Siegel S., Siegel B. The Encyclopedia Of Hollywood
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by auteurist critics and film historians. With generally poor
scripts, unheard of actors, and miniscule budgets, Lewis
managed to make a number of vivid, atmospheric action/sus-
pense movies that have become minor classics.
Lewis learned the business from the technical side, work-
ing as a camera assistant at MGM and later as an editor at
Republic. He graduated from second-unit director to feature
director in 1937 when he codirected Navy Spy. The scripts he
was assigned to direct during the rest of the 1930s and early
1940s were dreadful. He directed films such as Singing Out-
law (1937), Border Wolves (1938), Boys of the City (1940), and
The Invisible Ghost (1941) that were billed as the bottom half
of double features and promptly forgotten.
After making 24 movies, he finally had a hit with his 25th,
My Name Is Julia Ross (1945). The film was the sleeper hit of
the year. A tightly made suspense thriller, audiences and crit-
ics responded in tandem, and Lewis rose a peg in the Holly-
wood hierarchy. Although he never had a big budget, his
access to minor stars increased, and he made a number of
compelling little movies, including The Undercover Man
(1949), The Big Combo (1955), and The Halliday Brand (1957),
but the movie that remains his masterpiece is the startling
Gun Crazy (1949). With unknown actors John Dall and
Peggy Cummins, Lewis made a stylized and vivid action
movie that prefigured Arthur Penn’s Bonnie and Clyde (1967).
In Gun Crazy, Lewis pulled off an elaborate bank robbery
scene and getaway in one long, incredible take that is as visu-
ally astonishing as anything ever done by any other director
in Hollywood.
Lewis made a total of 39 movies before finally turning to
television directing in the late 1950s. His last motion picture
was Terror in a Texas Town (1958). As Simple as That: Joseph H.
Lewis in Hollywood, a documentary film about his life and
career, appeared in 1987, and he was given a lifetime achieve-
ment award by the Los Angeles Film Critics in 1997.
Lewton, Val (1904–1951) A producer at RKO who
put his stamp on a series of low-budget horror films, creating
a new kind of terror in the movies in the 1940s. Lewton’s
fresh approach to the genre was in suggesting horror rather
than showing it.
The first Lewton “B” horror movie was The Cat People
(1942). It was an unexpected hit starring Simone Simon and
was followed by the memorably titled I Walked with a Zombie
(1943). Altogether, he made eight horror films between 1942
and 1946.
There was a great visual flair to Lewton’s films that belied
their low budgets. For the most part, his movies didn’t fea-
ture stars, except for the ever-reliable
BORIS KARLOFF
in The
Body Snatcher (1945), Isle of the Dead (1945), and Bedlam
(1946). But one doesn’t think of these movies as Karloff vehi-
cles. The stars were really the dark shadows, the stylish cam-
erawork, and the often forbidden sexual subject matter.
Unlike most horror films, Lewton’s have the feel of a
clever calculating mind behind them, and a horror all the
more terrifying for its subtlety.
See also
HORROR FILMS
.
Little Caesar Though by no means the first gangster film,
this controversial 1930 hit movie turned the genre into a
major commercial force. Little Caesar was the right movie at
the right time. A poll taken by a Chicago newspaper not long
after the film opened showed that Americans were more
familiar with the names of gangsters than any other group—
except for movie actors.
Based on the novel of the same name by W. R. Burnett,
Little Caesar was a box-office bonanza for
WARNER BROS
. and
a trendsetter as not only the first of a spate of gangster movies
but also the first of the studio’s dramas based on current
events. Its success encouraged Warners to become the
provider of streetwise movies for (and about) the common
man, a cycle of films that lasted through the 1930s and for
which the studio is best known.
Little Caesar depicted the rise and fall of Caesar Enrico
Bandello (
EDWARD G
.
ROBINSON
), who went from small-
time hood to top mobster, only to be killed at the end of the
movie in a dark alley muttering the now famous line,
“Mother of Mercy, is this the end of Rico?” Tightly directed
by
MERVYN LE ROY
and filled with a strong supporting cast,
including
DOUGLAS FAIRBANKS
Jr., Glenda Farrell, Stanley
Fields, Sidney Blackmer, Ralph Ince, and George E. Stone,
the movie bristled with violence, tension, and a refreshing
grubbiness that rang absolutely true to life.
The film’s ability to speak the language of the people,
both in its realistic dialogue and in its dim-eyed view of soci-
ety, had a great deal to do with its appeal. Edward G. Robin-
son brought Rico to life, imbuing the character with depth
and pathos. One might be repelled by Rico, but one couldn’t
help but feel a certain grudging respect for him too, thanks
to Robinson’s portrayal. Also, as Robert Warshow wrote in
his famous essay “The Gangster as Tragic Hero,” Rico,
despite his cruelty and stupidity, is a character of tragic
dimensions. The very qualities that bring him to the top—his
vanity chief among them—also seal his doom.
See also
GANGSTER MOVIES
.
Lloyd, Harold (1893–1971) After Chaplin and Keaton,
he was the most accomplished of the silent-screen comedi-
ans. In fact, during the better part of the 1920s, Lloyd was
actually more successful as the box office than either of his
two rivals. Lloyd was a superb comic actor who created an
American go-getter character to whom jazz age audiences
could easily respond.
Lloyd was 19 years old and living in San Diego, Califor-
nia, when a camera crew from the Edison Company arrived to
shoot some location footage. He picked up work playing an
extra and was immediately hooked on the movies. He teamed
up with
HAL ROACH
to form a fledgling production company
and starred in a primitive comedy one-reeler, Just Nuts (1915).
In 1916, Lloyd invented a character called Lonesome
Luke, whom he patterned after
CHARLIE CHAPLIN
. Instead
of wearing baggy clothes like the tramp, Lloyd dressed his
Lonesome Luke in particularly tight-fitting togs. The char-
acter was immediately popular, and Lloyd made more than
100 Lonesome Luke comedy shorts.
LEWTON, VAL
248
Not satisfied, he had an idea for a new character whom he
called Glasses. This character was the epitome of the
upwardly mobile young American. He was a young college
man with a seemingly meek-and-mild disposition who simply
would not give up until he met with success. Glasses first
appeared on film in a one-reeler titled Over the Fence (1917).
