Thursday, September 30, 2010

R.I.P., Tony Curtis

From Criss Cross (1947). His first scene in movies, dancing with Yvonne deCarlo:

The Sweet Smell of Success
(1957):

The Defiant Ones (1958):

Some Like It Hot (1960):

13 comments:

Sylvia K said...

A great RIP for Tony Curtis, K. Have to admit it startled me to read about him in the NYT this morning -- I guess even when we know better it's not hard to think that somehow those famous ones never really grow old and just kind of go on forever. A gal in NJ wrote yesterday about a new album that Tom Jones has out and there were photos of him now and he surely doesn't look like the photos of him "back then"! But he looked pretty good for an old dude! Hope you're doing well.

Sylvia

Nick said...

I got to meet him a few years ago, and blogged about it just a few weeks ago. Lovely man & fabulous actor.

http://getnickt.blogspot.com/2010/07/tony-curtis-meeting-in-desert.html

Roy said...

Hmmmm... He's a part of Hollywood I missed. I saw Some Like it Hot years later and thought it was moderately funny, but tony Curtis was just never a part of my formative movie experience. Thanks for the clips; they at least give me a better idea of his work than I had.

K. said...

His most notorious scene -- the one from Spartacus in which Laurence Olivier asking leeringly if slave boy Curtis prefers snails or oysters -- is not on YouTube. (At least I couldn't find it.) That's same scene in which TC claims to have "tawt da classix to da childrun 'a my mastah."

On the other hand, his Some Like It Hot Cary Grant imitation -- and Jack Lemmon's response to it ("Where did you get that ridiculous accent?") -- is priceless.

Foxessa said...

There never was before and never will be again a film like "Some Like It Hot."

It achieves greatness while remaining unique.

Love, C.

K. said...

Billy Wilder made an awful lot of topnotch films. I would be pretty happy with an oeuvre of Hot, Stalag 17, Double Indemnity, Ace in the Hole, The Lost Weekend, The Apartment, and Sunset Blvd.

21 Academy Award nominations, 6 wins, plus the Thalberg Lifetime Achievement.

Frank Partisan said...

I even liked him when he was on TV with Roger Moore in The Persuades, which was on BBC.

K. said...

I totally forgot about The Persuaders. It briefly made it to American TV as part of the Avengers-Prisoner British invasion.

K. said...

Here are the credits!

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=aO_yyCPmTu0

Shaw Kenawe said...

"Some Like it Hot" is my favorite comedy.

And whenever I make a silly mistake I always remember to say:

"Well, nobody's perfect."

The last line of that wonderful movie spoken by Joe E. Brown.

cile said...

I feel a Tony Curtis Film fest coming on. Fire up the popcorn popper and let the festivities of appreciation begin. RIP, indeed, and thank you Tony Curtis...and K., of course, for the reminder to stop and reflect.

Darlene said...

Since Tony Curtis was my age it will come as no surprise that I adored him when we were both young.

I think that was Burt Lancaster featured in the first clip. There was very little of Tony Curtis , but he was 'hot' from his first movie on.

Rest in peace, Tony.

K. said...

That's the sum total of TC's first appearance on celluloid! For a treat, check out the documentary The Celluloid Closet, about Hollywood's portrayal of gays throughout film history. He's interviewed in connection with Some Like It Hot and Spartacus. I'd say that he steals the show except that hearing Gore Vidal expound on Ben-Hur is worth the price of admission by itself.