First Academy Award Ceremony was Held - 1929

What happened on this date in Hollywood history – May 16, 1929, the first Academy Awards ceremony is held. The awards banquet took place in the Blossom Room of the Hollywood Roosevelt Hotel. Some 270 people attended, and tickets cost $5 each. After a long dinner, complete with numerous speeches, Douglas Fairbanks, the president of the Academy of Motion Picture Arts and Sciences, which had been formed in 1927, handed out 15 awards in a five-minute ceremony. The awards presentation was somewhat anticlimactic compared to today’s Academy Award ceremonies, as the winners had already been announced in February. 

In 1929, movies were just making the transition from silent films to talkies, but all the nominated films were without sound. For the only time in Academy history, Best Picture honors were split into two categories: Best Picture - Unique and Artistic Production, and Best Picture - Production. The winner in the first category was F.W. Murnau’s romantic drama Sunrise: A Song of Two Humans, starring George O’Brien and Janet Gaynor. William Wellman’s film Wings, set in the World War I-era and starring Clara Bow, Charles “Buddy” Rogers and Richard Arlen, won in the second category. Other winners of the night included the German actor Emil Jannings as Best Actor for two films, The Last Command and The Way of All Flesh; and Gaynor as Best Actress. She had received three of the five nominations in the category, and was honored for all three roles, in Sunrise, Seventh Heaven and Street Angel. The Academy also presented an honorary award to Charles Chaplin; it would be the only honor the great actor and filmmaker would receive from the organization until 1972, when he accept another honorary award. Starting with the following year’s awards, the Academy began releasing the names of the winners to the press on the night of the awards ceremony to preserve some suspense. That practice ended in 1940, after the Los Angeles Times published the results in its evening edition, which meant they were revealed before the ceremony. The Academy then instituted a system of sealed envelopes, which remains in use today.

 

 

Michael Thomas Barry is the author of numerous books that includes Fade to Black Graveside Memories of Hollywood Greats, 1927-1950. The was awarded a silver medal at the 2011 Readers Favorite International Book Awards in Miami and was also the 2013 winner of the Beverly Hills Book Awards. Visit Michael’s website www.michaelthomasbarry.com for more details about his books. To order Fade to Black click on the Amazon link below.

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Janet Gaynor, Carole Lombard and Bette Davis

Who was born on this date:

Actress Janet Gaynor was the first winner of the Academy Award for lead actress and the youngest ever to win the award (until Marlee Matlin in 1986). She was born Laura Gainer on October 6, 1906 in Philadelphia. Gaynor had a long career in show business with over sixty film, theater, and television credits from 1924 until 1981. She was one of Hollywood’s top stars from the late 1920’s through the 1930’s. The classic virgin-heroine type on screen, her personal life mirrored her on screen persona. A devout Quaker, Gaynor lived at home with her mother until she got married. She was one of the few actresses to successfully move from silent pictures to talkies. Gaynor’s major film credits include; High Society Blues (1930), Daddy Long Legs (1931), State Fair (1933), The Farmer Takes a Wife (1935), and A Star is Born (1937).  

Gaynor won the lead actress Academy award (1927-1928) for performances in three films, Sunrise (1927), 7th Heaven (1927), and Street Angel (1928). During the first years of the Academy Awards, actors and actresses could win for multiple films. Gaynor’s award winning performances during 1927-1928, were a real challenge to box office champ, Gloria Swanson’s dominance. Gaynor was nominated for a second best actress Academy Award in 1937 in A Star is Born, but lost to Luise Rainer.                            

At the peak of her film career in 1938, Gaynor abruptly retired from films and married MGM dress designer Gilbert Adrian. Her retirement from show business lasted until 1959, when she returned to the Broadway stage in Midnight Sun. On September 5, 1982, Gaynor was seriously hurt in an automobile accident in San Francisco, which also injured fellow actress Mary Martin. Unfortunately, Gaynor never fully recovered from these injuries. Chronic illness followed the accident and on September 14, 1984, almost two years after the tragic car crash, Gaynor died from pneumonia at a Palm Springs, California area hospital. In accordance with her final wishes, there was no memorial or funeral service. Gaynor is interred at Hollywood Forever Cemetery next to her first husband, Gilbert Adrian in the Garden of Legends.

