NORMA SHEARER in “MARIE ANTOINETTE” – At the Legion of Honor, January 13th

San Francisco Sentinel’s fine arts critic will introduce MGM’s “Queen Of The Lot”

By Seán Martinfield
Sentinel Fine Arts Critic
Copyright © 2007 San Francisco Sentinel
On Saturday afternoon, January 13th, at 3:00 PM, the Legion of Honor presents MGM’s monumental screen classic from 1938, “MARIE ANTOINETTE”. Starring legendary Hollywood beauty Norma Shearer in her most celebrated role, this special event screening is in conjunction with the Legion’s current exhibit, MARIE-ANTOINETTE AND THE PETIT TRIANON AT VERSAILLES. The film will be presented in the beautiful Louis XVI style Florence Gould Theatre located on the Legion’s lower level. Seán Martinfield, fine arts critic for the San Francisco Sentinel, will introduce the film and discuss Norma Shearer’s reputation as “Queen of the Lot” at MGM Studios. The film is included with an Admission Ticket to the museum. The Legion of Honor is located in San Francisco’s Lincoln Park at 34th Avenue and Clement Street.

NORMA SHEARER – Marie Antoinette (MGM, 1938
Co-starring with Norma Shearer is the 24-year old Tyrone Power, then a rising contract player with 20th Century Fox. He was hand-picked by Miss Shearer for the role of the Queen’s lover, “Axel de Fersen”, and granted equal billing with her in the opening screen credits. He was also given a substantial boost in salary.

TYRONE POWER and NORMA SHEARER
“MARIE ANTOINETTE” features a star-studded supporting cast including John Barrymore as “Louis XV”, Robert Morley as “Louis XVI”, Gladys George as “Madame DuBarry”, Joseph Schildkraut as the “Duke D’Orleans”, and Anita Louise as the Royal Governess, “Princesse de Lamballe “. Direction was assigned to W.S. Van Dyke – revered by studio executive Louis B. Mayer as “One-Take Woodie” – whose previous credits included the Thin Man series, the first two Tarzan features starring Johnny Weissmuller, and the musicals of Jeanette MacDonald and Nelson Eddy. Van Dyke hit it off immediately with Norma Shearer who was not only MGM’s “Queen of the Lot” but also a major share holder in the company stock. Under his watchful eye, Shearer won “Best Actress” at the Venice Film Festival and garnered her sixth Academy Award nomination. Celebrated English actor Robert Morley received his only Oscar nomination in the “Best Supporting Actor” category. Cedric Gibbons was nominated for “Best Art Direction” and Herbert Stothart for “Best Score”.

GLADYS GEORGE, as Madame DuBarry
The film is based in part on the 1933 biography by Stefan Zweig, MARIE ANTOINETTE: The Portrait of an Average Woman. Taking a Freudian position, the story examines the life of the young Archduchess of Austria, betrothed and wed to the future king of France while still a teenager, and consigned to a sexless and childless union until seven years later. Zweig posits that the Queen’s unfulfilled sexual passions are channeled toward reckless gambling, extravagant fashions, diamonds and pearls, and eventually a handsome young Swedish Count. MGM quickly purchased the rights to the book, called in F. Scott Fitzgerald among others and began developing it as a vehicle for Norma Shearer, wife of producer Irving Thalberg, and one of the studio’s top money-making stars. Her contemporaries, Greta Garbo and Joan Crawford – eventually labeled as “Box Office Poison” – were dropped from the studio roster. Thalberg died in 1936 after the release of ROMEO AND JULIET starring his wife and Leslie Howard (later cast as “Ashley Wilkes” in GONE WITH THE WIND). Shearer pushed for the completion of “Marie Antoinette”, Sydney Guilaroff (Norma’s personal hair stylist) dressed the wigs, and fashion designer Adrian was given a blank check to create the most opulent period wardrobe ever to grace the silver screen.

GILBERT ADRIAN, NORMA SHEARER, and W.S. VAN DYKE
Production began December 30, 1937 and was completed the following May. The film premiered at the Carthay Circle Theatre on July 8, 1938 and was released into general distribution August 26th. “MARIE ANTOINETTE” proceeded to gross over three million dollars, a larger profit than any other MGM production up to that point.

The Archduchess of Austria arrives at Versailles

THE WEDDING NIGHT – Robert Morley and Norma Shearer
Watch the original 1938 trailer to: MARIE ANTOINETTE
Click here for additional information on the January 13th screening at the Legion of Honor: “MARIE ANTOINETTE”
Click here for more information on the exhibit: MARIE-ANTOINETTE AND THE PETIT TRIANON AT VERSAILLES
Visit Seán on YouTube: SAMSON & DELILAH – Meet Seán Martinfield
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MARIE ANTOINETTE’S PETIT TRIANON COMES TO SAN FRANCISCO
JENNIFER SIEBEL – A Conversation
SWEENEY TODD – PRIME CUTS FROM DIRECTOR TIM BURTON
SEÁN MARTINFIELD wins “Best Presentation” in SF City Hall Bake-Off
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ANITA COCKTAIL and LEANNE BORGHESI – A 3-Way Dialogue
PATRICIA RACETTE – Returns to San Francisco Opera as “Madama Butterfly”
SCOTT FOGLESONG, Pianist – IN CONCERT, Sunday Afternoon at the SF Conservatory of Music
MACBETH – Double Trouble, Spoil and Rubble at SF OPERA
THE OLD MINT – Breathing New Life Into “The Granite Lady”
APPOMATTOX – A Flag–Waving Victory for San Francisco Opera
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An Interview with PASCAL MOLAT, Principal Dancer of the San Francisco Ballet

