Louise Brooks, Wichita Kansas girl scout

In the early 1920s, Louise Brooks was a member of the Girl Scouts. In fact, according to this 1921 article in the Wichita Eagle newspaper, she was a member of one of the first girl scout troops in Wichita, Kansas. Brooks is pictured in the article below, top row, fourth from the left.

Louise Brooks shoots marbles

Louise Brooks, far left, shoots marble with other junior Paramount stars, 1927

Report from Glastonbury: Louise Brooks and the Dodge Brothers

On Saturday, June 28, the Dodge Brothers became the first band to accompany a silent film at the Glastonbury Festival. The film they accompanied was Beggars of Life (1928), starring Louise Brooks.

The Dodge Brothers are Mike Hammond (lead guitar, lead vocals, banjo), Mark Kermode (bass, harmonica, vocals), Aly Hirji (rhythm guitar, mandolin, vocals), and Alex Hammond (washboard, snare drum, percussion). Joining the band at Glastonbury and elsewhere when they accompany silent films is composer and silent film accompanist Neil Brand, a regular at London's National Film Theatre.

Band member Mark Kermode has written about the experience for the Guardian newspaper. He reported, "the audience are terrifically responsive." You can read his entire write-up at "Diary of a Dodge Brother skiffling at Glastonbury." Kermode also posted a video blog which can be viewed below.

New book - Douglas Fairbanks and the American Century

All interested in silent film will want to know . . . . Douglas Fairbanks and the American Century is just out from the University of Mississippi Press. It looks great. The 384 page book, by John C. Tibbetts and James M. Welsh, includes a foreword by Kevin Brownlow and greeting by Vera Fairbanks. The book is a critical study of Fairbank' acting career and "his brand" as the ultimate American.

From the publisher: "Douglas Fairbanks and the American Century brings to life the most popular movie star of his day, the personification of the Golden Age of Hollywood. At his peak, in the teens and twenties, the swashbuckling adventurer embodied the new American Century of speed, opportunity, and aggressive optimism. The essays and interviews in this volume bring fresh perspectives to his life and work, including analyses of films never before examined.

Also published here for the first time in English is a first-hand production account of the making of Fairbanks's last silent film, The Iron Mask.

Fairbanks (1883-1939) was the most vivid and strenuous exponent of the American Century, whose dominant mode after 1900 was the mass marketing of a burgeoning democratic optimism, at home and abroad. During those first decades of the twentieth century, his satiric comedy-adventures shadow-boxed with the illusions of class and custom. His characters managed to combine the American Easterner's experience and pretension and the Westerner's promise and expansion. As the masculine personification of the Old World aristocrat and the New World self-made man--tied to tradition yet emancipated from history--he constructed a uniquely American aristocrat striding into a new age and sensibility.

This is the most complete account yet written of the film career of Douglas Fairbanks, one of the first great stars of the silent American cinema and one of the original United Artists (comprising Fairbanks, Mary Pickford, Charles Chaplin, and D. W. Griffith). John C. Tibbetts and James M. Welsh's text is especially rich in its coverage of the early years of the star's career from 1915 to 1920 and covers in detail several films previously considered lost.

It's the Old Army Game with Louise Brooks screens in Chicago July 17

It's the Old Army Game will be shown in Chicago on July 17th, as part of the 2014 Silent Summer Film Festival. The film stars W.C. Fields and Louise Brooks, and the screening will take place at the historic Pickwick Theatre, 5 Prospect Ave (Touhy & NW Hwy), in nearby Park Ridge, Illinois. According to the Chicagoist website: 

The festival kicks off July 17 with a screening of “It’s the Old Army Game,” a 1926 film starring W.C. Fields as a put-upon pharmacist and Louise Brooks as Louise Brooks as his employee in the pharmacy. After being talked by a con man into selling bogus New York City lots from the drugstore, Fields feels compelled to return the money stolen from townsfolk by the con man after he’s caught. Fields would later remake this film as the talkie “It’s a Gift” but it’s Brooks who steals the film every time she’s on screen. The Great Lakes Trio, a regular fixture at the festival, provides pre-show music. SFSC executive director Dennis Wolkowicz accompanies the film on the Wurlitzer in his guise as “Jay Warren.”

Louise Brooks: At the Beach

It's summer. So here are a few images of Louise Brooks at the beach.

As a member of Denishawn, in 1923. Louise Brooks is second from right.
Martha Graham is center. Picture taken on the Atlantic Coast.

As a Paramount actress, in 1927. Louise Brooks is center, with
Sally Blane (left) and Nancy Phillips (right). Pacific Coast.

Southern California in 1927, with Nancy Phillips.

At the Cavilier Beach Club, Virginia Beach, in 1929.

In a scene from Prix de beaute, filmed in France in 1929.
I would guess this was taken on the Mediterranean.

Louise Brooks: Modelling a bathing suit

Cool pic of the day: Louise Brooks models a bathing suit, circa 1927.