That film in general is quite wonderful on a number of levels, overlooked perhaps because it came in on that tsunami of great work released in 1939.

Throughout the classic era the ideals of being ladies and gentlemen were taken very seriously. Ladies and gentlemen did not show their emotions. A British film like SCOTT OF THE ANTARCTIC shows the positive side of this stoic ideal. Some of the actors you mentioned, such as Herbert Marshall, exemplified the gentleman. For some of our parents and grandparents, repression = middle class or higher, and the unchecked expression of emotion = lower class.

You know, when Bette stole Dennis Morgan away from Olivia in IN THIS OUR LIFE, you could see why, but if it’s George Brent, why bother? Though George actually seems more attractive and less wooden in THE RAINS CAME and THE GAY SISTERS, we do tend to remember Tyrone Power and Myrna Loy in THE RAINS CAME, which sort of proves your point.

My description of Dana Andrews, who I only think might be misinterpreted as wooden in a few of his lesser films, was largely facetious and meant to show that he really does not belong in any wooden league, but is a wonderful actor capable of showing a range of emotions using a minimum of histrionics on screen. I have always loved Herbert Marshall, and would be glad to defend his clipped delivery and wonderfully dry delivery of his lines in good movies and bad. As to the bio-pic Jeanne Eagels, I have seen it about five times since childhood and as adorable as Jeff Chandler is as the nice carny in that film, I don’t think it was a very good part for him but was only marginally better for Novak.

I used to think that Kim Novak was wooden, but then came to appreciate her style in Pushover, Middle of the Night and Strangers When We Meet. Given a role that engaged her, and some careful direction, she could be far better than she appeared in many of her films, (even Vertigo).

And you ought to see Jeff Chandler opposite Kim Novak in JEANNE EAGELS—Novak makes Chandler seem like Nicolas Cage when he’s chewing the scenery. She’s got to be the female equivalent of wooden, though I think she goes beyond wooden into somnambulism.

Take Jeff Chandler for example.

A recent biography of Sammy Davis Jr. tells how the entertainer lost an eye in a car accident and was treated at an out-of-the-way hospital. The first performer to come visit him was Chandler. There are photos of him in the hospital with Sammy. Tony Curtis and Frank Sinatra showed too. (Incidentally Chandler and Curtis made cameo appearances in MEET DANNY WILSON

How wonderful to compare it the “hams” (and there is more to write there I am sure.)

Thanks for the hard work. I enjoyed it.

I sometimes worry that no one will get my sometimes off-kilter humor in print, but I have had so much fun writing this one, it was criminal. I think that Dana Andrews and his perennial thousand yard stare were used to enormous effect in film, though he might easily be one of the boys in the wood pile. I have thought that his blanked out gaze, cynicism and exhaustion in movies such as Where the Sidewalk Ends and The Best Years of Our Lives might seem wooden, especially since he is one of the few actors who rarely raised his voice in films and spoke with the trace of a drawl. However, he can be enormously touching and subtle, especially in roles when he captures that ‘average joe’ air of men of his generation who, like Andrews in real life, endured considerable hardship in the Depression and its aftermath. Whenever Andrews tried to play conventional men living humdrum lives, I have definitely found him lacking credibility, but not when he was carefully cast in parts that allowed him to suggest the weight of carrying on, even when he knows he is in deep trouble, he can be seen at his considerable best.

I like your suggestion of adding on a wing for the Hams Hall of Fame. Maybe we should start to build that as an annex to the Wooden Actors Valhalla? Something tells me that the Hams are going to need a lot more room than those terribly well behaved Wooden guys.