This is a guest blog by Barbara Bair, historian of Literature, Culture, and the Arts in the Manuscript Division.
Join Manuscript Division senior archives specialist Laura Kells and author Kurt Jensen as they highlight the work and legacy of film and theater director Rouben Mamoulian and Jensen’s new book, Peerless: Rouben Mamoulian, Hollywood, and Broadway with host and collection specialist Barbara Bair.
The event took place online only on Thursday, July 18, 2024, 12 pm-1 pm EST. Watch the program here:
Film and theater director Rouben Mamoulian (1897-1987) was born in the Russian Empire in what is now Tbilisi, Georgia, of Armenian descent. In the early 1920s he gained experience directing for the stage in London before coming to the United States in 1923 to teach and direct opera and operettas in Rochester, N.Y. His Broadway breakthrough came in 1929 with the direction of DuBose and Dorothy Heywood’s Porgy, followed in 1935 by the George Gershwin musical version, Porgy and Bess. Other hit musicals followed in the 1940s, including Oklahoma! (1943), Carousel (1945), and Lost in the Stars (1949).
Mamoulian earned a reputation for working in innovative ways with lighting and staging in theater, and in early sound and technicolor film. His early movie releases include the backstage story Applause (1929), the science fiction thriller and cult classic Dr. Jekyll and Mr. Hyde (1931), the romantic musical Love Me Tonight (1932) starring French entertainer Maurice Chevalier with music by Rodgers and Hart, and the historical drama Queen Christina (1933), which showcased Greta Garbo in her last film made with John Gilbert. Mamoulian’s work in film musicals concluded with the popular adaptation of the romantic comedy Silk Stockings (1957), shot in Metrocolor for Metro-Goldwyn-Mayer (MGM) studios, featuring Fred Astaire and Cyd Charisse.
In 1982 Mamoulian received a Lifetime Achievement Award from the Directors Guild of America. In 1990 Love Me Tonight was added to the Library of Congress National Film Registry for its cultural and historical significance. It was joined on the registry in 2006 by his early sound film Applause, his swashbuckling adventure The Mark of Zorro (1940) in 2009, and his Technicolor historical drama Becky Sharp (1935) in 2019.
The Manuscript Division’s Rouben Mamoulian Papers contain 59,000 items and came to the Library as gift of the estate of his wife, the artist Azadia Mamoulian, between 2002 and 2003. The Library also holds Mamoulian print materials, visual images, films, and sound recordings.
Senior archives specialist Laura Kells led the team that processed the Rouben Mamoulian Papers for the Manuscript Division and created the collection’s finding aid. Author Kurt Jensen has been a film reviewer and news writer for several publications and a contributor to Studies in Musical Theatre and the Los Angeles Review of Books. His new book Peerless: Rouben Mamoulian, Hollywood, and Broadway, part of the Wisconsin Film Studies series of the University of Wisconsin Press, traces the full scope of Mamoulian’s professional career.
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Made at the Library is an event series highlighting works inspired by and emerging from research at the Library of Congress. Featuring authors, artists, and other creators in conversation with Library experts, this series takes a deep dive into the process of working with the Library’s collections.
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