March 6, 2008
Anne's Mrs. Robinson character is certainly an, um, interesting inspiration for this fashion collection (to say the least). You don't want to know my opinion about "high fashion" so I shall let this news item speak for itself.
PARIS (Reuters) - All that was missing was Anne Bancroft, smoky eyed and seductive, clutching a whisky tumbler.
John Galliano took a trip back to the 1960s at Dior on Monday updating the rich bored housewife look made famous by Bancroft in the film "The Graduate" for a generation of women looking to take that buttoned-up womanliness into the office.
To the pumping introduction of "Mrs Robinson," the title track from the 1967 movie, Galliano sent models down the runway in tailored daysuits with box jackets in lollipop colors of fuchsia, mandarin, flame red and lime.
Evening dresses for autumn and winter 2008 were long and languorous; day dresses short and flirty; evening coats opulent and fur-edged; and there were lots and lots of accessories, from alligator skin stacked heels to oversized hats.
In short, there was something for women to wear whether they were in their 20s or their 80s -- a recipe for retail success at a time when falling financial markets mean a designer needs to appeal the widest possible clientele to weather a downturn.
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I don't know about you, but I need a sorbet to refresh my palate after all of that.
Much better. The real thing always is, you know.
Speaking of fashion, I caught this at a blog:
In case I haven't made it clear yet, I'll say it again: I have a thing for handbags. The bigger, the better. I hardly ever travel light.
So, my breakfast visit to Kate Spade's 25th Avenue office/showroom space was delicious, and not just because the tiny egg sandwiches and bite-sized stacks of pancakes waiters served were tasty.
It was room after room of preppy chic bags, shoes, stationery, housewares and wares from Jack Spade, the men's line of bags and accessories.
Pictures of Ali McGraw, Anne Bancroft and Audrey Hepburn hung on the wall, and vintage books shared shelf space with the richly colored bags. There was a lot of ostrich, pony hair and leather, in boxy and more abstract constructions.
A sophisticated but cute cabbage rose print showed up on dresses as well as a few sets of toiletry bags.
The shoes are just as varied, but with a classic bent: Tassled flats, spectator mary jane heels and ballet flats were among the offerings.
I thought that this Valentine's Day item, "Romances made of everyday gestures," was very sweet:
Ask yourself this: When the man you love realizes that half the screws are missing from the Ikea bookcase he's attempting to assemble for you, does he:
(a) Complain bitterly about herring and Volvos -- vowing to forsake all things Swedish for the rest of his natural days?
(b) Leave the shelving in a heap on the living room floor and question your need to read in the first place?
(c) Complete construction using a combination of rubber bands and Krazy Glue while suggesting you fill the thing with pamphlets rather than actual books?
If you answered (c), then, my friend, life is good -- because it means somebody out there loves you enough to try to get your bookcase together. That creative effort is the kind of everyday gesture on which great romances are built. I wouldn't be surprised to hear that while at the drugstore picking up the amulet of poison, Romeo also picked up a copy of "People" for Juliet. I like to imagine Abelard taping "Grey's Anatomy" for Heloise. I bet a day didn't go by that Mel Brooks wasn't funny for Anne Bancroft.
Don't get me wrong, I'll always want the chubby little cupids and coconut bonbons, but lately I find myself drawn to something richer, deeper, sweeter. Provided nobody decides to do a remake of "Titanic," with Johannes each day is Valentine's Day.
A writer for ESPN on Rutgers basketball coach C. Vivian Stringer:
Stringer is, at her very core, a coach. A person who motivates, visualizes, cajoles, inspires, infuriates, ignites, pushes and pulls. She always has seen the potential for so much more than just "basketball player" with every young woman who has gone through her programs at Cheyney, Iowa and Rutgers.
The best coaches have vision that comes from their souls. And they have an unquenchable desire to help those in their charge achieve that which they have envisioned.
There's a magnificent line that always comes to my mind when I think of someone like Stringer, who knows pain at the most intimate, excruciating level and yet still feels such joy at the achievements of the kids who receive her tutelage.
The line is from one of my very favorite movies, "The Miracle Worker." Anne Bancroft as fiery teacher (coach) Annie Sullivan is explaining to Helen Keller's father that pity is not what will help his child. Annie Sullivan battled blindness herself, so she knows how much damage pity actually does.
Sullivan says Helen might be blind and deaf, but she still has an amazingly adept mind and she doesn't need people feeling sorry for her. She needs someone who will demand that she live up to her vast potential. Sullivan says she refuses to accept anything else from Helen.
"I treat her like a seeing child because I ask her to see! I EXPECT her to see!"
For decades now, Stringer has expected the very best from youngsters who, of course, have been blessed with great physical gifts. She treats them all like champions because she expects them to be champions.
Whether they actually hoist the ultimate trophy is not the point. She'll consider them to be champions if they are the kind of women who hold their heads high, respect their elders, cherish their education, conduct themselves with dignity and lend a hand to those who need it.
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From my mailbag:
Did Anne convert when she married Mel? ~ Veronica
No, she didn't. (See the FAQ page.)
We have to be careful with this celebrity sighting (link):
When my husband and I were in London for our long-overdue honeymoon, we found ourselves starving in the late afternoon in the theater district. We found a corner pasta shop and asked for a table. As we were walking to our table, we saw Richard Dreyfuss and Anne Bancroft seated at a table nearby. It was all we could do to control ourselves.
because of this blog item I stumbled across:
Last night we went to a local production of Neil Simon's "The Good-bye Girl." I remember seeing the movie years ago starring Richard Dreyfus and Anne Bancroft. I vaguely remembered the story line, but had forgotten how funny it was, especially Richard Dreyfus's character, Elliot.