By 1918, Lloyd had dropped the Lonesome Luke charac-
ter completely, such was the public acceptance of his new
persona. One-reelers gave way to two-reelers during the next
few years, and by this time, the only obstacle to Lloyd’s grow-
ing fame was a bomb—but not necessarily of the celluloid
variety. In 1920, while posing for a publicity still, he leaned
on “prop” explosives. They were not props after all, and
Lloyd spent six months in a hospital and lost two fingers on
his right hand when the explosives blew up.
When he returned to work, Lloyd continued to expand
the scope of his films. With complete artistic control of his
movies, he made three-reelers, four-reelers, and five-reelers.
By 1922, he was making full-fledged features, the first of
which was Dr. Jack. His second feature became his most
famous, Safety Last (1923), in which he was literally sus-
pended from the hands of a clock on a high tower in one of
film comedy’s grandest stunts.
From this point on, Lloyd’s humor tended more toward
the awe inspiring than the belly laugh. His breathtaking
stunts (done without benefit of a stuntman) remain
unequaled to this day.
The hits came fast and furious, including Girl Shy (1924),
one of the top money-makers of the year. The Freshman (1925)
was his most successful movie at the box office and one of the
biggest grossers of the entire silent era, with receipts of more
than $2.5 million. For Heaven’s Sake (1926), The Kid Brother
(1927), and Speedy (1928) were also highly successful.
After the shock of the Great Depression, Glasses no longer
seemed quite believable as a character. Nonetheless, Lloyd
continued making films throughout the 1930s and had modest
success. His best films of this era were The Milky Way (1936)
and Professor Beware (1938). After the latter movie, he retired
from the screen until he attempted a curious comeback in 1947
in the
PRESTON STURGES
film Mad Wednesday, which began
with the end of Lloyd’s silent hit The Freshman. Unfortunately,
the film was not a success, and Lloyd retired for good.
In 1952, Lloyd was given a special Oscar, honoring him
as a “master comedian.”
location shooting Filming that takes place outside a stu-
dio soundstage or back lot. A location shoot of a scene might
be made within a few hours’ distance of a studio and might
therefore require only a day trip by select members of the
cast and crew, or it might require the entire cast and crew to
travel for a week or several months to one or more distant
locations, adding the cost of feeding and housing everyone to
the film’s budget.
In the silent era, location shooting was extremely com-
mon. In fact, the desire to make films on location was one of
the reasons that led to Hollywood becoming the center of
American filmmaking. Southern California was an ideal place
to make movies because of its geographical variety. Within a
short distance, filmmakers could find an ocean, mountains,
deserts, and forests, and, of course, the warm, sunny weather
allowed for prolonged outdoor shooting as well.
The talkies brought about a massive reversal in the num-
ber of movies shot on location. The difficulties of sound
filming were such that it forced most movies to be made in
the studio.
At the same time as the sound revolution, the film indus-
try solidified into a relative handful of major companies
which, in the late 1920s and early 1930s, established a
streamlined method for turning out movies for an entertain-
ment-hungry public. For the most part, it was less expensive
to shoot in the studio or the back lot than to send the cast and
crew all over the country to make a film. Just as significantly,
studio moguls such as
LOUIS B
.
MAYER
and
JACK L
.
WARNER
felt they had less control over costs if a film was made outside
the walls of their fiefdoms. In fact, later financial debacles
such as
CLEOPATRA
(1963) and Heaven’s Gate (1980) were a
direct result of poor studio/producer supervision.
Films were made on location during the studio heyday of
the 1930s and 1940s but were more the exception than the
rule. Generally, exteriors of big-budget outdoor films were
shot on location, but interiors were still done in the studio.
One of the most famous examples of location shooting dur-
ing this period occurred in 1939 in John Ford’s
STAGECOACH
.
Part of the movie was shot in Monument Valley, which
became the location of a great many of Ford’s later westerns
of the 1940s and 1950s.
But even Ford shot only exteriors on location in 1939.
Making most of a film on location was still extremely rare in
Hollywood when
JOHN HUSTON
convinced Warner Bros. to
let him take the entire cast and crew to Mexico for two months
to shoot The Treasure of the Sierra Madre (1948). The film was
a critical though not a box-office hit, but it was successful
enough to crack open the door to more location shooting.
The advent of television in the 1950s, however, brought a
resurgence of location shooting to the movies. Most TV shows
were studio bound, and movies could make a visual distinction
between the product on the big screen and the little box, pro-
viding a greater sweep and realism with location shooting.
With the demise of the
STUDIO SYSTEM
and the rise of
independent producers, location shooting has become as
common in recent years as it was during the silent era. In an
effort to avoid high union labor costs in Hollywood and New
York, many films are shot on location with nonunion crews.
It’s ironic that for a great many filmmakers, shooting on loca-
tion has become less expensive than shooting in a studio.
Loesser, Frank (1910–1969) Unlike the majority of
famous Hollywood composers and lyricists, Loesser actually
got his start in Los Angeles, in 1930. He worked with a great
many composers, including Burton Lane (“The Lady’s in
Love with You”), Hoagy Carmichael (“Small Fry”), and
Arthur Schwartz (“They’re Either Too Young or Too Old”).
During his years as a lyricist, his work appeared in 20 films,
including the fondly remembered Destry Rides Again (1939),
LOESSER, FRANK
249
famous for Marlene Dietrich’s number, “The Boys in the
Back Room.”
After a long tenure as a lyricist, in 1947 Loesser began to
compose music for the screen, as well. His first film was The
Perils of Pauline (1947), but he gained Hollywood’s attention
in 1949 when he won a Best Song Oscar for “Baby, It’s Cold
Outside” from Neptune’s Daughter. In that same year, he had
his one and only screen appearance, playing the gangster
Hairdo Lempke in Red, Hot and Blue, a film for which he also
wrote the music and lyrics.
In the early 1950s, while composing the minor
FRED
ASTAIRE
and
BETTY HUTTON
vehicle Let’s Dance (1950) and
the popular
DANNY KAYE
film Hans Christian Andersen
(1952), Loesser also embarked on a Broadway career, writing
Where’s Charley, which was a hit on the stage and then a film
in 1952 (it featured the song “Once in Love with Amy”).
