Front Row Dress Circle

Not all fashionable trends come out of Paris and Milan - for many years in the early decades of the twentieth century Hollywood wielded the most influence over how people wore their hair, the way ladies dressed and even how they dressed their children. Ask your Gran about those poor kids she knew who had to go around with rag curls in their hair each night so that they would look like Shirley Temple…every mother in the 1930’s wanted their little girl to look like the famous ring-curled moppet but what they did not know was that Shirley’s famous curls were not all entirely hers…a good number were glued onto her hair after it was discovered that the curling wand was damaging her baby-fine locks. A bald Shirley Temple would have spelt disaster for the Fox studios of course. But how did Mrs Temple create those curls at all…? she was a fan of silent actress Mary Pickford and decided baby Shirley would have ring curls too - 56 in fact all over her head. The process involved - carried out every night - dampening the hair with a wave solution, wrapping a lock around her finger, securing it with a bobby pin and then combing it when dry.

The Pageboy: this style still enjoys popularity today and has taken varying forms. The Pageboy had it’s origin when Lauren Bacall hit the screens in 1944 as the 19 year old co-star of Humphrey Bogart with waves styled under and swept to the side smoothly with a parting. Actress June Allyson wore the pageboy style shorter and more combined with a bob and actually wore her hair in this style well into old age. The style has been mostly attributed though to the trends of the 1950’s when Marilyn Monroe styled her platinum blonde hair into a very short pageboy for the film The Seven Year Itch, and kinky glamour model Bettie Page became synonymous with the hairstyle.

The style was taken from the way boys wore their hair in the 19th century; when the ends of the hair is rolled upwards and outwards the style is known as the ‘pageboy flip’.

The Bob: This trendy hairstyle has never been out of fashion thanks to several actresses across the years. The Bob has been there right from the start, from the early talkies in the 1920’s through to the 1960’s and and 1970’s. In the early years it was enigmatic actress Louise Brooks who made this cut fashionable and was to inspire Liza Minnelli to copy the fashion in ‘Cabaret’ and also Glenda Jackson who wore a slightly longer style of bob cut in her 1973 Hollywood debut film ‘A Touch of Class’. The style was definitely suited to straight hair and any kinks would have been ironed out with ghd Hair​ Straigh​teners​ to achieve that sleek and glossy look. Elizabeth Taylor wore a longer bob cut famously in ‘Cleopatra’.

The Poodle Cut: Inspired by the Italian street girls of Rome, this cut was launched by the siren herself Gina Lollobrigida in the 1956 film ‘Trapeze’. The style was one of the first to feature a root perm and the edges, cut short and wispy, were styled around the face with styling spray.

It was very similar to the style worn by Elizabeth Taylor in ‘A Place in the Sun’, the difference being that Gina’s hair was curled and styled while Taylor’s hair was basically straight and shaped with curlers around the face.

The Wash ‘n Wear Perm (or…the Nellie Forbush cut): Ladies who love to perm had broadway star Mary Martin to thank for introducing this most popular style to the world back in the 1940’s. Back then the usual permanent wave to get was the Marcel Wave which required much pinning, setting and waiting to dry - but then along came the stage musical South Pacific. Star Mary Martin, as Nellie Forbush, had to wash her hair on a nightly basis for a scene (I’m gonna wash that man right outta my hair…) and so legendary Hollywood hairdresser Helen Turpin devised a style for her which was both perky and ‘Nellie’ and also ‘drip dry’ so that her hair would be dry for the next scene - the wash ‘n wear perm was born. Mitzi Gaynor adopted the style for her role as Nellie in the film and the short, curly style is still popular today.

The Gamine Cut: This style, certainly not for everyone, was worn with great flair by actresses such as Leslie Caron, Jean Seberg and Mia Farrow. The style appeared in the 1950’s when Leslie Caron arrived from France and required a style to suit her elfin features. Twiggy made the style very famous in the 1960’s and the cut is still popular today.

Popularity: 14% [?]

Everyone loves a good cry and what better way to get some cry-therapy than to sit down and enjoy your favourite tearjerker? We all have our favourites and there are plenty of moments captured on celluloid guaranteed to bring a lump to your throat.

