How to Throw a 1950's Thanksgiving

Bustle.com provides us with a post detailing how to throw a Thanksgiving like the 1950s!

Are you finding that your family's modern Thanksgiving dinner is not traditional enough? Too many foods that actually taste good? Too much gender parity? Too fun? Well, then this year, you might want to consider having ... a 1950s Thanksgiving dinner! It's good for what ails ya! (if "what ails ya" is greater awareness of racism and sexism, that is).

While the 1950s had enviable interior design and some really cute women's clothing, it was, in general, a crappy decade for almost everyone — from the straight white men who were expected to repress their emotions and work themselves senseless to support their families, to the straight white women expected to have no ambitions outside being a homemaker, to anyone who was not straight and white, who had to deal with constant degrading treatment and basically having no rights in the eyes of the law. And the post-war decade's Thanksgiving celebrations were a microcosm of the era's trends and social problems — unthinking sexism and racism, emotional repression, and Jell-O based food-stuffs.

That doesn't mean that parts of 1950s Thanksgiving celebrations weren't campy and adorable, of course — I mean, Marilyn Monroe dressed as a pilgrim? How precious!

If you'd like to learn more about a difficult and confusing period in our nation's history, read on for our guide to how to do your Thanksgiving — 1950s style. However, unlike Marilyn, you should probably plan on wearing pants.

"Va Va Voom" Star of the Day: Harry James

Harry James
Taken from the official Harry James website:
Harry Haag James was born in 1916 in Albany, Georgia, in the United States. He learned the trumpet from his father, a circus bandleader. James decided to pursue a professional career in music after winning a state high-school trumpet competition.

Harry began to perform with several dance bands, including that of Ben Pollack's popular group. The flawless, technically outstanding trumpeter played for several years with the Benny Goodman Band before forming his own band in 1939 with a gifted but little known vocalist, Frank Sinatra.

During the golden era of the big bands, Harry recorded a number of hits, including "I've Heard That Song Before," from the motion picture Youth on Parade (1942), "You Made Me Love You" (1941), the number-one instrumental hit "Sleepy Lagoon" (1942), "I Had the Craziest Dream" (1943), "You'll Never Know" and his theme song, "Ciribiribin." His band helped launch the careers of many pop music stars of the World War II era, including Frank Sinatra and Helen Forrest.  Ed. note: Doris Day sang with him on one of the greatest albums ever, "Young Man With a Horn," which was the soundtrack for the movie of the same name.

"Va Va Voom" Star of the Day: Ava Gardner

This is an updated version of a previous post.
Ava Gardner
Beautiful, shining star of the MGM studio, Ava was born in 1922.  She was the youngest of 7 children living on a cotton and tobacco farm in the rural southern town of Smithfield, North Carolina.

Her show business beginning began just as simply.  Her brother-in-law, a professional photographer took her photo in 1941 and displayed it at his studio.  A theater clerk saw her photo and told the photographer that she oughta' be in pictures, and the in-laws sent her information and photo immediately to MGM.

According to reports, when Gardner first arrived at the studio and did a screen test, Louis B. Mayer said "She can't sing. She can't act. She can't talk. She's terrific. Sign her." She got a 7-year contract with MGM.  The studio worked with her to remove her Carolina drawl and teach her to act.  Soon she had been in several films with little to no notice, but was gaining experience on set.  It wasn't until 1946 in the film "The Killers" that Ava rose her to sex symbol status and made her a big star.

"Va Va Voom" Star of the Day

Grace Kelly
Today let us highlight the Princess of Monaco.

Grace struck out on her own after high school, heading to New York's bright lights to try her luck. Grace worked as a model but made her acting debut on Broadway in 1949. She also had a brief stint in television. Not content with the work in New York, Grace moved to Southern California for the more prestigious part of acting -- motion pictures.

In 1951, she appeared in her first film Fourteen Hours when she was 22. It was a small part, but a start nonetheless. The following year she landed the role of Amy Kane in High Noon, a western starring Gary Cooper and Lloyd Bridges which turned out to be very popular. In 1953, Grace appeared in only one film, but it was another popular one, Mogambo. The film was a jungle drama in which fellow cast members, Clark Gable and Ava Gardner turned in masterful performances. It was also one of the best films ever released by MGM.

Must-See Movie: High Society

High Society (1956)
With a stellar cast and some catchy tunes, this is a no-brainer to see...but there are still some cons that go with the pros of how "must-see" this movie is.

