Actor Lee Tracy What happened in Mexico 1933

What happened in Mexico
didn't stay in Mexico for Lee Tracy

Lee Tracy 1945
Betrayal From The East

"I heard a parade going by. I ran out on the balcony, waved and shouted, 'Viva La Parade.' I had on pajama pants. Some of the boys in the parade saw me waving my arms and shouting they hollered back at me to shut up. 

"I was feeling pretty high so I shouted as loud as I could, 'Why don't you go to hell.' But I was just helping them celebrate."

Lee Tracy had been a movie actor for several years by this point. He'd also been on Broadway. He was Hildy Johnson in The Front Page, the play that was transformed on screen as His Girl Friday. There Hildy Johnson became a woman, Rosalind Russell playing the role opposite Cary Grant and Ralph Bellamy.  

It was 1933. A time before stylists and spin doctors. The studio had warned him not to talk, Tracy said. 
 
"The insult offered by this actor to the Mexican Cadet Corps has embarrassed and shocked the Metro-Goldwyn-Mayer organization as deeply as it has the Mexican people," Mr. Mayer wired. 

"As a result of this actor's deplorable behavior, Metro-Goldwyn-Mayer has removed him not only from the film Viva Villa, but has dismissed him entirely from its employ and canceled his long term contract. Tracy's action in effect

The Front Page
1928 Play

voided his contract, it was said."
-- The Pittsburgh Press, November 23, 1933

Charles G. Clarke, the cinematographer on the picture, said that he was standing outside the hotel and doing some filming during the parade. People in the crowd were yelling for Tracy and Wallace Beery to come out and make an appearance.

"All of the paraders were not ardent fans, however, and some of them would make obscene gestures. The exact meaning may have been known only to themselves, but I gathered they were not complementary. Our boys, in innocence, may have laughingly returned a gesture or two, but if so, I did not witness it. 

"I thought it was nice of them to make an appearance and that they must have thrilled many of the country boys who could not return to their homes and boast to all their friends about how they had seen the famous actors in person. 

"In a short time our government liaison connections rushed down to the hotel and stated that Lee Tracy had to be gotten out of the country immediately. They said that the papers were coming out that afternoon with a story to the effect that Tracy had insulted the Mexican flag, Mexican motherhood and the nation in general. It would put the government in an embarrassing position and some action against Tracy would have to be taken.

"The Mexican papers raised such a scandal that our own press took it up. Lee Tracy became a martyr, and to satisfy public opinion he was removed from the picture. Much has been written about this affair, and there may have been other circumstances, but at least you have one eyewitness account of what really happened. *The most widely reported story is that Lee Tracy urinated on the people below."
-- Highlights and Shadows: The Memoirs of a Hollywood Cameraman



Lee Tracy appeared in Bombshell with Jean Harlow 

The earliest articles said Tracy was on the balcony in his pajamas gesturing,

Emporio Armani
Men's Cotton Pant

pretty much what the actor himself said. 

He'd also admitted from the start that he'd had too much to drink. He was hollering back and forth with people in the crowd. That behavior was bad, particularly as a guest in the country and a representative of the studio.

Some of the later articles changed things around. He became more and more naked and exposed in each article. His behavior was reported as being even more outrageous. Repeatedly he was called Godiva on a balcony.

"Tracy was accused of hurling insulting epithets from the balcony of his hotel at the passing parade. Not only that, but the actor is charged with playing the dickens with Mexican morals by appearing on said balcony with nothing between him and nudity but a carelessly draped blanket which revealed much of Mr. Tracy's physical magnificence."
-- The Sunday Morning Star, Wilmington Delaware

"At the Brown Derby in Hollywood. Irving Pichel, Isabel Jewell and the irrepressible Lee Tracy.
His Mexican adventure fitted in so perfectly with his screen character that he was promptly forgiven by his fans."
Silver Screen Feb. 1934

Director Howard Hawks had been in Mexico working on the movie earlier. He had already left Mexico at the time all this happened. Hawks however did say that Tracy urinated on people. Where the director got the story and why he repeated it isn't clear.

It seems there would have been some more immediate ramifications following such behavior that we also would have heard about.

There is at least a chance the 'urination' part of the story was manufactured entirely from thin air. That part of the story could have kept going to the point that it seemed to be fact due to repetition and word of mouth.
 
From a book about the director, a story he told:
"Hawks may have even inadvertently killed a man himself. At one location 'a fellow came out and shoved a gun at me and started to yell something. I just turned and hit him and he went over and hit his head on a railroad track. 

"I never heard whether he died or what happened. I said, 'What the hell was he yelling?' They told me that he said, This is for the revolution! Another man supposedly blew his brains out in front of everyone. Hawks's bemused comment on all this turmoil was simply, 'It was nutty.'"
 

"Actor clad only in blanket on balcony police say,
and then it slipped."
(Who came up with this?)

"US Ambassador to Mexico Josephus Daniels reported more fully to the State Department:

"'Tracy appeared on a balcony of the Hotel Regis unclad and using very profane and insulting language at  the moment when the military cadets marching in the parade of November 19th were passing in front of the hotel. He was immediately arrested and ... was released at 1:00 o'clock on the morning of November 20th and left the capital by plane at 6:00 a.m. that day. His arrival at El Paso Texas was reported in press dispatches from there the following day, November 21st.

"'From November 22nd to November 24th the Mexico City press gave considerable publicity to the Tracy incident as well as to the filming of the picture, Viva Villa! On November 23rd prominence was given to a telegram which Mr. Louis B. Mayer sent to President Rodríguez apologizing for the conduct of Lee Tracy and announcing his dismissal and the cancellation of his contract with the company. 

"'Prior to the arrest of Lee Tracy, considerable newspaper publicity had been given to alleged complaints against the filming of the picture Viva Villa!, which was said picture the former revolutionary leader of Mexico General Francisco Villa, in a manner defamatory to Mexico.'
[end of quote from the Ambassador to Mexico; ellipsis is part of quote]

"There was no mention of urination in the ambassador's summary, nor was there in a more detailed account prepared by the embassy's third secretary, John Aguirre. ... Hawks, who in his own memory of the events had left before any of this started, arrived at the US Embassy for a meeting at which he requested that the consulate general handle the case from here on, which was done."
-- Howard Hawks: The Grey Fox of Hollywood by Todd McCarthy

Viva Villa poster, Wallace Beery, Fay Wray

The only mention I've found of Tracy's urinating on people or anything else has been from those who weren't there, often written by people who weren't even born when it happened. Reading texts, books, newspaper accounts, they say he was intoxicated, dressed improperly, he spoke and gestured offensively. I saw nothing even hinting at his urinating, spitting, throwing anything, etc.

