Joan Crawford: The Best of Everything

MAGAZINES: Many thanks to James for sending me the transcript of the below-mentioned Richard Brody article in the New Yorker! Click here or on the photo to read it on this site.

11/25/25

NEWS: The Criterion.com Books section has this blurb RE the new Eyman bio and Richard Brody's current article about it in the New Yorker:

Scott Eyman’s Joan Crawford: A Woman’s Face is “a trove of anecdotes, quotes, and insights,” writes the New Yorker’s Richard Brody, “but, above all, it’s the energetic pursuit of an idea: Eyman presents the story of Crawford’s rise to fame as the story of Hollywood stardom itself.” Writing about his “favorite classic-Hollywood actress,” Brody observes that Crawford “took all that was unsayable in Hollywood—all that was unspeakable, all that was ineffable, and all that was unrepresentable in what she’d learned of life, as a child, a clawing outsider, and a star—and brought it all out, one burning fury at a time, in a form of performance that was a music of images. For decades, every time her eyes flashed onscreen, they brought live heat fiercer than the projector bulb that would burn film on contact.”

Editor's plea: I stopped subscribing to the New Yorker in 2016, so I don't have access to the above Brody article. Can any kind-hearted reader send me a transcript of it so I can post it on this site? Much obliged in advance! :)

RADIO: Added 2 shots of a 1935 UK 78 rpm label for "Voice of the Stars, Jubilee Edition, No. 2" promo record for distribution/free play on radio stations. Includes a snippet of Joan, Clark, and Montgomery from Forsaking All Others. (The entire program can be found on YouTube.)

11/21/25

R: Recipes: Updated the separate page for Joan's formal dinner from How to Take a Trick a Day with Bisquick (1935) with 4 new photos. Also updated the cross-referenced Books with Joan Mentions page for this book.

11/17/25

ART: Congratulations to collector Rick Spector, who just recently acquired the Doug Fairbanks, Jr., sculpture that accompanies the Joan piece by the same noted sculptor, Gilbert Riswold. See the Riswold page for new info, along with new photos, including how the two works are now displayed.

PHOTOS: 1925 --- Updated the 11/13 Slave of Fashion photo page. Thanks to Tom C. for discovering a page from Exhibitors Trade Review featuring Joan in a similar pose (though the magazine INcorrectly identifies her as being Norma Shearer!).

11/13/25

PHOTOS:

1925: Joan as an extra in A Slave of Fashion.

1927: Publicity by Ruth Harriet Louise.

1928: Publicity for Dream of Love.

1929: Publicity in ermine by Louise.

MAGAZINES:

To a 1926 photo page, added a page from a 1926 National Police Gazette (NYC) paper with same photo.

Three new covers (1930 and 1931) for UK's Picture Show.

11/07/25

BOOKS:

Added an entry/cover for David Meuel's Joan Crawford in Film Noir: The Actress as Auteur (2024, McFarland). See also this interesting interview with the author on YouTube (Robert Bellissimo At the Movies).

LETTERS:

1966: To a fan re why Joan is called "Sarah" in Chicago.

1968: Thanks to a fan for the cocktail napkins.

11/05/25

PHOTOS:

1944: Candid publicity at home (autographed).

1958: Candids on the set of GE Theater's "Strange Witness": one and two.

1959: The Best of Everything -- Publicity shots, one and two.

CHRONOLOGY: A 1962 invite from the Akron, Ohio, Pepsi chief for a cocktail/dinner party honoring Joan.

10/30/25

TOBACCIANA: Pages from a 1938 Player (UK) "Film Stars" cig-card album.

FILMS: An MGM post-office envelope stamping promoting Mannequin.

The Best of Everything