Seán Martinfield is a native San Franciscan. He is a Theatre Arts Graduate from San Francisco State University, a professional singer, and well-known private vocal coach to Bay Area actors and singers of all ages and persuasions. His clients have appeared in Broadway National Tours including Wicked, Aïda, Miss Saigon, Rent, Bye Bye Birdie, in theatres and cabarets throughout the Bay Area, and are regularly featured in major City events including Diva Fest, Gay Pride, and Halloween In The Castro. As an Internet consultant in vocal development and audition preparation he has published thousands of responses to those seeking his advice concerning singing techniques, professional and academic auditions, and careers in the Performing Arts. Mr. Martinfield’s Broadway clients have all profited from his vocal methodology, “The Belter’s Method”, which is being prepared for publication. If you want answers about your vocal technique, post him a question.

Norma Shearer: Canadian was a Hollywood Movie Star

Montreal was the childhood home of actress Norma Shearer. The star of silent movies and talkies, the beautiful Shearer overcame her own shortfalls.

The lovely Canadian actress Norma Shearer

The Shearer home in Montreal, Quebec was an unusual place. It seemed that parents Edith and Andrew Shearer did not have a close attachment, but the home was still held a pleasant atmosphere for their three children. Their third child, Edith Norma Shearer, was born on August 10, 1902. Her sister Athole was born in 1900, her brother Douglas the firstborn in 1899. The house rules leaned toward lax. “We were given greater freedom and more opportunities to show initiative than is the lot of most youngsters,” said Norma Shearer in a 1936 interview. Rather than sit in a confined classroom, she took advantage of the freedom to study at home instead.

A pretty child, Norma grew into a beautiful woman. After watching a Vaudeville show on her ninth birthday, she was interested in learning music and becoming an actress. At age 14, Norma won a beauty pageant, even though she needed her teeth straightened and her right eye had a cast to it, causing it to appear crossed.

Norma Shearer to New York

When Andrew Shearer’s business collapsed into bankruptcy in 1918, the Shearers moved from a comfortable home in a good neighbourhood to one in a run-down area of Montreal. In 1920, the girls were packed off to New York with their mother Edith to fulfill her dream of breaking into entertainment. The Shearer women stayed in a cheap boarding house, using their wardrobe trunk as storage, dining table and bench. There was only one bed, and loud city trains passed interminably by their window.

Receiving a look-over by the Ziegfield Follies owner, Norma was turned down. She next attended a Universal Pictures casting call for extras. Chosen along with seven other girls out of dozens, Norma’s first on-screen appearance was in the barn-dancing scene in the silent “Way Down East” in 1920. The film was a foot in the door. Finding work as an extra in several more movies, Norma and her mother moved to California for the bright lights of Hollywood. The cross-country move was worthwhile – Norma signed a five-year contract with Metro Company (later MGM) in 1922, under prodigious young producer Irving Thalberg. Before signing, there was a snag, though. Norma failed the first screen test. Instead of sobbing and dashing her hopes, Norma was irate and determined. She received a second screen test and passed.

Eye Problems Plague Shearerer

Making a film a year from 1924 to 1928, Norma became a movie star. Meanwhile the young actress spent much of her money on doctors to fix her wandering eye. She found “an eye doctor, who trained her to strengthen her weak eye,” said the “Biography for Norma Shearer” at IMDb. Learning the craft of make-up to highlight her best features, Norma was conscious about her appearance.

Glamour photo of Norma Shearer

Norma’s future became even brighter in 1927 when she married Thalberg. Her husband thought that Norma would retire from acting when they wed, but she was just beginning. Adept, she transitioned easily from silent screen star to talkies’ “Queen of MGM Studios.” Filming her first “talkie”, “The Trial of Mary Dugan,” in 1929, Norma continued to grow in fame. Appearing in several more movies, in 1930 she won an Oscar for her role in “The Divorcee.” (Over the length of her career, Norma was nominated for six Oscar Awards.) The same year, the Thalbergs welcomed their first child, son Irving Jr. Their second child was daughter Katherine, born in 1935. In the 1930s, Norma appeared only in her influential and prestigious producer-husband’s films.

Actress Turned Down Future Classics

Suffering a devastating heart attack, Irving Thalberg died on September 14, 1936 at age 37. Much too young, four years earlier he had suffered a first heart attack. Norma considered leaving the movie business, but the studio instead contracted her for another six movies. Earning Oscar nominations for many movies, she also turned down roles in films that became classic: Gone with the Wind, Sunset Blvd., and Mrs. Miniver. At her peak, Norma was earning $6,000 a week; she was paid $150,000 for her role in Marie Antoinette in 1938.

