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Charles MacArthur
Charles Gordon MacArthur (November 5, 1895 – April 21, 1956) was an American playwright, screenwriter and 1935 winner of the Academy Award for Best Story. Life and career MacArthur was born in Scranton, Pennsylvania, the sixth of seven children of stern evangelist William Telfer MacArthur and Georgiana Welsted MacArthur. He early developed a passion for reading. Declining to follow his father into ministry, he moved to the Midwest and soon became a successful reporter in Chicago, working for the ''Chicago Tribune'' and '' Chicago Daily News''. MacArthur joined the United States Army for World War I, and served in France as a private assigned to Battery F, 149th Field Artillery, a unit of the 42nd Division. He recounted his wartime experience in 1919's ''A Bug's-Eye View of the War''. After the war, he wrote several short stories, two of which, "Hang It All" (1921) and "Rope" (1923), were published in H. L. Mencken's '' The Smart Set'' magazine. Eventually he settled in Ne ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Scranton, Pennsylvania
Scranton is a city in the Commonwealth of Pennsylvania, United States, and the county seat of Lackawanna County. With a population of 76,328 as of the 2020 U.S. census, Scranton is the largest city in Northeastern Pennsylvania, the Wyoming Valley, and the Scranton–Wilkes-Barre–Hazleton Metropolitan Statistical Area, which has a population of 562,037 as of 2020. It is the sixth largest city in Pennsylvania. The contiguous network of five cities and more than 40 boroughs all built in a straight line in Northeastern Pennsylvania's urban area act culturally and logistically as one continuous city, so while the city of Scranton itself is a smaller town, the larger unofficial city of Scranton/Wilkes-Barre contains nearly half a million residents in roughly 200 square miles. Scranton/Wilkes-Barre is the cultural and economic center of a region called Northeastern Pennsylvania, which is home to over 1.3 million residents. Scranton hosts a federal court building for the United ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
The Smart Set
''The Smart Set'' was an American literary magazine, founded by Colonel William d'Alton Mann and published from March 1900 to June 1930. Its headquarters was in New York City. During its Jazz Age heyday under the editorship of H. L. Mencken and George Jean Nathan, ''The Smart Set'' offered many up-and-coming authors their start and gave them access to a relatively large audience. Following a dispute over an unprinted article by Mencken and Nathan mocking the national grief over President Warren G. Harding's death, the two co-editors departed the publication to create ''The American Mercury'' in 1924. Within a year of their departure, owner Eltinge Warner sold the publication to press mogul William Randolph Hearst. Although circulation increased under Hearst's ownership, the magazine's content declined in quality. Following the Wall Street Crash of 1929, the magazine was unable to survive the economic slump and ceased publication in June 1930. Half a decade after its dissolution, ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Nyack, New York
Nyack () is a village located primarily in the town of Orangetown in Rockland County, New York, United States. Incorporated in 1872, it retains a very small western section in Clarkstown. It is a suburb of New York City lying approximately north of the Manhattan boundary near the west bank of the Hudson River, situated north of South Nyack, east of Central Nyack, south of Upper Nyack, and southeast of Valley Cottage. Nyack had a population of 6,765 as of the 2010 census. Setting Nyack is one of five southeastern Rockland County villages and hamlets that constitute "The Nyacks" – Nyack, Central Nyack, South Nyack, Upper Nyack and West Nyack. Named after the Native Americans who resided there before European colonization, the village consists mostly of low-rise buildings lying on the hilly terrain that meets the western shore of the Hudson River. Adjacent South Nyack is the western terminus of the Tappan Zee Bridge, connected across the Hudson River to Tarrytown i ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Dorothy Parker
