A few rarely seen tidbits from the newspapers and magazines from Flynn’s pre-star days.
Enjoy!
— Topper
Archive for the ‘New Articles’ Category
Errol Flynn’s South American Trip, June 1940!
22
Apr
Errol, along with Johnny Meyer, press agent for Warner Bros., begins his South American Tour that is sanctioned by Warner’s as a good will tour. Newspapers, fan magazines, telegrams and even radio broadcasts and shows provided a variety of times, places and events. A map is provided to try and consolidate the where and when of Errol’s visits.
(you can double click a page for more detail…thank you David)
Enjoy
— Topper
Errol and Marilyn … Did it Happen?
18
Jan
The post will have several newspapers clipping and 2 pages of books.
The available evidence:
Danny Kaye’s account states that Errol met and snubbed Monroe Aug 19 1950 at a party Danny organized for Olivier Laurence and Vivian Leigh. That was the first time that they were introduced.
Errol wasn’t in LA on Aug 19 1950, he was in France.
Errol and Pat were at a party in LA on Aug 2 1950 with Danny Kaye present … but I found no evidence that Monroe was there.
The last big party Errol threw at Mulholland was in feb 1949.
I also found no evidence that the ballet corps in the swimming pool was naked.
Supposedly the “bunny” race was at that party. (Hence, Feb 1949).
No evidence was found that Monroe was present or that such event even happened other than Hedy Lamar’s autobiography. She sued her ghost writer for filling the book with lies. No other accounts of the bunny race were found.
Truman Capote’s story was told only by Capote. A pathological liar, according to many observers. Errol couldn’t play the piano.
The letter of Marilyn to Errol … Monroe experts said that they have no recollection of the two meeting and the handwriting isn’t Monroe’s. The fact that it was auctioned by Christie’s means nothing. As of now that letter is considered a forgery.
So as of now I have zero evidence that Marilyn and Errol ever met …
— Selene Hutchison-Zuffi
⛵The 2021 Race is On!⛵
24
Apr
“A well loved and always amazing SoCal event is the legendary Newport Beach to Ensenada Mexico yacht race now in its 72nd year. This race was hatched by old school die hard sailors at the Balboa Yacht Club on Bayside Drive, and the Newport Harbor Yacht Club.”
“Humphrey Bogart was among the original instigators of the first official race in 1948, and sailed, along with Spencer Tracy and Errol Flynn (each in their own boats) into the local history books. As one of the largest sailboat races in the nation, ‘The Ensenada Race’ is a top event for a broad spectrum of yachts – classes from day sailors to world class maxi racers. Other notable racers have include: Walter Chronkite, movie producer Milton Bren, well-known actors Buddy Ebsen, comedian Vicki Lawrence, and Pulitzer Prize winning cartoonist Paul Conrad, It’s an awesome spectacle to see the coast immediately around the starting line as hundreds of boats jockey for position, and spectators on other boats and on shore line the coast.”
— Tim
The Heroine of Hollywood
27
Dec
In the seventh year you shall set them free (Deut. 15:12)
After spending 18 months in legal and professional limbo, de Havilland won the case and her free agency when, in 1944, the California Supreme Court upheld a lower court ruling that Warner Brothers had appealed: The studio could not extend her seven-year contract. At 5’ 3” and scarcely 100 pounds, de Havilland looked unintimidating, but her iron resolve was draped in velvet and silk.
When I asked her about the suit in 1998, she cited Deuteronomy 15, which stipulates that, in the seventh year, slaves shall be freed. “It seemed to me positively unbiblical to hold me to that contract for more than seven years,” she purred in her mellifluous voice. (By then, she was a lector at the American Cathedral in Paris.)
For the very deep diggers;
law.justia.com…
— Tim
Olivia in Chico – Robin to Robbery
01
Oct
Olivia de Havilland starred as Maid Marian in the 1938 “The Adventures of Robin Hood,” which was filmed in fall of 1937 in Bidwell Park in Chico. (Enterprise-Record files)
Chico was charmed by Olivia de Havilland, and she by Chico. She graced Bidwell Park in the form of Maid Marian, but it was not Bidwell Park. It was Sherwood Forest in the 1938 classic “The Adventures of Robin Hood.”
It was in late September 1937 that she descended the train into Chico as a 22-year-old. The trees were aflame with orange, red and yellow tinges.