Six years after the death of Irving, Norma married Martin Arrouge in 1942. The Sun Valley ski instructor was 20 years her junior and they remained married for over 40 years. The performer retired from the movie industry the same year and aside from an active social life, slipped from publicity. While in Sun Valley, Idaho, Norma spotted a young woman at a ski lodge. Recommended to MGM by Norma, the girl became the talented Janet Leigh.

Suffering depression and Alzheimer’s Disease for nearly a decade before her death, Edith Norma Shearer died of pneumonia on June 12, 1983. She was interred with her first husband in Glendale, California’s Great Mausoleum in Forest Lawn Memorial Park.

Douglas Shearer a Technical Genius

What happened to the rest of the Shearer-Thalberg family? Norma’s sister Athole became an actress in her own right, but did not receive the same acclaim as Norma. Their brother Douglas joined them in California, becoming a renowned pioneer of movie sound design and a recording director. Called a technical genius, he received seven Oscars for his work. Norma’s son Irving was a philosophy professor at the University of Illinois in Chicago. He died of cancer in 1988 at age 58. Head of the Society of Animal Rights in Aspen, Colorado, Norma’s daughter Katherine also died of cancer at age 71.

Edith Norma Shearer was honoured by Canada Post in June 2008 with a stamp in the “Canadians in Hollywood: The Sequel” collection. A star installed in 2008 on Hollywood’s Walk of Fame also commemorates the brilliant actress.

Beautiful, elegant, determined, and dubbed “first lady of the screen,” Norma Shearer overcame shortfalls and pitfalls to rise to the top of the early movie industry. To think, the remarkable Shearer story began in… Canada.

Sydney Guilaroff, 89, Stylist to Stars, Is Dead

Sydney Guilaroff, who gave Claudette Colbert her bangs, made Lucille Ball a redhead, gave Judy Garland her ''Wizard of Oz'' braids and cut, curled, coiffed and cosseted virtually every other MGM star in a 40-year reign as Hollywood's most creative and celebrated hairdresser, died on Wednesday at a nursing home in Beverly Hills, Calif. He was 89.

His son Jon said the cause was pneumonia.

Movie stars had hair before Mr. Guilaroff came along, and there were presumably studio hairdressers, too.

But there was a reason that he was the first to receive screen credits and a reason that Greta Garbo, Greer Garson, Elizabeth Taylor, Joan Crawford, Norma Shearer, Hedy Lamarr, Ava Gardner, Lana Turner, Lena Horne, Grace Kelly, Debbie Reynolds, Kathryn Grayson, Ann-Margret, Marilyn Monroe and myriad other stars would not dream of making a movie -- or sometimes a move -- without Mr. Guilaroff.

He was at once a master craftsman -- a wizard with scissors -- and an acknowledged artist, one with such an instinctive eye for the possibilities of beauty that he could look at a face and instantly see it transformed -- by a curl, a flip, a wave, a daring cut or a bit of color.

As the chief stylist at Metro-Goldwyn-Mayer during the studio's golden years from 1934 to the late 1970's, he was the man behind the hairdos in more than a thousand movies.

Among them were ''Ben-Hur,'' ''Quo Vadis,'' ''Camille,'' ''The Philadelphia Story,'' ''Some Like It Hot,'' ''Gentlemen Prefer Blondes,'' and what he called his greatest challenge, the 1938 production of ''Marie Antoinette,'' which required 2,000 court wigs (some with actual birds in cages), lesser wigs for 3,000 extras and Norma Shearer's monumental bejeweled and feathered artists' ball creation.

A man with an enormous talent for friendship who both gave and inspired loyalty, Mr. Guilaroff (pronounced GIL-er-ahf) not only did actresses' hair; by his own account he shared their private moments of triumph and disaster: the man Grace Kelly summoned to Monaco to style her hair for her wedding to Prince Ranier; the man who sat with the bed-ridden Joan Crawford the night she won an Oscar for ''Mildred Pierce''; the ''surrogate father'' to whom Elizabeth Taylor turned for comfort when her husband Mike Todd was killed in a plane crash, and the friend a distraught Marilyn Monroe called the night she died in August 1962.

Along the way, Mr. Guilaroff heard so many secrets it was all he could do to hold them in until he disgorged them in his memoirs, ''Crowning Glories,'' an as-told-to tell-all told to Cathy Griffin and published by General Publishing Group last year.

Well, maybe he did not tell all the all, but his accounts of his long-term affairs with Greta Garbo and Ava Gardner should be enough to establish Mr. Guilaroff as one of Hollywood's great lovers, even if neither actress is around to verify the details.

Even before Miss Colbert discovered the 21-year-old ''Mr. Sydney'' in 1928 at Antoine's, the elegant Saks Fifth Avenue salon in Manhattan, and walked out with the bangs and bob that would be her trademark for the rest of her life, Mr. Guilaroff had inadvertently changed the shape of women's hair and made his mark on the movies.

