THE TWO THAT GOT AWAY

   Note  I wrote this post several years ago. Every now and then I repost it. Why? Because I like it.  Jon

MAE WEST

MARIA RASPUTIN

I've met a lot of famous people when I lived in California and I've written about some of my encounters on previous blog posts - - John Wayne, Sonny and Cher, Groucho Marx, Ronald Reagan, Ann Miller, Liza Minnelli, Joan Rivers, Shelley Winters, Raquel Welch......and that's only a few. 
I haven't even mentioned the porn stars (no, I'm not kidding).

The great thing about Hollywood (at least when I lived there) was that it was fairly easy to cross paths with famous people. And I knew many extremely colorful characters who knew famous people. The connections were everywhere. At the time, it was exciting and I loved it. 

Despite all the celebrities I met, I still think the most about the two that got away. Two people whom I desperately wanted to meet but never did. Incredibly, they were both listed in the L.A. phone book:
Actress Mae West and Maria Rasputin - daughter of Grigory Rasputin, the infamous Russian monk who knew Tsar Nicholas II.

 I still have the old L.A. phone book

Maria Rasputin was a colorful character in her own right - a former governess, cabaret dancer, and long-time circus lion tamer.
She soothed the wild beasts with her mesmeric eyes.

She was indeed listed in the phone book (trust me, there aren't many Rasputins in the white pages....). She lived in obscurity in a modest place on Larissa near the Hollywood Freeway. 
I staked out her residence numerous times hoping to get a glimpse of her, but I never did. She was already in her late 70s then and died a short time later.

Since she was listed in the phone book, I regret not calling her. I was a heckuva lot more brash in my youth than I am now. But - - let's be rational here - - I didn't know what to say.
What's a good opening line when you want to talk to Rasputin's daughter?
"Hey, I was a big fan of your father".....??
  

Maria Rasputin

Mae West. Film star legend. Hollywood icon. I was an immensely huge Mae West fan back then and really wanted to meet her, but she was already in her 80s and led a reclusive life.

Ironically, one of my close friends and fellow musician Anthony had met her (I wrote about Anthony in a previous blog post - his sister Clara wanted to marry me).

Anthony's encounter with Mae West happened long ago when he was about twelve years old. His mother was doing some sort of Hollywood charity work and Mae West was involved. They were both invited to West's apartment. Anthony, at that time, had never heard of  Mae West and wasn't particularly interested. He remembered that the apartment living room was decorated entirely in white and he said Mae West was very alluring.

Ravenswood Apartments on Rossmore
Long-time residence of Mae West

Mae West had lived in the same Hollywood apartment building for over forty-five years - - in fact, she had a lifetime lease. It was called Ravenswood and is located on north Rossmore, only a few blocks from Paramount Studios on Melrose (where she worked during her heyday). Incidentally, West's apartment number was 611.

I initially thought that Mae West owned Ravenswood, but she didn't. Ravenswood was built by Paramount Studios in 1930 and had once housed such famous residents as Clark Gable and Ava Gardner.

One day I was driving and my car broke down directly in front of Ravenswood. It hadn't dawned on me where I was until I looked up and saw the big Ravenswood sign on the roof.

Holy crap! Mae West lives here! I was astonished and delighted that fate had unceremoniously dumped me right in front of her abode.

There's no satisfactory resolution to this story because I never did meet Mae West. I did my best to get a glimpse of her but to no avail.

In retrospect this sounds crazy, but on several later occasions (usually at night) I would sit on a wall across the street and gaze at Mae West's windows.

West had been listed in the L.A. phone book for many years. When she was younger she actually answered the phone and talked to her fans (imagine any star doing that nowadays!).

Despite my reluctance to call Maria Rasputin, I did call Mae West's number several times. I talked to her long-time companion Paul Novak, who was a former body builder and had been one of several muscle-bound pretty boys featured in West's Las Vegas show.

