#monkey business

[thecinamonroe]

Marilyn Monroe on the set of Monkey Business, 1952.

[quesocheeso]

[yossyislandd]

ricky flies away

[hotvintagepoll]

You…really think Cary is better in Monkey Business thsn Bringing Up Baby or The Philadelphia Story?! (Not fighting, just can’t fathom it.)

yes and i will tell you why!!

Cary is wonderful in his 1930s movies but in Monkey Business he does the magic trick of turning from 1950s cary grant—respectable, cool, ready to star in a bunch of hitchcock dramas—into the 1930s version of himself, onscreen, through body language alone. It is extraordinary. In the space of three minutes he drops fifteen years, loses every affect that made him the serious hero of To Catch a Thief and flips back to the mad gymnast of Bringing Up Baby.

it is one thing to control your image when it is half you already, in that moment of your life, and another thing entirely to make it so clear onscreen how constructed this image is and how you can pull it out like a card from your sleeve whenever you want. he shows you "cary grant" is something he can perform anytime, out of time, and he can give you whichever version you want. it's absolutely nuts and has no place in a movie about a chimp conducting mad science

I wish I could just yank the one clip instead of the whole film (which, like I said—bad), but you can see what I mean from 23:34 (though start earlier to get a good read on "old" Cary Grant, and how this is the same version of him from to catch a thief or north by northwest) to 26:59.

[precodesoul]

Thelma Todd and Groucho Marx in Monkey Business (dir. Norman Z. Mcleod, 1931)

[vintage-tigre]

Irish McCalla stood 5’10”, a statuesque force of 1950s glamour who seemed built for myth: part Vargas pin-up, part jungle queen, part silver-screen mirage. As Sheena, Queen of the Jungle, she appeared in only 26 episodes, yet that brief flash of TV fame was enough to turn her into a cult icon, all leopard print, poise, and untamed charisma. Later remembered as both actress and artist, she earned a star on the Hollywood Walk of Fame, and in one beautifully strange final tribute, an asteroid was named after her: 83464 Irishmccalla.

[kelpermoosee]

Monkeys when they have business to attend to:

[stars-bean]

Monkey Business (1952) dir. Howard Hawks