Five years earlier, when he was a 16-year-old apprentice stylist at the old McAlpin Hotel in New York City, as he later recalled it, he created a national hairstyle rage known as the ''shingle'' for a walk-in client he did not realize at the time was the silent screen star Louise Brooks.

For all his natural talent and later acclaim, Mr. Guilaroff became a hairdresser by accident. A native of London who grew up in Canada, first in Winnipeg, Manitoba, and later in Montreal, he had a decidedly artistic bent as a child and a flair for playing the piano and for painting. But he dreamed of becoming an architect before a family financial squeeze led him to leave home at 13 and seek employment in New York.

So poor that he sometimes slept on park benches, he held a series of menial jobs before he landed at the McAlpin salon as a handyman, picking up his trade almost by osmosis and proving so adept that by the time he was 17 he was at Antoine's. Within a few years, he had his own salon at Bonwit Teller.

Miss Colbert's raves made him a favorite in the New York theater world, and drew such clients as Libby Holman, Ginger Rogers and Clare Booth Luce. But it was Miss Crawford's insistence on coming to New York for a Guilaroff styling before every picture that led Louis B. Mayer to take him to Hollywood in 1934.

A favorite of directors as well as actors, Mr. Guilaroff was tapped for two appearances on the screen, once in person as Geraldine Page's hairdresser in ''Sweet Bird of Youth,'' and once by inference when ''Blackie's,'' the name of the salon that is the setting of Clare Booth Luce's play ''The Women,'' which was based on an actual incident involving a former Guilaroff client, was changed to ''Sydney's'' for the movie version.

Although Mr. Guilaroff's movie clients included virtually all the major male stars of the era, women were clearly his forte.

Despite all his love of women, and theirs for him, he never married. Yet, as the sixth of seven children, including five older sisters, he longed for family life and saw no reason that his single status should keep him from being a father.

So in 1938, at the age of 31, the man who had revolutionized the nation's hairstyles blithely made legal history by becoming the first never-married man in the United States who was allowed to adopt a child, a year-old son he named Jon, after Joan Crawford. Three years later, he adopted a second son, named Eugene for Mr. Guilaroff's father.

As Jon recalled it, Mr. Guilaroff was a doting father who made it a point to have dinner with his sons every night and who provided them a special childhood bonus: Hollywood's greatest stylist gave them haircuts.

Besides Jon, of Santa Monica, Calif., and Eugene, of Alvagon, Ky., Mr. Guilaroff is survived by two sisters, Rita Loadman of Winnipeg and Eva Feldman of Montreal.

Photos: Sydney Guilaroff styled Marilyn Monroe, for ''The Misfits'' (1961) and Norma Shearer for ''Marie Antoinette'' (1938). (General Publishing Group)

Los Angeles' Hollywood legacy is an auction house dream

Norma Shearer's monogrammed silk sheets, a Charlie Chaplin bowler — many entertainment-world treasures long lie forgotten in L.A.'s attics and garages. About 400 will be up for auction Sunday.

Norma Shearer's silk sheets sat for years in a Los Angeles garage, with no one to admire the embroidered monogram: NST, for Norma Shearer Thalberg.

The starlet's Louis Vuitton steamer trunks waited in vain to voyage. One was dedicated solely to protecting Shearer's shoes — some of its 30 leather-trimmed drawers still bearing hand-written labels like "silvered lizard sandal evening" and "gold kid sandal evening high heels."

This was Golden Age glamour. It was an auction house's dream.

Bonhams on Sunset Boulevard got the call.

"There were her scripts, stacks of her publicity photographs from MGM. It was really pretty much a time capsule," said Catherine Williamson, Bonhams' erudite director of both entertainment memorabilia and fine books and manuscripts.

Last year, Shearer's shoe trunk sold for $30,500, her ivory sheets for $1,220.

Who knows what the latest Hollywood relics to emerge from the dust will fetch when they hit the auction block Sunday.

Treasures are everywhere here, amassed by stars and the many who have played crucial supporting roles in their success.

In a junk shop, you might not give the black bowler hat a second glance, given its broken band and general state of wear. Your eyes probably would flick right past the slight bamboo cane beside it, never noticing the inked notation: "CCLT 36."

CC stands for Charlie Chaplin, LT for Little Tramp, and 1936 was the year Chaplin retired his famous character and posed for a wax bust by Katherine Stubergh Keller — L.A.'s Madame Tussaud of the day. Chaplin gave her the mementos, which 30 years later she passed on to the proprietor of a wax museum more than 2,000 miles away.

Recently, the Mammoth Cave Wax Museum in Cave City, Ky., went under. And little bits of the Little Tramp found their way home to Hollywood.

The hat and cane have a combined auction estimate of $40,000 to $60,000. They go on the block at 10 a.m., one lot in an eclectic assortment of more than 400.

As auctioneer, Williamson will spend maybe four hours moving through it all — work by Disney animator T. Hee and "Peanuts" cartoonist Charles M. Schulz, an "Annie Hall" script, Beatles bobbleheads, an alto sax Charlie Parker once pawned, Jimi Hendrix's turquoise jewelry, Bing Crosby's straw hats and scuffed golf shoes.

