USC librarian Ned Comstock, beloved by film scholars, is no more 1

Film
photo credit marilee bradford The material would arrive unannounced—by email attachment. Lengthy, well-organized PDF documents of pages scanned from books, bundled, as complete packages with title pages, footnotes and relevant index pages. They were every researcher’s dream. They were culled from the depths of USC Cinematic Arts Library by a knowledgeable, passionate, and brilliant, really, ...

Gwen Verdon to critic: Don’t overlook my choreographer

Dance
Gwen Verdon, a woman with values, in a handwritten note from September 1958, mildly protests to Los Angeles Times film critic John L. Scott about a crazy oversight in his review of the film Damn Yankees. [Hover to pause the slide show for easier reading.] Scott was sufficiently impressed by Verdon’s message that he saved ...