In my first blog post of this year, "What's Coming to the Blog in 2022" I mentioned a desire to cover individuals and others--such as musical groups--who have stars on the Hollywood Walk of Fame and some significant connection to Alabama. I also hope to cover the Oscars, Emmys and Tonys in a similar fashion. No, I probably won't do the Golden Globes; I have to stop somewhere.
"The Hollywood Walk of Fame comprises more than 2,600[1] five-pointed terrazzo and brass stars embedded in the sidewalks along 15 blocks of Hollywood Boulevard and three blocks of Vine Street in Hollywood, California. The stars are permanent public monuments to achievement in the entertainment industry, bearing the names of a mix of musicians, actors, directors, producers, musical and theatrical groups, fictional characters, and others. The Walk of Fame is administered by the Hollywood Chamber of Commerce and maintained by the self-financing Hollywood Historic Trust."
So this post is the first of two on the Walk of Fame. Most entries are actors and actresses; many are Alabama natives. Others are included because they have some other significant connection to the state. I was unable to locate photos of the actual stars of most honorees, but have included other illustrations. Let's begin....
UPDATE: On February 27, 2023, Birmingham native Courteney Cox received a star on Hollywood in the "Television" category. You can read all about it here.
Alabama [recording]
Up first is the musical group Alabama, "the most commercially successful country act in the 1980s". The entry at the Walk of Fame web site gives a pretty detailed history of the band from Fort Payne. The ceremony was held on October 6, 1998.
Mary Anderson [film]
Mary Anderson was born in Birmingham on April 3, 1918, and died April 6, 2014. Her acting career in films and television stretched from 1939 until the 1960s. She had a small uncredited role in the classic 1939 film The Women, then made a speaking role appearance as Maybelle Merriwether in Gone with the Wind that same year. Many significant film roles followed, including 1944's Lifeboat, an Alfred Hitchcock movie in which fellow state native Tallulah Bankhead also appeared. She brought her star power to her native city in 1947, with an appearance at the first film premier in Birmingham for Whispering City.
Anderson's induction into the Walk of Fame took place on February 8, 1960.
Tallulah Bankhead [film]
Born in Huntsville on January 31, 1902, Bankhead began her career at age 15 with a small part in a silent film made in New York City. Her final acting appearance came in a two-part episode of the Batman TV series in March 1967. I've discussed those episodes here and here. She died December 12, 1968.
In between those dates Bankhead made some movies, most prominently Lifeboat as mentioned above. I've also discussed her 1932 film, Faithless. She spent the 1920s becoming famous on the London stage, then returned to the U.S. and conquered Broadway with appearances such as The Little Foxes, Lillian Hellman's drama based on her mother's family in Demopolis and set in that town. Bankhead's performance as Regina Giddens was widely lauded, but Bette Davis landed the role in the 1941 film version.
Over her career Bankhead made almost 300 appearances on film, the stage, radio and television. She was inducted into the Walk of Fame on the same date as fellow Alabamian, Mary Anderson--February 8, 1960. I've also written about her stage appearances in Birmingham. The Encyclopedia of Alabama has a nice entry on Bankhead.
Tallulah in Faithless [1932]
Clarence Brown [film]
Although he was born in Massachusetts, Brown's family moved to Knoxville, Tennessee, when he was 11. After high school he he earned two engineering degrees from the University of Tennessee. Brown ended up at the Peerless Studio in Fort Lee, New Jersey, working in the silent film industry. In World War I he served as a fighter pilot and flight instructor. After his war service, he headed to Hollywood and a career as a film director that lasted from 1915 until 1953.
Brown [1890-1987] directed such classics as Anna Karenina and Ah, Wilderness [both 1935], The Human Comedy [1943], National Velvet (1944), The Yearling (1946) and Angel in the Outfield (1951). In his many years at the MGM studio he directed Joan Crawford in seven films and Greta Garbo in six. He was nominated for an Academy Award six times but never won.
So, what was the Alabama connection? Well, there are a couple....
