The actress moviegoers know as Polly Benedict, girlfriend to the irrepressible Andy Hardy (Mickey Rooney) in the popular M-G-M The Hardy Family film series was born on this date in Vancouver, British Columbia back in 1920—which means (although I’m always a bit hesitant to reveal a lady’s age) that she’s celebrating her ninetieth natal anniversary today. Faithful TDOY perusers know that Mickey Rooney is usually welcomed around these parts with the same enthusiasm as rubella but I make an exception for the Hardy films, and Ms. Rutherford is one of the main reasons (I also liked her as Red Skelton’s long-suffering fiancée in the Whistling films, as you might have guessed from the photo).
Ann’s not the only celeb to become a nonagenarian today—character great Warren Stevens (born in 1919 in Clark ’s Summit , PA
Daniel Boone (1754-1820) – Frontiersman-explorer whose exploits live on in reruns on the Retro Television Network
Marie Antoinette (1755-1793) – Queen of France and proponent of cake eating
James K. Polk (1795-1849) – Eleventh President of the United States
Warren G. Harding (1865-1923) – Twenty-ninth President of the United States
Jerry Giesler (1886-1962) – Legal eagle whose specialty was getting celebrities out of messy entanglements and scrapes
Alice Brady (1892-1939) – Academy Award-winning actress whose vehicles include My Man Godfrey and In Old Chicago
Tim Whelan (1893-1957) – Motion picture writer-director whose films include The Murder Man, The Divorce of Lady X and Clouds over Europe
Walter Woolf King (1899-1964) – Actor-singer best remembered as the disagreeable opera singer Rudolf Lassparri in A Night in the Opera
Paul Ford (1901-1976) – Stage, film and television character great who achieved TV immortality as Colonel John T. Hall on The Phil Silvers Show
James Dunn (1901-1967) – Academy Award-winning actor whose vehicles include A Tree Grows in Brooklyn and Killer McCoy
Sydney Zelinka (1906-1981) – Old-time radio and television scriptwriter who enjoyed a long association writing for The Honeymooners and The Jackie Gleason Show
Luchino Visconti (1906-1976) – Italian motion picture director whose works include The Leopard, The Damned and Death in Venice
Sydney Guilaroff (1907-1997) – Longtime M-G-M hair stylist (and the guy who says “damn good actress” in the beginning of those TCM Word of Mouth segments)
Bunny Berigan (1908-1942) – Jazz trumpeter/musician
Reginald Beckwith (1908-1966) – British stage, screen and film actor whose vehicles include Genevieve, The Titfield Thunderbolt and Night of the Demon
Burt Lancaster (1913-1994) – Academy Award-winning actor whose films include The Killers, Sweet Smell of Success and Elmer Gantry
Harry Babbitt (1913-2004) – Vocalist with Kay Kyser’s band
Ray Walston (1914-2001) – My favorite Martian
Sidney Luft (1915-2005) – Film and television producer better remembered as one-time husband to Judy Garland, whose Oscar for The Wizard of Oz he repeatedly tried to sell until a court told him to cut it out
Janette Davis (1917-2005) – Longtime featured female vocalist on Arthur Godfrey’s radio and television show and hawker of Carolina Rice
Shepard Menken (1921-1999) – OTR, film and television actor who did a great deal of voice work, including channeling character actor Richard Haydn for the voice of Clyde Crashcup on The Alvin Show
Howard Post (1926-2010) – Animator and comic strip-book artist who created the strip The Dropouts
Steve Ditko (1927- ) – Marvel comic book artist who co-created Doctor Strange and The Amazing Spider-Man
Earl Carroll (1937- ) – They often call him Speedo but his real name is Mr. Earl
Jay Black (1938- ) – American
Pat Buchanan (1938- ) – Conservative columnist-pundit, former Nixon/Reagan speechwriter, one-time Presidential candidate…and a man whom I’ve long suspected kicks back in the evening with a martini…dressed in an SS uniform
Stefanie Powers (1942- ) – Film and television actress best known for her TV roles on The Girl from U.N.C.L.E. and Hart to Hart
J.D. Souther (1945- ) – Country/rock singer-songwriter
Maxine Nightingale (1952- ) – R&B/Soul singer
k.d. lang (1961- ) – Country/pop singer-songwriter
David Brock (1962- ) – Former conservative turned liberal journalist-pundit and founder of Media Matters for America
David Schwimmer (1966- ) – Ross
2 comments:
Two presidential birthdays. YAY!
At first I thought..."Jay Black....& he is an American??" Then I listened to the clip and thought "DOH! I shoulda known that."
Birthdays again!!!!!! Thank you!!!!
Post a Comment