Berlin-born director Mike Nichols (nee Peschkowsky) made a lengthy career of producing edgy, irreverent films that both cleaned up at the box office and spoke volumes...
Andy Warhol called James Dean the damaged but beautiful soul of our time. Though the tormented young actor only appeared in three major films–East of Eden,...
Though Marion Davies was educated in a New York convent, she followed in the footsteps of her three older sisters to pursue a dancing career in...
Veronica Lake, née Constance Ockelman, was diagnosed as a classic schizophrenic as a teenager; unfortunately, her opportunistic mother’s idea of treatment was to prod her relentlessly...
The Italian director Sergio Leone resented the label “spaghetti western,” which critics and pundits applied to his films A Fistful of Dollars (1964), For a Few...
With starring roles in such iconic sixties’ fare as the series Peyton Place and the film Valley of the Dolls, Barbara Parkins will forever be linked...
Vienna-Born Hedy Lamarr began her acting career at the age of sixteen under the auspices of German impresario Max Reinhardt, and appeared in mediocre German cinematic...
Incontestably the king of silent screen comedies, Charlie Chaplin achieved international stardom with his utterly captivating portrayal of “The Little Tramp” in such classic films as...
Singing, dancing, and acting legend Sammy Davis, Jr., got his start in the business early–at age two, he was already hamming it up in his parents’...
Ah, the vagaries of typecasting. Following the 1971 release of Stanley Kubrick’s pioneering adaptation of novelist Anthony Burgess’ dystopian masterpiece A Clockwork Orange, actor Malcolm McDowell...
Ever the nonchalant celebrity, Dean Martin first gained fame with his partnership with all-screws-loose comedian Jerry Lewis in the forties and fifties. The son of Italian...
Doubtless the most loved TV comedienne of all time, Lucille Ball became an American icon with her characterization of the scatterbrained sitcom wife, Lucy Ricardo, on...
Bette Davis once said, “Until you’re known in my profession as a monster, you’re not a star.” Whether her theory holds water or not, Davis was...
Sharon Tate is one of those people who are sadly more famous for having died than having lived. As one of the victims of the Manson...
Dolores Del Rio was a second cousin to silent film star Ramon Novarro, a relationship that provided her entrée into an endless stream of Hollywood parties....