I've heard of Anne being mistaken for some other ladies before, and vice-versa, but never Marsha Mason being mistaken for Anne!
Anne is mentioned in a March Vanity Fair article... my thanks to Tess for the heads-up about this item:
'IN HER EARLY days she had that beatific expression characteristic of Victorian prettiness - like a sheep painted by Raphael," said James Agate of Lillie Langtry.
I thought of this looking at the March "Hollywood Issue" of Vanity Fair. On its cover, there are six pastel pinkish, light greenish, pallid and faded-looking "movie stars" photographed by the celebrated Annie Leibovitz.
But if you can identify more than one of these young dames, I'll be surprised. (Anne Hathaway and America Ferrera are the only ones I recognize without a program.) Hey, Vanity Fair, next year when you do Hollywood why not just slap their names right on their pictures? Nobody ever had to be told who Bette Davis, Joan Crawford, Lana Turner or Carole Lombard were in the past, but times are different.
Inside there are great articles by wonderful writers about the old Hollywood, when men were men and women were glad of it and movie stars didn't all look like vapid replicas of one another. I especially loved the story of how Mike Nichols went against all odds to make something called "The Graduate" with an unknown actor named Dustin Hoffman. And how he finally chose the gifted actress Anne Bancroft over Ava Gardner to play Mrs. Robinson.
Lots of fun "Producers" trivia at this page... such as:
Dustin Hoffman was set to play Franz Liebkind, but declined when he got the part of Benjamin in The Graduate (1967). Brooks only allowed Hoffman the chance to go off to the audition for the film because his wife (Anne Bancroft) was in it, and Brooks was familiar enough with the role of Benjamin to know Hoffman was utterly wrong for it (as written) and would never be cast.
Saved the best for last today.
This 1888 photo released by the New England Historic Genealogical Society in Boston shows Helen Keller when she was eight years old, left, holding hands with her teacher, Anne Sullivan, during a summer vacation to Brewster, Mass., on Cape Cod. A staff member at the society discovered the photograph in a large photography collection recently donated to the society. When Sullivan arrived at the Keller household to teach Helen, she gave her a doll as a present. Although Keller had many dolls throughout her childhood, this is believed to be the first known photograph of Helen Keller with one of her dolls. (AP Photo/Courtesy of the Thaxter P. Spencer Collection, R. Stanton Avery Special Collections, New England Historic Genealogical Society-Boston)
1888 photo depicts Helen Keller, teacher
by Melissa Trujillo, APBOSTON - Researchers have uncovered a rare photograph of a young Helen Keller with her teacher Anne Sullivan, nearly 120 years after it was taken on Cape Cod and tucked inside a family album.
The photograph, shot in July 1888 in Brewster, shows an 8-year-old Helen sitting outside in a light-colored dress, holding Sullivan's hand and cradling one of her beloved dolls.
Experts on Keller's life believe it could be the earliest photo of the two women together and the only one showing the blind and deaf child with a doll — the first word Sullivan spelled for Keller after they met in 1887 — according to the New England Historic Genealogical Society, which now has the photo.
"It's really one of the best images I've seen in a long, long time," said Helen Selsdon, an archivist at the American Foundation for the Blind, where Keller worked for more than 40 years. "This is just a huge visual addition to the history of Helen and Annie."
For more than a century, though, the photograph was hidden in an album that belonged to the family of Thaxter Spencer, an 87-year-old man in Waltham.
Spencer's mother, Hope Thaxter Parks, often stayed at the Elijah Cobb House on Cape Cod during the summer as a child. In July 1888, she played with Keller, whose family had traveled from Tuscumbia, Ala., to vacation in Massachusetts.
Spencer, who doesn't know which of his relatives took the picture, told the society that his mother, four years younger than Helen, remembered Helen exploring her face with her hands.
In June, Spencer donated a large collection of photo albums, letters, diaries and other heirlooms to the genealogical society, which preserves artifacts from New England families for future research.
"I never thought much about it," Spencer said in a statement released by the society. "It just seemed like something no one would find very interesting." Spencer has recently been hospitalized and could not be reached for comment.
It wasn't until recently that staff at the society realized the photograph's significance.
D. Brenton Simons, the society's president and CEO, said the photograph offers a glimpse of what was a very important time in Keller's life.
Sullivan was hired in 1887 to teach Keller, who had been left blind and deaf after an illness at the age of 1 1/2. With her new teacher, Keller learned language from words spelled manually into her hand. Not quite 7, the girl went from an angry, frustrated child without a way to communicate to an eager scholar.
While "doll" was the first word spelled into her hand, Helen finally comprehended the meaning of language a few weeks later with the word "water," as famously depicted in the film "The Miracle Worker." Sullivan stayed at her side until her death in 1936, and Keller became a world-famous author and humanitarian. She died in 1968.
Jan Seymour-Ford, a research librarian at the Perkins School for the Blind in Watertown, which both Sullivan and Keller attended, said she was moved to see how deeply connected the women were, even in 1888.
"The way Anne is gazing so intently at Helen, I think it's a beautiful portrait of the devotion that lasted between these two women all of Anne's life," Seymour-Ford said.
Selsdon said the photograph is valuable because it shows many elements of Keller's childhood: that devotion, Sullivan's push to teach Helen outdoors and Helen's attachment to her baby dolls, one of which was given to her upon Sullivan's arrival as her teacher.
"It's a beautiful composition," she said. "It's not even the individual elements. It's the fact that it has all of the components."
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