Hans Wassmann

Hans Wassmann (1873-1932) was a German film actor. Between 1914 and his death in 1932, Wassmann played in 50 German films, mostly in supporting parts.


German postcard by Verlag Julius Bard, Berlin / Generalvertrieb Hermann Leiser, Berlin, no. 20. Hans Wassmann in the play 'Viel Lärm um Nichts', a German version of William Shakespeare's 'Much Ado About Nothing'. Caption: Offizielle Ausgabe des deutschen Theaters zu Berlin.


German postcard by Verlag Hermann Leiser, Berlin-Wilm., no. 8667. Photo: Dührkoop. Collection: Geoffrey Donaldson Institute.

In the section of grave gentlemen of the world and respected men of power

Hans Wassmann was born in 1873 in Berlin as the son of a rentier. He had commercial training after leaving school (Gymnasium) and worked for a year in the grain and commission business. At the age of 19, he made a career change, was trained by Arthur Vollmer and went to the stage.

Wassmann made his debut in Gera in 1892 with the tiny role of a recruit in the play 'Wallenstein's Camp'. After stints in Hanau (1893/94), Elberfeld (1894/95) and Freiburg im Breisgau (1895/96), he came to Berlin in 1896 for a two-year engagement at the Deutsches Theater. In 1898, he moved to the New Theatre.

In the autumn of 1901, he returned to the Deutsches Theater, later directed by Max Reinhardt. In 1903, he toured with the Kleines Theater. Wassmann's early role subject was that of the bon vivant, nature boy and youthful character actor.

In later life, the compact Berliner with the massive skull and the wart between his eyes grew into the section of grave gentlemen of the world and respected men of power, but he also repeatedly proved his considerable talent for comedy and received much praise for his portrayal of dull, limited characters. His best-known late stage roles include his Baron in 'Nachtasyl', his Junker Bleichenwang in 'Was ihr wollt' (As You Like It) and the Mopsus in 'Das Wintermärchen'.

In films during the Weimar Republic, the extremely popular mime played a wealth of supporting roles in farces such as the mayors in 'Schützenfest in Schilda' and 'Die Schlacht von Bademünde' or the admiral in 'Der Herr Bürovorsteher'. In other comedy plays, he was even given the leading role: for example, he was the mayor Eusebius Müller in 'Vater geht auf Reisen' and the financially strapped owner of a baby equipment shop in the comedy 'Der Storch streikt'.


German postcard by Verlag Hermann Leiser, Berlin-Wilm., no. 705. Photo: Fritz Richard. Hans Wassmann as the jester Probstein in 'Wie es Euch gefällt' (As You Like It) by William Shakespeare.


German postcard by Verlag Hermann Leiser, Berlin, no. 20. Photo: Atelier Dührkoop. Hans Wassmann in the play 'Was Ihr wollt', a German version of William Shakespeare's 'As You Like It'.


German postcard by Verlag Hermann Leiser, Berlin, no. 4151. Photo: Zander & Labisch. Hans Wassmann in the play 'Der Widerspenstigen Zähmung' (The Taming of the Shrew) by William Shakespeare. Collection: Geoffrey Donaldson Institute.


German postcard by Verlag Hermann Leiser, Berlin, no. 7123. Hans Waßmann as the innkeeper in the play 'Minna von Barnhelm' by Gotthold Ephraim Lessing.

Supporting parts in 50 German films

Between 1914 and his death in 1932, Hans Wassmann played in 50 German films, mostly in supporting parts. He started at Deutsche Bioscop in 1914 in Stellan Rye's comedy Bedingung - kein Anhang!, where he had Ernst Lubitsch and Albert Paulig as his co-actors.

A first lead he had in the comedy Hans und Hanni (Max Mack, 1916), with Hanni Weisse. While continuing in comedy, Wassmann also acted in dramas such as Lola Montez (Robert Heymann, 1918), starring Leopoldine Konstantin.

In the 1920s, Wassmann appeared with many of the German film stars of the era. He acted opposite Asta Nielsen in Die Tänzerin Navarro / The Dancer Navarro (Ludwig Wolff, 1922), Der Absturz / Downfall (Ludwig Wolff, 1923) and Das gefährliche Alter / That Dangerous Age (Eugen Illés, 1927). Other co-stars were Ada Svedin (Miss Venus, Ludwig Czerny, 1921), Henny Porten (Sie und die Drei, Ewald André Dupont, 1922), and Mady Christians in Ein Glas Wasser / A Glass of Water (Ludwig Berger, 1923), and Königin Luise, II / Queen Louise (Karl Grune, 1928).

His other films included Fridericus Rex (1921-1922) starring Otto Gebühr, Nanon (Hanns Schwarz, 1924) with Ágnes Eszterházy, and Garragan (Ludwig Wolff, 1924), starring American actress Carmel Myers. Wassmann also acted with Lilian Harvey in the comedy Die keusche Susanna / Chaste Susanne (Richard Eichberg, 1926), Maria Corda in Eine Dubarry von heute / A Modern Dubarry (Alexander Korda, 1926), Rudolf Rittner in the historical comedy Der Meister von Nürnberg / The Master of Nuremberg  (Ludwig Berger, 1927), and Lya Mara in Das tanzende Wien / Dancing Vienna (Friedrich Zelnik, 1927).

In the early 1930s, Hans Wassmann still played several minor parts in German early sound films such as Meine Frau, die Hochstaplerin / My Wife, the Impostor (Kurt Gerron, 1931) with Käthe von Nagy. In 1904, Wassmann married the actress Clara Kollendt. He died in 1932 as a result of a stroke, which he suffered during a film rehearsal in Neubabelsberg. He found his final resting place at the Südwestkirchhof Stahnsdorf. Hans Wassmann was 59.

