September 11 Timmy Update
#1 One very good possibility for Shimmy was discarded much too easily.
#2 Yes, the explanation for the blind is long, but only because it would be a disservice to just give the answer and not tell you the why. I did see a comment where someone got very close to the why.
#3 I was going to post something on Jane Wyman and then figured everyone would see the photo and die, so held back. Ditto a photo collection of Hollywood leading ladies which is really incredible.
#4 The photos in the post are just photos and as far as I know Timmy isn't in any of them. They were just photos I found on Google looking for old Hollywood casts. I'm amazed by the amount of research done on the theatres and if there is a historical society associated with them, they have enough for a book.
#5 Sorry to disappoint the t-shirt makers (where are the free t-shirts for all the people who worked on this?) but it isn't Kay Kendall for Shimmy (did I hear a gasp or groan?) and it isn't Robert Moore for Timmy.
#6 Not Judy Holiday, Judy Holliday, or Madonna's song Holiday.
The 'Why?' comment by EL has me thinking of another possible reason - maybe the transition from black and white to mostly colour films by the studio Shimmy was connected to meant that his skin condition was too difficult to hide, thus causing him to leave his actress career?
ReplyDeleteDepends on the severity of the condition, and of course black and white films were still being made into the late '50s/early '60s en masse; also it may not tie in with timeline entirely. Just a possibilty though.
Molly:
ReplyDeleteI posted it to appease the people saying it wasn't an Oscar..so they could run off on their tangent and try and find a TV person that would fit.
As far as I can see the only people on the Emmy list that were winners and also were around in film when the studio system was still going strong and musicals were popular were were Loretta Young, Donna Reed, Jane Wyatt, Claire Trevor, Dinah Shore, Ingrid Bergman and Barbara Stanwyck.
and seriously doubt it's any of them.
okay...the EL comment about Madonna's song Holiday got me thinking about her lyrics to "Vogue"...this verse in particular ----
ReplyDeleteGreta Garbo, and Monroe
Deitrich and DiMaggio
Marlon Brando, Jimmy Dean
On the cover of a magazine
Grace Kelly; Harlow, Jean
Picture of a beauty queen
Gene Kelly, Fred Astaire
Ginger Rodgers, dance on air
They had style, they had grace
Rita Hayworth gave good face
Lauren, Katherine, Lana too
Bette Davis, we love you
Hey, guys?
ReplyDeleteHow many more people are gonna post the lyrics to "Vogue" tonight? Wanna start taking bets on that one?
Alicia said...
ReplyDelete"Hey, guys?
How many more people are gonna post the lyrics to "Vogue" tonight? Wanna start taking bets on that one?"
I'll take the 5-7 spread
and esp since all the names mentioned in no way could be Timmy/Shimmy..
ReplyDeleteOk. Need an answer soon!! Things are gettin' a little heated. lol
ReplyDeleteI just can't make anyone fit now that KK is out of the running.
I really don't think that EL would have researched the BI in the way that we all have, to the extent that he would give clues in Madonna lyrics, as shown by the original post photos being random examples than of a relative production.
ReplyDeleteAll of the people mentioned in Madonna's lyrics had very successful careers anyway, most of them were pretty lengthy too.
sadly the only Oscar winner I can come up with in which the film they won for as the subject, so to speak, of the blind item is Mary Astor for 'The Great Lie".
ReplyDeletebut her life as a female and her work prior to and after the win is too vast and well documented.
Lady said...
ReplyDelete"I really don't think that EL would have researched the BI in the way that we all have, to the extent that he would give clues in Madonna lyrics"
nor I..seems much more like an off the cuff remark tha anything
at this point I think we're seeing clues where there are none..we're so immersed in this mystery
I think I've said before -- the only proof that EL is going to be able to provide is the matching scar.
ReplyDeleteWe've got to see that scar on Shimmy and Timmy.
I've got all the DVDs. I'm gonna start with
Best Foot Forward
The Major and the Minor
which both have casts of teenage boys.
It might make sense that Timmy was in a series of films of kids, like Our Gang or The Little Rascals, or maybe the Andy Hardy series of movies.
If they were in a series like that, they could rack up a lot of movies in a short amount of time, which would account for the 100 sum total.
Isn't poor old JJ going to freak when he realizes that this incredible old Hollywood secret, that only ten people know, has been revealed? On an anonymous entertainment lawyer's blog, no less? Ent's identity will be busted for sure (and his credibility as a confidante to JJ) and then why would JJ continue to blab to him these secrets for future blinds?
ReplyDeleteIt makes no sense, and I think people who are talking about big name stars need to realize that it is probably more along the lines of Ent's more recent "secret star," the one whose name I can't recall and I don't feel like scrolling back to find it (the one whose legs were pictured and someone found the picture immed. on the internet and identified her). I just feel bad for all of you who are working so hard on this without realizing how unrealistic it is that Ent would be privy to such a shocking Hollywood secret (and I think right now Ent is frantically trying to figure out how to pull this one off).
Having said that, with utmost respect, who are you people?! Because you sure are not the same ones who write catty and sometimes crass remarks about modern celebrities that normally comment here! It's a compliment because you seem like an older, smarter group of old-time movie buffs. (It's funny to see it go from guessing 'what reality star had a threesome while coked up' to this intense intellectual debate on old Hollywood's machinations!). Kudos and keep on guessing - (obviously I don't have a clue who Ent is going to say this was, I just felt someone had to stick up for poor old JJ running his mouth to the wrong "friends" and former coworkers - I guess mathematically speaking if he's 90 and Ent is mid-thirties and passed the bar in his mid-twenties, JJ has "worked" with Ent starting around age 80. I suppose he could have forged a strong relationship with a young up and comer like Ent and then brought up the story a couple times to him without ever revealing it to anyone else but the select 10 - anything is possible, I guess!)
I'm David, happy to meet you Milli.
ReplyDeleteI'm thinking Timmy is someone like this person:
George Noisom
http://www.imdb.com/name/nm0634168/
well..honestly "JJ" has nothing to lose by revealing this info at this point..and perhaps even gave EL his blessing to post the story.
ReplyDeletePerhaps "JJ" IS writing that book and this will be great pre-publicity to boost sales?
I'm going on the assumption that J.J. is Mickey Rooney (Joe Yule, Jr.) and Mickey was certainly the star of musicals and would know the other boys in the cast.
ReplyDeletecan't be Mickey..he's already written a book
ReplyDeleteChenoFan,
ReplyDeleteIs it Kristin Chenoweth you're a fan of?
We love her too! around these parts.
(Upper West Side Manhattan)
yes David..it's Kristin C that I am a fan of ;)
ReplyDeleteThe Academy Awards Presentation was first televised on March 19, 1953.
ReplyDeleteyes Lisa that's true..though the broadcast the following year had a record number of viewers..for the time
ReplyDeleteInteresting... Dalton Trumbo had to use a pseudonym for the Roman Holiday screenplay, because he was blacklisted at the time. Audrey Hepburn won for best actress - Roman Holiday, and Donna Reed won for best supporting actress - From Here To Eternity. No sign of Shimmy, but the "why" practically begs to be blacklisting due to the timeline.
ReplyDeleteor the stress of possible discovery with all of that nonsense going on
ReplyDeleteMae West
ReplyDeleteheh... cause of iknowwho's posting, I finally did a wiki search on mae west and yeah, it does say she likes to shimmy.. and there's even an entry for "shimmy" in wiki (which I honestly didn't know was a dance thing).
ReplyDeleteAnyway, what I found interesting was a link at the end of the wiki article for shimmy that points to
http://www.streetswing.com/histmain/z3shimy.htm
4 paragraphs down, it's written that
"In the Ziegfeld Follies of 1919, the song "You Cannot Make Your Shimmy Shake On Tea" was performed."
Now... there was a movie called the Great Zeigfeld right? It was an academy award winning film and Luise Rainer did win the actress thing, but she won again afterwards which didn't fit the clues that Ent gave. But then again, Luise Rainer was one of the actresses that was easily discarded.
The thing is, now I'm starting to wondering why Ent used "Shimmy" as the female persona for Timmy.
BTW, good job to everyone of you trying to solve this mystery. If ent ever decides to retire and open up a PI agency, I think he should contact you all ;)
guessing EL used shimmy because it's short for/an amalgam of she timmy?
ReplyDeleteEnt has confirmed he found the pictures for the original blind item by random Googling. Well, what did he search for? The Golden Horseshoe pic comes up in Google for 'Hollywood 1950s cast picture' (but not just 'Hollywood cast picture'), so that might also point us to the 50s as our time frame.
ReplyDelete(And if I recall correctly, "Shimmy" was coined by someone on this board.)
Ent lifted "Shimmy" out of the comments.
ReplyDeletestill no doubt shimmy is an amalgam of she timmy
ReplyDeleteand shimmy is only slightly less offensive than shemale or tranny
ReplyDeleteI'm pretty sure Ent. didn't use the term "Shimmy" to describe female Timmy until after one of the commenters had already come up with it. That's not to say he couldn't have thought it was also an apt clue.
ReplyDeleteah, beaten to the punch!
ReplyDeleterofl cheno.. yeah I suppose that's correct.
ReplyDeleteThanks for the tips peeps, there're just so many comments on all the timmy related postings, I think I must have missed those.
And btw, if it's worth anything, I wanna go on record for thanking ent and also to you all. Cause honestly, looking up all these links and all these info for actors & actresses and classic movies have made me start to appreciate them. I've actually come up with a good list of these old movies that I wanna see. Thanks :)
ReplyDeleteI second Rachel's comments..my dvd and book library has grown over the past 2 weeks..
ReplyDeleteI'll third it. It's been a facinatin' two weeks.
ReplyDeleteI've been lurking for two weeks and had to post before the reveal. Now, I'm off to watch High Society, since I'm positive Shimmy isn't Grace Kelly. Anything else would drive me nuts tonight/this morning. lol
ReplyDeleteI still say Greta Garbo, was she the one who would dress in mens clothes or was it Marlene Dietrich? Also, I have got to say that this blind item has been one of the best ones to research and the most fun! On a side note why oh why do alot of these women look like men underneath it all?????
ReplyDeleteENT posted at 12:13pm on August 30th:
ReplyDelete"#6 The post was reposted on several sites and was guessed correctly on at least 3 of them. I won't say if anyone has guessed correctly on my site."
I just went and did an extensive google search and found all the guesses that were made before 12:13pm on August 30th on all the blogs that I could find. Here is the final list of possible names I came up with, but I couldn't find any names that were guessed on three sites...these are the names that I came up with that were guessed on at least two sites:
Alice Brady
Joan Crawford
Eileen Heckart
Margaret Rutherford
Claire Trevor
Shelley Winters
Here is the complete list of sites and guesses I compiled:
Page 1
Page 2
Here is the scar above her right brow... it is Louise Rainer... and she won and won again and then disappeared for Europe.
ReplyDeletehttp://www.imdb.com/gallery/mptv/1089/4003-0018.jpg.html?path=pgallery&path_key=Rainer%2C%20Luise&seq=24
Oops, I already noticed that I missed one name that was posted on two sites:
ReplyDeleteJo van Fleet
Please let me know if you notice any more I missed. Also, I could have missed some names that were posted to those sites, or missed some sites entirely.
So, here's my updated list of names that were mentioned on at least 2 sites before August 30th @ 12:13pm. Please let me know if you have more names to add to this list (and please cite your sources):
ReplyDeleteAlice Brady
Joan Crawford
Eileen Heckart
Margaret Rutherford
Claire Trevor
Jo van Fleet
Shelley Winters
Even more helpful would be if you could find any of the above names on a THIRD site that was posted before August 30th at 12:13pm.