Loesser went on to write a great many Broadway musicals,
many of which were later turned into movies, including Guys
and Dolls (1955) and the Pulitzer Prize–winning How to Suc-
ceed in Business Without Really Trying (1966).
Lombard, Carole (1908–1942) An actress who seemed
destined for a career as a glamour queen but who surprised
everyone by proving to be a consummate comedienne. A more
upscale version of
JEAN HARLOW
, she could be both sexy and
funny without being vulgar. She appealed not only to movie
audiences but to movie stars as well: During the 1930s she
married, in succession,
WILLIAM POWELL
and
CLARK GABLE
.
Born Jane Peters, she was raised in a broken home. Her
first appearance in the movies came as a fluke. She was spot-
ted in her backyard by director
ALLAN DWAN
who was visit-
ing nearby. He decided she had the ideal look for a part in A
Perfect Crime (1921). The 13-year-old girl had her first
screen credit.
Once having appeared in the movies, she set out to learn
her craft. When she was 16, she tested for the role of Geor-
gia (the female lead) in
CHARLIE CHAPLIN
’s The Gold Rush
(1924), but she didn’t get the part. The following year, how-
ever, finally brought her back into the film business with a
starring role in Marriage in Transit. Eventually, in 1927, she
joined
MACK SENNETT
’s studio and received a valuable two-
year education in silent film comedy, playing in a number of
comic two-reelers.
Lombard mostly played vamps or glamorous sophisti-
cates in the early 1930s. She had achieved a certain level of
popularity in mediocre movies but was hardly a major star. As
David Shipman wrote in his book The Great Movie Stars, she
was “noted more for her slinky blonde looks, good legs and
daring gowns than for anything else.”
That all changed when she starred with John Barrymore
in
HOWARD HAWKS
’s first screwball comedy, Twentieth Cen-
tury (1934). Barrymore was fabulous in one of his last great
roles, but Lombard was the revelation. Her comic abilities
were on grand display, and suddenly audiences (and film stu-
dios) saw a great talent behind the beauty.
Unfortunately, that talent was trapped in a number of
mediocre movies during the next few years, but there were
also several films that gave Lombard a chance to shine. My
Man Godfrey (1936), in which she starred with her then ex-
husband, William Powell, was a standout. So was Nothing
Sacred (1937). That year she was Hollywood’s highest paid
actress, earning $465,000.
Dramatic roles came her way along with comedies. She
was winsome in Made for Each Other (1939) with
JAMES
STEWART
and wonderfully tough-minded in They Knew What
They Wanted (1940) with
CHARLES LAUGHTON
. Her last
movie was Ernst Lubitsch’s anti-Nazi film To Be or Not to Be
(1942). She starred opposite
JACK BENNY
in what is now con-
sidered a classic comedy. At the time, however, it was poorly
received by the critics.
In that same year, Lombard died in a plane crash near Las
Vegas while returning home to her husband, Clark Gable,
after a successful war-bond drive. The nation mourned along
with Gable. Lombard engendered a new sort of female star:
Beautiful without being brittle, her wit, style, and feistiness
did not compromise her glamour.
Loos, Anita (1893–1981) Though best known as the
author of the novel, play, and movie versions of Gentlemen
Prefer Blondes (filmed in 1928 and 1953), she was actually
one of Hollywood’s wittiest screenwriters in an active film
career of 30 years. Discovered by
D
.
W
.
GRIFFITH
, who
bought her first story idea for $15 in 1912 and turned it into
The New York Hat, Loos went on to write scores of one- and
two-reelers as well as features. She was one of the rare breed
of women who worked steadily in the film business as a
screenwriter.
Loos had a talent for creating unusual stories and amus-
ing subtitles. Griffith, however, was not well known for his
sense of humor, so it was a happy circumstance that she was
assigned to write scripts in 1916 for the relatively unknown
DOUGLAS FAIRBANKS
. With a series of exuberant, clever
comedies such as Manhattan Madness (1916), The Matrima-
niac (1916), and Wild and Woolly (1917), Loos helped define
Fairbanks’s star personality and helped launch his spectacu-
lar career.
Her success with Fairbanks gave her considerable clout in
Hollywood, and with her fine working relationship with
director (and later, husband) John Emerson, Loos went on to
write and occasionally produce successful female-oriented
films during the 1920s such as The Perfect Woman (1920),
Woman’s Place (1921), and Learning to Love (1925).
Although a great many screenwriters of the silent era
were pushed aside with the advent of sound, Loos had no
trouble finding work due to her playwriting success with
Gentlemen Prefer Blondes. As she had in the 1920s, Loos fash-
ioned most of her sound films for the female audience, writ-
ing movies such as Hold Your Man (1933), The Biography of a
Bachelor Girl (1935), and The Women (1939). But like any
adaptable Hollywood screenwriter, she was capable of writ-
ing melodramas, too, penning Riffraff (1936) and (with her
husband) the most popular film of 1936, San Francisco. While
her last official screenplay was I Married an Angel in 1942, she
was rediscovered by the public yet again when Gentlemen Pre-
LOMBARD, CAROLE
250
fer Blondes was remade as a musical with
JANE RUSSELL
and
MARILYN MONROE
in 1953.
A prolific author, Loos wrote a number of nonfiction
books, including two with her husband, How to Write Photo-
plays (1919) and Breaking into the Movies (1921). After John
Emerson’s death in 1956, she wrote a series of autobiogra-
phies: A Girl Like I (1966), Kiss Hollywood Good-Bye (1974),
and Cast of Thousands (1977). She also wrote a biography of
her silent screen contemporaries, The Talmadge Girls (1978).
Lopez, Jennifer (1970– ) Born in the Bronx, New
York, to Puerto Rican parents on July 24, 1970, Jennifer
Lopez was urged to study the arts, taking lessons in dance,
ballet, jazz, piano, and theater. Attending Holy Family
School, she acted in community and school productions of
musicals such as Jesus Christ Superstar and Oklahoma. Her pop
idol was Madonna, but Rita Moreno was her role model.
