1st        1954 20th Century Fox sued Marlon Brando for walking out on his role in “The Egyptian”. The suit was settled when Marlon agreed to pay $75, 000 and appear in “Desiree”. Most critics rated both films “duds”. April Fool!

2nd       1932 Thomas Jefferson died in Hollywood. No, not that one. This Thomas was a character actor in 73 silent films and 7 “talkies”, and the son and brother of actors. He was 75 years old when he died just after completing a role in Frank Capra’s “Forbidden” with Barbara Stanwyck.

8th        1986 Clint Eastwood was elected mayor of Carmel-by-the-Sea, California. He held the job for one-term.

11th       1970 The bad news was in all the headlines world-wide! The Beatles were breaking up and going their separate ways! The next day “Let It Be”, the song Paul McCartney had written for his mother, hit the top of the charts!

13th       1929 The first sound film was screened in Brazil…Ernst Lubitsch’s “The Patriot” with Emil Jannings.

15th       1949 Actor/director Wallace Beery died at 64 of a heart attack He was the brother of actorNoah Beery and the uncle of actor Noah Beery, Jr.

17th       1937 Porky Pig, the cartoon character introduced his fans to his new buddy (?), Daffy Duck in “Porky’s Duck Hunt”. Buddies don’t hunt other buddies with a gun!

21st        1913 “Quo Vadis”, an 8 reel film from Italy made big news. Its size? No! The stars? No! It was the price! For the first time a movie actually cost theexorbitant price of $1.50!

22nd      1509 King Henry VIII, best known for his wives and his unusual way of avoiding alimony, ascended to the throne of England. Jolly King Hank also inspired 3 Oscar-nominated film performances….Charles Laughton in “The Private Life of Henry VIII” (1933) (the only one to win the award), Robert Shaw in “A Man For All Seasons” (1966) and Richard Burton in “Anne of the Thousand Days” (1969).

24th       1962 Interviewer Mike Wallace (and his audience) got a taste of Burt Lancaster’s famous temper when Burt got annoyed during a taping of “P. M. East – P. M. West” and walked out.

25th       1972 George Sanders committed suicide by taking an overdose of sleeping pills. He began his suicide note with “Dear World, I am leaving because I am bored”!

26th        1970 Gypsy Rose Lee, the subject of the Broadway musical and the film “Gypsy”, died of cancer at age 56.

29th        1945 More fisticuffs! This time it was between actor Errol Flynn and director John Huston. It seems Errol, who had an affair with Olivia De Havilland, made mention of it to John, still secretly in love with the lady himself. Blows were exchanged and Errol ended up in one hospital with broken ribs and John ended up in another one with a re-broken nose.

30th        1970 Actress Inger Stevens committed suicide, her death attributed to barbiturate poisoning. This was her second attempt to take her own life. She was 35 years old.

1st        1931 “Svengali” opened at the Hollywood Theater in NYC. The film was memorable for its bizarre sets and unique visual effects as well as the stellar performances of the Great Profile John Barrymore and his leading lady, Marian Marsh as Trilby.

3rd       1967 Actor-singer Frank Sinatra, known around Hollywood as the leader of the Rat Pack and Chairman of the Board, was chosen head of the Italian Anti-Defamation League.

4th       1919 Louella Parsons must have kicked herself years later when she realized what she had done. Early in her career as a columnist, Louella commented in her column on the “youth and good looks” of a new contract player at MGM. The young starlet, who would become her worst rival was Hedda Hopper!

5th        1968 Actor Albert Dekker was found dead in his bathroom. The cause of death was listed as accidental strangulation but the methods were so bizarre that suicide or even murder would have been a reasonable conclusion.

7th         1937 Spell check! The New York Times announced that Warner Bros. had put a Midwest baseball announcer/sportswriter under contract. They listed the future president’s name as “Ronald Regan”!

10th       1974 Hal Mohr, the cinematographer on the first sound movie “The Jazz Singer” and one of only six of his peers to have a star on the Hollywood Walk of Fame, died at age 79. His final job was as consultant on Alfred Hitchcock’s “Topaz” in 1969

12th        1992 Actor Robert Reed succumbed to intestinal cancer and the complications of AIDS. He was 59. No one on the set of his television series “The Brady Bunch” knew of his condition until the week before he died. The secret escaped notice by the press because his medications were purchased under his real name…John Robert Reitz.

14th         1942 A star is born! When “This Gun For Hire” premiered at the Paramount Theater in Hollywood, a cold-blooded, psychopathic killer called the Raven made Alan Ladd a superstar!

19th       1962 Spell check again? No, this time the press had it right. The actress interviewed by The New Yorker because of her spectacular performance in Broadway’s “I Can Get It For You Wholesale” had dropped an ‘a’ from her stage name. She was now Barbra Streisand.

21st      1941 Albert Gordon MacRae, who exercised his vocal chords with Horace Heidt’s orchestra, wed popular nightclub singer Sheila Margaret Stephens. As actor Gordon MacRae, the singer went on to make 20 films, notably “Oklahoma” and “Carousel”. In the 1960’s, Sheila MacRae took over Audrey Meadows’ role as Alice in Jackie Gleason’s “The Honeymooners” television series.

22nd      1951 The Communist witch hunt claimed two more victims. Howard De Silva, who gave such a riveting performance as Benjamin Franklin in both stage and film versions of “1778” , and Gale Sondergaard, who won the Best Supporting Actor award in 1946 for “Anna and the King of Siam”, were called before the HUAC. Both were blacklisted and wouldn’t work in films again for many years.

23rd     1962 A screenplay written for television became a major stage and film success. “The Miracle Worker” with Anne Bancroft and Patty Duke reprising their stage roles premiered in New York. Both actresses would win Oscars for their performances in the story originally written for “Playhouse 90”, starring Teresa Wright and Patty McCormack in the title roles.

26th      1939 With Victor Fleming now firmly at the helm, the famous scene where Rhett Butler carries Scarlett O’Hara up that long staircase was about to be filmed. But Clark Gable and Vivien Leigh had to do it six times before Fleming was satisfied!

29th       1963 The first James Bond film premiered in the United Artists Premiere Showcase theaters. It was “Dr. No” starring Sean Connery as Bond and Ursula Andress as the first Bond girl, Honey Ryder.