Cameraman Charles G. Clarke witnessed it, was filming and he says it did not happen. I can't find anything from Wallace Beery. 

The most offensive outrageous story will get the most traction whether it's 1933 or 2014, and faster online. The more outrageous they say his behavior was, the more justification for his being fired. It may have served someone politically, too. 

The most repeated information of Tracy's urinating on people is cited from the autobiography of Desi Arnaz. I haven't seen the book or the exact quote. I couldn't find what character Mr. Arnaz played in the film. If Arnaz was with them and/or witnessed the event, that's something right there. 

Some of the web sites, blogs and books who have mentioned it may have alternate information and sources. It isn't that easy to find.

The Hays Office reported having Tracy under a Gentleman's Ban, giving him time to cool his heels.

Eyewitnesses were interviewed in a 1934 magazine

Addition September 2014: George Rigas played Pancho Villa's father in Viva Villa. He stood below the window of Tracy's room, watching the procession with Charles Clark, the cameraman of the company. .... "I am not a personal friend of Mr. Tracy. I have talked to him only once or twice in my life," he says. " But I feel that a grave injustice has been done and I should like do see it righted. You see I saw it all. I was not in the room with him, but even better - I was standing under his window, watching the procession pass. ..."
This is an excerpt from the article.  Rigas says that a gesture Tracy made may have been misinterpreted by some in the crowd but if so it was a minority.

A newspaperman called the police and eyewitnesses admit that Tracy was argumentative with the officers who arrived. Another man, actor and director Irving Pichel, who was in the room with Lee Tracy was also interviewed.

Tracy takes out a full-page ad ...

In movie magazine Modern Screen he explains his side of the story, 1934

Excerpts:  
"To the readers of Modern Screen: I have no apology to make to anyone. In the first place, Mexico has forgotten my hilarious conduct while a guest in their country. Mexico is actually unable understand the unforgivably bad publicity meted out to me by uninformed members of the press. 

"Hollywood, however is not quite so charitable. Making mountains out of molehills, creating rumor stories out of thin air seems to be the favorite indoor sport of our best gossipers."

He goes on to make his official statement:
"I did nothing shameful or disgraceful while in Mexico. I was fully clothed. There was no balcony. I was in a hotel room seven stories above the ground, peering over an iron grating that reached to my chest. 

"Thanks to Modern Screen for their usual gesture of fairness in allowing me this opportunity of thus speaking my heart to their large body of readers. I hope I have assured my friends that my actions while in Mexico were the careless and natural actions of a hilarious young fellow who should have known better."

Questions: How different is this situation from something that might happen today? How would it be handled today? 

Do you think Lee Tracy's comments helped his cause? Mr. Tracy was in his mid-thirties when this happened, if that matters. 

Lee Tracy has a star on the Hollywood Walk of Fame at 1638 Vine Street. He received his star in February 1960 when many classic stars received theirs.

Lee Tracy in Fixer Dugan
He played a circus promoter in the 1939 movie

Spencer Tracy got his job in the 1934 film The Show Off because Lee Tracy, who'd been in The Show Off on Broadway in 1924 and was originally cast in the film, was no longer with the studio.

"Lee Tracy whose drinking was the stuff of legend in Hollywood, was accused of insulting a member of the Mexican Cadet Corps during a Revolution Day parade. .. Accounts differ as to exactly what he was supposed to have done. Later it was surmised that the growing strength of organized labor in Mexico had much to do with the resulting uproar over the incident."
-- Spencer Tracy: A Biography by James Curtis

The Film is Burned and Destroyed:

If all this weren't enough drama and confusion, there was an added situation also November 1933. 

An American Airways mail plane "exploded and caught fire 800 feet above El Paso." The pilot, who was able to bail out, was burned badly but was expected to recover. "Undeveloped film for the motion picture Viva Villa, taken in Mexico was destroyed. The film was valued at $60,000 to $100,000."

"Films of Viva Villa, the photoplay made in Mexico about which a storm has developed, were destroyed in a fire. The plane crashed near a residence section after the pilot bailed out.  [The pilot, who was] flying alone said his plane burst into flame from an undetermined cause. He was burned before he could escape."



"Howard Hawks, director of Viva Villa, said films burned were mostly of mob scenes and were valued at $60,000 to $100,000. He said they would need to be retaken."  About half of the mail was burned.
-- Quotes and information from The Spokane Daily Chronicle and California's Berkeley Daily Gazette, November 22, 1933

Jack Conway is given credit as being director of Viva Villa. Howard Hawks and William Wellman are the two most often said to have also done some directing without receiving onscreen credit. Wellman may have taken over for a short time while Conway was ill. Late 1933, early 1934 newspapers said that Hawks had quietly left the movie and MGM entirely moving over to a different studio. Jack Conway would finish the picture. 

Jack Conway also directed Libeled Lady with Myrna Loy, William Powell, Jean Harlow and Spencer Tracy in 1936. It's one of only two films that Harlow and Powell ever did together. Howard Hawks famously went on to some screwball comedies such as Bringing Up Baby with Cary Grant and Katharine Hepburn.

One good show deserves another

Apparently in December a theater group in Mexico City had quickly put together a show enacting scenes of the situations encountered by the actors and crew while filming Viva Villa. An act at one of the Mexico City Theaters was presenting a send-up of the movie troupe's escapades, the actors portraying the characterizations of Wallace Beery, Lee Tracy and even Howard Hawks. "This burlesque number shows Beery dissecting the beds and looking scornfully over his assigned room, refusing to stay there. ..." He refuses to stay in the finest hacienda in town.

There was a reenactment of "the famous Tracy balcony scene" and "throughout the play a man thrusts his head through a window and yells, 'It's Disartro!' Many other true incidents that took place while the troupe was there are also enacted much to the merriment of the audience. In fact the Metro invasion of Mexico City will not be forgotten by the natives there for years to come."
-- Pittsburgh Post-Gazette, December 19, 1933


Lee Tracy has been on the water wagon for 2 years still gets razzed

The actor said that the incident in Mexico had snapped him out of not only a life of alcohol abuse but caused him to give up drinking alcohol totally. "The trouble," Lee Tracy says, "is that every time anything happens in connection with me, and I mean anything everybody thinks that Lee Tracy is drunk again. ...
 