German postcard by Photochemie, Berlin, no. K.1358. Photo: Alex Binder, Berlin.


German postcard by Photochemie, Berlin, no. K.1359. Photo: Alex Binder, Berlin.

Sources: Wikipedia (German and English) and IMDb.

Real Western Heroes: Buffalo Bill

American soldier, bison hunter, and showman Buffalo Bill (1846-1917), real name William Frederick Cody, was one of the most colourful characters of the Wild West. He became famous for his Wild West Show, which made him one of the founders of modern show business. Cody started his legend at the age of 23.


American postcard by AZUSA Publishing, Inc., Englewood, Colorado, no. 124, 2000. Photo: David Notman, 1885. Caption: Sitting Bull and Buffalo Bill. Sitting Bull made only one tour with William F. Cody's Wild West Show - this photograph was taken during that tour.


French poster postcard in the Buffalo Bill's Wild West series, no. 14. Caption: Amusements des Cowboys.


German collectors card by J & M Serienbilder Produktion Saar, no. 21. Photo: Gloria Film. Gordon Scott in Buffalo Bill, l'eroe del far west / Buffalo Bill, Hero of the Far West (Mario Costa, 1965). The German film title was Das war Buffalo Bill. Caption: 'Colonel William Frederick Cody is about to embark on the most dangerous adventure of his daring life. The victor over white bandits and scalp greedy redskins with the honourable name Buffalo Bill wants to establish order in the Wild West with all his might.'

Creating an enduring cliché about the Old West

William Frederick Cody was born in 1846. He was the son of Isaac Cody and his wife, Mary Ann Bonsell Laycock. He was born on a farm just outside Le Claire, Iowa Territory (now the U.S. state of Iowa), but he lived for several years in his father's hometown in modern-day Mississauga, Ontario, before the family returned to the Midwest and settled in the Kansas Territory.

Cody started working at the age of 11, after his father's death. At the age of 14, in 1860, Cody was caught up in the 'gold fever', with news of gold at Fort Colville and the Holcomb Valley Gold Rush in California. On his way to the goldfields, however, he met an agent for the Pony Express. He signed with them, and after building several stations and corrals, Cody was given a job as a rider. He worked at this until he was called home to his sick mother's bedside

Cody told in the press that he held many jobs, including trapper, bull catcher, prospector in Colorado, guide for settler caravans, stagecoach driver, soldier in the American Civil War, and even hotel manager. However, historians have had difficulty documenting them. He may have fabricated some for publicity. Wikipedia: "Namely, it is argued that in contrast to Cody's claims, he never rode for the Pony Express, but as a boy, he did work for its parent company, the transport firm of Russell, Majors, and Waddell. In contrast to the adventurous rides, hundreds of miles long, that he recounted in the press, his real job was to carry messages on horseback from the firm's office in Leavenworth to the telegraph station three miles away."

After his mother recovered, Cody wanted to enlist as a soldier in the Union Army during the American Civil War, but was refused because of his young age. He began working with a freight caravan that delivered supplies to Fort Laramie in present-day Wyoming. In 1863, at age 17, he enlisted as a teamster with the rank of private in Company H, 7th Kansas Cavalry, and served until discharged in 1865. In 1866, he reunited with his old friend Wild Bill Hickok in Junction City, Kansas, then serving as a scout. From 1868 to 1872, the U.S. Army employed Cody himself as a scout. He was attached as a scout, variously, to Captain George Augustus Armes (Battle of the Saline River) and Lieutenant Colonel George Armstrong Custer (guide and impromptu horse race to Fort Larned). In 1872, he received the Congressional Medal of Honour for his role as a civilian scout for the United States Army. This medal is the United States' highest award for valour.

Cody received the nickname 'Buffalo Bill' after the American Civil War, when he had a contract to supply Kansas Pacific Railroad workers with buffalo (American bison) meat. The nickname had previously been given to a certain Bill Comstock. Cody and another hunter, Bill Comstock, competed in an eight-hour buffalo-shooting match over the exclusive right to use the name, which Cody won by killing 68 animals to Comstock's 48. Cody is purported to have killed 4,282 buffalo in eighteen months in 1867 and 1868. In 1869, the 23-year-old Cody met Ned Buntline, an American journalist from New York. Buntline later published a story based on Cody's adventures (largely invented by the writer) in Street and Smith's New York Weekly> He then published a highly successful novel, 'Buffalo Bill, King of the Bordermen', which was first serialised on the front page of the Chicago Tribune. Many other sequels followed from the 1870s through the early 1900s. They played a key role in creating the enduring cliché about the Old West.


French postcard. Image: Adrian Jones, 1903. Caption: Published for Buffalo Bill's Wild West.


American postcard by AZUSA Publishing, Inc., Englewood, Colorado, no. 610, 2000. Photo. J.E. Stimson, 1907. Caption: Buffalo Bill's Wild West Show, Grand Entry. The American Wild West became legendary in its own time due to Buffalo Bill's vision, bringing the action and personalities of the Old West to audiences around the world. Cody is credited with inventing both the rodeo and the Wild West Show in North Platte, Nebraska, during a July 4th Celebration amply termed the "Old Glory Blowout". Later that year, the first Wild West Show premiered in Columbus, Nebraska, and performances continued for 31 years until 1913.


Australian poster postcard. Poster by Pawnee Bill Film Company. William 'Buffalo Bill' Cody himself in The Life of Buffalo Bill (Paul Panzer, 1912). Caption: Thrilling Incidents in the life of the last of the great scouts.