Rather than attending college as her parents wished, she left
school to take dancing jobs in music videos and later toured
Europe with the Golden Musicals of Broadway troupe. After
a Japanese tour with the theater production Synchronicity,
she was employed in 1991 as a Fly Girl, one of the dancers on
Fox’s In Living Color. She moved to Los Angeles and assumed
the role of Lucy on Fox’s South Central. The next year, she
appeared in the CBS television series Second Chances and then
reprised her role in another TV series, Malibu Road. Next
came the television movie Nurses on the Line: The Crash of
Flight 7. Her first feature film role was as Maria in Gregory
Nava’s film My Family/Mi Familia (1995), starring Jimmy
Smits. She received much attention for her next role as under-
cover cop Grace Santiago in Money Train (1995), with stars
Woody Harrelson and
WESLEY SNIPES
. Next, she played a
piano teacher opposite
ROBIN WILLIAMS
in Jack in 1996; the
same year, she played the title role in Selena (released in 1997),
a biopic about the crossover Mexican singing sensation Selena
Quintanilla Perez who was killed by the demented ex-presi-
dent of her fan club in March 1995. Selena was her break-
through movie role, enabling her to show off her multifaceted
talents. She earned $1 million for her role in Selena and
received several awards for her performance: Best Actress at
the 1998 American Latino Media Arts Awards, Best Actress at
the Lone Star Film and Television Awards, the MTV Movie
Award nomination for Best Breakthrough Performance, and a
Golden Globe nomination as Best Actress.
In 1997 she also squeezed in Anaconda, playing documen-
tary filmmaker Terri Flores, and in her next feature film had an
affair with the
JACK NICHOLSON
character in Bob Rafelson’s
LOPEZ, JENNIFER
251
Jennifer Lopez in The Cell (2000) (PHOTO COURTESY NEW LINE CINEMA)
Blood and Wine (1997), a melodrama in which her character
chose money over love. She also appeared in
OLIVER STONE
’s
U-Turn, playing incest victim Grace McKenna. Out of Sight
with George Clooney (1998) amply demonstrated her flair
for romantic comedy. Lopez was a federal marshal out to nab
Clooney, who was a thief on the lam in this outlandish but
popular film. Her popularity resulted in lucrative endorse-
ment deals with L’Oreal and Coca-Cola. In 1999 her debut
album, On the 6, went platinum. Also she played a psychiatrist
who could not only empathize with her patients but also
actually enter their minds in The Cell, released in 2000. The
film, which grossed $61 million, has been described as a cross
between The Matrix and The Silence of the Lambs. Lopez
appeared in two films in 2001, Angel Eyes (playing a police-
woman; the film grossed $24 million) and The Wedding Plan-
ner, a romantic comedy with Matthew McConaughey, that
grossed $64 million. This movie and recording star has
become a cultural icon known simply as J.Lo. Her latest film
as of this writing was the updated Cinderella story Maid in
Manhattan (2003).
Lorre, Peter (1904–1964) Though small of stature,
his talent was of a tall order, and he was one of the most dis-
tinctive actors in Hollywood. With his large sad eyes, myste-
rious and menacing voice, and his coiled body, Lorre could
play villains, heroes, or fools with equal ease. It was not
uncommon for the actor to steal scenes from bigger stars, not
because he chewed the scenery as a conventional ham might
but because his voice, movements, and languid style riveted
the eyes and the ears of his beholders.
Born Lazlo Lowenstein in Hungary, the young man
began his adult life as a bank clerk but studied acting in
Vienna before commencing his career on the stage in
Switzerland. A theater actor for seven years, he had little film
experience and only a minor reputation in Central Europe
before winning the part of the child murderer in Fritz Lang’s
M (1931). The film was an international success both for the
director and the young star, who gave a splendid perform-
ance. It remains among Lorre’s greatest triumphs.
After the Nazis’ rise to power in Germany, Lorre fled to
France and England, stopping along the way to make two
films, including
ALFRED HITCHCOCK
’s The Man Who Knew
Too Much (1934). Lorre’s European reputation preceded
him when he arrived in the United States. In 1935, he was
given his first role in a Hollywood film, the lead in a horror
thriller called Mad Love. He was electric in the film, and he
followed it up with the role of Raskolnikov in Josef von
Sternberg’s nearly forgotten version of Crime and Punish-
ment (1935).
After a trip back to England to appear in Hitchcock’s
Secret Agent (1936), Lorre returned to America and soon
began to appear in a low-budget but eminently entertaining
series of detective mysteries, playing the title character, Mr.
Moto. Though he was of Eastern European descent, Lorre
was adept at playing vaguely oriental types, and Mr. Moto
was an obvious attempt at cashing in on the success of the
Charlie Chan movies. Unlike Chan, Moto used not only his
wits to solve crimes, but also jiujitsu and a gun (when neces-
sary). Action packed and well plotted, the Moto films were
popular “B” movies, and Lorre made eight of them between
1937 and 1939 before anti-Japanese sentiments spelled the
end of the series.
Though he continued working, his career lacked focus
until he became a member of the
WARNER BROS
. stock com-
pany in the 1940s. Often featured along with Sydney
Greenstreet, Lorre made his mark on film history with a
wonderfully subtle performance as the effeminate Joel
Cairo in The Maltese Falcon (1941). He was also memorably
oily as Ugarte in Casablanca (1942) and compelling as the
writer/protagonist of The Mask of Dimitrios (1944). Perhaps
his best film—and most unusual starring vehicle—was the
Donald Siegel-directed minor classic, The Verdict (1946).
By the latter part of the 1940s, Lorre’s career seemed to
flounder, and in lesser films the actor seemed to camp up his
roles. Then he briefly left Hollywood for Germany to write,
direct, and star in Der Verlorene/The Lost One (1951). It was to
be his only directorial credit.
The 1950s was a period of marked decline for Lorre. He
was off the screen for three years with health problems, and
when he returned, bloated and heavy, he gave but a handful
of charming supporting performances in films such as Beat
the Devil (1954), Silk Stockings (1957), and The Big Circus
LORRE, PETER
252
Peter Lorre was among Hollywood’s most intriguing
character actors. He played everything from Asians to
Russians, to Arabs and Europeans. He could play sniveling
or implacably sinister characters as easily as he could heroes.
