 Cover of the March 1950 issue featuring Elizabeth Taylor | |
| Categories | Fan magazine |
|---|---|
| Frequency | Monthly |
| Founded | 1930 |
| Final issue | 1985 |
| Company | Dell Magazines |
| Country | United States |
| Based in | New York City |
| Language | English |
| ISSN | 0026-8429 |
Modern Screen was an American fan magazine that for over 50 years, featuring articles, pictorials and interviews with film stars (and later television and music personalities).
Modern Screen magazine debuted on November 3, 1930. [1] [2] Founded by the Dell Company of New York City it initially sold for 10 cents. Modern Screen quickly became popular and by 1933 it had become Photoplay magazine's main competition. It began to brag on its cover that it had "The Largest Circulation of Any Screen Magazine", [3] and Jean Harlow is seen reading a copy of Modern Screen in the 1933 film Dinner at Eight .
During the early 1930s, the magazine featured artwork portraits of film stars on the cover. By 1940 it featured natural color photographs of the stars and was charging 15 cents per issue.
Modern Screen had many different editors in chief over the years, including Richard Heller, who understood the importance of the fan magazine's contribution to movie sales [4] and Mark Bego, the latter of whom edited the book The Best of Modern Screen [5] (St. Martin's Press, 1986). The editor most associated with the magazine, however, was Regina Cannon (1900-1992), but her standards for publication were so low that Carl F. Cotter, who wrote 'Forty Hacks of the Fan Mags' (The Coast, 1939), declared her stories to be the worst of the entire lot. [3]
Contributors to the magazine included famed photographer George Hurrell and famed writers like Faith Baldwin. [3] Louella Parsons wrote a column entitled "Good News." [6]
Modern Screen remained a major success through the 1950s but a downturn in movie ticket sales at the end of the decade led to a general sales decline in the magazine. Still Modern Screen managed to remain popular. On January 3, 1967, The Film Daily declared that 50% of movie ticket sales were influenced by fan magazines such as Modern Screen and Photoplay. [4] [7] The magazine remained popular through the 1970s, and Lily Tomlin released her 1975 comedy album Modern Scream, a parody of celebrity magazines. In the early 1980s, however, the popularity of general interest celebrity publications like People Magazine proved to be the end of old-fashioned movie fan magazines. Modern Screen became a bimonthly magazine, but in 1985 publication of the magazine ceased.
On January 16, 1963, actor Troy Donahue filed a $200,000 law suit in Santa Monica against Modern Screen, Dell Publishing Co., and 17 year old Joyce Becker, a self-described actress and writer, who wrote an inflammatory article the magazine published titled, “The First Time Troy Made Love to Me.” [8] [9]
Donahue protested that the article described them as better friends than they really were. His lawyer said they were only casually acquainted and had met only once, when Becker interviewed Donahue for a teen magazine. Donahue’s action claimed that the story violated privacy and said the statements in the article were “unjustified and untrue.” [10]
Eventually, Dell Publishing Co. printed a retraction, and paid Donahue an undisclosed settlement. [8]
Mary Louise Cecilia "Texas" Guinan was an American actress, producer, and entrepreneur. Born in Texas to Irish immigrant parents, Guinan decided at an early age to become an entertainer. After becoming a star on the New York stage, the repercussions of her involvement in a weight loss scam motivated her to switch careers to the film business. Spending several years in California appearing in numerous productions, she eventually formed her own company.
Photoplay was one of the first American film fan magazines. It was founded in Chicago in 1911. Under early editors, Julian Johnson and James R. Quirk, in style and reach it became a pacesetter for fan magazines. In 1921, Photoplay established what is considered the first significant annual movie award. For most of its run, it was published by Macfadden Publications. The magazine ceased publication in 1980.
Us Weekly is a weekly celebrity and entertainment magazine based in New York City. Us Weekly was founded in 1977 by The New York Times Company, who sold it in 1980. It was acquired by Wenner Media in 1986, and sold to American Media Inc. in 2017. Shortly afterward, former editor James Heidenry stepped down, and was replaced by Jennifer Peros. The chief content officer of American Media, Dylan Howard, oversees the publication.
Troy Donahue was an American film and television actor, best known for his role as Johnny Hunter in the film A Summer Place. He was a popular sex symbol in the 1950s and 1960s.
A fan magazine is a commercially written and published magazine intended for the amusement of fans of the popular culture subject matter that it covers. It is distinguished from a scholarly, literary or trade magazine on the one hand, by the target audience of its contents, and from a fanzine on the other, by the commercial and for-profit nature of its production and distribution. Scholarly works on popular culture and fandoms do not always make this terminological distinction clear. In some relevant works, fanzines are called "fan magazines", possibly because the term "fanzine" is seen as slang.
Joan Evans was an American film actress known for Roseanna McCoy, Skirts Ahoy! and co-starred with Audie Murphy in the movie, Column South. She was married to Kirby Weatherly in August 1952.
