Tag Archive | MGM

Latest HollywoodEssays.com mini-documentary: The Mysterious Death of Ted Healy

On December 21, 1937, Hollywood actor, rogue and the creator of the Three Stooges, Ted Healy, went out on a night out on the town to celebrate the birth of his first child. Just 36 hours later he would be found dead. What role did Albert “Cubby” Broccoli (creator of the Bond movie franchise) and […]

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HollywoodEssays.com now on YouTube!

By Alicia Mayer April 25, 2013 Leave a comment

In 1938, George Burns’ career was nearly crushed by incredible allegations that had Hollywood holding it’s breath and all of America in shock. Alicia Mayer, grand-niece of MGM studio boss, Louis B. Mayer, introduces you to the story, which she covers in full at http://www.HollywoodEssays.com. Read the forgotten stories about our most loved entertainment icons.

Not Harlow. Mary Dees, the actress who filmed Jean Harlow’s unfinished scenes in Saratoga.

By Alicia Mayer March 31, 2013 6 Comments

“Backstage at the Shubert Theatre, the stage manager hesitates to pop his head into in the star dressing room. He’s not sure he can take looking at the young woman one more time. That’s not something he’s ever thought about a gorgeous woman before. His motto – You can look at a buffet all you […]

New Hollywood Essays ebooks with foreword by Leonard Maltin coming soon!

By Alicia Mayer February 18, 2013 7 Comments

I am thrilled to announce that Hollywood Essays will soon be launched as an ebook series! Leonard Maltin, the esteemed film historian, critic and author, will provide the forward. The ebook collection, created in iBooks Author, features expanded essays on the Mayer family of MGM and the legendary filmmakers and stars they worked with. Each […]

Judy Garland – the tragic arc of the child star.

By Alicia Mayer January 29, 2013 10 Comments

Like any starry-eyed teenager, the young singer was ready to experience the glamorous world of the movie star. Instead, Garland was sent to MGM school where she met Mickey Rooney and the other kid talents of the time, most of whom were true beauties, like Ava Gardner and Elizabeth Taylor. She was not in their […]

How Hamlet nearly killed Oscar – the big studio revolt that almost ended the Academy Awards

By Alicia Mayer January 12, 2013 7 Comments

It would take just a week after the shocking awards ceremony for the response from the big studios to hit the headlines, as they did on the 1st of April, 1949 and read like April’s Fool Day jokes, including “Academy Awards May Be Stopped” and “Hollywood Oscars May Be On The Way Out”. The first […]

Death comes to the creator of The Three Stooges after a night at the Trocadero.

By Alicia Mayer January 6, 2013 6 Comments

Exactly what happened after the initial altercation with Albert “Cubby” Broccoli is not clear, but Healy would later be found at a Hollywood hotel where the hotel doctor sewed up a huge gash over his left eye. Along with this wound, Healy looked like he had been severely beaten. He was taken home but he […]

The pro-Hitler maid who nearly killed George Burns’ career

By Alicia Mayer January 1, 2013 8 Comments

Three years after this photo, their perfect world came crashing down thanks to two diamond bangles from Paris, a shadowy “Nicaraguan diplomat” and the vengeful, Hitler-loving maid of a Supreme Court judge. THIS IS MY favorite group photo from my family’s collection. One can only wonder what the photographer said to get these terrific reactions. […]

W.S. Van Dyke – the trusted director, star maker, party host and patriot who would not wait for death

By Alicia Mayer December 24, 2012 3 Comments

“My mother, Laura Winston, with a baby to support, went back to the calling she had followed before her marriage – the stage. I was raised in a theatre trunk. We went on the road, up and down the coast, into the Middle West, all over the US. When I was 5 years old they […]

Me, the ghost of the future past

By Alicia Mayer December 1, 2012 Leave a comment

Knowing what I know about my family, the good and the bad – thanks to the books, old newspaper articles, the fragments of over-heard conversations or stories told to me – I still ache to be in that photo. Oh, how I love this photo and wish for all the tea in China that I […]

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