Here are just a few of my own favourites…

Titanic - who didn’t have a blub into their hankies towards the end of this film? for me it was the moment when the elderly Rose walks the deck towards the edge of the ship and leans over the side to gaze down into the depths of the ocean above the site of the wreck of the Titanic. She thinks back to that fateful night and then opens her hand to reveal the precious stone that she carried on her when she was rescued from the water all those years ago. She takes a deep breath and then lets it fall down into the black depths. Then she is shown in her bed and we know she has passed on - the camera lingers on photos, moments from her life after the tragedy. Then for major lump-in-the-throat stuff we are whisked back to the Titanic in all it’s glory, as Rose, young again, meets Jack on the staircase under the clock and kiss to the applause of all those friends who perished that night so long ago. 

On Golden Pond - I blubbed when I first saw it in 1980 and I still get choked up when I watch this film starring the irreplaceable Henry Fonda and Katharine Hepburn. Two moments for me in particular: 1) when Norman is dispatched to pick some strawberries for Ethel and he becomes lost and disoriented after walking just a few feet from their home. He finds his way back and breaks down when he tells her he ‘forgot the way’. Ethel then tells him that, no matter what happens, he will always be her ‘knight in shining armour’. 2) right at the end when Chelsea is saying goodbye to her parents and for the first time calls her father ‘dad’ instead of ‘Norman’. He takes her in his arms and holds her and she relishes the moment between them. 

Terms of Endearment - three moments for me in this one. The first is the famous ‘give my daughter the shot!!!!’ which any mother can surely identify with. I think any mother would ‘do an Aurora’ if the need arose. The second is the scene which, once again, would tear at the heart of any mother - where Emma says goodbye to her two little boys in the hospital knowing her death from cancer is imminent. The third, and the one which makes me almost choke to death each time I watch it, is Emma’s death. The finest ‘death scene’ I have ever watched in a film - Emma slips away silently after turning to look at her mother.  Aurora leans in close expecting her daughter to say something to her and then realises she has died - her anguish and tears at her daughter’s passing…”I never thought it would be this hard, this is too hard, oh my sweet, sweet baby…”

Lassie Come Home - sorry, but it just does something to me does the final scene. After being sold and sent away because her owners could not afford to keep her, Lassie has finally limped home to her village and makes her way to her spot under the tree to wait for her little master to come out of school. When the young Roddy McDowell sees his beloved long-lost dog waiting for him he runs to her and throws his arms around her with joy…”You’re my Lassie come home”. Sniffle…

Philadelphia - this wonderful film has a final sequence which breaks my heart. Andy has died from AID’s and at his wake his family and friends gather around a television to watch home movies featuring Andy and his younger brother as little boys. Playing on the beach, opening Xmas presents, blowing out candles on a birthday cake, being normal healthy children…with the music of Bruce Springsteen accompanying the footage the images are a powerful and at the same time heartrending portrayal of past happiness and immense loss. The first time I saw the film this final sequence devastated me.

Waking Ned Devine - I just love this delightful film starring the late, great Ian Bannen. Shot on the Isle of Man, we see the touching relationship between two elderly men who have been friends all their lives and now must put not only their friendship to the test but their principals as well when they conspire to collect the Lotto winnings of a friend who died of shock during the televised draw. The moment I love is when the village is burying old Ned and the lottery agent comes into the church during the funeral. Micheal Sullivan has pretended to be Ned to the agent and is seated in the front pew - his friend and co-conspirator Jackie is giving the eulogy and has to decided whether to maintain the charade or not…and begins to eulogise instead about his ‘very dear friend Micheal Sullivan’. He talks about their friendship and how “the words spoken at a funeral are spoken too late for the man who has died” - he is paying tribute to his lifelong friend sitting in front of him, still very much alive, and who gets the rare chance to hear words spoken about him which he would never have heard otherwise.

Up - what a revelation this animated film is. In the early part of the film the beautiful and moving montage of the life of the elderly man and his wife, showing them across the years from their marriage to her death. Just gorgeous.

Ghost - ah come on, everyone has a blub at the last scene when Molly at last is able to see her beloved Sam as he bids farewell to her moments before he is finally taken to heaven.

