Boris Karloff | OLD HOLLYWOOD IN COLOR

The First Rock Stars of America

Throughout the year I am always colorizing photographs for my three Facebook groups. (Click any of the three here on the right under the listing for “Arliss Archives” and request to join >>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>

So, in no particular order I offer a parade of notable talented people from the past, all of whom we can see and hear today thanks to the restoration of their films on DVD, Blu-ray, and streaming.

Before the advent of so-called Rock Stars of our time, just who were the celebrities that were treated like the rock stars of today? Believe it or not, the public was first obsessed with opera singers. Film stars would develop a bit later, but among the many superstar opera singers of the early 1900s, none were more popular than soprano Geraldine Farrar. During her summers off from the Metropolitan Opera in New York, she traveled to Los Angeles in her own private railroad car to make films for Cecil B. De Mille. This portrait dates from 1906:

One of her most popular films was De Mille’s JOAN THE WOMAN (1917) where Gerry portrayed Joan of Arc. No, she didn’t sing, she didn’t even speak because it was a silent film. But audiences were mesmerized nevertheless:

A newspaper ad for her 1919 film had quite an eye-catching title:

Perhaps the most popular of rock stars, I mean opera singers, of that time was tenor Enrico Caruso. Yet another star of the Metropolitan Opera along with Farrar, he was recruited for movies in 1918, possibly because of Gerry’s success in that medium. His film debut was in MY COUSIN where he played two roles: a famous opera singer and his poor cousin.

Caruso literally established the standard of the opera star as a mass communications phenomenon. He embraced making records not merely as a sideline but as an important part of his career. It was said that Caruso made records an important commodity much more than records made him important.

Here are two pressbook pages used to help theater owners publicize MY COUSIN:

The Met was an unlikely source for movie stars, but the Ziegfeld Follies was another matter. Where to start: Marion Davies, W.C. Fields, Helen Morgan, Will Rogers, Billie Burke, Eddie Cantor, and many more Follies performers had long and successful film careers. But perhaps the most heartbreaking was Olive Thomas who soared from being a “Ziegfeld Girl” to becoming a major film star in the late 1910s:

Olive married Jack Pickford, Mary Pickford’s brother, in 1916 but their respective film careers kept them from getting away for a honeymoon until the summer of 1920. They sailed for Europe but one night in Paris Olive accidently ingested poison and died a few days later of kidney failure.

Latin actors were especially popular stars in American films of the 1920s. Here are two prominent Mexican actresses early in their careers: Lupe Velez and Dolores Del Rio.

Nobody planned it, but early Hollywood was a multicultural community long before the term was invented. Here is Hungarian Vilma Banky and Italian Rudolph Valentino with director Clarence Brown on the set of THE EAGLE (1925):

Valentino arrived in America in 1913 with not much more than optimism. Within a few years he was attracting attention as a dancer and in films. Rudy’s career blossomed in the early 20s and it seemed that just about everything he did attracted attention. He and his wife Natacha Rambova toured America in 1923 in a dance presentation that was wildly popular ……

….and widely imitated:

Movie star sisters Shirley Mason and Viola Dana raised funds for charity with their dance routine in imitation of the Valentinos.

Polish actress Pola Negri became a popular film star in Germany, then tackled Hollywood with help from some of her German friends who came over such as director Ernst Lubitsch. By the mid-1920s she was an “American” film star and her activities were covered as front-page news:

German film star Conrad Veidt was called “the John Barrymore of Europe.” So when John Barrymore invited him to travel to Hollywood to appear in his new film, THE BELOVED ROGUE in 1926, Veidt happily accepted. Conny – as he was called – made friends quickly in Hollywood and Universal signed him to a three-film contract. Here is a character portrait as the magician who is infatuated with his assistant, Mary Philbin, in THE LAST PERFORMANCE (1929):

But Veidt’s first stint in Hollywood – he returned during World War II to make propaganda films – was capped by the elaborate Gothic horror film, THE MAN WHO LAUGH (1928):

When Veidt returned to Hollywood shortly before his death in 1943, he scored in several war-related films, especially CASABLANCA (1942). Here Conny shares a scene with Claude Rains:

Mabel Normand became the first major female comedian in American films by about 1913. She also directed a number of her films for Mack Sennett and his Keystone studio. Believe or not, she directed Charlie Chaplin in a film during his first year making movies in 1914. Eventually, she focused on acting exclusively and for a number of years before poor health limited her activities, she was one of the most beloved film stars.

