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May Day No. 1: The Legend of Robin Hood

01 May

No other aspect of the history of the Robin Hood legend deserves more notice than the hero’s participation in the May Day Games.

May Day Games and the Robin Hood Legend

Robin Hood ballads reflect the discontent of ordinary people with political conditions in medieval England. They were especially upset about new laws that kept them from hunting freely in forests that were now claimed as the property of kings and nobles. Social unrest and rebellion swirled through England at the time the Robin Hood ballads first became popular. This unrest erupted in an event called the Peasants’ Revolt of 1381.

The earliest known mention of Robin Hood is in a ballad called Piers Plowman, in which a character mentions that he knows “rimes of Robin Hood.” This and other references from the late 1300s suggest that Robin Hood was well established as a popular legend by that time. One source of that legend may lie in the old French custom of celebrating May Day. A character called Robin des Bois, or Robin of the Woods, was associated with this spring festival and may have been transplanted to England—with a slight name change. May Day celebrations in England in the 1400s featured a festival “king” called Robin Hood.

Robin Hood Ballads

Dressing up as the medieval social justice warrior was among young Henry VIII’s favourite pastimes.

Henry VIII Joins the Party

— Tim

 
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Posted in Behind the Scenes, Gentleman Tim, Main Page, Newspapers & Magazines, Special Events

 

$300,000

30 Apr

Newcastle Morning Herald and Miner’s Advocate
New South Wales, Australia

Errol Flynn Sues Magazine

LOS ANGELES, April 27. A.A.P.

Errol Flynn, the actor, has lodged a claim for 300,000 dollars damages against the film magazine “Movie Stars Parade.”

His action followed publication in the magazine of an article entitled: “My First Screen Kiss by Errol Flynn.” Flynn’s statement of claim said he did not authorize or write the article, which was untrue and harmful to his professional standing.

The article described a scene in which Flynn and Olivia de Havilland acted. It quoted Flynn as saying of his first screen kiss: “I looked forward to that tender passage with the same placid approval a wolf lavished on a herd of spring lambs.”

Flynn also seeks an injunction against alleged unfair trade practices and invasion of privacy.

Very Similar Article in the Canberra Times, April 28

— Tim

 
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Posted in Author Errol Flynn, Behind the Scenes, Co-Stars, Dates & Girlfriends, Gentleman Tim, Main Page, Newspaper & Headlines

 

April 29 — 1957 — — Errol Settles Down

30 Apr

Louella 0. Parsons in Hollywood

International News Service
Louella O. Parsons Motion Picture Editor

After six years abroad Errol and Mrs. Flynn (Patrice Wymore) return to Hollywood with baby Arnella.
He’s a real homebody now.

DASHING, happy-go-lucky, colorful Errol Flynn, who lost millions, is poorer today but happier than he’s ever been in his life. And he didn’t hesitate to say that Patrice Wymore (the present Mrs. Flynn) is responsible. Six months ago, Errol owed $900,000. Today, he has paid off $750,000 and sees his way clear to handing over the remainder by December. This is a changed Errol. No longer does that roving eye of his look at every pretty girl who enters a room. In the past, Errol was as wild, unpredictable and full of pranks as anyone I ever interviewed. He always talked with his tongue in cheek, and while I always liked him, I used to have the feeling that some of his nonsense was due to the fact that life was not happy. He asked me to have dinner with him and Patrice at La Rue. You can always depend upon Errol to say something different and to make an interview an occasion, and his first words to me were: “Well, what do you think of her?” pointing to the calm, gracious Patrice. A little embarrassed with such frankness, I countered with, “What do you think of her yourself?” “Well, she’s not my type, but 1 love her,” he laughed. “You know, she saved my life. I’d have run when the going was so tough, but, Pat, without a word of complaint, helped me straighten out my affairs, stuck by me and gave me encouragement. “I never thought I’d ever say I’d be lonely for any woman,” he continued, “but, do you know something? I can’t bear to be separated from her. She gives me a confidence I all but lost during those months of worry.”

