Lillian Diana Gish www.lilliangish1893.com

  A Pictorial History of the AMERICAN THEATRE 1860-1980 (by DANIEL BLUM – 1981) PDF Download There has been no book up to now which will be as valuable to actors and theatre lovers in years to come as this pictorial history of the American stage by Daniel Blum. Here is a permanent record of all the great plays and players of the last one hundred years. The camera as it has been used by many masters of the photographic art has an ability which is almost uncanny in capturing mood and interpretation as well as likeness. A pictorial history of the American theatre, 1860-1980 cover A pictorial history of the American theatre, 1860-1980_nodrm DOWNLOAD Back to Lillian Gish Home page

  The MGM Girls Behind The Velvet Courtain – 1983 (PDF Download) Peter Harry Brown & Pamela Ann Brown Louis B. Mayer had a talent for taking hopeful young actresses and turning them into the glamorous movie queens that audiences associated with his MGM studios. Few in those audiences realized that those carefully created, pampered stars were the most bullied women in Hollywood. The MGM Girls raises the velvet curtain and shows the real story of life on the movie lot that Hedy Lamarr called “heaven and hell all contained in five acres.” MGM-backlot-set-for-Meet-Me-in-St.-Louis-1944 The MGM girls behind the velvet curtain_nodrm DOWNLOAD Back to Lillian Gish Home page

  Classics of The Silent Screen – By Franklin Joe (1959) PDF Download Broken Blossoms was an ugly story, demanding as much sensitivity and understanding as its audiences could give it. More than that, it needed the very special visual treatment that Griffith gave it. Photographically it was superb, with its striking sets beautifully lit. Moreover, its tinting and toning were an integral part of the whole; gentle rose hues, savage reds, rich blues for the night scenes, and other tones matching every mood and nuance. Audiences that see this film in its rare public viewing today almost invariably see a black-and-white print, which is tantamount to seeing but a pale shadow of what the film originally was. In black and white the tenderness and beauty fade, the ugliness and sheer melodrama are strengthened. The film’s whole balance is thus shifted. But in its original form the film still weaves that same magic spell that Griffith—and Lillian Gish—gave it in 1919. Classics of the silent s...

  A Life In Photography – by Edward Steichen 1984 (PDF Download) The first time I saw Lillian Gish, other than on the movie screen, was as she walked into my studio to be photographed for Vanity Fair. As the saying goes, I was knocked for a loop. It was as if an angel had come into the place. Every movement she made and everything she said seemed full of magic. I made pictures fast and wildly and believed they were all wonderful. But that night, when I looked at the negatives, even before seeing the proofs, I realized I didn’t have anything at all. I had allowed my emotional reaction to take charge of that sitting and had lost all charge of myself. This was a valuable lesson, but a very embarrassing one, for I had to go to Miss Gish with the proofs and beg her to come and sit again for me. She was very gracious about my chagrin. When she came again, I decided to do a fanciful version of Romola, a romantic role she was planning to undertake. I put flowers in her hair and then let he...

  Vaity Fair Archive – Lillian Gish (PDF Download) The particular genius of Lillian Gish lies in making the definite charmingly indefinite. Her technique consists in thinking out a characterization directly and concretely and then executing it in terms of semi-vague suggestion. The acting of every other woman in the moving pictures is a thing of hard, set lines; the acting of Lillian Gish is a thing of a hundred shadings, hints and implications. The so-called wistful smile of the usual movie actress is a mere matter of drawing the lips coyly back from the gums; her tears are a mere matter of inhaling five times rapidly through the nose, blinking the eyes and letting a few drops of glycerine trickle down the left cheek. Vanity Fair Archive – Lillian Gish DOWNLOAD Back to Lillian Gish Home page