"Truth is Tracy hasn't had a drink in more than two years, or since his widely publicized escapade on a hotel balcony in Mexico City during a patriotic parade. That nearly ruined him as a movie actor, but he went on the wagon and eventually beat his way back to the top. He's starring now in See How They Run which will hit the RKO cameras in two weeks." 
-- Milwaukee Journal, September 1, 1939

Kohler Kitchen
Faucet Stainless

Books and Related Pages of Interest:

Highlights and Shadows: The Memoirs of a Hollywood Cameraman Charles G. Clarke


Spencer Tracy: A Biography by James Curtis

Boris Karloff wishes you a Happy Thanksgiving 1950, do you know your folk music?

Classic film actors jobs, clothes, tools of the trade Tour film stars' closets, more

A Book  Desi Arnaz Autobiography

TCM's Summer Under the Stars August 2014


10 Famous TV Dads Costumes and Trivia: Ricky Ricardo

Howard Hawks: The Grey Fox of Hollywood by Todd McCarthy
 

Classic film actors talk jobs, clothes, tools of the trade

Costuming Hollywood Movie Stars in the 1930s-1950s

Robert Montgomery
Magazine Photo orig

"The distinction that these stars of the past attained through the way they dressed reveals how much the film industry has changed today – and with it, how our notions of the icon has changed. 

"When Astaire, Cooper and Grant were making films, Hollywood had an increasing number of make-up artists, stylists and costume designers–but even with these amenities at hand, the leading stars often dressed themselves, sometimes with their own clothes. 

"This personal touch of an actor being responsible for his own wardrobe is a far cry from today, where an actor’s wardrobe is sourced for him (frequently to endorse a particular couturier or brand)." 
-- Hollywood Costume by Deborah Nadoolman Landis

The costume designer who worked mainly or exclusively on women's fashion tended to receive credit on screen for an entire film. Several others did work in wardrobe and accessories. A different designer might oversee gowns, another jewelry and accessories. If a contemporary film, men's wardrobe was purchased or designed by the men's wardrobe department when need be.

When making purchase decisions, actors may have bought multiples, in the case that something had to be cleaned or something was damaged in the course of filming. I read a few times that they anticipated color film so they kept that in mind early on while still thinking how it would look in black and white.

Good to note that clothes for either gender to be intentionally damaged during production are studio property. As an example, Warner Brothers picked up the tab for "the former clothes" worn by Dick Powell and Rosemary Lane when they splash about in the lily pond in a scene in Hollywood Hotel. The 1937 film included Busby Berkeley's Hooray for Hollywood.

Tyrone Power, Dick Powell, Charles Laughton ...

Makes you wonder. How about the clothes William Powell wore in the beginning of My Man Godfrey, when he lived in the dumps. Or the suit Cary Grant wore in the shower in Charade. With little chance of being reused by the actors, were these 'on the studio,' as they say? 

Hard to believe that the clothes we saw old actors wearing in many of the classic movies were actually suits or tuxedos, shirts, coats, etc that the actors themselves had bought and paid for.

James Stewart needs a Tailored Bathrobe ASAP

Sometimes even when filming a 'modern' movie, what seemed like the simplest thing will need to be specially made to fit the director's vision and maybe the proportions of the actor. Quite a bit has been written about the recurring Greek motif and goddess references, including the specially designed robe made by Adrian for Katharine Hepburn in The Philadelphia Story. 

Cary Grant, a costar of this film is one of the few male actors whose clothes have been analyzed with gusto. Between Grant's looks, his knowledge of dressing a character, his taste and interest in clothes he is a role model not just for actors but for men in general. Sometimes it's a character who's been played by different actors, like James Bond, who piques the public's interest.




In The Philadelphia Story, there was an unexpected poolside glitch. Neither Mr. Stewart nor anyone else had foreseen it when choosing clothes for his character.

"[James] Stewart had to have a robe for a swimming scene with Miss Hepburn. Nothing was thought about it until the day before the sequence was to be filmed, when director George Cukor requested several bathrobes to be tried on Stewart. None owned by the studio would do. They all hit the six-foot four-inch Stewart around the knees.



"The wardrobe department hastily canvassed all the stores in Hollywood and the surrounding vicinity, but there wasn't a bathrobe in Southern California to cover the actor's lanky figure. Plenty could be found to fit six-footers, but not Stewart. 

"It was finally necessary to make one and three studio tailors labored all night on the job. The moment the scene was completed the wardrobe department had a man on hand to take the robe back and carefully put it away just in case Stewart ever was to wear a bathrobe on the screen again." 
-- The Montreal Gazette, February 18, 1941

I can't say for sure, but my guess is that particularly if Stewart became the owner of that robe, it was well-used in later pictures when he worked with studios other than MGM. 



In early 2014, The Museum at FIT had a show about fashion in the 1930s. Their video, "Elegance in an Age of Crisis" talks about the way men dressed, the importance of the suit both for the men in families and the men in society, 1930s style and beyond.

Cary Grant occasionally wore things
that probably weren't hanging in his closet
Knight in shining armor; Bachelor and the Bobby Soxer

Suits made by a tailor on Savile Row

Charlie Chaplin, Cary Grant, Fred Astaire and Bing Crosby were among the classic film stars who had shoes made at Henry Maxwell Shoe Makers on Savile Row in London. Once he was able to do so, Grant had his clothes custom tailored in London such as Kilgour or Norton and Sons also on Savile Row.

Some of the Savile Row shops use the names and even images of the old Hollywood stars on their web sites to this day.  A few years ago, Burberry used a photo of Humphrey Bogart wearing his famous trench coat in some of its advertising. They hadn't gotten approval from Mr. Bogart's estate and there were legal ramifications. 

Looking online for information about Cary Grant in Hitchcock films, there are slightly different versions of pretty much the same story. Add books and interviews and the end result was that Grant provided his own clothes most of the time. Not surprising. In a film like North by Northwest, several versions of the famous grey suit were manufactured. There were also several copies of the tie, etc.



In the 1980s Cary Grant gave a series of talks across the country, conversations with audiences where he answered questions with fans. This is an audio recording where he talks about working with Hitchcock and specifically discusses the suit he wore in North by Northwest.

