Lena Horne Is Remembered at Funeral Mass

From NYT:

"In the pews were hundreds of mourners, among them Jessye Norman, Leontyne Price, Dionne Warwick, Lauren Bacall, Chita Rivera, Cicely Tyson, Vanessa Williams and Gov. David A. Paterson. Leslie Uggams said that Ms. Horne had been someone to look up to. “When my father reluctantly figured out that I was going to go in show business,” Ms. Uggams recalled outside the church, he said, “I want you to be like Lena.”

The service began with a cello piece by Bach. Later, Audra McDonald performed an arrangement of “This Little Light of Mine” and “Amazing Grace,” and one of four speakers, Representative John Lewis of Georgia, said Ms. Horne had been “a light, and she did shine."

I never had much of an opinion about Lena Horne--a passable supper-club singer, a civil wright stalwart, a beautiful woman, an MGM star that could never really became a star--until I learned, in Billy Strayhorn's biography Lush Life, she was very close to Ellington's legendary collaborator, and I purchased a record of her standards called, unsurprisingly, Stormy Weather--both her signature song and film role. Both gave me a better appreciation for her gifts and her personality.

Stormy Weather was a great film, and she was a giant.

The list of mourners is fantastic--Leontyne Price and Jessye Norman the ones I was most pleased to see.

The legacy of Grace Kelly

From The New Yorker:

"If you want to see Hollywood at the last gasp of its otherworldliness, before the old glory gave way, consult the photograph of Kelly and her fellow-presenter, Audrey Hepburn, backstage at the Academy Awards in 1956. (Kelly had returned to present an award.) Both are in profile, gazing in expectation, and both wear white gloves. They could be at their first Communion."

I read every piece on Old Hollywood—especially when said piece involves a consideration (or reconsideration) of a star—but, aside from a few choice phrases and a couple of worthy insights (the above my favorite, if only because it is the truest), the profile is so boring and not particularly true. To people in the know, perhaps, her sexuality is an open question, but to anyone else? I somehow doubt it.

A life story worthy of the movies

From The Boston Globe

Leslie Caron says she got rid of the “dead wood’’ writing her autobiography, “Thank Heaven.’’

The candid, lyrically written tome of the French actress’s storied life chronicles her childhood in Paris, her suffering through World War II, her teenage years as a ballet dancer with Roland Petit’s acclaimed company where she was discovered by Gene Kelly, her career at MGM starring in such classics as “An American in Paris’’ and “Gigi,’’ her two Oscar nominations, her three failed marriages and high-profile love affair with Warren Beatty, her mother’s suicide, and her own battles with depression and alcohol.

I remember being elated, if slightly puzzled, to see her guest-star on Law & Order: Special Victims Unit a couple of years back, especially as her presence meant French was spoken on the show. The article is very pedestrian and uninteresting, as the headline gives some indication, but it has alerted me to her autobiography, which I will try to pick up at some point. It has been far too long since I have seen either An American in Paris or Gigi, two of my absolute favorite films, the condensed essence (and alas the twilight) of the Golden Age movie musical. God, I remember never seeing so much color in my life, even setting aside the famous Impressionist set piece of the former. And despite all this James Cameron dry-humping, count me unimpressed by Avatar. Those movies had a palette. And, not to mention, human beings. We would all do well to remember that. Even that overdetermined behemoth, Gone With the Wind—which just celebrated its 60th (I think) anniversary—had more drama in its melodrama than the most earnest "prestige" pictures.