Lillian Russell

Heartwarming Disney tale stars Fred MacMurray as a travelling musician who dreams of becoming a lawyer. After settling in a sleepy small town, he decides to become a scoutmaster for a newly formed Boy Scouts troop. As MacMurray leads the youths, he decides to put aside his career plans and instead focus on helping his community. With Vera Miles, Lillian Gish, David Bailey. 133 min. Standard; Soundtrack: English Dolby Digital mono; Subtitles: Spanish; photo gallery; documentary.

14 songs from vaudeville's great stars.

"I'm not a drinker--I'm a drunk." These words, and the serious message behind them, were still potent enough in 1945 to shock audiences flocking to The Lost Weekend. The speaker is Don Birnam (Ray Milland), a handsome, talented, articulate alcoholic. The writing team of producer Charles Brackett and director Billy Wilder pull no punches in their depiction of Birnam's massive weekend bender, a tailspin that finds him reeling from his favorite watering hole to Bellevue Hospital. Location shooting in New York helps the street-level atmosphere, especially a sequence in which Birnam, a budding writer, tries to hock his typewriter for booze money. He desperately staggers past shuttered storefronts--it's Yom Kippur, and the pawnshops are closed. Milland, previously known as a lightweight leading man (he'd starred in Wilder's hilarious The Major and the Minor three years earlier), burrows convincingly under the skin of the character, whether waxing poetic about the escape of drinking or screaming his lungs out in the D.T.'s sequence. Wilder, having just made the ultra-noir Double Indemnity, brought a new kind of frankness and darkness to Hollywood's treatment of a social problem. At first the film may have seemed too bold; Paramount Pictures nearly killed the release of the picture after it tested poorly with preview audiences. But once in release, The Lost Weekend became a substantial hit, and won four Oscars: for picture, director, screenplay, and actor. --Robert Horton

William Wyler and Bette Davis made their third and final collaboration their finest with this striking 1941 adaptation of Lillian Hellman's acidic play. The titular foxes are a particularly ravenous turn-of-the-century Southern moneyed clan, the Hubbards, and the most cunning of them all is sister Regina Giddens, the brilliant but ruthless woman played by Davis. In contrast to the manipulative Regina and her scheming brothers (Charles Dingle and Carl Benton Reid) is her guileless sister-in-law Birdie (Patricia Collinge in a delicately flighty performance) and her sickly, humanistic husband Horace (Herbert Marshall), whom she tolerates only for his money and position--until he stands in the way of a scheme that could bring her a fortune. Teresa Wright is the hope of the next generation as Regina's thoughtful daughter, Alexandra, who stands in marked contrast to her graceless, greedy cousin Leo (Dan Duryea). Wyler's longtime cameraman, Gregg Toland, fresh from his groundbreaking work on Citizen Kane, fills the film with amazing deep-focus compositions and razor-sharp images, showing off the grandly handsome mansion set in all its old-world splendor. But for all its beauty Wyler reveals it as a cold, lonely world ruled by a heartless woman. Excellent performances by all make Hellman's sharp dialogue glint like the edge of a knife, which ultimately cuts deep into the soul of this powerful classic. --Sean Axmaker

"I'm not a drinker--I'm a drunk." These words, and the serious message behind them, were still potent enough in 1945 to shock audiences flocking to The Lost Weekend. The speaker is Don Birnam (Ray Milland), a handsome, talented, articulate alcoholic. The writing team of producer Charles Brackett and director Billy Wilder pull no punches in their depiction of Birnam's massive weekend bender, a tailspin that finds him reeling from his favorite watering hole to Bellevue Hospital. Location shooting in New York helps the street-level atmosphere, especially a sequence in which Birnam, a budding writer, tries to hock his typewriter for booze money. He desperately staggers past shuttered storefronts--it's Yom Kippur, and the pawnshops are closed. Milland, previously known as a lightweight leading man (he'd starred in Wilder's hilarious The Major and the Minor three years earlier), burrows convincingly under the skin of the character, whether waxing poetic about the escape of drinking or screaming his lungs out in the D.T.'s sequence. Wilder, having just made the ultra-noir Double Indemnity, brought a new kind of frankness and darkness to Hollywood's treatment of a social problem. At first the film may have seemed too bold; Paramount Pictures nearly killed the release of the picture after it tested poorly with preview audiences. But once in release, The Lost Weekend became a substantial hit, and won four Oscars: for picture, director, screenplay, and actor. --Robert Horton

Billy Wilder's Oscar-winning social drama stars Ray Milland as an alcoholic writer who falls into a maelstrom of delusion and dementia and winds up in a psychiatric ward during a three-day bender. Groundbreaking look into the dangers of alcoholism that was almost not released co-stars Jane Wyman, Howard Da Silva, and Frank Faylen. 101 min. Standard; Soundtrack: English Dolby Digital mono; Subtitles: French, Spanish; production notes; biographies; theatrical trailer.

Photo Puzzle, LILLIAN RUSSELL (1861-1922). N

Photo Puzzle, LILLIAN RUSSELL (1861-1922). N

Photo Puzzle, LILLIAN RUSSELL (1861-1922). N

Brand New Officially Licensed Sports Photo - Guaranteed to Arrive Safe - Size: 11 x 17 inches - Great for Autographs

Frances is a fussy eater. In fact, the only thing she likes is bread and jam. She won't touch her squishy soft-boiled egg. She trades away her chicken-salad sandwich at lunch. She turns up her nose at boring veal cutlets. Unless Mother can come up with a plan, Frances just might go on eating bread and jam forever!

Thelma always seems to get Frances into trouble. When she tricks Frances into buying her tea set, it s the last straw. Can Frances show her that it s better to lose a bargain than lose a friend? Recommended in Laura Berquist Kindergarten Syllabus Author: Russell Hoban Pages: 64 Publisher: Harper Collins ISBN: 006444001X

It s bedtime for young Frances--an adorable and irrepressible little badger--and everyone else is ready. But not Francis!! Recommended in Laura Berquist Kindergarten SyllabusAuthor: Russel HobanPublisher: HarperTrophyFormat: 32 pages, paperbackISBN: 978-0064434515

It's bedtime for young Frances--an adorable and irrepressible little badger--and everyone is ready but her. At 7:00 p.m. Frances is wide awake and bursting with youthful excitement. She tries every delay tactic she can muster--from demanding extra hugs and kisses to volleying a series of urgent last-minute questions ("May I sleep with my teddy bear?" "May I have my door open?"). She's almost positive there are spiders, giants, and tigers in her room. Any parent will quickly identify with this phenomenon--how the last minutes of the day suddenly become the most action-packed. Garth Williams's illustrations complement Russell Hoban's sweet story perfectly, capturing the endless energy and overactive imagination of Frances, and the waning patience of her exhausted parents. Bedtime for Frances is the perfect goodnight story to tell your wide-eyed children. And never fear, like Frances, they too will eventually, contentedly, drift off to sleep. (Ages 4 to 8)