Novak was thirty years younger than West. It was rumored that they had been lovers, but I have my doubts (for some private reasons that I won't disclose here). Paul was kind and easy to talk to. He told me that Mae was very deaf and no longer spoke on the phone (I already assumed that, because I'd heard of all the trouble she had with her hearing while she was making the movie Myra Breckinridge).

Like a sappy jackass, I wrote a humorous poem and fan letter and sent it to West. Paul said that he'd make sure she got it. She did. Within a few days I received a letter and signed photo from Mae. I still have it.  

The lines on the photo are a reflection from the window.

Mae West, in later years, with Paul Novak (Paul is on the left) and Mickey Hargitay (he later was Jayne Mansfield's husband)

P.S.

Unfortunately, the once-elegant Ravenswood has now fallen into decay and is largely forgotten.

Hollywood is NOTHING like it used to be.     Jon

UNINTERESTING NONENTITIES

It's Friday the 13th. I'm not superstitious. Bad luck can find us on any day when we least expect it.

Would a black cat have bad luck if he walked under a ladder?

Change of subject

Today I'm going to bore you with a haphazard collection of uninteresting nonentities.

This wooden box belonged to my paternal grandmother, which she had in Hungary. I've had it since I was about twelve, and I keep some of my treasures in it. The old wooden mirror above is from Italy.

In that wooden box is my very first photo, taken by my father. Not exactly attractive.

What's this?

It's  my senior class photo. I was sixteen.

I was fifty in this photo. Any resemblance to my first photo?

These were my baby shoes, well preserved.

These were my boots when I lived in Texas. I always wore them in my house, because there were scorpions on the floor.

A wooden pencil box that my paternal grandfather brought from Hungary.

When I was 18 or 19, I always wore an old Army jacket that I got from the Army Surplus store on Main St. in Los Angeles. I sewed these patches onto it.

Match books, anybody?

The Green Cafe was one of my favorite hangouts. My "very close companion" Phil always went there with me. He was the ex-con, who was in prison for robbery and attempted murder. Unbelievably handsome

 Lots of celebrities went to the Green Cafe.....unfortunately the place no longer exists. It's now a store that sells wine.

Remember when I said I was caught in a midnight raid in the notorious Drake Theater? Here's a match book that I still have.

Those were my reckless years. I existed in danger and cherished it.

A certificate nominating me to be a member of the American Film Institute. This is because of the numerous articles I published in movie magazines. I have an entire box of them, most of which I had forgotten.

Samples from Movie Collector's World and Classic Images.

Dracula: In the Beginning

I was nineteen when I started writing for Classic Images, a very popular movie magazine back then.

The cover featuring my article about silent star Ramon Novarro, who was in the 1925 epic film Ben-Hur. My name is in tiny print on lower right.

A few of the many letters that I have from celebrities. Photo from Shelley Winters, after I met her. The blue envelope is from Olivia de Havilland (when she lived in Paris). The pink envelope is from Joan Rivers. She was really nice in person. Other letters from Jimmy Stewart, George Burns, can't remember all.....

Onto art....

I still have all the pen and ink things when I was 19 or 20.

This is the very first picture I drew in ink.

And another treasure:

This is the very first oil painting I did when I was eleven years old (yes, 11).

 I did many oil paintings, but most of them are lost.

I have dozens and dozens of ticket stubs from operas and ballets that I saw in the Los Angeles Music Center.

Can you believe the very best tickets in the Founder's Circle was only $12.50  back then? The cheapest in the balcony were $3.50.

That envelope is from the famous Brown Derby restaurant in Hollywood.

I have a LOT more of my treasures to share, but this post is long enough.

What's this?

My new ring, a tangerine sapphire. It looks much better in real. I'm holding the phone in my clumsy left hand to take these photos.

Holy Crap!

Don't forget my (old) poetry books, still available on Amazon and other places. 

