Wohlbrück and Tauber in ‘melodie der liebe’ (1932)

Posted on July 11, 2015January 30, 2018 by James

On my last visit to London I managed to locate the grave of the famous tenor Richard Tauber (1891-1948) and thought I should write a short post about his collaboration with AW. Despite his self-confessed musical range of ‘two and a half notes’ Anton’s career involved a considerable amount of musical performances, from operetta films through to concerts, stage musicals and even an appearance at Glyndebourne. In 1932 he co-starred with Tauber in Melodie der Liebe – also known as Right to Happiness.

Tauber was born in Linz to theatrical parents, and began performing professionally in his early twenties. After the end of World War One his career really took off, with a contract to the Vienna State Opera, the first of over 700 recordings, and hugely successful excursions into the popular genre of operetta. His first film appearances were during the silent era, but with the advent of sound there was clear potential for adapting his operetta performances for the screen.

Many of these films were, to be frank, of no great merit, having little other purpose was to provide a vehicle for Tauber’s singing. Despite his popularity, Die grosse Attraktion (Max Reichmann, 1931) failed badly at the box office,
leading to the collapse of the Richard Tauber Sound-Film Company. As would happen again during his career, he recouped the financial losses with a lucrative concert tour of Britain and America. When he returned to Germany in 1932, it was clear that a different approach would be necessary if he was going to be attempt another film.

Thankfully the script for Melodie der Liebe (Georg Jacoby, 1932) was much stronger than previous screenplays and provided cinema audiences with a decent story to follow between the musical sequences. Tauber played Richard Hoffman, an eminent singer who has lost his wife and is travelling in the company of his brother in law Bernhard (Szoke Szakall) and young daughter Gloria (Petra Unkel), prior to his departure for a tour in America. After a chance meeting in a pub, he falls for a young woman named Lilli (Alice Treff), unaware of her real intention: she is already engaged to Erwin Richter (AW), an ambitious conductor who sees Hoffmann as a means of furthering his own career. While this pair devise a plan to exploit Hoffman’s infatuation, and Lilli’s hard-up parents do their best to secure a match, the singer’s daughter has met charming young artist Escha (Lien Deyers), who sees right through Lilli’s pretence. Things come to a head as Hoffman prepares for his farewell performance of Tosca: will he find true love before he sails for New York in the morning?

Looking pensive: AW as Erwin Richter

One strength of the storyline is that it allowed Tauber to perform songs and arias that were integral to the plot, rather than being contrived interruptions of it. Audiences particularly enjoyed little Petra Unkel’s performance as Gloria, and Szakall’s antics as her hapless Uncle Bernhard. The film premiered in Berlin on 26 April 1932 and was well received, later being released in Britain and America as The Right to Happiness.

AW in a characteristic pose. Only one more film and his elegance would be perfected with the appearance of his trademark moustache

Very few could claim their right to happiness in Nazi Germany, however, and several of the film’s cast were forced to leave soon after the film was released. Deyers and Szakall both went to Hollywood, the latter finding fame in Casablanca. Tauber’s grandfather was Jewish but he was raised as a Catholic after his father converted. Nazi papers began attacking him nonetheless, drawing attention to his ancestry as well as criticising the amount of money he was making. He left Germany for his native Austria in 1933, later moving to Britain where he achieved some success with more films as well as concert and opera performances. In 1936 he married English actress Diana Napier (1905-82) and remained in Britain throughout the war, dying in London of cancer on 8 January 1948.

Tauber’s grave in Brompton cemetery

Ten years later the BBC Home Service presented an hour long programme, ‘The Richard Tauber Story’ to mark the anniversary of his death. The radio programme was broadcast at 8 pm on Wednesday 8 January 1958, narrated by Evelyn Laye (AW’s co-star in the 1954 musical Wedding in Paris) with contributions from Walbrook, Elisabeth Schwarzkopf, Percy Kahn, Jane Baxter and Tauber’s widow Diana Napier.

