Happy Birthday: Ava Gardner!

Ava Gardner (December 24, 1922 – January 25, 1990), performed in small roles until her performance in the film, The Killers (1946). Please click here to view The Killers(1946) movie review.

Soon after, she became one of Hollywood's leading actresses and considered one of the most beautiful women of her day. She was nominated for the Academy Award for Best Actress for her performance in, Mogambo (1953). Please click here to view Mogambo(1954) movie review.

She appeared in many films from the 1950s to 1970s: Bhowani Junction (1956), On the Beach (1959), The Night of the Iguana (1964),Please click here to view Night of the Iguana(1964) movie review. Earthquake (1974), and The Cassandra Crossing (1976). Gardner continued to act until 1986.

This video is from the film, Show Boat (1951).



Please click here to read more about Ava Gardner.

The Great Dramas: The Night of the Iguana (1964).

The Night of the Iguana (1964). Based on the 1961 play The Night of the Iguana by Tennessee Williams. Directed by John Huston.Cast: Richard Burton, Ava Gardner, and Deborah Kerr. It won the 1964 Academy Award for Best Costume Design, and was nominated for the Academy Awards for Best Art Direction and Best Cinematography. Actress Grayson Hall received an Academy Award nomination for Best Supporting Actress, and Cyril Delevanti received a Golden Globe nomination for Best Supporting Actor.

A defrocked Minister by the name Shannon, is now working as a tour guide for Blake Tours, his first job is to take a group of Baptist School teachers on a bus to Puerto Vallarta, Mexico. Charlotte's aunt, accuses Shannon of trying to seduce her niece and fires him. Panicked, Shannon drives the bus and ladies, to a Costa Verde Hotel in Mismaloya on the coast of Mexico, where he tries to prevent Fellowes from calling his boss. Shannon is surprised when he hears that his old friend Fred, died a month earlier, and the hotel is now run by Fred's widow, Maxine Faulk. Soon after, Hannah Jelkes, a painter from Nantucket who travels from place to place with her elderly poet grandfather show up. They have run out of money and Shannon convinces the not to happy Maxine, to let them stay.

While Shannon ties to battle his demons, Miss Fellows niece continues to make trouble for him.

Shannon suffers a breakdown, the cabana boys tie him in a hammock, Hannah calms him with poppy tea and understanding..





Another emotional  scene.


Night of the Iguana is deeply emotional film. The characters all have their troubles, but.. they are also thoughtful and courageous. Creating a film that is absolutely amazing. One that you will want to watch many times.

The Hucksters (1947).

The Hucksters (1947). Cast: Clark Gable, Deborah Kerr, Sydney Greenstreet, Adolphe Menjou, Ava Gardner and Keenan Wynn .

War veteran Victor Albee Norman returns to New York City, wanting to land an advertising job with the Kimberly Advertising Agency. During his interview with Mr. Kimberly, Victor agrees to take on the company's toughest client, Evans Beauty Soap. Victor likes the idea of the new advertising campaign, in which twenty-five women, give testimonials for the soap in exchange for a donation to their favorite charity. At the photographer's studio, Victor and a representative from the Kimberly agency argue over how Kay should dress for the shoot. The argument results in an emergency board meeting, during which Victor meets Evans. To prove his point that consumers can be shocked into paying attention to advertisements, Evans catches the attention of the board members by spitting on the table. Evans shares his belief that the radio ad should irritate its listeners in order to be best remembered, Victor tell him that the soap should talk about cleanliness. Victor then impresses Evans with a new classier radio ad.



To celebrate, Kimberly and his wife take Victor and Kay out to the dinner club where Victor's past lover, Jean Ogilvie, is singing, Kimberly gets drunk and almost ruins the evening.

Later when they are alone, Victor and Kay make plans to spend a romantic evening together at the, Blue Penguin Inn. Victor is surprised to see that the hotel is under a new and less-than-attentive management. When Kay arrives, she takes one look at the hotel and misinterpreting Victor's intentions, immediately leaves. Victor is still waiting for Kay when he is called back to New York. His next job is to go to Hollywood to sign up radio personality Buddy Hare for the show.

While traveling Victor runs into Jean, after their conversation, Jean realizes that he is in love with Kay. Will Victor and Kay become engaged and will Victor complete his new assignment?

