They are staging a prize-fight, vintage of 1905, for Warner Bros Picture, The Sisters.
Two old time fighters are in the ring and Bette Davis and Errol Flynn are sitting in the front row. Flynn plays a sports writer in the story and Bette is his wife. This is supposed to be the first fight she has ever seen and one of the boxers gets knocked out of the ring and practically into her lap. She is sickened and leaves the stadium.
Bette Davis isn’t a fight fan off the screen, either.
“In August 1941 Peter Stackpole of LIFE Magazine joined Errol Flynn (1909–1959)—the swashbuckling leading man of The Adventures of Robin Hood (1938)—aboard Flynn’s yacht, the Sirocco, to photograph him for a story about his spearfishing skills. Also present were stuntman Buster Wiles, crew members, and three young women. One of them, fifteen-year-old actress Peggy Satterlee, later accused Flynn of raping her. The case, unsurprisingly, created a media storm.”
Ten years ago director Michael Curtiz was looking for a particular type of girl for a picture, Puppies in Paris. His luck was poor until chance carried him to a performance of the “Follies Bergere.” In one of the specialty dancers, a girl glamorous and young, he saw the ideal type for the role. So he hired her — and that is how Lili Damita got her start in pictures.
Today, in the Warners Brothers film, Captain Blood, Curtis is preparing to give another untried player, Errol Flynn, his first big chance at film fame. Flynn is married to Lili Damita.