YOU Tube'n

[mrsl]

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WoW. Those photos of Caesar Romero look great to me. They look like they could be my late husband, or at the very least, his brother. I wish I could post photos to prove that I'm not nuts.
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[CineMaven]

This cracked me up when he said this, because I'm a silly silly goose:

George Murphy went around giving everybody that was there, a nick name. A nick name that didn’t suit them. Particularly. And when he got to me he said “And your name is Butch” and everybody laughed and they kept calling me Butch. And suddenly became my name. And I’ve been Butch ever since.”

Yes, Romero was very dashing. And frankly, he looked better the older he got.

Whoa...at first I thought Skip was the guy who used to be on the "Will and Grace" show:

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[JackFavell]

Oh my gosh, I always loved it when that guy was on Will and Grace and Frank's Place I think too. There was a time when he was on everything....

Caesar Romero was certainly not 'butch', but you know what? He wasn't femme either. If he weren't gay, I would have completely fallen for him! SO sophisticated. What I loved, no matter whether he was supporting Ty, or making an appearance on Batman, was his sense of humor and his obvious joy of acting.

[moira finnie]

Good golly, he was seventy eight in that first interview! He must have had good genes.

Interestingly, he may (or may not) have shared some very distinguished genes. José Martí (1853-1895), a Cuban national hero and a well-known poet, worked to unite Cubans against domination by both Spain and the U.S.--though he admired American principles of freedom. One of Marti's most beautiful poems was adapted into the well-known folk song "Guantanamera."

He may have been Romero's maternal grandfather, though documentary evidence may be non-existent to prove this story conclusively one way or another.

Above:Cesar Romero with his parents, Cesar, Sr. and Maria Romero

The story goes that during a sojourn in NYC, the married poet-revolutionary may have fathered Romero's mother, Maria Mantilla (b. 1881), though Manuel Mantilla was officially listed as the girl's father on her birth certificate. Marti was already the father of a son by his legal wife. In later years, he wrote a series of tender letters to his god-daughter's mother, who maintained a boarding house at 51 East 29th Street, in Manhattan (or possibly another residence in The Bronx). These missives are reportedly among the most beautiful of the author's prose works. Officially, Marti was listed as the girl's godfather, though many who knew them both claimed that their closeness was similar to that between father and daughter. Maria reported that Marti referred to her as "daughter" and she inherited many of his personal papers, which are now in an archive at the University of Florida Archives.

Years later, Cesar Romero would occasionally make reference to his belief that "the Cuban Revolution was planned on [his] grandmother's oil cloth-covered kitchen table." People on both sides of this issue still debate its veracity as you can see in these sources below:
http://josemartiblog.blogspot.com/2011/ ... ghter.html
http://www.latinamericanstudies.org/marti-1.htm
http://web.uflib.ufl.edu/spec/manuscrip ... romero.htm

[CineMaven]

Moira, sometimes the background of these celebrities is sooooooo interesting. ( I'm going to make a visit to East 29th Street. )

Wendy, we might not have had a chance with Cesar...but he looked like he had a ball being in the movies. He's also got to be the best dressed man in Hollywood. Every photograph I've ever seen him in, he looks impeccable! And I get the impression he doesn't 'kiss-and-tell.' Moira, does Cesar have an autobiography out or is there one ON him? He looks like he knew ev'rybody and lived Hollywood...to...the...hilt.

[RedRiver]

He's also got to be the best dressed man in Hollywood

With the exception of Charley Weaver, of course!

[CineMaven]

Oh lord.

[JackFavell]

That's so cool, Moira! was Marti killed or desaparecidos? or am I mistaking him for another? I remember a Pete Seeger intro to Guatanamera talking about this hero, but maybe it was another song or person I am thinking of?

Cesar always dressed beautifully, never over the top and looked like he had fun.

My gosh, I haven't actually thought of Charley Weaver in at least 20 years. What a blast from the past.

[CineMaven]

Always choose Cliff Arquette! He was the smartest "square". ( Grandpa to: Rosanna Arquette, Patricia Arquette, David Arquette...and two lesser known Arquettes. )

[norfious]

I don't usually like many fan-made music videos, but these two work particularly well with the music. Quite amusing!

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[mrsl]

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I think I could enjoy watching Jimmy Cagney dancing for half the day and not get tired of it. I guess I'll have to find a bio on him to read because even though I looked him up on imdB, I couldn't find much info on his musical days. There was a 13 year span between Yankee Doodle Dandy and The Seven Little Foys, and I'm sure it was rough for him to bring his dancing skills back up to that level again to repeat some of the steps from YDD for his short apearance in The 7LF. I'm fairly familiar with some of his films pre-YDD, especially that one where he's dancing with the Asian girl on the bar, but that's the only one I recall seeing with him dancing. I'm not mad about the gangster films with him, Bogart and Robinson, but I like all of them in all the other roles they took on.

Any suggestions for a book I can obtain from the library?

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[norfious]

mrsl, I have read "Cagney by Cagney", written, of course, by James Cagney himself. It offers a lot of insights into the man's career, including his history as a dancer. If you can find this one at the library, I'd recommend it!

[knitwit45]

Anne, that "Asian girl" is none other than Ruby Keeler, in one of the finale numbers of Footlight Parade (1933)

[mrsl]

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Thanks knitty, I thought it was her from something I read a long time ago, but I didn't want to say it out loud. I say enough dumb things in these posts I write without making announcements that I can't back up.

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[MissGoddess]

Lovely interview here by William Friedkin of Fritz Lang, made late in his life:

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His candor is disarming and his manner still full of old-world charm. I was rather taken
by his admitting he didn't really believe much in the message of Metropolis until decades
after he'd made it.