French postcard by Editions Cinémagazine, no. 118. Joë Hamman was the French equivalent of the cowboy in a long-ranging career from 1907 to 1967. He was also an affluent film director. In 1904, he met Buffalo Bill Cody when he was 21, and his father took him on a business trip to America. Hamman and Cody became friends, and Hamman visited Cody’s North Plate house in Nebraska, meeting the extras of Cody’s Wild West Show, and drawing watercolours for local rangers. At a ranch in Montana, Hamman learned to ride, was engaged as a cowboy, and learned to break and gather horses.

The Buffalo Bill Wild West Show

After his experiences in the 'Old West', Buffalo Bill Cody entered show business. He toured the United States with shows based on his 'Western' adventures. In 1883, he and the sharpshooter William Frank 'Doc' Carver founded 'Cody & Carver's Rocky Mountain and Prairie Exhibition', later called the 'Buffalo Bill Wild West Show' and 'Buffalo Bill's Wild West and Congress of Rough Riders of the World'. The show featured a huge array of people and animals, and Cody managed to engage famous Native American chiefs such as Sitting Bull as performers. A tent with a capacity of approximately 6,000 spectators was erected for the show. The circus-like attraction toured for many years. Both Annie Oakley, a female sharpshooter, and Cody's friend Texas Jack, who served as the model for the idealised cowboy, were part of this show.

Buffalo Bill's show inspired Irving Berlin to write the musical 'Annie Get Your Gun' in 1946. Cody also exported his show to Europe. In 1887, he performed with the entire circus in London at the celebration of Queen Victoria's Jubilee. In 1889, Buffalo Bill toured Europe, including the Paris World's Fair. He pitched his tents near the 1893 Chicago World's Fair, a clever move that greatly contributed to his popularity. In 1905, Cody’s circus came to France, and he invited his French admirer and friend, Jean Hamman, to join and participate in the French tour of Buffalo Bill. Jean became known as the French cowboy star Joë Hamman. In 1907, Hamman started out in the cinema as both actor and director of the short silent Le desperado / The Desperado (Joë Hamman, 1907). He followed his debut with performances in some 40 more short Westerns, including Les aventures de Buffalo Bill / The Adventures of Buffalo Bill (Joë Hamman, 1911). According to IMDb, the script was written by Buffalo Bill Cody himself.

IMDb does not mention another early silent film, The Life of Buffalo Bill (Paul Panzer, 1912), in which Cody himself appeared. It was produced by the Buffalo Bill and Pawnee Bill Film Company, based in New York City. Cody himself appeared in scenes that bookend the short film, a series of adventures presented in flashback as Buffalo Bill's dreams. The film is in the collection of the Library of Congress. IMDb does mention Cody's appearance in The Circus Girl's Romance (Henry MacRae, 1915,) starring Marie Walcamp, and several films films based on Cody's 'Buffalo Bill's Own Story' including Fighting with Buffalo Bill (Ray Taylor, 1926) and 'The First All-Talking Universal Serial', Indians Are Coming (Henry MacRae, 1930), both with Edmund Cobb as Buffalo Bill. Countless films about Buffalo Bill followed.

In 1917, Buffalo Bill appeared in the Essanay production The Adventures of Buffalo Bill (Charles A. King, 1917). Moving Picture World: "Buffalo Bill is shown in the early days of his thrilling career as a pony express rider in the pioneer west; later as hunter of buffalo and then as the chief Indian scout for the United States army. Appearing with Buffalo Bill in the picturization of the Indian battles which follow are Lieutenant-General Nelson A. Miles, Major-General Jesse M. Lee, Brigadier-General Frank D. Baldwin and Marion P. Maus and other heroic figures of the pioneer days. Historically accurate versions of the Battle of Summit Springs, the Battle of Warbonnet, Col. Cody's knife duel with the Sioux Chief Yellow Hand and his fight with Chief Tall Bull, in which the Indians were killed, are shown. Five thousand United States troops and Indians participated in the battles. Buffalo Bill's later life, giving intimate glimpses of him at home and of his great hunting expeditions, including that on which he guided the Prince of Monaco after big game in the Rockies, concludes this picture." IMDb suggests that The Life of Buffalo Bill (1912) was re-edited and released as The Adventures of Buffalo Bill to cash in on Buffalo Bill Cody's death in 1917.

During his eventful life, Buffalo Bill witnessed the American West change dramatically. Towards the end of his life, he witnessed the beginning of the exploitation of coal, oil, and natural gas in his beloved Wyoming. Cody was married to Louise Maude Frederici, and they had four children. William Cody died of uremia following kidney disease in 1917 in Denver, Colorado, USA. After his death, he was buried, at his own request, in Lookout Mountain Park in Colorado, just west of Denver on the edge of the Rocky Mountains and overlooking the Great Plains. Twenty-four days after Buffalo Bill died in 1917, the Medal of Honour was revoked because it should not have been awarded to the 'civilian' William Cody. However, the U.S. Army posthumously re-awarded the medal to Cody in 1989. He was pictured as Buffalo Bill on one of a set of twenty 29¢ US commemorative postage stamps celebrating Legends of the West, issued in 1994. Other persons honoured were Annie Oakley, Wyatt Earp, Wild Bill Hickok, Kit Carson, and Geronimo.


French poster postcard by Editions F. Nugeron, Levallois Perret, no. E 34. Belgian poster by Paramount. Gary Cooper as Buffalo Bill and Jean Arthur as Annie Oakley in The Plainsman (Cecil B. DeMille, 1936).


