Tall, distinguished, aristocratic Louis Calhern eventually broke into films. Although his regal bearing would seem to pigeonhole him in aristocratic parts in serious drama, he proved to be a very versatile actor, as much at home playing a comic foil to The Marx Brothers in Duck Soup (1933) as he was as Buffalo Bill to Betty Hutton's Annie Oakley in Annie Get Your Gun (1950) or, most memorably, the lawyer involved with the criminal gang in The Asphalt Jungle (1950).
Cecil Parker
Cecil Parker ( 1897 – 1971) was an English actor with a distinctively husky voice, who usually played supporting roles, often characters with a supercilious demeanour, in his 91 films made between 1928 and 1969.
The Lady Vanishes (1938)
The Ladykillers (1955)
23 Paces to Baker Street (1956)
Indiscreet (1958)
Arletty
Bette Davis
Bette Davis (1908 – 1989) was an American actress with a career spanning more than 50 years and 100 acting credits. She was noted for playing unsympathetic, sardonic characters, and was famous for her performances in a range of film genres, from contemporary crime melodramas to historical films, suspense horror, and occasional comedies, although her greater successes were in romantic dramas.
A recipient of two Academy Awards, she was the first thespian to accrue ten nominations.
She played a Broadway star in All About Eve (1950), which earned her another Oscar nomination and won her the Cannes Film Festival Award for Best Actress.
Wendy Hiller
Dame Wendy Margaret Hiller, DBE was an English film and stage actress who enjoyed a varied acting career that spanned nearly 60 years. Writer Joel Hirschorn, in his 1984 compilation Rating the Movie Stars, described her as 'a no-nonsense actress who literally took command of the screen whenever she appeared on film At Shaw's insistence, she starred as Eliza Doolittle in the film Pygmalion (1938) with Leslie Howard as Professor Higgins. This performance earned Hiller her first Oscar nomination, a first for a British actress in a British film, and became one of her best-remembered roles.
Luise Rainer
Marlene Dietrich
Marie Magdalene 'Marlene' Dietrich (1901 – 1992) was a German-born American actress and singer. Her career spanned from the 1910s to the 1980s.
In 1920s Berlin, Dietrich performed on the stage and in silent films. Her performance as Lola-Lola in Josef von Sternberg's The Blue Angel (1930) brought her international acclaim and a contract with Paramount Pictures. Dietrich starred in many Hollywood films including, most iconically, the six vehicles directed by Sternberg —Morocco (1930) (her only Academy Award nomination), Dishonored (1931), Shanghai Express and Blonde Venus (both 1932), The Scarlet Empress (1934) and The Devil Is a Woman (1935)— plus Desire (1936) and Destry Rides Again (1939).
Mary Astor
Mary Astor was an American actress and musician. Although her career spanned several decades, she may be best remembered for her performance as Brigid O'Shaughnessy in The Maltese Falcon. Astor began her long motion picture career as a teenager in the silent movies of the early 1920s.
Director Lindsay Anderson wrote of Astor in 1990 that when 'two or three who love the cinema are gathered together, the name of Mary Astor always comes up, and everybody agrees that she was an actress of special attraction, whose qualities of depth and reality always seemed to illuminate the parts she played.
Jean Simmons
Off the screen for a few years, Jean Simmons captivated moviegoers with a brilliant performance as the mother in All the Way Home (1963), a literate, tasteful adaptation of James Agee's 'A Death in the Family'. However, after that, she found quality projects somewhat harder to come by, and took work in Life at the Top (1965), Mister Buddwing (1966), Divorce American Style (1967), Rough Night in Jericho (1967), The Happy Ending (1969) (a Richard Brooks film for which she was again Oscar-nominated, this time as Best Actress).
Groucho Marx
Terry-Thomas
One of Britain's most beloved eccentric comedians, the irrepressible, gap-toothed Terry-Thomas starred in I'm All Right Jack (1959) (in which he recreated his Major Hitchcock character as a representative of management vis-à-vis labour) and School for Scoundrels (1960), in which he was perfectly cast a first-class bounder and Too Many Crooks (1959). Alternating dastardly, moustache-twirling comic villains (Those Magnificent Men in Their Flying Machines ) (1965)) with sophisticated, rakish bon vivants and impeccably British chauffeurs (Kiss the Girls and Make Them Die (1966) or butlers (How to Murder Your Wife (1965), popularised Terry on both sides of the Atlantic.
Anne Baxter
A granddaughter of Frank Lloyd Wright, Baxter studied acting with Maria Ouspenskaya and had some stage experience before making her film debut in 20 Mule Team (1940). She became a contract player of 20th Century Fox and was loaned to RKO Pictures for the role of Lucy Morgan in Orson Welles' The Magnificent Ambersons (1942), one of her earlier films. In 1947, she won the Academy Award for Best Supporting Actress for her role as Sophie MacDonald in The Razor's Edge (1946). In 1951, she received an Academy Award nomination for Best Actress for the title role in All About Eve starring Bette Davis (1950).
Peggy Ashcroft
Peggy Ashcroft (1907 – 1991) was an English actress whose career spanned more than 60 years winning an Academy Award for Best Supporting Actress and several British and European awards.
Born to a comfortable middle-class family, Ashcroft was determined from an early age to become an actress, despite parental opposition. She was working in smaller theatres even before graduating from drama school, and within two years thereafter she was starring in the West End. Ashcroft maintained her leading place in British theatre for the next 50 years.
Laurence Olivier
Laurence Olivier
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Venetian Mask
After a long absence, the Carnival returned in 1979. The Government decided to bring back the history and culture of Venice, and sought to use the traditional Carnival as the centerpiece of its efforts. The redevelopment of the masks began as the pursuit of some Venetian college students for the tourist trade. Since then, approximately 3 million visitors come to Venice every year for the Carnival.
Venetian Mask
The carnival ends with the Christian celebration of Lent, forty days before Easter, on Shrove Tuesday (Martedì Grasso or Mardi Gras), the day before Ash Wednesday. The festival is world-famous for its elaborate masks.
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Piazza San Marco is the city's main public square and contains its most famous buildings such as St Mark's Basilica and the Doge's Palace. Napoleon called it 'the world's most beautiful drawing room'. Piazza San Marco is in the heart of Venice. Piazza San Marco, often known in English as St Mark's Square, is the principal public square of Venice, Italy, where it is generally known just as la Piazza. All other urban spaces in the city are called campi. The Piazzetta is an extension of the Piazza towards San Marco basin in its south east corner.
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The Moretta was a small mask covered with black velvet (hence the name 'Moretta' because, in Venetian dialect, 'moro' means dark, black) of French origin and reserved exclusively for women. Initially it was used by the ladies when they went to visit nuns in respectful silence: the Moretta, in fact, did not allow the wearer to speak because it was held close to the face without the use of laces, but by biting a button on the inside, positioned at the level of the mouth ... From this surprising detail comes the second name of this unique female accessory: the Muta.
Venice Carnival 2015
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Venice Carnival 2015
Venice Carnival The Venice Carnival became extremely popular during the eighteenth century, when aristocrats from all over the world would attend the annual festival. The royal families and nobility of other neighbouring countries would also come and dress up with elaborate masks and costumes.
For centuries, it was one of the only ways the citizens could escape from the control of the Venetian government. When Napoleon invaded Venice, the Carnival was banned for fear of the citizens conspiring against the French troops.