A Crosby-phile could score 900 of his canceled checks — and so accompany the crooner vicariously on an African safari. A "Harry Potter" buff could grip a battery-illuminated wand wielded by actor Daniel Radcliffe in two blockbusters.

"To me, there are two big impulses for these kinds of collectors: One is, 'I want to know more about the person I admire.' The other is, 'I want to know more about the film that I admire, so I want to know more about the process,'" Williamson said. "And if you look at all of this stuff, it falls in one or the other category."

Bonhams' auction room has about 70 comfy chairs. Many will be empty Sunday as offers come in by phone or online. Some will be occupied, possibly by people in flip-flops and shorts, Williamson said. In New York, they still dress to bid. But not here.

Photos from the silent picture days, a wicker chair from Rick's Cafe in "Casablanca," a flesh-colored, foam-rubber alien from "The X Files'' — the objects on offer range from yesteryear to yesterday, from already much ogled to intimate.

Jimmy Stewart's childhood room in Indiana, Pa., had two mahogany-stained twin-size beds. When he left home, his father gave them to someone who worked at his hardware store. One eventually found its way to the Jimmy Stewart Museum. The other, with extra-long rails to fit the lanky star's frame, has an estimate of $4,500 to $6,500.

John Belushi's brown bathrobe, a red jacket from Elvis Presley's last tour — you could buy them and, if you so chose, put them on. (But be warned: Sammy Davis Jr.'s suits are so small that they have to be displayed on women's and children's mannequins.)

Paddles will go up. The gavel will go down. Objects will depart the premises, leaving room for new ones.

Can you blame the auction experts if they drive our city streets thinking: What's in that attic? That shed? What will be coming our way next?

MOVIE MIRROR

I walked onto the set of MARIE ANTOINETTE at Metro-Goldwyn-Mayer that first day with my heart in my throat. I had reason enough: this was the first time I'd ever been loaned to another studio, for one thing. The picture, a $3,000,000 production, was obviously an enormously important affair, and I had been cast as the lover, and I had only three weeks in which to do the part.

There were other things. They were having dressing room shortage trouble at Metro and I had to use one of the gals' places in Ladies Row, sandwiched between Myrna Loy and Joan Crawford, with Jeanette MacDonald within hearing distance. That left me wide open for a lot of strange ribbing, besides starting me off on a case of nerves. The room was very frou-frou-and suppose I left the door open some time while addressing a few loud remarks at a tie that wouldn't come out right? A dressing room is supposed to be the one place in which an actor can relax.

Additionally, there were all the rumors-some based on fact, I thought-that this was going to be one of the most difficult and nerve-racking films any young actor ever had the luck to hit. It was, above all else, Norma Shearer's comeback after two years-her first picture since the passing of her husband, Irving Thalberg-and everyone knew how difficult it would be for her to return to the lot.

I had met her once, and I felt that so poised and gracious a lady would conquer a difficult situation of that sort with consummate ease.

But there was another complication. Sidney Franklin, Miss Shearer's favorite director, who had seen her through most of her earlier success, fell sick just before the picture was to start shooting. The only other director at Metro available at the moment was W. S. Van Dyke.

Now Woody Van Dyke is one of the finest men in his profession, in addition to being a great guy. But, notoriously, he is the fastest shooter of them all. On straight films the rehearsal of a scene usually constitutes his first-and last-take. In that way he assures himself of spontaneity, enthusiasm in portrayal, and a shortened budget to match the shortened production schedule.

Immediately the great Hollywood tongue began to buzz. How would Miss Shearer, who extolled the leisured pace and the safety of many takes in production, react to Woody's speed methods. Everyone understood that she was now one of the largest stockholders in Metro-Goldwyn-Mayer, and therefore powerful enough to argue all she wanted to, if, she wanted to. She would, thought Hollywood. 

MARIE ANTOINETTE was the one picture she had planned from the beginning with her husband; it was their dream of the perfect production, and it had been postponed several times because existing circumstances might have hastened it, and nothing, surely, would hurt her more than to see it rushed through in actual shooting.

And if she did stand up to Van Dyke about his ideas and methods, what then? Woody is sure of himself, as well he deserves to be, and insists on absolute control of the set on which he is working. Explosive and impatient, he has blown up often at some of the biggest stars on the lot.

The entire working company, as I cam into the sound stage that first morning, were all apprised of the situation and waiting for the fireworks. You could feel the tenseness in the silence there; the usual hammering and clattering sounded, but sharply and detached, whereas it is usually subdued by the murmuring of voices. Today there were no voices.

I sat down and waited. When Miss Shearer came in there was a moment's hush, while every eye observed her; she looked radiant, her loveliness more than ever accented by the high, ornate headdress she wore and the magnificent costume.

You knew at once that here was not only an actress who had been titled "First Lady of the Screen," but queen as well.

There was an interval, during which she walked to her dressing table. Then friends, old acquaintances and co-workers, approached her to wish her well. The silence was broken then.

