Elsa Lanchester interviewed here about Laughton including his homosexuality and their marriage. They actually did quite a few films together, which I didn't realize. He was a marvelous actor. They don't make them like this anymore. A very enjoyable documentary.
Hey, kiddo. Thank you. Now how about making me a sandwich?
by Anonymous | reply 1 | July 23, 2024 2:01 AM |
He was so insecure about his looks, yet this is what made him so great in so many roles.
by Anonymous | reply 2 | July 23, 2024 2:04 AM |
An interview with Peter Ustinov where he talks about Laughton's insecurity.
by Anonymous | reply 3 | July 23, 2024 2:15 AM |
If he had lived longer, Martin Scorsese could have used him in something… a bunch of hoodlums surrounding him in an alley or parking garage, with taunts of “Ya fat fuck!” etc.
by Anonymous | reply 4 | July 23, 2024 2:19 AM |
I show a film series and Laughton in Witness for the Prosecution was a favorite of the audience for the series. Great seriocomic performance.
He was a favorite of mine as a kid, I remember seeing him at an early age on TV in The Beachcomber, Rembrandt, The Island of Lost Souls, and The Private Life of Henry VIII.
And then there's Night of the Hunter.
by Anonymous | reply 5 | July 23, 2024 2:25 AM |
Night of the Hunter was not that well received at the time, but has grown to cult status.
by Anonymous | reply 6 | July 23, 2024 2:30 AM |
Even as a kid, I knew I was watching something amazing when I saw him in Henry VIII, Mutiny on the Bounty and Hunchback, of course. Laughton had many facets. Would have loved to have seen him on the stage.
by Anonymous | reply 7 | July 23, 2024 2:31 AM |
Elsa was a great actress in her own right. Iconic as Bride of Frankenstein. So beautiful. She outlived Laughton by 24 years. Obviously, she was very forgiving as they got married in 1929!!
by Anonymous | reply 8 | July 23, 2024 2:36 AM |
He won an Academy Award and wanted to do a comedy, picked Leo McCarey to direct him, and "Ruggles of Red Gap" (1935) was the very funny result.
by Anonymous | reply 9 | July 23, 2024 2:39 AM |
Ruggles Of Red Gap is a delightful movie.
I read something recently about it. Laughton's Gettysburg Address moment didn't go over well in previews. People laughed at his facial expressions. So McCarey solved the problem by cutting away from his face to the awed spectators in the saloon as he recited the speech. It's a great scene but a lot of people might not notice the camera isn't on Laughton for much of it.
by Anonymous | reply 10 | July 23, 2024 2:43 AM |
If for nothing else, I would adore Elsa Lanchester for her portrayal of suspected ax murderess Evelyn Holmby and her watercress sandwiches, chopping her way through the Florida Everglades with her blonde companion.
by Anonymous | reply 11 | July 23, 2024 2:43 AM |
Laughton was fired from David Copperfield (1935) because he couldn't get a hold on how to play Mr. Micawber (he was replaced by W. C. Fields). Freddie Bartholomew played David as a boy. Someone working on the film mentioned at the time, regarding Laughton's attempts at the role, "He looked like he was about to molest the child."
by Anonymous | reply 12 | July 23, 2024 2:49 AM |
WC Fields? Please... that hack!
by Anonymous | reply 13 | July 23, 2024 2:52 AM |
The shit sandwich story/description still makes me sick just thinking about it.
by Anonymous | reply 14 | July 23, 2024 2:54 AM |
Laughton was so disheartened by the reception that Night of the Hunter received that he never directed another movie. What a waste.
by Anonymous | reply 15 | July 23, 2024 2:56 AM |
Laughton is so fascinating, in a fantastic cast, in "Witness for the Prosecution." Never tire of watching this movie! Laughton's scenes with each of the co-stars are riveting. My look here:
by Anonymous | reply 16 | July 23, 2024 3:00 AM |
^^One of the best movies ever made.
by Anonymous | reply 17 | July 23, 2024 3:10 AM |
I actually think that aside from the ending, that film’s deadly boring. Sorry.
by Anonymous | reply 18 | July 23, 2024 3:22 AM |
R18 There's one in every crowd.
by Anonymous | reply 19 | July 23, 2024 3:26 AM |
R18 I have the same response to some other "must see" films. Like Magnificent Ambersons. Just not for me. I can't even articulate why? I just can't do it.
