The Jackie Robinson You Won't See in '42'
April, 11, 2013 12:49 pm | Comments On #baseball, jackie robinson, Movies, paul robeson, Richard NixonThere is probably no one in American sports more beloved than Jackie Robinson, who receives worshipful treatment in the new Legendary Pictures-Warner Bros.’ biopic, “42.”
The film, which stars Chadwick Boseman as the legendary ballplayer and Harrison Ford as the man who put him in the lineup – Brooklyn Dodgers owner Branch Rickey – opens Friday. But there’s a darker side to Robinson’s life story that won’t be celebrated by baseball, and isn’t in the film
On the field, Robinson made history when he broke baseball’s color barrier, but off the field he often found himself on the wrong side of history.
His was, in fact, a life filled with regret.
Robinson backed the wrong horse in the 1960 presidential election, campaigning for Richard Nixon against John F. Kennedy – a decision he would later...
Read MoreDrugs, Tragedies and 'Charlie's Angels'
March, 13, 2013 9:02 am | Comments On #Television
Legendary stuntwoman Julie Johnson says she first became aware that “Charlie’s Angels” had a coke problem on Jan. 3, 1979. The show was filming on location at Indian Dunes that day at a dirt airfield out by Magic Mountain, some 30 miles north of Los Angeles.
“I was sitting in the back seat of the stunt car – an old Ford station wagon – waiting for the driver to return,” Julie (below right) recalls. “I had the window down when a member of the crew in jeans and a white T-shirt walked by and yelled out to someone up ahead, ‘Bobby got the last of the coke this morning! God damn it!’”
Bobby, she knew, was Bobby...
Read MoreKirk Douglas and the Blacklist
August, 13, 2012 9:23 am | Comments On #Dalton Trumbo, Hollywood Blacklist, Kirk Douglas, Movies, SpartacusKirk Douglas will be the honored guest and featured speaker tonight (Monday, Aug. 13) at the Academy of Motion Picture Arts & Sciences’ screening of “Spartacus.” No doubt, he will, as he did in his recent book, "I Am Spartacus: Making a Film, Breaking the Blacklist," take credit for breaking the Hollywood Blacklist.
In fact, no one person broke the blacklist, anymore than any one person won World War II.
Breaking the blacklist was a team effort, and if anyone deserves a share of the credit, it’s legendary producer-director Stanley Kramer.
Kramer defied the blacklist in 1952 – a full eight years before blacklisted...
Read MoreRichard Nixon's Secret War on JFK's Health
March, 15, 2012 11:20 am | Comments On #MediaRichard Nixon was in a panic. With only five days to go before the 1960 election, he was trailing in the polls and appeared to be headed for a narrow but certain defeat. But he had one last card to play. It was a gamble, he knew, but Nixon was a gambler, and now was the time to raise the stakes.
Throughout the campaign, both the Kennedy and Nixon camps feared that each had obtained damaging medical information about the other. The Kennedy campaign believed that Nixon had come into possession of Jack’s stolen medical records showing that he had Addison’s disease, and Nixon knew that someone -- probably the Kennedys -- had hired a private...
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Description
David L. Robb is an award-winning freelance journalist who has been nominated for the Pulitzer Prize three times. He is the author of "Operation Hollywood: How the Pentagon Shapes and Censors the Movies" and "The Gumshoe and the Shrink: The Secret History of the 1950 Kennedy/Nixon Election." His work has been featured in Daily Variety, the Hollywood Reporter, LA Weekly, the Los Angeles Times, the Nation, the New York Times and the Washington Post. He lives in Los Angeles. His new book is "The Stuntwoman: The True Story of a Hollywood Heroine," with Julie Ann Johnson.
