Bright Young Things

Virginia Gibson, Marilyn Monroe, Mitzi Gaynor, Leslie Caron, Tony Curtis and John Derek at the 1952 Golden Globe Awards

Goodnight, Josephine

TONY CURTIS

1925 - 2010

Like a Miss Atlantic City

Who Was That Lady?

Quick - name a Janet Leigh film, besides Psycho.

She was an Oscar-nominated actress, and half of one of the most famous, publicized couples of the 1950's...


...but Miss Leigh possibly made the least memorable films of any major star we can think of. Perhaps it was her flexibility and almost cipher-like prettiness that was the trouble: she was equally at home in dramas, comedies, musicals, and Westerns; and could give fair approximations of a girl next door, a blonde bombshell, or a glamorous fashion plate. Never honing a particular image to fix upon the public, she drifted from Houdini (1953) to The Naked Spur (1954) to My Sister Eileen (1955) with professional ease.


However, a closer inspection reveals at least two other bona fide classics in Miss Leigh's filmography, aside from her infamous outing with Hitch: Touch of Evil (1958) and The Manchurian Candidate (1962), cinephile favorites which we don't immediately associate as "Janet Leigh films." Perhaps Orson Welles and John Frankenheimer chose Miss Leigh precisely for her versatile, chameleon-like quality, and for her ability to add to the whole of the project without stealing focus from it.


Then there's Night of the Lepus (1972), but that's a whole other bag of bunnies.

She's the Sheriff

We're sure that a woman who has counted Joe Namath, Steve McQueen, Elvis Presley, James Dean, Burt Reynolds, Warren Beatty, Henry Kissinger, Bo Belinsky, and (so help us) Rock Hudson among her conquests found further use for that holster outside of her civic duties. No handcuffs in sight, though; Rock must have been borrowing them.

She Was a Backlot Hussy

Judging by her hand placement, we think Martha wants to go Hyer.

The Eyes Have It

Isn't it a Shame...

...that movie stars no longer smolder? Back in the day, even the B stars were required to sparkle, smolder, and serve glamour. And wear a mean turban.