Monday, Nov. 30, 1953
Names make news. Last week these names made this news:
Producer Sam Goldwyn, who was prepared to spend $250.000 for the film rights to Charles A. Lindbergh's book The Spirit of St. Louis, called the whole thing off. What nettled Goldwyn was Author Lindbergh's demand for a veto in the choice of actors, writers and director.
The U.S. Parole Board in Washington announced that it had once more considered the parole application of Perjurer Alger Hiss, again agreed to deny it.
Seated in a jeep to save wear & tear on his ailing hip. TV Star Arthur Godfrey joined friends for the opening of the Michigan deer-hunting season. Among his fellow huntsmen: Defense Secretary Charles E. Wilson, General Motors' President Harlow H. Curtice, SACommander General Curtis LeMay. In two days Godfrey fired five times, missed each time. Bag for the rest of the party: five bucks.
In London, Buckingham Palace was romantically aflutter over the marriage of Robina MacDonald, 37, personal maid to Princess Margaret, and Norman Gordon, 32, onetime footman to Queen Elizabeth, now a post-office telephonist. Queen Mother Elizabeth personally supervised the baking of the wedding cake.
The Soviet zone magazine Berliner II-lustrierte, all hot and bothered, disclosed the power responsible for last year's Republican victory, for U.S. policy in Germany, and for McCarthyism. It turned out to be none other than Cinemactress Marilyn Monroe. Her function, said the magazine in a full-page expose, is to make people forget why Joe and Tom had to die in Korea, how [Americans] are cashing in throughout West Germany, and about the rising cost of living . . . Not by coincidence did this appeal to the nerves begin at the height of the American presidential election: it was a maneuver to remove the last vestiges of the voters' freedom of choice. Neither is it by coincidence that the Western press is devoting so much attention to this 'star' now at a time when Adenauer is openly rearming . . . During the premiere of one of [Monroe's] films in New York, fans literally tore her clothing from her body and hardly noticed that at the same time McCarthy was violating the great democratic traditions of the American people."
. . .
British film drumbeaters meanwhile came forth with "England's bewitching answer to Marilyn Monroe": 23-year-old Mara Lane, a movie bit-player, who, so far, has not been accused by anyone of causing the Conservative victory in Britain's last elections, but who seems likely to command attention in other respects. . . .
In Illinois' Stateville Penitentiary, Nathan Leopold, 49, partner in the notorious Loeb-Leopold "thrill murder" of Bobby Franks in 1924, got word that his brother Foreman, who died this month, had cut him out of his will. Foreman, who with his family changed his last name to Lebold, left a $400,000 estate to his widow.
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Facing a vote of censure by the United Nations Legal Committee, Polish Delegate Juliusz Katz-Suchy, known along the East River as the poor man's Vishinsky, left his seat, told reporters he was going for "a drink of water," instead, picked up his coat and walked out. Reason for the censure: as the committee's chairman, Katz-Suchy refused to recognize Nationalist China's Dr. Shuhsi Hsu as "the delegate from China." sneeringly kept calling him "Dr. Hsu." Resolved the committee: "It is the duty of the chairman . . . to treat all members . . . as representatives of their respective countries and not as private persons."
Los Angeles officials and Hollywood celebrities turned out for a banquet honoring Greece's King Paul and Queen Frederika. Among the entertainers was talented, sexy Eartha Kitt, who sang songs such as Santa Baby and I Want to Be Evil. Next day, some of Los Angeles' councilmen were shocked. Said one: "It was low-level entertainment, repugnant to all decent citizens." Eartha's songs, according to Mayor Morris Poulson, were "filthy, risque and off-color." Eartha herself pleaded not guilty. Said she: "I can't understand it. I didn't think it was possible to shock politicians." The King and Queen, already on their way to New Mexico and Texas, were bewildered by the fuss. "We saw nothing wrong with it," said King Paul. "We both enjoyed it very much." Echoed the Queen: "It was lovely." But the modest Californians refused to drop the subject. Said Councilman Don Allen: "The King and Queen must wonder what kind of yo-yo heads we have in Los Angeles."
Surrealist Painter Salvador Dali announced in Nice that he is about to go into a new motion picture venture. To be produced by him next year: a movie starring Italy's earthy Anna Magnani, in which she will play a woman in love with a wheelbarrow. "The name of the film will be The Wheelbarrow of Flesh" explained Dali, "and she will find in that object all the qualities and charms of a human being . . . it's terrific."
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