But not the nervous tension that filled the set. That remained, as tangible as ever.

Essentially I was sure that there would be no explosions. I felt that both Norma Shearer and Woody Van Dyke would make small concessions to each other, mainly because serious dissension of any kind, on any score, would, in the last analysis, be fatal to the picture. Miss Shearer would not allow that. The whole production was too important to her; she had worked with too much determination for too long a time towards its success.

You must know that half a million dollars was spent on MARIE ANTOINETTE before it ever reached the cameras. Thalberg conceived the idea of the picture five years ago when he first read Stefan Sweig's biography of the tragic queen. Form that time on the endless resources and financial backing of Metro went into the preparation. Whole troupes of people rushed off to Europe, spent hundreds of thousands of dollars purchasing original antiques, jewels, old brocades.

When Thalberg died his wife carried on where he left off. Until, on the night I first met her, the picture had reached the casting stage. Norma Shearer was one of the few big stars in Hollywood I'd never personally seen or spoken to at that time. When I learned she would be at the same dinner party to which I was invited I was genuinely excited; and at dinner I found myself seated next to her.

I had expected dignity, the charm of a great sophisticate, the wise and unaffected conversation of a worldly woman. These didn't surprise me. But I knew of the tragedy she had passed through so recently and I had not thought she would come out of it so magnificently. She was not only beautiful, but as lovely as youth; she had a brilliant wit that kept me busy mentally trying to keep up. I couldn't catch a tinge of bitterness in anything she said or did.

She told me then about "Antoinette"-her plans for it and the work she had done, getting it ready. "I've thought," she told me, "ever since I saw 'Lloyds of London' that you were the person the play Axel, the Compte de Fersen whom Antoinette loved. You've read Zweig's book?"

I said I had.

"You're perfect for the role, as Zweig built it. What's more, I rather think I'll see if Metro can't" borrow you from 20th Century-Fox for it. Would you like that?"

There was nothing I could say. It would be a terrific break for me. But after that evening I put it from my mind. My schedule for the entire year was close packed at my own studio, and I was so new in pictures it seemed unlikely that M-G-M would go to the trouble of getting me from my home lot, with all the complications involved.

I remembered from the dinner party only my impression of Miss Shearer as a completely dynamic woman with an amazing determination. I must have been correct in the analysis because, after a few weeks, the studio informed me that all arrangements had been made for me to play Antoinette?s lover at Metro.

That first day all of us realized that Miss Shearer was a little nervous about the work. That was natural. She had been away from the screen for a long time, and there?s nothing like a vacation from the cameras to break your sense of timing and crack your confidence in your ability. Those of us who could watch knew that her lines were perfection, her carriage in those ungainly costumes above reproach, her feeling for the part sensitive and genuine.

Van Dyke, unlike his usual self, encourage her with his quiet enthusiasm, his lack of excitement or temperament. Taking their cue from him, the rest of the company worked with what amounted to solemnity.

It was mildly uncomfortable but at least the rumors were unjustified. I had a feeling that miss Shearer was striving desperately for some means of breaking the spell that held the company taut, of easing the atmosphere into the jovial friendliness usual on her pictures.

For myself, I went home exhausted.

The thing happened two or three afternoons later, as it was bound to. They were lining up an over-the-shoulder shot of me, and Miss Shearer and I were standing while the crew adjusted the lights and mike. I saw that she was getting tired, since her gown weighed thirty or forty pounds, so I called to the property man who was crossing the far side of the stage.

there was one of those inexplicable silences at the time, so that my voice resounded in the clearest possible manner. I yelled, "Get miss Gaynor a chair!"

I'll never know to my dying day how it happened. I wasn't thinking of Janet at the time. But in the waiting stillness, while I crawled mentally under the nearest old piece of rotten wood, Miss Shearer's voice rang out in delighted laughter. "Why don't you speak for yourself, Mr. Taylor?" she said.

I think that really cracked the ice. Later in the afternoon, during a particularly formal scene, Norma tripped and went into a comedy sprawl which brought howls from everyone on the set; and from that time forward the ribbing went on apace.

They invariably called me Mr. Taylor or Mr. Gable. When a gag was pulled Miss Shearer was in on it and her laughter was as hearty as any one else's. There was the day she called her favorite physician on the phone and told him, "Dr. Harris, this is Norma Shearer. I'm going to have a baby. It startled all of us a little we remembered a scene scheduled for the following week in which Antoinette was to give birth to the Dauphin.

I bet a cup of coffee to everyone on the set for every basket the Metro team made over the 20th Century-Fox team, and the Fox team took a terrific beating, and it cost me three gallons of coffee a day for three weeks. They loved that. Then there was the morning of the Great Fire. Norma, in a cloth of metal gown, backed into a fuse box in which some wires were loose, causing a short; all the lights went out and sparks flew around, and in the general confusion I made a point of crushing out a few coals clinging to the dress. The next day publicity had it that I had rescued Miss Shearer from a flaming death. The company had fun with that little item, too.

Shooting went smoothly, nerves were quieted. Humor settled over the set and although nothing raucous went on, although a certain dignity held, there was nevertheless a sense of great relief.