ReplyDeleteThe sites I found are as follows:
http://community.livejournal.com/ohnotheydidnt/15025147.html
http://blinditems.typepad.com/dish/2007/09/the-actress-who.html
http://bitterjealousfatties.yuku.com/topic/1060/t/Entertainment-Lawyer-8-29-07-Blind-Item.html
http://members5.boardhost.com/pinkparlor/msg/archive/1188518688.html
http://www.gossiprocks.com/forum/blind-items/50426-entertainment-lawyer-08-29-07-a.html
http://groups.google.com.nf/group/alt.gossip.celebrities/browse_thread/thread/1fc4fdaa9bd962ae
what the britney is going on? ya leave the US for a smidge and whaaa.... it's gettin good again. LUV IT.....here we go again
ReplyDeleteJust for grins, here's my closeted A-listers list to go with the gals I listed above:
ReplyDeleteDirk Bogarde
Montgomery Clift
James Dean
Sir John Gielgud
Farley Granger
Hurd Hatfield
Rock Hudson
David Manners
Roddy McDowall
Sal Mineo
George Nader
Cesar Romero
Clifton Webb
Alice Brady, Joan Crawford, Shelley Winters, Claire Trevor, Eileen Heckart and Margaret Rtherford were all chosen three times or more according to the compiled list.
ReplyDeletehttp://survivorsucks.yuku.com/topic/14718/t/The-Mother-of-all-Blind-Items.html
ReplyDeleteanother site that has guesses to match you list of actresses, Calla
Here's a thought for Timmy. Who knows...
ReplyDeletehttp://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Beulah_Bondi
She won and Emmy.
I'm so tired I can't even think anymore!
Maria said...
ReplyDeleteAlice Brady, Joan Crawford, Shelley Winters, Claire Trevor, Eileen Heckart and Margaret Rtherford were all chosen three times or more according to the compiled list.
All of the above were chosen three times or more by August 30th at 12:13pm?
Cala,
ReplyDeleteI got it from your page 1 and 2... just added them up.
Re: teh 3 sites that guessed right: actually Blind Item Collective guessed more than just kay kendall in their initial post unlike what someone said. They also guessed Marie Dressler, Alice Brady, Margaret Rutherford and some others I think. The other sites people have mentioned didn't seem to make gueses themselves - the ppl in the comments section did but not the sites?? Is that right. I mean if we're just going by the comments sections of sites it could be anyone.
ReplyDeleteAlso I fear that just like DS, all the proof we will get from EL is a name and story of how and why. Which could all just be hollywood legend her heard from JJ or elsewhere.
My vote is for Merle. She must have won some award at some point, everybody does. And she did co-star with Larry O, who was bi, and I can't remember who else.
ReplyDeleteJo van Fleet has already been eliminated.
ReplyDeleteLook into Luise Rainier
Luise Rainer made an appearance at the Oscars in 1998..not her
ReplyDeletehttp://imdb.com/gallery/granitz/0433-
aca/Events/0433-aca/rainerl1.ise.
html?path=pgallery&path_key
=Rainer,%20Luise
Oh yes. I'd forgotten that.
ReplyDeleteHave we ruled out Greer Garson?
Here's my updated list according to that new "survivorsucks" link Helena gave me (thank you!):
ReplyDeleteMentioned on 3 sites by Aug 30th 12:13pm:
Joan Crawford
Claire Trevor
Mentioned on 2 sites by Aug 30th 12:13pm:
Fay Bainter
Anne Bancroft
Alice Brady
Eileen Heckart
Mercedes Mccambridge
Anne Revere
Margaret Rutherford
Simone Signoret
Jo van Fleet
Shelley Winters
Teresa Wright
The sites:
http://community.livejournal.com/ohnotheydidnt/15025147.html
http://blinditems.typepad.com/dish/2007/09/the-actress-who.html
http://bitterjealousfatties.yuku.com/topic/1060/t/Entertainment-Lawyer-8-29-07-Blind-Item.html
http://members5.boardhost.com/pinkparlor/msg/archive/1188518688.html
http://www.gossiprocks.com/forum/blind-items/50426-entertainment-lawyer-08-29-07-a.html
http://groups.google.com.nf/group/alt.gossip.celebrities/browse_thread/thread/1fc4fd
http://survivorsucks.yuku.com/topic/14718/t/The-Mother-of-all-Blind-Items.html
Was Jo van Fleet actually eliminated by ENT? If so I will cross her off my list.
ReplyDeleteIs there another blog/site I am missing (one that had guesses before Aug 30 at 12:13pm)? I really don't think it's Joan Crawford or Claire Trevor, and the list of those w/2 guesses is getting too long to be useful. :[
ReplyDeleteCalla, no. JVF wasn't eliminated by Ent. it was us posters who did that after finding a movie with her in it that came out in 1986. The only people mentioned by names as NOT's by Ent. himself are the ones I put upthread.
ReplyDeletesince Greer got her Oscar in 1941/42 and her credits go to 1982 I'd say yes
ReplyDeleteJo's credits go to 1986 so I'd say she's eliminated
ReplyDeleteI was taking notes as people guessed- so this is a compilation of many guesses by many people. And mine are basically saying who I don't think it can be, no help on new names- my research abilities aren't as extensive as all of yours! (Dang kids!)
ReplyDeleteRE: Ella Raines - she was born in Snoqualmie Falls, Washington and attended the U. of Washington (as a woman). She studied drama and was in plays there- that would be a hard bio to fake as there'd be academic transcripts and photos of plays that could easily be found. I'm sure the drama department would be proud to keep records of a famous alumni. So I think she's out- too much well documented background.
RE: all the holiday names and Madonna. Someone was making a connection between the Madonna song and a Katherine Hepburn film, "Holiday". Except that ENT said it was NOT any of the Holidays... so I don't think we need to try to make a connection there. But I do find it intriguing that he said it was not Madonna's HOLIDAY- as in, not that Madonna song, but another. Or he just wanted to emphasize the name of the song- he very well could have just said- Not Madonna's "Holiday". Probably best not to read too much into the clues or "nots".
RE: Vera Ellen- she has a well documented early career (starting at age 10?) as a dancer. Again- seems like there is too much that is easy to check and prove wrong.
Luise Rainer: She was born in Germany and also has well documented early work- as a girl. I also found a reference to an interview in 1997 and an appearance at the Oscars in 1998, so that would be difficult to team up with "Timmy" dying no later than 1985.
Claire Trevor: She has quite the list of movies, don't know if she won any awards, but she was appearing on TV in 1987. I can't make that fit in with "Timmy" dying of AIDS related complications no later than 1985. So I think she'd be out.
Joan Crawford: Don't think the CEO of Pepsi would have married a man pretending to be a woman- but you never know! *wink* I just think there's too much proof of her being a woman. I do have to admit it would make "Mommy Dearest" a much more interesting movie to watch!! I think it's particularly appropriate that Faye Dunaway played her in the movie, considering FD was such a regular guess for the nasty star in the store BI. But, Crawford worked on many things after her Oscar win, so that doesn't fit the BI either. "Shimmy" only worked for 3-4 years after her win.
Now... Margaret Rutherford: I can't find pictures of her when she was young, but she doesn't look too "slight" to me. The timeline and award might fit, but I'm not convinced that it could be her. In the photos I've seen, she seems less like a man and more like an older British woman. But I think she could still be on a short list of candidates- especially since I can't find a picture of her young- she could have been "slight" then. Help me out- have you all eliminated Rutherford already, or could she still be in the running?
I was on the AB side, but I'm beginning to think she'll be "notted" ("outed") as well.
To whomever posted about George Noisom- about Timmy being someone like George Noisom- I'd have to agree. If you look him up on IMDb he's got an extensive list of uncredited work- like 40 movies- so that would help a lot with the 100 movies between them (Timmy and Shimmy). Not saying it's him (can't find a photo of him) but I agree it will probably turn out to be someone LIKE that- not too well heard of, lots of work involving small parts or uncredited parts. That would be a lot easier to hide from then if you had had big parts. That's just a theory, though- I'd have to go back and read the Timmy clues again to verify that he didn't have any big roles. So I'm not going to worry about finding Timmy as much as looking at who Shimmy might be.
Side note: About Gene Tierney contracting measles during her pregnancy from a fan that snuck out to see her-- there's an Agatha Christie novel about that exact same thing. I'm assuming that's where the idea for the story came from. Poor thing- that would really suck to have a "fan" basically ruin your hopes and dreams and harm your child.
Just throwing this out there for grins:
ReplyDelete"When it came to the very big award..."
Maybe EL's talking about the actual size of the award, not the prestige value.
Gale Sondergaard - can probably be eliminated, but what are those two dark lines on her chin?? (second pic)
ReplyDeletehttp://www.meredy.com/sondergaardtriv.html
it's NOT Luise Rainer..she was at the OSCARS in 1998
ReplyDeleteJeff said:
ReplyDelete'Maybe EL's talking about the actual size of the award, not the prestige value.'
okay you are either a size queen or an idiot..how old are you?
Hey everyone; I've been watching this from the beginning - you are all amazing, but I think the guy who duct-taped his chest has to get the prize for dedication.
ReplyDeleteI just had a tiny brainwave, and forgive me if someone else has had it already - but when he says the award is the one with all the television viewers, couldn't it simply be an Emmy? As in, not necessarily a televised award show, but rather an award for shows with a TV audience.
Just my two cents. I was convinced it was KK. I feel somehow robbed.
tatehouse- the problem with the Emmy was outlined in a post above. There are so many clues that point to a film- so I don't think the award has to do with a TV role.
ReplyDeleteI keep wondering if he means all the tv viewers then or now, but I think either way the Oscars are the awards show that get the most viewers. I'm not sure, but I would guess that has always been true.
Anyone have any insight into that?
Mae West really looks like a man here
ReplyDeletehttp://63.146.123.220/THE%20Mae%20West.jpg
Why are people saying buh bye to "KK fans"? We're not going anywhere!
ReplyDeleteDragon Slayer, it would be very easy to fake a bio back in the day. Up until about twenty years ago you could put fake information on a resume for a job and nobody caught you. I think we're limiting ourselves by assuming information on a bio couldn't possibly be faked, and EL basically told us the same thing.
Calla, EL said in the second week or early on that there was a popular guess here and reminded us that the female Timmy quit shortly after winning and "if you look at imdb and see them working for several years after their win, it's not Timmy". The general consensus was that he was talking about Jo Van Fleet. This would also apply to Joan Crawford and Shelley Winters, however.
It's not a Tony award if EL rented the film. That means it's also not an Emmy. It's a movie. He's already ruled out BAFTA so it's either a Golden Globe or Oscar unless someone thinks of something else.
Merle Oberon never won an award.
Also, I really think EL mentioned Holiday by Madonna because people keep assuming everything he says is related to a song and they post the lyrics to try and decode them. Like when he said the photo's he posted were just random photo's, I don't think the song Holiday is a hint.
why the name 'Timmy'??? reason or no reason.....
ReplyDeleteSince I was very new to this CDAN site, I assumed ENT was very meticulous about his word-choice in clues, but after the monumental sloppiness of having to change that it "happened 50 years ago" to it "happened within a 50-year time frame," I'm not sure how much we should trust him on any clue, early or recent.
ReplyDeleteThis is the line that is bothering me today:
"...and one website made it their official guess."