Actors had to know their audiences, the characters they were playing. Cary Grant knew what he wore impacted the character, the picture and his fan base. Grant not only wore the clothes, he spent time figuring out timing, just how he would adjust his tie for the best comic effect. How would he put on or take off a jacket. Was the scene seductive, suspenseful, silly? 

The actor inhabiting the suit understands the importance of a cuff being precise down to the eighth of an inch. The placement of an object on a table means the choreography and performance of the scene will work well. This can include the choreography involved with dressing, undressing and adjusting what you're wearing.

Back in the 1930s, when Peter Lorre complained on the set of The Man Who Knew Too Much, that a suit had been ruined, Hitchcock, a lover of practical jokes, had another one sent to him, beautifully tailored in the same material but cut to infant size.

Adolphe Menjou wore 16 suits in The Goldwyn Follies. But that did not represent his entire wardrobe. For special accessories, including top coats, shirts and ties, all designed with the garish demands of the color camera in mind. Menjou's bill ran well over $5,000. And most of it was a total loss because the suits and accessories were so glaring he wouldn't dare ware them, except to a masquerade.



In 1947, Robert Montgomery starred in and directed the film noir Lady in the Lake.  the  film is shot from the viewpoint of the central character, Marlowe. You hear him, but he's rarely seen. Still he's dressed as the character. 

"Robert Montgomery, in Wooden Wedding now in production is wearing six new business suits, two  sport outfits a full dress and a dinner suit. His tailor bill for that film will stand him more than 2,000. And Wooden Wedding didn't spot Montgomery into an especially well-dressed part. For many of his society playboy roles he spends even more. 

Ann Blyth "Killer" Robert Montgomery
Once More My Darling b&w 8x10 1949

"When a scenario demands the male lead wear half a dozen or more snappy outfits it is reasonable to  assume the studio should pay the costs, said Montgomery. It is true the actor retains title to his clothes and possibly can wear some of them in future pictures. And on top of that there's a huge pile of tricky outfits we'd never think of wearing outside the backyard. It's all pretty much of a loss." Wooden Wedding became The First Hundred Years (1938) 

Clark Gable Boom Town Photo with Spencer Tracy

Where oh where has his undershirt gone?

Bob Cummings couldn't have been the only one his undershirts and shorts tailor made to wear in movies. Other actors' underclothes, or lack of them, have been making news from the beginning.

What men wore in films, particularly those set in the present day, just didn't get anything close to the attention the women's clothes got unless the film was a period piece. Maybe if the movie took place in space or some other unusual locale. Sometimes the actor got to don an interesting sweater or leather jacket. 

Once in a while a t-shirt or lack of one made a huge statement. It's what Clark Gable didn't wear in It Happened One Night in 1934, his appearing on screen without an undershirt that they say caused a significant drop in the sale of undershirts. In a later film his character would appear wearing an undershirt. Marlon Brando would again cause a rise in sales when he wore a T-Shirt type undershirt in A Streetcar Named Desire in 1951. Brando, too had a very popular leather jacket in The Wild One, 1953. Did he have to buy these for himself?

These stories may be somewhat apocryphal. They have been well repeated. I haven't seen any sales figures from these years and don't know if we can attribute sales directly to what we saw in the movies, let alone to one movie. But sales and fashion trends do seem to have been happening around the times of these films.

Marlon Brando talked about how he was perceived partly based on what he wore. "The closer you come to the successful portrayal of a character, the more people mythologize about you in that role. Perception is everything. I didn't wear jeans as a badge of anything, they were just comfortable. 

"But because I wore blue jeans and a T-shirt in Streetcar and rode a motorcycle in The Wild One, I was considered a rebel. It's true that I always hated conforming because it breeds mediocrity, but the real source of my reputation as a rebel was my refusal to follow some of the normal Hollywood rules."
-- Brando: Songs My Mother Taught Me by Marlon Brando

Brando talks about how he didn't like to give interviews. In the years before

Marlon Brando Vivien Leigh
8x10 glossy Photo

actors such as Cary Grant were the same way. Interviews with him would sometimes consist of his asking things like, "Why are people so interested in actors' private lives?" Can you have a rebel in a tuxedo?

In Marlon Brando by Patricia Bosworth there is a story of choosing and styling the T-shirt and jeans Brando would wear in A Streetcar Named Desire. Costume designer Lucinda Ballard took him for a fitting at Eaves Costume Company for role as Stanley Kowalski. The story also appears in Brando: the Biography by Peter Manso.

"She dyed a couple of T-shirts red and washed them over and over again until they shrunk Then she tore the right shoulder to suggest that Stella might have scratched Stanley. 

"She had the tailor cut and taper the jeans to fit the countours of Brando's body like a second skin; they were tight as a glove, and Brando didn't wear any underpants when they were fitted.  When he saw his reflection in the mirror, he saw how the jeans outlined every muscle in his thighs. 

"He 'almost went crazy' Ballard told Peter Manso. 'He wa dancing between the gold cases leaping off the ground.' Brando said, 'This is it! This is what I've always wanted!'"
-- Marlon Brando



Style from Robin and the 7 Hoods
Frank Sinatra, Dean Martin, Sammy Davis, Jr. and Bing Crosby 1964

Let's visit (and inventory) the clothes in a couple of actors' closets. Follow me and bring your calculators ...

Robert Cummings appeared in two Alfred Hitchcock films Saboteur (1942) and Dial M for Murder (1954) alongside Grace Kelly. His character's clothes won't ever get any notice there! His other movies include Three Smart Girls Grow Up (1939) with Deanna Durbin, The Devil and Miss Jones (1941) with Jean Arthur, and The Bride Wore Boots (1946) with Barbara Stanwyck and Moon Over Miami (1941). 1955 through 1959 he starred on TV in  The Bob Cummings Show. Mr. Cummings is letting us peek into his closet first, he could use a custom closet organizer. The year is 1950.

"Tools of the trade is what Bob Cummings and other male stars call their expensive duds. Bob reckons he has invested $30,000 or more in his wardrobe, part of which he keeps in a room at home and part in a storage company warehouse.

"In his early screen days Bob would try to get by with a comparatively cheap suit though it was the best he could afford. During shooting it would become shapeless and ruined, he said, and 'just didn't pay.' Now he pays $200 to $250 per tailored suit. He owns 60 virtually all bought for screen roles. 