Somehow Miss Shearer managed to avoid even the suggestion of a fractious not throughout. I went back to my home studio knowing that here was a woman of enormous vitality and drive and ambition and of inexhaustible energy, which she coated with a simple sweetness that made her vary winning. Frankly, I can understand how she got and held the title of "First Lady of the Screen." She is that. I think she must have decided to have that title in the beginning, and let nothing stand in the way until she had it.

You couldn't call MARIE ANTOINETTE a new start for her. She's had a vacation, that's all, and comes back now in exactly the same position she was before, looking younger and lovelier than ever, but dignified by the experience she has had.

Actress Norma Shearer's 1930 Oscar sold at auction for $256,000

LOS ANGELES - An Oscar statuette awarded to actress Norma Shearer in 1930 sold on Wednesday for US$180,000 (S$256,000) in a rare sale of an Academy Awards trophy.

The Oscar that recognised Shearer's role in "The Divorcee"was put up for auction by her estate. It sold along with the cinematography prize for a 1928 film, "White Shadows in the South Seas," that also fetched US$180,000.

Oscars rarely come up for auction because since 1950, the Academy of Motion Picture Arts and Sciences, host of the Academy Awards, has required that winners, their heirs or estates not sell one without first offering it to the Academy for US$1.

The 88-year-old organisation has recently attempted to keep ownership rights to trophies awarded before 1950. Last year, the estate of actress Joan Fontaine withdrew her Oscar from a much-anticipated auction when the Academy threatened to sue over its sale.

And in July, a Los Angeles Superior Court Judge ruled that the Academy could apply its rule to a 1943 statuette that had been sold at auction, because its winner, art director Joseph Wright, remained an Academy member past 1951.

The Academy did not respond to a request for comment on Wednesday's auction, conducted in Hollywood by auctioneer Profiles in History.

The Canadian-born Shearer, best known for such films as"Marie Antoinette" and "The Women," was nominated for five other roles as Best Actress, cementing her fame as a Hollywood star through the 1930s. She died in 1983.

- See more at: http://news.asiaone.com/news/showbiz/actress-norma-shearers-1930-oscar-sold-auction-256000#sthash.cv5JYd0M.dpuf

Norma Shearer Movies: From Ramon Novarro to Clark Gable

Ramon Novarro, Norma Shearer in Ernst Lubitsch's The Student Prince in Old Heidelberg (top); Joan Crawford, Norma Shearer, second husband Martin Arrouge (bottom)

Norma Shearer may not be a household name today, but back in the late 1920s and throughout the 1930s all the way to the early 1940s, Shearer's star shone brighter than most.

Turner Classic Movies is dedicating Thursday, Aug. 12, to the actress then known as MGM's First Lady – who would have turned 108 yesterday (Aug. 10). As part of its “Summer Under the Stars” series, TCM will be presenting thirteen of the actress' films, in addition to Hugh Munro Neely's 2003 documentary Complicated Women, inspired by Mick LaSalles' book of the same name and in which Shearer is extensively featured. (LaSalle is a major Shearer aficionado.) (See Norma Shearer schedule further below.)

Now, Norma Shearer may take some getting used to. Her acting style may come across as coy and mannered to those unaccustomed to silent movies. Shearer, after all, went through nearly a decade appearing in dozens of silents before her transition to the more naturalistic style of talking pictures.

Having said that, let me (paradoxically) add that Shearer could be thoroughly naturalistic in her silents (He Who Gets Slapped, After Midnight), whereas she could be just as thoroughly artificial in her talkies, even the later ones (The Women, Escape).

So, which Norma Shearer movies would I recommend? Well, personally, I'd say all of them. Even at her most actressy and declamatory (Their Own Desire, A Free Soul, Smilin' Through, Riptide), I still enjoy watching her – though, admittedly, I do catch myself cringing here and there at the uncontrolled histrionics of MGM's second-in-command Irving Thalberg's protegee/wife.

Among the TCM showings, my favorite Norma Shearer performances are those found inLady of the Night (1925, right), in which she plays two roles (right/wrong side of the tracks); Ernst Lubitsch's The Student Prince in Old Heidelberg (1927), looking fresh and lovely as the barmaid Kathy, enamored of Ramon Novarro's equally flawless monarch-to-be; and W. S. Van Dyke's Marie Antoinette (1938), in which, as the movie progresses, Shearer's affected girlish mannerisms are replaced by a mature, darker demeanor that is unique in the actress' career. The queen's last scene, in which we get to see Shearer's face devoid of make-up, is unforgettable.

Robert Morley's Louis XVI is just as remarkable, but Tyrone Power's fictionalized hero is totally out of place.

The very mainstream Romeo and Juliet (1936), directed by George Cukor, is the only (direct) screen adaptation of a Shakespeare work that I've enjoyed watching. (I find Laurence Olivier's Henry V, Hamlet, and Richard III hard to sit through.) Shearer, then 36, is surprisingly believable as the teenage Juliet, though fellow player Leslie Howard (then 43) is a less convincing Romeo.

In Clarence Brown's Idiot's Delight (1939) Shearer does a hilarious Greta Garbo impersonation, all but eviscerating Clark Gable (right) from the screen. She also holds her own as the betrayed wife in Robert Z. Leonard's The Divorcee (1930), which won her a not-terribly-well-deserved Best Actress Academy Award. (That same year she was much more effective in Let Us Be Gay.)

In the '30s, Shearer received more Oscar nods than any other performer. Her other nominations were for Their Own Desire (1929 – nominated the same year as The Divorcee), A Free Soul (1931),The Barretts of Wimpole Street (1934, one of her weakest performances, but it's a good film), Romeo and Juliet, and Marie Antoinette.

MGM, currently facing bankruptcy, isn't what it used to be. The studio's former First Lady, however, remains as alluring as ever. Give her a try on Thursday.

Note: Norma Shearer can be briefly spotted – as Elizabeth Barrett in The Barretts of Wimpole Street – in this montage featuring actresses from the 1920s to the 1950s, among them Jean Arthur, Patricia Neal, Teresa Wright, Laraine Day,Gail Russell, and Janet Gaynor.

Norma Shearer, Marie Antoinette

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Schedule and synopses from the TCM website:

3:00 AM Lady of the Night(1924)
In this silent film, a young man must choose between a woman from the streets and a refined woman, both of whom are in love with him. Cast: Norma Shearer, Malcolm McGregor, George K. Arthur. Dir.: Monta Bell. Black and white. 61 min.

4:15 AM Lady Of Chance, A (1928)
In this silent film, a female con artist lures men to her apartment so she can blackmail them. Cast: Norma Shearer, Lowell Sherman, Gwen Lee. Dir.: Robert Z. Leonard. Black and white. 78 min.

5:45 AM Their Own Desire (1929)
A young couple's affair is complicated by her father's relationship with his mother. Cast: Norma Shearer, Robert Montgomery, Lewis Stone. Dir.: E. Mason Hopper. Black and white. 65 min.

7:00 AM Complicated Women (2003)
Documentary that looks at the phenomenon of “pre-code women” during the years 1929-1934. Cast: Narrated by Jane Fonda. Dir.:Hugh Munro Neely. Black and white. 55 min.

8:00 AM Divorcee, The (1930)
The double standard destroys a liberal couple's marriage. Cast:Norma Shearer, Chester Morris, Robert Montgomery. Dir.: Robert Z. Leonard. Black and white. 82 min.

9:30 AM Barretts of Wimpole Street, The (1934)
An invalid poetess defies her father's wishes to marry a dashing young poet. Cast: Norma Shearer, Fredric March, Charles Laughton.Dir.: Sidney Franklin. Black and white. 109 min.

11:30 AM Riptide (1934)
A chorus girl weds a British lord then falls for an old flame. Cast:Norma Shearer, Robert Montgomery, Herbert Marshall. Dir.:Edmund Goulding. Black and white. 92 min.

1:04 PM Short Film: Minnesota “Land Of Plenty” (1942)
This “Traveltalk” explores the history, land, and culture of Minnesota. Cast: James A. Fitzpatrick C-10 min.

1:15 PM Escape (1940)
A Nazi officer's mistress helps an American free his mother from a concentration camp. Cast: Norma Shearer, Robert Taylor, Conrad Veidt. Dir.: Mervyn LeRoy. Black and white. 98 min.

3:00 PM Idiot's Delight (1939)
A hoofer and a fake Russian countess are caught behind enemy lines at the outbreak of World War II. Cast: Clark Gable, Norma Shearer, Edward Arnold. Dir.: Clarence Brown. Black and white. 110 min.

4:51 PM Short Film: Victor Mclaglen Bio (1962)
BW-4 min.

5:00 PM Student Prince in Old Heidelberg, The (1927)
In this silent film, a young prince attending college falls for a barmaid below his station. Cast: Ramon Novarro, Norma Shearer, Jean Hersholt. Dir.: Ernst Lubitsch. Black and white. 106 min.

6:56 PM Short Film: Norma Shearer Biography (1962)
BW-4 min.

7:00 PM Private Lives (1931)
A divorced couple rekindles the spark after landing in adjoining honeymoon suites with new mates. Cast: Norma Shearer, Robert Montgomery, Una Merkel. Dir.: Sidney Franklin. Black and white. 84 min.

8:30 PM Romeo and Juliet (1936)
Shakespeare's classic tale of young lovers from feuding families. Cast:Norma Shearer, Leslie Howard, John Barrymore. Dir.: George Cukor. Black and white. 125 min.

10:45 PM Marie Antoinette (1938)
Lavish biography of the French queen who “let them eat cake.” Cast:Norma Shearer, Tyrone Power, Robert Morley. Dir.: W.S. Van Dyke II. Black and white. 157 min.

1:30 AM Strangers May Kiss (1931)
A sophisticated woman risks her marriage for love of a ruthless schemer. Cast: Norma Shearer, Robert Montgomery, Neil Hamilton.Dir.: George Fitzmaurice. Black and white. 81 min.

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