The websites I went to in order to see what they were saying did not have one person making one "official" guess. It was like here: a bunch of random (albeit brilliant) people throwing out every name of every actress who had ever won an Oscar. Is there one website discussing Timmy that doesn't have reader comments and is run by monitors who actually said something like "Our final guess is so-and-so?"
It wouldn't surprise me if the next two revision-clues from ENT turn out to be
1. Oh, did I say Hollywood? I meant London.
2. Oh, did I say film? I meant ballet.
(In which case I'm guessing Dame Margot Fonteyn.)
I'm wondering if some specialty video rental ENT went to has copies of made-for-TV movies or copies of those classic old dramas that were performed live on TV in the 1950s but might have been preserved. Someone has already posted all the actresses who won Emmys, and I see nothing there that I would call a film that could be rented.
(That list did remind me that I want to see Geraldine Page in Truman Capote's "A Christmas Memory" again. To you younger people, if you've never seen this amazing performance, you need to. It infrequently pops up on PBS as part of their Great Performances series and is a great reminded that good writing plus bravura acting can equal something so sublime that you are left breathless in wonder.)
I still go with the Two Different Alice Brady theory, but if ENT insists it's even weirder than that, let's try to figure out how Marisa Pavan and Pier Angeli were really one person pretending to be twins pretending to be females and taking each other's places until it was determined "Pier" should die, after which yet another person pretended to be Marisa while Timmy went back to being a slight "fair" guy. It's going to have to be that weird to justify all of our time, effort, and interest.
Marianne, we've been trying to figure that out, but so far have come up short.
ReplyDeleteOklahoma, EL writes very quickly, it seems, so he doesn't always express himself as clearly as he could. He's great about making corrections, however, so if he hasn't corrected us yet on those things, then we must be right. I don't think there were made for tv movies back in the 50's, but it's possible there was Playhouse whatever it was that used to have those live presentations. We should check and see if those are even available before we go in that direction.
ChenoFan said...
ReplyDeleteJeff said:
'Maybe EL's talking about the actual size of the award, not the prestige value.'
okay you are either a size queen or an idiot..how old are you?
-----------
Here's a quarter. Go buy yourself a sense of humor, bitch.
I have gone through the list I posted earlier of our early guesses for Shimmy. I have elimiated everyone who worked for years after their award or worked after 1985 - have not taken Bio's into account at all.
ReplyDeleteAm left with
Alice Brady
Margaret Rutherford
Marie Dressler
Mary Pickford
Susan Kohner
twistedsister:
ReplyDeleteI know bio's can be faked- but when you are talking about attending universities, being in productions that have cast photos, belonging to well-known groups, and multiple stories from people corraborating the biographical info, then I think you can safely say that Bio is probably right.
So if you think Ella Raines could fake attending the UW, then sure- that could be fake. But I'm from Washington State and I've been to Snoqualmie Falls. That's one of those "everybody knows everybody's business" type places and if you are claiming that someone attended the University of Washington AND went on to become famous and is from your town, it better be true. Snoqualmie Falls is only about 30-45 minutes from Seattle (depending on how fast you drive!) and it's a story EASILY checked out.
Luise Rainer was at the Oscars in '98- so even if her background is fake, she was alive for too long.
Vera Ellen-- was one of the youngest Rockettes ever (that's hard to fake, I'm guessing) and was a Broadway dancer. The Rockettes are too big for someone to get away with claiming to be one for very long, I would think. I think the other ladies would resent that a lot and speak up. It's not like just ANYONE can be a Rockette, true? And Timmy's background in theatre wouldn't jive with being a Rockette or a Broadway dancer from what I got out of the info on him.
So, again- I *know* bio's can be faked. I almost feel like you didn't really read what I wrote, just assumed that I was basing it on the fact they had a bio. I wouldn't have listed those people as probably nots if the bio's seemed "thin". But attending a big University and being a Rockette seem like tough things to fake. Maybe I'm wrong, so if so let me know. But I'm willing to bet that someone in the UW drama department could dig around to find out if Ella Raines actually attended and I'm sure the Rockettes could verify Vera Ellen.
And before anyone slams me for being rude to twistedsister, I'm not meaning to be rude- I'm just defending my position. I haven't posted on this BI up until the last couple of days because I didn't have anything to add that others hadn't said. So if I post, I don't just do it on a whim. I read about these women, really thought about them and whether or not I thought they could be faking or not and then posted. If someone finds out otherwise or ENT reveals Shimmy as one of the women I mentioned, then I'm okay with that- I was wrong; I can handle it. But please don't post something that sounds dismissive as if I hadn't bothered to check anything.
I actually went through all of ENT's posts including the original, added all the hints into the relavent sections of the original post and added the list of "Nots" to the end. I was going to post it here, hoping it would be helpful and keep people on track and see where things might have gone astray. Now I'm not so sure.
I don't mind being wrong... It really bothers me to be "dismissed". If you didn't mean it that way, then my apologies- but that's what it felt like.
Why was anna magnani rejected so quickly?
ReplyDeleteThat guy George Noisom was a child actor called Bubbles Noisom. He was the flying monkey that grabbed Dorothy in The Wizard of Oz, and he was Mickey Rooney's stunt double for a time.
ReplyDeletePhoto here
and info here.
He died in 2005, but I just find all these little stories fascinating. Flying monkeys!
Look at this photo of Gloria Grahame. A large scar next to her left eye? http://www.doctormacro.info/Images/Grahame,%20Gloria/Annex/Annex%20-%20Grahame,%20Gloria%20(Human%20Desire)_01.jpg
ReplyDeleteHey, Amy- thanks for that info! I only looked him up briefly and saw all the uncredited work and thought- Yeah, that sounds like what we might find out about Timmy.
ReplyDeleteLike I said before, I don't think Timmy is George "Bubbles" Noisom, but with an early career full of uncredited roles. That's cool to find out more about him, though- Micky Rooney's stunt double! I'll bet that was interesting!
And definitely fascinating- Flying monkeys, indeed!
Dragon Slayer even I don't think you're being rude, I doubt anyone else would.
ReplyDeleteI did read your post - the entire post - and I kind of see your point, but still think people easily faked bio's back then because it was difficult to know who was saying what. In Washington you had no clue what they were saying in California when talking to a studio. It could have been information they never would have shared in an interview but still would have used in a bio, see what I'm saying?
Melster, Susan Kohner was seen last year at some award so it's not her.
Carol, Anna Magnani worked for many years following her win, that's why she was eliminated from our guesses.
Chenofan, this is the second response you gave to someone that was rude. Kindly knock that shit off!
Margaret Rutherford won all her awards for one movie, The V.I,P,'s. She had a recurring role as Miss Marple. The year before she won her awards she played the lead opposite Ron Moody who is definitely A-list. All appearances after the Miss Marple roles were within a three year period.
ReplyDeleteMaureen, the A-lister was also a never married closeted homosexual, and Ron married, but maybe there's someone else who fits that category she acted with?
ReplyDeletewow .. i must say that this has been the most fun I have had with my keyboard in years .. thanks ent and thanks to everyone who has taken time and energy on this ... cant wait for the reveal ..
ReplyDeletefor some reason, I cant get fay bainter out of my head .. dont know why .. has she been eliminated, as I do not want to rework what has already been done ..
I don't think it was Vera Ellen. EL said Timmy was a good singer. As I recall, the rumor was that Vera Ellen didn't sing in White Christmas - Rosemary Clooney did all the singing (sort of a Singing in the Rain thing). So either Timmy was a good singer, but a baritone or something and couldn't sing as a woman, or Vera Ellen just couldn't sing. She was a dancer, so they probably hired her to dance and Rosemary to sing. Either way, I doubt it was her.
ReplyDeleteChenoFan said...
ReplyDeleteJeff said:
'Maybe EL's talking about the actual size of the award, not the prestige value.'
okay you are either a size queen or an idiot..how old are you?
-----------
Here's a quarter. Go buy yourself a sense of humor, bitch.
To both of you - this was actually discussed in some of the previous comments regarding the size of a GG versus the AA. Either way we were all still talking about the same awards.
Wow! KK is out! Isn't that interesting?!?!!? I can imagine both she and Rex Harrison are laughing at us all.
ReplyDeleteI hope the BI continues for awhile yet. I'm enjoying the research - even though I don't get caught up in real time. I'm at 5:12pm now and will read up before I post a guess as I don't have a clue.
I do think the theory of Shimmy filing in for a sick actress works lots better than a made-up person for Shimmy. That would encourage people to keep things quiet.
Sleuth on all!!
I agree with whoever said upthread that Ent's writing seems rushed, and so what we may pick over as a clue is really a typo or an awkward construction. However, I think he italicized Madonna's "Holiday" because it's proper formatting to set apart titles. Brings back horrible memories of paging through my MLA Handbook the night before a paper was due.
ReplyDeleteI'm going to repeat my Luise Rainer theory--Luise hated the Hollywood star system and was demoralized by the lukewarm reviews at the start of her American career, but she was locked in to a 7 year contract. So she and her lookalike Timmy collaborated--she stayed home while Timmy went to the set. While the female Luise existed, it was Timmy on the screen in The Good Earth. This theory takes care of the main Rainer objections.
1. She was married to two men.
Luise was married to the men; Timmy was not.
2. She is still alive.
Luise is still alive; Timmy is not.
3. She continued to work for a long time afterward.
Luise did her last movie in the studio system in 1944. She worked sporadically on the stage and in television, but her film career was effectively over a few years after her Oscar wins.
Long-shot, yeah, to say the least. But still a heck of a lot more likely than the well-connected Alice Brady being able to pull a switcheroo like that. I'm Team Rainer or Team Winless Mcnamara.
I would like to leave an apology for Ms. Kendall, Ms. Hull and Ms. Holliday. Sorry for thinking you's were shemen.
ReplyDeleteI think Joan Crawford can be quickly and easily eliminated. She had an extremely lengthy career (from 1925 until 1970)and her Oscar win was in 1945.
ReplyDeleteI also think that Mary Pickford should be eliminated from the running. She had a very established silent film career and while her career did die out after her Oscar win in 1929, it was more so because of the coming of talkies than anything else. Her sweet, little girl roles simply did not translate into talking pictures, and the woman was pushing 40 at the time. High time to move away from the children's roles.
I cannot believe that Shimmy would be Marie Dressler. Besides her extensive stage work prior to acting in films, she could hardly be described as slight. She was a stocky, large woman - - and she wasn't so feminine in appearance that people would be stunned to believe she was a man. From EL's clues, I formed an opinion that this would be a shocking revelation, that it would be an actress that no one suspected to be a man.
Which is the main doubt I have with Mae West. Rumors about her have persisted for years - - and I don't think a reveal about her would be all that shocking.
I am still on the AB train, but I expect that EL is going to "not" her shortly. I am completely confounded and confuzzled by this BI - - many kudos to all the diligent researchers and fact finders out there, you all have done an amazing job!
Writing very quickly and not expressing yourself as clearly as you should are very unfortunate traits for an attorney. And it's in direct contradiction to the persistent assumption on this site that every word Ent types is carefully crafted. Just saying.
ReplyDeleteCheck this out,
ReplyDeletehttp://www.moviemaidens.com/index.asp
Great website FULL of photos from the 1920's to the 1950's of actresses. the bio's are quite well done, also.
Milli, since this gossip blog isn't EL's full time job, I think it's safe to assume he's more careful when he's writing for work (as we ALL are), and will therefore cut him some slack.
ReplyDelete"I do not judge other people for what they believe but for me this is what works."
ReplyDeleteKristin Chenowith
melster said...
ReplyDeleteI have gone through the list I posted earlier of our early guesses for Shimmy. I have elimiated everyone who worked for years after their award or worked after 1985 - have not taken Bio's into account at all.