British postcard in the Picturegoer series, London, no. W. 868. Photo: Metro Goldwyn Mayer. Betty Hutton as Annie Oakley, J. Carrol Naish as Chief Sitting Bull and Louis Calhern as Buffalo Bill Cody in Annie Get Your Gun (George Sidney, 1950).


German collector card by J & M Serienbilder Produktion Saar, no. 38. Photo: Gloria Film. Gordon Scott and Feodor Chaliapin Jr. in Buffalo Bill, l'eroe del far west / Buffalo Bill, Hero of the Far West (Mario Costa, 1965). The German film title was Das war Buffalo Bill. Caption: 'Buffalo Bill enjoys the admiration of the great chief ‘Wise Fox’, to whom he reports the disgraceful deeds of ‘Yellow Dog’. The treacherous breach of the peace treaty must be punished.'


American Arcade card by the Exhibit Supply Co. of Chicago. Photo: Pathé. Buffalo Bill Jr. a.k.a. Jay Wilsey.

Buffalo Bill Jr. was a stage name of cowboy star Jay Wilsey (1896-1961) who appeared in nearly 100 very low-budget Westerns, both in the silent and the sound era. He had no connection with the real Buffalo Bill Cody, aka Buffalo Bill.

Sources: Wikipedia (Dutch, German, French and English) and IMDb.

The Five Best Films of 1908

There is a new film history podcast, The 5 Best Films of Every Year Ever. It features experts and enthusiasts and their favourite films of every year ever. The host is film scholar and college instructor Tristan Ettleman. Every week, he sits down with a new guest to dive into the history and beauty of some of the best films ever. Recently,  EFSP's Ivo Blom was Tristan's guest, and he talked about his favourite films of 1908. For this post, Ivo chose some great postcards of films from 1908 and reveals which 5 films he selected for Tristan.


French postcard by Croissant, Paris, no. 3666. Photo: Film Pathé. Publicity still for Peau d'âne (Albert Capellani, 1908). Caption: The princess wears a donkey skin. The early Pathé production Peau d'ane / Donkey Skin (Albert Capellani, 1908) was based on a story by Charles Perrault (1697). The actors are unknown.


French postcard by Croissant, Paris, no. 3667. Photo: Film Pathé. Scene from Le Chat botté / Puss in Boots (Albert Capellani, 1908), based on the fairytale by Charles Perrault (1697). Caption: Long live the Marquis of Carabas!

During the 1900s, the French company Pathé Frères was famous for its coloured-in adaptations from fairytales, mainly from the French writer Charles Perrault: Le chat botté / Puss in Boots, La belle au bois dormant / Sleeping Beauty, Le petit poucet / Tom Thumb, Barbe-bleue / Bluebird, Cendrillon / Cinderella, Le petit chaperon rouge / Little Red Riding Hood, Riquet a la Houppe, and Peau d'âne / Donkey Skin. From some tales, even multiple versions were made, such as La belle au bois dormant in 1902 and 1908, Le chat botté in 1903 and 1908, Peau d'âne in 1904 and 1908. Georges Méliès had already started these fairytale films in France before 1900 with Cendrillon (1899), while from 1910, Gaumont would also film a few.


French still by Film d'Art. Julia Bartet as Penelope in Le Retour d'Ulysse / The Return of Ulysses (Charles Le Bargy, André Calmettes, 1908). In this film, Paul Mounet played Ulysses and Albert Lambert Antinous.


French postcard by PA, no. 227. Photo: Film d'Art. The card says Albert Lambert in the play 'Vie de Jésus', but this card refers to a film instead. In 1908, Albert Lambert played Jesus in the early French film Le baiser de Judas / The Judas Kiss (André Calmettes, Armand Bour, 1908), with Jean Mounet-Sully as Judas, and scripted by Henri Lavedan.

Ivo's Five Best Films of 1908

5. 'Tonfilmoperette' by Deutsche Bioscop a.o.

German postcard by Verlag Hermann Leiser, Berlin, no. 972. Photo: Atelier Badekow, Berlin.

Between 1907 and 1911, German tenor Albert Kutzner performed in five very early sound shorts, so-called 'Tonfilmoperette', made by the companies Deutsche Bioscop, Messter and others, e.g. Die lustige Witwe (Viktor Léon, Leo Stein, 1907) and Boccaccio (1908). Kutzner also directed Henny Porten and her sister Rosa in Apachentanz (Messter, 1906), and he directed two early sound films: a scene from the operetta Der Vogelhändler (1908) and Liebes Mannchen, folge Mir (1910).

4. Løvejagten / Lion Hunt (Viggo Larsen, 1908)


German postcard by Verlag Herm. Leiser, Berlin-Wilm., no. 3198.

In the ten-minute short Løvejagten / Lion Hunt (1907), two big game hunters (Viggo Larsen and Knud Lumbye) are on safari in the jungle with their African guide. They observe zebras, ostriches, and a hippopotamus and catch a small monkey for a pet. During the night, they are awakened by a lion that kills a small goat and then the hunters' horse. The hunters shoot the lion as it stands by the water on a beach. They discover another lion and shoot it also. The lions are gutted and skinned. The happy hunters sit and smoke cigarettes afterwards.

