May 15, 1900: The Lumière brothers dazzle audiences at the Paris World’s Fair with films projected onto an enormous 82′ x 49′ wide screen.
May 10, 1912: The screen’s earliest romantic pairing, Francis X. Bushman and Beverly Bayne, first gaze into each other’s eyes in The House of Pride.
May 11, 1927: The Academy of Motion Pictures Arts and Sciences is founded. There are 36 members, presided over by Douglas Fairbanks.
May 11, 1931: Germany’s first sound film, Fritz Lang‘s M, is released, featuring stage actor Peter Lorre in a chilling portrayal of a child murderer.
May 15, 1931: With The Public Enemy, starring newcomer James Cagney, and Little Caesar with Edward G. Robinson before it, Warners carves a niche in the gangster drama genre.
May 12, 1944: Roy Rogers makes his first movie with future wife Dale Evans, The Cowboy and the Señorita, but saves his screen kisses for Trigger.
May 10, 1948: Aviator, business mogul and part-time film producer Howard Hughes purchases RKO for a reported $8.8 million.
May 15, 1948: A U.S. Supreme Court ruling against “monopolistic practices” will, over the next two years, force studios to divest themselves of their theaters.
May 13, 1956: After leaving a dinner party given by Elizabeth Taylor, Montgomery Clift gets into a devastating car accident that seriously scars his face.
May 13, 1961: Screen star Gary Cooper, 60, in films from 1925’s The Vanishing American until this year’s The Naked Edge, dies of cancer.
May 11, 1963: An Italian court sentences director Pier Paolo Pasolini to four months suspended sentence for “public defamation” because of his work in RoGoPaG.
May 10, 1977: Joan Crawford (Article), star of Mildred Pierce and Johnny Guitar and famous Hollywood “mommie,” dies at the age of 73.
May 10, 1980: Teen-slayer Jason Voorhees, not yet wearing his trademark hockey mask, makes his screen debut in the original Friday the 13th.
May 12, 1987: Woody Allen and Ginger Rogers are among the Hollywood notables speaking out against the colorization of vintage films before Congress.
May 15, 1987: Hollywood wags will have a new synonym for “bomb” with the failure of the $40 million Warren Beatty–Dustin Hoffman (article) comedy Ishtar.
May 14, 1998: “The Voice” is finally silenced, as legendary singer and Oscar-winning actor Frank Sinatra faces the final curtain at age 82.