Classic ‘It’s A Wonderful Life’ started as a box office flop that critics dismissed: ‘Embarrassing’

Classic ‘It’s A Wonderful Life’ started as a box office flop that critics dismissed: ‘Embarrassing’

Everybody knows the famous line “Every time a bell rings an angel gets its wings.” But there’s an even more inspiring message to be gleaned from Hollywood history: Sometimes when a movie flops, it gets a second chance. That, bewilderingly, is what happened to “It’s A Wonderful Life,” Frank Capra’s seasonal classic that many today … Read more

How the Oscars got started—and all the flops that almost did it in

How the Oscars got started—and all the flops that almost did it in

Well before the grandiloquently dubbed Academy of Motion Picture Arts and Sciences hosted its inaugural award ceremony at the Hollywood Roosevelt Hotel in Los Angeles on May 16, 1929, the movie industry was already up to it eyeballs in stink.  Star Fatty Arbuckle had been acquitted for rape and murder. Director William Desmond Taylor was a cold case, … Read more