Am left with
Alice Brady
Margaret Rutherford
Marie Dressler
Mary Pickford
Susan Kohner
I think we can safely rule out Susan Kohner, since she is the mother of the Weitz brothers.
So we are down to:
Alice Brady
Margaret Rutherford
Marie Dressler
Mary Pickford
I was interested in Marisa Pavan- and I just wanted to throw out this idea.... What if Marisa & Pier (twin sisters) Were a woman and a man?
ReplyDelete***Marisa: Pavan accepted (the best actress oscar)on her behalf as Magnani was not present at the awards ceremony. Pavan was nominated for best actress in a supporting role Oscar, losing to Jo Van Fleet (for East of Eden). Both Magnani and Pavan won Golden Globe awards that year.
-which might fit that she was a man accepting the BIG award, even if it was on someone else's behalf. She also won a Tony, so she was a winner and accpeted the BIG award (for someone else).
***Marisa: Her breakthrough came in the film The Rose Tattoo as Anna Magnani's daughter; her role was first assigned to her twin, who at the time was unable to play the part.
-Why was her twin unable to play the part? It says motherhood, but what if that is only partially true, or not true at all. Pier later dies of a possible suicide, after suffering a nervous condition. Shimmy got the skin condition (hives) from the anxiety over being nervous when reporters started to ask alot of questions. Sounds like a nervous condition to me. So Marisa acted like a woman to help his sister)
***Pier: Listed James Dean (closeted gay a-lister)as the love of her life.
-Maybe was really Marisa's love?)
***Pier: MGM, after having discovered Leslie Caron, another Continental ingénue, loaned Angeli out to other studios.
-she was mad that she was loaned out, and it says she finished her contract with MGM in movies where her acting was "indifferent", which I think means her last couple MGM films were not the best acting jobs. She was mad she was loaned out.
***Marisa: She married, divorced, and later remarried the French actor Jean-Pierre Aumont between 1956 until his death in 2001; they had two sons.
-Why did she remarry the same guy after a break?
So here's my theory, which I'm sure is wrong, but....
What if either Marisa was a man? What if instead of being born twin girls, they were boy/girl? The boy being slight with pale features. If one twin had emotional problems (a domineering mother was mentioned somewhere in one's bio), maybe they both had some issues? The being gay, with a domineering mother, at a time it wasn't acceptable- couldn't hurt in forming a nervous condition. Anyways, what if when Pier couldn't play her part, Marisa (really a man) filled in for her. Maybe this was a phenomenal performance out of the blue, getting him oscar nom's, and winning a golden globe. Marisa only acted in a few parts after that, and has never died. Maybe because she reverted back to a man because of his nervous hives. Pier continued on as a woman, dying in 1971. There is very little info on Marisa, who won the Oscar. But there is quite a bit (and a pic) on "her" twin sister Pier, who never won. So this would make Marisa Paven Shimmy.
-She's not dead.
-She stood on stage and accepted the best acctress oscar (for someone else), she got an oscar nom herself, and won the golden globe.
-She seems to only have acted a handful of times after her golden globe win, and nothing after 4 years.
There is a husband listed, but if I am right about the twin sister, maybe Pier didn't really die in 1971, it could have been faked, and she could have continued on as Marisa (who hasn't died yet). I looked for the date of Marisa's second marriage, and couldn't find it. Maybe they had to remarry so that it would be the real woman in the second marriage, not the man pretending to be a woman. Since Marisa never died, maybe that's why enty said date of death not important.
Ha! I should just write that up as a book!!!
1. Well EL, intellectually speaking, and not to blind you personally, but there are societies and no matter where you surf sometimes you need to avoid rocks on your own beach.
ReplyDelete2. Hey Oklahoma. Wouldnt want to give you a headache. Maybe Piers twin is a guy. Maybe the reason JD was bumming outside the church was that his beard got married. Nice to see Debbie Reynolds in APs wedding pic, where the hell is her sister.
Parisss wrote:
ReplyDelete"-Why did she remarry the same guy after a break?"
The same reason Natalie Wood remarried Robert Wagner?
Marisa accepted the best actress award but she didn't win it. She won the BSA award. "leave it to us to figure out which one she one."
ReplyDeletePier is dead, and her heirs talk about various attempts to bring her story that have died. They talk about needing to include the whole family, yet no one talks about the sister.
Maybe (besides the pregnancy) they were desparate to appease AM with an actress who understood Italian as that was AM's first english speaking film.
Sugaree---
ReplyDeleteHow do you explain EL's statement that Shimmy got meaty supporting roles (plural) not long after the screen test? Although Timmy starts out in Hollywood, are you suggesting they sent him to Germany to do 3 German films before returning to Hollywood for "Escapade"? She is supporting in the first German film, but the lead in the next two. I don't see the Timmy/Shimmy thing taking place in Germany circa 1932.
OK...if the clues fit Rainer better, I could see the "why" as being her accent. Perhaps her accent was so thick that they got Timmy to pretend to be her for "Ziegfeld" and "Good Earth." Then Timmy stops being Rainer. (There is a gap for part of the war years.) Then Rainer reassumes her true identity (after taking a lot of vocal lessons to improve her accent). And the real Rainer doesn't die yet. (Ent tells us it wasn't necessary for the actress to die in order for the Timmy story to continue.) She eventually re-assumes her old identity and shows up in 1998 at the Oscars and makes more TV and movie appearances prior to that.
(That's the part that doesn't fit. We are led to believe that the true actress stopped acting on film and faded away forever. "The Gambler" is in 1997. That doesn't fit the clue that the actress fades from view quickly. Timmy as the actress might fade from view, but the real Rainer is still around acting in 1997.)
What is it about Rainer that audiences had never seen before? Great dramatic acting in a talkie with good close-ups? I can accept that. So I could agree with your theory if the real Rainer had not made subsequent acting appearances under her own name.
I know. I like my story better though.
ReplyDeleteAnd I meant no offense to anyone who has remarried the same person, I understand why a person would. I was just questioning in this instance that it could add to my suspicion.
ENT - WE NEED ANOTHER HINT !!
ReplyDeleteNot who it's not but clues to who it is. We want to solve this before the reveal.
I agree, it would be great if we could solve this before the reveal. Is he revealing it sometime this week or next week?
ReplyDeleteThis comment has been removed by the author.
ReplyDeleteWas watching "Zelig" the other night. Woody Allen chameleon movie. Marie Dressler's name came up in movie. Interesting or just coincidence?
ReplyDeleteWhy can't I find any pictures of Marisa and Pier together? It seems odd.
ReplyDeleteTo Dragon Slayer: Re your post way upthread on the bios of some of the Shimmy candidates, I totally agree with you that if we see someone came from a smaller town and had several specific ties to churches, universities, theatre groups, etc. that could be easily verified or challenged at the time Shimmy was famous....that's not our Shimmy. I'm guessing Shimmy's bio states she's from NYC, Chicago, LA -- some city big and anonymous enough that the details of Shimmy's upbringing would sound like a million other folks. Also, the general rule of thumb when lying is to keep it simple -- the more details you use to embellish your story, the more likely you'll get caught (and it's harder to remember).
ReplyDeleteAlso, wrt the Rockettes -- I worked closely with them for over a decade and can state for a fact that it would be impossible for a man to pass as one (though several have auditioned!). The Rockettes you see on the Music Hall stage aren't the only Rockettes around because there have always been swing Rockettes, second companies, etc., and their alumni association is pretty meticulous about their membership. I remember that Vera-Ellen was indeed known to be a legitimate Rockette (this by those who had been with the Music Hall from practically the beginning). Granted, Dena Lohan has claimed to be a Rockette and was only recently busted once someone actually called Radio City to verify it.
Just thought I'd share that info!
James Dean comes up alot on lists of possible closeted actors. I don't know anything about him though, but I had though that he'd been mentioned in these discussions as a possible never-married-closeted-A-lister. Sorry if I'm wrong.
ReplyDeletePariss the only pic I found was on youtube and Marisa looks like she has hives on her neck.
ReplyDeleteOf course, I posted all of this before.
http://www.geocities.com/laureelam/jpa-MarisaPavanWeddingPierAngeli.JPG
ReplyDeleteOk. I guess this is a picture of both sisters at the wedding of Marisa and Jean-Claude in 1956. I'm still routing for my idea though!
Can someone explain how it can be Alice Brady when she was born in 1892 meaning that she/he was about 90 when she died due to AIDS? She could not have fudged her age by that much since her first movie was in 1914. I just don't see someone dying that old with AIDS.
ReplyDeleteI like Sugaree's theory. Or start of it. What if the actress could not perform for some reason (this where wehre the "WHY?" comes into place. And had TImmy step in for her for a role. Then Timmy won an award for it and went back to playing roles as a man.
ReplyDeleteTimmy then died in the 80s and the actress was still alive. (perhaps died after Timmy's death or is even still alive today)
I tis possible that the actress in question is still alive, as stated in a BI correction.
I like this theory. It bring on a whole new set of possibilities and also concentrates on the ONE role that Timmy subbed for. So It could even be a really big star or can also skewer the times frames a little and help think outside the box.
It probably isn't Alice Brady. I think it's someone who was discarded at the beginning.
ReplyDeleteParisss...I could accept just about any version of this Marisa/Pier story as it might relate to Timmy. Ent says it's going to be even more complicated than we think, and the various scenarios we can create for twins pretending to be each other can certainly get complicated.
ReplyDeleteI keep going back to look at Margaret Rutherford's info.
In Rutherford's favor (in the Timmy story)...
1. first movie is in 1936.
2. first role is as "an old gang moll," which sounds meaty to me.
3. lots of good supporting roles.
4. winning 3 awards prior to the Oscar win, all for "VIPs." Is this the only actress we can find who actually wins 3 well-known awards for the same role prior to winning the Oscar for that role?
against her
1. Why can't Rutherford do her own film acting? Why does Timmy have to take her place? Is Timmy standing in for Rutherford for her entire film career?
2. How does Timmy start out in Hollywood around 1930 as an unknown but gets shipped to England for a career start over there?
3. Rutherford starts acting onstage in England in 1925. Does she do her all of her own stage acting as herself, while Timmy does her film roles?
4. Who is the closeted A-list actor she plays lead against? Someone in the Miss Marple mysteries?
5. Rutherford didn't attend the Oscars, but ENT says she was sitting there.
-------
I'm still with Alice Brady, but I can understand how we might be told that it's Margaret Rutherford or the Marisa/Pier twins.
hello all..
ReplyDeletelong time lurker (i think i may have actually read almost every comment you guys have left on the subject) and i have to admit, while i wonder how any of us are getting work done during the day, i am really impressed by your research abilities and knowledge of old hollywood. i feel like i've learned so much just reading this blog obsessively over the last couple of weeks. this is so much more interesting than britney spears being a trainwreck, i hope we get more like this.
that being said, i really hope this does not end up being just some huge hollywood urban legend.
also, i'm not sure how helpful anyone is going to find this but vera ellen's big secret is not that she was a man. she had a life-long eating disorder that prematurely aged her neck and hands, which is why she is always shown in high-necked outfits and often with gloves. i believe, but i can't remember, that this might have actually lead to her death.
at any rate, you guys have given me a great deal of entertainment so thank you for that!
Budford- I just went back and saw you did mention Marisa Pavan that first day. Why was she totally discounted?
