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Alla Nazimova

Alla Nazimova

Acting

Biography

Alla Nazimova (Russian and Ukrainian: Алла Назимова; 3 June [O.S. 22 May] 1879 – 13 July 1945) was an American film and theatre actress, a screenwriter, and film producer. She is perhaps best known as simply Nazimova, but also went under the name Alia Nasimoff. She emigrated to the United States from the Russian Empire. In 1927, Nazimova became a naturalized citizen of the United States. She was signed up by the American producer Henry Miller and made her Broadway debut in New York City, in 1906 to critical and popular success. She quickly became extremely popular (a theatre was named after her) and remained a major Broadway star for years, often acting in the plays of Henrik Ibsen and Anton Chekhov. Dorothy Parker described her as the finest Hedda Gabler she had ever seen. Due to her notoriety in a 35-minute 1915 play entitled War Brides, Nazimova made her silent film debut in 1916 in the filmed version of the play, which was produced by Lewis J. Selznick. A young actor with a bit part in the movie was Richard Barthelmess whose mother taught Nazimova English. In 1917, she negotiated a contract with Metro Pictures, a precursor to MGM, that included a weekly salary of $13,000. She moved from New York to Hollywood, where she made a number of highly successful films for Metro that earned her considerable money. She was influential in the film industry in the silent era and continued to play character roles until the end of her life. Between the years of 1917 and 1922 Nazimova wielded considerable influence and power in Hollywood. By all accounts she was extremely generous to young actresses in whom she saw talent and became involved with at least some of them romantically. By 1925 Nazimova could no longer afford to invest in more films; and financial backers withdrew their support. Left with few options, she gave up on the film industry, returning to perform on Broadway, notably starring as Natalya Petrovna in Rouben Mamoulian's 1930 New York production of Turgenev's A Month in the Country and an acclaimed performance as Mrs. Alving in Ibsen's Ghosts. In the early 1940s, she appeared in a few more films, playing Robert Taylor's mother in Escape (1940) and Tyrone Power's mother in Blood and Sand (1941). This late return to motion pictures fortunately preserves Nazimova and her art on sound film. She died of a coronary thrombosis, age 66, in the Good Samaritan Hospital in Los Angeles. Her ashes were interred in Forest Lawn Memorial Park Cemetery in Glendale, California. Her contributions to the film industry have been recognized with a star on the Hollywood Walk of Fame.

Known For

Toys of Fate
N/A

A gypsy girl whose mother committed suicide after being seduced and abandoned by a rich man finds herself twenty years later being wooed by the same man.

Toys of Fate

1918
Since You Went Away
6.6

In 1943, several people enter, re-enter, and exit the difficult life of a Midwestern family whose patriarch has been called up to war, leaving behind his wife and two teen daughters.

Since You Went Away

1944
Blood and Sand
6.5

Bullfighter Juan Gallardo falls for socialite Dona Sol, turning from the faithful Carmen who nevertheless stands by her man as he continues to face real danger in the bullring.

Blood and Sand

1941
Escape
7.5

An American goes to pre-war Germany to find his mother and discovers her in a concentration camp. With the help of an American-born widowed countess he seeks to engineer her escape.

Escape

1940
Salomé
6.3

Based on Oscar Wilde's play, the films tells the story of how Salomé agrees to dance for King Herod in return for the head of John the Baptist.

Salomé

1923
Billions
6.0

Princess Triloff, an emigrée from Czarist Russia, escapes to America where she becomes a patron of the arts. She falls in love with the verses of impoverished poet Owen Carey and becomes his anonymous benefactor. When Owen inherits a fortune from his rich Uncle Krakerfeller, he assumes his uncle's identity and confers his own upon an impoverished friend, Frank Manners. At a resort, Owen meets the princess and falls in love with her, but is chagrined to discover that she is enamored with Manners. The princess finally discovers Owen's real identity and the two fall in love.

Billions

1920
Camille
5.7

Camille is a courtesan in Paris. She falls deeply in love with a young man of promise, Armand Duval. When Armand's father begs her not to ruin his hope of a career and position by marrying Armand, she acquiesces and leaves her lover. However, when poverty and terminal illness overwhelm her, Camille discovers that Armand has not lost his love for her.