by Anonymous | reply 20 | July 23, 2024 3:29 AM |
According to Hollywood lore, he had a feces fetish where he had a friend of his wipe his ass with a piece of bread, which he put on his sandwich and then ate it. Mr. Laughton, a great actor in "Mutiny on the Bounty" may have had a few screws loose.
by Anonymous | reply 21 | July 23, 2024 3:34 AM |
GIGANTIC FLAMING QUEEN
by Anonymous | reply 22 | July 23, 2024 3:36 AM |
I found him to be a self-conscious actor, but that can also be interesting sometimes.
by Anonymous | reply 23 | July 23, 2024 3:38 AM |
The producer Paul Gregory (later married to Janet Gaynor) wanted Laughton to direct and star in "The Night of the Hunter," but eventually they decided together that Robert Mitchum would be a better choice for the leading role. When Laughton first met with Mitchum, he told him, "This character I want you to play is a diabolical shit," to which the actor replied, “Present.”
by Anonymous | reply 24 | July 23, 2024 3:43 AM |
Laughton may only have directed one movie (he also had a hand in directing The Man On the Eiffel Tower, but isn't credited)...but he directed for the theater, I think. According to Henry Fonda he actually directed The Caine Mutiny Court Martial (he was the co-producer, Dick Powell was the credited director), working with the actors who were on a bus tour with this play doing one night stands before it went to Broadway.
by Anonymous | reply 25 | July 23, 2024 3:49 AM |
I don't think Laughton ever directed again after Night of the Hunter. Is that correct?
by Anonymous | reply 26 | July 23, 2024 3:49 AM |
Correct, and he only lived around 7 more years.
by Anonymous | reply 27 | July 23, 2024 3:56 AM |
It is a pity he never directed again after THE NIGHT OF THE HUNTER
by Anonymous | reply 28 | July 23, 2024 3:57 AM |
He directed several plays on Broadway over 25 years, including an adaptation of Agatha Christie's "The Murder of Roger Ackroyd," in which he played Hercule Poirot. He had played the role to great acclaim in London (although he didn't direct the production there), and got excellent reviews on Broadway, but the production flopped and closed after a month.
by Anonymous | reply 29 | July 23, 2024 4:03 AM |
Laughton's family owned a hotel. When he returned from WWI he joined the family business. He busied himself into the design and decor and concierge services...you know, trying to upscale the operation. Apparently fell on deaf ears. If his efforts had been better received, we may be discussing Charles Laughton for entirely different reasons!
by Anonymous | reply 30 | July 23, 2024 4:34 AM |
I always loved his plump, baby lips. Never wanted to do anything else with them, however!
by Anonymous | reply 31 | July 23, 2024 4:35 AM |
Laughton had PTSD from WWI, but no one cares...holy shit, the things people went through.
"Laughton served in World War I, during which he was gassed, serving first with the 2/1st Battalion of the Huntingdonshire Cyclist Battalion,[8] and then with the 7th Battalion of the Northamptonshire Regiment."
by Anonymous | reply 32 | July 23, 2024 4:37 AM |
R32 People still do.
by Anonymous | reply 33 | July 23, 2024 4:43 AM |
Sad how Elsa said she became a more complete, alive person after he died. It ain't easy being married to a shit eater.
by Anonymous | reply 34 | July 23, 2024 6:50 AM |
Elsa felt incomplete because she was sewn together from many parts.
by Anonymous | reply 35 | July 23, 2024 1:54 PM |
"Life is a like a shit sandwich -- the less bread you have the more shit you have to eat."
by Anonymous | reply 36 | July 23, 2024 1:58 PM |
When I was a kid watching Bugs Bunny I overheard two adults in the room saying the king in the "Cook! Cook! Where's my hassenpfeffer!?" cartoon was a parody of Charles Laughton.
Later that week I saw Charles Laughton in a movie and quickly understood what parody meant
by Anonymous | reply 37 | July 23, 2024 2:28 PM |
He played a sympathetic chump in The Suspect, a really cool old film noir.
by Anonymous | reply 38 | July 23, 2024 3:18 PM |
[quote] Night of the Hunter was not that well received at the time, but has grown to cult status.