Mabel helps build morale during World War I with this 1918 schoolroom pose. Whether she actually drew that image of President Woodrow Wilson is open to speculation, but she focused attention where it needed to be.

Normand was not the only actress-director of that time. Lillian Gish gave it a try once by directing her sister Dorothy in one of her feature films. She never directed again and when she was asked why, she was quoted as saying, “It’s no job for a lady.” Here she is playing Mimi on the set of LA BOHEME (1926) with star John Gilbert on the left and director King Vidor on the right:

Lillian Gish continued to oversee her films more in a producer capacity and was involved in every aspect of filmmaking including set design. This is a stunning portrait of the set in ROMOLA (1924) that literally dwarfs its star. Much of this film was made on location in Italy:

Boris Karloff made plenty of films during the 1920s, but fame eluded him until he played the Monster in FRANKENSTEIN (1931). Lon Chaney Sr., the Man of 1,000 Faces, once advised him to play a character that would make himself memorable to the public. It took Boris a while to accomplish this. Here is one of his attempts circa 1925 in a film that I haven’t been able to identify. Anybody recognize it?

Speaking of Lon Chaney Sr., here is one of his thousand faces in the 1928 film, LAUGH CLOWN LAUGH:

Finally, here is an iconic group photo of some of the most popular silent film stars of the 1910s and 1920s as they appeared in the 1936 film, HOLLYWOOD BOULEVARD. No doubt you will notice that most of them still look relatively young in 1936. Well, they were. In some ways, not much has changed in Hollywood during the past decades. A star at 20 and an extra by 30. But many of these former stars skillfully reinvented themselves and did quite well in their later lives:

Who they are:

I hope you enjoyed our tour through times past. They were certainly colorful!

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The First Rock Stars

on March 2, 2022 at 2:37 PM Comments (3)
Tags: Boris Karloff, classic film, Conrad Veidt, Dolores Del Rio, Enrico Caruso, Geraldine Farrar, John Gilbert, King Vidor, Lillian Gish, lon Chaney, Lupe Velez, Mabel Normand, Natacha Rambova, old Hollywood, Olive Thomas, Pola Negri, Rudolph Valentino, Shirley Mason, silent film, Vilma Banky, Viola Dana

Just in Time for Halloween – Outtakes from Classic Horror Films

If there’s one thing that is more indestructible in film history than Count Dracula, Frankenstein’s Monster, and the Phantom of the Opera, it has to be the films themselves. With every innovation in home entertainment, these Universal Pictures monsters were in the forefront – from the old days of broadcast TV, then VHS, and then DVDs, more recently Blu-ray, and most recently, 4K transfers, not to mention video streaming – these guys just won’t go away.

And as familiar as many of us are with these classics through repeated viewings, it may come as a surprise that there were some scenes filmed but left on the proverbial cutting room floor. For this Halloween I thought we would marvel and be mystified with these “orphan” sequences that were deemed unsuitable for the finished product for one reason or another.

Alas, the sequences themselves no longer exist but a number of 8×10-inch stills have survived to hint at what was deleted. Our tour begins in 1923 and ends in 1935. I have taken the liberty of creating color version of these great B&W photos much in the same way that the old Hollywood studios themselves turned their b/w photos into the glorious colorized lobby cards.

[SUGGESTION: if you are viewing these photos on an iphone or ipad, I urge you to switch to a full-screen monitor to fully appreciate the clarity and detail of the images.]

