Gentlemen Prefer Blondell

Ol' Joan didn't hide from publicity
On the phone she'd provide electricity
In bath and boudoir
Her path took her far
She's shown just this side of explicit-y.

Pre-Code era star Joan Blondell: no actress looked like she was having more fun getting in and out of her clothes. Title by that chaser of Loos women, gentle Donald B. Benson.

The Medium Was the Menace

 

When naughtiness reached a crescendo,
Both up front and by innuendo,
The censoring boards
Protected us hordes
Till cable, the net, and Nintendo.

Donald B. Benson

Joan Blondell and Dick Powell in Convention City (Archie Mayo; 1933)--a notoriously racy film, now apparently lost.

On Golden Blonde

With plotlines more bracing than sappy,
Joan's hotties are aces and scrappy
Exposing her thighs
In hose she cracks wise,
Allotted lines racy and snappy.



Joan Blondell's gams are featured in the very first shot of Smarty (1934; Robert Florey); with Warren William.

Baths of Glory

When eyeing a dame in the tub,
A guy's always game for a rub
But censors say nyet!
To anything wet
Keep it dry, or film frames they will scrub.



James Cagney and Joan Blondell, having fun in Blonde Crazy (Roy Del Ruth; 1931). Title by bathist Donald B. Benson.

Con With the Wind

This sleaze with the wandering mitts
Will squeeze her if blondie permits
Present her with jewels
And then, April Fools!
Turning tease, she'll abscond with the glitz!



Guy Kibbee falls for con woman Joan Blondell in Blonde Crazy (Roy Del Ruth; 1931). Title by windy David Cairns.

Joan of Arc Lights

Her life wasn't joy uninterrupted
The strife sometimes boiled and erupted
But Blondell had that flair
That compels you to stare
Just one eyeful and boy! You're corrupted.

David Cairns

In the 1930s Joan Blondell was a staple in racy pre-Code films at Warner Brothers Pictures, usually playing a sexy, wisecracking blonde. From Wikipedia: Rose Joan Blondell was born to a vaudeville family. Her cradle was a property trunk as her parents moved from place to place and she made her first appearance on stage at the age of four months when she was carried on in a cradle as the daughter of Peggy Astaire in The Greatest Love. Her family comprised a vaudeville troupe, the "Bouncing Blondells."

Blondell Crazy

We're aflame, cock-a-hoop, took by storm!
With that same Betty Boop-looking form
For Joan's luminous quality
Dispels gloom, promotes jollity
This dame's ice-cream scoops stacked -- but warm.

David Cairns



Joan Blondell takes a bath in Blonde Crazy (Roy Del Ruth; 1931).

Guy's the Limit

Here's a portly and jiggly bear
Just the sort you would figure was square
Although jolly and paunchy
With the dolls he gets raunchy
All while sporting a wig (that ain't hair).

Joan Blondell runs her fingers through Guy Kibbee's toupée in Convention City (Archie Mayo; 1933). Guy Kibbee added comic dimension to such pre-code films as 42nd Street, Gold Diggers of 1933 and Footlight Parade. From Wikipedia: "Kibbee specialized in playing jovial, but not particularly bright, businessmen and government officials."

Revel May Care

 

For each gin-addled salesman, a floozy
An insolent gal who'll get boozy
A crowded hotel
Where the rowdy raise hell
This sin-loaded tale is a doozy!

Booze on the table, cash on the floor: Guy Kibbee and Joan Blondell in a suggestive still from Convention City (Archie Mayo; 1933). Several lines of dialog were ordered removed by Motion Picture Production Code censors, including the following: "Now you take off that dress and I'll take off my toupee, huh!"

Out-of-Doughboys

Our doughboys return from the war
Find no way to earn, and grow sore 
Gave their all, are forgotten
It's appalling, it's rotten
This show-stopping turn demands MORE!



Joan Blondell delivers the very stirring spoken word in the Remember My Forgotten Man number in Gold Diggers of 1933 (Mervyn LeRoy; Busby Berkeley). Title by doughy Donald B. Benson.

Ginger's Snap

Now Ruby, your mother could meet,
While Joan was more earthy, but sweet.
But let it be said
That Ginger (pre-Fred)
Would crank up the sexual heat.

Donald B. Benson

Aline MacMahon, Ginger Rogers, Joan Blondell, and Ruby Keeler, the Gold Diggers of 1933 (Mervyn LeRoy; Busby Berkeley).

Nightmare Alley Cats

Calliopes blow in the dark
A carnival barker yells, "Hark!"
"Come shriek at the geek
and peek at the freak
conducting electrical arc!"



Joan Blondell, Mike Mazurki, Colleen Grey and Tyrone Power in Nightmare Alley (Edmund Goulding, 1947). Photo source: The Movie Title Stills Collection; thenighteditor.blogspot.com; moviemail-online.co.uk; cinemaisdope.com