Spanish postcard. Rina De Liguoro in Messalina (Enrico Guazzoni, 1924).
Rina De Liguoro (1892-1966) had her breakthrough with the epic Messalina (1924). It was the start of a prolific career in Italian silent cinema in the 1920s with Quo vadis? (1924) and Gli ultimi giorni di Pompeii (1926). In the late 1920s, she also performed in Germany and France, e.g. in Casanova (1927). Invited to Hollywood in 1930, she had only minor parts in Spanish versions of American films there but pursued a career as a piano player. She returned to Italy in 1939. Her last role was that of Burt Lancaster's table companion at the ball in Luchino Visconti's Il Gattopardo / The Leopard (1963).
Austrian postcard by Iris Verlag, no. 5111. Photo: Atelier Hanni Schwarz.
Henry Stuart (1885-1948) was a Swiss actor, director and writer who worked mostly in German silent cinema.
French postcard by Europe, no. 855. Photo: Metro-Goldwyn-Mayer.
American film star Joan Crawford (1904-1977) had a career that spanned many decades, studios, and controversies. In her silent films, she made an impact as a vivacious Jazz Age flapper, and later, she matured into a star of psychological melodramas.
French postcard by Europe, no. 867.
Prima ballerina, dancer, singer and actress Liane Haid (1895-2000) was the first film star of Austria. She was the epitome of the Süßes Wiener Mädel (Sweet Viennese Girl), and from the mid-1910s on, she made close to a hundred films.
French postcard by Europe, no. 417. Photo: Metro-Goldwyn-Mayer.
British actress Renée Adorée (1898-1933) appeared in Hollywood in several silent films during the 1920s. She is best known as Melisande in the successful war epic The Big Parade (King Vidor, 1925) opposite John Gilbert. She died a few days after her 35th birthday.
Italian postcard by G.B. Falci, Milano, no. 720. Photo: Fox Films.
Margaret Livingston (1895–1984) was an American film actress and businesswoman, most notable for her work during the silent film era. She remains best known today as 'the Woman from the City' in F.W. Murnau's film Sunrise: A Song of Two Humans (1927).
Belgian postcard, signed by 'Mary Johnson'.
This souvenir card, written in 1934, refers to the Antwerp stage world. Yet, the fascinating woman depicted has little in common with the famous Swedish silent film actress Mary Johnson, who in 1932 withdrew from stage and screen after marrying Rudolf Klein-Rogge.
British postcard. The Timbertown Follies, interned in Holland, ca. 1915-1918. The man on the piano left might well be Fred Penley.
During World War I, a remarkable group of performers toured Dutch theatres. They called themselves The Timbertown Follies. They were part of the 1500 English soldiers who fled Belgium when invaded by the Germans and were imprisoned in a wooden camp (hence the 'Timbertown') near Groningen, in the - neutral - Northern Netherlands. Out of boredom, they started a theatre show that, however, became so popular that in 1915, they were allowed to perform at the Groningen city theatre and elsewhere. Despite the shortages, they managed to put on a dazzling show, raising thousands of guilders for all sorts of charities, such as the Belgian people and the victims of the 1916 Dutch floods. While many Dutch visitors didn't speak English, the show was understandable to all.
Fred Penley, the leader of the troupe, moved audiences with his song. He was a London actor, brought up on the profession. His father was the actor W.S. Penley, who became famous in his country with the play ‘Charley's Aunt’. In 1917, rules became less strict, and Penley became an actor at the Dutch Hollandia Film studio. He played the banker and spy Sorga in the three-part Oorlog en Vrede / War and Peace (Maurits Binger, 1918), starring Adelqui Migliar and Annie Bos. After the war's end, Penley stayed in the Netherlands and acted in the films Het goudvischje (Maurits Binger, 1919) and Circus Jim (Bernard Edwin Doxat-Pratt, Adelqui Migliar, 1921). In 1921, he started a new stage tour with a new group, still under the name of Timbertown Follies. In the early 1920s, Penley started a film rental company with Alex Benno named Actueel Film. The two also produced the popular comedy Kee en Janus naar Berlijn / Kee & anus. to Berlin, starring Adriënne Solser and Kees Pruis. Penley married a Dutch woman in 1923 but left for Paris in 1925. In 2014, the Dutch book 'Het Engelse Kamp' by Menno Wielinga was published, which contains a DVD with the documentary 'The Timbertown Follies' (Leo van Maaren, Frank Herrebout, 2014).
German postcard. Image: Roethe, 1938. Caption: Gruss aus Berlin. On the back: Willi Schaeffers, the man who ran the cabaret between 1938 and 1944. The card was sent in 1939 to the Netherlands. Schaeffers also acted in supporting parts in countless German silent and sound films (1910s to 1950s).