ReplyDeleteBack to the serious candidates, from the previous posted list:
ReplyDelete"So we are down to:
Alice Brady
Margaret Rutherford
Marie Dressler
Mary Pickford"
I think we can safely eliminate Mary Pickford, who had a long career as a woman before there were Oscars at all, and she was seen sittting in bed on the Oscar telecast in 1977, the same year she died.
Margaret Rutherford was a great British actress, and has a twenty-year career in films. She's in Blithe Spirit in 1945, playing the hilarious Madame Arcati (spiritualist). It isn't Margaret.
So, we remain with Marie Dressler and Alice Brady.
If it's Marie Dressler, then EL's got some of his facts wrong. If she didn't die until 1985, she would have been over 100 -- not an AIDS case at all.
If it's Alice Brady, again, this person would have been very, very old by the 80s.
Honestly, I don't think it's any of these.
As to Luise Rainer, she's from Austria, and has a thick Austrian accent. She appears in a documentary (filmed sometime in the 90s) in one of her movies on DVD. There's no scar that I can see. It isn't her either.
Susan Kohner is the mother of the Weitz brothers, who are alive and working in the biz. It's not her.
Pariss: I'm kind of liking your Marisa Pavan/Pier Angeli theory but I'm not sure if it's because of them specifically or because it generally captures the theory that Timmy/Shimmy is one human being and the actress that Shimmy impersonates is another.
ReplyDeleteSo bear with me on this because I'm thinking out loud. Several people (among others I'm thinking direpotatoe and btw where is he?) have brought forth the theory that Timmy/Shimmy temporarily replaced an actress and while doing so, won the big award. Alice Brady has primarily been mentioned in conjunction with this.
This would allow the REAL actress to live way beyond Timmy/Shimmy and explain the timeline discrepancies. It would also explain why the REAL actress was seen sporadically in later years at an awards ceremony or in some guest spot on Murder She Wrote. After all, ENT never says that the Shimmy persona was never seen again (or does he?).
The alternate theory of Timmy/Shimmy and the award-winning actress being one human being also has its merits, but it does make it harder to fit all the clues -- as written. Which leads me to believe that, should THIS theory be correct, ENT will dissemble part of the BI (Shimmy was "honored" for her role and many people consider being nominated an "honor"). I don't have the original BI in front of me to make actual quotes, but that's the sense I got.
I know I'm not saying anything utterly original but with these posts spread out over several threads it's almost impossible to keep track of the good theories and I need to pull my thoughts together.
(I wish there was ONE place that we could discuss this because some good stuff is being lost in the shuffle!)
Marisa Pavan doesn't fit as she worked into the 90s.
ReplyDeleteMary Pickford continued to produce long after her win and made public appearances now and again for the remainder of her life.
ReplyDeleteAlso, Pier was married to Vic Damone, who is alive and certainly would know the facts of Pier's life and career.
ReplyDeleteVic may be in the closet, but they were married and had a child.
I feel like it isn't Pier/Marisa either.
I think we're going for somebody too well-known. It's someone lesser known, but I can't find that person without an "award," which automatically puts them on a list with their name.
There are alot of options with this twin idea. And I don't think I hit the nail quite on the head.
ReplyDeleteI just find it odd that Marisa is alive still, quit hollywood within 4 years of her win, and I can find almost no info on her. Maybe there was a brother who filled in for Marisa when Pier couldn't act in the part. There are alot of possibilities.
But Marisa was still working in 1992, so it can't be her.
ReplyDeletePariss
ReplyDeleteNo idea why, just think people got caught up on AB/KK.
There are holes in all the stories. No one fits perfectly. Marisa acted in tv, I don't think she returned to Hollywood after 1959. I still think maybe Pier's death was faked and she took over Marisa's life to marry Jean-Claude (who pretended to be married to Timmy to help out the story for the first marriage). That's why their were 2 marriages.
ReplyDeleteLOVE the work that went into the Marisa Pavan/Pier Angeli theory. Did you know that Marisa's real name was Marisa Pierangeli? Hmm. Interesting.
ReplyDeleteAnd Pier's alliance with James Dean does raise the eyebrows a bit.
I dont think Piers death was faked, but it is reported that her marriage to Damone was arranged. Not surprising. There was supposedly another sister. Three identities. Himself, him as the actress and him in the committed relationship.
ReplyDeleteI think its easier to discount with the follow up clues, but she sure got blown off quickly.
Call me simplistic, but I don't get the emphasis on the "why" part all of a sudden: In the original writing of the BI, Ent clearly states that by happenstance Timmy gets encouragement to act as a woman through his success filling in as an understudy. Since he was only getting minor roles as a man, he decided to reinvent himself as a woman and went back on the road as a woman for a couple of years to build up his credibility as a woman before trying Hollywood again. That's the "why," isn't it? He wanted to be a film star and he realized he had the best chance, given his appearance, as a woman. He only went back to being a male actor when his skin condition precluded him from acting as a woman.
ReplyDeleteOh, and TS, you are probably right. Ent probably writes very carefully in his "real" job because this is just a little side thing he whips off in between clients, court appearances, phone conferences, and keeping track of his billing hours. I'm all for having fun with this blog, but get real!
Okay, I've been doing a bit of research on Mae West, since her name was brought up.
ReplyDeleteCase for Mae West being Shimmy:
The obvious. Her pictures and looks are definitely questionable.
Rumors have spun around her for decades.
She dropped out of movies in 1940, or so (although she would reappear around 1970).
She wrote her own movies and plays and thus had the theatrical background Timmy had.
She had a long-hidden spouse (married in 1911) that she divorced in 1942. At the time of the divorce she claimed they had only lived together for "several weeks".
Was a singer, although not one of staggering talent.
Interesting coincidence: is sometimes credited with inventing the "Shimmy", a popular dance.
Case Against Mae West Being Shimmy:
No major awards of any kind.
Was a vaudeville child star.
Despite an absence from the screen,she continued to record albums and make appearances.
No known skin disorders.
Another interesting tidbit is that Jerry Orbach (from "Law & Order") was Ms. West's chauffeur at one point, late in her career.
Anyhow, I think Mae West can be safely eliminated.
Pier's marriages:
ReplyDelete-Armando Trovajoli (14 February 1962 - 1969) (divorced) 1 child
-Vic Damone (24 November 1954 - 18 December 1958) (divorced) 1 child
Marisa's are:
-Jean-Pierre Aumont (married on March 27, 1956; divorced in 1965; remarried in 1969)
What if Marisa & Jean-Pierre's first marriage was a sham. They divorce first in 1965, Pier divorces the second time in 1969. Pier & Marisa then could have switched names.
The new "Marisa"(originally Pier) marries Jean-Pierre in 1969, after Pier's marriage to Trovajoli was officially divorced.
The new "Pier" (who was the man version of Marisa) lives 3 years (alone and depressed allegedly)then "dies"- but really lives life as a man from then on. Now Pier was always a woman, who just calls herself "Marisa" after her 1969 divorce, because her brother, who was pretending to be a woman and was getting sick with the stress of the pretending. Maybe the woman Pier fell in love Jean-Pierre while JP was pretending to be married to Marisa.
Oh, my Rainer theory is so full of holes that Marie Dressler and Kay Kendall could swagger through it and wouldn't even have to duck. But it's my theory. I'm going to nurture it and care for it and call it George.
ReplyDeletesugaree-- I like your basic hypothesis about Luise Rainer... but how does it tie in with the rest of the info:
ReplyDeleteTimmy got a chance to fill in for someone and it went over well. Only then did HE leave the theatre to pursue roles as a WOMAN. If that person he filled in for was Luise Rainer that would be great, but otherwise he's made the transition from man to woman on his own, not to help her out. So she'd have to later find out about him being "in drag" and there'd have to be a resemblance and then she'd ask him to be her. She was brought to Hollywood from Germany- she'd only meet Timmy once he was in Hollywood and he'd already be acting as a woman.
Also, it states that from his first screen test as a woman he impressed people. Was he testing as Luise Rainer then? He came to Hollywood and established himself as a NEW person was my understanding. So, he would have had to fill in for Luise Rainer on stage for her to even know he could act as a woman. Then he'd have to go do all his theatre work as either just "any old woman" and then come to Hollywood and turn into her- or he was working AS Luise Rainer on stage. I think that gets too confusing for me.
According to Wikipedia (and we all know that stuff is never wrong [note sarcasm]) she didn't come to Hollywood until 1935. That's within the 50 year time frame. However it states that she first came to Hollywood and took English lessons and then made her first film in 1935. On the other hand Timmy comes to Hollywood and is given "... meaty supporting roles"- nothing about starring.
I'm not trying to burst your bubble- I want every guess to be the right one (so I can stop obsessing)- so I'm just trying to find out how it can fit. Unless Timmy is doing roles as a woman and THEN goes and 'impersonates" Luis Rainer, I don't see how it can fit into the story- not all the fine details, mind you- even just the basic story. But I didn't get the feeling from the original post that Timmy ever played more than one woman-- maybe while doing theatre when he was perfecting his trade, but once in Hollywood I would think he'd have to be ONE female person. I'm sure it was already all too complicated as it was, let alone being more than one woman!
I think that scenario is just not plausible. It'd be a great story (I wonder how many script proposals will come out of all of the difference scenarios we all come up with) but I just don't think it works with all that was said.
Again, I could very well be wrong- but my gut feeling is "no". But I do like the idea! Imagine how it would feel to be her and be back at the Oscars-- "neener-neener-neener" comes to mind!
Budford- what if the alleged third sister was a brother. That would explain a whole lot then. He would have filled in as Marisa instead of as Pier, incase his and Pier's acting styles didn't match. Then the real Marisa would have left hollywood, but maybe continued on tv.
ReplyDeleteBut I have not seen anything about any third siblings.
Just because Alice Brady was born in a certain year doesn't mean that Timmy was born in that year.
ReplyDeleteWith the "two Alice Bradys" theory, a young Timmy is in drag "acting older." By my calculations, Timmy should be born around 1912-1916 (if he's going to show up in Hollywood 1930-1935). The new theory that Timmy is a child actor could have him born in the 1920s!
So a man born in the 1920s could still die of AIDS-related pneumonia in 1980.
I saw a university performance of "Importance of Being Earnest" in which Lady Bracknell was played by a cute young actress...according to the pictures posted in the lobby. It is pretty easy for a young person to play old...as several posters have already pointed out to us. How easy that would come across in screen close-ups is another matter entirely.
Could a very young Timmy show up in England in 1935 to pretend to be a much older Margaret Rutherford in the 1936 film that was her screen debut? I suppose stranger things have happened in this world.
The problem I have with James Dean being the closeted A-lister is that Dean was not A-list until after his death. And from what I remember about some of his biographies is that he wasn't exactly closeted or hid his bisexuality.
ReplyDeleteOK, I've got a new *theory,* based on my Kay Kendall theory.
ReplyDeleteShimmy took over the career of a famous actress, who died in an accident, and the studio needed to finish a movie.
Say, for instance, Joan Crawford, who won the Oscar for Mildred Pierce.
I'm just using Joan as an example.
Joan is making Mildred Pierce. She's in a car accident, and killed. The studio doesn't know what to do, but William Haines mentions that he has a friend who can do Joan, and they only need this person to fill in for a few scenes.
The guy does the scenes, and then later, Joan wins the Oscar. The guy accepts the Oscar, and has to become Joan. He does a few more movies as Joan, and has to play Joan for the rest of his life in public, which is pretty disconcerting to him.
You see?
Perhaps Shimmy is actually a famous actress with a long career, but part of that career she was actually a different person, a man.
If this is the case, then it could be almost anybody. It could be Mary Pickford. Alice Brady. Margaret Rutherford, etc., etc.