And my book for children

That's enough for now

Jon, ❤️  almost fascinating

I finally tried to correct the MANY spelling errors!

IT'S NEVER COLD IN SOUTHERN CALIFORNIA

 

 I've taken an unedited chapter from my unpublished memoirs. It describes one of my memorable Christmas Eves in Los Angeles when I was in my very early 20's.

Every word of this is the raw truth. Could be offensive to some. I'm sorry for that.  Most every aspect of life is offensive.

Jon

An annual event was a very popular  Christmas Eve concert at the Dorothy Chandler Pavilion at the Los Angeles Music Center. The concert began at 3:00 p.m. and lasted until 9:00 p.m. and the entire six hours were broadcast on live television. The musical participants came from schools, colleges, churchs, and other organizations.

Since I was a member of a chamber ensemble at Cypress College, I participated at the live concert. There was nothing spectacular with our group. Five instruments playing music by  baroque composers. Telemann, Corelli, Handel. I was accompaniest on piano. Should have been harpsichord, but I was subtle and soft-pedaled.

Performing on TV was no big deal. My nerves were reinforced by the hash that me and Randy the cellist were smoking beforehand. We did the same thing before two previous concerts we gave at UCLA.

Afterwards, backstage, I was stunned to receive a quick thank you from Dorothy Chandler herself. She was a legend back then, the main force that devised and built the Music Center. Wife of the L.A. Times publisher Norman Chandler.

After the concert, the L.A. night was like a cool glittering afterthought. My good clothes became a burden. My regular attire - corduroy coat, Stetson hat, Levis, boots - were in my car. I quickly changed in a gas station rest room.

Typical shoddy unkempt rest room. On the graffiti covered wall a condom vending machine. Above, a hand-painted sign proclaiming

JESUS LOVES YOU

Christmas Eve. What to do? The notorious City of Angels was all decked out with colored lights and sparkling holiday attire. A glittering facsimile of ancient Babylon. 

Unusually chilly in the place that's never cold. Walking back to my car, a spectacular sunset was glowing in the distance - - the sky a fiery sea of blood red in a surrealistic display.

Why did that sunset inflict me with sadness, emptiness, hollow loneliness? As the brilliant light slowly melted away, so did the spirit in my soul.

Perhaps because this night is Christmas Eve. Lonely, painfully lonely. Every one I know is busy with their families. Every one. 

My parents were in Las Vegas - - at the persistent invitation of Uncle Frank, my father's brother. My mother didn't want to go. Frank was obnoxious, boisterous, and usually trouble. Rich? Hell, yes. I knew firsthand the stories that he and his thriving New Jersey business were deeply entwined with the Jersey Mob. This got him into trouble later in life. I've seen things firsthand when I recently visited Jersey. I wouldn't dare say more.

Tonight I desperately wanted Greg. More than anyone. We would have definitely been together, if he hadn't been forced to spend Christmas with his parents in their posh mountain cabin at Big Bear. Nice to be wealthy.

The sunset is waning, as it vanished the night became unusually cold. Nearly 32 degrees Fahrenheit - - damn teeth - rattling cold in L.A.

Greg, a pianist like myself. Our secret ongoing torrid relationship was carefully kept from his ex-professional singer psycho mother, who did everything possible to thwart his sexual predilection. I have no doubt she would hire a hit man to oust me away from her son. My love for Gregory was fierce and undaunting. Nothing could come between us.

An incredibly ugly scene. She claimed he was insane. The police smashed down his bedroom door. He was dragged to some kind of an institution. This long-ago diabolical ploy didn't work. He was released in three days.....

I shuddered thinking about it in the cold.

Nothing can bannish true love. We valiantly fought the obstacles.

Merry Christmas, City of Tarnished Angels.

Downtown L.A. is a haphazard, tawdry, dangerous place to be - - even on Christmas Eve.

