A snippet about #MGM and #Adrian from research for my next book on #TheWomen: "For close-ups [of flying #monkeys] real feathers had to be used....zookeepers who agreed to cooperate collected molten feathers in their aviaries..." #TCMParty #wizardofoz

In 1946 in an article titled, "If You Want Him, Ask Him!" women's magazine GO praised #TheBestYearsofOurLives for "setting a precedent showing that, if a girl knows what she wants, she'll go after it...." #TCMParty #Feminism

"Harold's the fellow who almost stole the show..." In an article entitled "No Hands...No Handicap," #HaroldRussell is profiled as he travels the country promoting #veterans' issues and, by extension, #TheBestYearsofOurLives in May 1947. #TCMParty #disability

On the set of #TheBestYearsOfOurLives: #DanaAndrews practices his sundae-making skills as DP #GreggToland and #WilliamWyler monitor the whipped cream allocation. #TCMParty #drugstorecowboy

A fave bit of research for #TheBestYearsofOurLives was learning #FredricMarch's comedic bits didn't play well w/troops in #WWII, so he performed the JEKYLL AND HYDE transformation scene sans FX--it was a hit! (The top hat now belongs to his niece 😉) On #TCM this a.m. #TCMParty

In 1948 the War Dept.'s Gen. Robert McClure, known for "unconventional" methods of psych. warfare, reached out to #SamuelGoldwyn requesting to screen #TheBestYearsofOurLives “for use in re-educating the Germans.” Goldwyn agreed. Rumor is they clapped at the end. #TCMParty #WWII

Cartoonist Milton Caniff polled his readers in 1949 for a film to include in his "Steve Canyon" comic; #TheBestYearsofOurLives won by a landslide. Samuel Goldwyn was suspicious--comics!--but Goldwyn exec Bill Hebert convinced him to OK the use of the images. #TCMParty #comics

Thank you, @marcikay.bsky.social for the photo and the chat! So glad you were there. #TCMFF #TCMParty #TheBestYearsofOurLives

Hey #TCMFF, I'll be introducing #TheBestYearsofOurLives for its 80th anniversary tomorrow morning at 9 am 🎉 #TCMParty, set your alarms #veterans

#OTD in 1946 #WilliamWyler began shooting Fred's nightmare during production on #TheBestYearsofOurLives. Featuring #DanaAndrews as Fred and #TeresaWright as Peggy, the sequence required the better part of a week with daily rehearsals and multiple takes of each shot. #TCMParty

@kristenklopez.bsky.social look what I found at Larry Edmunds 👀 And it's signed 😍 #TCMParty #TCMFF #HaroldRussell #TheBestYearsofOurLives #Disability

Think this episode about #TheBestYearsofOurLives is dropping soon! Thanks @ticklishbiz.bsky.social for having me on. See you soon! #TCMFF #TCMParty

RKO sound man Harold Tannenbaum (L) with #WilliamWyler during #WWII. He was KIA shooting footage for THE MEMPHIS BELLE. “I suppose you heard we lost Tannenbaum,” a devastated Wyler wrote home. “I came back and he didn’t. I guess that’s about all there is to it.” #TCMParty📸 Wyler

Interviewed by the DAILY NEWS in Dec. '46 to promote #TheBestYearsofOurLives, #MyrnaLoy said, "People are ducking the great issues we face today...In the film, the characters had to attack their difficulties and bring them to a conclusion. This is the way it should be." #TCMParty

#OTD in April 1946, #SamuelGoldwyn sends a telegram to screenwriter #RobertSherwood in New York: “You would have been thrilled if you could have seen the rushes this morning of Al’s homecoming. I haven’t been as moved by a scene in many years.” #TheBestYearsofOurLives #TCMParty

From Teresa Wright's contract ca. 1946: "I will not pose in shorts, playing with a cute cocker spaniel. I will not be shown happily whipping up a meal for a huge family." #TCMParty #TheBestYearsofOurLives #TeresaWright

Thrilled to get to see my grad school pal Christina Lane (@phantomlady15) at #TCMFF! She's the author of the multi-award winning #JoanHarrison bio PHANTOM LADY and will be introducing that film, produced by Harrison, on Sat., May 2, 11:15 am, Chinese Multiplex House 4. #TCMParty