Only eliminate people who were seen in a movie or in theater after 1985.
Sorry sugaree-- my post came in right after yours! I wasn't responding to your new post, just the old one- but I got sidetracked by having to make dinner and such and it didn't get posted earlier. It just happens that mine posted right after yours-- I wasn't trying to poke more holes in your theory!!
ReplyDeleteHee-- hee "I will love him and pet him and call him George!" :-D I think you should- it's your theory, you can love it all you want!! (And I love the IDEA, I just don't know how it fits... but it'd be a cool story!!)
Here's my guess: Mae West.
ReplyDeleteLook at this:
http://maewest.blogspot.com/2005/10/mae-west-1918-shimmy-queen.html
And if that photo of her as the "shimmy queen" doesn't look like a man in drag, i don't know what does.
David, your theory reminds me of the story of Corinne Griffith, the Orchid Lady of silent films (sadly, no Oscar).
ReplyDeleteShe was divorcing one of her husbands in the 60's and explained away a claim of being 51 years old instead of her actual 71 by saying she was really her own sister who replaced the star after she had been killed on a movie set years earlier. Her old co-stars were called as witnesses and all ID'd her as the same ol' actress they'd worked with decades earlier...
I suppose anything is possible!
Yep, that's it: Ent has uncovered that Mae West was a man. Wait until this hits CNN once it's revealed. What a shocker - I bet Geraldo will devote a large portion of his weekend show on Fox to this, too. Mickey Rooney revealed to our own Ent that Mae West was a homosexual man!
ReplyDelete(Sorry for the sarcasm but people are getting a little nutty over this - it's not a big name, "trust.")
Let's see...Timmy as Shimmy bears a strong resemblance to Luise Rainer, but he's on the stage in small roles under another name. He's more successful than he was as a man, but he's not quite at the role of star. Then he and Luise meet up, hit it off, and get a real kick out of how much they look alike (with a little work on Timmy's part).
ReplyDeleteThey realize that they are the answer to each other's prayers. As LR, Timmy can be a star. If Timmy plays Luise--not just going to the set, but giving interviews to Hedda and Louella and making appearances at all the dreadful studio functions--Luise is free. Clifford Odets was so busy with his writing and politics that he didn't even notice, or maybe he just didn't care. After all, it was Luise in bed with him, not Timmy.
I love my theory. See how big and strong it's growing to be?
Good lord, is Vic Damone in the closet as well? Five wives including the luscious young Dihanne Carroll and he's supposed to be gay? You'd think two or three wives would be sufficient for bearding purposes.
The problem with the studio hiring a replacement for a dead star is that the replacement would be more expensive than simply recasting and reshooting the role. Not only would Timmy need to be paid, but the studio might have to bribe the star's family and friends, plus any witnesses to the death, hospital workers and undertakers, anyone who finds out about Timmy, and anyone from Timmy's past who notices.
Off the top of my head, I can't think of any successful switches or substitutions of this magnitude in history.
Okay, I LOVE David's theory UNTIL he mentions that it could be anyone and that person could have worked all the way up to 1985.
ReplyDeleteI love the fact that he said Shimmy could have been a stand-in (due to the one role, one award clue), but Ent specifically said that it would NOT make sense to be concentrating on a Shimmy whose credits go more than a couple/few years past her win.
So, if it's a stand-in for an actress who may have died mid-production, it would be a great explanation of the "why" that Ent keeps stressing OTHERWISE Shimmy was an original person with her own Shimmy identity and we need to figure out the "why". In that case of the original identity Shimmy, my bet is on revenge and William Haines HAS to be tied into that revenge since he was Timmy's mentor.
I hope this makes sense.
Okay- this is long, but I think it's worth posting- especially for those that jumped in after the original post. This is the original post with all the hints that ENT gave mixed in. I've added dates to his hints to you can keep track of what was added and I put in some notes myself (identifed as [my note:...] so you'd know that's just me asking a question or trying to clarify something (mostly for myself). My biggest problem with all the "switching places with someone already established" ideas is that they don't really seem to fit the tone of the BI. I'm open to suggestions, but so far I'm not convinced- like the concept, but don't see where it applies here. Okay, here's the long post with all the info:
ReplyDelete---------------------------------------------------------------------
Wednesday, August 29, 2007
The Life And Times Of Timmy
I don't remember the first time I met JJ. It just seemed like from the first day I started at my first position he was there. It seems like he has always said he is retired, but at the same time it seems like he always has a piece of every project. JJ is pushing 90 if he isn't there already. He started in the business when he was a kid doing gofer work and his career rise has matched the rise of films through their infancy all the way to the present day. He knows everyone and for those few people he doesn't know, they certainly know him.
I've always told him he needs to write a book about his life and times and let future generations have an insight into his life and what he has seen. I get the feeling he has, although he hasn't ever confirmed it. Maybe he is waiting to publish it after he dies. I don't know.
With what I do now I don't come into contact with JJ much anymore on a professional basis but I always stay in touch on a personal basis. Every other month or so we get together for brunch and I get entertained for a few hours. I'm not sure what JJ gets out of it except for some company and some free food. Somehow I think I'm getting the better part of the deal.
This past Sunday the conversation turned towards an event he had hinted at previously, but had never really finished the story and I took the opportunity this time to get the answers I wanted.
All I will say about these events are they happened within the past 50 years and only about ten people know the whole story.
8/30/07--#1 I meant to say the events happened within a 50 year time frame as opposed to happening within the past 50 years. To help you out more I will say that Timmy died between 1980-1985 so you need to go back 50 years from that date.
[my note: -- Timeline is 1930/1935- 1980/1985. Is 1930/1935 the date that Timmy first started doing theatre or the time that he first started working as a woman for the studios?]
Timmy was a gay man at a time when gay men were treated miserably, not only in Hollywood but in the rest of the country as well. Timmy's homosexuality was compounded by the fact that he was very slightly built, had very pale features and a skin condition that prevented much hair growth on his body.
What Timmy had going for him was a personality that wouldn't quit and a way of capturing an audience whether one person, five hundred or through film that was unlike anything most people had seen previously.
Timmy grew up in the Northeast in a small town where he really and truly didn't fit in. At some point he knew he wanted to be an actor and began performing in theatres across the country. He would stick in a city long enough to work in some plays and shows and then move on when he heard of another opportunity in a bigger town or for more money somewhere else. Each of these moves pushed him further and further west to his ultimate destination in Hollywood.
When he first arrived in LA, the studio system was still going strong and most performers were tied to a studio for many years. They would often work on several films simultaneously and often share accommodations with other performers of the same level who also worked at the same studio.
Timmy worked often, but nothing more than a few lines here or there and spent a great deal of time in the "chorus" sections of musicals which were still fairly popular. To supplement his income Timmy began performing in local theatre productions. One night the lead actress was unable to perform and there was no understudy. A sold out audience was going to be sent home unless something was done.
[my note: -- so Timmy was working in films (as Timmy) AND doing theatre (as Timmy) at the same time.]
Enter Timmy. With the audience none the wiser, Timmy performed the entire two hour show as the lead actress and received a standing ovation. He was brilliant and there was even a review in the paper which talked about this understudy who was even better than the regular actress.
As good as Timmy was, it was only for one night, and he went back to his regular role the next night. Timmy was excited about the possibilities the night before had held though and the response he received was never far from his mind.
After another year working at the studio without getting much further than bit parts, Timmy decided to do something which would put him in the spotlight. When his studio contract ended he basically reversed his original trek to LA and began performing in small town theatres again, but this time as a woman.
Timmy traveled and did the theatre route for almost two years while building up a resume and a background for his new persona. When he finally felt as if he had it down, Timmy returned to Hollywood. This time as a woman.
8/30/07-- #4 Remember that Timmy was under a great deal of pressure even back then about his biography as a woman. People wanted to know where she was from, etc. Timmy provided information and it wasn't as easy to check on stories and timelines for reporters then, and so whatever an actress said about their past was generally just accepted and is reflected on the "official" biography for Timmy as an actress. The story Timmy gave is the one still in use.
9/04/07-- As, I am going through all the comments to make them more manageable, I noticed that in at least the first 300 or so comments, that people are confusing the biography of Timmy and Shimmy. Yes, Timmy was born in the Northeast, but I never said where Shimmy claimed to be from. Shimmy can be from anywhere.
From his very first screen test as a woman, Timmy was destined to become a star. Timmy was initially given meaty supporting roles and moved into an apartment with two other women who worked at the studio. One of those women was JJ's wife. There was just no way for Timmy to keep his masculinity a secret in such close quarters and so the two women became Timmy's confidantes and helped him whenever possible.
[my note: -- he says "One of those women was JJ's wife." Not "...one of JJ's wives." which would indicate JJ had been married multiple times and this roommate was one those many wives. So either JJ was married to her at the time (and he has or has not been remarried since), or she is currently his wife now, regardless of whether he knew her or not then.]
Over the next two years, Timmy worked steadily as a woman and kept getting better and better roles. He was very rarely the lead, but in memorable role he was cast as the lead opposite a very closeted A list at the time actor who also remained single for his entire life. The two began a relationship which was always kept quiet but lasted for many years.
8/30/07--#5 Timmy had a relationship with the closeted A list actor, but it didn't continue until Timmy's death.
9/04/07--Second, remember the A-lister was an A lister at that time.
9/07/07-- #4 Timmy was a very good singer. He was not A list. William Haines was a mentor to him. Katharine Hepburn adored Timmy.
Shortly after Timmy was cast as the lead, he was cast in another role which is the subject of the blind. Timmy was incredible in this role and whether his acting was as a result of his new found love or as a result of just the right part at the right time, Hollywood took notice and so did the critics. During award season, Timmy began winning regularly for his role. I want to make it perfectly clear that none of these organizations knew Timmy was actually a man when they were honoring him with awards as an actress.
[my note: -- find the role from above (with the closeted A-list actor) and shortly after Shimmy makes that film, Shimmy is cast in the role that ultimately leads to all the awards. So find a film with the closeted actor and a film made/released shortly after that is the film in question. Shimmy began winning REGULARLY for this role. More than one award.]
This award season was a blessing because it honored Timmy for his work, but at the same time the increased publicity and probes into his background were causing a great deal of stress and Timmy began getting hives and breaking out as the stress of trying to maintain three different persona's. Timmy himself, Timmy the actress, and Timmy the gay man in a loving relationship with a closeted star.
When it came to the very big award, the one with all the television viewers, Timmy won again. There he was, the woman who was really a gay man was being honored for being the Best Supporting Actress/Best Actress of the year. Its up to you to figure out which of the two he won.
9/04/07--So as I waded my way through another 200 comments, I noticed another theme popping up which was whether the award was a BAFTA. It wasn't. So you can remove from your consideration that Cornell woman.
[my note: -- Shimmy won AGAIN. So Shimmy has already gotten more than one award for this role (see above) and now wins "the very big award". This says to me that Shimmy won other awards and then the final award was an Oscar.]
After the award season, Timmy thought the hives and his skin would go back to normal, but if anything they became worse. The severe outbreak he had been dealing with had altered his body to the point where it just wouldn't go back to normal.
At that time there was no CGI, and makeup could only do so much. Timmy the award winning actress was having trouble finding work because of his condition and so he saw his career slowly work its way back down the ladder over the course of three or four years.
8/31/07 - There seems to be a very popular guess that everyone is making and one website made it their official guess. However, if you read the blind you realize this popular guess makes no sense. Timmy the actress gave up acting very soon after winning the award, so when you look at IMDB and see an actress worked for many years after her win, the guess doesn't make any sense despite the fact that everything else fits. It's easy to make up biographies, but you can't hide the fact that this actress who is a popular guess was in so many movies after her win.