(PHOTO COURTESY OF THE SIEGEL COLLECTION)
(1959). There was a suggestion of his earlier fame when, in
the early 1960s, he appeared in more major roles in Roger
Corman’s Edgar Allan Poe movies Tales of Terror (1962) and
The Raven (1963), as well as Jacques Tourneur’s Comedy of Ter-
rors (1964). He made his last film appearance playing a heavy
in the Jerry Lewis vehicle, The Patsy (1964). During that same
year, Lorre died of a heart attack.
Loy, Myrna (1905–1994) She was an actress who
appeared in roughly 60 movies before she became a star,
spending much of her early career playing oriental vamps. (It
hardly seemed to matter that she wasn’t Asian.) When she
finally became a star after her long apprenticeship, there was
hardly a more accomplished actress in Hollywood. Once she
became famous, Loy was quickly typecast as the ideal wife,
playing the role to perfection for nearly two decades before
making a slight change and becoming the ideal mother.
Born Myrna Williams, she began her show-business
career as a dancer, making it to the chorus line at Grauman’s
Chinese Theater in Hollywood. She was spotted there and
given a tiny role in What Price Beauty (1925). She can also be
seen in a small role in the original Ben-Hur (1926).
During the next eight years, Loy jumped up and down
the credit list, having lead roles and bit parts, but without
making a strong impression on movie audiences. Her most
interesting appearances are in films such as Ham and Eggs at
the Front (1927), in which she played a spy in blackface; The
Jazz Singer (1927), in the small role of a showgirl; and Crim-
son City (1928), in a lead role and playing her first oriental
vamp character. Her last such role was as Fa-Lo-Si, the
daughter of Fu Manchu, in The Mask of Fu Manchu (1932).
Loy worked steadily, even during the transition to sound,
and when she finally received a meaty role in The Animal
Kingdom (1932) opposite
LESLIE HOWARD
, she showed
flashes of star quality.
MGM, which owned her contract, began to use Loy in
“A” movies, hoping to turn her into a star. Several successful
films followed, one of which, Manhattan Melodrama (1934),
was a hit for unexpected reasons. The film received enor-
mous publicity as the movie that the gangster John Dillinger
had seen right before he met his end in a deadly shootout in
front of a Chicago theater where the film was playing.
More important for her career, however, she starred in
Manhattan Melodrama with both
WILLIAM POWELL
and
CLARK GABLE
, her two most important leading men. She had
already appeared in two other films with Gable, but this was
her first with Powell. The film’s director, W. S. Van Dyke,
thought that Loy and Powell would make a wonderful comic
team. The result was The Thin Man (1934).
The film was a huge hit. As Nora Charles, Loy became
the quintessential modern wife: clever, resourceful, and very
much the equal of her husband Nick Charles (Powell) both
in sleuthing and in quipping. Loy played her character with
charm, wit, and warmth. The two stars were a delightful pair
and they clearly enjoyed working together. The two of them
reprised their roles five times in subsequent Thin Man
movies, the final one being Song of the Thin Man (1946).
As famous as she was for playing Nora to Powell’s Nick,
Loy actually acted just as often with Clark Gable. In fact, she
was voted the queen of Hollywood at the same time (1937)
that Clark Gable was voted king.
But Loy wasn’t terribly interested in lording it over
Hollywood. She made only one movie (The Thin Man Goes
Home, 1944) during the war years, choosing instead to work
for the Red Cross. She returned to full-time acting after the
war and soon appeared in the Oscar-winning movie, The
Best Years of Our Lives (1946), playing both wife and mother
to perfection.
Loy finished out the 1940s with a succession of polished
performances in several films, including The Bachelor and the
Bobby Soxer (1947) and Mr. Blandings Builds His Dream House
(1948), both with
CARY GRANT
.
The actress chose to slow down her film career in the
1950s and, apart from Cheaper by the Dozen (1950) and Lone-
lyhearts (1958), made no movies of note. She barely appeared
on screen in the 1960s and was wasted in The April Fools
(1969). Except for featured performances in films such as
LOY, MYRNA
253
A former dancer at Grauman’s Chinese Theater, Myrna
Loy eventually became known as the perfect wife, thanks
to her lively teaming with William Powell in the many
successful Thin Man mystery movies. In 1936, she was the
country’s number-one female box-office draw.
(PHOTO
COURTESY OF MYRNA LOY)
Airport 1975, The End (1979), and Just Tell Me What You Want
(1979), Loy appeared far more often in TV movies.
From Asians to blacks, and from sophisticates to drunken
mothers, Myrna Loy has probably played a greater variety of
roles in her career than any other screen actress, but it is for
the intelligent, witty wives she portrayed that she will be best
remembered.
Lubitsch, Ernst (1892–1947) A director-producer
who set the standard for sophisticated sex comedies during
both the silent and sound eras. He became known for “The
Lubitsch Touch,” clever visual innuendos about events
occurring behind closed doors. Yet despite this wittiness,
many critics have commented on an undercurrent of melan-
choly and nostalgia that deepens Lubitsch’s comedy; some of
this feeling perhaps was due to the European locales in which
the German director set most of his Hollywood films. But
there can be no doubt about Lubitsch’s real home: He once
said, “I’ve been to Paris, France, and I’ve been to Paris, Para-
mount. Paris, Paramount, is better.”
Born to a well-to-do Berlin tailor, Lubitsch became
enamored of the stage while an adolescent. In 1911 he
became a member of Max Reinhardt’s legendary Deutsches
Theater, quickly establishing himself in important roles. But
the theater didn’t pay very well and, to make extra money, he
took a job with a Berlin film company in 1912. The follow-
ing year he began to act in films, starring in a series of com-
edy shorts in which he played a Jewish character named
Meyer. The Meyer comedies proved to be quite popular, and
Lubitsch furthered his film education and career by writing
his own scripts and directing himself in subsequent movies.
