Happy Birthday, Handsome

Today marks what would've been the 101st birthday of All-American actor Henry Fonda, whose unforgettable roles in films like The Grapes of Wrath have forever emblazoned his as an easily-identifiable face of integrity and honesty in American culture. I have harbored a completely understandable crush on Hank since watching 12 Angry Men last fall (and Jezebel, and Fort Apache, and Mister Roberts, and Yours, Mine and Ours, and Sex and the Single Girl...). Okay, yeah, I admit it. I adore One-Take Fonda.

If you missed tuning in to TCM's half-hearted birthday tribute to Fonda this morning, then I suggest renting any of the aforementioned films along with such classics as The Ox-Bow Incident, Young Mr. Lincoln, and On Golden Pond. In honor of my paramour's 101st, I myself plan to lie poolside and skim through Fonda: My Life once again, watch Jezebel for the second time this week, and spend the money I've allocated for a security deposit on the Criterion Collection edition of The Lady Eve instead. Ahhh, summer.

Interestingly enough, Fonda's first wife, actress Margaret Sullavan, was also born on this day; she died in 1960 at the age of only 48.



"He moved me always, this reserved man. There was a reason he was a star." - Sidney Lumet on Henry Fonda