Dorothy Parker (née Rothschild; August 22, 1893 – June 7, 1967) was an American poet, writer, critic, and satirist based in New York; she was known for her wit, wisecracks, and eye for 20th-century urban foibles. From a conflicted and unhappy childhood, Parker rose to acclaim, both for her literary works published in magazines, such as ''The New Yorker,'' and as a founding member of the Algonquin Round Table. Following the breakup of the circle, Parker traveled to Hollywood to pursue screenwriting. Her successes there, including two Academy Award nominations, were curtailed when her involvement in left-wing politics resulted in her being placed on the Hollywood blacklist. Dismissive of her own talents, she deplored her reputation as a "wisecracker." Nevertheless, both her literary output and reputation for sharp wit have endured. Some of her works have been set to music; adaptations included the operatic song cycle '' Hate Songs'' by composer Marcus Paus. Early life and ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Robert Benchley
Robert Charles Benchley (September 15, 1889 – November 21, 1945) was an American humorist best known for his work as a newspaper columnist and film actor. From his beginnings at '' The Harvard Lampoon'' while attending Harvard University, through his many years writing essays and articles for '' Vanity Fair'' and ''The New Yorker'' and his acclaimed short films, Benchley's style of humor brought him respect and success during his life, from his peers at the Algonquin Round Table in New York City to contemporaries in the burgeoning film industry. Benchley is best remembered for his contributions to ''The New Yorker'', where his essays, whether topical or absurdist, influenced many modern humorists. He also made a name for himself in Hollywood, when his short film '' How to Sleep'' was a popular success and won Best Short Subject at the 1935 Academy Awards. He also made many memorable appearances acting in films such as Alfred Hitchcock's ''Foreign Correspondent'' (1940) and ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Algonquin Round Table
The Algonquin Round Table was a group of New York City writers, critics, actors, and wits. Gathering initially as part of a practical joke, members of "The Vicious Circle", as they dubbed themselves, met for lunch each day at the Algonquin Hotel from 1919 until roughly 1929. At these luncheons they engaged in wisecracks, wordplay, and witticisms that, through the newspaper columns of Round Table members, were disseminated across the country. Daily association with each other, both at the luncheons and outside of them, inspired members of the Circle to collaborate creatively. The entire group worked together successfully only once, however, to create a revue called '' No Sirree!'' which helped launch a Hollywood career for Round Tabler Robert Benchley. In its ten years of association, the Round Table and a number of its members acquired national reputations, both for their contributions to literature and for their sparkling wit. Although some of their contemporaries, and later ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
David Belasco
David Belasco (July 25, 1853 – May 14, 1931) was an American theatrical producer, impresario, director, and playwright. He was the first writer to adapt the short story '' Madame Butterfly'' for the stage. He launched the theatrical career of many actors, including James O'Neill, Mary Pickford, Lenore Ulric, and Barbara Stanwyck. Belasco pioneered many innovative new forms of stage lighting and special effects in order to create realism and naturalism.Osnes, Beth, and Gill, Sam. ''Acting: An International Encyclopedia'', ABC-CLIO (2001) p. 34Marker, Lise-Lone, ''David Belasco: Naturalism in the American Theater'', Princeton Univ. Press (1975) Early years David Belasco was born in 1853 in San Francisco, California, the son of Abraham H. Belasco (1830–1911) and Reyna Belasco (née Nunes, 1830–1899), Sephardic Jews who had immigrated to the United States from London's Spanish and Portuguese Jewish community during the California Gold Rush. He began working as a youth in a ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Edward Sheldon
Edward Brewster Sheldon (Chicago, Illinois, February 4, 1886 – April 1, 1946, New York City) was an American dramatist. His plays include ''Salvation Nell'' (1908) and '' Romance'' (1913), which was made into a motion picture with Greta Garbo. After becoming ill at age 29 with crippling rheumatoid arthritis, which eventually claimed his sight (around 1930), Sheldon became a source of emotional and creative support for his many friends, notably Minnie Maddern Fiske (he wrote ''Salvation Nell'' for her), Julia Marlowe, John Barrymore (his closest friend and confidante), Thornton Wilder, Alexander Woollcott, Anne Morrow Lindbergh, Ruth Gordon, Helen Hayes. While in hospital his advice was received by those in the theatrical profession as gospel. Actress and librettist Dorothy Donnelly formed a close friendship with Sheldon, and after he became bedridden often assisted with transcribing, editing, and supporting his work. In May 1915 Sheldon narrowly missed sailing on the '' Lusit ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
