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Room Service (1938 Film)
''Room Service'' is a 1938 American comedy film directed by William A. Seiter, based on the 1937 play of the same name by Allen Boretz and John Murray. The film stars the Marx Brothers ( Groucho, Harpo and Chico) and also features Lucille Ball, Ann Miller and Frank Albertson. It was produced and distributed by RKO Pictures; RKO paid $255,000 for filming rights, which was then a record for a sound picture. This is the only film starring the Marx Brothers with a screenplay based on material that was not written especially for the team. Less frenetic and more physically contained (mostly Gordon Miller's hotel room) than their other films, the plot revolves around the shenanigans of a broke Broadway producer getting a play staged and funded by a mysterious backer, while evading eviction from a hotel. RKO remade the movie in 1944 as '' Step Lively'', starring George Murphy and Frank Sinatra. Plot Gordon Miller, a flat-broke theatrical producer, whose staff includes Harry Binell ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
William A
William is a masculine given name of Germanic origin. It became popular in England after the Norman conquest in 1066,All Things William"Meaning & Origin of the Name"/ref> and remained so throughout the Middle Ages and into the modern era. It is sometimes abbreviated "Wm." Shortened familiar versions in English include Will or Wil, Wills, Willy, Willie, Bill, Billie, and Billy. A common Irish form is Liam. Scottish diminutives include Wull, Willie or Wullie (as in Oor Wullie). Female forms include Willa, Willemina, Wilma and Wilhelmina. Etymology William is related to the German given name ''Wilhelm''. Both ultimately descend from Proto-Germanic ''*Wiljahelmaz'', with a direct cognate also in the Old Norse name ''Vilhjalmr'' and a West Germanic borrowing into Medieval Latin ''Willelmus''. The Proto-Germanic name is a compound of *''wiljô'' "will, wish, desire" and *''helmaz'' "helm, helmet".Hanks, Hardcastle and Hodges, ''Oxford Dictionary of First Names'', Oxfor ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
RKO Radio Pictures
RKO Radio Pictures Inc., commonly known as RKO Pictures or simply RKO, is an American film production and distribution company, historically one of the "Big Five" film studios of Hollywood's Golden Age. The business was formed after the Keith-Albee-Orpheum theater chain and Joseph P. Kennedy's Film Booking Offices of America studio were brought together under the control of the Radio Corporation of America (RCA) in October 1928. RCA executive David Sarnoff engineered the merger to create a market for the company's sound-on-film technology, RCA Photophone, and in early 1929 production began under the RKO name (an initialism of Radio-Keith-Orpheum). Two years later, another Kennedy concern, the Pathé studio, was folded into the operation. By the mid-1940s, RKO was controlled by investor Floyd Odlum. RKO has long been renowned for its cycle of musicals starring Fred Astaire and Ginger Rogers in the mid- to late 1930s. Actors Katharine Hepburn and, later, Robert Mitchu ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
George Abbott
George Francis Abbott (June 25, 1887January 31, 1995) was an American theatre producer, director, playwright, screenwriter, film director and producer whose career spanned eight decades. He received numerous honors including six Tony Awards, the Pulitzer Prize, the Kennedy Center Honors in 1982,"George Abbott Biography" kennedy-center.org, accessed August 6, 2019"History, 1982" kennedy-center.org, accessed August 6, 2019Hall, Carla; McCombs, Phil [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Max Wagner
Max Wagner (November 28, 1901 – November 16, 1975) was a Mexican-born American film actor who specialized in playing small parts such as thugs, gangsters, sailors, henchmen, bodyguards, cab drivers and moving men, appearing more than 400 films in his career, most without receiving screen credit.Erickson, HaBiography (Allmovie)/ref> In 1927, he was a leading witness in the well-publicized manslaughter trials of actor Paul Kelly (actor), Paul Kelly and actress/screenwriter Dorothy Mackaye. Biography Wagner was one of five children, all boys, of William Wallace Wagner, a railroad conductor, and Edith Wagner, a writer who provided dispatches for the ''Christian Science Monitor'' during the Mexican Revolution. When he was 10 years old, his father was killed by rebels and the family moved to Salinas, California, where he met John Steinbeck, who became a lifelong friend. Steinbeck based the character of the boy in his novel ''The Red Pony'' on Wagner. Three of Wagner's brothers ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Charles Halton
