Year of Ann Dvorak: Day 70

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Ann Dvorak had a handful of reasons for walking out on her Warner Bros. contract and traveling to Europe in the summer of 1932; exhaustion, wanderlust, lust in general (she had recently gotten married and wanted to go on a honeymoon). What prompted Ann and her husband Leslie Fenton to take off across the Atlantic is that Fenton was offered a part in the film F.P.1.

F.P.1., a science-fiction/spy drama set on a floating air station, was shot simultaneously in French, German, and English and jointly produced by Gaumont, UFA, and Les Productions Fox Europa. Fenton was cast in a supporting role in the English-language version and jumped at the chance to be involved in the production which was filmed in Berlin and the Baltic Sea. As soon as he confirmed, that also instantly meant that Ann would be coming, as there was no way the couple would have an ocean and continent between them.

Ann was reportedly offered the lead role, which was ultimately played by Jill Esmond, opposite Conrad Veidt. As much as Ann may have wanted to star in appear in another film with her husband (they had previously appeared together in The Strange Love of Molly Louvain before they were married), she knew that appearing in a non-Warner Bros. film would burn her last bridge with the studio. At this point, she wasn’t sure what their reaction was going to be to her lengthy absence, and she decided not to violate her contract further by acting in another studio’s film. It’s kind of a shame that she didn’t make the film, because it would have been a more sophisticated part that what she usually got at Warner Bros.

Ann may have not starred in F.P.1., but did she appear in it anyway? She came with Fenton to the set everyday, and was around so much that the crew nicknamed the couple “the inseperables.” When I sat down to watch the film, it occurred to me that maybe Ann would have been put in the film as an extra, just for kicks. As I sat through it, I had my Ann-detector on and think I may have spotted her. The movie opens with a party scene and for a split second, there is a woman who walks through the frame who bears a striking resemblance to Ann as Cesca Camonte, the character she played in Scarface. I tried to grab a some screen shots, from the moment that lasts maybe 2 seconds.

The one thing that leads me to think it wouldn’t be her is that Fenton is not in the scene, so they would not have been required to be on set. Otherwise, I think there’s a good possibility that it’s our Divine Miss D slinking her way through a couple of frames in F.P.1.

What do you think?

Year of Ann Dvorak: Day 64

Some of the other classic film bloggers are having a little fun starting this week with the 3rd annual Classic Movie Actresses Tournament. Different sites are hosting different decades of the tournament, and you can see the full run down over at A Mythical Monkey Writes About the Movies. Amazingly enough, our dear Ann is included in the 1930s bracket, though she’s rather unfairly pitted against Marlene Dietrich. She seems to be holding her own so far, but can probably use a boost from some of her devoted fans. So, if you get a second, pop on over to All Good Things blog and cast your vote for the Divine Ms. Dvorak. Voting for this first round wraps up on Wednesday evening.