Viggo Larsen had filmed the lion hunt at the little Danish island of Elleore in the Roskilde fjord (decorated with palm fronds and artificial plants to simulate a tropical savanna) and in the Copenhagen Zoo. The actual shooting of two captive lions, which Larsen had bought from the Hagenbeck Zoo in Hamburg, caused an enormous public protest in Denmark, and the film was banned. However, the hitherto unusual and attractive use of exotic animals and the publicity from the protests created success in Sweden. The following year, after the charges of animal cruelty were dropped and the Danish ban was rescinded, the film had its premiere in Denmark. Nordisk eventually sold 259 prints of Løvejagten, which earned the company an enormous profit. It ushered in the 'golden age' of Danish cinema when Nordisk Film became the most productive film company in Europe. A sequel to the film, Bear Hunting in Russia, was shot in 1909 and was also a profitable film, eventually selling 118 prints.

3. The Adventures of Dollie (D.W. Griffith, 1908)


Swedish postcard by Förlag Nordisk Konst, Stockholm, no. 922. A rare portrait of the famous American film director D.W. Griffith.

In 1897, David Wark Griffith set out to pursue a career both acting and writing for the theatre, but for the most part, he was unsuccessful. Reluctantly, he agreed to work for the new motion picture medium for Edwin S. Porter at the Edison Company. He tried to sell a story to Edison, but they hired him as an actor instead. Griffith was eventually offered a job at the financially struggling American Mutoscope & Biograph Co. In 1908, Biograph hired him as a first-time director when the chief director fell ill. His directorial debut was The Adventures of Dollie (1908). He stayed and directed over four hundred and fifty short films.

2. Gli ultimi giorni di Pompei / The Last Days of Pompeii (Arturo Ambrosio, Luigi Maggi, 1908)


Italian postcard. Publicity for the photographic studio and souvenir shop of Giorgio Sommer in Naples, founded in 1857. It not only offered all kinds of photographic materials, including lantern slides, but also marble, silver, ceramic and bronze objects after originals of Roman and Pompeian Antiquity. Sommer could even offer to install electric light in statues and old lamps, which indicates that this card must be from the 1890s earliest.

The Ambrosio film company was founded in 1906 in Turin by Arturo Ambrosio and Alfredo Gandolfi, first as ‘Società Ambrosio & C.’, and in 1907 turned into the public corporation ‘Società Anonima Ambrosio, Torino’. From 1908, when it opened its new studio complex, until 1912, it flooded the world with its shorts. Ambrosio established his reputation worldwide and that of Italian cinema with the historical dramas Gli ultimi giorni di Pompei / The Last Days of Pompei (Arturo Ambrosio, Luigi Maggi, 1908) and Nerone / Nero (Arturo Ambrosio, Luigi Maggi, 1909), both with Luigi Maggi and Lydia Roberti. From 1911 on, Ambrosio produced feature-length films, starting with L’ultimo dei Frontignac / The Last of the Frontignacs (Mario Caserini, 1911) with Alberto Capozzi. In 1912 and 1913, Ambrosio managed to release around 200 films per year and shared with the Roman company Cines the primacy of Italian cinema on the international market.

1. L'assassinat du duc de Guise / The Assassination of the Duke de Guise (André Calmettes, Charles Le Bargy, 1908)


French minicard (collector card) in the Collection Félix Potin, series 1. Photo: Boyer, Paris. Charles Le Bargy.

Charles Le Bargy (1858-1936) was already a famous stage actor in his time, performing at the Comédie-Française, when he debuted in film as the perfidious King Henry III in the historical film L'assassinat du duc de Guise / The Assassination of the Duke de Guise (André Calmettes, Charles Le Bargy, 1908). Remarkable was that Le Bargy, in contrast to the wildly gesticulating actors in the films by, e.g. George Méliès, focused on facial expression and kept the rest rather restrained.


French collector card in the Félix Potin series 2 (1908). Photo: Henri Manuel. Caption: Calmettes (André). Artist.

L'assassinat du duc de Guise / The Assassination of the Duke de Guise (André Calmettes, Charles Le Bargy, 1908) was scripted by Henri Lavédan and starred Albert Lambert as the proud Duke de Guise, Charles Le Bargy as the perfidious King Henry III, and Gabrielle Robinne as Guise's mistress who, in vain, warns him of danger at the royal palace. The murder scene was inspired by a famous painting (1834) by Paul Delaroche, which had already resulted in a so-called 'Living Picture' in 1897 by the Lumière Frères. In 1908, to cover the noise of the spectators, André Calmettes had the great idea of asking a newly written music accompaniment for L'Assassinat du Duc de Guise. Thus, the first composer to compose a film score was Camille Saint-Saëns. The music was most often played "live" by a pianist in the auditorium during the projection.


French postcard by Union postale universelle. Early 20th-century reproduction of Paul Delaroche's painting 'L'Assassinat du Duc de Guise' (1834), Musée Condé, Chantilly. Quoted in the French silent film L'assassinat du duc de Guise / The Assassination of the Duke de Guise (André Calmettes, Charles Le Bargy, 1908).

And check out The 5 Best Films of Every Year Ever. Recommended!

Ali MacGraw

American actress Ali MacGraw (1939) began her career as an assistant photographer for Harper's Bazaar magazine and then worked as a model. She became known with the film Goodbye Columbus (1969) and became famous worldwide with her lead role in Love Story (1970), for which she received an Oscar nomination. She married producer Robert Evans in 1969 but divorced him in 1972. The following year, she married Steve McQueen, her co-star in The Getaway (1972). MacGraw also appeared in such films as Convoy (1978) and TV series as Dynasty (1984).


Romanian postcard by Casa Filmului Acin, no. 196.

A new type of fresh college girl

Elizabeth Alice MacGraw was born in 1939 in Pound Ridge, New York. Her parents were Frances Klein MacGraw and Richard MacGraw. Her father owned a gas station chain, and her mother was an artist. She had a younger brother, Richard MacGraw Jr., also an artist.