Charles Halton (March 16, 1876 – April 16, 1959) was an American character actor who appeared in over 180 films. Life and career Halton trained at the New York Academy of Dramatic Arts. He made his Broadway debut in 1901, after which he appeared in about 35 productions during the next 50 years. For the summer of 1911 he performed as a member of the summer stock cast at Elitch Theatre in Denver, Colorado. From the 1920s, Halton's thinning hair, rimless glasses, stern-looking face and officious manner were also familiar to generations of American moviegoers. Whether playing the neighborhood busybody, a stern government bureaucrat or weaselly attorney, Halton's characters tried to drive the "immoral influences" out of the neighborhood, foreclose on the orphanage, evict the poor widow and her children from their apartment, or any other number of dastardly deeds, all justified usually by "...I'm sorry but that's my job." Among Halton's best-known roles were Dr. Glass, the ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Alexander Asro
Alexander Asro (also: Aleksander Azro; 10 February 1888 – January 1963) was a film and theatre actor. He was a member of the Vilna Troupe and appeared in several comedic films in the United States. Biography Early life Born in Vilna, in the Russian Empire (today Vilnius, Lithuania), Asro attended a traditional Jewish elementary school (cheder), and early on gave 'circus' performances for other children together with his friend Jacob Lubotsky, the brother of Sonia Alomis (born Lubotsky), Asro's future wife.Zylbercweig, Zalmen (1931).Azro, Aleksander . In: Zylbercweig, with the assistance of Jacob Mestel, ''Leksikon fun yidishn teater'' exicon of the Yiddish theatre Vol. 1. New York. Columns 46-48. He later joined the dramatic circles of the Jewish Labor Bund, making his first public appearance at the age of 13, in the role of Yehuda in the Biblical play ''Mechirat Yosef'' (The Sale of Joseph), in a production by older tradesmen. In this way he came to the attention of ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Donald MacBride
Donald Hugh MacBride (June 23, 1893 – June 21, 1957) was an American character actor on stage, in films, and on television. MacBride launched his career as a chorister at St Thomas Fifth Avenue and then at Garden City Cathedral in New York. As a teenager, he recorded the earliest example of a solo recording by a chorister from the USA, on 15 November 1907, singing Handel's 'Angels Ever Bright and Fair'. He also performed in vaudeville and went on to be an actor in New York. Biography Donald MacBride was born 1893 in Brooklyn, New York. MacBride appeared in nearly 140 films between 1914 and 1955. His year of birth is given variously as 1889 or 1893 in the standard reference books. Motion pictures Beginning in 1930, like many New York-based, stage-trained actors, he found work at the Paramount, Vitaphone, and Educational studios, all of which had East Coast branches. He is clearly visible as a crowd extra welcoming Groucho Marx in the Paramount feature '' Animal Cracker ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Cliff Dunstan
Cliff Dunstan (born Clifford Dunstan; July 18, 1899 – November 8, 1968) was an American actor known for his work on stage, in film, and on television. He appeared in numerous Broadway productions and had roles in films and TV series in the mid-20th century. Theater Dunstan began his stage career in the early 1930s and performed in a wide variety of plays and musicals on Broadway. His Broadway credits include: * 1932: ''The Round Up'' as Parenthesis * 1935: ''Three Men on a Horse'' as Clarence Dobbins * 1937: ''Room Service'' as Joseph Gribble * 1938: ''The Boys from Syracuse'' as Merchant of Ephesus / Tailor * 1939: ''Aries Is Rising'' as Jake * 1940: '' The Unconquered'' as Upravdom * 1940: '' Pal Joey'' as Assistant Hotel Manager * 1942: ''Beat the Band'' as Hotel Manager * 1944: ''Snafu'' as Detective * 1946: '' Annie Get Your Gun'' as Mac * 1950: '' Arms and the Girl'' as General Lucius Curtis * 1951: ''Out West of Eighth'' as Horace MacNamara Film Dunstan also appear ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Ipecac
