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Happy Times
Hundreds of celebrity photographs from Jerome Zerbe's archive of 50,000 are compiled here, with commentary by New Yorker writer Brendan Gill. Includes casual photos of Howard Hughes, Gloria Swanson, Noel Coward, Doris Duke, Gypsy Rose Lee, Tennessee Williams, Jean Harlow, Gary Cooper, Humprey Bogart, Kirk Douglas, Clark Gable, Greta Garbo, Maria Callas, Cary Grant, Carole Lombard, Grace Kelly, Ingrid Bergman, Gene Tierney, Buster Keaton, Thomas Wolfe, , Marilyn Monroe, and many others.
288 pages, Hardcover
First published January 1, 1973
12 people want to read
About the author
Brendan Gill
75 books15 followersBrendan Gill (October 4, 1914 – December 27, 1997) wrote for The New Yorker for more than 60 years. He also contributed film criticism for Film Comment and wrote a popular book about his time at the New Yorker magazine.
Biography[edit]
Born in Hartford, Connecticut, Gill attended the Kingswood-Oxford School before graduating in 1936 from Yale University, where he was a member of Skull and Bones.[1]:127 He was a long-time resident of Bronxville, New York, and Norfolk, Connecticut.
In 1936 The New Yorker editor St. Clair McKelway hired Gill as a writer.[2] One of the publication's few writers to serve under its first four editors, he wrote more than 1,200 pieces for the magazine. These included Profiles, Talk of the Town features, and scores of reviews of Broadway and Off-Broadway theater productions.[3] As The New Yorker's main architecture critic from 1987 to 1996, he wrote the long-running "Skyline" column before Paul Goldberger took his place.
A champion of architectural preservation and other visual arts, Gill joined Jacqueline Kennedy's coalition to preserve and restore New York's Grand Central Terminal. He also chaired the Andy Warhol Foundation for the Visual Arts and authored 15 books, including Here at The New Yorker and the iconoclastic Frank Lloyd Wright biography Many Masks.
Gill was a good friend of actor Sir Rex Harrison and was among the speakers who memorialized the legendary star of the musical My Fair Lady at his memorial service in New York City in 1990.
Death[edit]
Brendan Gill died of natural causes in 1997, at the age of 83. In a New Yorker "Postscript" following Gill's death, John Updike described him as “avidly alert to the power of art in general.”[3]
Legacy[edit]
Gill's son, Michael Gates Gill, is the author of How Starbucks Saved My Life: A Son of Privilege Learns to Live Like Everyone Else.[4] His youngest son, Charles Gill, is the author of the novel The Boozer Challenge.
Offices held[edit]
Chairman of the Andy Warhol Foundation for the Visual Arts
Chairman of the Municipal Art Society
Chairman of the New York Landmarks Conservancy
Vice President of the American Academy of Arts and Letters
Works[edit]
This list is incomplete; you can help by expanding it.
Books[edit]
The Day the Money Stopped (1957)
The Trouble of One House (1951)
Fair Land to Build in: The Architecture of the Empire State (1984)
The Dream Come True: Great Houses of Los Angeles (1980)
Lindbergh Alone - May 21, 1927 (1980)
Summer Places (with Dudley Whitney Hill) (1978)
Ways of Loving (short stories) (1974).
Tallulah (Tallulah Bankhead biography) (1972)
Cole Porter (Cole Porter biography) (1972)
New York Life: Of Friends and Others
The introduction to Portable Dorothy Parker (Dorothy Parker collection of her stories & columns) (1972)
Late Bloomers
Here at The New Yorker (1975)
Many Masks: A Life of Frank Lloyd Wright (1987)
Articles[edit]
Gill, Brendan (15 January 1949). "The Talk of the Town: Runaway". The New Yorker. 24 (47): 22–23. I Can Hear it Now - album of speeches and news broadcasts, 1932-45 (with Spencer Klaw).
Gill, Brendan (4 February 1950). "The Talk of the Town: The Wildest People". The New Yorker. 25 (50): 21–22. Transit Radio, Inc.
Gill, Brendan (4 February 1950). "The Talk of the Town: Improvisation". The New Yorker. 25 (50): 25. Hiding telephone lines in the ivy at Princeton (with M. Galt).