The Flynns have been in Europe for six years. They left Hollywood in 1950, and Errol had considerable trouble with William Tell, the picture he was to make in Italy. He says he lost over $200,000 of his own money in it. Errol said, “To show you the kind of girl Pat is, she was expecting our bambina any hour when I got word that I had to be in New York on business. She said, ‘You go right ahead and I’ll wait until you return to have the baby.’ I got back Christmas Eve to find that she’d invited 30 people for Christmas Day egg nogs. On Christmas I rushed her to the hospital where the baby was born within a few hours. We just left all our guests at the party. “I never thought I’d want to settle down to family life,” Errol went on, “but you should see me now. You know how I never wanted domesticity. Whenever it threatened me I’d go away on my boat or take a picture assignment away from home. We now have the greatest family life you ever saw.

“Since I’ve been back in Hollywood,” he said, “we’ve had Pat’s parents from Kansas, her grandmother, and all the children with us My two little girls, Deirdre and Rory, by my marriage to Nora Haymes, spend every week end with us, and our daughter Arnella loves playing with them.” His fourteen-year-old son, Sean, by his marriage to Lili Damita, is the spittin’ image of Errol. Patrice told me Sean spent a little time with them in Europe. “He is so handsome and so intelligent,” she said. “He’s now in Florida with his mother.” A woman who can praise a previous wife’s child is all right for my money. Usually there is a feeling of resentment, but if Pat has any feeling of this sort she’s a great actress. Errol said, “At Universal-International they gave me some of rry ‘face’ back with a great part in Istanbul. I hope to come back and make another picture for them; it’s a nice studio. I’ll return in December.” “Didn’t you almost turn in at Warner Brothers studio by mistake?” I asked him. He started his career Warners with Captain Blood [the film which made him] one of the top stars in the country.

Errol is older now and wiser. He has taken off some of the weight which so shocked me when I first saw him after his return here. But he’s still and always will be the same charm boy. When domesticity threatened in the past, he’d be off to other shores.

— Tim

 
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Posted in Arnella Flynn, Behind the Scenes, Deirdre Flynn, Main Page, Rory Flynn, Sean Flynn

 

April 29 — 1945 — — Errol Peps Up Hollywood Party

29 Apr

Huston was a very skilled boxer, with a very long reach. Both went to the hospital, were complimentary of each others fighting skills and etiquette, and subsequently became friendly. The fight is thought to have been over OdH, with whom both Errol and JH had been in love.

— Tim

 
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Posted in Behind the Scenes, Dates & Girlfriends, Flynn and..., Friends & Family, Gentleman Tim, Main Page, Newspaper & Headlines, Tennis, Wives

 

April 29 — 1937 — — Errol Tops in Tennis with Garbo

29 Apr

Jimmy Starr – April 29, 1936
LA Evening Herald Express

Already ranked as one of the movie village’s tennis greats, Gilbert Roland took it upon himself to name Hollywood’s 10 best racket wielders.

On the set of Paramount’s The Last Train from Madrid, Gilbert put Garbo in the top spot among feminine tennis players, Errol Flynn equals her in the men’s division. Others are Marlene Dietrich, Cedric Gibbons, Constance Bennett, Gary Cooper, Carole Lombard, Harold Lloyd, Elizabeth Allen and Ronald Colman.

Errol Backstroking in Hollywood Circa 1935

— Tim

 
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Posted in Main Page

 

In Memory of Chris Reid – He Spoke Flynn Fluently

26 Apr

My brother, Chris Reid, died yesterday. He was a huge fan of Errol Flynn, so much so that he moved thousands of miles to live in Chico, where he graduated from Cal State there. He knew Bidwell Park intimately and all the other famous (and many only rarely known) Flynn sites in and surrounding Chico. I was fortunate to get a few royal tours. He also knew many of Errol’s other haunts in California and Mexico. In fact, I was with him when we climbed the hills of Hollywood in a valiant but unsuccessful attempt to penetrate Mulholland Farm. (If only we knew Jack Marino then!) Chris could and did quote Flynn fluently. He was also a very big Beatle fan, hence the ‘Let It Be’ inspired image below that will be part of a forthcoming video tribute. He was only 57, is already very dearly missed, and will be forever by his large family and many friends.