Actress Carole Lombard was born on October 6, 1908 in Fort Wayne, Indiana. She was known as the Queen of the 1930s screwball comedies. Lombard made her film debut at the age of twelve after in A Perfect Crime (1921). In the 1920s, she worked in several low-budget productions. Lombard achieved a few minor successes in the early 1930s but was continually cast in second-rate films. It was not until 1934 that her career began to take off. That year, director Howard Hawks encountered Lombard at a party and became enamored with her saucy personality, thinking her just right for his latest project. Film credits include Bolero (1934), My Man Godfrey (19336), for which she earned a best actress Academy Award nomination, Nothing Sacred (1937), Fools for a Scandal (1938), Made for Each other (1939), Vigil in the Night (1940), Mr. & Mrs. Smith (1941),  and To Be or Not to Be (1942). 

In October 1930, Lombard met William Powell. They had worked together in the films Man of the World and Ladies' Man. Unlike many of Lombard's other suitors at the time, Powell was urbane and sophisticated. He also appreciated her blunt personality and bawdy sense of humor. They married on June 26, 1931.She did not believe their sixteen-year age difference would present a problem, but friends felt they were ill-suited, as Lombard had an extroverted personality while Powell was more reserved. They divorced in 1933, but remained good friends and worked together without acrimony, notably in My Man Godfrey. In 1934, following her divorce from Powell, she carried on relationships with actors Gary Cooper and George Raft. Also during 1934, Lombard met and began a serious affair with crooner Russ Columbo. Columbo reportedly proposed marriage, but was killed in a freak shooting accident at the age of 26. To reporters, Lombard said Columbo was the love of her life.

Lombard's most famous relationship came in 1936 when she became involved with actor Clark Gable. They had worked together previously in 1932, but at the time Lombard was still happily married to Powell and knew Gable to have the reputation of a roving eye. They were indifferent to each other on the set and did not keep in touch. It was not until 1936, when Gable came to the Mayfair Ball that Lombard had planned, that their romance began to take off. Gable, however, was married at the time to oil heiress Ria Langham, and the affair was kept quiet. The situation proved a major factor in Gable accepting the role of Rhett Butler in Gone with the Wind, as MGM head Louis B. Mayer sweetened the deal for a reluctant Clark Gable by giving him enough money to settle a divorce agreement with Langham and marry Lombard. Gable divorced Langham on March 7, 1939 and proposed to Lombard in a telephone booth at the Brown Derby. On March 29, 1939, during a break in production on Gone with the Wind, Gable and Lombard drove out to Kingman, Arizona and were married in a quiet ceremony with only Gable's press agent, Otto Winkler, in attendance.

When the US entered World War II at the end of 1941, Lombard traveled to her home state of Indiana for a War bond rally with her mother, Bess Peters, and Clark Gable's press agent, Otto Winkler. After raising over $2 million in defense bonds, Lombard addressed her fans, saying: "Before I say goodbye to you all, come on and join me in a big cheer! V for Victory!" On January 16, 1942, Lombard, her mother, and Winkler boarded a a DC-3 airplane to return to California. After refueling in Las Vegas took off and 23 minutes later, crashed into "Double Up Peak" near the 8,300 ft level of Mt. Potosi, 32 statute miles southwest of Las Vegas. All 22 aboard, including 15 army servicemen, were killed instantly. Shortly after her death at the age of 33, Gable (who was inconsolable and devastated by her loss) joined the U.S. Army Air Corp. Lombard is interred at the Forest Lawn Memorial Park, Glendale. Although Gable remarried, he was interred next to her when he died in 1960.

