly composition after another, Red Desert creates a nearly apocalyptic image of its time, and confirms Antonioni as cinema’s preeminent poet of the modern age. In Italian with English subtitles. (1964, 117 min, 35mm)
 

Saturday, September 7, 2013

The 2013 Gish Prize to Anna Deavere Smith by Liz Smith 2013

Liz Smith report from February 2013


ONE OF my Smith relatives of whom I’m so very proud is Anna Deavere Smith who will be presented with the Dorothy and Lillian Gish Prize by JP Morgan Chase & Co. on Feb. 13th at 1 Manhattan Chase Plaza, on the 60th floor.

Lillian Gish was one of the first heroines of silent cinema, having been directed by D.W. Griffith with her long hair glued to an ice floe back when actors had to do all their own stunts — or else. (The movie was 1920’s “Way Down East.”)


Lillian Gish in “Way Down East.”
Miss Gish was a charmer and so talented. She lived and worked until 1993 and just before she went to her reward, she told me that Bette Davis (in a last movie “The Whales of August”) was “the worst person I ever had to work with.”

Then Lillian promised me that I would, at any memorial to her, tell the following story. Lillian was standing in a cocktail party given by the agent Milton Goldman. The room was crowed with stars and famous Broadway actors. One such was witty Anne Meara who was sitting on an over-crowded couch.

“Anne,” demanded Lauren Bacall, “get up and give Lillian your seat!”

Anne looked over at the 99-year-old Miss Gish and said, “Why? Is she pregnant?!”

Maybe this won’t throw you on the floor with laughter but this was Lillian’s own favorite story.

Maybe Anna will tell this story herself. Former recipients of the Gish award include Ingmar Bergman, Bob Dylan, Arthur Miller, Peter Sellars, Robert Redford, Pete Seeger, etc. Nobody deserves it more than Anna who has moved and used comedy to elevate social problems.

Posted by James Patterson
Adviser, Dorothy and Lillian Gish Theater, BGSU

Lillian Gish during filming of The Whales of August

Thursday, September 5, 2013

Elder Dignity: Lillian Gish and James Patterson

September 4, 2013
 
Hello Mr. Patterson,
 
Your letter to SFPL requesting that the library screen Whales of August recently made it into my hands in the Art, Music and Recreation Department of the Main Library and I am interested.  The program I have envisioned though may be very different (and much more simple) than what you had in mind. 
 
At the time your letter reached me I was, coincidentally, in the midst of planning the library's monthly Thursday noon movie series on the theme of older persons in film.  For the series, Silver Screen, I had planned on showing three films with interesting portrayals of older people such as, Make Way for TomorrowDriving Miss Daisy, the Straight Story and/or the Whales of August
 
If we choose to screen Whales of August, would you be interested in introducing the film for this noon series by perhaps sharing 5-10 minutes of your remembrance of Lillian Gish, the making of the film, and the cause (better roles for older actors) she championed?
 
If you are interested, please let me know at your soonest convenience.  The film screening dates are all in November.  You could choose to present on either November 7th, 14th or 28th, but we must decide in advance by Monday, September 16th.
 
Thank you for your consideration and I look forward to hearing from you. 
 
Sincerely,
Gretchen
 
Gretchen Good
Librarian I
Art, Music and Recreation Department
San Francisco Public Library
100 Larkin Street, 4th Floor
San Francisco, CA 94102

Sunday, September 1, 2013

Nominate Lillian Gish in The Whales of August (1987) for 2013 National Film Registry by September 13!


Nominate Lillian Gish's last film The Whales of August (1987) for the 2013 National Film registry by September 13. Instructions below.


Nominate Your Selections for the 2013 Film Registry No Later Than Sept. 13.

Your voice is important!

Librarian of Congress James H. Billington seeks nominations for the National Film Registry. Public nominations play a key role when the Librarian of Congress and Film Board are considering their final selections. To be eligible for the Registry, a film must be at least 10 years old and be “culturally, historically, or aesthetically significant.”
Congress first established the National Film Registry in the 1988 National Film Preservation Act, and most recently extended the Registry with passage of the Library of Congress Sound Recording and Film Preservation Programs Reauthorization Act of 2008 (PL110-336). Along with mandating continuing implementation of a plan to save the American film heritage, this law authorizes the Librarian of Congress (after reviewing public suggestions and consulting extensively with film experts and the 44 members and alternates of the National Film Preservation Board) to select up to 25 films each year for inclusion in the Registry. New selections are usually announced at the end of December.
The 600 films chosen to date illustrate the vibrant diversity of American film-making, and range from well-known Hollywood classics (Born Yesterday, Breakfast at Tiffany’s, Casablanca, A Christmas Story, Forrest Gump, A League of Their Own, and Silence of the Lambs) to landmark independent, documentary and avant-garde masterpieces (One Survivor Remembers, Two-Lane Blacktop, They Call It Pro Football, and The Times of Harvey Milk).