Timmy considered trying to resume a film career as a man but the skin condition made that impossible because it would have been one hell of a coincidence that two people who looked remarkably alike had the same condition. What he could do though was return to the theatre, and he did so, as a man and worked as a man until his death from AIDS related complications.
8/30/07--#8 Why does the date of death of the "actress" matter? If she is in fact even listed as deceased.
Sunday after brunch I went to Blockbuster and I rented the award winning film, and even knowing what I knew, when I watched it Sunday night it was almost impossible to tell. If you watch it carefully there is one giveaway which is a scar. It's not a big scar, but its evident in photos of the male Timmy which you can still find online in old cast photos and in the female version of Timmy as she acts her way to one of the biggest awards in films.
8/30/07--#3 It wasn't actually Blockbuster that I got the movie on Sunday. I said Blockbuster to just indicate that I rented the film at a video store. I actually went to a place that has older films, BUT, I didn't use their name more to protect my own identity for when this is solved/revealed because there aren't that many people renting this particular film.
Timmy as an actor and actress was in over 100 films and theatre productions from Topeka to Broadway, but this is about one role and one award.
8/30/07--#2 Combined between Timmy AND his female persona they were in over 100 movies.
--------------- general notes and NOTS -----------------
8/30/07--#6 The post was reposted on several sites and was guessed correctly on at least 3 of them. I won't say if anyone has guessed correctly on my site.
8/30/07--#7 This item will be revealed. Probably at Christmas when I do the July-December updates and reveals.
9/07/07-- #1-To the best of my knowledge there is no book deal or anything like it. If there is, I'm not getting any money from it. I think it would make a great book and movie, but I think there is more potential for a movie with Gift Clement.
9/07/07-- #2 It's not a simple answer. When I reveal it will be a long post explaining everything.
9/10/07-- So, I know everyone has been working hard on Timmy/Shimmy and so I won't even make you wait until I hit 2,000 posts. I will do it sometime next week. [my note: -- note the date of this - the 10th. That means the reveal will be after the weekend- NEXT week. Bummer, huh?]
Not going to tell you when, but I will do it next week. Like many of you I haven't been doing all of my work lately and was really far behind so I haven't had a chance to go through all your weekend comments in detail to see if you discovered the identity of Timmy.
I will say that in my superficial glance at some of them that some of you have started to speculate HOW it could have happened, but you also need to think about WHY it happened in more detail. There's even a little bonus mystery solution at play in all of this which I think is almost the best part of the story.
9/11/07-- #2 Yes, the explanation for the blind is long, but only because it would be a disservice to just give the answer and not tell you the why. I did see a comment where someone got very close to the why.
9/11/07-- #3 I was going to post something on Jane Wyman and then figured everyone would see the photo and die, so held back. Ditto a photo collection of Hollywood leading ladies which is really incredible.
[my note: not sure if this is Blind Item related or just idle chatter, but I left it in just in case.]
9/11/07-- #4 The photos in the post are just photos and as far as I know Timmy isn't in any of them. They were just photos I found on Google looking for old Hollywood casts.
9/04/07-- So you can remove from your consideration that Cornell woman. = NOT Cornell Borchers
9/05/07
-- NOT Sandy Dennis
-- NOT Shirley Booth
-- I don't think anyone has mentioned Timmy on any blog. I'm not absolutely, positively, 100% sure because there are so many comments on so many different blogs and sites but to the best of my knowledge no one has mentioned Timmy.
9/06/07 -- Shimmy is NOT Mercedes McCambridge
-- NOT Judy Holiday
-- Timmy is NOT Danny Kaye
9/07/07--
-- NOT Hattie McDaniel
-- NOT Edith Evans
-- NOT Josephine Hull
9/11/07-- #1 One very good possibility for Shimmy was discarded much too easily.
9/11/07-- #5 Sorry to disappoint the t-shirt makers (where are the free t-shirts for all the people who worked on this?) but it isn't Kay Kendall for Shimmy (did I hear a gasp or groan?) and it isn't Robert Moore for Timmy.
9/11/07-- #6 Not Judy Holiday, Judy Holliday, or Madonna's song Holiday.
People complaining that there "isn't one place to discuss this all"...
ReplyDeleteThere's now a perfectly good thread just waiting for you all on the message board - that's why the board was created. I've been too busy to remind everyone that it's there, but it is!
There has always been talk about Mae West being a man in drag.
ReplyDeleteThe award show was televised (or did it mean it now gets a lot of TV viewers?), so that knocks out anyone who won anything before the 1950s. They were first shown on TV in 1953.
Dragon Slayer - this is awesome, thank you!!
ReplyDeleteAccording to one Howard Hughes biography, Ida Lupino once asked Hughes if he'd ever dated Mae West. He replied, "I always heard she was a man dolled up as a woman." Of course this wouldn't have deterred Howard, who slept with anyone as long as they were "clean" ...
ReplyDeleteI'm starting to re-think the Haines revenge motivation after reading the excerpts on googlebooks of something called The Fixers, about the MGM publicity machine. Amazing stuff.
(There's a message board?)
Hez- I'm trying to post over there, but I'm still waiting for my registration mail to show up.
ReplyDeleteWhen it does, I hope you don't mind if I post my big post from above over there. I think it's helpful to have it all together like that. I know re-reading it all and adding the notes reminded me of some things I had forgotten/was forgetting to pay attention to.
But right now... I'm waiting on the mail so I can log in...
Dragon Slayer - GREAT idea to compile all the information. Thanks for doing that!
ReplyDeleteHez:
ReplyDeleteI'm the one who complained about not having one place to post all this and I DID post something on that message board the other day but it's dead as a doornail!
Maybe if we all agree to go over there it would be better.
Also DragonSlayer, thanks for putting all that info together. I was doing the exact same thing when I saw your post so you saved me mucho time.
Dragon Slayer, absolutely awesome post! Many thanks!
ReplyDeleteThanks Dragon Slayer for the big and much-needed recap.
ReplyDeleteNow, let's all read this again from the original BI:
"... Timmy began winning regularly for his role."
How many times does something have to happen for the adverb "regularly" to apply?
Two times = twice
three times = regularly?
Margaret Rutherford won the following four awards for "VIPs""
National Board of Review
The Laurel
The Golden Globe
The Oscar
The problem is..."There he was" would suggest he was present at the Oscars, but apparently he wasn't at the ceremony and Terry Thomas accepted for him. Unless the words "There he was" are to be taken as an idiom for "This was the situation he found himself in."
I want it to be Alice Brady, but Margaret Rutherford is the only one who fits the multiple-awards pattern.
Twisted:
ReplyDeleteRon Moody didn't marry until he was 61 years old! MR would have known him BEFORE he was married. I believe Margaret's bio is fake, giving her a birthdate much earlier than Timmy/ Shimmy's was. If, in fact, her bio was real, then her first acting gig would have been when she was 44 yrs. old (b.1892 1st film in U.S. 1936). Ron Moody wouldn't have married until 1985, according to his bio, and that would have been around the time Timmy died.
Sources IMDb and Wikipedia
Yeah, but in her role(s) right before The VIPs, Margaret Rutherford was not in a romance. That same year she was in an Agatha Christie mystery and a movie about the space program. From the BI it sounds like Shimmy was cast as the lead in a romance, or at least a film with romantic situations.
ReplyDeleteI also have mental picture of Shimmy as someone in there 30's and not an older woman.
ReplyDeleteI'm picturing a young, hot woman. No offense to Dame Rutherford, but she doesn't really seem to fit the romantic lead role idea very well.
ReplyDeleteMaureen, maybe I'm confused. I thought when you pointed out Ron Moody as being the A-lister Margaret Rutherford acted with, you were pointing to him as being the A-list closeted homosexual. Was I mistaken? If so, sorry!
ReplyDeleteOkay now - I'm still trying to find Timmy.
ReplyDeleteSince Katherine Hepburn "adored" him, I'm thinking how did she meet him?? Was he in one of her movies?? So I went through all of her movies up until 1960, which is when the studio system was pretty much kaput and these are the actors who were in them AND died within the 1980-85 timeframe - I hope this helps...
- Peter Bull
- George Raft
- George Jessel
- Sam Jaffe
- William Demarest
- Kenny Baker
I don't know if these people have been mentioned before - I HAVE read throgh all of the posts, but I'm telling you, my brain is MUSH right now so I may have overlooked the mentioning of any of these guys.
Anyone think any of these sounds good??
Nice job, Janele!
ReplyDeleteAnd I know we've already said NO to Mae West, and I'm NOT on that bandwagon, but sooo interesting is this fact about Raft - "His 1932 film Night After Night launched the movie career of Mae West with a supporting part as well as providing Raft's first leading role (they would die within two days of each other 48 years later and their corpses would wind up in the same morgue at the same time)."
ReplyDeleteYikes, that is MORBID (the part about their corpses).
ReplyDeleteOne thing that sticks with me...ENT didn't say that one potential candidate was dismissed too "early;" he said that the candidate was dismissed too "easily." So, someone's been brushed aside, and maybe not on the first day.
ReplyDeleteAlso, when ENT says that the guess for Shimmy was correctly named early on, it may not have been as an "official" guess, but maybe it was a name posted in a list of names thrown out for discussion.
So maybe it's Marie Dressler? The only thing we could find that eliminated her was she doesn't have a slight build and it seems her win was too early to fit into the 50 year timeframe.
ReplyDeleteTimmy... is not going to be anyone we have ever heard of. He's going to be a complete unknown, with about 50 movies to his credit, singing in the chorus.
ReplyDeleteHoly crap! I just looked at a photo of William Demarest and I'd be damned if he didn't look EXACTLY like Josephine Hull. But then I realized she'd been "notted"!!!!
ReplyDeleteDavid, then why would Ent have said we could see his scar in old cast photos? There has to be some way we could find him.
ReplyDeleteI don't know. But I don't believe we're gonna find a Ron Moody who did a few years as Margaret Rutherford, but then turned back into Ron Moody.
ReplyDeleteTimmy is unknown, a blank. When EL reveals the identity of Shimmy, he'll tell us who Timmy is and we'll all think "who's that?"
All we know about Timmy is that he was a good singer, we was raised in the Northeast, he had an odd skin condition, and he made quite a few movies, in the chorus. Even though EL says Timmy went back to theater after the career switch as Shimmy, it doesn't mean Broadway. And even if he did Broadway as a man, I'll bet you it was under a different name than his original.
I think it's useless to try and find Timmy from this information, unless you want to scan old photos from old musicals, looking at all the chorus guys for one with a scar.
Ron Moody was Margaret Rutherford's costar. If he was also her, that's a feat I'd like to see!
ReplyDeletePersonally I really don't buy into the Margaret Rutherford idea. She looks like the dragon in Pete's Dragon, not a youngish romantic lead.
Earlier, I posted the IMDB list of George Noisom.
ReplyDeleteI don't think he's Timmy, necessarily, but it's going to be somebody exactly like him:
http://www.imdb.com/name/nm0634168/
Long list of credits, born in the Northeast (sort of), never got anywhere as a boy/man.
It says he died in 2005, but this might be wrong.
Timmy is going to be an unknown like this guy.
Janele, I agree with David and I think what EL means is when we see photo's of old plays or movies we'll see him once EL points him out to us, but 99% of the population will never know his name.
ReplyDeleteThink of the photo's he posted in the original blind. We had no clue who those people were. Timmy will be someone like that, I believe, which is why I haven't spent any time trying to find out who he is.