Lola Montez (MAX Ophuls 1955) Part 1

Posted on July 1, 2015January 30, 2018 by James

There are two things I haven’t done for a while – 1) posted here and 2) watched Lola Montes (Ophuls, 1955.) Both are long overdue, and so today – the first day of another month – I thought I’d post a couple of film stills from my collection. Both are black and white, which does no justice to the lush cinematography and gorgeous Eastmancolor of the film – as well as being Ophuls’ final film, Lola Montes was his only venture into colour, and we’ll never know what wonders he might have achieved had it been otherwise.

AW as King Ludwig I of Bavaria in ‘Lola Montes’

AW plays Ludwig I (1786-1868), King of Bavaria from 1825 until he was dethroned by the revolution 1848. The king’s downfall was partly due to his public relationship with Lola Montez (1821-61), a former dancer and courtesan who wielded influence over Ludwig ever since they met in Munich in 1846. Born in Ireland, her early life saw her flitting around between Liverpool, London, Montrose, Calcutta and Paris, and by the time she met Ludwig she had been married, separated, had an affair with Franz Liszt (other alleged lovers included Alexandre Dumas, author of The Three Musketeers) and performed on stage under the pseudonym of ‘Lola Montez, the Spanish Dancer.’ Her risqué ‘Spider Dance’ would later become notorious.

Lola (Martine Carole) and the KIng

After the fall of Ludwig, Lola had to flee Bavaria, spending time in Switzerland and England before emigrating to America where she took part in public lectures and performances about her past. It is probably this period of her life that suggested the bold concept of Ophuls’ film – to present Lola’s life as a circus performance. As a historical event this is pure fiction, but it provides scope for playing with ideas about public life as a visual spectacle, with the sins of a celebrity forming the centre of (quite literally) a media circus.

Such a circular visual device obviously recalls La Ronde (Ophuls, 1950) where again there is a central narrator around whom the story revolves: however, the Ringmaster (Peter Ustinov), is a much darker and more cynical character than AW’s master-of-ceremonies in La Ronde. There is a cruelty about the Ringmaster’s exploitation of the woman, who is forced to answer questions about her past life in exchange for money. Her life in the circus ring is in sharp contrast to her former life with Ludwig, probably the happiest period of her life. In my next post on Lola Montes I hope to write more about AW’s performance and include some colour pictures from the film.

field work

Posted on June 24, 2015January 30, 2018 by James

This illustration comes from an 1896 French catalogue of photographic equipment and shows an innovative form of changing tent, enabling a photographer to switch his dark slides in the field without exposing them to day light. Instead of the traditional structure, which was held up with poles, the rigidity of this little tent comes from a series of hollow cells in the outer wall which are inflated with an air pump (visible at the front of the picture.)

LEAVES from a commonplace book

Posted on June 23, 2015January 30, 2018 by James

Some of the items in my collection are what one might call high-end artefacts – beautifully-crafted and formally-produced, such as limited edition fine prints or bound volumes. However elegant and precious these might be, I often find myself far more attracted to – and excited by – the odd little vernacular trinkets found at the other end of the scale: hand-written postcards, personal ephemera, amateur photographic montages or scrapbook compilations. Objects such as these were created without any interest in commercial value or posterity, and in addition to their sense of honesty and charm, they often provide a window into how our ancestors amused themselves in private.

Compiling commonplace books was a popular pasttime well into the 20th century, and one might argue that contemporary online practices such as blogging and website such as Pinterest are a continuation of the same impulse. Commonplace books are compilations of quotations, useful passages from books, epigrams and so on, copied out into one’s own notebook and often organised thematically or by the addition of an index or other keys, They developed from the medieval florilegium or ‘gathering of flowers’, in which the scribe would select what he regarded as the wisest texts from earlier writers – just as a bee extracts nectar from the most attractive flowers – and arranged them under thematic headings. Although there was always this tradition of serious, intellectual self-improvement – the philosopher John Locke published his A New Method of Making Common-Place Books in 1706 – there was also a more light-hearted approach that saw compilers decorate their favourite quotes with colourful illustrations, cartoons or floral emblems. Sometimes others would be invited to write their own texts or verses onto the pages, producing some overlap with autograph and visitors’ books. Such books might well be compiled as someone was about to get married or leave the country: it would be an opportunity for friends and family to choose appropriate words of wisdom or poetry, to which they could add their own messages.

