Is it possible to overdose on Gary Cooper? I’m preparing to find out this weekend. The following things came to me in the mail today:
* Saratoga Trunk (1946), co-starring Ingrid Bergman. This is one of the Warner Archive movies that’s been on my wish list for a while now. I can’t wait to watch it!
* The Gary Cooper Collection, containing five movies: Design for Living, The Lives of a Bengal Lancer, Peter Ibbetson, The General Died at Dawn, and Beau Geste. Over 8 hours of Coop at his 1930s prettiest! It would’ve been worth the $19 for Design for Living alone. That movie is perfection.
* Cooper’s Women by Jane Ellen Wayne, a book I’m embarrassed to have purchased even though it was a cheap used copy. It’s so trashy, it really is! I knew as soon as I read this review and excerpt by Sheila O’Malley that I would have to track it down, however. Cooper’s Women is a gossipy accounting of his many love affairs, written in a way that at times has an almost fanfiction-y vibe. Oh, I’m so ashamed! Honestly though, it’s hard not to have at least a little bit of prurient interest in Cooper, given his insanely good looks and his legendary status with the ladies. Let’s just say that acting wasn’t the only thing at which he excelled.
* Gary Cooper Off Camera: A Daughter Remembers by Maria Cooper Janis, with an introduction by Tom Hanks. This is a touching, lovingly written tribute to Cooper by his daughter, full of beautiful photos. Reading this sweet book will, I hope, make me feel less guilty about reading Cooper’s Women. Heh.
So far this is one of my favorite pictures from the book – Gary Cooper crossing a stream in Sun Valley while on a hunting trip with Ernest Hemingway, 1941.
What a great photograph by Robert Capa. Cooper displays such an attractive blend of masculinity and gracefulness. There are many hunters in my part of the country, but I’ve never seen any of them looking one iota as dapper and well dressed when heading out to shoot and fish, that’s for sure!
Yeah, I’m pretty smitten. Brace yourself for more crazy Coop chat – I’m sure it’s coming.
Happy Thoughts, Darling 