Ali was educated at Wellesley College, where she studied art history and literature. In 1957, she was voted the most beautiful hotel waitress of the season in Atlantic City, where she worked during her college years. In 1960, she married Robin Martin Hoen. The couple divorced two years later. She began her career as an assistant for photographer Melvin Sokolsky, who worked for fashion magazines such as Harper's Bazaar, and she also worked as a stylist. She later worked before the camera as a model.

She entered film in 1968. In her very first film, The Fastest Way to Heaven (David Lowell Rich, 1968), she played a small role alongside Kirk Douglas. The film, however, was a flop. She gained fame with her first leading role in the comedy Goodbye Columbus (Larry Peerce, 1969), starring Richard Benjamin. She won a Golden Globe for Best Young Actress.

With her straight, long black hair and her barely made-up, natural-looking face, Ali MacGraw was considered a new type of 'fresh college girl' in the USA in the late 1960s and early 1970s. In 1969, she married Paramount studio executive and film producer Robert Evans, who built MacGraw into a star with the melodrama Love Story (Arthur Hiller, 1970). In it, she played a college student who falls in love with a fellow student (Ryan O'Neal) and ultimately dies of a blood disease. Love Story captured the zeitgeist, and Ali received an Oscar nomination. The film was wildly successful and became one of the first blockbusters, grossing more than 100 million dollars.

A few years later, she fell in love with Steve McQueen, the co-star of her next film, The Getaway (Sam Peckinpah, 1972). She divorced Evans in 1972 and married McQueen in 1973. With Robert Evans, she had a son, Josh Evans. Evans was developing several high-profile projects for her when she filed for divorce. The roles she walked away from were Daisy in The Great Gatsby (1974) and Evelyn in Chinatown (1974).


Romanian postcard by Casa Filmului Acin, no. 196. Ali McGraw and Ryan O'Neal in Love Story (Arthur Hiller, 1970).


Belgian postcard by Raider Bounty / Joepie. Ali McGraw and Ryan O'Neal in Love Story (Arthur Hiller, 1970).

A surprisingly modest lifestyle in Santa Fe

Ali MacGraw's marriage to Steve McQueen also ended in divorce in 1978. MacGraw returned to the screen in Convoy (Sam Peckinpah, 1978), an action film among truckers with Kris Kristofferson. For her role, she had her famous long straight hair cut short and tightly permed.

She later confessed that she always felt uncomfortable in front of the camera. She arrived on the set of Convoy (1978) one day too high on cocaine and tequila to perform. The incident prompted her to quit drugs. She appeared in more but less successful films, such as the Sports drama Players (Anthony Harvey, 1979) with Dean Paul Martin and Maximilian Schell, and the romantic comedy Just Tell Me What You Want (Sidney Lumet, 1980).

McGraw turned to television and acted in the miniseries China Rose (Robert Day, 1983), starring George C. Scott, and The Winds of War (Dan Curtis, 1983) with Robert Mitchum. In 1984, she joined the cast of Dynasty as Lady Ashley Mitchell and appeared in 14 episodes, ending in the fifth season.

She made her stage debut on Broadway in the play 'Festen'. She also wrote about her problems with alcohol and men in her autobiography 'Moving Pictures' (1991). Her final film was Glam (1997), directed by her son, Josh Evans. The film, intended as a satire of the Hollywood establishment, was panned by critics.

Fifty years after her smash hit Love Story, Ali MacGraw received a star on the Hollywood Walk of Fame. It happened in a double ceremony with Ryan O'Neal at 7057 Hollywood Boulevard in Hollywood, California, in 2021. Since 1994, the former star has led a surprisingly modest lifestyle in Santa Fe in New Mexico. She is the grandmother of Jackson Evans.


French postcard by La Roue Tourne, Paris.


Romanian postcard by Casa Filmului Acin, no. 287.

Sources: Wikipedia (Dutch) and IMDb.

Directed by Luigi Comencini

Italian film director Luigi Comencini (1916-2007) was one of the masters of the 'Commedia All'Italiana' - together with Dino Risi, Ettore Scola, and Mario Monicelli. He also made memorable films on childhood and the parent-child relationship. His own daughters, Cristina and Francesca, also became film directors.

French postcard by Entr'acte, no. 005/6. Photo: Collection: B. Courtel / D. R. Gina Lollobrigida and Luigi Comencini (in the middle) on the set of Pane, amore e fantasia / Bread, Love and Dreams (Luigi Comencini, 1953). Caption: A moment of concentration for Gina Lollobrigida: Luigi Comencini directs the star.


Small Italian collector card, no. 291. Photo: Ivo Meldones. Totò in L'imperatore di Capri / The Emperor of Capri (Luigi Comencini, 1949).


French postcard by E.D.U.G., no. 55. Gina Lollobrigida in Pane, amore e fantasia / Love, Bread and Fantasy (Luigi Comencini, 1953).


Small Czech collector card by Pressfoto, Praha (Prague), no. S 101/8. Claudia Cardinale and director Luigi Comencini, director of La ragazza di Bube / Bebo's Girl (1964), at Karlovy Vary International Film Festival.


Italian postcard. Stefano Colagrande in Incompreso / Misunderstood (Luigi Comencini, 1966). Caption: "Questo è il solo film che andro a vedere. James Bond" (This is the only movie I'll go to see. James Bond).