It’s remarkable, really. Laughton directed only one picture, and it’s one of the greatest movies of all time.
by Anonymous | reply 39 | July 23, 2024 3:39 PM |
A little more on the bread, if you would, kiddo. I have quite a taste for it this morning.
by Anonymous | reply 40 | July 23, 2024 4:28 PM |
"I am not a man, I am not a beast, I am about as shapeless as the man-in-the-moon."
by Anonymous | reply 41 | July 23, 2024 5:21 PM |
The shit sandwich story is right up there with Danny Thomas and the glass coffee table.
by Anonymous | reply 42 | July 23, 2024 5:21 PM |
Laughton was in one of my favorite old movies, The Old Dark House, directed by James Whale. Laughton brings pathos to what could've been an insufferable bore of a character.
by Anonymous | reply 43 | July 23, 2024 6:16 PM |
Simon Callie’s book on him, is superb, for my money the best book on an actor and how his life and intertwined ever written. That Callow was openly gay and a character actor who nonetheless was a star makes it especially moving and insightful—and sympathetic to what living in a different era did to Laughton.
I love Elsa Lanchestet. My favorite performance of hers is what amounts to a cameo in The Razor’d Edge, late in the film, where she plays the sympathetic assistant who allows Tyrone Power to take an invitation to the party that poorClifton Webb, on his deathbed, has been snubbed from. TRE is a bit too “spiritual journey” for my taste (I prefer the Dickensian bildungdroman of Of Human Bondage, and some of the short stories, like “The Letter” and “Rain”), but the film has a number of fine performances (though Owers and Tierney, both of whom I enjoy in other films, are pretty wooden). Anne Baxter, often reviled on FL (and she is over-the-top in Yen Commaents, but so is Judith Anderson and Nina Foch, so she’s in good company), is very touching as Sophie—and what a feat-/to beat Ethel Barrymore, Lillian Gish, Flora Robson, and Gale Sondergaard for the BSA’
by Anonymous | reply 44 | July 23, 2024 7:03 PM |
When we watched Julius Caesar in high school I thought Laughton came across as a fat old lady.
by Anonymous | reply 45 | July 23, 2024 7:09 PM |
Which film of "Julius Caesar" did Laughton appear in?
by Anonymous | reply 46 | July 23, 2024 7:31 PM |
I love Laughton, nice to see a thread on him here. How I wish we could have seen him play Poirot! Wow.
by Anonymous | reply 47 | July 23, 2024 7:35 PM |
I will.definitwly download that Callow biography. Thanks r44
by Anonymous | reply 48 | July 23, 2024 7:57 PM |
Oh wow! Callow did 3 vols on Orson Welles too!
by Anonymous | reply 49 | July 23, 2024 7:59 PM |
R46, the one with Charlton Heston.
by Anonymous | reply 50 | July 23, 2024 8:18 PM |
When I first so Mutiny Laughton was so hateful just the embodiment of evil. When I saw a part of it recently he looked as young as a college student.
by Anonymous | reply 51 | July 23, 2024 8:22 PM |
R44=Jaclyn Smith
by Anonymous | reply 52 | July 23, 2024 8:25 PM |
"Island of Lost Souls" is the best version of the story. A fever-dream production, through and through.
by Anonymous | reply 54 | July 23, 2024 8:36 PM |
Marylin has some fond memories of working with Charles.
by Anonymous | reply 55 | July 23, 2024 8:36 PM |
Him and his whole family are MAGAts.
by Anonymous | reply 56 | July 23, 2024 8:47 PM |
Henry VIII is an excellent film. The costumes are fabulous!
by Anonymous | reply 57 | July 23, 2024 10:44 PM |
A few years ago I started a thread and asked for recommendations for old movies. I watched a lot of the ones in the thread, but "Witness for the Prosecution" was my favorite.
by Anonymous | reply 58 | July 23, 2024 10:46 PM |
I read that he put off his Broadway debut because New York was undergoing a hot spell!
by Anonymous | reply 59 | July 23, 2024 11:47 PM |
[quote] Anne Baxter, often reviled on FL (and she is over-the-top in Yen Commaents, but so is Judith Anderson and Nina Foch, so she’s in good company)
Was Yen Commaents a Chinese film?
