After a string of villainous roles, Clark Gable managed to land two of the most important roles throughout his acting career: a gangster who shoved Norma Shearer in A Free Soul (1931), and a plantation manager whose “unshaven love-making” with braless Jean Harlow in Red Dust (1932). These roles not only insured that Gable never played a supporting role again but also made him the biggest male star of MGM. He won his first Oscar Best Actor for It Happened One Night in 1935, which made Gable a bigger star more than ever. He received two more Academy Awards nominations for Best Actor for Mutiny on the Bounty (1935) and Gone With the Wind (1939). Rhett Butler remains Gable’s best-known role, and always successfully revived his popularity whenever his career would start to fade.
Below are 29 photographs capture “the King of Hollywood” during the 1930s:
Clark Gable smoking pipe, 1930s. Photo by Bettmann.
Clark Gable, circa 1930. Photo by George Hurrell.
Clark Gable and Jean Harlow chatting between scenes for ‘Hold Your Man,’ circa 1930. Photo by Keystone-France.
Joan Crawford sits on a stool while Clark Gable smokes a cigarette on the set the film ‘Possessed,’ 1931. Photo by Hulton Archive.
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