Got into my car. Headed to Hollywood.  Dangerous, of course. But I knew the place very well and always feel safe there - - despite the hustlers, hookers, muggers, druggies...... and ubiquitous vice cops. All imperative players part of the after-dark scene.

I drink an intruguing amount of Bacardi Rum in my car. It gives me the mellow high that I want. Better with Coca-Cola, but sufficiently effective without it.

Hollywood Boulevard. Shimmering and sparkling holiday decor. The annoying star struck tourists will soon diminish. Not too many tonight. Xmas Eve.

A kid, maybe sixteen, asks if I want to buy some Blue Blotter. LSD? Hell, no. I don't like hallucinogenics. I prefer to be in the familiar custody of 80 proof. Or 45. Whatever.  I have a handful of quaaludes in my pocket. And a small whiskey bottle that I occasionally swig.

I'm feeling pleasantly inebriated. The holiday decorations sprawl above Hollywood Boulevard, glittering and shivering in the cold breeze.

Goddamn the holidays. The most annoying and loneliest time of the year. That's when acute sentimentality accosts you.

Getting colder. The frigid dampness is fighting to get through my coat and start rattling my bones. A passerby said it's 32 degrees. Freezing mode. Almost unheard of in L.A.

Male hustlers are looking miserable and annoyed. They're anxiously waiting for some desperate tourist who will eagerly go into an alley with them, and pay 20 bucks for a quick.......whatever. 

Be on the lookout for the vice cops. Maybe not too many on a cold Christmas Eve. I escaped from them on numerous occasions in the past.

I'm remembering the notorious Drake Theater on Melrose. A hotbed of debauchery after dark. One of my regular haunts. Nude male dancers on stage (I knew one of them). Rampant illicit sex in the backrooms. 

One night, a massive police raid at the Drake....determined to arrest everyone. An incredible fluke of good fortune. Since I was only seated doing absolutely nothing illegal (a rarity) the cops let me go!

Just a fleeting memory. Vice cops. My vices were profound, but my record was clean.

The biting cold seemed to slowly eradicate the people wandering on the Boulevard. They eventually dwindled to nearly nothing. Nothing left but the hardcore creatures of the dark. A few shivering male hustlers, a few homeless victims sleeping in doorways until the cops kick them out. A few random wanderers, so intensely plied with drugs that they have no clue where they might be.

Merry Christmas, dark angels of the night. Sweet fallen angels who have descended into the abyss.

Raw, undiluted Life is the real abyss.

I saw him walking towards me, unexpectedly interrupting my thoughts. One of the lone, scarce night creatures on Hollywood Boulevard.

He looked at me before passing, and when he passed I glanced back and he stopped and walked up to me.

On only a brief surveillance, I assumed he was a decade older than myself. Long hair and a stylishly short beard gave him the appearance of a saint.

He drew a cigarette from his pocket.

"Have a light?" he asked. That was an old ploy. I gave him my book of matches. He lit his cigarette.

"It's a bad habit," he said.

"I have lots of bad habits," I replied, knowing he would understand the connotation.

"They're the greatest pleasures of life," he said.

We were walking together on the deserted  Hollywood walk of stars. Casually glancing in the unlighted windows of the closed shops.

We suddenly were in the dusky alcove of a bookstore. I tried to read the titles of books in the windows, but it was too dark.

Very unexpectedly, he tossed the cigarette, extinguished it with his foot, and kissed me - with impressive expertise.

"Wanna come to my place?" he asked. "It's warmer than here."

"Why not?" I heard my words like a distant admission.

And an instant flash went through my inebriated mind. 

I'm remembering the final scene of the German 1929 film Pandora's Box. Louise Brooks is a prostitute on the London streets. On Christmas Eve she invites a man into her shabby room. They light a candle. She sits on his lap. He holds mistletoe over her head, asks for a kiss. As she complies, he grabs a knife from the table....and murders her.

Just a fleeting thought on a lonely Christmas Eve.

"I live on Ivar," he said.