This comment has been removed by the author.
ReplyDeleteI guess I just don't understand why he'd mention clues for Timmy, then. Why mention that Hepburn adored him or Haines was his mentor?? Is this so we can figure out the "why" part because if we're not trying to find out who Timmy is and only ocncentrating on Shimmy, why would we need the clues about Timmy? Maybe I'm reading into this too much.
ReplyDeletetwo quick things. please discount if necessary.
ReplyDelete1. is there a reason why this BI is coming out NOW? I am not talking about a book deal or a movie deal. Maybe someone recently died and now the truth can be told?
2. Am I correct in assuming that when timmy took over on stage role and won accolades and then when he won an award for a later performance in film, it has NOT been established that he used the SAME name for both performances or decidely used a different name for both? has this been made clear or is it still speculation?
if we knew, it might help.
I feel silly posting this, but Garbo was an early guess. She's got a funky biography, so much so that when she "died" in 1990 (I know, I know), it wasn't immediately possible to identify her survivors. A niece received her estate. She never married. One A-list closeted co-star was Ramon Novarro (sp?). He never married either.
ReplyDeleteShe was an absolute freak about close-ups, would not sign autographs, used to kick her directors off the set for her love scenes, quit acting at age 36, and moved to the East Coast, where she spent the rest of her life hiding under enormous floppy hats and never acted again.
I dismissed her at the start because - it's Garbo. Even if she were a man, which I'm not convinced she was or wasn't, why would she leave the business only to go out East and work as someone other than Garbo?
Maybe he wanted to be let alone. Maybe he still wanted to work. Maybe there was blackmail involved. There are even rumors that Garbo was a real spy, sort of, during WWII, providing inside info to the Allies (Mata Hari was her film w. Ramon, btw).
The thing is, if it were Garbo, the how would be almost as long as the why. Because you have a dead old lady in an apartment in NYC five years after Timmy died. Of course, much of the AB theory can be applied to Garbo with the break between silents and talkies - and the fact that Garbo is one of the most-impersonated females ever.
She did not win an Oscar for best or best supporting actress. However, she did win a lot of very big awards (NY Film Critics Award used to be more prestigious than oscar because it was the learned folks, not the actors, voting) within a couple of years before she quit.
So, with her, you've got a sketchy bio, nearly unmanageable sex scandals, no marriages or children, multiple awards, a closeted a-lister who also never married, career slows to an absolute stop shortly after the awards, no voluntary public appearances after that.
But it's Garbo. And five years after Timmy dies, there's another body, presumably female.
So maybe this is a guess I shouldn't have dismissed so easily. But that doesn't make it the right guess.
When EL reveals Shimmy and Timmy, he'll give us the name of Timmy, and we'll all look him up on IMDB, and the facts will be there, born in the Northeast, good singer, etc., 60 movies to his credit, all in the chorus.
ReplyDeleteThis will be proof of EL's story (which seems more and more to be an urban legend, to me).
I also think the facts about Timmy have been red herrings in the sense that, we've been looking for the wrong stuff.
Even EL said Shimmy may not be listed as deceased, even though Timmy died in 1985.
Until 2 days ago, Shimmy could have been Jane Wyman for all we knew.
I know Jane wasn't Shimmy -- just using her as an example.
Timmy's an unknown. And Shimmy had a short career. But Timmy/Shimmy had a lot of movies in toto.
I would say, Timmy's got a lot of movies as a boy/man, which leads me to believe he was in a series of some kind.
Our Gang
Little Rascals
Lassie
Andy Hardy movies...
Carl Switzer, from Our Gang/Little Rascals, has over 100 films to his credit, and he died at age 31.
Maybe he didn't die. Maybe he became Elizabeth Hartman.
LOL
With Garbo, her lead role could be in Anna Karenina. She took two years off between 39 and 41 before making her last movie.. maybe hoping the hives would go away.
ReplyDeleteJust speculating :)
Maybe Shimmy was Jane Wyman and Ronald Regan was Timmy. That'd be a shocker!
ReplyDeleteThere is no way on Earth William Demarest could be mistaken for a woman.
ReplyDeleteoh this is a great clip for those of us obsessed with Timmy -
ReplyDeletehttp://blinditems.typepad.com/dish/2007/09/the-average-dre.html
I think Garbo is an obvious choice, except for 2 small items: her boobs, which flop around in Ninotchka.
ReplyDeleteShe may have been a big lesbian, but she wasn't a man.
Also, in the TCM documentary about her, there's a close-up screentest shot in 1948, when she was invited to return to films.
She looks GREAT!
She decided not to come back, of course.
Why why
ReplyDeleteSo timmy is an NY equity chorus boy who gets a taste of playing actress, wants to get an acting pay scale, goes west, hides from Equity under an assumed name, makes it but now is faced with SAG pressure, the union class system and potential blacklisting. Soundies inspire the studio system to start organizing the labor all over again into classes. SAG founders included multiple lawyers so maybe they required physicals or id checks?
Perhaps Garbo had moobs.
ReplyDeletePlus Garbo was treated for breast cancer.
ReplyDelete"Moobs." Hahahaha!!!
ReplyDeleteSorry if this has been explained in detail. I've only recently begun to post and like many of you, I'm completely overwhelmed by the sheer volume of comments and research.
ReplyDeleteCould someone remind me why Anna Magnani and Katina Paxinou had been eliminated?
It's probably just the fatigue taking over, but geez, both these ladies look like dudes in some of their pictures and had some really vague backgrounds.
Of course, every woman looks like a dude now . . .
CMON ENT GIVE US A CLUE - WE'RE GOING COLD HERE.
ReplyDeleteJust like Jason Davis!
ReplyDeleteThis whole thing is making me goofy.
I don't think it's going to end up being a woman who looks like a dude but rather a dude that looks like a woman. Remember, EL described Timmy as slight and pale with very little body hair.
ReplyDeleteTimmy MUST be listed in the IMDB, so what about going through their 'died on this day' lists starting from Jan 1st and going all the way to Dec 31st, checking all the filmographies for male actors who died between 1980-1985... looking for *mostly* bit part actors from, say, 1920s-1950s? Just a suggestion, but it could help us find new candidates. If there are 12 people (one for each month) going through the lists it won't take us long to skim through all the dates.
ReplyDeleteI think ENT's allusion to William Haines was to narrow the time frame that Timmy the male actor started in Hollywood because Haines was out of MGM by 1933-34.
ReplyDeleteBut, Haines started acting in NY at age 14 or so...could have mentored Timmy before they got to Hollywood. Either way it narrows the birthdate of Timmy to around 1903-1918. That leaves out Marie Dressler AND Alice Brady (if you believe she was really born in 1892).
That time frame also makes Timmy and JJ more like contemporaries. And makes Timmy's death in early '80s from AIDS related illness more credible.
Katharine Hepburn's "adoring" Timmy suggests he was younger than she, so, he would be born after 1907-1918.
He may have contracted the pandemic flu as an infant (1916-1918) which may have caused his hairlessness (from fever) and his general slight build.
If he were a WWI baby, he would have been leaving Hollywood, given the time-line, about 1939-1941. I say this because if born in, say, 1915, arives in H-wood at age 19 in 1934 just in time to catch Wm. Haines, is under contract with MGM long enough to make dozens of pictures before he leaves to become Shimmy--would have to be in films as Timmy for about 5 to 7 years, typical length of H-wood contract.
He left H-wood, not just to pursue acting career as woman, but to escape the draft of WWII! He lays low for 4 years or so (per the original BI) acting as Shimmy (the duration of WWII) and gets a big break resulting in awards.
Now the problem is, which award? GG and AA winners in both categories for 1945-1951 don't fit. The Supporting Actress category is most logical, but winners who have not been "notted" by ENT all have subsequent careers.
What do you think?
Do you think Timmy would have been bald or partially so? I wonder if the hair loss condition extended to his head. He probably would have worn toupees / wigs though, so looking for bald guys in musicals probably wouldn't work.
ReplyDeleteThere have been nude photos of Garbo published out there...I forget where, but I know I've seen them. Lots of old-time stars had nude photos taken/"blue" movies starred in. There are nude pics of Joan Crawford out there too. And Jean Harlow.
ReplyDeleteAnyway, Garbo was definitely a woman.
Timmy MUST be listed in the IMDB, so what about going through their 'died on this day' lists starting from Jan 1st and going all the way to Dec 31st, checking all the filmographies for male actors who died between 1980-1985
ReplyDeleteHow do you get to these lists?
Here's another thought...ENT eliminated Robert Moore as Timmy. A couple of days ago, there were some comparisons of Robert Moore to Maggie McNamara (okay, I admit, mostly by me)...both starred in Otto Preminger movies, Robert Moore directed Maggie's The Moon is Blue co-star David Niven.
ReplyDeleteI know there are only a few of us still working on the Maggie Mac angle (no major awards except the BAFTA which was eliminated, only nominated and not a winner for an Oscar), but maybe ENT was saying something by eliminating Robert Moore? Either, Maggie's still a possibility as Shimmy, but not with Robert as Timmy, or else Maggie's not in the running (which I know many people think anyway).
I just thought it was interesting that ENT definitely eliminated Robert Moore as Timmy, and hadn't seen any discussion on it so I thought I would throw it out there.
Let me clarify. I do think Ron Moody is the closeted A lister. He married in 1985, at the age of 61 for the first time. This roughly coincides with Timmy's death. He may have waited until then to marry because he was still in love with "Timmy". Margaret would have had a relationship with him prior to his marriage, so he was single and never married at the time she began the affair.
ReplyDeleteOne year before she won the awards for The V.I.P.s, she was in a movie called, The Mouse That Roared. She played the lead opposite Ron Moody.
Both of them are English. In pictures of her as Miss Marpole, she has "bumps" on her face.
Ana, walking back from lunch today I had that exact thought. Maybe Timmy was bald. Maybe that's why Ent is encouraging us to find the "why." Maybe congenital baldness or premature baldness is the "why."
ReplyDeleteI've been thinking WW2, draft, etc. Can you imagine what a young slight gay man's life would be like in the army? Could this be part of the 'why'?
ReplyDeleteAnd another random thought - everyone associated with this bi needs to be dead - or there could be no reveal.
And also - if Shimmy was never a real person isn't it possible that she just dropped off the face of the earth - no explanation, no 'death'? Maybe that's why ent says her death is irrelevant. Or, perhaps Timmy did replace someone real for a time, perhaps someone who, because of say, politics, drugs, pregnancy, disfigurement or something to do with the war, (n general, something undesirable or scandalous)was dropped by the studios who then needed someone to replace her to cover their investment.
Maybe this has something to do with the blind from months ago about the actress who never went home from the hollywood party...omg I'm going crazy - too many questions!!!
Maureen, I really don't think Rutherford is Shimmy, firstly she is English and it would have taken a long time for Timmy to master the accent and secondly she has an OBE. In other words, the Queen was tricked too? Doubt it.
ReplyDelete"Maybe this has something to do with the blind from months ago about the actress who never went home from the hollywood party"
ReplyDeleteOoh, when was that???
Actually, I really think it is AB, and have for quite some time. I threw out Margaret Rutherford's name as I'm trying to "think out of the box" in response to EL's latest clues. However, don't be too quick to dismiss this possibility. If "Shimmy" can fool the award judges, I have no doubt that she could fool the Queen.
ReplyDeleteIt was in June, I think - but I think I thought of it because I've had to much coffee today - or maybe Ent has a cunning, twisted mind, and is letting these stories out, drop by drop...
ReplyDeleteOK too much coffee.