In Dec. 1945, #SamuelGoldwyn scout Miriam Howell sent a memo from Cambridge to LA after her first meeting with #HaroldRussell for #TheBestYearsofOurLives: “He has a round, apple-cheeked, Irish pan and a wonderful smile… one of the most winning and likable people….” #TCMParty

Love this on-set photo of #MyrnaLoy, who followed #TheBestYearsofOurLives with THE BACHELOR AND THE BOBBY SOXER, shot in and around Los Angeles. #TCMParty

I have such a soft spot for #Piranha, on #TCM tonight! Not only was it filmed nearby in San Marcos (close to a campus where I taught), but its writer #JohnSayles graciously blurbed my book about #screenwriter Warren Skaaren. #TCMParty #Piranha #Monstermovie

#VirginiaMayo's dramatic turn in #TheBestYearsofOurLives helped her get cast beyond musical comedies in films like #WhiteHeat. Mayo's favorite scene? When inmate #JamesCagney learns his mother has died: "It is powerful, compelling, horrifying and all Cagney!" #TCMParty

#FrankCapra and #WilliamWyler began shooting #ItsaWonderfulLife and #TheBestYearsofOurLives #OTD in April 1946. "Last one in is a rotten egg," telegrammed Wyler to Capra, who ribbed, "My first day was easy but do you know they're using sound today." #TCMParty

Comedian @mulaney.bsky.social on why he's a fan of #TheBestYearsofOurLives: “This was the first time I thought about people coming back from the Second World War, and it not having been simply a heroic, great time.... I find it a pretty stark movie.” #TCMParty

In April 1947, PIC magazine reviewed #TheBestYearsofOurLives: "It's as wholesome as a filet mignon, as realistic as the next-door neighbors and as American as a hotdog stand." #TCMParty

The Wardrobe Plot Book for #TheBestYearsofOurLives is a thick stack of 3-hole scrapbook pages with b/w photos and lots of detail, like which actors wore their own jewelry (Wright) and who wore fingernail polish (Loy). Here, #TeresaWright wearing one of my fave dresses. #TCMParty

Excited to be attending my first #TCMFF to introduce #TheBestYearsofOurLives for its 80th anniversary 🎉 #TCMParty, set your alarms ⏰ Thank you @tcmtv.bsky.social for the invitation! #WilliamWyler #Veterans

"Dear George: I'm plumb crazy over today's rushes...Joan looks stunning (Allah and Guilaroff be praised) and the scene's a knockout in every respect." Prod. Hunt Stromberg to #GeorgeCukor about #JoanCrawford and this scene in #TheWomen, on #TCM overnight. #TCMParty #nextbook

ohn O'Donnell, theater critic for Iowa's Quad-City Times, encouraged his readers to see #TheBestYearsofOurLives in May 1947, hailing its realism: " #HaroldRussell DID lose his two hands while serving his country...he is the genuine post-war Harold Russell." #TCMParty #Veterans

On #Easter Sunday 1947, #TheBestYearsofOurLives was being celebrated in London as the "Picture of the Month": "Although ever-long....(it) won b/c of its first-class direction...tremendous star appeal and...its human approach to the American postwar problems." #TCMParty #Veterans

Thelma #ButterflyMcQueen in her first uncredited role as Lulu in #TheWomen, whom #JoanCrawford pays to cook dinner to impress her married boyfriend. “I didn’t mind being funny, but I didn’t like being stupid,” McQueen said of her roles, in 1990. #TCMParty #nextbook

Censor Joe Breen sent an 8-page memo in April ‘46 to #SamuelGoldwyn re: #TheBestYearsOfOurLives, warning to take “the greatest possible care in the shooting of all scenes of kissing. These should not be prolonged, or lustful...NO OPEN-MOUTHED KISSING.” #TCMParty #censorship

#OTD in '46 #BetteDavis wrote to ex #WilliamWyler declaring a truce after he sent flowers for the death of her beloved dog: "As I said the night of the Academy [awards], the war should be over between us--it is so long ago--and so much happened to both of us." #TCMParty #Jezebel

#MyrnaLoy in 1946 at the November 21 premiere of #TheBestYearsofOurLives in New York City at the Astor Theatre. #TCMParty

#TeresaWright, #MyrnaLoy, and #DanaAndrews relaxing between takes of the "night on the town" scene in #TheBestYearsofOurLives ca. May 1946. #TCMParty