This was Ava Gardner's first big role in a major film. This was the first of three films she did with Gable, besides Lone Star and Mogambo. I think that you will love Ava's and Gable's, on screen chemistry.

Keenan Wynn (July 27, 1916 – October 14, 1986) was a character actor and member of a well-known show business family. His bristling mustache and expressive face were his stock in trade, and though he very rarely had a lead role, he received prominent billing in most of his movie and TV roles.

List of Keenan films I have seen :
Week-End at the Waldorf
Easy to Wed (1946)
The Hucksters (1947)
Song of the Thin Man
Neptune's Daughter (1949)
Annie Get Your Gun (1950)
Angels in the Outfield (1951)
Royal Wedding (1951)
Kiss Me Kate (1953)
The Long, Long Trailer (1954)
Men of the Fighting Lady (1954)
The Glass Slipper (1955)
The Man in the Gray Flannel Suit (1956)
That Kind of Woman (1959)
A Hole in the Head (1959)
The Absent-Minded Professor (1961)
Son of Flubber (1963)
Dr. Strangelove (1964)
Bikini Beach (1964)
The Great Race (1965)
Stagecoach (1966)
Welcome to Hard Times (1967)
The War Wagon (1967)
Point Blank (1967)
Terror in the Sky (1971) (TV)
The Mechanic (1972)
Hijack! (1973)
Herbie Rides Again (1974)
The Devil's Rain (1975)
The Shaggy D.A.
Best Friends (1982)

Ava Gardner.

Naked Maja, The (1959). Romantic biography of the Spanish painter Goya and his relationship with the Duchess of Alba. Cast: Ava Gardner, Anthony Franciosa, Amedeo Nazzari. Dir: Henry Koster.

On the Beach (1959). After a nuclear war, U.S. sailors stationed in Australia deal with the end of civilization. Cast: Gregory Peck, Ava Gardner, Fred Astaire.

Angel Wore Red, The (1960).A priest and a prostitute fall in love during the Spanish Civil War. Cast: Ava Gardner, Dirk Bogarde, Joseph Cotten. Dir: Nunnally Johnson.

55 Days At Peking (1963). An American major leads the defense against Chinese revolutionaries in 1900 Peking. Cast: Charlton Heston, David Niven, Ava Gardner. Dir: Nicholas Ray.

Hucksters, The (1947). A war veteran fights for honesty in the advertising game. Cast: Clark Gable, Deborah Kerr, Ava Gardner. Dir: Jack Conway.


Of all the Ava Gardner movies that are being featured today I have only seen, She Went To The Races (1945). A pretty scientist with a system for horse-race betting falls in love with a trainer. Cast: James Craig, Frances Gifford, Ava Gardner. Dir: Willis Goldbeck. Please click Ava Gardners  picture located on the side bar to read movie review.

Ava Gardner.

Mogambo(1953).In this remake of Red Dust, an African hunter is torn between a lusty showgirl and a married woman. Cast: Clark Gable, Ava Gardner, Grace Kelly. Dir: John Ford.

Barefoot Contessa, The (1954). A Spanish dancer becomes an international star but still longs to get her feet in the dirt. Cast: Humphrey Bogart, Ava Gardner, Edmond O'Brien. Dir: Joseph L. Mankiewicz.

Bhowani Junction (1956). An Anglo-Indian beauty falls for a British officer as her country fights for independence. Cast: Ava Gardner, Stewart Granger, Bill Travers. Dir: George Cukor.


Little Hut, The (1957). A neglected wife is shipwrecked on a desert island with her husband and her would-be lover. Cast: Ava Gardner, Stewart Granger, David Niven. Dir: Mark Robson.

The Killers (1946)

The Killers (1946). Film noir. Based on the short story of the same name by Ernest Hemingway. The film was directed by Robert Siodmak Cast: Burt Lancaster in his screen debut, as well as Ava Gardner, Edmond O'Brien, and Sam Levene.

Two hit men, Max and Al, drive to small town diner, looking for,"the Swede" . They find him held up in a boarding house where, they carry out thier plans to murder him.

The Swede had life insurance, so Investigator Jim Reardon, is assigned to look into the murder for his company. Interviewing people from his past, Reardon believes that The Swede's murder was because of a payroll robbery masterminded by, Big Jim Colfax and Kitty Collins , the woman Swede loved.