Who died on this date: 

On October 6, 1989, actress Bette Davis died. She was known as “the First Lady of the American Screen.” Davis was born Ruth Elizabeth Davis on April 5, 1908 in Lowell, Massachusetts. An outgoing child, the young Bette Davis was destined for a career on the stage and film. She studied and excelled in acting under famed drama coach John Murray Anderson. In 1929, Davis made her successful Broadway stage debut in Broken Promises. It was in this performance that Hollywood began to take notice of the future award winning actress. In 1930, studio executives at Universal Pictures who offered her a contract and her film debut followed the next year (1931) in Bad Sister. The next few pictures that followed were less than successful for Davis and she was dropped by Universal Pictures. Fortunately, Warner Brothers gave her a second chance; she co-starred alongside Academy Award winning actor George Arliss in The Man Who Played God (1932). This began what would become a successful eighteen year association with Warner Studios. This relationship was very contentious; she often fought with studio head Jack Warner over top movie roles and even sued the studio in an attempt to break her contact. Davis’ storied film career spanned nearly six decades 1931 to 1989, and included over one hundred and twenty television and motion picture performances. Her first big smash hit came in 1934’s, Of Human Bondage, loaned out to RKO Pictures by Warner Studios; Davis cemented her place in Hollywood lore by playing the role of the sullen heroine, Mildred Rogers for which she was nominated for an Academy Award.

During her legendary film career, Davis was nominated for eleven Academy Awards and won twice, her nominated films include: Of Human Bondage (1934), Dark Victory (1939), The Letter (1940), The Little Foxes (1941), Now, Voyager (1942), Mr. Skeffington (1944), All About Eve (1950), The Star (1952) , and What Ever Happened to Baby Jane (1962). In 1935, Davis won the first of two best actress Oscars for her portrayal of Joyce Heath in Dangerous and won a second award in 1938 in Jezebel. During the late 1930’s through the mid-1940’s, Davis’ stature in the film industry grew with every film but by the end of the decade, her career began to wane and seemed headed for oblivion. A renaissance occurred when she co-starred alongside Anne Baxter in 1950’s best picture, All About Eve. Her performance in this film is considered by many to be one of the greatest of all time. During her storied film career she reigned as one of the most successful and durable stars having clawed and scratched her way to the top the film business. The award winning actress known for her toughness, huge eyes and haute acting style died on October 6, 1989 in Neuilly, France from breast cancer. Davis’ ornate crypt is found at Forest Lawn Memorial Park, Hollywood Hills outside of the Court of Remembrance. Her epitaph reads; Bette Davis, April 5, 1908 – October 6, 1989; “She did it the hard way.”

Jack Hawkins, Kay Medford, Grace Kelly, Irving Thalberg, Janet Gaynor

Who was born on this date:

Actor Jack Hawkins was born on September 14, 1910 - 18 July 1973) in Middlesex, England. Although he had appeared in several films during the 1930s, it was only after World War II that he began to build a successful career in the cinema and often played stern but sympathetic authority figures in films like Angels One Five, The Cruel Sea, and The Long Arm. From the late 1950s, he mostly appeared in character roles, often in epic films like Ben-Hur, The Bridge on the River Kwai, Lawrence of Arabia, Lord Jim, Oh, What a Lovely War and Zulu. For The Bridge on the River Kwai, he had to persuade good friend Alec Guinness to take the lead role, which would ultimately win Guinness an Oscar.Hawkins was married to actress Jessica Tandy from 1932 to 1940. A three-pack-a-day smoker, Hawkins began experiencing voice problems in the late 1950s; unknown to the public he had undergone cobalt treatment in 1959 for what was then described as a secondary condition of the larynx, but which was probably cancer. In December 1965, he was diagnosed with throat cancer. His entire larynx was removed in January of the following year; thereafter his performances were dubbed. Following an unsuccessful operation to fit him with an artificial voice box, he died at St Stephen's Hospital, London, on July 18, 1973. He was cremated and interred at the Golders Green Crematorium, London.

Actress Kay Medford was born on September 14, 1914 in New York City. She was a character actress who began her career as the original "Mama" in Bye Bye Birdie, starring opposite Dick Van Dyke on Broadway. Medford appeared in the Warner Bros. rock and roll movie Jamboree (1957). She appeared in musicals such as Paint Your Wagon and Carousel, before appearing onstage in Funny Girl. For her performance she was nominated for a 1964 Tony Award for Featured Actress (Musical), and when she repeated the role in the 1968 film version and was nominated for an Academy Award for best supporting actress. From 1969-70 she co-starred opposite John Forsythe in the CBS television series To Rome with Love. Medford never married and died on April 10, 1980 in New York City from cervical cancer. She was cremated and her ashes were scattered.