Godspeed on your new journey, Chris.

— Tim

 
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Posted in Behind the Scenes, Gentleman Tim, Main Page

 

Hunting for Devil Fish — Errol Flynn A.W.O.L.

25 Apr

April 25, 1938

Elizabeth Yeaman
Hollywood Citizen News

Although Warners aren’t saying anything about it yet, I understand that beginning this morning Errol Flynn is A.W.O.L Flynn was told to be on the set this morning to start work on Because of a Man, which is the new title for Sister Act, in which the Lane Sisters will be featured. The last I heard of Flynn he was in Florida waters aboard his yacht, and the studio sent out stories that he was shooting devil fish with his Robin Hood’s bow and arrow!

…

— Tim

 
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Posted in Main Page

 

Fight or Flight?

24 Apr

Which was Safer?

April 25, 1939

Jimmy Starr
Evening Herald Express

It isn’t news that Errol Flynn and wifey, Lili Damtat often engage in what is any married couple’s right -yiu a slight family spat, or mild disagreement. But it is rather important when said argument saves them from possible physical injury.

The other day Errol decided to purchse a low-wing monoplane. He had just given a check for payment when the row started. Errol interrupted the verbal excitement long enough to tell his friend, Bud Ernst, to try out the plane.

While Errol and Lili were settling their differences, Bud was gracefully sailing through the air in the new plane. When he started to land, however, spectators were horrified to see him start the descent minus the landing gear.

Ernst pancaked the plane to the ground but with slight damage. Had Errol and Lili been on the plane, the “belly” landing would have been impossible without a serious crack-up. Ernst explained that the lever operating the retractable gear had jammed.

And that’s the story of a spat that was worth while.
…

In actuality, Errol may have been safer in the air with his buds than he was on the ground with Lili. Dueling with the Red Baron in the skies above France may have been less challenging than drinking Pink Champagne with Fleen’s Red Hot Dame from France in the hills above Hollywood.

— Tim

 
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Autograph Army on Patrol in Chico

23 Apr

AUTOGRAPH ARMY ALWAYS ON TRAIL OF CINEMA STARS

Restaurant Employee Pays For Olivia De Havilland’s Meals For Signature

REDEEMS HER CHECKS

Player Is Now With Errol Flynn in “Adventures of Robin. Hood”
By FRANK HEACOCK Hollywood,Cal., March 3, 1938

The prophet may be without honor in his own country but the movie star certainly isn’t. One of the demonstrations of the honor in which the screen darlings are held is their pursuit by autograph hunters. And nowhere does the autograph hunter flourish more lustily than in California, country of the movies. And California signature-seekers have several times achieved new highs of ingenuity in devising methods of obtaining the coveted name scrawls of their film favorites. Most unusual of them came to light recently during the filming of “The Adventures of Robin Hood,” when the company was on location near Chico, Calif.

Signs the Checks

When a film troupe is on location, be it explained, the studio takes care of meals and accommodations for its members. And to simplify the business of paying for meals the studio arranges for members of the company to sign their checks; a company auditor paying them later. Members of the “Adventures of Robin Hood” company, in which Errol Flynn and Olivia de Havilland are co-starred, ran up a healthy accumulation of meal checks to be paid off. But a week after her arrival at Chico it was found no meal check signed by Miss de Havilland had turned up at the hotel where she was staying.

Auditor Stumped

Now Miss de Havilland, by her own admission, is a girl who likes her victuals. She wasn’t on a diet and she certainly wasn’t paying for for own meals. The auditor couldn’t figure it out.

Sold Autographs

Investigation disclosed that a kitchen employee had been removing her “autographed” meal checKs from the daily collection and dropping into the cash register an amount equivalent to the price of her meals. The hotel employee then proceeded to sell the “autographs” to a Hollywood autograph broker of whom there are dozens. The broker, according in the avid autograph collector, was paying him fifty cents more for each signature than the check bearing it cost him. Considering that there was nothing intrinsically dishonest in his actions, the hotel contented itself with a reprimand and a proposal that he denote his profits to a local charity. But by that time eighteen Olivia de Havilland autographs had found their ‘way to market’.

