JOHNNY WEISSMULLER BEFORE TARZAN – SWIMMING CHAMPION 1928

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6 Comments

  1. George Kaplan
    June 27, 2013

    Great picture, there’s just something about swimming pool shots that seems to *work* perhaps it’s the way light plays shimmeringly and glimmeringly on the rippling or placid surface… Of course, I prefer pictures of *women* in pools rather than men! 😉 Bwahahaha! Naughty…
    Tarzan, him swim well, me only hope rubber crocodile not menace him… Of all the athletes and sporting “stars” that Hollywood recruited to the dream factory, Johnny Weissmuller really hit on a character who was perfect for him (altho’ he’s apparently somewhat removed from the books’ Ape Man), no complex speeches just likeability, fun quasi-dumb dialogue, and physicality. I recall watching those picures as a child. Good memories. Ar-ah-arr-ah-arh-AH-ARR!

    • June 27, 2013

      Could it be? I hear the call of the jungle? Those boys (Buster and Johnny) really should have stuck to a life of coaching – but you’re right the movies are fun, if dopey!

  2. June 27, 2013

    Dearest V
    Being known to participate in la natation myself in younger times, you have hit on something of a hero of mine here.
    How apt to feature another aquatic artist so soon after Esther’s sad demise too.
    Yours ever
    The Perfumed Dandy

    • June 27, 2013

      My mom used to call me a water baby and splashing across a pool, day or night, is still one of my favorite places to be. Could we be the La Natation Twins? What scent says a glorious plunge in the pool??? Inquiring minds 😉

      • June 27, 2013

        Dearest V
        This is a question that I have given a lot of thought to!
        Though for many years on account of spending so much time in the water I smelt mainly of eau de chlorine.
        I think it rather depends on the pool and context, though a nice villa in Provence with a rectangle of azure must surely smell of Hermes Jardin Med…
        Oh yes indeedy we can be ‘les jumeaux de la natation”… shall we synchronise.
        Yours ever
        The Perfumed Dandy

  3. June 27, 2013

    From my mother’s travel letters, dated 18 June 1949; she and my father are travelling (as tourists) on a copra boat around some Fiji islands. They have reached Nabouwalu and my mother writes: ” They are having their first picture show here tonight. It’s ” Tarzan and his Mate” Adults 2/9 (shillings) and children (1/9). I guess the picture will cause a stir.” I bet it did but, at those prices, I wonder how many could afford to watch.

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