Vagabond Dreams Come True

New York, NY: E. P. Dutton & Co., Inc, 1930. Signed limited Large Paper edition. Number 297 of 299. Hardcover. Good/Clear plastic DJ. Hal Phyfe (frontis photograph). [2],262, [4] pages. Illustrations. Includes poem Husband's Lament by Marjorie C. Divan. Both signed and inscribed by Vallee on the large paper limited edition page. The inscription reads: To D. P. Wooley with my best wishes, Rudy Vallee, December 1930. A black and white copyrighted photograph of Rudy Vallee by Hal Phyfe has been laid in (same image as the frontis illustration). The book is in a plastic sleeve. Cover has some wear and soiling. Vall�e became the most prominent and, arguably, the first of a new style of popular singer, the crooner. Crooners had soft voices that were well suited to the intimacy of the medium of the radio. Vall�e's trombone-like vocal phrasing would inspire later crooners such as Bing Crosby, Frank Sinatra, and Perry Como to model their voices on jazz instruments. Vall�e also became what was perhaps the first complete example of the 20th century mass media pop star. Rudy Vallee was an American singer, actor, and radio host. He was one of the first modern pop stars of the teen idol type. In 1929, Vall�e made his first feature film, The Vagabond Lover for RKO Radio. His first films were made to cash in on his singing popularity. While his initial performances were rather wooden, his acting greatly improved in the late 1930s and 1940s, and by the time he began working with Preston Sturges in the 1940s, he had become a successful comedic supporting player. He appeared opposite Claudette Colbert in Sturges's 1942 screwball comedy The Palm Beach Story. Other films in which he appeared include I Remember Mama, Unfaithfully Yours and The Bachelor and the Bobby-Soxer. In 1955, Vall�e was featured in Gentlemen Marry Brunettes, co-starring Jane Russell, Alan Young, and Jeanne Crain. The production was filmed on location in Paris. The film was based on the Anita Loos novel that was a sequel to her acclaimed Gentlemen Prefer Blondes. Gentlemen Marry Brunettes was popular throughout Europe at the time and was released in France as A Paris Pour les Quatre ("Paris for the Four"), and in Belgium as Tevieren Te Parijs. Vall�e performed on Broadway as J.B. Biggley in the 1961 musical How to Succeed in Business Without Really Trying and reprised the role in the 1967 film version. He appeared in the 1960s Batman television show as the villain Lord Marmaduke Ffogg and in 1971 as a vindictive surgeon in the Night Gallery episode "Marmalade Wine".

Hal Phyfe was trained as a sculptor in France and a painter in Italy, Hal Phyfe began pursuing photography an an enlistee in World War I. During the 1920s he built a reputation for his theatrical portraiture shot on commission for various magazines. He became the principal photographer for Florenz Ziegfeld during 1930-31. He became famous for his dictum that no smiles were allowed during sittings. Phyfe's notorious eccentricity of dress extended to wearing moccasins instead of shoes and dressing down in denim at debutante balls during that period when he was official photographer to High Society. As adept at portraying men as women, Phyfe produced some of the most dynamic male portraits of the late 1920s. He preferred not to portray performers in costume. A master of middle grays, his exhibition and portfolio prints of the late 1920s display exquisitely refined shading. During the late 1920s he indulged in the penchant among New York portraitists to vignette heads. There would be strong graphic intervention at the perimeters of the image, suggesting a drawing. In the 1930s he opted for a straighter style of portraiture, full body, often with the subject seated. His Society portraits of the 1930s are well posed and understated, suggesting refinement rather than ostentation. His popularity among Hollywood performers derives from his disinclination to overstate elegance. He signed original prints in red crayon in distinctive squared letters. His Hollywood portraits are signed on the negative in white.