Tribute to California’s ingenious autograph hunters. Tribute, too, to the healthy appetite Miss de Havilland worked up during the making of “The Adventures of Robin Hood” in Chico’s bracing atmosphere.

…

— Tim

 
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Posted in Behind the Scenes, Co-Stars, Dates & Girlfriends, Gentleman Tim, Main Page, Newspaper & Headlines

 

The Knights and The Baron — A Million Dollar Story

21 Apr

DENIES ACCUSATIONS

NEW YORK, April 21, 1937

Errol Flynn, film player, denied today in a telegram to the Knights of Columbus that he had engaged In activities in behalf of loyalist Spain. The telegram, addressed to John L. Rossborough, state deputy in Oakland, California, and Thomas B. Flanagan, secretary of the Los Angeles council, was made public here by Warner Brothers.
…

Catholic Opposition to Communism in Spain

“Catholics believed that communism was the antithesis to Christianity and thus the only way to save the soul of the country was to side with those opposing it. The archbishop of Toledo wrote to the American bishops in 1937 asking for support, stating that “the National army is defending the essential foundation of society.” The final straw that pushed Catholics to side with the Nationalists was the persecution of the Church religious. In total 12 bishops, 4184 priests, 2365 male religious, and 283 female religious were killed by the Republicans during the war.”

…

…

ACTOR DENIES SAYING STARS RAISED FUNDS

Report That $1,500,000 Given By Certain Film Players to Loyalists Claimed False

By United Press
HOLLYWOOD, April 21, 1937

An Interview with Errol Flynn In Barcelona Spain, in which the film actor and soldier of fortune purportedly told of helping raise a $1,500,000 fund in the Hollywood film colony to aid the loyalist forces, came under the scrutiny of the Knight of Columbus today. Thomas B. Flanagan, secretary of the Los Angeles council of the Knights of Columbus, said he was sending a report on Flynn to John J. Rossborough, state deputy of the order at Oakland, California, and to the national headquarters of the organization’s newly launched “antiradical” campaign at New Haven, Conn.

The purported interview was published in the Hollywood Reporter, a film trade paper. The Reporter stated the interview was filed to them by “our regular Barcelona correspondent.” The part to which the Knights of Columbus reportedly found most objection to follows:

SAYS FUND RAISED

“Is it true that money has been collected in Hollywood to help the Spanish government?’ asked the Reporter. “‘Yes,’ said the actor, ‘Fredrick March, James Cagney and I were the initiators and $1,500,000 has been raised so far”.” Flynn, husky film leading man and husband of Lili Damita, French actress, has been in Spain as a roving correspondent He was reported wounded by a machine gun bullet in dispatches from Madrid which later developed to be erroneous.

The Hollywood Reporter’s dispatch upon his arrival at Barcelona, strong loyalist headquarters, further stated: “When Errol Flynn arrived in Barcelona he was greeted by the “commissioner of public spectacles, J. Carner Rlbalta, who introduced him to the “commissioner of propaganda” of the Catalonian government, Jaime Miravitles, and the heart of the cinema section the same department, Juan Castanyer.

While in Barcelona, Flynn was considered a guest of honor of the Catalonian government and all facilities were accorded him. “In an interview with the press, Flynn said his visit to Spain was prompted by a desire to ascertain the truth regarding conditions here. “Asked by the press boys what was the general impression in the United States about the war, he replied: “That’s it, the confusing news and the fact that all the American press is in the hands of powerful trusts made me decide to take this trip to see with my own eves what is really happening and write a series of articles for publication.”

The dispatch ended:

“Flynn was accompanied by his old friend, Dr. Hermann F. Erben, a well known member of the American Communist party.”

Per the San Bernadino Daily Sun, April 22, 1937

— Tim

 
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Posted in Author Errol Flynn, Behind the Scenes, Gentleman Tim, Main Page, Newspaper & Headlines, Travels

 
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