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Kirk Douglas is still alive — and today he's 100 years old.

Happy Birthday, Kirk Douglas!

From his Wikipedia page:

Growing up, Douglas sold snacks to mill workers to earn enough to buy milk and bread to help his family. Later, he delivered newspapers and during his youth worked at more than forty different jobs before getting a job acting....

Douglas' acting talents were noticed at the American Academy of Dramatic Arts in New York City, which gave him a special scholarship. One of his classmates was Betty Joan Perske (later to become better known as Lauren Bacall)... Bacall wrote that she "had a wild crush on Kirk"... During their time together, she learned that he had no money, and that he once spent the night in jail since he had no place to sleep. She once gave him her uncle's old coat to keep warm: "I thought he must be frozen in the winter... He was thrilled and grateful."...

 

What a face! What a presence! Here's a list of all his movies, many of which I have not seen. So I'll just say I loved him in "Lust for Life" and "Paths of Glory." (And though I have the DVD, I've never watched "Spartacus.") 

"The thing that lots of people are missing is that I was wearing a costume. A homage to Mad Max."

"I look ridiculous in frocks. I can’t wear heels – my back goes out and my feet get terribly sore. And besides, I have no interest in clothes other than what they tell me about a person. I am a storyteller – I’m not interested in fashion. Other than people like Alexander McQueen. The rest of it is just so much Cinderella stuff.... I don’t mean that as an insult to Cinderella. It’s just – fashion like that is just telling one story. Catwalk models: not only do they all walk the same way, they all look identical. It’s only the clothes that change. Whereas when I’m researching something, I go and sit in a relevant café and just watch people, which is completely fascinating. For myself, I just wear black and white. I want to be in the background."

Said Jenny Beavan — about why she wore what she wore when she won the Oscar for costume design. Beavan is 65 — same age as me — and the way she looked, she got mocked as a "bag lady" and as "a rude woman" who "plainly could not be bothered... self-absorbed and childish... puffed up by her own ego."

Back in 1987, she also won an Oscar. It was for "Room with a View" — which was a very un-Mad-Max-y movie. Here's how that looked... with Lauren Bacall announcing the thing (looking very 80s):



Beavan doesn't appear until 8:18 — there's a lot of 80s dancing in the process of listing the nominees — and she's wearing a sort of tuxedo. I wondered what was the best costume for the day.

"When I told my pal #LaurenBacall I had boyfriend troubles she said "Men, f**k 'em!" Give 'em hell in heaven Betty RIP."

When I told my pal #LaurenBacall I had boyfriend troubles she said "Men, f**k 'em!" Give 'em hell in heaven Betty RIP pic.twitter.com/UaY4X2dmzZ

— Marlee Matlin (@MarleeMatlin) August 13, 2014

Goodbye to Lauren Bacall.

A grand old actress has died. She was 89.

Watch her with Betty Grable and Marilyn Monroe in "How to Marry a Millionaire":



AND: Lauren's best lines:



"I'm hard to get, Steve. All you have to do is ask me."

Harper Seven.

What to name your 4th child, when your first 3 are Brooklyn, Romeo and Cruz.

The Seven in the name is believed to be a reference to David's football number when he played for Manchester United and England, while the Harper could be referring to Harper's Bazaar magazine or perhaps To Kill A Mockingbird author Harper Lee.

When I think Harper, I think "Paul Newman is 'Harper'" — a 1966 movie slogan. Here's 1 minute and 41 seconds of Paul Newman as Harper, confronting Lauren Bacall in a tiny festival of bad acting:



I remember seeing this movie at the time. I was 15. I remember having the realization that I wasn't as good at watching movies as the filmmakers expected you to be. I kept having that why is he going there now? struggle to keep up with the elliptical editing and thinking other people in the audience somehow knew. They got it. It was cool that Harper knew where to go next. You knew and he knew. But I didn't know. I blamed myself.