Arts Entertainment
Silver Screen Simchas
Author's passion for haute couture
takes her into the dressing rooms
of Hollywood brides.
ALICE BURDICK SCHWEIGER
Special to the Jewish News
ver since she was a child, Sandy Schreier
has had a fascination with weddings, bridal
gowns and Hollywood's portrayal of matri-
mony. As she pursued a career in fashion
and began collecting rare couture and film costumes,
her interest in nuptial ceremonies and bridal garb
only intensified.
Now, Schreier takes her curiosity one step further
in a new book, Hollywood Gets Married (Clarkson
Potter Publishers, $29.95), to be released May 21.
On June 2 at 3 p.m., the Book Beat in Oak Park
will host the author in a book signing. And wedding
cake will be served.
Hollywood Gets Married is a pictorial history that
uses detailed captions and anecdotes to highlight
some of the most glamorous on- and off-screen wed-
dings of the 20th century.
"While doing research for my first book, [1998's]
Hollywood Dressed and Undressed, I came across lots
of information about celebrity weddings," says
Schreier, who lives in metro Detroit.
"I also have seen the return of marriage — rather
than just relationships — and noticed a general
interest about weddings and celebrities. So I thought
it would be a great book."
Heimish Hollywood
Top to bottom: Judy Benjamin (Goldie Hawn)
marries lawyer Yale Goodman (Albert Brooks) in
the 1980 comedy "Private Benjamin" — Schreier's
favorite onscreen Jewish wedding.
Barbara Streisand, playing Fanny Brice, wears an
Irene Sharaff creation in this scene from 1968's
"Funny Girl."
Arthur Miller and Marilyn Monroe at their real-
lift wedding, June 29, 1956 Before the wedding,
Marilyn took conversion classes from a rabbi and
learned to cook chopped liver from Miller's mother.
5/17
2002
80
Katharine Ross in a flowing gown being pulled
away by Dustin Hoffman in The Graduate; Sarah
Jessica Parker taking her vows with Nicolas Cage in
Honeymoon in Vegas; Barbra Streisand as a pregnant
bride in Funny Girl — these are just some of the
movie weddings in Hollywood Gets Married.
"To put the book together, Schreier combed
though thousands of celebrity wedding photos,
spoke to a slew of costume designers and
watched countless old movies. In the process,
she made an interesting discovery — the influ-
ence of Jews.
To begin with, the motion picture industry
wouldn't exist without the Jewish people," she
says. "Secondly, the starters of the film industry
were Jews in the fashion world.
"Adolph Zukor was a furrier, Louis B. Mayer was
a button dealer and Samuel Goldwyn was a glove
manufacturer. They all came from the shtetls of
Eastern Europe and wound up in New York's rag
trade.
"When they went to Hollywood, they didn't
know anything about making a movie, but they
knew about making beautiful clothes. And that's
why costumes became a major asset on the silver
screen.
There were wedding scenes in every movie, even
westerns and mysteries, says Schreier, "because they
were selling the wedding gowns seen on the screen.
Those gowns were pictured in magazines, and manufac-
turers would buy the rights to make those gowns and the
founding fathers of the film industry were profiting."
Being Jewish and married herself, Schreier, who wed
lawyer Sherwin Schreier at Adat Shalom Synagogue in
the 1950s, particularly enjoyed writing about wed-
dings of famous real-life Jews.
"I think Marilyn Monroe and Arthur Miller's mar-
riage was fascinating," she says. "Arthur wore a yar-
mulke, they got married by a rabbi, and the reception
was a barbecue in the back yard of his parents' house.
"Marilyn converted and moved in with his par-
ents, and Mrs. Miller taught Marilyn to make
chopped liver and gefilte fish. In fact, Marilyn had
such a great relationship with his parents, that even
after Mrs. Miller died, Marilyn continued to visit
Mr. Miller senior and he became her confidant."
Norma Schearer and Irving Thalberg were real-life
bride and groom in another of the book's Jewish
weddings. "She was the queen of MGM and he was
the vice president," Schreier says. "His best man was
[studio head] Louis B. Mayer, and for a wedding gift
he gave them an enormous check plus a three-Month
European honeymoon."
Elizabeth Taylor, with eight marriages, "is the queen
of Jewish weddings," says Schreier, who put Taylor on
the cover. "After she converted for Mike Todd, she
continued to have Jewish weddings. She even made
John Warner wear a yarmulke — they had an
Episcopal ceremony and a honeymoon in Israel!"
As for the best Jewish wedding in a movie,
Schreier's favorite is Goldie Hawn and Albert
Brooks' in Private Benjamin. They had a
Conservative Jewish wedding and Goldie wore a
1980s gown that was purchased at Bendel's by the
costume designer."
The Ever-Evolving Wedding
Wedding styles have indeed changed over the
years, says Schreier.
"Weddings reflect real life," she points out. "In the
Below: Sandy Schreier
in a 1950s photo
that accompanied
her wedding
announcement in
the Jewish News.
Above: The cover photo of
"Hollywood Gets Married"
features Elizabeth Taylor in
"Father of the Bride," wear-
ing a Helen Rose wedding
gown. Schreier refers to
Taylor as "the queen of
Jewish brides."