May Allison was an American actress whose greatest success was achieved in the early part of the 20th century in silent films, although she also appeared on stage.
Pageant was a 20th-century monthly magazine published in the United States from November 1944 until February 1977. Printed in a digest size format, it became Coronet magazine's leading competition, although it aimed for comparison to Reader's Digest.
Fantastic Films was an American film magazine specializing in the genres of science fiction and fantasy. The magazine was published by Blake Publishing Corp. and existed between 1978 and 1985.
Clara Williams was an American silent film actress. Along with Louise Glaum and Dorothy Dalton, she was one of the principal leading ladies at Inceville, one of the first motion picture studios to make feature films in Los Angeles. Williams appeared in more than one hundred films between 1910 and 1918, including starring roles in The Italian and William S. Hart's western, Hell's Hinges, both of which are included in the National Film Registry. When she married director Reginald Barker at age 31, she retired from acting.
Motion Picture was an American monthly fan magazine about film, published from 1911 to 1977. It was lastly published by Macfadden Publications.
May Mann, born May Vasta Randall, was a Hollywood columnist and freelance writer. She wrote a syndicated column about Hollywood gossip and wrote articles on celebrities for fan magazines. Her "Going Hollywood" column was syndicated to 400 newspapers, and contributed to movie magazines Movie Mirror, Silver Screen, Movie Teen, Screenland, and Photoplay. Her columns often featured photos of herself with the celebrity she profiled. She befriended several celebrities like Marilyn Monroe and wrote books about Elvis Presley, Clark Gable, and Jayne Mansfield. She was known as "Hollywood Date Girl" since she wrote about parties that she attended with Hollywood celebrities.
Jean Harlow was an American actress who made her uncredited debut in two 1928 films: Honor Bound for Fox Film; and Moran of the Marines for Paramount Pictures. While waiting for a friend at the studio in 1928, she was discovered by studio executives who gave her letters of introduction to casting agencies, where she was offered the two small roles that subsequently launched her film career. During the initial two years of her career, Harlow appeared uncredited in 16 films, including several Hal Roach productions developed for Laurel and Hardy. Her first speaking role was a bit part in the 1929 American pre-Code romantic comedy The Saturday Night Kid, starring Clara Bow and Jean Arthur. The film has since been preserved by the UCLA Film and Television Archive.
Shadowland was an American monthly magazine about art, dance, and film published from 1919 to 1923 before being absorbed by Motion Picture Classic. The first issue appeared in September 1919. The subtitle was "the Handsomest Magazine in the Whole World". The publisher was M. P. Publishing Company and the headquarters was in New York City. It featured art deco illustrations, caricatures, photographs, poetry, and articles concerning artists, actors, dancers, the theatre, and music. Its covers were designed by A. M. Hopfmuller. The last issue was published in November 1923.
Cordelia D. "Delight" Evans was an American entertainment writer, editor, and film critic who was most widely known for her career as the editor of Screenland Magazine. Before accepting her career-making position at Screenland, Evans worked for Photoplay Magazine for six years. Screenland and Photoplay were both popular fan magazines that allowed fans to connect with movies outside the theaters. Some of the magazines' content consisted of movie reviews, movie promotions, and spreads of popular actors and actresses. Evans first started working for Screenland Magazine in October 1924 where she wrote reviews for various iconic films of that time. In 1929, Evans was promoted to Editor of the magazine. Nine years later in 1938, her success and ambitious attitude lead her to her own radio program, Food Secrets of the Movie Stars.
Jane Kesner Ardmore, also known as Jane Kesner Morris, was a writer in Hollywood, best known for biographies of actors, and for three novels.
Corliss Palmer was an American silent film actress and model. She first came to public attention after winning Motion Picture Magazine's Fame and Fortune Contest in 1920, upon which she was deemed the "most beautiful girl in America." She would go on to appear in a total of sixteen films between 1922 and 1931.
Toughest Man Alive is a 1955 American drama film directed by Sidney Salkow and starring Dane Clark, Lita Milan, and Anthony Caruso. Based on an original screenplay by Steve Fisher, the film was released on November 6, 1955.
Russell Ball was an American studio glamour photographer who made stills for films and portraits of Hollywood film stars including Jean Harlow, Greta Garbo, Louise Brooks, Mary Pickford, Esther Ralston and Carol Dempster.
Cal York, an amalgam of California and New York, was a pseudonymous name used in the American film magazine Photoplay that ran from 1911 to 1980. Popular entertainment scholar Anthony Slide considered it one of the most reliable voices in the old Hollywood gossip columns. York was the "columnist" for "Inside Stuff," and also a contributor to other parts of the magazine, including "Plays and Players." Not every film scholar seems aware of the pseudonym, as many quote York without noting the meaning behind the name. Slide notes that the surname York once morphed to Yorke, assuming a typo, but it may also have been an inside joke. He adds that toward the end of the magazine's life West Coast editor Richard Cuskelly wrote as Cal York. By the 1970s Photoplay was still using the old name, but Slide considered it an echo of the past.