We headed east on Hollywood Boulevard, turned left on Ivar, going past the ancient Knickerbocker Hotel.

His place was in a run down apartment building, third floor. It was intriguingly warm in his living room- - no mistletoe...but a few haphazard strings of colored Christmas lights.

We smoked a couple of mild joints. It trasported me to a mellow, congenial distant realm. The Christmas lights assumed enormous preportions. The deep kisses were lingering intimacies of ecstasy. The moment transported us to other, more intimate realms.

Just before dawn, while he was sleeping, I dressed and quietly left. The cold dampness awakened my muddled, aching hangover.

As I walked to Gower, where my car was parked, the faint glow of dawn was rising in the east.

Among the apathetic drowsy palmtrees I saw traces of frost on shrubs and grass.

The world would assume an optimistic glimmer as the sun came up with reassuring warmth.

Merry Christmas, city of lost angels.

Jon, a chapter from my  memoirs

THE NIGHT I CRASHED THE OSCARS

 

The 95th Academy Award ceremony will take place tonight in Hollywood. I have no intention of watching it.

A once dignified and meaningful event has turned into a tacky, inane ego circus.  The essence of Hollywood has changed so drastically from what it used to be that it's completely intolerable.

Rather than being an exclusive celebration of the film industry, the Academy Awards has turned into a lengthy and tedious political forum - - tainted with an unbearable in-your-face WOKE agenda.

The Tinseltown Bolsheviks - who make a zillion dollars a day and live in walled fortresses - arrogantly lecture us about how rotten our country is. And now the entire award ceremony is infiltrated with race and gender.
I'm black! I'm Latino! I'm a lesbian! I'm a womanwomanwoman! No white men allowed!

I don't give a royal rat's ass what race or gender you are.

Violence was the highlight last year's ceremony - when actor Will Smith punched comedian Chris Rock for telling a joke about Will's bald wife.

Am I the only one who thinks this incident was completely staged? It rings hollow to me, and - after all - everything in Hollywood is fake.
Besides, Will Smith was seen on camera laughing at the joke.

 
  The creative quality of the industry has waned. Every year we seem to be plied with more and more movies that fewer and fewer people have seen. Not to mention flash-in-the-pan actors and actresses that nobody has heard of. They grab their Oscar and then quickly vanish into the overcrowded netherworld of Hollywood has-beens, never to be heard of again.

Does anybody remember who won the Awards last year?
Or what film won for Best Picture?
Probably not.

Do I sound bitter?

I am. Perhaps I'm pining for the past, when Hollywood seemed to have more substance and class. And talent. 

I miss the Hollywood that I knew when I lived there. Sure - it was always a tawdry, sleazy, corrupt, ruthless, fake, potentially lethal Dreamworld. But it  provided me with a wealth of delicious memories - - and the Academy Awards always managed to ignite them. Back then, Hollywood still maintained a smidgen of glamour and gold.

I've written about all this many times before. Despite what it might seem, I'm not rehashing it to brag. I'm simply remembering my adventurous past, and astonishing myself with memories of my now-faded audacity.

Way back when, during my Hollywood years

I crashed the Oscars when I was eighteen years old. I didn't yet live in Hollywood at that time, but I was smitten with the glitz and glamor. That was back when the Awards were held at the Dorothy Chandler Pavilion of the Music Center in downtown L.A. 

I knew the Music Center very well and it was surprisingly easy to sneak in on Oscar night. Security wasn't as tight as it is nowadays. I simply slipped in a side door - the musician's entrance. I went upstairs via the restaurant, then found an empty seat in the back of the auditorium and watched about twenty minutes of the live show. I could have stayed longer but was afraid I'd be caught.

I can't think of anyone else in Hollywood history who ever crashed the Oscars. I could be wrong, of course, but I like to think I hold the solo honor. Heck, that adventurous feat deserves some sort of award.