Syrup of ipecac (), or simply ipecac, is a drug that was once widely used as an expectorant (in low doses) and a rapid-acting emetic (in higher doses). It is obtained from the dried rhizome and roots of the ipecacuanha plant ('' Carapichea ipecacuanha''), from which it derives its name. It is no longer regularly used in medicine. In particular, the rapidly induced forceful vomiting produced by ipecac was considered for many years to be an important front-line treatment for orally ingested poisons. However, subsequent studies (including a comprehensive 2005 meta-study) revealed the stomach purging produced by ipecac to be far less effective at lowering total body poison concentrations than the adsorption effect of oral activated charcoal (which is effective through the entire gastrointestinal tract and is often coupled with whole bowel irrigation). Ipecac also presents a small risk of overdose (being a mild poison itself) and a major risk of esophagitis and aspiration pneumo ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Frank Sinatra
Francis Albert Sinatra (; December 12, 1915 – May 14, 1998) was an American singer and actor. Honorific nicknames in popular music, Nicknamed the "Chairman of the Board" and "Ol' Blue Eyes", he is regarded as one of the Time 100: The Most Important People of the Century, most popular entertainers of the 20th century. Sinatra is among the List of best-selling music artists, world's best-selling music artists, with an estimated 150 million record sales globally. Born to Italian Americans, Italian immigrants in Hoboken, New Jersey, Sinatra began his musical career in the swing era and was influenced by the easy-listening vocal style of Bing Crosby. He joined the Harry James band as the vocalist in 1939 before finding success as a solo artist after signing with Columbia Records in 1943, becoming the idol of the "Bobby-soxer, bobby soxers". In 1946, Sinatra released his debut album, ''The Voice of Frank Sinatra''. He then signed with Capitol Records and released several albums wi ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
George Murphy
George Lloyd Murphy (July 4, 1902 – May 3, 1992) was an American actor and politician. Murphy was a song-and-dance leading man in many big-budget Hollywood musicals from 1930 to 1952. He was the president of the Screen Actors Guild from 1944 to 1946, and was awarded an honorary Oscar in 1951. Murphy served from 1965 to 1971 as U.S. Senator from California, the first notable American actor to be elected to statewide office in California, predating Ronald Reagan and Arnold Schwarzenegger, who each served two terms as governor. He is the only United States Senator represented by a star on the Hollywood Walk of Fame. Early life Murphy was born in New Haven, Connecticut, of Irish Catholic extraction, the son of Michael Charles "Mike" Murphy, athletic trainer and coach, and the former Nora Long. He was educated at Trinity-Pawling School, Peddie School and Yale University in his native New Haven. Career Film In movies, Murphy was known as a song-and-dance man and appeared i ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Step Lively (1944 Film)
''Step Lively'' is a 1944 American musical film directed by Tim Whelan and starring Frank Sinatra. ''Step Lively'' was based on the 1937 play ''Room Service (play), Room Service'', by Allen Boretz and John Murray (playwright), John Murray. It was a remake of the 1938 RKO film Room Service (1938 film), ''Room Service'', starring the Marx Brothers, Lucille Ball, and Ann Miller. Plot Theatrical producer Gordon Miller is mounting a new play, but is chronically short of cash. Miller, his assistants, and his entire company have been living at a posh Broadway hotel on credit, thanks to the indulgence of the hotel manager, Joe Gribble, who is Miller's brother-in-law. Playwright Glenn Russell arrives from out of town, expecting royalty payments for his work, and Miller convinces him to invest in the play. Russell demonstrates a remarkable singing voice, and takes a leading role in the production. Meanwhile, Miller keeps juggling creditors and tries to keep his company fed and sheltered. ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
