Remembering Charles Addams on his birthday 🎂
📷 Albert Fenn, 1946
"To the people who were surprised that Addams did not seem sinister in the flesh, he said, 'I try not to let it show'."
- Linda H. Davis
Charles Addams gets weird
📷 Albert Fenn
These photos were published in Life magazine, December 1946
Irving Penn @NewYorker cartoonists, 1947
Helen Hokinson
Saul Steinberg
George Price
Barbara Shermund
Otto Soglow
William Steig
Richard Taylor
Whitney Darrow Jr.
Perry Barlow
Richard Dekker
Barney Tobey
Robert Day
Alajalov
Carl Rose
Leonard Dove
Chon Day
Mischa Richter
Chas Addams
Another series of Life photos of Charles Addams, this time by George Silk, from October 1948. I believe the woman is a model made up to look like Morticia.
Addams was a big car enthusiast. In the late 40s he owned a 1926 35C Bugatti, the same model that killed Isadora Duncan.
Charles Addams by George Silk, 1948
Addams collected cars his whole life.
"He dated Jackie Kennedy, and he claimed he drove her down Washington’s Pennsylvania Avenue at 110 mph, but in his 1960 black Bentley, not the Bugatti."
- Pete Vack
Charles Addams, "The Skier", @NewYorker, 1940.
Probably his best-known cartoon.
In 1945 Alfred Eisenstaedt took this shot of cross-country skier Conrad Thrane in Canada, reproducing Addams' famous cartoon.
But he spoiled the joke a bit by showing how it was done.
"A cartoon is a remark made by hand & eye instead of breath. It's like a significant glance or an expressive shrug that doesn't vanish in an instant but remains its original spontaneous self indefinitely."
- Ian Frazier
My favourite Charles Addams @NewYorker cartoon, I think.
Charles Addams
Self-portrait, 1954
"Normal is an illusion. What is normal for the spider is chaos for the fly."
Charles Addams by George Silk, 1948
He died at 76 in 1988, in his parked car.
Said his widow: "He's always been a car buff, so it was a nice way to go."
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#RIP Marilyn Bergman
📷 Lawrence K. Ho, 1996
"Lyrics as unabashedly romantic and time-conscious as the Bergmans’ require a singer’s complete emotional immersion to come fully alive."
- Stephen Holden
You Must Believe In Spring
I couldn't track down a photographer for this lovely 1969 shot of Alan & Marilyn Bergman. The #Oscar is for "The Windmills of Your Mind", one of many Michel Legrand songs for which the Bergmans provided the lyrics. #RIP
My favourite version is by Dusty!
The Bergmans by Lawrence K. Ho, 2015 #RIP Marilyn
So many great songs, so many award night triumphs.
The Way We Were, an Oscar-winning song from 1975, with music by Marvin Hamlisch. Grammy Song of the Year as well!
Remembering Graham Chapman on his birthday 🎂
📷 Chris Steele-Perkins, 1987
The parrot sketch was originally about a car.
"While John Cleese was typing it up, & dotting the Is & crossing the Ts, Graham took his pipe out of his mouth & said ‘what about a parrot’?"
- Bob McCabe
A more formal shot of Graham Chapman by Chris Steele-Perkins, 1987
Boxing Tonight: Jack Bodell v. Sir Kenneth Clark
Sir Kenneth (Graham Chapman): "This then is the height of the English Renaissance, the triumph of Classical over Gothic..."
(Bodell knocks Sir Kenneth down)
Voice Over: "He's down! Sir Kenneth Clark is down in eight seconds." #MPFC
Happy birthday Elvis Presley 🎂
📷 Gary Null
A shot from Elvis's 1968 Comeback Special on NBC.
"Elvis kicked 'How Much Is That Doggie in the Window' out the window and replaced it with 'Let's fuck.' The rest of us are still reeling from the impact."
- Lester Bangs
Henry Leutwyler
Elvis Presley's glasses
Henry Leutwyler
Elvis Presley's television
"The story goes that as he watched singer Robert Goulet performing on television one night, he shot out the screen of his 25-inch RCA TV."
Remembering Bill Graham on his birthday 🎂
📷 Thomas Monaster, New York, 1968
"Bill was our power guy, he’s the guy that made rock n’ roll into an art-form."
- Jerry Garcia
The Fillmore East marquee on the night Bill Graham pulled the plug, June 27, 1971.
"In a fitting climax, Albert King ripped up the joint. He was on opening night bill March 8, 1968. The house that rock built is dead."
- NY Daily News caption
📷 Thomas Monaster
Here's Bill Graham in the Fillmore East - nearly a full house.
📷 John Olson for Life, 1970
Remembering José Ferrer on his birthday 🎂
📷 Kurt Hutton
He's contemplating an assortment of noses for his role as Cyrano de Bergerac in Michael Gordon's 1950 film. He won an #Oscar for the movie, & a #Tony for the play; I'm trying to think of another instance of that happening.
José Ferrer & Judy Holliday both won acting Oscars on March 29, 1951. They were in New York that night, following the proceedings at La Zambra nightclub. They're having fun in this Slim Aarons shot.
Cyrano, meet Billie Dawn.
When José Ferrer wins for Best Actor, his close friend Gloria Swanson jumps for joy. Ferrer gets a hug from the eventual Best Actress winner, Judy Holliday.
📷 Hal Mathewson, 1951
Remembering David Bowie on his birthday 🎂
📷 Norman Parkinson
Town & Country, 1982
"Bowie was his generation’s standard-bearer for rock as theater: something constructed and inflated yet sincere in its artifice, saying more than naturalism could."
- Jon Pareles
David Bowie by Mick Rock
New York, 2002
Another fine photographer we lost in 2021 #RIP