by Anonymous | reply 60 | July 24, 2024 12:45 AM |
Don't forget he played Nero in The Sign of the Cross (1932) (Cecil B. DeMille)
by Anonymous | reply 61 | July 24, 2024 1:03 AM |
And he wasn't in either of Heston's "Julius Caesar" films.
by Anonymous | reply 62 | July 24, 2024 1:05 AM |
R50 That's not correct.
by Anonymous | reply 63 | July 24, 2024 1:05 AM |
He sounds like James Mason at R64, which I'd never noticed before.
by Anonymous | reply 65 | July 24, 2024 1:22 AM |
Charles on What's My Line has a bone to pick with Dorothy Kilgallen.
by Anonymous | reply 66 | July 24, 2024 1:31 AM |
my sincerest apologies
i must have meant Spartacus
by Anonymous | reply 67 | July 24, 2024 1:33 AM |
Honestly, when I first saw this thread I thought it said
[quote]Charles Laughton can we discuss his genitals?
by Anonymous | reply 68 | July 24, 2024 1:42 AM |
by Anonymous | reply 69 | July 24, 2024 1:43 AM |
Shelley did not have luck with water in the movies. Drowned in both A Place In The Sun and The Poseidon Adventure.
by Anonymous | reply 70 | July 24, 2024 1:46 AM |
She didn't drown in either, r70.
by Anonymous | reply 71 | July 24, 2024 1:51 AM |
R71 She didn't drown?
by Anonymous | reply 73 | July 24, 2024 2:27 AM |
R71 In Poseidon didn't she have a heart attack? But she drowned in A Place in the Sun, didn't she?
by Anonymous | reply 74 | July 24, 2024 2:29 AM |
In the water I'm a very skinny lady.
by Anonymous | reply 75 | July 24, 2024 2:36 AM |
I just assumed Mitchum killed her first, r73. I could be wrong.
Yes, r74, she drowned in that...to the audience's relief. Unlike the sympathetic Sylvia Sidney.
by Anonymous | reply 76 | July 24, 2024 2:40 AM |
She delivered the baby in the water after she was dead.
The turtles and crawfish devoured it as it drowned.
by Anonymous | reply 77 | July 24, 2024 2:44 AM |
Sit back with a cuppa tea and enjoy this little masterpiece.
by Anonymous | reply 78 | July 24, 2024 2:45 AM |
Scotty Bowers is the one who told the shit sammie story. Laughton was also so hygienically challenged he could have been an EPA Superfund site.
by Anonymous | reply 79 | July 24, 2024 3:32 AM |
He played Nero as a flaming queen. I can tell few of you have seen it.
by Anonymous | reply 80 | July 24, 2024 4:18 AM |
I could never watch A Place in the Sun. You would want Winters to drown. That is 180 from the way you feel about the heartbreaking tragic character in Dreiser's book. The worst casting in the world.
by Anonymous | reply 81 | July 24, 2024 6:10 AM |
Shelley Winters tells the story that she dressed down for the audition and director George Stevens didn't recognize her in the waiting room. He was used to seeing Shelley as the sexpot.
by Anonymous | reply 82 | July 24, 2024 9:10 AM |
In the movie cute Monty has to be the sympathetic character. He represents all the young men trying to make it post-WW2, find their "place in the sun". Liz represents the unattainable trophy girl; Shelley is the tired ball 'n chain trying to ruin it all for him. George Stevens had such an affection for the character he changed the name from Clyde to George.
by Anonymous | reply 83 | July 24, 2024 12:32 PM |
I loved how he used the monocle all the way through "Witness".
In the final scene he sits completly still ,eyes down, monocle tangling -waiting for the drama between Marlene and Tyrone to unfold as if he knows what´s coming.
by Anonymous | reply 84 | July 24, 2024 12:58 PM |
R73 I don't think he did, that was district attorney Raymond Burr's interpretation. And it was Montgomery Clift.
by Anonymous | reply 85 | July 24, 2024 1:37 PM |
Bowers isn't a credible source about anything. Laughton was a great actor beloeved and respected by colleagues.
Lanchester was annoying lush in her later years. She was Isherwood's neighbor and he felt compelled to put up with her coming over in an incoherent state.
by Anonymous | reply 86 | July 24, 2024 2:29 PM |
I love how Bowers gets those high church of film types in a well-deserved snit.
by Anonymous | reply 87 | July 24, 2024 2:36 PM |
R86 "Gincoherent"
by Anonymous | reply 88 | July 24, 2024 2:47 PM |
[quote]When I first so Mutiny Laughton was so hateful just the embodiment of evil.