"He estimated other items: 15 sport coats at about $190 each; slacks about 30 pairs ($40-$60); shoes, 15 pairs ($15-$30); hats ($20), including gray, brown, panama, opera and character toppers. His 100 assorted white shirts ($20 each) are dyed faintly grayish, like all movie leading men's, to prevent glare into the camera. His 100 ties must knot as neatly at the end of two months' shooting as they did at the start. He orders them in pairs. If one is lost or damaged, shooting isn't interrupted.

"He has about six full dress suits ($500 each), 10 full dress shirts ($30), 10 overcoats ($150-$300), and 10 pairs of gloves (gray, black, white, pigskin at $7.50-$10). Cummings may take 40 suits to a studio when outfitting himself for a role. If the girl wears light clothes in a particular scene, he probably wears dark for contrast.

"A suit may be cleaned and pressed 20 times on a picture. A studio tailor makes a replica of the leading man's suit of a cheaper material, for him to wear when thrown into the mud or tattered in a fight. Four or five duplicates may be damaged in action sequences. Are Bob's clothes luxuries? 'In this business,' he says, 'they're a necessity.'" 

Maybe this would have been a good time for a actor to start his own clothing design line? Maybe do some modeling? Something to make a little extra money.

This wasn't just limited to the gentlemen who were known for wearing suits and tuxedos, the ones sometimes called the glamor boys of Hollywood. John Wayne's had to buy at least some of his own clothes. If in the contract any performer may have to supply his own clothing, a featured performer, an extra.

1930s Fans chimed in, sort of...

Too much nudism. "Have you noticed the insane mania of late to show men as well as women in bathroom scenes displaying every part of the anatomy they can get away with? .... He now seems to conduct most of his work showing his naked body or consuming enormous quantities of liquor -- much of the picture was taken of him in the bath, scrubbing and soaping his hulk. He is so darned conceited. ... Now he simply seems to want to display his manly form." This is the gist of a 1936 Modern Screen Magazine received a letter from, if you're interested, a male film fan.

What star do you think they're talking about, flaunting his manly nakedness and liquor drinking? Why it's William Powell in one of The Thin Man films. (In the movie magazines of the 1930s-1950s I've looked through only about about a third of the fan letters had anything negative to say about the stars or the films. And this topic is sort of the antithesis of costume.) 

The Public and Private sides of William Powell 

Promo shot for Reckless
Powell with Jean Harlow

So of course, we're on to the home of William Powell. We've gone back in time. The year is 1935. Maybe Jean Harlow will be visiting? Unlike the suave detective characters he plays on screen in real life, if Powell loses his shirt studs, he says rather than look for them it's easier to buy another set. Bill's valet's biggest job is to keep him dressed up to the public's demand. ... 

He had to have a special closet built off his bedroom for all of his suits. This wardrobe is not his personal private clothes closet. It's his stock in trade, the tools of his profession, it's the stuff he has to wear on the screen to keep his spot.   

Full dress suits 5; dinner jackets (tux to you) 6; street clothes, business suits and so on - 44; overcoats 14 (and one all white one he has never worn); gloves 39 pairs; sports trousers 25 but not one pair of knickers or plus fours, he hates 'em); hats 54 (including toppers and the opera-hat things you can pop); neckties 167; turtleneck sweaters a la Gable 6, sox [sic] 175 pairs shirts 63 and one white beret. What did his personal clothes closet contain?

In 1936, Clark Gable was number one when newspapers polled chorus girls asking who they thought was the Best Dressed Men in Pictures. Number two was William Powell. In 1937, Hollywood outfitters released a list of the Best Dressed Movie Star. Gable and Powell tied for first place. Gable for sports clothes, Powell for business suits. 

William Powell was known to be somewhat fastidious about his clothing when working. In the privacy of his home, he was said to be more interested in comfort. Beyond that, he had the reputation for wearing little to nothing at all when possible. "He doesn't care for clothes and doesn't know much about fashions. He prefers not to wear clothes. At home he generally walks around completely naked, except when it is necessary to wear a dressing gown."
-- Pittsburgh Press, October 30, 1936

"This best-dressed man reputation he's got, that gives Bill a laugh, too. Because the fact that there isn't a sloppier dresser in all Hollywood than Bill Powell, when he can do it."

At home, in the privacy of his house and with his intimate friends about, Bill loves to wander about with a somewhat neglected stubble of whisker, his hair tousled, his legs encased in in an ancient and streaked pair of unpressed slacks or old pants, a well-seasoned sweatshirt or polo shirt on and a pair of comfortably aged slippers on his feet. Or if the weather's warm, give him a breech-clout* and a drink on the patio and he's contented. 

Your own
breech-clout

*I'd read in a couple places how Mr. Powell enjoyed walking around his home au naturel. After consulting different sources for the definition of breech-clout the best I can come up with is that today or in 1935 it is something of a loincloth. Comanche warriors normally went about in only a breech clout and moccasins. Movie stars, too?

How to make your own breech-clout:

"The width of the Breech Clout is determined by the size of your hands. Place hands, palm down, thumbs bent out in almost a right angle, thumb tips touching. Width of the cloth is distance between the outside edges of hands." You might like to decorate yours with paint or beads. You might recall seeing Rudolph Valentino wearing one of these in a movie poster??

"For general use, most Indians wore breech clout and moccasins solely. But for ceremonies and special occasions they got into more elaborate fineries."
-- Rough idea and image example from 1941 Boys' Life

In some cases, it would work a little differently. Again, it all depended on how you drew up your contract. Here's how Lew Ayres acquired some of his suits. Aside from starring in the series of Dr. Kildare movies alongside Lionel Barrymore, Ayres was in All Quiet on the Western Front, Holiday with Cary Grant and Katharine Hepburn, He was nominated for an Academy Award for his work in Johnny Belinda. Co-star Jane Wyman won in 1948.

"Lew, whose taste tended towards elegance, had a noticeably large and full closet of tailored suits. He had accumulated them through the years by purchasing them from the studios for half the cost after making his films. While at Universal, he paid $200 for a suit and at Warners he purchased each $600 suit for $300 after wearing them during filming."
-- Lew Ayres: Hollywood's Conscientious Objector

Boom Town Costume & Spencer Tracy's Big Idea

Boom Town Lobby Card

 
Wardrobe, contractually the responsibility of the actor on a modern-dress picture, became a matter of swapping out clothes with genuine laborers. 

When making Boom Town, "Larry Keethe, our wardrobe man, thought I was crazy when we bought a bunch of new work clothes and went down to a building project around here, looking for a couple of workmen who were about my size. 

