Liebster Award!!!

So, you know those cool Q & A things you always see floating around in the blogosphere? I finally get to join in on the fun, thanks to my fellow blogger MarsMoonlight over at Back to Golden Days (a fabulous blog by the way). She nominated me for the Liebster Award! To participate I have to: answer the 11 awesome questions she came up with, share 11 facts about myself, nominate up to 11 other bloggers, and come up with 11 questions of my own for them to answer! Let the fun begin!

I nominate: Inky from On Shoes and Ships and Sealing-Wax, Amanda from Old Hollywood Films, Crystal from In the Good Old Days of Classic Hollywood, and Classic Reel Girl.


MarsMoonlight's questions:

1. What was the first classic film you ever saw?
I have no idea. I grew up on classic films and the Three Stooges. The Wizard of Oz (which was my favorite), The Quiet Man, Rio Grande, White Christmas, Bells of St. Mary's, Miracle on 34th Street, Arsenic and Old Lace, Bright Eyes, The Littlest Rebel, The Sound of Music, Mary Poppins... I don't remember these films ever NOT being in my life. If there's anyone out there wanting to know what classic films to start their kids on, I highly recommend these. Me and my brothers all love classic films because of these.

2. Favorite movie character (classic or otherwise)?

I would have to say pretty much any William Powell character (when he's with Loy), but especially as Nick Charles (The Thin Man). A modern character: Jude Law as John Watson.

 

     

 

3. How many films from AFI's 100 Years... 100 Movies 2007 list have you seen?

31

 

4. Favorite Gene Kelly film?

Well... to be completely honest I've never been fond of Gene Kelly (please don't hurt me ;). I've seen Singing in the Rain, An American in Paris, Summer Stock, and For Me and My Gal. But out of those I pick Summer Stock. I did like the scene in For Me and My Gal where he and Judy suddenly realize they're in love though.

 

 

5. If you could spend a day with any classic actor/actress, who would you choose and why?

I would probably pick Judy Garland. She was my idol growing up. I would (and still do) try to sing like her all the time and she is such a legend.

 

 

 

6. Is there any book you wish was adapted into a film? If so, which one?

"Enemy Brothers" by Constance Savory. It's set in England during WWII. I have no idea who I would want to play the characters though. Probably Henry Cavill for the main guy...

 

 

7. Favorite song from a movie?

"Embraceable You" from Girl Crazy. Wait, scratch that. "Over the Rainbow", duh! Also all the songs in White Christmas.

 

 

8. Favorite film from the 1940s?

Ugh, so many... How about my favorite 20?? I guess Meet John Doe.

 

9. Black & white or Technicolor?

Definitely black and white.

 

10. What actor/actress/director do you think deserved an Oscar but never got one?

First of all, I think John Wayne should have been given one a lot sooner, for The Searchers let's say? William Powell is the next one to come to mind. And Carole Lombard should have won for My Man Godfrey. And of course Judy Garland. A Juvenile Oscar just doesn't cut it.

 

Lombard and Powell

 

11. If you could cast 5 actors from any decade/era in a film, who would you cast?

I would cast Michael Callan, Cliff Robertson, Patrick Wayne, John Gavin, and Aldo Ray. I play the leading lady and they're all trying to get me to marry them :) I would never be able to decide...

 

Michael Callan?

 

 

Cliff Robertson?

 

Patrick Wayne? (you get the Duke for a father-in-law)

 

John Gavin?

Aldo Ray?

 

UPDATE: I changed my mind. I would do a nursing movie (like the nursing books written in the 50s) with Joan Chandler as the main nurse. Other cast members would include Cliff Robertson as the main doctor, Aldo Ray as the intern, Priscilla Lane as her nurse friend and roomie, and Mary Wickes as head nurse. Additional characters would include Ruth Roman (she falls in love with a dying patient) and Patricia Hitchcock in a small role. Van Johnson would be another doctor in love with Roman but unable to tell her.

 

11 Facts About Me (I'm not good with these kind of things...):

 

1. I still haven't seen Gone With the Wind, Citizen Kane, Double Indemnity, an Astaire/Rogers movie, or anything with Harold Lloyd, Clara Bow, Mary Pickford, either Douglas Fairbanks (scratch that, forgot about Gunga Din), Greta Garbo (and other silent film stars), Esther Williams, Ava Gardner, Rock Hudson, Richard Burton, Marlon Brando, or James Dean. Just this past month I saw my first movies with Orson Welles, Paul Newman, and Joanne Woodward (together and separate). Oh, and Robert Taylor and Janet Gaynor.

 

2. I wish I had eyebrows like Lauren Bacall.

 

 

3. My favorite movie is not from Hollywood's golden age. If fact, it's from the worst. It's Rocky (1976).

 

 

4. Movies I have/had an obsession with (in order of release): Cat People (1942), To Have and Have Not (1944), Gidget (1959), Moonstruck (1987), Signs (2002), Sherlock Holmes: A Game of Shadows (2011). 

 

5. Actors/actresses who mesmerized me with their performances: John Garfield and Ethel Barrymore.

 

 

6. My favorite classic actors are: John Wayne, William Powell, Bob Hope, Cary Grant, Melvyn Douglas, James Cagney, John Garfield, Joseph Cotten, and Dennis Morgan.

 

7. My favorite classic actresses are: Carole Lombard, Myrna Loy, Olivia de Havilland, Judy Garland, Lauren Bacall, Katharine Hepburn, Audrey Hepburn, Simone Simon, Priscilla Lane, and Janet Leigh.

 

Simone Simon

 

8. My favorite classic TV shows are: The Three Stooges (technically they're shorts...) The Honeymooners, Love That Bob (Robert Cummings), Life with Elizabeth (Betty White), Maverick (James Garner), My Three Sons (Fred MacMurray), The Dick Van Dyke Show, Bewitched (first 5 seasons), and Gidget (Sally Field). I like a lot more than these but I don't want this to just be a list of all the classic TV shows lol. These are ones that I've been buying on DVD (if available) and watching in order. I just started M*A*S*H a few days ago.

 

9. My favorite food is spaghetti (it has to be made by my mom) with a piece of buttered toast (whole wheat). My favorite ice cream is Breyers black raspberry chocolate. Whenever I go out to eat I end up ordering off the appetizer menu: mozzarella sticks or nachos (bean and cheese).

 

10. I want to write children's books one day.

 

11. I watched 302 movies last year (as opposed to only about 100 the year before at 60/40). 245 of them I had never seen before.

 

Here are my questions (all apply to classic movies, actors and actress, pre-1970s):

 

1. If you could pick any film home to live in which one would it be? You can also pick a summer home if you need to ;)

 

2. Film you've discovered in the past year that you are obsessed with?

 

3. Name an actor/actress you've recently discovered that you've been "binge-watching", or in other words, watching and reading everything you can on them.

 

4. What film do you love all the costumes in?

 

5. What actor/actress do you wish you looked like?

 

6. If you could change the ending of a film, which film would it be and how would it end (here's your chance to help somebody live!)?

 

7. What classic movie set do you wish had been preserved (not the house you chose above)?

 

8. If you were stranded on an island (with a TV and DVD player that were solar-powered of course), what 10 movies would you want to have with you (any decade)?

 

9. What question would you like to ask Robert Osborne?

 

10. What decade would you have liked to be a movie star in and why?

 

11. Favorite movie quote.

 

Bonus question (in case one of the above questions is just TOO hard to answer)- Who's your favorite character actor/actress (ex. Thelma Ritter, Frank McHugh, etc.)?

 

Those should make you think for a while!! Anyone I didn't nominate, feel free to answer any and all questions in the comments.