The most successful Italian film of the early 1950s

Luigi Comencini was born in 1916 in Salò, located on the shores of Lake Garda, Kingdom of Italy. He was the son of Cesare Comencini and Maria Magdalena Comencini, known as Mimì. He spent his childhood in Agen, in southern France, following his engineer father, where he began to take an interest in cinema. On his return to Italy, he studied architecture at the Milan Polytechnic. A passionate cinephile, in the late 1930s, he, together with Mario Ferrari, who died young in 1938, and the future director Alberto Lattuada, began collecting films and exchanging them with French enthusiasts like Henri Langlois. This was the core for the future Cineteca Italiana of Milan. As a member of the GUF (University Fascist Group), he took part in the Littoriali della cultura e dell'arte (Littoriali of Culture and Art), winning one edition.

He hated fascism, though, and after World War II, he began as a newspaper film critic for the socialist newspaper 'Avanti'. His career as a filmmaker began in 1946 with the release of Bambini in città / Children in the City (1947), a documentary about the harsh lives of children in Milan during those postwar months. Childhood and adolescence were themes that would accompany him throughout his career. This brought him to the attention of the biggest film company in Rome of the time, Lux, where he was hired by Carlo Ponti to direct what was intended as an Italian version of Hollywood's Boys Town (Norman Taurog, 1938), set in Naples. The result, the flop Proibito rubare / Stealing Forbidden (1948), obliged him to accept a commercial chore.

This became his first successful film, the comedy L'imperatore di Capri / The Emperor of Capri (1949), featuring Totò. His next films included the erotic melodrama Persiane chiuse / Behind Closed Shutters (1951) starring Massimo Girotti, Eleonora Rossi Drago and Giulietta Masina, the Swiss family drama Heidi / Heidi, Child of the Mountain (1952) starring Elsbeth Sigmund and Theo Lingen, and the comedy La valigia dei sogni / Suitcase of Dreams (1953) with Umberto Melnati and silent star Helena Makowska. He made La valigia dei sogni to provide financial support to the Cineteca. Several scenes and part of its voice-over were borrowed from the documentary Il museo dei sogni, which he had made several years earlier. His aim was to use a fictional narrative to raise public awareness and interest in the heritage of Italian silent cinema, which was gradually disappearing.

His comedy Pane, amore e fantasia / Bread Love and Dreams (1953) is a primary example of 'Neorealismo Rosa' (pink neorealism). The fortunate pairing of Vittorio De Sica as the philandering middle-aged carabinieri and the pin-up star Gina Lollobrigida as the peasant beauty was a winning formula. It became the most successful Italian film of the early 1950s, and was followed by the equally successful Pane, amore e gelosia / Bread, Love and Jealousy (1954) with the same stars.

Though he refused to make the third film in the series, he played safe by testing his newly won box office credibility with three more comedies in a row, including La Bella di Roma (1955), starring Alberto Sordi. Only then did he feel ready to make a film which he would always cite as one of his favourites, La Finestra sul Luna Park / Window on the Fairground (1956), about the relationship between father and son. It was a subject he felt deeply about, and it became a recurring theme in his work. However, the film was a flop, so he had to return to commercial work.


German collector card. Theo Lingen in Heidi (Luigi Comencini, 1952).


Italian postcard by Rotalfoto, no. 241. Maria Pia Casilio in La valigia dei sogni / The Suitcase of Dreams (Luigi Comencini, 1953).


Yugoslav postcard by NPO, no. G5. Photo: G.B. Poletto. Gina Lollobrigida and donkey in Pane, amore e fantasia / Bread, Love and Dreams (Luigi Comencini, 1953).


Dutch postcard by Uitg. Takken, Utrecht, no. 1748. Gina Lollobrigida in Pane, amore e fantasia / Bread, Love and Dreams (Luigi Comencini, 1953).


Italian postcard in the I Carabinieri nel Cinema series. Photo: Titanus. Photo: G.B. Poletto. Gina Lollobrigida and Vittorio De Sica in Pane, amore e gelosia / Bread, Love and Jealousy (Luigi Comencini, 1954).

One of the most famous examples of the Commedia all'italiana

In 1960, Luigi Comencini made his masterwork, the bitter comedy Tutti a casa / Everybody Go Home (1960), set during the Allied invasion of Italy in 1943. Featuring an international cast that includes Alberto Sordi, Martin Balsam, Eduardo De Filippo, and Serge Reggiani, the film is one of the most famous examples of the Commedia all'italiana. Sordi played a soldier in September of 1943, obliged to choose between carrying on the war with the fascists and Nazis or joining the resistance. The film won the Special Golden Prize at the 2nd Moscow International Film Festival.

In the 1960s, he continued to alternate hits with flops. Another masterpiece is the comedy-drama A cavallo della tigre / On the Tiger's Back (1961). Nino Manfredi stars as an inept thief who wants to escape prison and return to his family, but two of his prison mates (Mario Adorf and Gian Maria Volonté) also want out.

Comencini directed another famous war film, La ragazza di Bube / Bebo's Girl (1963), starring Claudia Cardinale and George Chakiris. It is set immediately after World War II, but this time devoted to the Italian partisans. The film was nominated for a Golden Bear Award at the 14th Berlin International Film Festival and won the Best Production Award at the David di Donatello Awards. Cardinale was awarded the Nastro d'Argento for Best Actress (Migliore Attrice Protagonista) for her role as Mara.

Comencini also directed the comedy Il compagno Don Camillo / Don Camillo in Moscow (1965) with Fernandel and Gino Cervi. It was the fifth film in the Don Camillo series.