So hateful! I loathed him. Then saw him as Henry VIII weeping after learning Catherine Howard betrayed him and felt such empathy for him. This was my earliest thought of "That guy can REALLY act."
by Anonymous | reply 89 | July 24, 2024 4:15 PM |
In 1937 Laughton starred in "I Claudius" as the roman emperor who had a limp and suffered from slight deafness due to being sick as a boy, Ostracized by his family he was excluded from public office until his consulship ,which he shared with his nephew Caligula.
The movie was produced by Alexander Korda who cast his wife Merle Oberon in the part of Claudius´ scheming third wife Messalina. Korda was in financial trouble after his last movie " Knigth Without Armour" for which he paid Marlene Dietrich a salary of $450 000.- thus making her the highest paid actress at the time. Still owing Marlene $100 000.- after production she said she would give up the money if Korda would hire her mentor Josef von Sternberg to direct "I Claudius". Von Sternbergs career had tanked after he ended his collaboration with Dietrich and the ever so loyal Marlene showed quiet some generosity to help him back on his feet. Dietrich adored Laugthon -Oberon not so much. " Can you imagine, that Singapore streetwalker a la Roman poisoner?"
Unfortunatly the production turned out to be a very troubled one. Laughton had frequent arguments with the director and producer about the characterisation of his character and constantly threatened to leave the production. Korda worried by exploding production cost was saved when Merle Oberon was involved in a car accident where she hit her face on a metal footrest. Though the seriousness of Oberons injuries have been much debated they gave Korda a reason to cancel the movie and collect insurance.
The unused footage later turned up in a BBC documentary . Great behind the scenes stuff.
by Anonymous | reply 90 | July 24, 2024 4:52 PM |
I didn't know that Isherwood had such an unpleasant voice.
by Anonymous | reply 91 | July 24, 2024 9:10 PM |
He was an unpleasant person.
by Anonymous | reply 92 | July 24, 2024 9:11 PM |
Why did Dietrich call Oberon a Singapore streetwalker, when she was from India?
by Anonymous | reply 93 | July 24, 2024 9:11 PM |
Carole Lombard found him physically repellent and had it in her contract that they would not be required to embrace or kiss in THEY KNEW WHAT THEY WANTED .
by Anonymous | reply 94 | July 24, 2024 9:14 PM |
R92, you mean Isherwood?
by Anonymous | reply 95 | July 24, 2024 9:29 PM |
Didn’t Isherwood work as Singapore streetwalker (in his youth?)
by Anonymous | reply 96 | July 24, 2024 9:46 PM |
First Singapore, then Berlin.
by Anonymous | reply 97 | July 24, 2024 9:49 PM |
Ustinov does Laughton impressions. He was such a brilliant man. What a raconteur!
by Anonymous | reply 98 | July 24, 2024 9:55 PM |
If you haven't seen HOBSON'S CHOICE with Laughton, John Mills, and Brenda de Banzie, I highly recommend it. Laughton is very funny.
And his hambone performance as a serpentine Southern senator in ADVISE AND CONSENT is very entertaining.
by Anonymous | reply 99 | July 24, 2024 10:07 PM |
R95: Yes. I don't know what Lombard's issue was with Laughton as he generally was liked and respected---perhaps he was "European" in his hygiene or she just thought him ugly.
by Anonymous | reply 100 | July 24, 2024 10:10 PM |
Quite a few movies of his up on YouTube. Here he is on What's My Line
by Anonymous | reply 101 | July 24, 2024 10:11 PM |
Hobson's choice is good but I needed subtitles to fully understand some of the accents.
by Anonymous | reply 102 | July 24, 2024 10:14 PM |
Watching what remains of "I Claudius" is painful. It could have been a truly great film. The scene where Claudius essentially takes over the senate is awesome.
by Anonymous | reply 103 | July 25, 2024 1:38 AM |
R100, you are right, Isherwood comes across as quite unlikable in that documentary.
by Anonymous | reply 104 | July 25, 2024 1:40 AM |
They must have be dozens, if not hundreds, of rent boys who had sex with Laughton. How come nothing ever transpired?