Blossoms in the Dust - the moving 1941 film about Edna Gladney, the wonderful woman who opened an orphanage in Fort Worth Texas for ‘foundling’ children in the days when illegitimacy was a stigma that destroyed many innocent lives. Continues to pack a powerful punch even today - Mrs Gladney fought the terrible social stigma so many children carried throughout their lives as the word ‘illegitimate’ used to be stamped on one’s birth certificate and even passport. She successfully fought to have this word removed from all official records. In this film Greer Garson plays Edna Gladney and this film has many moments of deep emotion. For me it is the scene when Edna must finally relinquish the little boy Timmy whom she has cared for since he was an abandoned baby with a disability. Edna prepares Timmy for adoption by a couple who have recently lost their own child, packing his suitcase and telling him about his new home despite the agony she feels in her own heart at giving him up. This is the one film my own father could not get through without a box of kleenex!

Popularity: 37% [?]

Former child actor Gary Coleman has died at the age of 42 after a fall at his home in Utah. He suffered head injuries from which he never recovered, his life support system was turned off after he failed to regain consciousness.

How sad is this news…? absolutely tragic in my opinion. Gary was a young man who we all had known since he was a very young child. Due to a congenital kidney disorder he never grew taller than that of an eight year old child and even at the age of 42 he still retained that cute, youthful appearance that we all fell in love with back in the 1980’s when he starred as the little boy Arnold Jackson in the tv sitcom ‘Diff’rent Strokes’. Gary is now the second ‘child’ of the three child stars in that show who have died since the series ended production - Dana Plato, who played adoptive sister Kimberly Drummond, died from a drug overdose in May 1999 having turned to crime and prostitution in her adult life. Fellow co-star Todd Bridges, who played his brother Willis Jackson, was a very talented child actor who also fell on hard times after the series ceased production. Todd was arrested several times for armed robbery and drugs charges but is now said to be rehabilitated and trying to rebuild his career.

Life for the children of ‘Diff’rent Strokes’ was very hard when the series ended. Dana Plato fell into the seedy world of drugs and prostitution, Todd Bridges life went awry with crime and Gary Coleman’s life went the way of so many talented child actors of the past - his high earnings were fleeced by his adoptive parents and by the time he turned 18 he learned that he had only $200,000 left to his name despite having earned millions of dollars since he was six years old. He became a champion for child actors in the industry and helped create legislation that ensured that ALL child actors kept every cent they earned until they reached adulthood.

Many people remember Gary Coleman as his role as Arnold Jackson being his first - it was not. I recall him making his first appearance in the tv sitcom ‘Good Times’ (1974-1979) with Jimmy Walker and Esther Rolle (JJ and Florida Evans). He was a little boy chasing after a very young Janet Jackson in the show. His very first appearance made such a huge stir; a teenaged Janet Jackson, playing the adoptive daughter ‘Penny’ of neighbour Willona, entered the Evan’s apartment stating she was trying to get away from someone pursuing her - the doorbell rang and in strode the tiny Gary Coleman resplendent in a three piece suit…“So THERE you are…woman, I’ve been looking for you EVERYWHERE!…”

The studio audience went absolutely wild for this cute little guy who was so young and yet had such brilliant comedic timing.It was only a matter of time before he had his own show…Diff’rent Strokes.

Gary Coleman never enjoyed the same fame in adulthood that he enjoyed as a child and teenager. He remained a very talented actor as an adult but unfortunately was typecast and producers were unable to look beyond the image of him being simply a cute but overgrown child. In 2007 Gary married his girlfriend Shannon Price, 22, and despite several well reported domestic disputes between them she was still his wife when he died at 12.05 MDT on May 28th 2010.

As we write, all of Hollywood is now paying tribute to a very talented young actor who was the victim of a cruel industry to which physical appearance means everything. An unforgiving industry which so often recognises great talent only when it is too late. Gary Coleman was used and cast aside when his cuteness ran out - his talent though never did.

Dana Plato update: It was reported on 13 May 2010 that the son of tragic ‘Diff’rent Strokes’ actress, Dana Plato, had committed suicide almost eleven years to the day his mother had died in 1999 from a drug overdose.  Tyler Lambert was the baby Dana Plato was pregnant with in 1985 when she was written out of the comedy series Diff’rent Strokes as a 19 year old. It was hoped her pregnancy could be written into the show but was decided against at the last minute - she was sacked from the series and thereafter fell into a life of crime, drugs and prostitution until she was found dead in her trailer from a drug overdose at the age of 34. Her 14 year old son, Tyler Lambert, was taken into care by his father, rock star Lanny Lambert, but eventually followed his mother into the seedy world of drugs and crime. 

Popularity: 57% [?]