This was followed by the beautiful melodrama Incompreso / Misunderstood (1966), based on an adaptation of a classic weepie of late nineteenth-century English literature by Florence Montgomery about a father's failure to understand his children's feelings. Comencini transforms this 'job-for-hire' into a subtle and highly personal film. The film, starring Anthony Quayle, earned Comencini his first David di Donatello award and a nomination for the Golden Palm at the Cannes Film Festival. It was more appreciated by audiences outside Italy than at home. Another film about a child followed, Infanzia, Vocazione e Prime Esperienze di Giacomo Casanova, Veneziano / Giacomo Casanova (1969).


German postcard by Ufa, Berlin-Tempelhof, no. FK. 4571. Photo: CCC / NF-Film / Arthur Grimm. Blandine Ebinger in ... Und das am Montagmorgen / And That on Monday Morning (Luigi Comencini, 1959).


Romanian postcard by Casa Filmului Acin, no. 13. Sylva Koscina and Dorian Gray in Le sorprese dell'amore / Surprise of Love (Luigi Comencini, 1959).


Romanian postcard by Casa Filmului Acin, no. 14. Franco Fabrizi and Dorian Gray in Le sorprese dell'amore / Surprise of Love (Luigi Comencini, 1959). Collection: Alina Deaconu.


Small Czech collector card by Pressfoto, Praha (Prague), 1965, no. S 101/7. The retail price was Kcs 0,50. Photo: Claudia Cardinale in La ragazza di Bube / Bebo's Girl (Luigi Comencini, 1964), the film which was presented at the Karlovy Vary International Film Festival 1964.


Romanian postcard by Casa Filmului Acin, no. 91. Catherine Spaak in 3 notti d'amore / Three Nights of Love (Renato Castellani, Luigi Comencini, Franco Rossi, 1964).

Another variation on the father-son theme

Luigi Comencini was the ideal director to handle the subject of children. Italy's public broadcaster, RAI, commissioned him to make a documentary series, Bambini e Noi / Children and Us (1970). He then had an outstanding success with another variation on the father-son theme, Le avventure di Pinocchio / The Adventures of Pinocchio (1972), starring Andrea Balestri as Pinocchio, Nino Manfredi as Geppetto and Gina Lollobrigida as The Fairy with Turquoise Hair. Based on Carlo Collodi's 1883 novel, the six-part Mini-series received a large critical success, and had an average of twenty-one and a half million viewers during its first airing.

In the same year, he directed the feature film Lo scopone scientifico / The Scientific Cardplayer (1972), a dark comedy about how money corrupts, with Alberto Sordi, Silvana Mangano and Bette Davis. Both Sordi and Mangano won the David di Donatello Award for their roles. His drama Delitto d'amore / Somewhere Beyond Love (1974), starring Giuliano Gemma and Stefania Sandrelli, was entered into the 1974 Cannes Film Festival. In 1975, he released the mystery La donna della domenica / Sunday Woman, featuring Marcello Mastroianni, Jacqueline Bisset and Jean-Louis Trintignant.

Comencini's subsequent works were characterised by the presence of famous Italian actors of the time: Ugo Tognazzi in the Giallo comedy Il gatto / The Cat (1977), or Nino Manfredi in his episode of Basta che non si sappia in giro. A box office hit was the satirical comedy-drama L'ingorgo - Una storia impossibile / Traffic Jam (1979). The film, based on the short story 'L'Autoroute du sud' (1966) by Julio Cortázar, was entered into the 1979 Cannes Film Festival. The comedy-drama Voltati Eugenio / Eugenio (1980) entered the 37th Venice International Film Festival and won the David di Donatello for Best Score.

His television series Cuore / Heart (1984), based on Edmondo de Amicis's children's classic, and La Storia / History (1986), based on Elsa Morante's best-selling novel and starring Claudia Cardinale in a Magnani-like role, were praised. The film Un ragazzo di Calabria / A Boy from Calabria entered the main competition at the 44th Venice Film Festival, in which it won the Pasinetti Award for Best Actor (to Gian Maria Volonté), but his other films in the 1980s were disappointing. Comencini's final film was Marcellino (1991), a rather pointless remake of the Spanish film Marcelino pan y vino / The Miracle of Marcelino (Ladislao Vajda, 1955).

For the last three decades of his life, he suffered from Parkinson's disease. Luigi Comencini died in Rome in 2007. He was 90. He and his wife, Giulia Grifio, had four daughters, including the directors Cristina and Francesca Comencini, costume designer, set designer and art director Paola Comencini and production manager Eleonora Comencini.


Italian postcard. Stefano Colagrande and Simone Giannozzi in foreground and Anthony Quayle in Incompreso / Misunderstood (Luigi Comencini, 1966). Caption: "Questo è il solo film che andro a vedere. James Bond" (This is the only movie I'll go to see. James Bond).


Italian postcard. Stefano Colagrande at right and Simone Giannozzi in the middle in Incompreso / Misunderstood (Luigi Comencini, 1966). Caption: "Questo è il solo film che andro a vedere. James Bond" (This is the only movie I'll go to see. James Bond).


Italian postcard by Edizioni Panini, Modena (EPM). Photo: Sampaolofilm / Cinepat. Gina Lollobrigida and Andrea Balestri in Le avventure di Pinocchio / The Adventures of Pinocchio (Luigi Comencini, 1972). Caption: The Fairy and the boy Pinocchio.


French poster postcard by Eds. F. Nugeron. Poster by Yves Prince for La Storia (Luigi Comencini, 1986), starring Claudia Cardinale.

Sources: John Francis Lane (The Guardian), Il Cinema Ritrovato, Wikipedia (Dutch, Italian and English), and IMDb. And thanks to Marlene Pilaete.