For consideration, please forward recommendations (limit 50 titles per year) via email to: dross@loc.gov. Looking for ideas on possible films to nominate? Check here for hundreds of titles not yet selected to the National Film Registry. Please include the date of the film nominated, and number your recommendations, please. And if you would, please tell us how you learned of the Registry.

Email is preferred; however, to submit via regular mail, send your nominations to:
National Film Registry
Library of Congress
Packard Campus for Audio Visual Conservation
19053 Mt. Pony Road
Culpeper, VA 22701
Attn: Donna Ross

Friday, August 30, 2013

TCM is Screening A Lillian Gish Festival

Here are the films from TCM's September 3 and 4 Gish Festival:

TCM Tue, Sep 3, 2:00 AMMovie The Birth of a Nation Viewer discretition is advised.
TCM Tue, Sep 3, 5:15 AMMovie Orphans of the Storm
TCM Tue, Sep 3, 8:00 PMMovie Intolerance
TCM Tue, Sep 3, 11:30 PMMovie Way Down East
TCM Wed, Sep 4, 7:15 AMMovie The Wind                           

Tuesday, August 27, 2013

San Francisco's Castro Theater to Screen Lillian Gish in New Digital Restortion of "Intolerance" (1916) October 5 2013 at Noon

The Castro Theater's September/October schedule makes it official: The new digital restoration of Intolearance (1916), with a great cast of Robert Harron, Mae Marsh, Constance Talmadge, Elmer Clifton, Mirian Cooper, and an actress we know around here as Lillian Gish, will screen Saturday, October 5 at noon. The bad News: One Screening only.

My experience with Intolearnce is that I've always had late screenings that go well into the next day due to the film's length. Even at the Film Forum screening, August 2,  speeches, comments, etc., etc., went long adn the film concluded nearly 1 a.m.

A nice thing they do at Film Forum is place free bags of unsold popcorn in the lobby so customers can take what hey want as they leave the theater. Why throw out perfectly good popcorn? Lillian would approve.

Also, in September the Castro is screening L'Avventura (1960). I missed it at Film Forum, but the Castro is a larger theater and I am eager to it again. First time I saw it was with Charles Champlain in Los Angeles in the 1970s. Many times since I've seen the film "about nothing and about everything."

From my notes:



L'AVVENTURA
 
A group of wealthy Italians go boating in the Mediterranean and dock at a rocky island near Sicily. Upon arriving, they notice that Anna is missing, and everyone searches for her amidst the endless crevices and wave-battered cliffs. It was filmed on location in Rome, Aeolin Islands and Sicily.
 
Her best friend, Claudia (Monica Vitti), teams with Anna's lover, Sandro, in the search, which is eventually abandoned in the hope that Anna simply left the island. Inquiries are made in a town as to her whereabouts, and several people claim to have seen her. In the process, Sandro becomes increasingly involved with Claudia, who becomes his lover and substitute for Anna.
 
L'AVVENTURA is one of Michelangelo Antonioni's finest films, and a landmark in the devlopment of cinematic narrative. The seemingly pressing question raised by the film's opening--"What happened to Anna?"--becomes increasingly irrelevant as we learn that there is no "adventure" of this type, just a shifting, unsettling meditation on emptiness, contemporary alienation and the opacity of human relationships.
 
The acting is minimalist and the blank-faced, passive Monica Vitti is marvelouly Garboesque in the role that deservedly made her an international star.
 
One character will be in deep "back" focus of an image, seemingly ready to call out to the person in the foreground, but communication is all but impossible. Even sex is a feeble attempt to escape the oddly charged ennui of this milieu. Careful pacing and unusual narrative structure make for interesting viewing.
 
As with all Antonioni films, the cinematography and composition are unsurpassed. He scatters his existential characters over the landscape, brilliantly emphasizing empty space over the trappings of plot.
 
L'Avventura was photographed largely outdoors, shooting took months to complete and sent the original production company, Imeria, into debt. Cino Del Duca came to Antonioni's aid and filming continued, though many of the summer shots actually took place in the winter.
 
The film received the Jury Prize at Cannes in 1960. L'Avventura set box-office records on premiere in Paris. Its US premier was marred by scandalous reviews. According to an Antonioni obituary, the film "systematically subverted the filmic codes, practices and structures in currency at its time." The newly restored version, filmed in black-and-white, runs 145 minutes. Stars Gabrielle Ferezetti, Lea Massari and Lex Barker, a 1950s era Hollywood Tarzan, who, as this film demonstrates, could really act.

