TCM Schedule for Thursday, August 8, 2013 -- Summer Under The Stars -- Ramon Navarro

[Staph]

Today's Star, Ramon Novarro, was born Jose Ramón Gil Samaniego on February 6, 1899, in Durango, Mexico, and died on October 30, 1968, in North Hollywood, California.

From IMDB -- The son of a prosperous Mexican dentist, Ramon Novarro moved to Los Angeles with his family as refugees from the Mexican revolution of 1916. After stints as a ballet dancer, piano teacher and singing waiter, he became a film extra in 1917. For five years he remained an extra until director Rex Ingram cast him as Rupert in The Prisoner of Zenda (1922). He was cast with Lewis Stone and Ingram's wife, Alice Terry. He worked with Ingram in his next four films and was again teamed with Terry in the successful Scaramouche (1923). Novarro's rising popularity among female moviegoers resulted in his being billed as the "New Valentino". In 1925 he appeared in his most famous role, as the title character in Ben-Hur: A Tale of the Christ (1925), and later co-starred with Norma Shearer in The Student Prince in Old Heidelberg (1927). His first talking picture was Call of the Flesh (1930), where he sang and danced the tango. He continued to appear in musicals, but his popularity was slipping. He starred with Greta Garbo in the successful Mata Hari (1931), but his career began to fade fast. In 1935 he left MGM and appeared on Broadway in a show that quickly flopped. His later career, when he was able to find work in films, consisted mostly of cameos. On October 30th, 1968, Ramon Novarro was savagely beaten in his North Hollywood home by two young hustlers. They had heard - in error - that he had thousands of dollars locked away somewhere in his home. They never found any money, and Ramon was discovered dead the next day by his servant.

He was a close friend of Gabriel Navarro, the grandfather of rocker Dave Navarro. He chose to borrow Gabriel's surname for his stagename, but a secretary made a typing error, rendering him forever Ramon Novarro. Enjoy!


6:00 AM -- The Prisoner Of Zenda (1922)
In this silent film, a vacationing Englishman steps in for the kidnapped king of a small European nation.
Dir: Rex Ingram
Cast: Lewis Stone, Alice Terry, Robert Edeson
BW-113 mins, TV-G,

The Turner library print is a re-release of the original version, with an uncredited piano music score and a running time of 113 minutes. Its opening credits were changed to list Ramon Novarro first, as he was then very popular, and also uses the name he is now known by. Also credited onscreen was John George and Snitz Edwards.


8:00 AM -- Scaramouche (1923)
In this silent film, a French rebel masquerades as a clown so that he can avenge his friend's murder.
Dir: Rex Ingram
Cast: Lloyd Ingraham, Alice Terry, Ramon Novarro
BW-124 mins, TV-G,

An army of workmen built a whole French village that covered 60 acres and was faithfully reproduced down to cobblestone streets and shop windows filled with actual wares. Hundreds of thousands of yards of muslin, satin, brocade and velvet were required in the making of the gorgeous costumes worn by the cast.


10:00 AM -- The Red Lily (1924)
In this silent film, a chance separation throws young lovers into the dregs of society.
Dir: Fred Niblo
Cast: Enid Bennett, Ramon Novarro, Wallace Beery
BW-81 mins, TV-G,

In 2005, Turner Entertainment Company copyrighted an 81-minute version with a musical score by H. Scott Salinas. It was first broadcast on Turner Classic Movies in 2006.


11:30 AM -- Across to Singapore (1928)
In this silent film, sailor brothers become romantic rivals.
Dir: William Nigh
Cast: Ramon Novarro, Joan Crawford, Ernest Torrence
BW-85 mins, TV-PG,

Based on the novel All The Brothers Were Valient, by Ben Ames Williams. The primary brothers in this film were played by Ramon Navarro and Ernest Torrance. In All the Brothers Were Valiant (1923), the brothers were Malcolm MacGregor and Lon Chaney (this version of the film is considered to be lost). In All the Brothers Were Valiant (1953), the brothers were Robert Taylor and Stewart Granger.


12:56 PM -- Singapore and Jahore (1938)
A visit to Singapore, an essential port city in Britain's empire, established in 1813 when Raffles negotiated its separation from the independent Malay state of Jahor.
Narrator: James A. Fitzpatrick
C-9 mins,

Fitzpatrick tells us at the close of the film, that the Sultan asked him to give his regards to film star Jeanette MacDonald, his favorite.


1:15 PM -- The Pagan (1929)
A South Seas native falls for a white woman.
Dir: W. S. Van Dyke
Cast: Ramón Novarro, Renée Adorée, Donald Crisp
BW-78 mins, TV-PG,

According to the credits, "Produced and photographed in the Paumotu Islands of the South Seas."


2:45 PM -- Devil May Care (1929)
A fugitive falls for the woman who turned him in.
Dir: Sidney Franklin
Cast: Ramón Novarro, Dorothy Jordan, Marion Harris
C-97 mins, TV-G,

Based on the French drama: "La Bataille des Dames", by Eugène Scribe and Ernest Legouve.


4:30 PM -- The Son-Daughter (1932)
Young Asians in San Francisco find their love thwarted by clan warfare.
Dir: Clarence Brown
Cast: Helen Hayes, Ramon Novarro, Lewis Stone
BW-79 mins, TV-PG,

Anna May Wong was very eager to play Lian Wha, but was turned down - by her own account, because the producers considered her "too Chinese to play a Chinese".