After venturing back outside, I hung around where the limos were parked (they were circled entirely around the Music Center) and struck up a conversation with the chauffeur of  actress Helen Hayes (Hayes was one of the presenters at the Awards that night). We watched the rest of the Award show on a small TV in the limo. Afterwards I got to meet a few celebrities -  including Shelly Winters,  Sammy Davis jr. , and actor George Hamilton and his then-wife Alana.
Sammy Davis was one of the nicest guys in Hollywood. Shelley Winters was down-to-earth and humorous. George Hamilton was slightly "stuck up".

Sammy Davis jr. at the Oscars that night,

and Helen Hayes

Fast Forward. 

A few years later. In my early twenties, now living in Hollywood. I was no longer an innocent star-struck gawker. I was a hardcore drinker, occasional druggie,  hell-bent on excitement and danger.

I remember attending an after-Oscar party at a Beverly Hills mansion - -  directly next door to Burt Reynold's house (I happened to know a few influential people back then).
I was pretty near wasted, and wound up having sex - oops, I mean a romantic encounter - with someone under a grand piano in the library.

I won't elaborate. It's not exactly a proud Oscar moment.

There were other, more intriguing, Academy Award nights in Hollywood that I remember: 
an intimate after-award dinner with a well-known set designer in a house atop the Hollywood Hills. The dining room was lighted with some fantastic candles that were given to us for the occasion by actress Sally Struthers (remember her? back then she was a famous TV star on All in the Family).

.....later, we spent the night in the bedroom loft which had a huge picture window overlooking the sparkling lights of Hollywood. To me, it seemed just like a movie set.....

Overlooking Hollywood

That was long ago when I was young, reckless ..... and very very far removed from any thoughts about ever living in the Tennessee wilderness with 'possums and coyotes.

Often, the bitter ironies in life know how to bite. 
Sometimes they bite hard,

 

 End of Reel

Jon

 

STARSTRUCK

It's nearly impossible to be raised in Southern California and not - in at least some small way - be affected by the movie industry. I was profoundly affected.

The distance of years and a semblance of maturity have slightly diminished my youthful enthusiasm for Hollywood, yet it still lingers with enduring persistence.

I was six years old when my family moved to California. At that long-ago time, remnants of Hollywood's golden past still lingered. The original Brown Derby restaurant was doing a brisk business on Wilshire Boulevard. Ciro's and the Coconut Grove were still hot night spots.

Movie stars were often out and about and sometimes accessible. We saw Harpo Marx on Hollywood Boulevard and Debbie Reynolds at the (then famous) Farmer's Market. I met comedian Henny Youngman on Olvera Street (the famed touristy Mexican street in L.A.) when I was a kid. In my sublime youthful ignorance I'd never heard of him - but got his autograph anyway.

 My father and I were stowaways in a wagon, on the set of Wagon Train somewhere in the Mojave Desert

As a child I had the privilege of seeing numerous TV shows being filmed on location (a friend of our family worked in the industry). Most notably I remember the movie ranch owned by stuntman/actor Ray "Crash" Corrigan, which was located in the Simi Valley, nestled in the scenic foothills of the Santa Susana Mountains.

Later known as Corriganville, it was in active use from the 1930's until around 1965. Hundreds of cowboy movies were filmed there and many TV shows including Gunsmoke, Rawhide, the Cisco Kid, Rin Tin Tin, the Lone Ranger, etc. 
Unfortunately, all the movie sets were destroyed by a series of fires in the 1970's.

Me, age six or seven, inspecting an ancient fire engine on a movie set

My father snapped this photo while a feisty actor from Gunsmoke drew his six-shooter on me (I don't remember the actor's name)

 That's me in front of the fort which was used in the 1948 movie Fort Apache (that was before my time...) and many other movies.

 Here's a photo of the fort taken while they were filming the movie

 

 I never had any aspirations to be an actor or to work in the film industry, but I was still intrigued with it.