When the Meyer shorts finally faded in popularity,
Lubitsch stopped acting and became one of Germany’s lead-
ing directors in the late 1910s and early 1920s with several
huge international hits, among them Gypsy Blood (1918), The
Oyster Princess (1919), and Deception (1920). His great reputa-
tion led
MARY PICKFORD
to insist that he direct her. Lubitsch
turned down one Pickford project before finally making his
American debut directing her in Rosita (1923). Lubitsch
stayed on in Hollywood for the rest of his life.
Among his silent-film successes were such milestones as
The Marriage Circle (1924), Forbidden Paradise (1924), and
Lady Windermere’s Fan (1925). Critic Andrew Sarris has said
of this last film that it “was an improvement over [Oscar]
Wilde’s original.”
Although many foreign directors were defeated by the
coming of sound, Lubitsch thrived. For instance, his conti-
nental operettas, The Love Parade (1929), One Hour With You
(1932), and The Merry Widow (1934), all with
JEANETTE
MACDONALD
and
MAURICE CHEVALIER
, were witty soufflés
that advanced the emerging art of the movie musical. He was
just as entertaining without music, making Trouble in Paradise
(1932) one of the cleverest, most satisfying bedroom farces
that has ever graced the big screen.
Lubitsch began to produce his own films in the latter half
of the 1930s when he became production manager at Para-
mount. His new duties did not stop him from continuing to
add to his seemingly endless string of quality productions
with Angel (1936), Bluebeard’s Eighth Wife (1938), Ninotchka
(1939), The Shop around the Corner (1940), and That Uncertain
Feeling (1941).
His first major critical and commercial flop also hap-
pened to be one of his greatest films, To Be or Not to Be (1942),
a movie that starred
JACK BENNY
and
CAROLE LOMBARD
.
There was a storm of protest against the film because
Lubitsch had made an anti-Nazi farce that showed Hitler and
company to be buffoons and fools rather than starkly evil
men. To Be or Not to Be has since come to be regarded as a
classic and was even remade virtually scene-for-scene by
MEL
BROOKS
in 1983.
Lubitsch shrugged off the failure but could not shrug off
his declining health. He managed to direct just two other
critical and commercial hits, Heaven Can Wait (1943) and
Cluny Brown (1946), before succumbing to his sixth heart
attack. He died while directing That Lady in Ermine (1948), a
film that was completed by
OTTO PREMINGER
.
In a film career that spanned nearly 35 years, 25 of them
in America where he became one of the industry’s most
revered (and copied) directors, Lubitsch nevertheless failed
to win a Best Director
ACADEMY AWARD
. (He had been nom-
inated for The Patriot [1928], The Love Parade [1929], and
Heaven Can Wait [1943].) Aware that he was a very sick man,
the academy moved quickly to honor him while he was still
alive with a Special Oscar in 1946 “for his distinguished con-
tributions to the art of the motion picture.”
Lucas, George (1945– ) A writer-director-producer
who in one capacity or another has been involved in the mak-
ing of six of the most commercially successful movies in Hol-
lywood history.
Lucas grew up in Modesto, California, with a penchant
for car racing. This passion was considerably cooled after his
miraculous survival of a serious car accident. After two years
of junior college, he began to study film at USC, where he
made a science fiction short titled THX-1138 that won first
prize at the 1965 National Student Film Festival. A scholar-
ship followed that allowed him the opportunity of watching
FRANCIS FORD COPPOLA
direct Finian’s Rainbow (1968).
Coppola took Lucas under his wing, and doors soon began
to open.
Lucas gained valuable experience as a production associ-
ate on Coppola’s The Rain People (1969), and later he was a
cameraman for the Rolling Stones’ rock concert documen-
tary Gimme Shelter (1970). He made his first film, a feature-
length version of THX-1138 in 1971, with the unknown
ROBERT DUVALL
in the lead. The movie was visually stun-
ning, and it was admired by critics, but it didn’t create much
of a sensation at the box office.
With the help of Coppola, Lucas eventually received the
funding to make an autobiographical film set in a small Cal-
ifornia city not unlike Modesto; he called the movie
AMERI
-
CAN GRAFFITI
(1973). He cowrote the screenplay, based on
his own story, and directed the film on a tiny $700,000
budget. It turned out to be the year’s biggest hit film.
LUBITSCH, ERNST
254
Despite the success of American Graffiti, Lucas had trou-
ble finding financing for his next film, a science fiction movie
with a $9 million budget. It was to be a film without stars in
a genre that had been box-office poison since the early 1960s.
TWENTIETH CENTURY
–
FOX
finally gave Lucas the money,
and Star Wars became the biggest grossing film of all time
(later supplanted by E.T. the Extra-Terrestrial).
The success of Star Wars (1977) has had an enormous
impact on the American movie industry. For example, the
May 25 release of the gargantuan hit extended the summer
movie season forevermore (it now begins on “George Lucas
Day,” two weeks before its earlier traditional beginning).
Lucas’s Star Wars also drove home the point that young peo-
ple, in particular, would pay to see a film over and over again
and that special effects would bring massive numbers of peo-
ple into movie theaters.
Star Wars elevated Lucas to the very height of directorial
power. Yet Lucas has not directed a movie since. He has cho-
sen, instead, to either write and/or produce his films. He pro-
vided the original stories and acted as executive producer for
the two other Star Wars epics, The Empire Strikes Back (1979)
and Return of the Jedi (1983). Along with
STEVEN SPIELBERG
,
Lucas conceived and produced the Spielberg-directed Raiders
of the Lost Ark (1981), Indiana Jones and the Temple of Doom
(1984), and Indiana Jones and the Last Crusade (1989). The
Star Wars trilogy and the Indiana Jones films became six of the
top-grossing films of all time.
The overwhelming commercial success of Star Wars
allowed Lucas to make The Empire Strikes Back (1979) with
his own money. The huge bankroll earned on the second Star
Wars film made it possible for Lucas to establish his own
company, Lucasfilm, and its special-effects subsidiary, Indus-
trial Light and Magic, both of which are located on 3,000
acres in Northern California, on Lucas’s Skywalker Ranch,
named for the hero of the Star Wars films, Luke Skywalker.