Let’s began with a curious scene from Lon Chaney, Sr.’s THE HUNCHBACKOF NOTRE DAME (1923), based on the classic novel by Victor Hugo. This film has been recently restored by Universal on Blu-ray and 4K. This scene was included in the original “Road Show” exhibitions in major cities when the film was first released. Later, when released to local neighborhood theatres, the movie was shortened and among the excised footage was this touching scene where Quasimodo (Chaney) attempts to buy some clothes for Esmeralda (Patsy Ruth Miller). His efforts don’t go well with the shopkeeper and he ends up attacking the man:

Next we return to 1925 and the film that many regard as the granddaddy of American horror films: THE PHANTOM OF THE OPERA. Again, Lon Chaney, Sr. created an unforgettable character that, like HUNCHBACK, was based on a hugely successful novel by another Frenchman, Gaston Leroux. The filming was a muddle and many scenes were discarded after preview audiences reacted unfavorably. Among the deleted scenes is this one below where Christine Daae (Mary Philbin) and Raoul (Norman Kerry) meet secretly in a cemetery. Things do not go as planned as you can see, and we know that eventually even the Erik the Phantom (Chaney, of course) shows up:

It seems that there were problems in deciding who the Phantom’s victims should be. In this discarded scene, Erik strikes among the opera patrons as one of the stagehands, Simon Buquet (Gibson Gowland), is found dead on the Grand Staircase in the lobby. In the finished work, Simon not only survives, but leads the angry mob to invade the Phantom’s underground lair and force him out to a watery grave.

On a lighter note, scenes showing playboy Raoul De Chagney (Norman Kerry) flirting with the ballerinas were likewise cut:

Even creating a satisfying ending for PHANTOM proved difficult. The two photos below show the unused ending, inspired by the novel’s ending, where poor Erik dies of a broken heart. An action ending was substituted:

MGM gave the nascent horror film genre a try during the silent era with LONDON AFTER MIDNIGHT (1927), perhaps the most famous “lost film” of all time. This film was a vehicle for Lon Chaney. Sr. who plays a dual role in this murder mystery where one of the suspects is a vampire(!). Since the film can no longer be viewed, we have as a guide the existing continuity script that showed film editors how to assemble copies of the film back in ’27. Only shots that actually were used in the final edit are listed in the continuity script so photos of scenes not listed were likely cut. Here’s an atmospheric photo of Chaney as the vampire (aka “the man in the beaver hat”) and Edna Tichenor as a “bat girl,” which may simply be a posed photo or an actual scene that was cut:

American “horror” films of the silent era – the genre really was not established during that time – always explained away the supernatural events as caused by scheming humans. But the late 1920s play, DRACULA, based on the 1897 novel by Bram Stoker, didn’t flinch and insisted right to the end that vampires were real. With Bela Lugosi in the title role, American audiences needed very little convincing. The 1931 Universal film followed this construct and the first genuine American horror film dealing with the supernatural was created. A number of scenes were filmed but not included in the final cut. Among the most interesting are detailed sets, or likely scale models, of Castle Dracula and a nearby village that were not used in the film:

Perhaps this is a way station near the Borgo Pass for the coach that is taking poor Renfield to meet the Count, likewise cut:

Boris Karloff soon joined Bela Lugosi as a major star of the horror genre as the result of his playing the Monster in FRANKENSTEIN (1931). Karloff’s follow-up film for Universal was THE MUMMY (1932), which seemed to combine the ideas of DRACULA and FRANKENSTEIN to create an entirely new story of a long-dead Egyptian mummy who is restored to life by a magic incantation. Again, the audience was not spared by a last-minute “explanation” and the film created some real controversy in its depiction of reincarnation. The revived Karloff, after being dead for 3700 years, only wanted to find his lost love from antiquity, played by Zita Johann. In this photo from a scene cut from the film, we see Karloff and Zita in the throes of passion in ancient Egypt. It would end badly for them:

Our final film for this Halloween review is one of the finest – and abundantly edited – among all the classic horror film. It is a sequel that is generally considered superior to the original film, BRIDE OF FRANKENSTEIN (1935). There are many, many production stills suggesting many cut scenes. Most involved subplots that Universal decided to drop because they only complicated the plot line and added unnecessary footage to the film. Here’s an assortment among many deletions. First, here’s a nice portrait of Ann Darling, the shepherdess who is barely seen in the film. She is almost frightened to death by the Monster until two hunters drive him away:

In a jettisoned subplot, after the Monster escapes from jail and runs amuck, a little girl is found slain, among others. Suspicions fall upon the Monster. Indeed, the audience is left to assume that too. But the real killer is Karl, played by Dwight Frye, for reasons never made clear because the subplot was dropped:

Another dropped subplot involved the idea of using Elizabeth’s heart (Valerie Hobson), the fiance of Henry Frankenstein (Colin Clive), to implant in the Bride. It sounds absurd but this photo shows the kidnapped Elizabeth (to secure Henry’s cooperation) being approached by Karl with a very visible knife in his hand. This idea was dropped but in the finished film Karl murders an unfortunate young woman to obtain her heart:

Finally, here is a unique photo of the Bride herself, memorably played by Elsa Lanchester. Obviously, this is not a cut scene but I included this not only because it has Elsa’s autograph, but because it also has her sketch of her character.

I hope you enjoyed this tour in a true “cinematic crypt” of unseen scenes from these classic films.

HAPPY HALLOWEEN 2021!

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Halloween 2021

on October 24, 2021 at 10:49 AM Comments (2)
Tags: Bela Lugosi, Boris Karloff, classic film, Dracula, Frankenstein, Halloween, Horror Films, lon Chaney, old Hollywood, Outtakes, Phantom of the Opera, silent film, talkies

Vintage Glass Slides Celebrate Classic Horror Films + An Interview with Colin Clive!

Halloween 2015 gives us a good reason to take a fresh look at some of the greatest horror film classics ever made. But not by viewing the familiar artwork found in vintage posters and lobby cards. Instead we have found several rarely-seen and extremely fragile glass slides that were projected onto movie screens over 80 and 90 years ago. Let’s begin the tour.

DR. JEKYLL AND MR. HYDE (1920) is often credited as the first American horror film. Although filmed many times beginning in 1911, this 1920 silent film version starring John Barrymore in his “breakthrough” movie performance is generally regarded as the best film version. This takes nothing away from at least two excellent sound film versions made in 1931 and 1941. The 1920 version is readily available today on Blu-ray, DVD, and streaming video:

Before Lon Chaney frightened audiences in THE HUNCHBACK OF NOTRE DAME (1923), the Man of 1,000 Faces created chills in this 1922 film, which alas, is lost:

Decades before JURASSIC PARK let loose an army of angry dinosaurs, movie audiences were awed by living prehistoric creatures in THE LOST WORLD (1925). Based on the popular novel by Sir Arthur Conan Doyle, this film is available on DVD:

Lon Chaney scored a huge hit with one of the most memorable films of all time. New generations today find THE PHANTOM OF THE OPERA (1925) is still a potent brew. The enduring popularity of the Chaney film has resulted in this PHANTOM being available on Blu-ray as well as DVD. We are also lucky to have TWO glass slides for this classic:

Chaney Sr. did not rest on his laurels with PHANTOM, but followed it up with edgy dramas such as THE ROAD TO MANDALAY (1926), which only partially exists today:

American horror films didn’t become established until the talkie era with DRACULA and FRANKENSTEIN, both released in 1931. A lesser-known film released in 1932 is THE WHITE ZOMBIE starring Count Dracula himself, Bela Lugosi. This low-budget film has grown in stature through the years and today is considered a classic. As a sign of its stature, ZOMBIE is available on DVD and even Blu-ray:

One of the best of the early 1930s horror classics is THE INVISIBLE MAN (1933), based on a novel by H.G. Wells, and starring Claude Rains in his first film. The romantic lead was Gloria Stuart who 60 years later appeared in TITANIC (1997):

1933 was a banner years for classic films and horror movies were no exception. In addition to THE INVISIBLE MAN, the public was treated to KING KONG:

The public barely had time to catch its collective breath when later in 1933 the sequel to KONG was released. While not as good as the original, SON OF KONG is enjoyable on its own terms:

Another early horror talkie that has grown in stature is THE BLACK ROOM (1935) starring the Frankenstein monster himself, Boris Karloff. And yes, it’s available on DVD:

It was only a matter of time before those Twin Princes of Horror Films, Boris Karloff and Bela Lugosi, were co-starred. THE RAVEN (1935) is the second of several successful films from the Karloff-Lugosi team and, yes, is on DVD:

Is there a consensus on one classic horror film that is considered the best ever made? Well, if there is, that film would be the sequel to FRANKENSTEIN (1931). Filmed under the working title of THE RETURN OF FRANKENSTEIN, this stunning film would be known to the world as THE BRIDE OF FRANKENSTEIN (1935). Of course, this one is available on Blu-ray and DVD:

British actor Colin Clive played Dr. Henry Frankenstein in those first two films of the series, FRANKENSTEIN (1931) and THE BRIDE OF FRANKENSTEIN (1935). Here is a candid of Colin Clive and Valerie Hobson on the Universal backlot in January 1935 during the filming of BRIDE:

Colin Clive was regarded as a gifted actor but a troubled individual. He passed away in 1937 following years of alcohol abuse complicated by tuberculosis. Typical of many actors of that time, Mr. Clive was unhappy with his being cast in these so-called “horror films.” But unlike other actors, he had no hesitation to go public with his concerns. Here is a rare interview with the man that many consider to be the definitive Dr. Frankenstein:

HAPPY HALLOWEEN!

Halloween 2014 – From the Artists’ Viewpoint

There are a number of talented modern-day artists who have turned their skills to the Classic Horror Films of Hollywood’s Golden Age. These individuals have made their works available on the Internet so what follows is a Halloween roundup with credit given where it is properly deserved.

Robert Semler offers a few of the 1,000 Faces of Lon Chaney Sr.:

Chaney’s THE HUNCHBACK OF NOTRE DAME (1923) by Robert Semler:

THE PHANTOM OF THE OPERA (1925) by Robert Semler:

The lamentably long-lost LONDON AFTER MIDNIGHT (1927) by Robert Semler:

Another artist, Daniel Horne, painted this exquisite portrait of THE PHANTOM:

Daniel Horne gives us LONDON AFTER MIDNIGHT:

Moving into the 1930s, Boris Karloff as the Frankenstein Monster by Daniel Horne:

Mr. Horne also sculptures. Here is Karloff again in two works as Ardath Bey aka THE MUMMY (1932):

The Monster again in sculpture by Daniel Horne:

Everybody’s favorite Halloween couple, Karloff and Elsa Lancaster in THE BRIDE OF FRANKENSTEIN (1935) by Daniel Horne:

An exquisite painting by Daniel Horne of the BRIDE herself:

It just wouldn’t seem like Halloween without Bela Lugosi. From THE MARK OF THE VAMPIRE (1935) by Daniel Horne:

One of my All-Time Favorites – Henry Hull as THE WEREWOLF OF LONDON (1935) by Daniel Horne:

Finally, here is your blogmeister’s attempt at an artistic potpouri of images from our favorite ghouls!

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Halloween 2014 - From the Artists' Viewpoint

on October 31, 2014 at 12:13 AM Comments (3)
Tags: 1930s film, Bela Lugosi, Boris Karloff, BRIDE OF FRANKENSTEIN, classic film, Frankenstein, Henry Hull, Horror Films, Lon Chaney Sr., LONDON ADTER MIDNIGHT, old Hollywood, The Hunchback, The Phantom, WEREWOLF OF LONDON

On the Set with Colin Clive

Colin Clive (1900-1937) is forever immortalized as Henry Frankenstein in the first two Universal FRANKENSTEIN films. His real forte as an actor was playing angst-ridden neurotics – meaning that he was perfectly cast as Henry Frankenstein – and when portraying a driven nervous energy character he didn’t seem to be acting. Much has been written about Colin’s health issues including a tubercular condition and alcoholism that eventually brought him to an early death. But here we’d like to celebrate his unique persona and compelling voice that made him so unforgettable even though his career was relatively brief. As you scroll down to the images, listen to his rare “lost” radio performance of November 14, 1935. Colin is introduced by host Rudy Vallee:

Colin takes a tea break with co-star Valerie Hobson on the set of BRIDE OF FRANKENSTEIN (1935). They seem to be in the middle of filming their first scene when Henry Frankenstein is brought back home on a stretcher and his fiance Elizabeth believes that he is dead:

Universal publicists were eager to take a number of photos of Colin and Boris Karloff taking breaks on the BRIDE set:

A playful Colin hugs Valerie Hobson somewhere on the backlot of Universal during the making of BRIDE during January-February 1935:

Another BRIDE publicity shot – the Monster is supposed to hate fire but perhaps that doesn’t apply to lighting his cigarettes:

When Colin worked for 20th Century Pictures in late 1934, the studio did a publicity shoot at his apartment at the Hollywood Tower located on Franklin Avenue in Los Angeles:

At Warner Bros. filming THE KEY (1934), a story of the Irish Rebellion. To Colin’s right are director Michael Curtiz and the film’s star William Powell:

Colin and girlfriend Iris Lancaster out on the town circa 1935. It is believed that Iris paid the expenses of his funeral. She worked as an actress in films until 1944 and thereafter vanished from public life:

On the roof of the Hollywood Tower (still in operation today offering luxury apartments), Colin looks out over the LA landscape towards the “Hollywood” sign in the distance:

If you are only familiar with Colin’s work in the FRANKENSTEIN films, you definitely will want to check out his performances in CHRISTOPHER STRONG (1933) with Katharine Hepburn, MAD LOVE (1935) with Peter Lorre and Frances Drake, and HISTORY IS MADE AT NIGHT (1937). with Jean Arthur and Charles Boyer.

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On the Set with Colin Clive

on October 26, 2013 at 3:20 PM Comments (3)
Tags: Boris Karloff, classic film, Colin Clive, Frankenstein films, horror film, old Hollywood, old time radio, Valerie Hobson

On the Set with Warner Oland

Today, the name Warner Oland (1879-1938) is synonymous with Charlie Chan, the fictional Honolulu detective created by Earl Derr Biggers. But Mr. Oland was much more than a talented character actor. He spoke several languages and, with his wife Edith, made the first English language translations of plays by August Strindberg. Born in Sweden, his family emigrated to the United States when Warner was 13 years old. He gravitated from the stage to films in the 1910s and first attracted attention playing the villain in Pearl White’s legendary movie serial, THE PERILS OF PAULINE (1914).

In those days the craft of acting included the ability to credibly portray characters of different nationalities or ethnic origins, and even different races. We are much more parochial today about these things but Warner Oland was the first actor to successfully portray a Chinese hero in American films. How successful? He starred in seventeen Charlie Chan films at 20th Century-Fox from 1931 through 1937 (technically, 18 films if we count an uncompleted one begun in January 1938 but abandoned as Warner’s health deteriorated).

Boris Karloff co-starred with Warner in CHARLIE CHAN AT THE OPERA (1936)

Warner had already established himself in a variety of ethnic roles during the silent film era, most notably as Cantor Rabinowitz in THE JAZZ SINGER (1927). He also impersonated an Austrian Archduke in the lavish DON Q, SON OF ZORRO (1925):

DON JUAN (1926), the first feature film to use synchronized sound, had Warner in the historical role of Cesare Borgia. Here is Warner on the DON JUAN set with Montagu Love on the right, and seated left to right, Helene Costello, Estelle Taylor, and Myrna Loy:

Elaborately costumed as an unscrupulous Frenchman in WHEN A MAN LOVES (1927):

By 1929, sound films revealed Warner to have a rich and soulful voice. Here he plays an American gangster in THE MIGHTY (1929) with Raymond Hatton (standing) and George Bancroft:

By 1931, Warner switched tracks from villain to hero with CHARLIE CHAN CARRIES ON, one of four lost Chans. The film became an unexpected hit and the second film in the series, THE BLACK CAMEL (also 1931), was actually filmed in Hawaii. Here, Warner looks as menacing towards Dorothy Revier as Bela Lugosi in THE BLACK CAMEL:

Offscreen, Warner was a doting papa to his schnauzer Raggedy Ann:

Back at work, Warner takes time out for a Ouija Board on the set of CHARLIE CHAN’S SECRET (1936), a story that involved spiritualism and seances:

Producer John Stone (left) confers with director H. Bruce Humberstone as Warner and William Demerest listen on the set of CHARLIE CHAN AT THE OPERA (1936):

Two visiting Chinese doctors on their way to Johns Hopkins in Baltimore stop by the set of OPERA to check Warner’s pulse:

Author Earl Derr Biggers wrote six Chan novels and based Charlie Chan on a real life Honolulu detective named Chang Apana. Warner met Apana when he was in Hawaii filming THE BLACK CAMEL. It’s worth noting that Warner Oland admired Charlie Chan because the character had many qualities that Warner lacked. Chan was a non-smoker and a teetotler whereas Warner was a heavy smoker and (later) a heavy drinker. Chan had eleven children but Warner, who liked kids, was childless. Eventually, Warner remained in the character of Chan even when not filming and signed his name on legal documents as Chan.

Keye Luke played Chan’s son Lee in several of the later Oland entries in the series, here in OPERA. The two actors became good friends offscreen:

Celebrity-endorsed products are nothing new. Here is Warner and apparently Charlie Chan recommending the new 1938 Desoto:

Today, many of Warner’s films, silent and sound, are readily available on DVD including all of his surviving Charlie Chans.

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On the Set with Warner Oland

on January 21, 2013 at 6:13 PM Leave a Comment
Tags: Bela Lugosi, Boris Karloff, Charlie Chan, classic film, Don Juan, Earl Derr Biggers, Estelle Taylor, Helene Costello, Keye Luke, Montagu Love, Myrna Loy, old Hollywood, silent film, sound film, talkies, Warner Oland

On the Set Again with Karloff & Lugosi: A New Halloween Tribute

Last Halloween and thereafter, we received quite a number of hits on our tribute to those unsurpassed masters of the macabre, Boris Karloff and Bela Lugosi. Since there’s plenty more, we decided to salute our horrific heroes again for this Halloween. Admit it, we know that we’re in the presence of the masters when reciting a single line such as, “I never drink – wine,” from DRACULA (1931), or “I dislike to be touched,” from THE MUMMY (1932), can be more blood curdling than the goriest of chainsaw massacres.

On the DRACULA set, Bela Lugosi greets Horace Liveright who produced the Broadway play version that brought stardom to Lugosi. The film’s director Tod Browning stands to the left of Bela:

Boris Karloff has survived the rigors of makeup and costuming as he checks the script before filming a scene for THE MUMMY (1932):

But nothing was as arduous as sitting for hours as makeup artist Jack Pierce literally made a Monster out of Boris. Judging by the status, I’d say they were only at the beginning of the procedure:

By contrast, Bela Lugosi’s greatest makeup challenge as Dracula was to make himself look as handsome as possible:

The boys would vary their horror film appearances with an occasional non-horror movie where they still gave audiences the creeps. Here Bela Lugosi as a medium matches wits with Warner Oland as Charlie Chan in THE BLACK CAMEL (1931), the only Charlie Chan movie filmed on location in Hawaii. Bela and Warner are standing in the lobby of the Royal Hawaiian Hotel:

Boris Karloff plays an anti-Semitic Prussian nobleman whom George Arliss has outwitted in THE HOUSE OF ROTHSCHILD (1934):

Colin Clive as Dr. Frankenstein shares a tea and cigarette break with Boris on the set of BRIDE OF FRANKENSTEIN (1935):

It was inevitable that Boris and Bela would be teamed, but the real surprise is that they worked very well together. The first and arguably the best of their co-starring vehicles is THE BLACK CAT (1934), a film that had nothing to do with Edgar Allan Poe, and almost nothing to do with cats either:

Their third pairing is a personal favorite of your blogmeister, THE INVISIBLE RAY (1936), a stylish sci-fi yarn that seamlessly blended in the Gothic horror elements of their earlier films. Here Dr. Karloff has been poisoned by his discovery of Radium X, and appeals to Dr. Lugosi for help. You just know this will turn out badly:

These guys seem to be holding their own Halloween party. On the set of SON OF FRANKENSTEIN (1939) they are really celebrating Boris’ birthday – from left to right, Boris, director Rowland V. Lee, Bela, and Basil Rathbone: