Saturday Salon: By the Sea, By the Sea, By the Beautiful Sea...!

Edward Henry Potthast (1857 - 1927 ) was as American Impressionist born in Cincinnati, Ohio. He studied in Munich and Paris and worked as a lithographer and illustrator. But it is mostly for his sunny beach canvases and his facility with light, color and movement, that he is remembered.

To learn more about Potthast and his work, please use this link.

Disclaimer: I've culled these examples of Edward Henry Potthast's work online purely for educational and artistic enjoyment purposes. I do not own nor make any claim to own the copyrights.

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Foreign Film Poster Friday

French poster for the Hercule Poirot movie based on Agatha Christie's book, APPOINTMENT WITH DEATH starring Peter Ustinov as Poirot. Not a very good movie, but a nice poster. (In truth, this is not that terrific a Christie book either.)

P.S. It sounds so much nicer in French.

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Friday's Forgotten Books, literally...

It's Inspector Maigret Day over at Patti Abbott's blog, PATTINASE.  (Actually, it's Georges Simenon Day, but to me that means Maigret, though I realize now that Simenon wrote a lot of other good stuff too.) I decided not to write about the commisairre of the Paris Brigade Criminelle made famous by his creator, the very prolific, Georges Simenon, simply because I couldn't remember the why or the how or the what of the books I'd read and loved years ago.

I was introduced to Maigret in MAIGRET'S CHRISTMAS, an anthology of 9 Maigret short stories not to be missed. (That much I do remember.) Then I read MAIGRET AND THE MADWOMAN, MAIGRET AND THE WINE MERCHANT and MAIGRET SETS A TRAP.

But here's the thing, I can't really say much about them except, I know I loved these stories set in Paris and I was very much taken with Maigret and his indefatigable wife.

Other than that, my memory refuses to cooperate. And short of re-reading everything and taking copious notes- something I might do one of these days - I simply demurred.

But don't you forget to check in at Patti's and see what other bloggers with better memories are saying about Maigret and his creator.

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Review: TO MARRY AN ENGLISH LORD Tales of Wealth and Mariiage, Sex and Snobbery by Gail MacColl and Carol McD.Wallace

This is the sort of book you can and probably should read in bits and pieces. There are lots of photos and tons of gossip re: Victorian, and later Edwardian excesses. Also included are intriguing explanations of rank, title and society do's and dont's. It's all in the name of 19th and early 20th century American heiresses, marrying well and adding to the depleted coffers of the English aristocracy.

Always a fun thing to read about, especially for Americans. Think of the swooning popularity of DOWNTON ABBEY. (The author of which has a blurb on the cover.) And this is NON-fiction. Though it often reads as just the opposite.

I mean, we wouldn't have had Winston Churchill in one of England's (and the world's) darkest hours if beautiful American heiress Jennie Jerome hadn't gone abroad and married Lord Randolph Churchill, the second son of the Duke of Marlborough. The fact that he was a dissolute cad desperate for money AND suffering from syphilis was probably not discovered by Jenny and her family until AFTER the wedding. (Well, the money part was understood - he was only a mere 'second' son.) But despite all this, Jennie did give birth to a great man and for that history is eternally grateful.

From the back cover: In 1895 nine American girls, including a Vanderbilt (railroads), LaRoche (pharmaceuticals), Rogers (oil), and Whitney (New York trolleys), married peers of the English realm - among them, a duke, an earl, three barons, and a knight. It was the peak year of a social phenomenon that began in the Gilded Age...

In all, more than 100 American heiresses invaded Britain and swapped dollars for titles. Filled with a wealth of historical personalities, grand houses, gossipy anecdotes, and a feature called comme il faut - the very finest points of etiquette that ruled Victorian and Edwardian society - TO MARRY AN ENGLISH LORD is their story.

Best read, as I mentioned, in bits and pieces - at least that's how I'm doing it - this is a grand book to dip into when life gets you down. No, I mean it. Think of the sheer bloody-mindedness that was an entrenched part of the day to day drama of these 'poor little rich girls'. (It was a life where if a woman simply bent over to adjust the buckle of her shoe - it was seen as untoward behavior.) Oh yeah, they were indescribably rich in an era before taxes and they had titles (I mean, who wouldn't want to be a Duchess? or even a plain old Lady something or other?) and tons of servants to cater to their every whim and lived in glorious mansions and had gorgeous fashions to wear....hmmm.

Okay, so maybe I don't feel that sorry for them. But you have to admit that some of these bright young things were practically sold by their doting mamas into the kind of rigidly structured 'societal slavery' that did not augur well for happily ever after. (Not that it should have come as any surprise after having experienced the cold-blooded rigors of New York society.) Love appears to have been the first casualty in most instances - many of these marriages were a misery for both bride and groom. But hey, you can't have everything. (Not for lack of trying, though.)

An aside: it remains (for me, at least) hard to fathom how the Prince of Wales (later Edward VII) was able to amass such a stable of lovely mistresses, given his homely looks and rather rotund appearance. (He had inherited his mother's baggy pop-eyes.) I know a liaison with a future King meant great influence and could be considered a social coup, but really...Maybe he had a great personality? You think?

