The Great Deception

Aileen Pringle's favorite film was a mid-1920s silent based on a book by Elinor Glyn: Three Weeks (1924), sort of a "Lady Chatterly's Lover". She recalled in a 1980 telephone conversation: "The film was in good taste; some people thought the book was trashy". Anita Loos wrote in "A Girl Like I", the first volume of her autobiography, vaudeville comic Joe Frisco telling Glynn: "Leave me get this straight. You want to find some tramp that don't look like a tramp, to play that English tramp in your picture. But take it from me, that kind of tramp don't hang out in Hollywood". Aileen had spent her 20s married to Charles McKenzie Pringle, the son of Sir John Pringle, a Jamaica landowner and a member of the Privy and Legislative Councils of Jamaica. Aileen lived in Jamaica until she went on stage with George Arliss. When she began divorce proceedings against Pringle in 1926, Hollywood gossip columnists speculated she would marry H.L. Mencken. She did not remarry until 1944 when she became the bride of James M. Cain, author of "The Postman Always Rings Twice". I opened my 1980 telephone conversation with Aileen by mentioning that the day before I had been reading her correspondence with Mencken at the New York Public Library. "But all the letters were destroyed", she said. I knew that Mencken had asked for all of his letters to her back at the time he became engaged to Sara Haardt. Aileen was the only woman who received such a request from Mencken at that time. "It was your letters from the late '30s and '40s I was reading", I told Aileen. "In one of them Mencken was urging you to write a book. Did you ever finish it?" "No. I got married instead." In a 1946 letter she wrote to Mencken. "If I had remained married to that psychotic Cain, I would be wearing a straitjacket instead of the New Look." Date of Death 16 December 1989, New York City, New York

From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia Sam B. Hardy (March 21, 1883 – October 16, 1935) was an American stage and film actor who appeared in feature films during the silent and early sound eras. He died of intestinal problems. He was also known as Samuel Hardy. Born in New Haven, Connecticut, Hardy attended Yale but left there to become an actor on stage. He entered the world of film with Biograph Studios. Hardy became ill while he was working in the film Shoot the Chutes, starring Eddie Cantor. He did not survive emergency surgery at a hospital.

Sir Basil Rathbone, KBE, MC, Kt (13 June 1892, Johannesburg – 21 July 1967, New York City) was an English actor. He rose to prominence in England as a Shakespearean stage actor and went on to appear in over 70 films, primarily costume dramas, swashbucklers, and, occasionally, horror films. He frequently portrayed suave villains or morally ambiguous characters, such as Murdstone in David Copperfield (1935) and Sir Guy of Gisbourne in The Adventures of Robin Hood (1938). His most famous role, however, was heroic—that of Sherlock Holmes in fourteen Hollywood films made between 1939 and 1946 and in a radio series. His later career included Broadway and television work; he received a Tony Award in 1948 as Best Actor in a Play. Description above from the Wikipedia article Basil Rathbone, licensed under CC-BY-SA, full list of contributors on Wikipedia.

From Wikipedia Amelia Summerville (1862–1934), born Amelia Shaw, was an Irish-born American stage and silent film actress. Summerville was born in County Kildare, Ireland and migrated to Toronto, Canada as a child. She first appeared on stage at the age of 7 in an operetta in Toronto. In 1884, Summerville appeared in her first leading role in the play Adonis. She originated the role of Rosetta, the Mountain Maid. Summerville appeared in fourteen Broadway plays from 1899 to 1925. She also performed in silent films during the 1910s and 1920s.