Except for him kissing her eyelids when she got smoke in them there was nothing else except for a couple of hugs. I know that off-screen they had the opposite political opinions (Douglas very liberal and Dunne very conservative)and wonder if they might not have been too fond of each other?
shareWhat would they have argued about? Social Security was a year old and AFDC was still a year away. Dunne got herself a powerful agent, Charles Feldman, when most of Hollywood was saddled with 7-year studio contracts and took the bosses to the cleaners. 1936 was huge for her.
joes119-1 wrote:
What would they have argued about?There was plenty to argue about at the time, and a lot of argument in Hollywood.
"I have no idea if these two actors argued that all."
Then why respond? The politics of Dunne and Douglas can't be judged by 21st century gridlock context. Dunne was more of a 19th century Republican and in Kentucky/Indiana she'd have been a wild-eyed liberal. And she was the actor who broke the bank for actor compensation against the Hollywood 'conservative' establishment.
I do have an idea about Dunne's argumentativeness: she never revealed even a hint of it in any statement made and/or recorded publicly. And, of course, we were talking about Dunne and Douglas, not Hollywood. Neither of these two ever had that tag stick to them.
You seem a bit anxious to display your flawed perceptions. Take them back to Friends where they won't be noticed.
joes119-1 wrote:
Then why respond?I was responding to your post:
What would they have argued about? Social Security was a year old and AFDC was still a year away.that demonstrates that you have absolutely no idea about politics in Hollywood in the 30s.
The politics of Dunne and Douglas can't be judged by 21st century gridlock context.For the people who felt strongly about politics, and Douglas was certainly one of them, the disagreements were much stronger than almost anything that exists today.
Neither of these two ever had that tag stick to them.That is simply untrue. Douglas was very political, liberal not communist, but his wife was far to the left of him and very close to the Communists.
You seem a bit anxious to display your flawed perceptions.I was correcting your completely clueless statement that there was nothing political to argue about in Hollywood in the 30s.
"What would 'they' have argued about?" It's beyond obvious that only two people are represented by the pronoun.
If ever Irene Dunne argued anything with anyone in the 30s it's never been recorded.
As it takes two to make an argument my question "What would they have argued about?" remains unanswered. And, as I perceive you may be conversing in ESL, "What would they have argued about?" has not the same meaning as "..there was nothing to argue about.."
The chasm that so divided Hollywood was that one separating the 'conservative' studio owners and the 'liberal' talent. Dunne and her agent Charles Feldman blew that up to the benefit of the talent. If Douglas was getting fairly paid he would have owed something to Dunne besides an argument.
I've read your linked article and can't give it any credit though it may be, in some part factual. One result of the world's so many turns is the politicization of age-old massacre.
joes119-1 wrote:
As it takes two to make an argument my question "What would they have argued about?"What would the devout Catholic Dunne and the liberal-communist sympathizer (in the mid-30s) with the far left wing wife have argued about in the mid-30s? Think about it. It really should come to you.
The chasm that so divided Hollywood was that one separating the 'conservative' studio owners and the 'liberal' talent.That wasn't the only one and that wasn't the one that ended up tearing apart friendships among actors and writers and directors.
I've read your linked article and can't give it any credit though it may be, in some part factual.You would've fit right in with the group of Communists and communist sympathizers in Hollywood in the 30s who denied the horrors that were happening in the Soviet Union. The point of the link to the article is that that is the sort of thing that people argued about.
I think you're drowning now! You can't find any proof that Irene Dunne ever argued with anyone about anything yet you're as certain that she did as you're certain about events in the Ukraine 80 years ago.
And quit dodging the fact that the issue is about specific two people and two people only. Not about writers, not about Europe, not about the Spanish Civil War.
Lastly, your implication that Dunne's Catholicism considered anti-Communism and Pro-fascism as an equivalence is just plain garbage. Show me one word she ever uttered in support of Franco or against the Republic.
If you can offer some evidence that both took public positions on opposite sides of any other issue under the sun then serve it up. I'll wait.
And ponder.. "What would Irene Dunne and Melvyn Douglas argue about?"
joes119-1 wrote:
yet you're as certain that she didYou are just lying. I have never said that. I have said twice that I don't know if they argued.
as you're certain about events in the Ukraine 80 years ago.Mass starvation in the Soviet Union as a result of Stalin's policies has been exhaustively documented. There was no revelation in the article. Anyone who knows anything about the history of the Soviet Union in that period knows that.
Lastly, your implication that Dunne's Catholicism considered anti-Communism and Pro-fascism as an equivalence is just plain garbage.You are just lying again. I did not say that. I said that the Catholic Church was extremely vocal about his opposition to godless Communism. It was not vocal about his opposition to Nazism particularly in Germany.
What would they have argued about? Social Security was a year old and AFDC was still a year away.What would an individual who is described as a devout Catholic and an individual who politically was in the alliance of Liberals and Communists that saw the Soviet Union as the salvation of the world have to argue about?
And ponder.. "What would Irene Dunne and Melvyn Douglas argue about?"What would the people in the examples above have to argue about? I'm not saying that they necessarily would argue, but they certainly have obvious strong disagreements to cause tensions, and they might well end up arguing about them. At least,the deeply held disagreements -- they were about fundamental matters of morality -- might well have caused unspoken tensions. Things like that usually do.
How about you produce a Dunne statement on a fundamental matter of morality with which Douglas would/could/might have disagreed. Or agreed.
I won't read your generic blather about arguments people other than Dunne or Douglas might argue over. It's irrelevant.