The train held not only her, but all the stars, technicians and props Warner Bros. needed to create a miniature Hollywood set on the banks of Big Chico Creek.
“I thought Chico a most charming town and its citizens welcoming and kind,” de Havilland wrote in a 1987 correspondence with the Chico Enterprise-Record from Paris.
The headquarters were set up in the form of tents by Sycamore Pool. Bidwell Park became a medieval forest.
According to a Sept. 15, 1937 Chico Record clipping, the park had been discovered by a Warner Bros. location scout and film director William Keighley.
“There was no location in California that could compare with Bidwell Park. I can’t understand why Chico has not been discovered before as a site for movies. I must confess my ignorance,” Keighley said.
“When Robin Hood was named for production, I thought a trip to the East or at least the Midwest would be necessary. I did not have any idea that anything such as Bidwell Park existed.”
More than 100 extras were hired for $10 a day. If someone was willing to let actor and famous archer Howard Hill shoot their padded body with an arrow, they could earn an extra $150 a day.
The film had an original budget of $1.25 million, yet it rounded the $2 million mark, making it the most expensive film Warner Bros. had produced to that date.
In an October 1987 interview with this newspaper, the late television director and producer Rudy Behlmer said, “(de Havilland) was so beautiful then, the rest of the cast, the breadth of the staging. There wasn’t anything you could point to and say, ‘Well, that didn’t work very well.’”
One reason the aesthetic was so appealing was the new three-strip Technicolor process used to create it. Three separate strips of film were exposed simultaneously in the same camera, providing rich color on screen.
“This was the best example of that early Technicolor process with the forest scenes and the costumes and so on. And it is still considered one of the best examples of Technicolor,” Behlmer said.
After six weeks of shooting, de Havilland, as well as the rest of the crew, left Chico on Nov. 9, 1937, to the sight of 500 well-wishers gathered at the train station to bid them adieu. The Chico High band played music for them. The north section of Ivy Street was named Warner Street to commemorate the time of production.
It wasn’t until May 1938 that “The Adventures of Robin Hood” was released to great critical and popular acclaim. On May 14, 1938, it arrived at the Senator Theatre for a three-day run.
The actress came back to Butte County in October 1979 to speak at the Oroville State Theatre.
She remembered Chico as a small, quiet town with an “adorable little hospital.”
A 1987 E-R clipping said that one of the many locals to “fall under the dark-eyed beauty’s spell” was Doctor Newton Thomas Enloe, the founder of Enloe Medical Center. He let de Havilland witness an operation firsthand after she kindly asked.
She and other cast members attended square dances in Paradise on the weekends. The fiddle music delighted them, as did the hospitality of the locals.
“A very kind local gentleman taught me the steps and I joined in with immense pleasure,” de Havilland recalled.
During her stay in Oroville, her motel room was broken into. The doing was not that of Robin Hood. It was at 10 a.m. at the Villa Motel (now Villa Court Inn) that $4,959 worth of clothing and jewelry were stolen and the rest of her belongings scattered about.
Even so, she showed her gratitude to the audience for having her.
“Thank you for recognizing me,” she said.
De Havilland’s acting prowess, among other things, created a fairy tale out of Chico that, like her impact on Hollywood, lasts to this very day
— Tim
Errol’s Last Adventure? — In Majorca? – ¿De Verdad?
27
Sep
A New documentary about Errol’s years in Majorca, featuring Michael Douglas, et al
Alucinante haber conseguido la colaboración de Michael Douglas… Un lujo participar en esta aventura con @roseramills @josemmaiz @BackstageProdu @IB3 pic.twitter.com…
— Tirso Calero (@TirsoCalero) September 22, 2020
Diana Dill in 1943, six months before she married Kirk Douglas. I believe Errol dated her in 1942.
— Tim
Robin in Oregon
17
Sep
This Weekend, Friday and Saturday, 6PM, September 18 and 19, 2020.
It’s yesteryear once more out in Oregon! See Errol swashbuckle his way to victory over the Sheriff of Nottingham at the historic Granada Theater in The Dalles, 84 miles east of Portland. The theater is showing old movies in a new way: as dinner theater with food matching the themes of the movies. It’s a cinematic and dining time machine!
www.granadatheatrethedalles.com…
— Tim