After college graduation, Brown went to work for the Stevens-Duryea Company, an auto manufacturing operation located near his birthplace of Clinton, Massachusetts. But then, "I became the traveling expert mechanic for Stevens-Duryea. One of my calls was to a dealer in Birmingham, Alabama, who took a liking to me, and he set me up in a subsidiary company, called the Brown Motor Car Company. I had the agency for the Alco truck, the Stevens-Duryea, and the Hudson. It was around this time—1913, 1914—that I became interested in the picture business.” He made these comments to Kevin Brownlow, author of a wonderful history of silent movies, And the Parades Gone By [1968].
Brown's time in Birmingham was apparently pretty short; I've yet to discover any documentation of it. He did almost have another connection to the city. At one point he was engaged to actress Dorothy Sebastian, a Birmingham native. I'll be writing about her in the second half of this post. Although Brown married four times, none of his wives was Sebastian.
Johnny Mack Brown [Film]
Brown [1904-1974], no relation to Clarence, achieved fame initially as a star running back at the University of Alabama. He was a factor in the 1926 Rose Bowl where the mighty University of Washington Huskies were upset by the Crimson Tide. By the following year Brown was appearing in comedy and romantic silent films.
His studio attempted to make him a leading man with such actresses as Joan Crawford and Norma Shearer. That effort didn't work out, and by the mid-1930s Brown began making westerns. He starred in dozens before his career faded in the 1950s.
I've written several blog posts about Johnny Mack Brown. One explored Our Dancing Daughters, a 1928 silent film in which he starred with Joan Crawford and fellow Alabama native Dorothy Sebastian. Those two also appeared together the following year in The Single Standard, along with some actress named Greta Garbo. I plan to write about that film at some point.
I devoted five [yes, five!] blog posts to another of Brown's eight 1928 films, A Lady of Chance. His co-star is the great Norma Shearer. I spent so much space on this film because not only is Brown's character from Alabama, but much of the film is set in a fictional town in the state. I've explored how one of Brown's appearances with Crawford didn't pan out, and one of his many westerns, the 1945 release Flame of the West in which Brown plays a physician.
He was induced February 8, 1960. That must have been Alabama Day in Hollywood.
Brown emotes to Norma Shearer in A Lady of Chance [1928, silent] before his transformation into the star of dozens of B-movie Westerns.
Brown even starred in his own comic book series from 1950 until 1959.
Pat Buttram [TV]
Buttram [1915-1994] was born in Addison, a small town in Winston County, Alabama. He first achieved fame as the sidekick of singing cowboy Gene Autry in more than 40 movies and 100 episodes of Autry's TV show. From 1965 until 1971 he played the character Mr. Haney on the popular Green Acres TV show. Before his death he did voice work in various animated films including The Aristocats, The Rescuers and Who Framed Roger Rabbit? One of his last roles was a cameo appearance in Back to the Future III.
Pat Buttram as Mr. Haney in Green Acres
Chuck Connors [TV]
According to Wikipedia, Connors [1921-1992] is one of only 13 athletes to play in both Major League Baseball and the National Basketball Association. His baseball career eventually led him to Los Angeles, and when he realized he would not make a career of sports he quickly transitioned into acting. In 1952 and 1953 he appeared in films with Spencer Tracy and Katherine Hepburn, Burt Lancaster and John Wayne. Thus began a prolific career in movies and television that lasted until just before his death at 71. Despite many film roles, Chuck Connors is probably best remembered for two western TV series, The Rifleman and Branded.
Connors athletic career led to his Alabama connection. As seen below, he played a year with the minor league Mobile Bay Bears baseball team.
He was inducted into the Hollywood Walk of Fame on July 18, 1984.
This photo shows the 1947 Mobile Bay Bears, who won the 1947 Southern Association Baseball League championship. Chuck Connors can be seen in the top row, third from the left.
Source: University of South Alabama Archives
Chuck Connors as The Rifleman in 1962
Source: Wikipedia
Nat King Cole [TV, recording]
Although he was born in Montgomery, Cole's family moved to Chicago when he was four years old. At age fifteen he dropped out of high school and joined his older brother Eddie's musical group that recorded two singles in 1936. Cole had his first solo success in 1940 with the song "Sweet Lorraine". From then until his death Nat King Cole achieved enormous success as a singer and musician with album and singles recordings and live performances. From November 1956 until December 1957 the Nat "King" Cole Show on NBC was one of the first television programs hosted by a black. The network's inability to find a national sponsor limited its run.