City News Bureau Of Chicago
City News Bureau of Chicago (CNB), or City Press (1890-2005), was a news bureau that served as one of the first cooperative news agencies in the United States. It was founded in 1890 by the newspapers of Chicago to provide a common source of local and breaking news and also used by them as a training ground for new reporters, described variously as "journalism's school of hard knocks" or "the reporter's boot camp." Hundreds of reporters "graduated" from the City News Bureau into newspaper dailies—both local and national—or other avenues of writing. Operations The City News Bureau had reporters in all important news sites, courthouses, Chicago City Hall, the County Building, Criminal Courts, as well as having as many as ten police reporters on duty. It operated around the clock and all year round. The reporters, though young, worked in competition with some of the best reporters in the country, working on the same stories as all the others, questioning politicians and police, ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
The Front Page
''The Front Page'' is a Broadway comedy about newspaper reporters on the police beat. Written by former Chicago reporters Ben Hecht and Charles MacArthur, it was first produced in 1928 and has been adapted for the cinema several times. Plot The play's single set is the dingy press room of Chicago's Criminal Courts Building, overlooking the gallows behind the Cook County Jail. Reporters from most of the city's newspapers are passing the time with poker and pungent wisecracks about the news of the day. Soon they will witness the hanging of Earl Williams, a white man and supposed Communist revolutionary convicted of killing a black policeman. Hildy Johnson, cocky star reporter for the ''Examiner'', is late. He appears only to say goodbye; he is quitting to get a respectable job and be married. Suddenly the reporters hear that Earl Williams has escaped from the jail. All but Hildy stampede out for more information. As Hildy tries to decide how to react, Williams comes in through th ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Twentieth Century (play)
''Twentieth Century'' is a 1932 play by Ben Hecht and Charles MacArthur based on the unproduced play ''Napoleon of Broadway'' by Charles B. Millholland, inspired by his experience working for the eccentric Broadway impresario David Belasco. Synopsis The Hecht-MacArthur comedy is set in the observation car of the ''20th Century Limited'', travelling from Chicago to New York's Grand Central Terminal. Aboard the luxury train are egomaniacal theatre producer Oscar Jaffe, desperately in need of a hit, and his former paramour and protégé, temperamental actress Lily Garland (born Mildred Plotka), who abandoned him for a Hollywood career. Oscar is determined to sign her for his new show, and Lily is just as determined to ignore his advances, both professional and personal. Productions The first Broadway production, directed by George Abbott, opened on December 29, 1932 at the Broadhurst Theatre, where it ran for 152 performances. Moffat Johnston and Eugenie Leontovich were the stars, ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Perfect Strangers (1950 Film)
''Perfect Strangers'', also released as ''Too Dangerous to Love'' in some territories, is a 1950 American comedy-drama film directed by Bretaigne Windust.''Variety'' film review; March 1, 1950, page 6.''Harrison's Reports'' film review; March 4, 1950, page 35. Edith Sommer wrote the screenplay from an adaptation written by George Oppenheimer, based on the 1939 play ''Ladies and Gentlemen'' by Charles MacArthur and Ben Hecht. The film stars Ginger Rogers and Dennis Morgan as two jurors who fall in love while sequestered during a murder trial. Thelma Ritter, Margalo Gillmore, and Anthony Ross co-star in supporting roles. The film was released by Warner Bros. on March 24, 1950, and received mixed to negative reviews from critics. Plot Terry Scott (Ginger Rogers), who is separated from her husband, and unhappily married David Campbell (Dennis Morgan), the father of two children, meet when they are selected to serve on the jury of the Los Angeles trial of Ernest Craig (Ford Rainey). ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