Gill, Brendan (14 January 1985). "The Theatre: The Ignominy of Boyhood". The New Yorker. 60 (48): 108–110. Reviews Bill C. Davis' "Dancing in the End Zone", James Duff's "Home Front" and Rodgers and Hammerstein's "The King and I".
Gill, Brendan (28 January 1985). "The Talk of the Town: Notes and Comment". The New Yorker. 60 (50): 19–20. West 44th Street development.
Biography[edit]
Born in Hartford, Connecticut, Gill attended the Kingswood-Oxford School before graduating in 1936 from Yale University, where he was a member of Skull and Bones.[1]:127 He was a long-time resident of Bronxville, New York, and Norfolk, Connecticut.
In 1936 The New Yorker editor St. Clair McKelway hired Gill as a writer.[2] One of the publication's few writers to serve under its first four editors, he wrote more than 1,200 pieces for the magazine. These included Profiles, Talk of the Town features, and scores of reviews of Broadway and Off-Broadway theater productions.[3] As The New Yorker's main architecture critic from 1987 to 1996, he wrote the long-running "Skyline" column before Paul Goldberger took his place.
A champion of architectural preservation and other visual arts, Gill joined Jacqueline Kennedy's coalition to preserve and restore New York's Grand Central Terminal. He also chaired the Andy Warhol Foundation for the Visual Arts and authored 15 books, including Here at The New Yorker and the iconoclastic Frank Lloyd Wright biography Many Masks.
Gill was a good friend of actor Sir Rex Harrison and was among the speakers who memorialized the legendary star of the musical My Fair Lady at his memorial service in New York City in 1990.
Death[edit]
Brendan Gill died of natural causes in 1997, at the age of 83. In a New Yorker "Postscript" following Gill's death, John Updike described him as “avidly alert to the power of art in general.”[3]
Legacy[edit]
Gill's son, Michael Gates Gill, is the author of How Starbucks Saved My Life: A Son of Privilege Learns to Live Like Everyone Else.[4] His youngest son, Charles Gill, is the author of the novel The Boozer Challenge.
Offices held[edit]
Chairman of the Andy Warhol Foundation for the Visual Arts
Chairman of the Municipal Art Society
Chairman of the New York Landmarks Conservancy
Vice President of the American Academy of Arts and Letters
Works[edit]
This list is incomplete; you can help by expanding it.
Books[edit]
The Day the Money Stopped (1957)
The Trouble of One House (1951)
Fair Land to Build in: The Architecture of the Empire State (1984)
The Dream Come True: Great Houses of Los Angeles (1980)
Lindbergh Alone - May 21, 1927 (1980)
Summer Places (with Dudley Whitney Hill) (1978)
Ways of Loving (short stories) (1974).
Tallulah (Tallulah Bankhead biography) (1972)
Cole Porter (Cole Porter biography) (1972)
New York Life: Of Friends and Others
The introduction to Portable Dorothy Parker (Dorothy Parker collection of her stories & columns) (1972)
Late Bloomers
Here at The New Yorker (1975)
Many Masks: A Life of Frank Lloyd Wright (1987)
Articles[edit]
Gill, Brendan (15 January 1949). "The Talk of the Town: Runaway". The New Yorker. 24 (47): 22–23. I Can Hear it Now - album of speeches and news broadcasts, 1932-45 (with Spencer Klaw).
Gill, Brendan (4 February 1950). "The Talk of the Town: The Wildest People". The New Yorker. 25 (50): 21–22. Transit Radio, Inc.
Gill, Brendan (4 February 1950). "The Talk of the Town: Improvisation". The New Yorker. 25 (50): 25. Hiding telephone lines in the ivy at Princeton (with M. Galt).
Gill, Brendan (14 January 1985). "The Theatre: The Ignominy of Boyhood". The New Yorker. 60 (48): 108–110. Reviews Bill C. Davis' "Dancing in the End Zone", James Duff's "Home Front" and Rodgers and Hammerstein's "The King and I".
Gill, Brendan (28 January 1985). "The Talk of the Town: Notes and Comment". The New Yorker. 60 (50): 19–20. West 44th Street development.
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Displaying 1 - 3 of 3 reviews
June 12, 2020
The stars are for the photographs. Not many of those are interesting as photographs (Zerbe wasn't trying to make art outside of the architectural photos, and they are meh), but as a record of the mid-20th century celebrity he certainly was present. There are photos of cafe society, including figures whose names probably mean nothing today: Brenda Frazier, Cholly Knickerbocker, Mrs. Hamilton Fish, Lucius Beebe. There are photos of Hollywood in the Golden Age. None of them are particularly striking, but it does give one pause to see Marlon Brando, Jimmy Stewart, Paul Newman and Gary Cooper all sitting on the same couch or at the same nightclub. Zerbe took his camera everywhere, and no one seemed to mind. There are two startling snaps of Greta Garbo at a party after her retirement from movies. She is obviously aware that Zerbe is taking her picture, doesn't care for it, but also doesn't stop him. So if the people of high society or the film industry between 1933 and 1973 interest you, the photos are engrossing enough.
It is Brendan Gill's incredibly bitchy commentary that spoils the book. He is the master of the veiled insult, and he dishes them out on almost every page. The jibes themselves lack all wit, although it is clear from Gill's smug tone that he is amusing himself. But for a grown man to insult a woman's shoes, or dress . . . and this kind of nonsense goes on from the beginning to the end, making it a dreary read. Gill also has mixed emotions about Zerbe himself, making lordly fun of his origins and social pretensions while at the same time clearly envious of the indisputable evidence that his friends liked Zerbe. Gill also manages a few potshots at the occasional New Yorker colleague who pops up. The book was published during the Here at the New Yorker Gill autobiography fracas that set Gill against a lot of literati, and from which he did not emerge covered in glory.
The meanest section deals with Lucius Beebe, unknown by most today. He was what used to be referred to as a boulevardier, although to read Gill's account of his life one would think the only thing he accomplished was a reputation for being well-dressed. I looked him up, and lo! Not only was Beebe what used to be referred to as a "confirmed batchelor", he had had a relationship with Zerbe. Gill drops veiled references to Beebe's sexuality throughout his waspish treatment. I hope this was not with Zerbe's approval. I fear it was. As I said, Gill's awful text nearly spoiled any pleasure I took in the pictures.
Only if you are interested in the period, and then I recommend you don't bother reading it. Just look at the pictures, and keep your opinions about shoes to yourself.
It is Brendan Gill's incredibly bitchy commentary that spoils the book. He is the master of the veiled insult, and he dishes them out on almost every page. The jibes themselves lack all wit, although it is clear from Gill's smug tone that he is amusing himself. But for a grown man to insult a woman's shoes, or dress . . . and this kind of nonsense goes on from the beginning to the end, making it a dreary read. Gill also has mixed emotions about Zerbe himself, making lordly fun of his origins and social pretensions while at the same time clearly envious of the indisputable evidence that his friends liked Zerbe. Gill also manages a few potshots at the occasional New Yorker colleague who pops up. The book was published during the Here at the New Yorker Gill autobiography fracas that set Gill against a lot of literati, and from which he did not emerge covered in glory.
The meanest section deals with Lucius Beebe, unknown by most today. He was what used to be referred to as a boulevardier, although to read Gill's account of his life one would think the only thing he accomplished was a reputation for being well-dressed. I looked him up, and lo! Not only was Beebe what used to be referred to as a "confirmed batchelor", he had had a relationship with Zerbe. Gill drops veiled references to Beebe's sexuality throughout his waspish treatment. I hope this was not with Zerbe's approval. I fear it was. As I said, Gill's awful text nearly spoiled any pleasure I took in the pictures.
Only if you are interested in the period, and then I recommend you don't bother reading it. Just look at the pictures, and keep your opinions about shoes to yourself.
January 7, 2026
How did I not know of this fellow Zerbe! The OG paparazzo of Old Hollywood, Jerome Zerbe put together this great collection of his work, with posed and candid shots of celebs—plus a few politicians, WWII at sea, and more. I got lucky that my local library had it (they had to pull it from storage!); you may find it on Amazon and eBay in various conditions and prices. This Zerbe says: Check it out!
August 28, 2014
There are some great photos in here. Interestingly enough, no explanation of why he has so many famous actors of the 1930's taking showers at his house? It's all got a "don't ask, don't tell" kind of vibe to it. It is great to take such a journey through this time period.
Displaying 1 - 3 of 3 reviews