My only quibble with the book is that it is confusing to follow one direct story straight through. Chapters are broken up by boxed 'asides,' photos and other intrusions containing info not always pertaining to what you're reading about.

But really, who cares? It's not rocket science. This is still a fun book to have on hand when DOWNTON ABBEY closes shop for the season.

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Food and Fiction

Alice in Wonderland Tea

Fictitious Dishes, a fun literary/foody project by graphic designer Dinah Fried takes a look at five favorite fictional works and surmises what might be on the menu. Take a look, it's enough to make you hungry for food AND reading. Never a bad combo, in my book.

Moby Dick

This gives rise to thoughts about other meals other fictitious characters might eat. Think about it.

Photo: Dinah Fried 
Thanks to Shelf Awareness for the original link.

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Overlooked (or Forgotten) Film Tuesday: SUSPECT (1987) starring Cher and Dennis Quaid

Today is Overlooked (or Forgotten) Film Tuesday, the weekly meme hosted by Todd Mason at his blog, SWEET FREEDOM. So don't forget to head on over there and check out the links.
I'd literally forgotten about today's film until very recently. I've been meaning to re-watch it but haven't had a chance. Hence, my post is based on memory with one or two proddings from IMdB.

Cher is one of the most engaging and charismatic film actors. It's hard to fathom how she does it, especially with her dazzling appearance - yet somehow she manages to disappear into her roles. Not only is she gorgeous, but the woman can act. Why she hasn't made more movies is anybody's guess.

The SUSPECT screenplay proposes the absurdity that a New York defense attorney (Cher) and a jury foreman (Dennis Quaid) could cahoot to solve the case they're both involved in (the case being tried in court) in which Cher's client, a deaf mute homeless man (Liam Neesom in one of his first roles), stands accused of a brutal murder.

As if no one would notice the lawyer and the jury foreman chatting mysteriously in the shadows. It is impossible (not to mention forbidden) for a defense attorney to have anything to do with a juror, let alone, the jury foreman, most especially DURING an on-going trial. It would mean immediate dismissal of said trial. (Not to mention a HUGE black mark against the attorney - a hearing for sure.)

But somehow, Cher and Dennis manage it.

Aside from that major implausibility, this film has some very sinister goings-on within the empty halls and underground passageways of a large court building: Shadows. Strange noises. Clicking heels. Echos. All sorts of sounds in the dark. Plus a very intriguing courtroom mystery.

A terrific thriller with a wham-bang of an ending.

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A Younger Morse

I wasn't going to watch this because, really, what would it be like? I suffered through Morse's death (and the real life death of John Thaw) and did I want to be reminded?

But PBS has the entire film for view on its website. So I took a chance and was rewarded with something really quite special.
For years we never knew what Morse's first name was as he was always referred to, simply, as Morse. But once we found out (near the end of the original series), we kind of understood his disinclination to reveal it.  It is an odd name though in some strange way, entirely appropriate.

The film is a prequel to the original series and it stars someone I am totally unfamiliar with, Shaun Evans. (Where do the Brits keep turning up these wonderful - and quirky - young actors? Never mind, where - how?)

It's a bit difficult to imagine Evans as the future Morse, but there is some vague resemblance. Close enough. Here he is an opera loving, gawky youth, a loner with a laser like mind and an ego to match.

In the story, set in 1965, we are treated to Constable Morse's first few awkward days on the job. We meet Inspector Thursday (Roger Allam), an honest cop who becomes Morse's mentor - more or less. (Though Morse is obviously the more brilliant of the two.) These two work wonderfully together - Allam is an especially likable actor. The rest of the cast isn't bad either. These things are always so well done, rarely a dud in the bunch.

Morse's first case is a difficult one. The disappearance of Mary Tremblett, a fifteen year old girl, later found strangled, her body tossed naked, in a wood. The police brass who are, themselves, under the thumb of a local, slimy, blackmailer (a car dealer, natch) would like the whole thing to go away.

Especially when it looks as if Mary's sad death and the 'suicide' of an Oxford student are tied together and may lead back to the university itself when one of the professors comes under suspicion of hanky-panky with the underage girl.

This particular professor happens to be married to the an opera soprano whom Morse idolizes. She has retired from performing and seems happy enough just to be a faculty wife. Morse is bowled over at meeting her and tells the story of how it was her sublime singing (most especially an aria from Puccini's Madame Butterfly) which taught him - as a child growing up in a bleak world - that beauty existed.

The entire story itself would fit the operatic mold of high melodrama, unrequited love, sex, death and destruction. Especially the very affecting ending.

Morse is shown to be as relentless and impatient when young as he was when we met him years later. He is devoted to the truth, no matter where it might lead.

My favorite scene: Morse is driving Inspector Thursday's Jaguar, the Inspector at his side. Thursday is talking about Morse's possible future. Morse looks in the rear view mirror and suddenly we hear the haunting sound of the original Morse music by Barrington Pheloung - just a little - and we see a familiar forehead and white hair in the mirror. It is an emotional moment.

I hope ENDEAVOUR becomes a series.

John Thaw

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