Dunne and Helen Gahagan were both devout Catholics. Gahagan belonged to the Hollywood Anti-Nazi league, Dunne didn't. Was she 'pro-Nazi'? Smearing Gahagan because she supported the ONLY people in the world fighting the Nazis bent on exterminating people of her husband's faith would, I think put you at odds with Dunne, Douglas, and Gahagan. You're the Nazi sympathizer! By 1941 they were the only ones fighting Communism!!
Hey. This is obviously your life but it's not mine. Only the IMDB notifications and your ridiculous [redacted] brings me back. You're looking like a stalker. Can't you find some unfunny TV 'comedy' from long ago on which you can obsess?
"When we have learned to love our neighbour, not just ourselves, no matter where we come from, then America will be perfect." Irene Dunne
joes119-1 wrote:
How about you produce a Dunne statement on a fundamental matter of morality with which Douglas would/could/might have disagreed. Or agreed.If Dunne, as a devout Catholic, followed the teachings of her church, she would've disagreed is a fundamental matter of morality with someone who supported the Soviet Union which Douglas did in the mid-30s.
Gahagan belonged to the Hollywood Anti-Nazi league,
The Hollywood Anti-Nazi League (later known as the American Peace Mobilization) was founded in Los Angeles in 1936 by Otto Katz and others to organize members of the American film industry to oppose fascism and Nazism. Although it was a communist front organization, run by the American popular front, it attracted broad support in Hollywood from both members and nonmembers of the Communist Party USA (CPUSA). Like many such communist front groups, it ceased all anti-Nazi activities immediately upon the signing of the Molotov–Ribbentrop Pact in August 1939.
Emphasis added
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hollywood_Anti-Nazi_League
Dunne didn't. Was she 'pro-Nazi'?You are lying again. I have never suggested anything like that. I have only said that as a devout Catholic, she was very likely to been strongly anti-Communist.
Smearing Gahagan because she supported the ONLY people in the world fighting the Nazis bent on exterminating people of her husband's faith wouldThe only people fighting the Nazis were the Communists and that attracted many liberals into their orbit. How am I smearing her. She was far to the left of her husband.
By 1941 they were the only ones fighting Communism!!From 1939 until Germany invaded the USSR, they were allies.
Can't you find some unfunny TV 'comedy' from long ago on which you can obsess?Your complete lack of intellectual honesty does call for a reply.
If you can't answer the question "What would they have argued about?" with something other than an "I don't know.." your appeal to 'intellectual honesty' is ended with that admission. Move on.
There's nothing intellectual going on here. You're a simpleton assigning positions to people based on nothing but their religion or willingness to accept help from anyone who might fight the Nazis. How honest is your acceptance of Nazism as the lesser evil?
And IMDB is the LAST place you should spout HUAC nonsense about people trying to keep their Euro relatives out of an oven.
joes119-1 wrote:
If you can't answer the question "What would they have argued about?" with something other than an "I don't know.."You are unbelievable. I have told you repeatedly what they had to argue about.
You're a simpleton assigning positions to people based on nothing but their religion or willingness to accept help from anyone who might fight the Nazis.Irene Dunne said
Now, for example, I hate Communists. But I don´t believe in jumping on top of a soapbox, and stamping my feet and waving my arms and shouting.
http://www.irenedunnesite.com/press/1949-changed-irene-airs-new-life-v iews/
Douglas was a great liberal and was a pillar of the anti-Nazi Popular Front in the Hollywood of the 1930s.Douglas would've been an extremely odd duck in the popular front of the 30s if he did not see Soviet Russia as the hope for the future.
http://www.imdb.com/name/nm0002048/bio
How honest is your acceptance of Nazism as the lesser evil?I don't think that there was a lesser evil. I think they are the same, and I think that the people who supported one were as despicable as the people who supported the other one.
And IMDB is the LAST place you should spout HUAC nonsense about people trying to keep their Euro relatives out of an oven.Once again, in the mid-30s, liberals who made common cause with the Communists routinely saw the Soviet Union as the hope for the future. The whole atmosphere was not just antifascist, it was also pro-Soviet Union. Once again, that changed first with the Moscow purge trials and then with the Nazi Soviet pact.
I think they had great chemistry in this film. In a 1974 interview Irene Dunne said that Melvyn Douglas helped her with her comedic timing in this film, which was her first comedy. So like the true professionals they were, the politics never entered into the picture.
shareI agree. The chemistry between Dunne and Douglas was non existent. He was too old (mid 30's) to be playing a romantic, impish rogue. The pigging out on cookies and intruding on the dinner party (wink and a nod to viewer) were crass and rude. There wasn't much to like about his character during his first few scenes and the initial impression left a bad taste for the remainder of the film. Discussing this with the others who watched it as well, we all felt that Theodora would have given him the air.
I came to Casablanca for the waters.....
I also thought that Melvyn Douglas' character was very offputting in the first half of the movie. Crashing the dinner was rude and following Theodora home, and threatening to expose for his own amusement, was even worse. The was primarily in the script, so not really Douglas' fault. But I can't help noting that Douglas had several parts that might have been more suitable for William Powell (whom he vaguely resembled); this film, and, particularly, Ninotchka. While Douglas was a good actor, he lacked the indefinable charisma that made Powell a star. Powell's dry debonair demeanor would have made the character's rude behavior a bit easier to take.
shareI actually think the way the film is constructed solves this problem. The second half serves as a reversal of the first so in the end, we don't end up too irritated with Michael and Theodora for their pushy behavior. While I love Ninotchka, I prefer this balance as I always felt like Ninotchka was the one making all the concessions. It got worse in Silk Stockings.
shareHis behavior in that first half reminded me of the then common movie device of attracting women by being a total %#$@^! "Yo shore do look purdy when you're mad!"