5:51 PM -- Picture Palace (1933)
When Hal and Dawn lose their jobs at a vaudeville theatre, they vow to return as performers.
Dir: Roy Mack
Cast: Hal LeRoy, Anne Shirley, Jack Fulton
BW-21 mins,

Anne Shirley as Dawn O'Day. Her birth name was Dawn Evelyeen Paris, but she changed it to Anne Shirley after appearing as that character in Anne of Green Gables (1934).


6:15 PM -- The Cat And The Fiddle (1934)
A struggling composer courts a singing star.
Dir: William K. Howard
Cast: Ramon Novarro, Jeanette MacDonald, Frank Morgan
BW-89 mins, TV-G,

This movie was rejected for re-release certification because the leading characters were in an illicit sexual relationship without any compensating moral values.


7:45 PM -- The Nickelette (1934)
This short attempts to recreate the nickelodeon experience for "talkie" generation.
Cast: Rudolph Valentino, Eugene O'Brien, Mabel Paige
BW-11 mins,

The soundtrack includes Memories (Music by Egbert Van Alstyne), Auld Lang Syne, The Sidewalks of New York (Music by Charles Lawlor), and The Curse of an Aching Heart (Music by Al Piantadosi, Lyrics by Henry Fink).



TCM PRIMETIME - WHAT'S ON TONIGHT: SUMMER UNDER THE STARS: RAMON NAVARRO



8:00 PM -- Ben-Hur: A Tale Of The Christ (1925)
In this silent film, a rebellious Israelite prince out for vengeance crosses paths with the Messiah.
Dir: Fred Niblo
Cast: Ramon Novarro, Francis X. Bushman, May McAvoy
BW-143 mins, TV-G,

This film had an "extra" cast like no other. Many Hollywood stars showed up on set to watch the shooting and were pressed into service as extras, especially in the chariot race. In addition, many who would later become Hollywood's top stars, but who were at the time just struggling actors, were also in the crowd scenes as extras. Among well-known and soon-to-be-well-known names "working" in the film were John Barrymore, Lionel Barrymore, Joan Crawford, Gary Cooper, Marion Davies, Myrna Loy, John Gilbert, Douglas Fairbanks, Clark Gable, Harold Lloyd, Carole Lombard, Janet Gaynor, Fay Wray, Mary Pickford, Colleen Moore, Lillian Gish, Dorothy Gish, Samuel Goldwyn and Rupert Julian.


10:30 PM -- The Student Prince in Old Heidelberg (1927)
In this silent film, a young prince attending college falls for a barmaid below his station.
Dir: Ernst Lubitsch
Cast: Ramon Novarro, Norma Shearer, Jean Hersholt
BW-106 mins, TV-G,

The onscreen credit source is "from the book Karl Heinrich," but no author is listed. The writer, Wilhelm Meyer-Förster, is therefore considered uncredited.


12:20 AM -- The Divine Woman (Lost Garbo Footage) (1928)
In the surviving footage of this lost film, a Parisian soldier has a last meal with his lover before he ships for Algiers.
Dir: Victor Sjöström
Cast: Greta Garbo, Lars Hanson
BW-9 mins,

The Swedish Film Institute holds two, newly restored, fragments of this film in their archives. They publicly screened these fragments on the 27th of February 2011. I don't know if these are included in the nine minutes to be shown on TCM.


12:30 AM -- Mata Hari (1931)
Romantic biography of World War I's notorious lady spy.
Dir: George Fitzmaurice
Cast: Greta Garbo, Ramon Novarro, Lionel Barrymore
BW-89 mins, TV-PG, CC,

Major Thomas Coulson's 1930 book, "Mata Hari: Courtesan and Spy", piqued interest in turning it into a movie, but an MGM executive said that no one book was the basis of their movie. Mata hari translates to "eye of the day" in Indonesian (and Malay), and is the most common word for "sun" in those languages. Censors of many cities required cuts in the movie, which was typical of many pre-code films. When MGM applied to the Hays Office for a certificate in 1936 for re-release, it was refused. However, a certificate was issued in 1939, when the movie was re-released.


2:15 AM -- The Night Is Young (1935)
A European nobleman falls for a ballerina.
Dir: Dudley Murphy
Cast: Ramon Novarro, Evelyn Laye, Charles Butterworth
BW-81 mins, TV-G, CC,

Because the action of the movie is so completely wedded to the music, the script was mimeographed on special music paper, with the action and dialogue printed between the staves and timed to each measure.


3:46 AM -- So You Want To Keep Your Hair (1946)
Average American Joe McDoakes searches in vain for any cure that will halt his fast-disappearing hairline.
Dir: Richard L. Bare
Cast: George O'Hanlon, Art Gilmore, Buster Brodie
BW-11 mins,

One of the 62 So You Want To ... / So You Think ... shorts from Warner Bros. in the 1940s and 1950s.


4:00 AM -- Crisis (1950)
An American doctor gets caught in the middle of a revolution when he's forced to operate on a South American dictator.
Dir: Richard Brooks
Cast: Cary Grant, Jose Ferrer, Paula Raymond
BW-96 mins, TV-G, CC,

Director Richard Brooks was as the Santa Anita race track where he met Cary Grant and struck up a conversation about this film; Brooks wrote the story but also wanted to direct but none of the studios would let him, but Grant asked for a copy of the script and loved it - so much so that Grant himself went to MGM and said he would love to do the movie but only if Brooks was the director.


5:46 AM -- Nostradamus Says So (1953)
This short film presents several predictions made by Nostradamus, such as the Korean War and the atomic bomb.
Dir: Richard H. Landau
Narrator: Carey Wilson
BW-11 mins,

Follows Nostradamus (1938) (Short), More About Nostradamus (1941) (Short), Further Prophecies of Nostradamus (1942) (Short), and Nostradamus and the Queen (1942) (Short).