The Kabarett der Komiker (the Cabaret of comedians), often called KadeKo, was a cabaret theatre in what is now the Berlin district of Charlottenburg-Wilmersdorf. On 1 December 1924, the actors Paul Morgan, Kurt Robitschek and Max Hansen founded the Kabarett der Komiker in Berlin. After moving several times (they first performed in Kantstraße, later in a theatre on Kurfürstendamm), a ‘smoke theatre’ for 950 visitors was opened in the WOGA complex on Lehniner Platz on 19 September 1928. In 1932, the first cabaret opera 'Rufen sie Herrn Plim!' was performed with lyrics by Robitschek and Marcellus Schiffer and music by Mischa Spoliansky.
The National Socialists' “seizure of power” led to the emigration of Robitschek and several of his colleagues. First, Hanns Schindler, then Willi Schaeffers, took over the management of the cabaret. By almost completely dispensing with any kind of contemporary criticism, the KadeKo was able to survive until the general opening up of the theatre. Nevertheless, the Cabaret of comedians was not free from reprisals. The cabaret and singing trio Die drei Rulands were expelled from the Reich Chamber of Culture after a performance as Die drei Stadtbauarchitekten, in which they aimed the National Socialist plans to rebuild Berlin, which meant a lifelong professional ban. On 31 August 1944, the cabaret ceased operations with a performance at Café Leon.
French postcard, no. 1031, mailed in 1905. Dutch written text. In the early years of the postcard, one was only allowed to write on the front side of the card. The text deals with the excuses of a person who couldn't make it to a private meeting because of an urgent business meeting.
Agustina del Carmen Otero Iglesias (1868–1965), better known as Carolina Otero or La belle Otero, was a Spanish actress, dancer and courtesan. She had a reputation for great beauty and was famous for her numerous lovers. She made her debut in cabaret in 1888 in Barcelona, moving soon after to France, first to Marseille, and then to Paris, where she became a star of the Folies Bergère. Within a few years, she became one of the most famous women on the entire continent, the sought-after heterosexual and mistress of many powerful and prominent men of the time, such as Prince Albert I of Monaco, King Edward VII of the United Kingdom, the royals of Serbia and Spain, the Grand Dukes of Russia, Peter and Nicholas Nikolaevič, or the famous writer Gabriele D'Annunzio.
French postcard by S.I.P., no. 1015. Photo: Reutlinger, Paris. Caption: Lygie.
'Lygie' may refer to the character in the novel 'Quo vadis?' (1896), which was adapted to the stage in France in 1901. Yet, the actress in the stage version, Cora Laparcerie, doesn't look very much like the woman on this card, so this may have been what is called a fantasy card.
British postcard by The Rapid Photo Printing Co., London, no. 1828. Printed in Belgium.
Gertie Millar (1879-1952) was an English actress and singer. From 1901 to 1910, Millar was a prima donna at London's Gaiety Theatre, starring in a series of musicals composed for her by the couple formed by her husband, Lionel Monckton, a former lawyer and theatre critic, and Ivan Caryll.
Dutch postcard by JosPe, Arnhem, no. 364. Photo: Fox Film.
Joan Bennett (1910–1990) was an American actress who had her breakthrough in Little Women (George Cukor, 1933). Producer Walter Wanger helped to manage her career and eventually married her in 1940. At the beginning of the 1940s, Bennett appeared in four films by Fritz Lang. These turned her into a femme fatale of Film Noir.
French postcard. no. 759. Photo: MGM. Mailed in Antwerp, Belgium, 1939.
American actress Paulette Goddard (1905-1990) started her career as a fashion model and as a Ziegfeld Girl in several Broadway shows. In the 1940s, she became a major star at Paramount Pictures. She was Charlie Chaplin's leading lady in Modern Times (1936) and The Great Dictator (1940). Goddard was nominated for an Oscar for Best Supporting Actress for So Proudly We Hail! (1943). Her husbands included Chaplin, Burgess Meredith, and Erich Maria Remarque.
Italian postcard by Rotalfoto, Milano, no. 168. Photo: Ponti De Laurentiis.
Franca Faldini (1931-2016) was an Italian actress, journalist and writer, who was Totò's companion from 1952 until he died in 1967. Faldini starred in many successful films alongside Totò, including Totò e le donne (1952), Un turco napoletano (1953) and Miseria e nobiltà (1954). Her film career was of no interest to her, and she turned down offers from directors such as Alessandro Blasetti and Vittorio De Sica. In 1957, Franca Faldini finished her career and stayed by Totò's side during his temporary blindness. She also supported him in the following years, in which the actor only partially recovered his sight.
Sources: Jaarbeurs, Wikipedia (German and Italian) and IMDb. Thanks to Marlene Pilaete.
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