Brooke Davis (![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png)
gobrookeyourself) wrote in ![[community profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/community.png)
fandomhigh2018-10-21 08:46 pm
gobrookeyourself) wrote in fandomhigh2018-10-21 08:46 pm
Entry tags:
Badass Women You Should Know- Monday- 2nd period
Guess what, class! It was Movie Day With a Purpose again! The TV was out, and there was Brooke at the head of the class.
"Hope everybody had a great homecoming. Now it's back to work," Brooke said, and looked back at the TV. "Relative work. Today we're going to be talking about Hedy Lamarr, who, if you've heard of it, it's probably because of her acting career. She was born across the Atlantic in Austria in 1914, with the name Hedwig Eva Maria Kiesler. She was an only child born to Jewish parents, though her mother coverted to Catholicism. Hedy won a beauty contest when she was twelve and was interested in acting, and was in Berlin by the age of sixteen to get into the business professionally. And when she was eighteen she was cast in a movie called Ecstasy, which became this big deal because she had a sex scene, which she said she was duped into making. It even got banned in America because things were way different back then.
Then she met an arms dealer named Friedrich Mandi and ended up marrying him, because he was apparently charming and super rich. He also had ties to a couple dictators, and this all ended up being a giant mistake. He was embarrassed about the movie she'd made and banned her from acting, and he was a controlling monster so she ended up fleeing to Paris to get away from him. After that she got to London, where she met the head of MGM Studios, who offered her money to work for them. She turned him down, then followed him to get in touch with him later and get a higher salary. Baller move," Brooke said approvingly. "She changed her name to get some distance from the movie that made her famous for a supposedly bad reason and came to America to start acting here, usually getting typecast as the exotic seductress, when apparently she really was not that in real life. And when World War II started, and the Nazis were rounding up Jewish people into concentration camps in Europe, Hedy wanted to do more for the war effort. Her father was dead by then, but she was able to help her mother escape Austria and brought her here, and she wanted to help by joining the National Inventors Council, but was talked out of it, being told that she could use her voice better to help sell war bonds.
"Here's the thing, though: she was totally good at science. See, when she was married to the Nazi jerk, he'd bring her along to meetings and she'd start talking to the scientists there, and figured out she liked it. She was self-taught and as a hobby would do things like design better stoplights. She dated Howard Hughes, and aviation tycoon, and recommended streamlining his aircrafts because she saw what fast birds and fish looked like. He supported her hobby, and assigned a team of science engineers to do whatever she wanted. And Hedy was uncomfortable being out in Hollywood, making money, while all this terrible stuff was happening, so she figured out that radio-controller torpedoes could be jammed and sent off course, because thanks to all her time with munitions people she knew how all that stuff worked. She and her friend George Anthell got the technology patented, but they couldn't find a way to implement it for World War II, but hey, they did figure it out by 1962, right around the time of the Cuban Missile Crisis.
"She acted for a few more years, but her movies started flopping, and she started a production company but didn't have a lot of experience there so it didn't go well. Her later years before she died in 2000 aren't very happy, with estranged kids and attempts to get her career back on track. So we'll focus on the better stuff. She and George Anthell were awarded the-" Out came a notecard. "-Electronic Frontier Foundation Pioneer Award, which was basically a lifetime achievement award. And in 2014, they were posthumously inducted into the National Inventors Hall of Fame, because as it turns out, all the work they did ended up becoming the basis for Wifi, and Bluetooth Technology. So the phones you use everyday to keep in contact with people and get information? That's thanks to her.
"And I was going to give a technology-based activity and then I figured you already have phones, and also I couldn't come up with one," Brooke admitted. "So we're going to watch a movie of hers from 1949 called Samson and Delilah. I think it's a Bible thing? I don't know. Just enjoy it."
"Hope everybody had a great homecoming. Now it's back to work," Brooke said, and looked back at the TV. "Relative work. Today we're going to be talking about Hedy Lamarr, who, if you've heard of it, it's probably because of her acting career. She was born across the Atlantic in Austria in 1914, with the name Hedwig Eva Maria Kiesler. She was an only child born to Jewish parents, though her mother coverted to Catholicism. Hedy won a beauty contest when she was twelve and was interested in acting, and was in Berlin by the age of sixteen to get into the business professionally. And when she was eighteen she was cast in a movie called Ecstasy, which became this big deal because she had a sex scene, which she said she was duped into making. It even got banned in America because things were way different back then.
Then she met an arms dealer named Friedrich Mandi and ended up marrying him, because he was apparently charming and super rich. He also had ties to a couple dictators, and this all ended up being a giant mistake. He was embarrassed about the movie she'd made and banned her from acting, and he was a controlling monster so she ended up fleeing to Paris to get away from him. After that she got to London, where she met the head of MGM Studios, who offered her money to work for them. She turned him down, then followed him to get in touch with him later and get a higher salary. Baller move," Brooke said approvingly. "She changed her name to get some distance from the movie that made her famous for a supposedly bad reason and came to America to start acting here, usually getting typecast as the exotic seductress, when apparently she really was not that in real life. And when World War II started, and the Nazis were rounding up Jewish people into concentration camps in Europe, Hedy wanted to do more for the war effort. Her father was dead by then, but she was able to help her mother escape Austria and brought her here, and she wanted to help by joining the National Inventors Council, but was talked out of it, being told that she could use her voice better to help sell war bonds.
"Here's the thing, though: she was totally good at science. See, when she was married to the Nazi jerk, he'd bring her along to meetings and she'd start talking to the scientists there, and figured out she liked it. She was self-taught and as a hobby would do things like design better stoplights. She dated Howard Hughes, and aviation tycoon, and recommended streamlining his aircrafts because she saw what fast birds and fish looked like. He supported her hobby, and assigned a team of science engineers to do whatever she wanted. And Hedy was uncomfortable being out in Hollywood, making money, while all this terrible stuff was happening, so she figured out that radio-controller torpedoes could be jammed and sent off course, because thanks to all her time with munitions people she knew how all that stuff worked. She and her friend George Anthell got the technology patented, but they couldn't find a way to implement it for World War II, but hey, they did figure it out by 1962, right around the time of the Cuban Missile Crisis.
"She acted for a few more years, but her movies started flopping, and she started a production company but didn't have a lot of experience there so it didn't go well. Her later years before she died in 2000 aren't very happy, with estranged kids and attempts to get her career back on track. So we'll focus on the better stuff. She and George Anthell were awarded the-" Out came a notecard. "-Electronic Frontier Foundation Pioneer Award, which was basically a lifetime achievement award. And in 2014, they were posthumously inducted into the National Inventors Hall of Fame, because as it turns out, all the work they did ended up becoming the basis for Wifi, and Bluetooth Technology. So the phones you use everyday to keep in contact with people and get information? That's thanks to her.
"And I was going to give a technology-based activity and then I figured you already have phones, and also I couldn't come up with one," Brooke admitted. "So we're going to watch a movie of hers from 1949 called Samson and Delilah. I think it's a Bible thing? I don't know. Just enjoy it."
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Listen to the lecture
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Didn't mean he wasn't paying attention, though. Some parts were new to him.
Re: Listen to the lecture
She was taking notes, here. If she was going to be stuck on this stupid planet, she'd probably want to better understand what it was she was stuck with, eventually.
Better understanding that stuff would help her better understand Hedy, too. Bonus.
Watch the movie
Talk to Brooke
OOC