Here's the story:  Jazz musician C.K. Dexter Haven (Bing Crosby) still holds a torch for his ex-wife, Rhode Island socialite Tracy Samantha Lord (Grace Kelly). He stays at a neighbor's house, bringing his full jazz band (including Louis Armstrong) to disrupt Tracy's upcoming nuptials to to a boring but wealthy man (John Lund).  But that's not the only conflict.  Reporter Mike Connor (Frank Sinatra) and photographer Liz Imbrie (Celeste Holm) from Spy Magazine, a fictional tabloid newspaper, are there to cover the wedding.  They are essentially blackmailing their way in, holding on to some embarrassing information about Tracy's father.  So to prevent the tabloid from getting the true story, Tracy begins an elaborate charade, pretending to be overly snobbish and frivolous, as well as introducing the tabloid to the wrong people.  To make matters even more confusing, Mike falls in love with Tracy, and she wakes up on the day of her wedding confused and unsure of what to do.

Monday's This & That

Things are really ramping up around here... I'm getting ready for a well-deserved 2 1/2-week vacation, and that means cranking away at work to get all my shtuff done so I can get the hell outta Dodge! As a result, I haven't found much time to do anything fun lately, but I have found a few choice tidbits of frivolity here and there...

Lighters, handbags, coasters, and other goodies featuring pin-up girls, Cary Grant, Clark Gable, Frank Sinatra, and more retro characters are for sale at PinupgirlLighters.com. They're enough to make smoking cool again!

Go back in time by checking out these WWII posters...

And Wired provides us with Air Hostesses of Yesteryear. Fly the friendly skies with an air of nostalgia!

Well, back to my march... And remember, VOTES FOR WOMEN!

Classic Quote of the Day

"I feel sorry for people who don't drink; when they wake up in the morning, that's as good as they are going to feel all day." --Frank Sinatra

Sweepea-TV: Friday Night

I went to see Casino Royale at Grauman's Chinese Theater in Hollywood. Being an L.A. native, I never took the time to look at the stars and famous footprints. Well, I finally did Friday night. First I got a snapshot of my favorite big band leader's star, Glenn Miller.They just gave Kevin Costner a hunk of pavement, so I had to see it. I was astonished that my Amazonian feet are almost exactly the same size as his. Then again, I'm a tall drink a'water...
Next up was ol' blue eyes, Frank Sinatra. I was like a 1940's schoolgirl, swooning at the sight of one of the greatest crooners of all time.
There's all these weird characters hanging around there...some are tourists, others are like this guy in an oversized wizard costume. Not promoting anything or handing out anything. Just staring at people when they walked by. Scared the bajeezus outta me.
I have pictures from my Saturday night, too...which will come later.

"Va Va Voom" Star of the Day

Peter Lawford
Saturday morning I fell in love. I was watching the Esther Williams' flick On An Island With You, and her leading man was a tall, tan wonderful navy pilot. His soft voice, his big puppy eyes, his thick eyebrows, and his gleaming white smile made my heart melt. And I was completely transfixed by the 1948 version of Peter Lawford. (Don't we look cute together?)

British-born, Peter's parents were un-wed when he was conceived. This caused a scandal that drove the family to the United States, where they travelled constantly. Because of his family's travels, Peter was never formally educated, and his lack of education was a sore subject. It contributed to his feelings of inadequacy later on as a member of the Kennedy family (his brother-in-law was JFK), and throughout his adult life.

Injuring his arm in a childhood accident kept Peter from entering World War II, the greatest thing that could happen to his acting career. Hollywood was infatuated with heroic Englishmen and as war movies were being churned out by the dozens. Peter Lawford was just what America was looking for.

Once he signed with MGM, his mother insisted that studio head Louis B. Mayer pay her a salary as Peter's personal assistant. Mayer declined, so Mrs. Lawford responded by claiming her son to be homosexual and that he needed to be "supervised". When Peter learned of his mother's actions their relationship was never the same.

Perhaps to prove to everyone his sexuality, Lawford had a reputation as a ladies' man, even as he was married to Patricia Kennedy. He allegedly had many affairs with famous women, including Ava Gardner, June Allyson, Lana Turner, Janet Leigh, Rita Hayworth, Dorothy Dandridge, Lucille Ball, Judy Holliday, Judy Garland, Marilyn Monroe, Grace Kelly, Kim Novak, Jackie O, Nancy Reagan, and Elizabeth Taylor, to name a few.