"We traded the new outfits for those a couple of guys were wearing. They thought I was crazy, too. But you can't look like a worker in the oil fields walking into a picture in brand-new dungarees. They must be baggy and faded from sweat and dirt and many washings."  
-- Spencer Tracy: A Biography

There were many famous Robert Mitchum movies including Night of the Hunter, The Sundowners and Cape Fear. He was nominated for an Oscar for his work in The Story of G.I. Joe. He was in Scrooged with Bill Murray in 1988. In his autobiography, Mitchum said, "I kept the same suit for six years - and the same dialog. We just changed the title of the picture and the leading lady.  ....

"RKO made the same film with me for ten years. They were so alike I wore the same suit in six of them and the same Burberry trench coat. They made a male Jane Russell out of me. I was the staff hero." 

Glamor Boy, Errol Flynn

In the 1930s and 40s, there were sometimes gender inequities in dressing rooms. It could, and still may to this day, work either way. In Errol Flynn's case, while working on location on the movie, working on location shooting Objective Burma, he saw female stars such as Bette Davis receive trucks to dress in. 

On the other hand Flynn was given what amounted to a tent. It had holes in the canvas walls and a dirt floor. Locals would drop by and peer through the holes, watching as he changed clothes. 

One day in 1944, he returned to the tent to find his clothes and other belongings had been stolen. He wrote a scathing letter to Warner Brothers. "Some things happen to actors that shouldn't happen to a dog." 

Errol Flynn 1940

A collection of the most popular and best dressed actors particularly those such as Flynn and Adolphe Menjou were called glamor boys. A mid-1938 edition of Life Magazine had the actor on the cover with the simple caption, Errol Flynn, Glamor Boy.

Such a suave and charming epithet can work against you. In early 1943 when Flynn was on trial for statutory rape, there was worry that some female jury members would be lenient.  

The prosecutor calling him 'the great glamor boy' in final argument to jury in day-long plea, asked that Mr. Flynn be sent to prison. He asked that same punishment that would be accorded an ordinary citizen. Deputy District Attorney Thomas Cochran had referred to him earlier as "the glamor man of all glamor men."

Women didn't always wear beautiful clothes created by studio costume designers. It all depended on the situation and the film. More clothes than just those worn making the film were needed for actors, there would be time spent promoting the movie.

Dressing an actress from "the basement store"

Providing your own clothing and wearing clothes other than the top of the line designer outfits wasn't something that happened exclusively to men. Alfred Hitchcock's The Wrong Man was a true life story. The director wanted realism, the main characters to dress like the real people dressed. When making the docudrama The Wrong Man with Henry Fonda and Vera Miles in 1956 Alfred Hitchcock dressed even his leading lady in attire purchased in stores where the woman Miles was playing would have shopped.  

The real woman had done her fashion shopping in a local basement store so they didn't need Edith Head,' he'd said. They'd just buy the actors' clothes there. "So Miss Miles didn't feel too deprived, we had Edith create a wardrobe for her to use on her promotional tour." 

Joan Crawford's Studio Wardrobe

When a magazine toured Joan Crawford's closets in 1935, it is ambiguous. Does she, too have some clothes she's bought only to wear on screen. Could well be. I know that she, like some other actresses had some outfits worn in films remade by designers for her personal use.

"She keeps not only one but four closets opening off the large white mirrored dressing room of her Westwood home. One contains studio wardrobe, another street things, number three holds all the evening frocks and number four, her pajamas and negligees. Then there are her shoe cabinets. .... Her hats are sorted by color and then by shade."

** This is part of a short series. When other parts are posted links will be provided here.

Sources and Resources:

Many of the books have hardcover, paperback and Digital/eReader/Kindle versions available. Sometimes digital versions don't include photos, etc.  Editions can be slightly different, too.

Evenings With Cary Grant: Recollections in His Own Words and by Those Who Knew Him Best by Nancy Nelson 

Spencer Tracy: A Biography  by James Curtis 

Brando: Songs My Mother Taught Me   by Marlon Brando and Robert Lindsey

Lew Ayres: Hollywood's Conscientious Objector by Lesley L. Coffin

Marlon Brando by Patricia Bosworth

Brando: the Biography by Peter Manso

Comanches The History of a People by T.R. Fehrenbach 

Hitchcock On the Half Shell: Time Magazine, May 9, 1983

Motion Picture Magazine November 1936

Silver Screen June 1935

The Victoria and Albert Museum in London will host an exhibition, Hollywood Costume, October 2, 2014, through March 2, 2015. The exhibition is curated by Deborah Nadoolman Landis. It is presented by The Academy of Motion Picture Arts and Sciences and sponsored by Swarovski.

Related Pages of Interest:

Dressing Male Stars in Old Hollywood; Provide Your Own Clothes Hollywood male film stars rebel against high wardrobe costs, The Internal Revenue Service, Tricky Tax Deductions in the 1930s ...

Dressing Gable, Rathbone, Robert Montgomery, Marlene Dietrich
It's 1930, Sherlock Holmes, Cary Grant's Stand-In talks about his duties

The Philadelphia Story, Features of Romantic Comedy

Blue Food Dinner Parties, The Practical Joke so nice Alfred Hitchcock played it twice

Hey Stella! Streetcar Named Desire, Barbara Stanwyck Stella Dallas, Kay Francis

Errol Flynn 1942 Birthday party ends in a brawl

Famous TV Dads, Movie character costumes

Men in the Bath: Have a personal film festival at your place, choose your own theme  

Sources listed may be used for any of the posts in the series. Major updates and corrections if necessary will be noted with a date.

Dressing Male Stars in Old Hollywood BYOC Bring Your Own Clothes

1930's & 40's Men's Fashions in Movies:

Hollywood male film stars rebelled against high wardrobe costs

Dial M for Murder
Robert Cummings and Grace Kelly;
Maybe they looked at her dress
but he wanted to look great, too.

"Next time you see Robert Cummings on screen in his underwear, it might be interesting to reflect that his tailor-made shorts and undershirt cost him $15." Not only has he paid to have his suits made but if he'll be wearing it onscreen, his underwear, pajamas and specially made ties."
-- Daytona Beach Morning Journal, May 16, 1950

The 1930s, 1940s are remembered as the Golden Age of Hollywood. There were great costume designers such as Edith Head, Adrian, Orry Kelly and Jean Louis. 