James Patterson
415 516 3493
JamesPatterson705@gmail.com
Adviser, Dorothy and Lillian Gish Theater
Co-chair of Development

For more information and to contribute to the Gish theater see www.bgsu.edu/gish

For information on the $300,000 Dorothy and Lillian Gush Prize, an annual award, see www.gishprize.com

Monday, August 26, 2013

Lillian Gish Trip August 2013

James Patterson

Adviser, Dorothy and Lillian Gish Theater, BGSU

766 Harrison Street Suite 211

San Francisco, CA 94107


August 23, 2013


Jan Larson McLaughlin, Editor

The Sentinel Tribune

Bowling Green, OH 43402



I enjoyed my recent trip to Bowling Green State University and the hospitality of Drs. Ralph Haven Wolfe, Brett Holden and Frederic Honneffer. BGSU is a world class campus with exciting activities for students and the wider community. BGSU’s campus reminds a bit of my alma mater Auburn University.


One of BGSU’s activities I am proud to be associated with is the Dorothy and Lillian Gish Theater in Hanna Hall. Lillian was a longtime family friend whose screen career began in 1912. I saw several of her TV and film performances while a student and began a correspondence and friendship with her that lasted many years.


One of Lillian’s issues was elder dignity. She lived to be 99. Her last film “The Whales of August” was a celebration of elder dignity as two sisters come to terms with their differences on their remote Maine island home as winter approaches. It is a beautiful and poetic film. Dr. Wolfe and I are working to have the film named on the National Film Registry. We are also working to get a Forever stamp honoring Lillian Gish. See www.LDGish.blogspot.com, a website unaffiliated with BGSU, to join us in these efforts.


I have been on travel since late July. In many ways it has been a Lillian Gish trip. I appeared at a screening of a new digital restoration of her 1916 film“Intolerance” at the Film Forum in New York. At a stop at the Jefferson Market Library, Avenue of the Americas, in New York, I found Lillian’s 1955 “The Night of the Hunter” playing. I saw Lillian in 1953’s TV production of “The Trip to Bountiful” and her 1927 MGM film “Annie Laurie” during my visit to BGSU.


While in Cleveland to see the career exhibit on the Rolling Stones at the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame and Museum, I discovered Lillian Gish with the Stones in a black-and-white collage from 1974. Yes, Lillian Gish is on exhibit at the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame and you can see her at www.LDGish.blogspot.com.


The future of the Gish Theater is exciting. As the elder population grows, attention will focus on issues of elder dignity, Lillian’s early advocacy of it, and the educational work of the Gish Theater in raising awareness on this important subject. The theater and BGSU are strategically positioned to benefit from increased attention to the important issues of elder dignity in our country and from organizations funding film projects and research on the subject.


I look forward to my next visit to the Gish Theater and the BGSU campus. Meantime, consider Lillian’s sage advice, “A happy life is one spent learning, earning and yearning.” Lillian loved education and BGSU and I am proud to be of service to both.


Sincerely,

James Patterson
Adviser, Dorothy and Lillian Gish Theater
Co-chair of Development
415 516 3493
JamesPatterson705@gmail.com
 

Julie Harris RIP A Memory

August 26, 2013

As I was going through security at the Kennedy Center for the 2005 Honors, I had a tap on the shoulder. I turned to see Julie Harris, an Honor recipient. The woman with her wanted me to step aside so Miss Harris could pass.

Before I complied, I congratulated Miss Harris on her Honor and asked about her co-stars James Dean, Ethel Waters, Brandon de Wilde and her stage director Charles Nelson Reilly, a much underrated actor and director, and the legendary Jackie Gleason, Cassius Clay (Muhammad Ali) and Rod Serling in 1962's "Requiem for a Heavyweight."  

"Charles has a special place in my heart," she said. She thanked me for asking about him. She said she was honored to have performed with Ethel Waters, who lived to be 81. "Brandon was only a child then," she said, "but very talented." de Wilde lived to be 30.


Julie Harris, winner of five Tony Awards for best actress, dies

Julie Harris had a long and luminous career on Broadway and in Hollywood. Julie Harris won six Tony Awards during a theater career that spanned almost 60 years.

By Mark Kennedy, Associated Press / August 26, 2013 at 8:56 am EDT New York

Julie Harris, one of Broadway's most honored performers, whose roles ranged from the flamboyant Sally Bowles in "I Am a Camera" to the reclusive Emily Dickinson in "The Belle of Amherst," died Saturday. She was 87.

Harris died at her West Chatham, Massachusetts, home actress and family friend Francesca James said.

