Hedda Hopper

[lovegod]

How did such a charming, inoffensive old lady

have such power over the top movie stars of the day ?

they were all terrified of losing favour with her....

go here

YouTube - Hedda Hopper on What's My Line?

[will.15]

I'm going to do thia without looking it up, but I believe there was a TV movie with Jane Alexander as Hedda Hopper and Elizabeth Taylor as Louella Parsons.

[Chris B]

yes there was it was very good , called "MALICE IN WONDERLAND"



Struggling actress Hedda Hopper can't get a break in Hollywood, even though an acquaintence of hers is the extremely powerful gossip monger Louella Parsons - maker and breaker of careers (and lives) through her daily syndicated newspaper column. The big movie moguls, fed up with Parson's power over their stars, decide to de-claw her by setting up gossip Hopper as a competitor in the rumour industry. What they couldn't forsee was that Hopper would become as big as Parsons -- and every bit as much of a pain. Based on the true life stories of two of the most powerful (and arguably dangerous) women of Hollywood's hay-day.

[christoph404]

She didn't have power over Spencer Tracey, he literally kicked her backside when he ran into her at a restaurant , he was none too pleased about an article she had written about his relationship with Hepburn. I think she got a fair amount of hate mail signed by notable actors for the lurid and usually untrue gossip she promoted in her column. As a fervent anti communist she certainly didn't hold back in persecuting and trying to ruin celebs who she felt had left wing views. ( ie "Commies")

[Ray]

Joan Bennett once sent her a skunk on Valentine's Day, and the usually sedate Joseph Cotten kicked her in the behind, so I guess she wasn't that charming an old lady.



She played a gossip columnist in The Women and herself in the last 5 minutes of Sunset Boulevard.



Her son William Hopper played Natalie Wood's father in Rebel Without a Cause, and was in over 250 episodes of the TV series, Perry Mason.

[Santonix]

She can be seen at the end of 'Sunset Boulevard' phoning through her story to her newspaper about Norma Desmond. William her son, as Ray points out, was a regular in the Perry Mason tv series, he played Paul Drake.

[Gerald Lovell]

She can be seen in her pre-gossip rag days in such fare as Dracula's Daughter (no, she didn't play the title role) and Tarzan's Revenge.

[Moor Larkin]

name='lovegod']How did such a charming, inoffensive old lady

have such power over the top movie stars of the day ?

they were all terrified of losing favour with her....

go here

YouTube - Hedda Hopper on What's My Line?

Same reason as Walter Winchell I guess...........







No.......... I can't figure it out either. I guess they were cool at the time ...........