The film was very entertaining.. Although, I never quite figured out why Swede allowed himself to be murdered, and who ordered the killing.

Video: First of 10.

Virginia Christine, was best known as the "Folger Coffee Woman". After moving to Los Angeles, Virginia worked in radio while attending the University of California, Los Angeles. She was trained for a theatrical career by actor/director Fritz Feld, whom she married in 1940. In 1942, she signed a contract with Warner Bros. and began performing in films: Edge of Darkness (1943), High Noon (1952), Judgment at Nuremberg (1961), The Mummy's Curse (1944) and Invasion of the Body Snatchers (1956). She was a favorite of Stanley Kramer, performing in a number of his films. But her greatest fame came in the 1960's when she started her 21-year appearances as "Mrs. Olson", who always had comforting words for young married couples while pouring Folgers Coffee.

Ava Gardner.

Ava Gardner was born on Christmas Eve, 1922, in Grabtown, NC. She was the youngest of seven children. Ava Gardner’s, rise to stardom came when she went to visit her older sister, Beatrice Gardner who had moved to New York and married Larry Tarr, a professional photographer. One of the pictures of Ava he had displayed in the window of his shop caught the eye of Barney Duhan, a young man who worked in the legal department of Lowe’s Theatres, who posed as a talent scout for MGM. The receptionist knew what he was up to and stalled him off by promising to deliver the message. Recognizing an opportunity, Larry Tarr and his staff worked through the night to print more photos of Ava. Tarr delivered them the next day to MGM’s New York office, and Ava soon got the call and was asked to appear for a screen test, and in 1941 at the age of 18, Ava signed a seven-year movie contract with MGM studios.

Shortly after arriving in Hollywood, Ava met and married Mickey Rooney. The marriage lasted one year. Her second short-lived marriage was to bandleader Artie Shaw. Ava’s third and last husband, and the love of her life, was singer Frank Sinatra. They were married in 1951 and divorced in 1957, unable to survive the pressures of their careers and their jealousy of each other.

Ava had small roles in 15 MGM movies before her career began to take off. In 1946, MGM loaned her out to Universal to play, Kitty Collins in the film noir, The Killers. Louis B. Mayer wasted no time casting Ava opposite Clark Gable in , The Hucksters. Other studio directors started also taking notice, and Ava soon landed the title role in, One Touch of Venus and was on her way to becoming a Hollywood legend.

In 1950, MGM chose Ava to perform in the role of Julie Laverne in Show Boat, one of the greatest musicals of all time. Ava teamed up with with Gable again in 1953 to shoot Mogambo, a remake of Gable’s 1932 film Red Dust. Ava received a Best Actress Oscar nomination for her role as Honey Bear Kelly in the film.


In 1964, Ava received a Golden Globe nomination for her role in the film, Night of the Iguana.


After starring in many disaster films during the 1970s such as Earthquake and The Cassandra Crossing, Ava begin working in television in the mid-1980s, including one season on the popular CBS drama Knots Landing.

At age 33, Ava moved to Madrid, Spain, where she lived for more than 10 years. Then, in 1968 she moved to London, England, where she lived the rest of her life.

List of Ava Gardner Movies I have seen:
This Time for Keeps
She Went To the Races
Whistle Stop
The Bribe
Show Boat
The Snows of Kilimanjaro
The Band Wagon
Mogambo
The Barefoot Contessa
The Sun Also Rises
The Night of the Iguana
Earthquake

Ava Gardner "looks like" Ashley Judd.

Ava Gardner (December 24, 1922 – January 25, 1990). Signed a contract with MGM in 1941 and performed in small roles until her performance in, The Killers (1946). She became one of Hollywood's leading actresses, considered one of the most beautiful women of her day. She was nominated for the Academy Award for Best Actress for her work in Mogambo (1953). She performed in many films from the 1950s to 1970s: Bhowani Junction (1956), On the Beach (1959), The Night of the Iguana (1964), Earthquake (1974), and The Cassandra Crossing (1976). Gardner continued to act until 1986.

Ashley Judd (born April 19, 1968). Actress, who is best known for playing strong characters in films: Ruby in Paradise, Kiss the Girls, Double Jeopardy, Where the Heart Is and High Crimes.