Just as #TheBestYearsofOurLives was named the top picture of 1947 by Film Daily, #OliviadeHavilland reached out to #WilliamWyler about adapting the play “The Heiress,” which would eventually become Wyler’s next film project. #TCMParty #BehindTheScenes

In 1947 writer-director #RobertRossen, whose film BODY AND SOUL was about to be released, named #TheBestYearsofOurLives as the only American film he found realistic, but added that even it "had some phony moments." Rossen on-set with DP #JamesWongHowe and #HazelBrooks. #TCMParty

Poster for BOOMERANG, #DanaAndrews’ follow-up to #TheBestYearsofOurLives. Goldwyn warned him not to discuss the film while promoting BEST YEARS. Shot in CT, where the real murder happened. Produced by “March of Time’s” Louis de Rochemont in “newsreel style.” #TCMParty

FUNNY GIRL on #TCM this afternoon. Of working with #WilliamWyler in her film debut, #BarbraStreisand said, "I wanted to please him. I wanted him to like it. I wanted him to like me.” Wyler said, "This girl knows her stuff." #TCMParty #FunnyGirl

The snub heard round the world: Photo purportedly documenting #Oscar winner #OliviadeHavilland "snubbing" her younger sister #JoanFontaine backstage after de Havilland's Best Actress win at the '47 Academy Awards. Ryan Murphy, here's your next installment! #TCMParty #Feud

Costume designer #Adrian and #RosalindRussell heading to the MGM set of #TheWomen in the spring of 1939. Ten years earlier, Adrian told SCREENLAND magazine, "With the entrance of the human voice [in movies], actresses suddenly became human beings." #TCMParty #nextbook

In March ’46 #TheBestYearsofOurLives' art director #PerryFerguson submitted a set construction estimate that also included locations like the Long Beach Airport (opening scene), the Parrish house (1125 W. 20th St in L.A., below), and Marie's apartment (12th and Hoover). #TCMParty

In mid March '47, a story by #HaroldRussell's wife Rita runs in U.S. newspapers. She writes of seeing his mother passing her house with a suitcase in '44. "I rushed out...she told me of the explosion that had blown off both his hands." #TCMParty #TheBestYearsofOurLives #WWII

Despite--or perhaps because of--her thick Alabama accent, #SamuelGoldwyn christened Ann Steely #CathyODonnell after assessing her Irish-leaning good looks. Once she had done extensive training and stage work, he cast her in #TheBestYearsofOurLives. #TCMParty #StPatricksDay ☘️

Despite #TheBestYearsofOurLives' record-setting wins at the 1947 #Oscars, the ongoing feud between sisters #OliviadeHavilland and #JoanFontaine dominated press coverage in the days following the awards ceremony. #TCMParty

#TheBestYearsofOurLives swept the #Oscars #OTD 79 yrs ago. One of the most emotional wins: #HaroldRussell for Best Supporting Actor (he also rc'd an honorary award). Here w/ #CathyODonnell (accepting for #FredricMarch) & fellow winners #OliviadeHavilland & #AnneBaxter. #TCMParty

#Oscars flashback: Press props for Oscar nominee #FredricMarch in #TheBestYearsofOurLives, his 15th film. Check out the last sentence for an estimated gross of his entire filmography in 1947 dollars (about $3.6 billion today). #TCMParty

#DanaAndrews, the original #drugstorecowboy, on the set of #TheBestYearsofOurLives in 1946 refusing service to DP #GreggToland and director #WilliamWyler. #TCMParty

Oscar winner #TeresaWright: “I wish Major Wyler were here tonight so I could thank him first for his splendid direction," she said upon winning Best Supporting Actress for MINIVER. (Also nominated in the Best Actress category, she lost to co-star #GreerGarson.) #TCMParty #Oscarweek

After #TheBestYearsofOurLives premiered in London and began its record-setting run in March 1947, English critic C. A. Lejeune lauded the film in London's Observer, writing, "...it deserves the clear judgment we should be prepared to give to any other foreign picture." #TCMParty

I never tire of Alfred Eisenstaedt's radiant portrait of #TeresaWright, who #DOD in 2005. Eisenstaedt shot the portrait for LIFE to promote #TheBestYearsofOurLives soon after the film's premiere in NYC. #TCMParty