Lucas’s touch hasn’t always been golden. He was the
executive producer of More American Graffiti (1979), a
minor misstep compared to his involvement in the cata-
clysmic flop Howard the Duck (1986). But Lucas didn’t write
either of those failures. After five years without a writing
credit, Lucas returned to the creative wars, penning the
script and producing the fantasy epic Willow (1988),
directed by
RON HOWARD
, which was disappointing. His
script for Indiana Jones and the Last Crusade, however, was
particularly well received by the critics. As for the much-
discussed remaining installments of the Star Wars opus,
Lucas would only say that he was thinking about them.
Lucas returned to Star Wars in a big way in 1997 when he
rereleased the movie in a reedited and updated version with
new and improved special effects. Updated versions of The
Empire Strikes Back and Return of the Jedi followed the same
year, the rerelease of the original trilogy becoming a prel-
ude to Lucas’s new Star Wars films. Star Wars: Episode I—
The Phantom Menace hit theaters in 1999; this told the story
of the first of nine proposed chapters in Lucas’s space opera.
Phantom Menace was a huge box-office hit that featured cut-
ting-edge special effects and enjoyed more hype and atten-
tion than any other movie released that year. Audiences
turned out in droves but critics attacked the weak story and
poor scripting. Star Wars: Episode II—Attack of the Clones
appeared three years later with more great special effects
and a slightly better story. The final film in Lucas’s latest
trilogy, Star Wars: Episode III, is scheduled for release in
2005. Lucas has claimed that he doesn’t intend to make any
more Star Wars movies once it is completed.
When asked to describe the themes of his films, Lucas
once told journalist Aljean Harmetz, “The underlying
issues, the psychological motives, in all my movies have
been the same: Personal responsibility and friendship, the
importance of a compassionate life as opposed to a passion-
ate life.”
See also
SCIENCE FICTION
;
SPECIAL EFFECTS
;
STAR WARS
.
Lugosi, Bela (1882–1956) An actor who will be for-
ever associated with the role of Dracula, though he had a
long film career both before and after he played the famous
vampire. Bela (pronounced Bayla) Lugosi’s deep baritone
voice with its aristocratic Magyar texture was both his acting
LUGOSI, BELA
255
Probably the most typecast actor in Hollywood, Bela
Lugosi was so tied to his role as Count Dracula that he
was rarely offered significant nonhorror parts. And yes,
it’s true: He was buried in his Dracula cape.
(PHOTO
COURTESY OF THE SIEGEL COLLECTION)
signature in Hollywood and the main reason he never pro-
gressed beyond his success as Dracula.
Born Béla Ferenc Dezsö Blaskó in Hungary, Lugosi was
a classically trained actor who claimed he learned his craft at
the Budapest Academy of Theatrical Arts. Occasionally using
the stage name of Ariztid Olt, he was a serious and successful
stage actor in Hungary for more than a decade before he
appeared in his first silent film in 1915.
After a political upheaval in Hungary, he made his way to
Germany where he made several more films. But America
was the land of opportunity for movie actors, particularly in
the silent era, and Lugosi arrived in the United States in 1921
to pursue his career. He found work in the theater and in the
movies, making his first U.S. appearance on screen in The
Silent Command (1923). He went on to make a handful of
other films during the 1920s, but, ironically, given his thick
accent, his greatest success was on the stage.
By 1927, Lugosi had garnered the lead in the Broadway
production of Dracula. It was a huge hit and a personal suc-
cess for the actor. He wisely stuck with the show and went on
the road, playing his most famous part for another two years.
When Universal Pictures bought the rights to Dracula,
Lugosi, with his black cape, dark menacing eyes, and velvet
voice, became an instant sensation. The film, directed by
TOD BROWNING
and released in 1931, was the first huge
horror hit of the sound era.
Lugosi was slated to star as the monster in Frankenstein
(1931), but he passed on the film to pursue another that was
never made. In doing so, he created his own horror competi-
tion by giving
BORIS KARLOFF
the chance to become a star.
From then on, the two actors were linked in the public con-
sciousness as the leading horror personalities of their time
and the dual heirs to the late
LON CHANEY
.
Lugosi appeared in dozens of horror films during the
1930s and 1940s. The quality of his projects didn’t seem to
matter to him, just so long as he worked. Some of his better
films were Murders in the Rue Morgue (1932), The Black Cat
(1934), Mark of the Vampire (1935), The Raven (1935), and (as
Dracula) Abbott and Costello Meet Frankenstein (1948). His
only significant supporting role outside of the horror genre
was in the delightful
GRETA GARBO
comedy Ninotchka (1939).
Lugosi became increasingly strange during his later years.
He took his horror image rather seriously and often gave
interviews while lying in a coffin. Yet his campy quality sur-
vived more than 50 mediocre—sometimes awful—movies.
His last film was Plan 9 from Outer Space (1956). As per his
instructions, when he died he was buried in his Dracula cape.
See also
DRACULA
;
HORROR FILMS
.
Lumet, Sidney (1924– ) One of the most prolific
directors of the modern era, he has made more than one
movie per year on average since his directorial debut in 1957.
His ability to draw major actors to his projects has allowed
Lumet to make some ambitious movies—which have resulted
in the occasional resounding failure. He has more than made
up for them, however, with a number of highly regarded
films during the 1970s and 1980s.
Born to a theatrical family, Lumet began his show-business
career at the age of four as a radio performer. His acting career
continued throughout his childhood, with stints on Broadway
in plays such as Dead End. World War II interrupted and for-
ever altered the course of his career. When he returned from
the service in 1946, Lumet turned his back on acting in favor
of directing. After gaining valuable experience working Off-
Broadway and in summer stock, he began to direct in the new
medium of television in 1950. In his six years as a TV director
of such top-notch showcases as Alcoa Theater and Goodyear
Playhouse, Lumet gained a considerable reputation for being
talented and resourceful. That reputation, along with having
also been the director of a TV show called Best of Broadway, led
to his directing the film version of the hit Broadway play
Twelve Angry Men (1957). The movie, starring
HENRY FONDA
,
was well received by both critics and audiences, and Lumet was
honored with his first Best Director Oscar nomination. As a
result, he also led the first wave of directors who made a suc-
cessful transition from TV to movies.