Cole did a bit of acting. I've written about his role as fellow Alabamian W.C. Handy in the film St. Louis Blues. He also appeared in Cat Ballou. Cole [1919-1965] is another Alabamian inducted on February 8, 1960.
Cole released several dozen albums during his lifetime. This 1960 release was the most successful Christmas album of the 1960s, selling over 6 million copies.
Sally Field [Film]
During a career that began in the early 1960s, Sally Field has appeared in numerous iconic movies and TV shows. She began on television with the comedies Gidget (1965–1966), The Flying Nun (1967–1970), and The Girl with Something Extra (1973–1974). By the late 1970s she started a run of films that included Smokey and the Bandit I and II [1977, 1980], Places in the Heart [1984], Absence of Malice [1981], Steel Magnolias [1989], and Mrs. Doubtfire [1993]. In the 2000s Field returned to series television with recurring roles in ER and Brothers and Sisters.
Field has also starred in several films with Alabama connections. These movies include Stay Hungry [1976], Hooper [1978], Norma Rae [1979] and Forrest Gump [1994]. In her 2018 memoir In Pieces, Field has some interesting comments about most of these films. The exception is Forrest Gump, which she mentions only in passing along with other films of that time, such as Mrs. Doubtfire.
About Stay Hungry [pp 275-286, 288, 294], she noted, "...I flew to Birmingham, Alabama, where I lived for seven weeks in a squat, crumbling motel along with the other actors, a smattering of crew, plus the director (Bob Rafelson)..." The film, about the world of body builders, also starred Jeff Bridges and Arnold Schwarzenegger, just beginning his film career. Rafelson had brief flings with Fields and other women during production. His wife Toby, designer and producer on the film, soon filed for divorce.
Field worked for the third time with Burt Reynolds on Hooper [pp 340-345]. She wondered why filming was done in Tuscaloosa, since the film had nothing to do with Alabama. She had a break during shooting and flew back to Los Angeles to meet with director Martin Ritt, who was seeking the female lead for his upcoming Norma Rae. After she returned, Ritt called her at her rented Tuscaloosa house to tell her she had the part.
In her memoir Field devotes a good bit of space [pp 344-352, 355-7] to Norma Rae, a complex, intense role that won her a Best Actress Oscar. One anecdote features Burt Reynolds. He showed up at her Opelika condo "in a Cadillac convertible and a cloud of red Alabama dust.
Field has another connection to Alabama. Her maternal grandmother, Joy Bickley, was born in the state in the late 1800's [p. 17]. Field's mother, Margaret, was an actress herself whose own film and television career ran from 1946 until 1973.
More notes are below the photos.
One of Field's greatest performances was Norma Rae, for which she won a Best Actress Oscar. The film explores union organizing in a southern textile mill and much filming was done in Opelika. Actress and Birmingham native Gail Strickland had a supporting role.
Burt Reynolds and Sally Field in Hooper, their third film together.
Susan Hayward [Film]
Hayward [1917-1975] started off as a fashion model but left New York for Hollywood to try out for the role of Scarlett O'Hara in Gone with the Wind. She missed out on that part, but made films in the late 1940s and 1950s that gave her Oscar nominations for Best Actress. She won for her portrayal of death row inmate Barbara Graham in the 1958 production I Want to Live.
The actress had a bit of an unusual connection to Alabama. In 1957 she married Floyd Chalkley, a Georgia rancher and businessman. They lived in Carrollton until his death in 1966. The couple also bought property in Cleburne County near Heflin and became well known in the area. Follow the link in the first sentence of this paragraph for my blog post about that phase of her life.
I've always been a fan of Hayward. One of my favorite films of hers is the 1951 western Rawhide with Tyrone Power. Her ability to play strong women also shines in that role.
She was yet another star inducted on February 8, 1960.
Hayward proudly holds her Oscar.
In June 1969 Hayward came to Auburn University to watch her son Gregory Baker graduate from the School of Veterinary Medicine. On the left is Harry M. Phillpot,PhD, President of Auburn University from 1965 until 1980. He was there during my years as a student and employee at Auburn.
TO BE CONTINUED