This, I suspect, was the background to this particular commonplace book, which I picked up for a pittance in a second hand bookshop last autumn.

An extract from William Cowper’s poem ‘The Task’ (1785)

The above verse – An Adventure, sometimes referred to as An Adventure on Wheels – seems to have started appearing in American newspapers in 1900 and clearly held popular appeal.

This exquisite watercolour appears to be the work of Edward Rimbault Dibdin (1853-1941), art critic and curator of the Walker Art Gallery in Liverpool.

These lines are from a hymn, ‘Kind Words Can Never Die’, adapted from an old Gospel song and made popular in America after it was set to music by Abby Hutchinson Patton (1829-92)

Sketch of Stonehenge, made on the occasion of a drive with Mrs Wilkins and her daughter, from Salisbury to Stonehenge and back, August 1878.

George Morland’s oil painting ‘Inside of a Stable’ was exhibited at the Royal Academy in 1791 and is now in London’s National Gallery.

The first line of the Latin prayer (trans. O Jesus, living in Mary, come and live in your servant also…’) It originated with the 17th century mystic Charles de Condren and also provided the inspiration for one of Gerard Manley Hopkins’ poems.

A postcard of Lacock Village by Joseph Pike

Given my interest in Joseph Pike, I was especially delighted to find this postcard of Lacock as the final image pasted into the book, doubly so as Lacock was of course the home of pioneer photographer Henry Talbot. My commonplace book certainly contains an eclectic mix of words and images, which raises the intriguing question – if you were to get family or friends to contribute some personal lines or favourite pictures to a similar project in 2015, what would it look like?

Stones of evil: Stonehenge through the ages

Posted on June 21, 2015January 30, 2018 by James

A couple of days ago I finished reading Bryan Cooper’s novel Stones of Evil (1974), which follows the experiences of a stone worker, Haril, in ancient Britain five thousand years ago. A skilled craftsman with expertise in working with flint, he finds himself among the workmen constructing Stonehenge under the direction of high priest Vardon. Initially impressed by the scale of the project and the quality of the stone, he becomes troubled at Vardon’s cruelty, especially after the priest switches his allegiance from the Sun God to the Dark One….

It’s not the sort of novel I tend to read, but I came across it in a junk shop and was intrigued by the idea of a horror tale being set in ancient Britain. Along the way, Haril meets a variety of individuals and tribes, including families from the dark ‘forest people’, groups of roaming hunters, and a religious caste that might be the precursor of the druids. The story itself provides yet another theory regarding the origins of Stonehenge, and Haril’s concluding thoughts are certainly true: ‘For the rest of time perhaps, people would come and stare silently at the ruins, wondering what had led men to build it in the first place.’

‘Stonhing’ in a print from 1575

William Stukeley’s ‘Stonehenge, a Temple Restor’d to the British Druids’ (London, 1740) recognised that Stonehenge was built in alignment with celestial bodies

Stonehenge as imagined in Francis Grose, ‘Antiquities of England and Wales’ (1773-6.)

Theories connecting the stone circle to Arthurian legend (above top, 1575) and Druidic practices (above, 1776) continue to the present day, alongside fanciful suggestions about UFO landing strips, sacred energy transmitters, ancient racecourses, healing temples or the tomb of Boadicea.

John Britton, ‘The Beauties of Wiltshire’ (1801-25)

John Britton – who worked with Pugin – was one of the first to publish sober and accurate delineations of antiquities.

Stonehenge as it appeared when I visited in September 2013

A fanciful image of Avebury stone circle, about 25 miles north of Stonehenge, from the spooky TV series ‘Children of the Stones’ (1977)

Although it was set in Avebury rather than Stonehenge, the seven episode HTV series Children of the Stones made use of many theories that had been applied to Stonehenge: Druidic rites, folk magic and advanced astronomy were fused with a plot about time-loops, supernovas and psychic control.

Perhaps the threat posed by the ancient stones might actually be more mundane

Today is the summer solstice, the longest day of summer, and traditionally attracts tens of thousands of visitors to Stonehenge to witness the sunrise.