by Anonymous | reply 105 | July 25, 2024 2:30 AM |
He probably paid them off when they tried to blackmail him.
by Anonymous | reply 106 | July 25, 2024 2:34 AM |
"Devil and the Deep" (1932) with Tallulah Bankhead,Gary Cooper & Cary Grant
Laughton and Bankhead did not care for each other at all and Tallulah refused to shake hands because of his dirty fingernails
Still working on adapting his stagy intensity for the movie cameras Charles developed high respect for Cary Cooper He cited Cooper as the paragon of film acting for the rest of his life.
fun fact: Tallulah said "The only reason I went to Hollywood was to fuck that divine Gary Cooper"
Gowns by Travis Banton
by Anonymous | reply 107 | July 25, 2024 10:07 AM |
He probably paid them off when they tried to blackmail him.
He probably sat on them.
by Anonymous | reply 108 | July 25, 2024 11:43 AM |
According to something I read (Callow?) Laughton took a long time to become comfortable with his sexuality and did have a relationship of some consequence with a guy later in his life.
by Anonymous | reply 109 | July 25, 2024 12:17 PM |
Laughton conducted an acting class at his home, Shelley Winters was in the class, it's one reason she was cast in Night of the Hunter.
There is or was an interview on YouTube with Charles and Elsa at their home--from the early 1950s, I think. The home looks modest. Movie stars lived differently then (and despite being wealthy they weren't super-rich as the stars are today--even non-star actors can be quite rich).
by Anonymous | reply 110 | July 25, 2024 12:23 PM |
‘’Witness’’ was fun but now so tainted because of the shit sandwich thing. Do think one of his scorned ex’s made up this story-please help…
by Anonymous | reply 111 | July 25, 2024 2:38 PM |
This scene always brings a tear to my eye…the timing of the sound effect, edited perfectly at the spot where he grabs Maureen O’Hara, is golden.
Sidebar: movie lovers always talk about 1939 as the year of years. Thomas Mitchell co-starred in Hunchback, GWTW and Stagecoach all in that one year. He deserved the Oscar that year for sure.
by Anonymous | reply 113 | July 25, 2024 3:35 PM |
Thomas Mitchell always played the same part.
by Anonymous | reply 114 | July 25, 2024 3:51 PM |
To be fair to Tallulah, Gary Cooper was a gorgeous man.
by Anonymous | reply 115 | July 25, 2024 3:59 PM |
Yes-R114. A Parisian lowlife-fool from the Middle Ages, a 19th Century alcoholic doctor in the Southwest and an antebellum Georgia plantation slavemaster are all so common and alike…no originality at all there!
by Anonymous | reply 116 | July 25, 2024 4:20 PM |
He won a Grammy for the recording of his 1955 one-man shows called "The Story-Teller ... A Session with Charles Laughton"
Unfortunatly the double-album wasn´t released until 1962, the year of his death and he was awarded the Grammy posthumously .
by Anonymous | reply 117 | July 25, 2024 4:53 PM |
If he had lived to make Irma La Duce maybe the film would have been watchable. As it was I think it was the Wilder film to make money.
by Anonymous | reply 118 | July 25, 2024 9:42 PM |
R113 And Mitchell also was in Mr. Smith Goes To Washington, in 1939. A role nothing like Gerald O'Hara in GWTW, R114. And he was also in Only Angels Have Wings in 1939.
by Anonymous | reply 119 | July 26, 2024 12:34 AM |
I meant to say, 'As it was I think it was the last Wilder film to be a hit.'
by Anonymous | reply 120 | July 26, 2024 1:11 AM |
Then it would seem a lot of people found it watchable.
by Anonymous | reply 121 | July 26, 2024 3:31 AM |
[quote]He sounds like James Mason at [R64], which I'd never noticed before.
Laughton and Mason were from Yorkshire. You can hear it in both their voices, especially as they got older.
by Anonymous | reply 122 | July 26, 2024 7:25 AM |
I watched 3/4 of “Arch of Triumph” last night before giving up. It’s rather awful… in that it’s very frustrating to see a professionally mounted film with SUCH a slow pace and SO little plot. Dear god!