When I was in my 20's (and early 30's) I spent a lot of time in Hollywood and had the opportunity to mingle with some of the bigwigs. I met many stars - including John Wayne, Groucho Marx, Shelley Winters, Sammy Davis Jr., Raquel Welch, Cher, Ann Miller, Patty Duke, George Burns, Zsa Zsa Gabor (to name only a few).

Just for the heck of it, I also did a few stints as a movie extra and worked on such enormously forgettable pictures as Malibu Beach and Sgt. Pepper's Lonely Hearts Club Band.

I probably shouldn't ruin my sterling reputation by mentioning this (big *smile* inserted here), but I knew a fairly well-known director of adult films and was on the sets of a few porn movies - including one on location near the old Spahn Movie Ranch, where notorious Charles Manson and his murderous hippie gang used to live.
I even had an offer to be in a gay porn flick but declined. Despite ugly rumors to the contrary, I do have a small semblance of pride and dignity.....

My main interest, of course, was music and I exclusively concentrated on my work as a pianist. 
Yet, my fascination with the film industry later inspired me when I was a freelance writer. I published many articles about Hollywood history (with an emphasis on the silent era). My foremost objective for writing was to resurrect the memory of forgotten stars and films.

My present existence as an impoverished semi-hermit in the Tennessee wilderness is very far removed from my California youth. My Hollywood memories linger tauntingly like echoes of a faded dream.

I cherish them.

 

Note:
this is a rehash from a previous blog post

WANTON WOMAN

 

 My latest video - - which should enchant and enthrall you......and help you forget my previous post.

 

Theda Bara (1885 - 1955)

Hollywood's first official sex symbol. Vamp. Femme fatale. Seductress. Wanton woman.

The publicity department at Fox Studios went overboard to promote Theda's forbidden allure and devious intent. They claimed she was born in the Sahara - the daughter of an Arab Sheik and a French actress. She was raised in the shadow of a pyramid and her name was an anagram for Arab Death. She was known as the Serpent of the Nile.

There were unusual restrictions in her movie contract, intended to increase her aura of mystery: she could only go out after dark. Her face had to be veiled. She must perpetuate an interest in mysticism and the occult.  

The truth was much less intoxicating than the myth. Theda Bara was in fact Theodosia Goodman, a Jewish girl from Cincinnati, Ohio. Her parents were of Polish and Swiss descent. 

During her career, Theda Bara made over forty films. She became Fox Studio's biggest star and at the height of her popularity (between 1915 - 1919) earned over $4,000 a week.

Her first films, starting in 1914, were made on the east coast at Fox Studios in Ft. Lee, New Jersey. She moved to California in 1917, when Fox decided to feature her in the epic Hollywood film Cleopatra.

Unfortunately, Theda Bara's acting ability and on-screen allure can never be fully critiqued or appreciated, because almost all of her films are lost. They were destroyed in a 1937 fire at the Fox film archives in New Jersey. To date, only six of her films have survived (none of which were her most popular).

The titles of some of her best films are an indication of the delectably devious  characters she portrayed:
Destruction (1915), Sin (1915), The Devil's Daughter (1915), The Serpent (1916), The Rose of Blood (1917), The She-Devil (1918).

Tired of being typecast as a vamp, and never really comfortable with her sexually-charged fabricated image, Theda left Fox in 1919. She only made a few more films before retiring in 1926. 

Perhaps the biggest secret about Theda Bara is that, in her personal life, she was a virtuous woman - a genuine Miss Goody Two Shoes. There were never any scandals connected with her, and she was never a part of the seedy Hollywood scene.

She married film director Charles Brabin in 1921 and, after her retirement, they moved out of California and lived a quiet life. Theda Bara never had any children. She died of cancer at age 69 in 1955. 

 

video best viewed full-screen 

Note:
I wanted the music to be hauntingly bizarre,  so I chose a composition by Erik Satie.