Hazel. She Was Much More Than A Maid.....

No, not that one.  We got a whole different Hazel on tap today.


If you are someday on a quiz program and you are asked (for a one million dollar prize) if a Caucasian movie actress ever appeared on the cover of Jet Magazine.........

You're welcome.

But, love Roz as I do, we need to take a closer look at the other woman with her......Hazel Washington.  What a gal.

Hazel was born in Dallas in 1915.  Somewhere in her early teens she came to Los Angeles and was, by age 16, married to Roscoe (Rocky) Washington.  There seems to be much higher ceilings (opportunity wise) for the Washington clan during those unenlightened days than for other minority families.  Rocky, a member of LAPD was the first uniformed African American to achieve the rank of Lieutenant on the force.  Rocky's brother Julius was a Captain in the Los Angeles Fire Department, and Rocky's nephew Kenny Washington was the first Black pro athlete to sign a contract with the NFL!  So, yes, the fellas did well, but Hazel was no slouch!

By the early thirties, Hazel found employment as a 'movie maid'.  To call the position a maid is really a bit of a misnomer.  The people who did these jobs were really a combination of servant, star chef, personal assistant, and (before the costume departments became unionized) wardrobe mistress.  In quick succession, Hazel worked for Virginia Bruce, Ginger Rogers and the Great Garbo.  But in Hazel's case, the number 4 was the charm.  When Garbo went back to Europe, Rosalind Russell was her next employer.   Russell had been looking for a replacement maid.  Her previous one was a tad, shall we say, star struck.  Roz said that when she would sit down to chat with Clark Gable on a set, her maid would park herself right next to them so she wouldn't miss a word that Gable said.  Further, the woman was fascinated by the camera.  "She wound up in more shots than me!"  None of this was an issue with a seasoned pro like Washington and, as Russell was willing to pay her year round and not just when she was on a picture, Hazel stayed. 

Hazel and Roz (being the women they were) found in short order that they had become good friends in addition to their employment arrangement.  Garbo's entreaties to come back to work for her fell on Hazel's deaf ears.  One day in '36 Hazel came to work carrying a beautifully stylish leather handbag.  Russell raved, wanting to know where it came from.  Hazel told her that she had seen one in a magazine and swooned.  She realized that she could never afford it, so she went to a leather and findings shop, purchased materials and made a copy of it for herself!  Flabbergasted at the workmanship from someone who didn't know the leather goods business, Roz told her friend that she wanted her to go to night school and study the craft and further that Russell would pay for it.

Then in early '41, in the most unlikely of places, Beverly Hills......

The Afro American newspaper, March 14, 1942

For a little perspective, that $100 bag mentioned in the article would be $1500 in today's dollars.  And it was on the low end of prices in the shop.  All of Hollywood flocked to the place.  Bette Davis, Lana Turner, Joan Crawford, Ann Sheridan, Mary Livingstone, and Lena Horne were clients.  Hazel did a custom order of gloves, made to measure, for Gable.  There was a portable bar in black kangaroo skin for Van Johnson at $250.  Picture frames in powder blue suede.

The shop didn't last very long, but not because of poor sales.  It was because leather became increasingly difficult to get during the war.  While planning their next business move, Russell and Washington continued the old arrangement of Star and maid.  Around this time (because apparently there was nothing Hazel couldn't do) Washington also became the first licensed hairdresser hired by the studios to do black hair for such films as "Cabin In The Sky" and "Stormy Weather".

Finally, as both Hazel and Roz were a wiz with the knitting needles, they started a business of handmade luxury cashmere knitwear trimmed, typically in beads, sequins, lace or fur.  That is the business that the Jet cover article above talks about.  You can read the full article here.

Hazel Washington's fabulous life doesn't stop there.  I found continued mentions about her. 

1959 - Rocky and Hazel celebrate their 28th wedding anniversary at Lionel Hampton's opening at Hollywood's Moulin Rouge.

1965 - Hazel has a furrier design a full length lavender mink coat.

1966 - While attending a Shriner's convention in Manhattan, the Washingtons occupy the duplex penthouse of the New York Hilton at a cost of $500 per day.

And this little item from 1962:

The last mention I can find anywhere of Hazel was squib in the Baltimore Afro-American from 1979.  It said that Hazel was planning, with the help of a Paul Gardner, to write her biography.  It doesn't appear that the book ever happened though.  And that, dear readers, is certainly our loss.

The Mystery Gets Revealed.

Ya gotta get up pretty early in the morning.......


Despite my misleading clue, many got this one.  I'd said, "It is perhaps fitting that he's in a sailor middy"

That's because sailor suits were made of cotton!  Joseph Cotten!  (alright, not great, but I was having a bad day)


George W. Tush seemed to be on to me, but Norma (otherwise known around here as 'she who gives gifts') was the first to correctly log the name!!!

Joseph Cheshire Cotten of Petersburg, Va. was born in 1905.  He first tread the boards on Broadway in 1930 but by 1939 he would create the role of C.K. Dexter Haven opposite Kate Hepburn's Tracy Lord in that stage debut of The Philadelphia Story.

While age 36 may be a bit, shall we say, long in the tooth to get your first Hollywood feature, it does help that it's a co-starring role in what many have called the greatest film of all time, Citizen Kane.

Cotten enjoyed a 40 year film career and spent the last 15 years of his life in happy retirement before his death in 1994.

The character of Martha in Who's Afraid Of Virginia Woolf refers to him as "modest Joseph Cotten", but I've never regarded him as that.  In fact, despite the wide variety of characters that he played, (particularly in his heyday) I've always thought of him more in the 'creepy/scary/sexy/dangerous' category.

And there may be a clue behind that!  His second screen appearance was in a 1938 short film.  It's title......"Too Much Johnson".

It's A Whole New Mystery!

Now before you go thinking, 'is he doing nothing but the ol' mystery routine anymore', the answer is no.  I'm just cleaning out some old mystery photo files.  And truth be told, I've hit an ebb recently on inspiration. 

Well, that and things have been kinda busy around here what with tours, facebook page updates, other facebook page updates, recent community service commitments, haggling with greedy real estate developers who want to bulldoze Hollywood History for skyscrapers,  and so on.....

And besides, you all seem to get such material enjoyment out of this game.

IF YOU ARE NEW TO THIS GAME PLEASE READ.  If you've seen this picture before, or know for sure who this is, feel free to send me an email, but for the sake of unbridled mystery and tension, let the gang have a go guessing in the comments section.

So, without delay, Who's the kid?

It is perhaps fitting that he's in a sailor middy.  ('tho most children were back then)

The Mystery Gets Revealed!!!

Alright, this one was, shall we say, perhaps a little left field.


The beauty in question is Margaret Field.

Margaret has a list on imdb of 91 performances!  They begin in 1945 and conclude in 1973.  She belonged to that grand tradition of "working actor".  If you turned on series or anthology television in the 50s and early 60s you would frequently find Margaret.

As a young divorcee with two small children in the early 50s, Margaret married stuntman/actor Jock Mahoney and so you might also see her work credited to Maggie Mahoney, and handle she sometimes used.

Sadly, many people don't know or recognize Margaret, but they're almost certain to be familiar with her first born child, Sally.

Margaret, at age 89, passed away November 6, 2011, on Sally's 65th birthday.

Mystery Guest Will You Enter And Sign In Please...

Since we all seem to really like this, I thought we might have another go.


IF YOU ARE NEW TO THIS GAME PLEASE READ.  If you've seen this picture before, or know for sure who this is, feel free to send me an email, but for the sake of unbridled mystery and tension, let the gang have a go guessing in the comments section.

Who is this lovely gal?

This Is Everything.

"Second Fiddle", 1939

The Mystery Gets Revealed!

There were some good guesses, some funny guesses and some correct guesses this time around.  Yes we are looking at young Larry Hagman in 1941 when he was a student at the Black-Foxe Military Academy.

Oh no, not another uniform!

Now since we can't very well shower accolades on someone named Anonymous, we will have to declare Marksparky the first identifiable correct guess!  (sorry 'nony')  CONGRATULATIONS MARKSPARKY!!!

Black-Foxe existed from 1928 to 1968 right here in the shadows of Hollywood on Wilcox Ave. just south of Melrose.

Just as you'd suspect, a lot of Hollywood youngsters and futures would attend including:  Harry Carey Jr., Horace Heidt Jr., Sydney Chaplin and Michael Douglas. 

Here are a couple more sons of.....

The caption reads:  Robert Walker shows his two sons, Bobby and Michael, the camera used in filming location scenes for My Son John at the Black-Foxe Military Institute in Los Angeles, where, coincidentally, the boys are students.

 Thanks for playing everyone, there will be a new mystery soon.

Mystery Guest Will You Enter And Sign In Please...

Game Time, Game Time!!

IF YOU ARE NEW TO THIS GAME PLEASE READ.  If you've seen this picture before, or know for sure who this is, feel free to send me an email, but for the sake of unbridled mystery and tension, let the gang have a go guessing in the comments section. 


I think this one may be a stumper, but I've been wrong before........so........who is this chap?

Memories, Light The Corners Of The Lot

Twenty years ago (how on earth can that be) I worked as the Costume Supervisor on the short-lived "Ben Stiller Show". 

Being a sketch comedy show, especially one fueled by the rapid-fire minds of Ben; Judd Apatow; Jeff Kahn; Janeane Garofalo; Bob Odenkirk; etc., my memory of it is one fast blur.  I don't think I sat down once during all the months of the job.

We shot on what is called, the Hollywood Center Studios.  It's a little, nondescript independent lot on Santa Monica Blvd. at Las Palmas Street.

As an indie lot, it may have had something of a scrappy, cheesy reputation.  And yes, during that hallowed, banner year of 1939 while the big guys were churning out history like Gone With The Wind and Mr. Smith Goes To Washington our little lot was creating the epic, Sunset Trail with Hopalong Cassidy and Gabby Hayes.  But Make No Mistake:  history - important history - happened there too.

In 1919, Jasper Johns, a former associate of Charlie Chaplin, built three production stages and several bungalows on a 16.5 acre site in Hollywood and named it Hollywood Studios Inc. The first stages resembled hot houses with steel frames, cloth walls, glass roofs and clerestory windows.  It also had one of the first 'sound' stages in town, built for the princely sum of half a million dollars in late '26.  Other studios would rent it for production while their own sound facilities were being built.

It was once the home of Monogram and of Educational for a few minutes until it settled into a long run under the name of General Service Studios (catchy name).

Funny business happened here in spades.  Silent comedy legends Charley Chase and Harold Lloyd made merriment here.  And during the sound era Mae West, Laurel & Hardy and The Marx Brothers made movies here.

It all wasn't just a barrel of laughs though, Howard Hughes film (first as a silent, then reshot with sound) Hell's Angeles was made here with baby Jean Harlow. As well as the Korda Brothers setting up camp for Larry and Viv in That Hamilton Woman.

The 70s saw the productions What's The Matter With Helen, Save The Tiger and Shampoo. In the early 80s the lot was the property of Coppola's Zoetrope.  The Outsiders and Rumblefish were produced here.

But it's real claim to fame is the Golden Age of Television!  Get a load of this list:

Perry Mason, Mr. Ed, The Addams Family, The Beverly Hillbillies, Petticoat Junction, Green Acres, Ozzie & Harriet, Our Miss Brooks, and The Lone Ranger to name a few.

We shot on Stage 2, which is more commonly known as:

Yep. That's right, I got to breath that rarefied air that Lucy, Desi, Viv and Bill used for the first two seasons of the show.

In the picture below, we see the inside of Stage 2 and the blackened doorway on the left of the first floor build-out was my office. (it's still there!!) The door on the right next to it was used by the Art Department and if memory serves me, those upstairs rooms weren't built yet.

TV got it's start there from the jump when George Burns brought he and Gracie's show onto Stage 3 in 1948.

45 years after he first walked onto that lot, and at the tender age of 96, Mr. Burns still had an office in a courtyard on the lot that he would come to for about an hour or so every day.  I know this first hand because one day, in the middle of a typically hectic day, I found myself in here:

peeing next to George Burns!  And, all kidding and snarky-ness aside, it was one of the most amazing moments of my life.  "How ah ya taday kid?" he wanted to know.  We exchanged small talk and as I was leaving, I stuttered out, "Goodbye Mr. Burns, have a terrific day." to which he replied, "Kid, at this age, what else am I gonna do?  See ya."

I hadn't thought about this stuff in so long when right before Christmas, my dear friend and neighbor, Charlie, and I were running around one day.  Charlie now works on a show on that lot and he wanted to run by to pick up his paycheck.  We were walking around the place swapping stories about what it was like working there now, versus 20 years ago, and he said, "how long has it been since you visited the sidewalk in the courtyard?"

Well wouldn't you know it, he showed me something I'd never seen before.

Here, in the lovely courtyard of writers and producers offices (where I'm convinced the celestial light rays indicate that George is still here), scrawled into the sidewalk from the long ago afternoon of November 6th, 1954:

 

The signatures of Donald O'Connor and Mitzi Gaynor!

Wondrous wonders just never cease.

 

You See?

Even they knew.

Go Ahead.......

....Discuss.

Happy New Year - Lady - Day

American Beauty Rose

Say What You Will About Her....

 

 

 

The Fairbanks, Jr. divorce

 

The Tone divorce

 

 

The Terry divorce

....Joan could always dress for a divorce.

An Xmas Libation from Bill and Jean

Feliz Navi.......Nada!

In 1928, the Hollywood Chamber of Commerce came up with a brilliant idea to drive up shopping traffic along their big commercial corridor of Hollywood Blvd.  A Christmas Parade!!!

So they got America's Sweetheart to do a little advance press and Viola!  Hollywood Blvd. magically became Santa Claus Lane.

Decorations festooned the corridor and crowds gathered for what, as it turned out, wasn't much of a parade.

That first year, aside from the lovely decorations, the 'parade' consisted of what you see above, one sleigh pulled by a couple of union reindeers from the Screen Reindeers Guild and the loot in the sleigh was a little known starlet named Jeanette Loff and.......Santa Claus.

Well Santa Claus was the star of this show, and he delivered the shoppers, and so the Santa Claus Lane Parade became an annual tradition.  Santa's appearance was always the climax of the parade that sent the crowds into paroxysms of glee.  It grew every year until it included big-named stars by the score.  And there is the famous story of Cowboy Star Gene Autry riding in the parade just in front of Santa in 1946.  After a couple of blocks of hearing children shrieking "Here Comes Santa Claus! Here Comes Santa Claus", Autry gets a notion and, a new Holiday Carol is born.

So the parade is only one night but for almost a month each year, Hollywood residents and visitors alike have been treated to a sweet and magical "Santa Claus Lane"


Just Look!:

No matter how seedy and downtrodden Hollywood ultimately became, the old girl still got tarted up and stirred a little sparkle.  By the mid 1980s, when Hollywood and the Boulevard were little more than an open air drug bazaar, and looked like Beirut on a rough day, from Thanksgiving on at least, there was still a little shiny-shiny going on:

At the beginning of the new century, the word was: Hollywood is experiencing a rebirth!  And Santa Claus Lane jumped on board tying together Holidays and the Cinema!:

So by 2012, you must be thinking, it's got to be STUPENDOUS!  Well, brother, would you ever be wrong.  I took this picture today from the northeast corner of Hollywood and Cahuenga looking west and, as you can see, zilch!

It could be any ol' day of the year, but certainly not smack in the middle of the Holiday Shopping Season!  Why even the sky looks like it's going to cry.

So Hollywood Chamber Of Commerce, what are you doing with aaaaallll that money you charge folks to be members, that you can't string up a few damn lights and a strand or two of tinsel?  Huh?

Unmasking The Mystery!

You've got to be quick on the draw to be a smart Cookie.  Sure enough, he quickly revealed our Mystery Gal to be the one and only miss Kitty Carlisle.

Though I found his Peggy Cass malarky a bit suspect.  C'mon Cookie, "Tell The Truth"

Sisters under the mink?