Here’s something to tide us over until Karlie Kloss and husband Josh Kushner launch their planned reboot of Life magazine. On Aug. 27, Taschen’s Life. Hollywood will be available for purchase — a stunning compendium of more than 600 Tinseltown images, carefully selected from the seminal photography magazine’s archives and spanning the industry’s Golden Age (1936-72).
A must-have for Hollywood history buffs, it’s a two-volume blockbuster that traces the rise of the film business, intertwined with Life’s own cultural ascendancy. (Before the introduction of television, Life served as a window to the world for Americans, one in three of whom were readers.) Life’s first movie star cover was Jean Harlow in 1937. It then ran more than 200 Hollywood-related covers until 1972, most of which are featured in the book, which includes introductory texts by photography critic Lucy Sante, captions by film historian Justin Humphreys and the work of more than 70 legendary Life photographers, among them Alfred Eisenstaedt and Margaret Bourke-White capturing the likes of Bette Davis, Elizabeth Taylor, Marlon Brando, Clark Gable, Steve McQueen, Sophia Loren, Alfred Hitchcock, Sidney Poitier, Paul Newman, Jane Fonda and Brigitte Bardot in their natural habitats: at Oscar ceremonies, on soundstages and lounging around glamorous filming locations across the globe. Cost of the book is $250.
Marilyn Monroe attended by a “flock of fixers,” as Life captioned it, while filming 1960’s Let’s Make Love.
John Bryson, MGM Studios, 1960. © Getty Images
Jayne Mansfiield in her famed Pink Palace in Holmby Hills in 1960.
Allan Grant/TI Gotham, Inc. © Life Picture Collection, Meredith Operations Corporation
Sammy Davis Jr. on the set of 1959’s Porgy and Bess.
Gjon Mili, Samuel Goldwyn Studios, 1959. TI Gotham, Inc. © Life Picture Collection, Meredith Operations Corporation
This story first appeared in the August 14 issue of The Hollywood Reporter magazine. Click here to subscribe.