Camille

1921
The Legend of Rudolph Valentino
7.0

A documentary of Hollywood's first great Latin Lover, the contradictions in his personal life, and his premature death.

The Legend of Rudolph Valentino

1961
A New Romance of Celluloid: The Miracle of Sound
6.9

This short documentary, presented and directed by MGM sound engineer Douglas Shearer, goes behind the scenes to look at how the sound portion of a talking picture is created.

A New Romance of Celluloid: The Miracle of Sound

1940
My Son
7.0

A mother and her son's lives are upended by the arrival of a wealthy flapper to their small New England fishing village.

My Son

1925
Screen Snapshots (Series 22, No. 10)
N/A

The edition of Screen Snapshots celebrates 25 years of production. It looks at the content of edition #1, then a tribute to movie people who have died in those 25 years. Finally there are tributes to the Screen Snapshots series by Cecil De Mille, Walt Disney, Louella Parsons and Rosalind Russell.

Screen Snapshots (Series 22, No. 10)

1942
Behind Natacha Rambova's Shadow
5.0

The adventurous life of Natacha Rambova (1897-1966), an American artist, born Winifred Kimball Shaughnessy, who reincarnated herself countless times: false Russian dancer, silent film actress, scenographer and costume designer, writer, spiritist, Egyptologist, indefatigable traveler, mysterious and curious; an amazing 20th century woman who created the myth of Rudolph Valentino.

Behind Natacha Rambova's Shadow

2019
The Red Lantern
6.5

Mahlee and Blanche Sackville are half-sisters, Blanche the daughter of an Englishman and his wife, Mahlee of the Englishman and his Chinese mistress. Mahlee rejects her people and attempts to find a life for herself among the Europeans. But she finds the color line impossible to pass and returns to lead her Chinese people in rebellion.

The Red Lantern

1919
The Bridge of San Luis Rey
6.3

A rope bridge over a gorge in the Peruvian Andes snaps, sending five people plunging to their deaths. A priest sets out to find out more about the life of each of the victims.

The Bridge of San Luis Rey

1944
The Brat
N/A

An unkempt chorus girl is arrested on a minor charge. In court, she is spotted by a novelist who is looking for someone of her type on whom to model a character in a book he is writing. He takes her into his home where she is looked down upon by his snobbish family. But the girl brings something to the family unlike anything they have known before.

The Brat

1919
In Our Time
6.4

It is early 1939 in Poland when Mrs. Bromley and Jennifer come to buy antiques for her business in London. Jennifer meets Count Stephen and they wine, dine and see the sights though out the city. He wishes to marry, but his family is against plain Jennifer. When she tries to leave, he catches her at the train station and they are married. To be self sufficient, they modernize the family farm with tractors and increase production, but then Germany starts the war.

In Our Time

1944
Stronger Than Death
7.0

Sigrid, A French dancer, diagnosed with a weak heart, is ordered by her doctor never to dance again. But when her dancing skills are needed by her lover's father to help quell a native uprising on the East Indian frontier, she determines to dance whatever the cost.

Stronger Than Death

1920
Revelation
N/A

Joline, a cabaret singer in Paris, models for her lover, painter Paul Granville. Paul becomes famous for his paintings of Joline in the guise of famous women like Cleopatra and Salome. But when he paints Joline as the Madonna, a miracle occurs which transforms her life and ultimately saves his.

Revelation

1918
Eye for Eye
N/A

The daughter of an Arab sheik falls in love with a French naval officer, thus breaking the strict rule of social law of her people, as well as her religion.

Eye for Eye

1918
The Redeeming Sin
8.0

Lupin is the lover of Joan of the Apaches. She is attracted by Paul de Gafilet, nobleman and sculptor. She visits him in his studio and resolves to abandon her underworld career for his sake. Lupin vows revenge but is frustrated by Joan. The latter's affection for Paul turns to rage when she sees him embracing another woman. Joan joins with her confederates to steal some jewels from a statue of the Madonna in a church. She learns that the woman she is jealous of is Paul's sister, attempts to halt the robbery but fails. Paul is injured by the thieves and Joan held captive.

The Redeeming Sin

1925