These affairs made Peter more of a celebrity than a movie star, especially when he was made member of the "Rat Pack." Later in life, Lawford fell into drug and alcohol abuse. This plus strained relationships and financial difficulties caused a great deal of stress on his increasingly fragile health. Lawford died alone in a hospital in Los Angeles on Christmas Eve 1984 of liver and kidney disease culminating in cardiac arrest at the age of 61.

Interestingly enough, none of the Rat Pack members attended the funeral. This is possibly due to a falling-out between Frank Sinatra and Lawford over Peter's involvement with Ava Gardner.

Mee-Yow Thursday

Frank Sinatra had bad vibes about Marlon Brando after being passed over for the role in "Waterfront." His animosity flare up during the making of "Guys and Dolls" in 1955. During a scene Sinatra had to eat some cheesecake, and Brando insisted on retake after retake (in contrast to "one-take-Frank") until Sinatra eventually exploded with the classic line "Just how much f#%$ing cheesecake can a man eat??"

"Va Va Voom" Star of the Day

Louis Prima
Prima's career began in the early 1930's, playing jazz trumpet in the style of fellow New Orleans trumpeter Louis Armstrong. He led his own swing band throughout most of the 30's and 40's, but during the late 40's and early 50's, he played a style of music closely resembling what we call rock and roll today.

Louis Prima was not an imitator of early R&B. On the contrary, many early R&B artists copied Prima. He was one of the only white artists who consistently showed up on the R&B charts in the mid- and late-40's, and many of his songs were covered by black artists. Prima made the charts himself with "White Cliffs Of Dover," "Robin Hood," and "I'll Walk Alone," in 1944 and '45.

Prima also brought life to Las Vegas when he put his act in the casino lounges. Many say this was the highlight of his career, as he was teamed up with first wife Keely Smith, and Sam Butera and the Witnesses. They would improvise the show, jumping from one song to the other, often in mid-tune. Many fans of Prima (like Frank Sinatra and other Vegas performers) would go directly from their show to the lounge just to see them perform. Their lax and comical attitude of classic love songs along with the combination of Prima's high-energy antics with Smith's poker-faced crooning made their popularity soar.

"Va Va Voom" Star of the Day

Lou Rawls
The jazz singer died today of lung and brain cancer, so I thought it fitting to make him our "Va Va Voom" Star of the Day.

The Grammy-award winning artist had a unique, smooth vocal style. Frank Sinatra once said that Rawls had "the classiest singing and silkiest chops in the singing game."

For a time he performed what some people have called "pre-rap." Rawls said this type of style grew out of necessity. "I was working in little joints where the stage would be behind the bar. So you were standing right over the cash register and the crushed ice machine. You'd be swinging and the waitress would yell, 'I want 12 beers and four martinis!' And then the dude would put the ice in the crusher. There had to be a way to get the attention of the people. So instead of just starting in singing, I would just start in talking the song." His "raps" were so popular that 1967's Dead End Street won him his first Grammy for Best R&B Vocal Performance.

Epitomizing class and soul, I've always thought his singing style is almost self-depreciating; an everyday-man-type of charm mixed with that jazzy sound. He will definitely be remembered in music history.

His official website can be found here, although I had trouble loading up the main frame page.

"Va Va Voom" Star of the Day

Ava Gardner
Beautiful, shining star of the MGM studio, Ava was born into a simple life (a tobacco farm in the rural south), but was destined for greatness. According to reports, when Gardner first arrived at the studio and did a screen test, Louis B. Mayer said "She can't act. She can't talk. She's terrific. Sign her." She got a 7-year contract with MGM and did several films without notice until "The Killers" rose her to sex symbol status and made her a big star.

Her movie and TV career is lengthy, but not as illustrious as her social life. She married three times: to Mickey Rooney when she was only 19-years-old, to big band leader and Hollywood bad boy Artie Shaw, and to the famous crooner Frank Sinatra. She also had affairs with Howard Hughes, George C. Scott, and a couple bullfighters.

Her dramatic romance with Sinatra made her most famous, as their affair began when he was still married. They constantly tried to create drama in their lives; Gardner flirted with Hughes as Sinatra feigned a couple suicide attempts to get her attention. She paid for his expenses as his career suffered, and even flew him out to the set of some of her movies. Overall it is widely believed that Ava was Sinatra's one true love.

After a stroke in 1989, which left her partially paralyzed and bedridden, Sinatra paid all her medical expenses. She died of pneumonia in London at the age of 67 in 1990.