Lumet’s work during the late 1950s and early 1960s contin-
ued to be largely in the area of film dramatizations of Broad-
way plays, such as Arthur Miller’s A View from the Bridge (1960)
and Tennessee Williams’s Long Day’s Journey into Night (1962).
He ventured into the area of grim thrillers with Fail Safe
(1964), in which New York City is blown up at the end. He
would later use New York time and again as the backdrop—if
not the symbol—of his preoccupation with America’s decline.
The director brought a dark visual flair to the unexpected
art-circuit hit The Pawnbroker in 1965, but not long after, his
career began to falter. He was producing and directing films
such as The Deadly Affair (1967), Bye Bye Braverman (1968),
and (another theater adaptation) The Last of the Mobile Hot
Shots (1970) with modest critical praise and very little audi-
ence support.
In 1973 Lumet finally broke out of his tailspin by direct-
ing
AL PACINO
in one of the year’s biggest hits, Serpico, based
on the true story of a New York City cop. After directing
Murder on the Orient Express (1974), based on Agatha
Christie’s novel, with professional polish, he returned to the
streets of New York to direct Pacino yet again in Dog Day
Afternoon (1975), gaining another Best Director
ACADEMY
AWARD
nomination. He then hit the peak of his career when
he brought
PADDY CHAYEFSKY
’s brilliant, if overwrought,
screenplay of Network (1976) to life. He was again nominated
as Best Director and again did not win an Oscar.
Unexpectedly, Lumet returned to adapting plays to the
screen but this time with less optimum results. Equus (1977)
was poorly received, and the big-budget all-black version of
The Wizard of Oz, The Wiz (1978), was a major bomb, both
critically and commercially. Lumet went back to the kind of
film with which he had enjoyed his greatest success, the New
York crime drama, and he hit it big yet again with Prince of
the City (1981). Deathtrap (1982) redeemed his reputation as
a director of filmed stage plays but was not a major box-
office winner.
In the 1980s, Lumet’s social concerns were increasingly
on display in films such as The Verdict (1982), Daniel (1983),
Power (1986), and Running on Empty (1988).
LUMET, SIDNEY
256
Lumet remained quite active during the 1990s in televi-
sion and film. After Family Business (1989), he directed A
Stranger among Us (1992), Guilty as Sin (1993), Night Falls on
Manhattan (1996), Critical Care (1997), Gloria (1999), Beauti-
ful Mrs. Seidermann (2000), and The Set-Up (2003). Lumet
always asked the right questions and made thought-provok-
ing statements through his work, such as “Who pays for the
passions and commitments of the parents?” (in Daniel, for
instance), “How and why do we create our own prison?” (in
The Pawnbroker), and “When we try to control everything,
everything winds up controlling us,” as Lumet wrote in his
book, Making Movies (1995), and demonstrated in his film
Prince of the City. He has been one of the most reliable and
dependable talents of the last half-century.
Lupino, Ida (1918–1995) As an actress, she excelled at
playing tough tarts, and later she became Hollywood’s only
female director of the 1940s and 1950s, managing to write
and produce her own films, as well. She experienced her
greatest popularity as an actress in the early to mid-1940s
when her smokey good looks and hard-edged performances
laced with a hint of vulnerability made her a standout. Her
artistic success in the latter 1940s and early 1950s as a Holly-
wood screenwriter and director was limited, but her pioneer-
ing efforts are historically important as they eventually
opened the door to future female screenwriters and directors.
Lupino was born in England to a well-known British
actor, Stanley Lupino, and was, in fact, a member of a family
with an acting tradition going back to the 17th century. The
young actress was trained at the Royal Academy of Dramatic
Arts and, after assorted bit parts in the movies, made her offi-
cial film debut at the age of 15 in an American film shot in
England, Her First Affair (1933).
When she was brought to America in 1934, Lupino
appeared in a number of films, but none of the studios with
which she worked were able to turn her into a star. The only
film in which she really shone during the 1930s—and there
was really only one—was The Gay Desperado (1936).
It would have seemed that with her beauty and English
accent she could have become another
GREER GARSON
dur-
ing the war years. Instead, Lupino became a sexier, sultrier
version of
JOAN BLONDELL
, costarring in a series of hard-
boiled adventure yarns at
WARNER BROS
. that finally tapped
her gaminelike qualities. Her run at stardom began with They
Drive by Night (1940), in support of
HUMPHREY BOGART
and
GEORGE RAFT
. Though she played the wayward wife of Alan
Hale in the film, there was good chemistry between her and
Bogart, and she was cast as his moll in the surprise hit film
High Sierra (1941). It was a movie that helped launch not only
Lupino but also Bogart and screenwriter
JOHN HUSTON
.
The year 1941 also saw her star with
JOHN GARFIELD
in
The Sea Wolf and Out of the Fog, two of her better efforts. She
hit the top of her acting career with The Hard Way (1943), a
film about a poor but determined beauty who would do any-
thing to escape her poverty-stricken life. It was pure soap
opera, but she was good at it, earning the New York Film
Critics Award as Best Actress of the year.
With
BETTE DAVIS
as queen of the lot, it was Lupino’s
bad luck to be under contract to Warners during the 1940s.
Unable to get the better scripts that were handed to Davis,
her career suffered. But the actress was as tough as the char-
acters she portrayed, and she decided to work behind the
camera, writing and producing a low-budget film about preg-
nancy called Not Wanted (1949). It was a minor success, lead-
ing to the opportunity to write and direct a story about a
polio victim’s struggle, Never Fear (1950). Both films had a
female protagonist. RKO was sufficiently impressed with her
work to offer her the chance to act, write, and direct. Her
output as a director was small—seven films—and of no par-
ticular artistic merit, but movies such as Outrage (1950),
Hard, Fast and Beautiful (1951), The Bigamist (1953), and The
Trouble with Angels (1966) worked well enough at the box
office to prove to Hollywood that a woman could sit in the
director’s chair.
Lupino continued to act on a regular basis during the
early to mid-1950s, but she never starred in any of the films
she directed. Once she began to appear on television in 1956
(she starred with her third husband, Howard Duff, in her
own series, Mr. Adams and Eve), she also began to direct in
that medium, as well. Her film appearances after the 1950s
were limited to a few supporting roles.
LUPINO, IDA
257