Description
United Artists, Metropolitan Studios, Warner Brothers, and William Fox Studio are shown. Other major buildings include Grauman’s Chinese Theatre, the Beverly Hills Hotel, Hollywood High School, and the Japanese Villa. Mansions of actors, producers and directors are illustrated in Beverly Hills and Whigley Heights, including Pola Negri, Harold Lloyd, Raymond Griffith, Gloria Swanson, Ernst Lubitsch, and the married couple Mary Pickford and Douglas Fairbanks. Not coincidentally, Grieve had worked with many of these people. Throughout are comic strip balloons making fun of gossipy conversations, such as “Who is that who just came in?” “It’s either Mary or Pola.” Some lampoon industry work conversations such as, “And then come to a close up of a wilted flower,” on a building advertising “Write Scenarios, Make Big Money,” and another complaining, “The director spoiled my story.” The margins are decorated with references to the movies, celebrities, and the nearby mountains and orange groves. The upper left and right margins are decorated with frames of unspooled film and the lower margin illustrates a Western being shot on location.
Harold W. Grieve spent his entire life in Los Angeles, where he worked in the film industry and as an interior designer. After attending Hollywood High School and studying at the Francis Smith School of Illustration and Painting, he worked as a set designer, costume designer, and art director on several silent films during the 1920s. His credits included Ben-Hur, The Thief of Bagdad starring Douglas Fairbanks, and Lady Windermere’s Fan directed by Ernst Lubitsch. In the late 1920s he became an interior designer with many clients in the film industry such as George Burns and his wife Gracie Allen, Jack Benny, Bing Crosby, Ernst Lubitsch, Hal Roach, Raoul Walsh, and the couple Irving Thalberg and Norma Shearer. Grieve was a founding member of the Academy of Motion Picture Arts and Sciences, which has his papers in their archive.
Condition: Generally very good to fine, having bright colors, nonetheless with the usual overall light toning, handling, wear.
References:
“Finding Aid for the Harold Walter Grieve papers.” Online Archive of California. https://oac.cdlib.org/findaid/ark:/13030/kt5x0nf3mp/ (4 February 2022).
“Harold Grieve papers 1921-1977 (inclusive).” Academy of Motion Picture Arts and Sciences. 2022. https://collections.new.oscars.org/Details/Collection/663 (4 February 2022).