Who died on this date: 

On September 14, 1982, actress Grace Kelly died. She was born on November 12, 1929 in Philadelphia, Pennsylvania.  After embarking on an acting career in 1950, at the age of 20, Grace Kelly appeared in New York City theatrical productions as well as in more than forty episodes of live drama productions broadcast during the early 1950s Golden Age of Television. In October 1953, with the release of Mogambo, she became a movie star, a status confirmed in 1954 with a Golden Globe Award and Academy Award nomination as well as leading roles in five films, including The Country Girl, in which she won the Oscar for best actress. On April 18, 1956, she married Rainier III, Prince of Monaco and became The Princess of Monaco. She retired from acting at 26 to enter upon her duties in Monaco. She died on September 14, 1982, when she lost control of her automobile and crashed after suffering a stroke. Her daughter Princess Stephanie, who was in the car with her, survived the accident. Princess Grace is buried at the Cathedral of Saint Nicholas in Monte Carlo, Monaco.

On September 14, 1936, movie mogul Irving Thalberg died. He was born on May 30, 1899 in Brooklyn, New York.  He was called "The Boy Wonder" for his youth and his extraordinary ability to select the right scripts, choose the right actors, gather the best production staff and make very profitable films. He worked as personal secretary to legendary studio founder carl Laemmle at Universal Studios. Irving Thalberg was bright and persistent, and by age 21 was executive in charge of production at Universal City. In 1924, he left Universal for MGM to become head of production. At the time he joined MGM, Thalberg was dating actress Norma Shearer, whom he married in 1927. At first, Thalberg and studio chief Louis B. Mayer got along famously well. However, they had different production philosophies. Thalberg preferred literary works, while Mayer preferred glitzy crowd-pleasing films. A clash was inevitable, and their relationship grew decidedly frosty. When Thalberg fell ill in 1932, Mayer took advantage of the situation and replaced him with David O. Selznick. When Thalberg returned to work in 1933, it was as one of the studio's unit producers; he helped develop some of MGM's most prestigious films of the early 1930s. Thalberg died of pneumonia on September 14, 1936 in Santa Monica, California. He is interred in a private marble tomb in the Great Mausoleum at Forest Lawn Memorial Park in Glendale, California. His crypt is engraved, "My Sweetheart Forever" by his wife Norma Shearer.

On September 14, 1984, actress Janet Gaynor died. She was the first winner of the Academy Award for lead actress and the youngest ever to win the award (until Marlee Matlin in 1986). She was born Laura Gainer on October 6, 1906 in Philadelphia. Gaynor had a long career in show business with over sixty film, theater, and television credits from 1924 until 1981. She was one of Hollywood’s top stars from the late 1920’s through the 1930’s. The classic virgin-heroine type on screen, her personal life mirrored her on screen persona. A devout Quaker, Gaynor lived at home with her mother until she got married. She was one of the few actresses to successfully move from silent pictures to talkies. Gaynor’s major film credits include; High Society Blues (1930), Daddy Long Legs (1931), State Fair (1933), The Farmer Takes a Wife (1935), and A Star is Born (1937). Gaynor won the lead actress Academy award (1927-1928) for performances in three films, Sunrise (1927), 7th Heaven (1927), and Street Angel (1928). During the first years of the Academy Awards, actors and actresses could win for multiple films. Gaynor’s award winning performances during 1927-1928, were a real challenge to box office champ, Gloria Swanson’s dominance. Gaynor was nominated for a second best actress Academy Award in 1937 in A Star is Born, but lost to Luise Rainer.                          

At the peak of her film career in 1938, Gaynor abruptly retired from films and married MGM dress designer Gilbert Adrian. Her retirement from show business lasted until 1959, when she returned to the Broadway stage in Midnight Sun. On September 5, 1982, Gaynor was seriously hurt in an automobile accident in San Francisco, which also injured fellow actress Mary Martin. Unfortunately, Gaynor never fully recovered from these injuries. Chronic illness followed the accident and on September 14, 1984, almost two years after the tragic car crash, Gaynor died from pneumonia at a Palm Springs, California area hospital. In accordance with her final wishes, there was no memorial or funeral service. Gaynor is interred at Hollywood Forever Cemetery next to her first husband, Gilbert Adrian in the Garden of Legends (formerly section 8), lot 193.