They worked with directors and producers, creating garments that would help to bring characters to life. Their looks helped to define the characters and virtually give life to the films. Some designers even created looks which became inseparable with a handful of our greatest stars.

What was the difference in how wardrobe for men and women was handled? The claim was that like so much in the theatrical arts it was tradition that women's clothes were created and provided by the producers of the show. If they weren't destroyed during the production, gowns may be offered to the actress at the end of the course of filming, often for a fee. 

Charles Boyer
Vintage 8x10 photo

The studios usually had men's costumes in stock for period pictures or costume dramas. Something special could be created if needed. A costume designer specializing in men's clothes, sometimes a team of designers may work on a movie. 

Usually it was the person in charge of women's costume who got credit onscreen. That person may be involved to a small or large degree with what the men wore in the movies. The director and/or producer may have a lot or a little to say about the costumes, from the style, the color to the material, the cost. 

Alfred Hitchcock, for instance was known to have definite opinions on how characters appeared. Did he decide on the colors of the suits that the men in his films wore, when they would be similar, when they wouldn't? More on Hitchcock in the next installment.

In a Cecil B. DeMille extravaganza, the costume designer may need to dress an animal such as a horse or even an elephant. In westerns, the way a horse looked was important.
Where do the men's costumes come from?

In 1938, newspapers ran this headline: "Hollywood male film stars rebel against high wardrobe costs. Actors assert

Ronald Colman
Under Two Flags 8x10" Photo

movie studios should pay clothing expenses. Mostly through stage tradition film companies furnish feminine wearables." The Screen Actors Guild was threatening action to have this practice changed. 

"Under the present operating mode more through stage tradition than anything else feminine performers are supplied free of charge with whatever wardrobe they're called on to wear in their parts. But the mere male actor, well he gets stuck for his share. And many times it's a real knifing."

"Tools of the trade is what Bob Cummings and other male stars call their expensive duds. Bob reckons he has invested $30,000 or more in his wardrobe, part of which he keeps in a room at home and part in a storage company warehouse."
-- The North American Newspaper Alliance (NANA), February 23, 1938 

When we think about old glamour, are we just thinking about the ladies?

Brian Aherne 8x10"
He asks, Dressing gowns, too??
Yup. Pretty much anything you wear on screen young man.

For a contemporary film, one that took place in the present, often in the 1930s-1950s in particular, men's clothes would be bought from stores. Some actors, Hollywood stars like William Powell and Robert Cummings wore clothes of their own. An actor may suggest clothes that he had or he may buy for a character. He could bring in some clothes and try them on camera. 

In cases like this an actor was expected to provide everything that his character might wear on screen, suits, shirts, coats, gloves, hats, scarves, pocket squares, pajamas, underwear and so on. The actors probably rarely wore these clothes in their private lives, since keeping them in the best shape possible was to their advantage.

The contract may also specify, for men and women, clothes that they would wear during photo shoots and tours to promote the movies. Clothes may be purchased or made just for those purposes alone.

The producer would give them a stipend, a bonus for buying clothes or using the clothes that they had. Wear and tear on their clothes was taken into consideration. If something special was needed the costume designer would create something. Then again, since it was probably tailored, it may well be available to the actor at the end of the movie.

There's a famous story about an actor who could track his old blue (?) suit through all of his early movies until he made the money to buy better clothes.

Depending on studio, director, actor, his contract, the film and the situation things varied. They may provide an entire wardrobe or a piece of it, making it in-house or purchasing it or providing it some other way. 

In Casablanca Humphrey Bogart wore a trench coat and fedora styled in a way that would become his trademark. If these items were provided for him, if he owned them previously or after the film I can't say. As with many things, I've seen auctions claiming to be selling his original Casablanca trench coat.

Charles Laughton Elsa Lanchester
Original 8x10" Photo

Actors Charles Laughton and Elsa Lanchester.
Married 1929 until Laughton's death in 1962, they appeared in five movies together, including Witness for the Prosecution 1957.

 
The Internal Revenue Service, Tricky Tax Deductions in the 1930s:

In 1938, the newspapers ran a story that had been brewing for a few years. The IRS was going to hold a group of hearings about tax deficiency cases of Hollywood actors.

"The Board of Tax Appeals today ordered hearings on alleged tax deficiency cases involving 15 members of Hollywood's movie colony." Included were Marlene Dietrich, Charles Laughton, Madge Evans, Adolph Menjou and the late John Gilbert.  One of the major issues to be settled was the amount actors could deduct from income tax returns for business entertainment, auto expenses, wardrobe expenses, cleaning and pressing of their clothes. "The largest claim is against Mr. Laughton assessed a deficiency of $104,430 on his 1934 tax."
-- The Pittsburgh Press, April 10, 1938

Until proven necessary business expenses, some deductions were dis-allowed. Mr. Laughton had certain issues with his taxes that were specific to him, but the IRS was still learning about special deductions for actors' clothing and the maintenance of that clothing. 

For Laughton and probably other actors, the IRS questioned deductions made for music, his automobile, gratuities to stage hands, books and periodicals, telephone and telegraph, advertising and publicity. Were these things for personal use, what percentage was for business? 

In his response and as part of the subsequent hearing, Laughton provided segments of his contract, including those stating that an actor (male) had to supply his own clothing for at least some of his roles. 

This would have been in the actor's contract. Did you receive a bonus for buying or providing your own clothing. How about wear and tear on your clothes, shoes, etc. 



1945 Custom shoes made in London for the Famous: Film Stars, Royalty, men and women 

These days I hear film and television actors' contracts are quite different and it would be unusual to supply everyday clothes for a part.

A 2013 Nolo list of possible deductions for actors Wardrobe section says, "If you buy your own wardrobe, you may deduct the cost only if it is not suitable for street wear. For example, you can't deduct the cost of a modern business suit, but you could deduct an ape costume."

"The 1935 California legislature enacted a personal net income tax based on a

Bing Crosby 8x10" Photo

graduated scale of net income. Primarily this law affected net incomes in excess of $5000 a year and its rates became progressively higher on net incomes above $10,000 annually. 

"The personal net income tax income incurred the immediate opposition of the conservative newspapers, wealthy persons of substantial net incomes and particularly moving-picture producers whose incomes are reputedly large. 

"Searching for some tax plan that would relieve them from the personal net income tax, such persons have become active in support of the gross income tax plan." 
-- Our California State Taxes: Facts and Problems

The Motion Picture Producers Association of California Incorporated began a drive against the tax plan.