I did laugh when I read that Charles Boyer remembered, “Before the editing it was terrible for four hours. Now it is only terrible for two hours.”
by Anonymous | reply 123 | July 26, 2024 10:25 AM |
He and Olivier didn't like each other.
by Anonymous | reply 124 | July 26, 2024 12:23 PM |
Laughton struggled to find his characters, as Garson Kanin (who directed They Knew What They Wanted) noted, and I think George Cukor also might have mentioned this in regard to David Copperfield. And Billy Wilder said he was always working on the characterization, adding little bits and improvements all the way through. He did train at RADA but was in a lot of ways like a method actor.
by Anonymous | reply 125 | July 26, 2024 12:25 PM |
Laughton’s Claudius, physically much more deformed than Derek Jacobi’s, is fascinating.
by Anonymous | reply 126 | July 26, 2024 12:43 PM |
Olivier was such a pompous ass. Who did like him?
by Anonymous | reply 127 | July 26, 2024 12:43 PM |
R127, for someone who was so celebrated during his lifetime Olivier's posthumous reputation isn't great-- he isn't a beloved figure at all, and while there are still people who praise him as an actor, there don't seem to be many people who have/had good things to say about him as a man.
by Anonymous | reply 128 | July 26, 2024 9:23 PM |
It is hard to find people who had anything good to say about Olivier as a man. In fact I don't recall anything. But there are a number of mean selfish things about him people have said. Maggie Smith has a couple. But those who saw him on stage said he was a force of nature. I think his performance in Wyler's Carrie is one of the best performances I've seen on film. And in Richard lll he is wonderful. His line 'I am not in the giving vein today' is so chilling. And his St Crispin's day speech in Henry V is exhilarating. But there are others which are either mediocre or hammy. He almost kills The Prince and the Showgirl except for the fact that Monroe is a blue diamond.
by Anonymous | reply 129 | July 26, 2024 10:17 PM |
He was good when he played a pompous and devious asshole. Because he was one.
by Anonymous | reply 130 | July 26, 2024 11:16 PM |
Stumbled upon this today. One of the best parts is Laughton transforming to a mafioso.
by Anonymous | reply 132 | July 27, 2024 2:12 AM |
R129 He was pretty great in Wuthering Heights. I thought he was fantastic in Spartacus, and in a not-very-well-known movie called Term Of Trial.
by Anonymous | reply 133 | July 27, 2024 6:30 AM |
About Spartacus:
Laughton also eventually agreed to sign on, for a reported fee of $41,000 ($400,000 today) for just thirteen days work, but he made Douglas' life a constant hell.
Laughton was never happy with the script by Dalton Trumbo, and Ustinov was asked to rewrite his scenes. Even so, he constantly harangued Douglas on set.
He recalled in his autobiography: "With shooting in progress, Charles Laughton, Gracchus in my epic movie Spartacus, was threatening to sue me and I was laughing hysterically. Charles looked at me strangely. As he waddled out, sputtering, I called, “Go ahead! Sue me! What the f*** do I care!” I never did find out why he wanted to sue me."
Olivier once famously said of his fellow thespian: "I'm not a genius. There’s no room for genius in the theatre, it's too much trouble. The only actor I ever knew who was a genius was Charles Laughton. Maybe that's why he was so difficult."
Despite his calm appraisal of Laughton's character, it didn't stop him from provoking him on set.
Peter Ustinov recalled: "For some reason - like animals - they just didn’t like each other. When you get two dogs that growl at each other, you don’t really ask why, you just accept it.
by Anonymous | reply 134 | July 27, 2024 6:35 AM |
He looked like he smelled bad.
by Anonymous | reply 135 | July 27, 2024 6:51 AM |
My very elderly aunt loved Olivier in Wuthering Heights. She tried watching Sleuth but she found Olivier's aged looks so heartbreaking she had to turn it off.
by Anonymous | reply 136 | July 27, 2024 8:20 AM |
R136, Olivier doesn't look bad in [italic]Sleuth[/italic] for a man in his mid-60s, but it's impossible to compete with his younger self as Heathcliff when his looks were at their absolute peak. He was never that gorgeous again, on film at least. I wonder if it irked Merle Oberon that Larry was prettier.
by Anonymous | reply 137 | July 27, 2024 9:42 AM |
R137 I wouldn't go that far, although in WH she didn't really look her best. That movie is made so well I didn't notice on my first viewing (which was at the Regency, in NYC, when that theater existed) that she's not strong in that role. Especially considering what a strong role it is. Still I think there's something so right about her. Her reactions. If she was inadequate the movie wouldn't work. It's just that she could have been more forceful, at times, as an actress. Olivier had such a powerful voice, and physical presence.
