#tyrone power

Some day I will show all the motherfuckers who say I was a success just because of my pretty face. Sometimes I wish I had a really bad car accident so my face would get smashed up and I’d look like Eddie Constantine. It’s so tiring being everybody’s darling boy at my age … I know I’ve been lucky, that things have gone almost too smoothly career-wise. What I resent about it is that it is all built on a pretty face. Hollywood was such a crazy place, made you feel terrific at times. You felt you could achieve anything because you were treated like a god. But it sure was a bum place too. When you saw the new faces queuing up, like bloody comets, who would strike the screen and leave an old worshiped star obsolete in no time. Nobody will ever understand what this did to people, how it destroyed them, made them hollow … Jesus Christ, I don’t want to become an ageless matinée idol, having to keep up my looks, lift my chin like Marlene and never dare smile in case my face cracks. - Tyrone Power

Here’s 5 to watch this week during TCM’s Summer Under the Stars lineup.

1. The Big Heat (1953) at 8 pm ET/5 pm PT Tuesday, Aug. 17: Gloria Grahame’s SUTS day is filled with noir riches. Basically, you can tune in any time during the afternoon or evening for a classic crime film (full schedule here: https://summer.tcm.com/ ), but if you have to pick just one, make it director Fritz Lang’s police procedural in which Grahame plays a disfigured mob moll seeking vengeance.

2. The Candidate (1972) at 1:15 pm ET/10:15 am ET Wednesday, Aug. 18: Robert Redford has starred in/directed several first-rate political films, but this cinema verite classic about a charismatic but vacuous Senate candidate is one of the best films airing during August. It anticipates our own image-driven age, and the final scene is a damning portrait of a man without a moral center (or any morals at all, really).

3. Late Autumn (1960) at 1:30 pm ET/10:30 am ET Thursday, Aug. 19: This beautifully filmed Japanese drama stars SUTS honoree Setsuko Hara as a widow who is trying to find a husband for her daughter (Yoko Tsukasa). Late Autumn is very specific to Japanese culture, but it also has universal themes of love, friendship, and family, and Hara is an actor who can break your heart with just one glance.

4. A Woman Rebels (1936) at 9 am ET/6 am PT Saturday, Aug. 21: Katharine Hepburn’s SUTS day is filled with all-time favorites like Bringing Up Baby (12:15 pm ET) and Desk Set (8 pm ET). However, if you’re looking for something a little different, tune in to this costume drama about the triumphs and travails of an independent Victorian woman. Kate is at her fiery, feminist best; plus, it’s the screen debut of Friday’s SUTS honoree, Van Heflin.

5. The Mark of Zorro (1940) at 10:15 pm ET/7:15 pm PT Sunday, Aug. 22: There’s no better way to wrap up your weekend than with a little classic-movie escapism courtesy of swashbuckling star Tyrone Power. A breathtaking Linda Darnell plays Power’s love interest, and Basil Rathbone is in peak villain mode.

Tyrone PowerinThe Rains Came (Clarence Brown, 1939)

Nightmare Alley (1947)

Director - Edmund Goulding, Cinematography - Lee Garmes

“Throughout the ages man has sought to look behind the veil that hides him from tomorrow. And through the ages certain men have looked into the polished crystal and seen. Is it some quality of the crystal itself? Or does the gazer merely use it to turn his gaze inward? Who knows? But visions come. Slowly shifting their form. Visions come.”