A 1935 Milwaukee Journal article reported that among those who it is estimated would have to pay 70 to 90 per cent of their incomes in combined state and federal taxes are Mary Pickford, Wallace Beery, Louis B. Mayer, Bing Crosby, Samuel Goldwyn, Irving Thalberg, Norma Shearer, Myron Selznick and Ernst Lubitsch. "An odd feature of the tax scare is that a great many of the highest paid actors are reported refusing work in order to hold their incomes below a certain surtax point." 

Film industry folks complained that they were giving away so much of their income to taxes. Actors noted that their popularity is very fleeting, they'll make the high income over just a matter of a few years. Their ability to put away money for retirement was threatened. Some companies and stars were threatening to leave California and establish residency in other states to avoid taxes.

"In any instance the studio does not furnish shoes. Shoes are they property of the star or featured player. In many cases she has them made to match the picture gown or more often she has accumulated such a number that cases are rare where a pair of shoes to meet the requirements cannot be found in her personal wardrobe. But everything else draping the feminine form including underthings as well as stocking are studio liabilities."
-- NANA, February 23, 1938  

Clark Gable Photo clipping

Check your contract, Fellas....

"The Artist shall provide at his own expense such modern wardrobe and wearing apparel as may be necessary for any and all roles to be portrayed by the Artist hereunder, it being agreed however that should so called character or period costumes be required the Producer shall supply the same. 

"The costumes, apparel and other articles furnished or paid for by the Producer pursuant to the terms of this agreement or otherwise shall be and remain the property of the Producer and shall be returned promptly to it."

The snippet of contractual language above was sent to the IRS to justify the deduction. Some of it is also quoted in the book, Long Live the King: a Biography of Clark Gable.

Even in those days, there were articles showing how the clothes worn by screen stars influenced how men dressed. Gentlemen's Quarterly was launched in 1931 and men's magazine Esquire was founded in 1932, first published in 1933. Actors would begin to appear on the covers and inside of such publications as well as in film magazines and newspapers.

In the mid-1930s Robert Taylor worked at Universal Studios and then at MGM.  After making Magnificent Obsession in 1935, apparently he didn't return some of what he wore in the film promptly enough.  

Magnificent Obsession
Robert Taylor (in a made-to-order suit) and Irene Dunne

"Universal was withholding a check for $2,000 until Taylor returned the six made-to-order suits, dress coat, slacks and tuxedo coat and vest he’d worn." 

When Taylor moved to MGM the next year, Louis B. Mayer gave him bonuses of $3000 and then $1500. "He advised Taylor about clothes. 'Maybe you can't act very well, Bob,' he said, 'but at least you can dress decently,' and sent the young man to his own tailor to get his first custom-made suit, his first dinner jacket and his first white suit and tails." 
-- A Life of Barbara Stanwyck: Steel-True 1907-1940, Victoria Wilson 

This is part of a short series. When other parts are posted links will be provided here.

Hitchcock's cameo appearance
with Cary Grant on the bus in To Catch a Thief

Coming up:

* What did some of the stars have in these closets ready to go? The clothes they owned might even help them land a picture deal. How about an inventory? 

* An instance where the studio suddenly had to create an item of clothing for an actor. He couldn't produce the item needed and it could not be found in local stores!

* A little about Cary Grant and the clothes he wore in some his legendary Hitchcock films

* How did Spencer Tracy brilliantly handle costume in a couple of his movies?

* What had Errol Flynn so upset??

* How did Robert Mitchum handle the 'bring your own clothes' situation?

* As you might expect, some of the snappiest dressers of the Golden Age, Robert Montgomery, Clark Gable, William Powell, James Stewart, Peter Lorre and more.


Sources and Resources:


Dressed: A Century of Hollywood Costume Design by Deborah Nadoolman Landis 

Edith Head: The Fifty-Year Career of Hollywood's Greatest Costume Designer by Jay Jorgensen

Long Live the King: a Biography of Clark Gable by Lyn Tornabene

Mitchum: In His Own Words edited by Jerry Roberts

It's Only a Movie: Alfred Hitchcock A Personal Biography by Charlotte Chandler

Day of the Peacock: Style for Men 1963-1973 by Geoffrey Aquilana Ross

Errol Flynn: The Life and Career by Thomas McNulty

Hollywood Costume by Deborah Nadoolman Landis

A Life of Barbara Stanwyck: Steel-True 1907-1940 by Victoria Wilson Mayer 

George Hurrell's Hollywood: Glamour Portraits 1925-1992 by Mark A. Vieira Includes Carole Lombard, Mary Pickford, Jean Harlow and Veronica Lake. Also includes John Garfield, Humphrey Bogart, Lon Chaney and Tyrone Power.

Spencer Tracy: A Biography by James Curtis 

Dangerous Men: Pre-Code Hollywood and the Birth of the Modern Man by Mick LaSalle

The North American Newspaper Alliance, February 23, 1938
 
The Daytona Beach Morning Journal, May 16, 1950

Our California State Taxes: Facts and Problems by Hobson Dewey Anderson

Hollywood Costume: Edith Head and Alfred Hitchcock: Legendary costume designer Edith Head and her collaboration with Alfred Hitchcock. A talk by Deborah Nadoolman Landis at V&A's 'Hollywood Costume' exhibition; via YouTube

Portions of State/Federal Income Tax Returns of Charles Laughton years 1934, 1935 United States Circuit Court of Appeals Transcript, Office of the Internal Revenue. Digitized into Public Domain 2010.

Francis X Bushman shirt advertisement Greeting Card by Jakestuff

Rudolph Valentino: www.AriesArtist.com Tshirts by keithmcdowell
Shop for Rudolph Valentino T-Shirts online at Zazzle.com

Rudolph Valentino in Bathing Suit Post Cards by reggiesgayadventures

Rudolph Valentino as The Son of the Sheik 1925 Print
Do you know what I have to pay for this?! by slicktees

Related Pages of Interest:

Classic film actors jobs, clothes, tools of the trade Tour film stars' closets, more 

Tell them Clark Gable Left his jacket at your place

Dressing Gable, Rathbone, Robert Montgomery, Marlene Dietrich
It's 1930, Sherlock Holmes, Cary Grant's Stand-In talks about his duties


 


Sources listed may be used for any of the posts in the series. Major updates and corrections if necessary will be noted with a date.