Ann Blyth
I had been interested in art director Anton Grot’s work for a while. He worked on many films with Curtiz, and is credited on numerous other Warner features in the thirties and forties. It’s been really hard to find information on Grot, but I did come across a blog which features several of his drawings. As far as I can tell, most of them were done for Captain Blood, but it looks like at least one was for Mildred Pierce, and the last one is probably for Elizabeth and Essex or The Sea Hawk (the two films share a number of sets). I first made the acquaintance of Ann Blyth on the film set of Mildred Pierce, (1945). Warner Bros had borrowed Ann for this film. It was Anton Grot’s that called Ann over and introduces me to her. What was so special about Ann? Well, she was just a nice person who always had a warm smile and a pleasant word for she exuded maternal compassion and was ever willing to listen to anyone's tales of woe (including mine).
There was a bright, shining moment during her convalescence when she was nominated for an Academy Award for Best Supporting Actress for Mildred Pierce (a heck of a get well card),
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Captain Blood and The Sea Hawk are two of my favorite oldies movies. I am a big swashbuckling fan of the era. I Googled Anton Grot and found a lot of pages about him, including a wiki entry
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Anton_Grot
and this one in IMDb
http://www.imdb.com/name/nm0343819/bio.
Hope these help you, there was a lot more on him including a lot of images of him as well.
San
Anton Grot to the filmmaking at Warner Bros. in 1927-1948 in the U.S. He studied interior decoration, illustration and design at the Technical College in Koenigsberg, Germany. He served as in charge of the design and construction of the sets as well as the special effects of several films which include "A Midsummer Night's Dream," "Anthony Adverse" and "Little Caesar." He also worked as supervisor over the work of other studio art directors and head of the art department. Grot retired in 1947 to devote his time to oil painting. I worked with on Mildred Pierce. In the spring of 1947 from Redlands, the CA-38 meanders northeast through an impressive rocky landscape that modulates into conifer territory as one climbs toward Big Bear Dubbed “Southern California’s only four-season resort,” Big Bear Lake nevertheless has an off-season in spring. After the skiers have departed and before the summer crowd has arrived, accommodations are plentiful and cheaper than at other times, although both weather and sightseeing are at their best in spring.