Alessandro the Photographer

The George Lewis New Orleans Jazz Band

Illustration

Kim Novak

One of the more pleasant aspects of being a photographer is having the opportunity to meet nice people on an intimate basis ~ as was the case with Kim Novak ~ a beautiful woman whose inner being was rarely shared with the millions of her fans world wide. Her roles in motion pictures heralded the coming of a deeply sensitive soul who also happened to be one of the most beautiful women ever to grace the silver screen.

Alessandro with Kim Novak who arrived at Sugarbush in Vermont to do a "How to Ski" book with instructor, Frank Day. Macone did the photography and remembers fondly the warm evenings spent by the fire with Kim as the snow howled outside.

When Kim came to Vermont to help Frank Day write his book on skiing, I was fortunate to be asked to handle the photography. After our day’s work on the slopes we’d retire back to Frank and Ann Day's farm at Mad River Glen for supper and family fun. On one particular evening we all sat around telling stories of the slopes and enjoying the fussings Kim was making on young Debbie’s hair. There was no television or radio playing. Just plain folks enjoying the quiet thrill of being. Kim fit very well.

Kim dressing Debbie Day's hair.

Portrait of youthful glamour

Kim felt that “Man with the Golden Arm” ended her status as an amateur. “People in Hollywood started to take me seriously after that picture was released,” she told Time magazine. “I hadn’t asked to become an actress, but once I was thrust into a movie career, I decided to give it my best.”

Jack Moffitt of the Hollywood Reporter said: “The film offers a fantastic study in what constitutes movie acting. We really don’t know whether Kim Novak, in a technical sense, can act at all. I only know that she, like Valentino and Garbo, seems to be one of those rare creatures born with a perfect affinity for the camera. Properly lighted, her face has a poignant emotional quality which carries an audience along with her and makes dialog seem superfluous. She generates a dreamy romantic range which can’t be taught or learned. It’s what made movies great during the silent days, and. apparently, you are either born with it or not.”

From: Kim Novak, Reluctant Goddess
By: Peter Harry Brown

Marilyn “Kim” Novak certainly had a way with a camera, she knew just how to hold its attention.

Bell, Book and Candle
With James Stewart

Kim Novak learned to act, making over 20 films including Vertigo, The Notorious Landlady and The Mirror Crack’d. The “star” part was just another job like when she demonstrated refrigerators as Miss Deepfreeze of 1953.

Picnic with Cliff Robertson

This is why the last blond sex symbol of the 1950’s, the Reluctant Goddess, survived the Hollywood studio system that made her a star.

Close up from Pal Joey singing
My Funny Valentine

Studio photographs of Kim are courtesy of
Columbia Pictures.

And when the work was over, she left Hollywood to make a new life for herself.

Pal Joey with Frank Sinatra

Architecture

Alessandro Macone, Inc. was a media company in Concord, Massachusetts, that specialized in technical photography... with heavy leanings toward architecture. Below are some of the projects initiated while Alessandro was the principal photographer for the Boston Redevelopment Authority, and for other major corporations that completed construction projects related to the building of The New Boston in the 1960's.