Travel in the Age of Deco Lecture (Co-presented with the Art Deco Society of Los Angeles) June 6, 2010

Co-presented with the Art Deco Society of Los Angeles: Travel in the Age of Deco Lecture: In the 1930s, in the age of art deco streamline design, people were traveling farther and faster than humans had ever traveled before. Fast cars, streamlined trains, luxury steamships, swift airliners, giant seaplanes and majestic Zeppelins opened up new horizons to those with the money to spend.

Walter Nelson will present a program of film, poster art, photographs and music that will bring to life the experience and romance of travel in the years just before World War II. Following at 5:00 PM is a screening of…
FLYING DOWN TO RIO, 1933, Warner Bros., 89 min. Dir. Thornton Freeland. Lothario Roger Bond (Gene Raymond) loses a band gig in Miami after he flirts with one too many tempting ladies. When he seriously falls for the Brazilian beauty Belinha (a smoldering Dolores Del Rio), he offers her an air-borne lift down to Rio de Janeiro, but a mechanical breakdown makes the trip a little more complicated than anticipated. This terrific musical set amid the clouds also features an early onscreen pairing of tap-dancing legends Fred Astaire and Ginger Rogers!