Vivien Leigh was offered the other part (Geraldine Fitzgerald's part) but turned it down. William Wyler told her something like, "You'll never get a better Hollywood debut than that part." Haha. People think she's have been a better Cathy but Oberon's vulnerability was heartbreaking so I don't know.
by Anonymous | reply 138 | July 27, 2024 2:13 PM |
*she'd
by Anonymous | reply 139 | July 27, 2024 2:13 PM |
I always found Oberon too prissy as Cathy. The character in the book is much more rough around the edges and Oberon couldn't play that to save her life.
I've seen a lot of versions of WH and the first actress who got closer to Bronte's Cathy was Anna Calder-Marshall in the 1970 film (which is very uneven).
by Anonymous | reply 140 | July 27, 2024 5:55 PM |
Oberon couldn't play much of anything.
by Anonymous | reply 141 | July 27, 2024 6:53 PM |
[quote]I show a film series and Laughton in Witness for the Prosecution was a favorite of the audience for the series. Great seriocomic performance.
His delivery is incredible as always.
It is a thrown away line but remains my favorite- When Tyrone Power (also wonderful) as the sad sack salesman explains, "It not only beats the egg, but it separates the white from the yolk!" and Laughton replies, "Is that at all desirable?"
Bloody brilliant.
by Anonymous | reply 142 | July 27, 2024 7:27 PM |
Brenda really holds her own against Laughton in Hobson's Choice. She is also delightful in the original Pink Panther.
Now if Laughton really liked shit sandwiches wouldn't dear close friends like Billy Wilder and Maureen O'Hara know? Gossip travels like lightening in Hollywood. They just didn't care?
by Anonymous | reply 144 | July 28, 2024 10:25 AM |
Yes at the time a lot of people found Irma watchable. I just personally find it pretty bad. Maybe there are others here who really like it. Many many years ago when I first went to Paris my cheap hotel was by that district portrayed in the film with all the prostitutes hanging out in the doorways. I was walking down the street and thinking 'Oh my god I'm in Irma La Douce!' They were calling out to me 'Hey tall guy!' I thought to myself you've got the wrong guy. You can't tell?
by Anonymous | reply 145 | July 28, 2024 10:57 AM |
Laughtons film debut in a 1928 short starring future wife Elsa Lanchester. Not much to see since Laughton took a very small part in the film just for fun as he had just started becoming involved with Elsa..
by Anonymous | reply 146 | July 28, 2024 5:17 PM |
I don't know why some thought Elsa was rather plain. I always thought she was quite attractive.
by Anonymous | reply 147 | July 28, 2024 6:11 PM |
You’re gay?! Yes, I’m sure.
by Anonymous | reply 148 | July 28, 2024 6:34 PM |
I like Elsa's role as the mother in Lassie Come Home. Not an eccentric part for her for once and she has a great scene trying to be a hard case about the family having to sell the dog and then suddenly breaking down. She also does a Yorkshire accent.
by Anonymous | reply 149 | July 28, 2024 11:18 PM |
R147: She was rather plain. Not glamorous, not ugly. She was never a great beauty and putting on weight made her look matronly before her time.
by Anonymous | reply 150 | July 29, 2024 3:37 AM |
I find her very homely in an almost unwatchable sense. Laughton, as well, especially when he was older. In both cases, they looked more attractive when they smiled. Both had a lot of magnetism on the screen, though. Both were quite short, as well.
by Anonymous | reply 151 | July 29, 2024 6:38 AM |
I also found Roddy McDowall very repulsive at a certain age (when he was a teen/young adult). He was adorable--though still homely--as a child, and somewhat better looking as an adult but always with the mouth hanging open.
by Anonymous | reply 152 | July 29, 2024 6:40 AM |
(^played Elsa's son in the Lassie picture.)
by Anonymous | reply 153 | July 29, 2024 6:41 AM |
Elsa is surprisingly pretty at the beginning of Bride of Frankenstein. She could do drama and comedy equally well.
by Anonymous | reply 155 | July 29, 2024 9:38 AM |