Harris won five Tony Awards for best actress in a play, displaying a virtuosity that enabled her to portray an astonishing gallery of women during a theater career that spanned almost 60 years and included such plays as "The Member of the Wedding" (1952), "The Lark" (1955), "Forty Carats" (1968) and "The Last of Mrs. Lincoln" (1972).

She was honored again with a sixth Tony, a special lifetime achievement award in 2002. Her record is up against Audra McDonald, with five competitive Tonys, and Angela Lansbury with four Tonys in the best actress-musical category and one for best supporting actress in a play.

Harris had suffered a stroke in 2001 while she was in Chicago appearing in a production of Claudia Allen's "Fossils." She suffered another stroke in 2010, James said.
 
"I'm still in sort of a place of shock," said James, who appeared in daytime soap operas "All My Children" and "One Life to Live."

"She was, really, the greatest influence in my life," said James, who had known Harris for about 50 years.

Television viewers knew Harris as the free-spirited Lilimae Clements on the prime-time soap opera "Knots Landing." In the movies, she was James Dean's romantic co-star in "East of Eden" (1955), and had roles in such films as "Requiem for a Heavyweight" (1962), "The Haunting" (1963) and "Reflections in a Golden Eye" (1967).

Yet Harris' biggest successes and most satisfying moments have been on stage. "The theater has been my church," the actress once said. "I don't hesitate to say that I found God in the theater."

The 5-foot-4 (1.62 meter) Harris, blue-eyed with delicate features and reddish-gold hair, made her Broadway debut in 1945 in a short-lived play called "It's a Gift." Five years later, at the age of 24, Harris was cast as Frankie, a lonely 12-year-old tomboy on the brink of adolescence, in "The Member of the Wedding," Carson McCullers' stage version of her wistful novel.

The critics raved about Harris, with Brooks Atkinson in The New York Times calling her performance "extraordinary — vibrant, full of anguish and elation."

"That play was really the beginning of everything big for me," Harris had said.

The actress appeared in the 1952 film version, too, with her original Broadway co-stars, Ethel Waters and Brandon De Wilde, and received an Academy Award nomination.
Harris won her first Tony Award for playing Sally Bowles, the confirmed hedonist in "I Am a Camera," adapted by John van Druten from Christopher Isherwood's "Berlin Stories." The play later became the stage and screen musical "Cabaret." In her second Tony-winning performance, Harris played a much more spiritual character, Joan of Arc in Lillian Hellman's adaptation of Jean Anouilh's "The Lark." The play had a six-month run, primarily because of the notices for Harris.

The actress was something of a critics' darling, getting good reviews even when her plays were less-well received. These included such work as "Marathon '33," ''Ready When You Are, C.B.!" and even a musical, "Skyscraper," adapted from an Elmer Rice play, "Dream Girl."

Her third Tony came for her work in "Forty Carats," a frothy French comedy about an older woman and a younger man. It was a big hit, running nearly two years.

Harris won her last two Tonys for playing historical figures — Mary Todd Lincoln in "The Last of Mrs. Lincoln" and poet Emily Dickinson in "The Belle of Amherst" by William Luce. The latter, a one-woman show, became something of an annuity for Harris, a play she would take around the country at various times in her career.

The actress liked to tour, even going out on the road in such plays as "Driving Miss Daisy" and "Lettice & Lovage" after they had been done in New York with other stars.

Harris' last Broadway appearances were in revivals, playing the domineering mother in a Roundabout Theatre Company production of "The Glass Menagerie" (1994) and then "The Gin Game" with Charles Durning for the National Actors Theatre in 1997.

In 2005, she was one of five performers to receive Kennedy Center honors.

Harris was born on Dec. 2, 1925, in Grosse Pointe, Michigan, the daughter of an investment banker. She grew up fascinated by movies, later saying she thought of herself as plain-looking and turned to acting as a way of becoming other persons.

She made her stage debut at the Grosse Pointe Country Day School in "The Hunchback of Notre Dame" at age 14. In the years that followed, she studied drama in finishing school, prep school, Yale University and the Actor's Studio.\

Before "Knots Landing," Harris made numerous guest-starring television appearances on dramas and was a regular on two quickly canceled series — "Thicker Than Water" in 1973 and "The Family Holvak" in 1975.

Her Emmys were for performances in two "Hallmark Hall of Fame" presentations: "Little Moon of Alban" in 1958 and "Victoria Regina" in 1961.

Harris was married three times, to lawyer Jay I. Julian, stage manager Manning Gurian and writer William Erwin Carroll. She had one son, Peter Alston Gurian.

The late AP Drama Writer Michael Kuchwara contributed to this report.
Copyright 2013 The Associated Press.
 
James Patterson
415 516 3493