Tyrone Power and Robert Taylor were arguably the two most gorgeous male actors in Hollywood’s Golden Era — so good looking that both constantly had to cope with speculation about their “masculinity.” Power ruled the roost at Fox, while Taylor was second banana to Clark Gable at MGM, until all three of them enlisted for service in World War II. As I noted in my review of the “Tyrone Power Matinee Idol” DVD box set this week, Power’s reputation has increased since his death, as contemporary audiences discover his darker performances in movies like “Nightmare Alley,” a flop that’s new considered a noir classic. Thanks to Fox, more of Power’s films are out on DVD than probably any other non-horror star of the era (coming in October: “Rose of Washington Square,” with Ty as a thinly disguised Nicky Arnstein to Alice Faye’s more-or-less funny girl Fanny Brice). Taylor, much the inferior actor, hasn’t been so lucky. Today, he’s probably best known for supporting the Hollywood blacklist during the HUAC era. In a fit of political correctness, when Sony took over the old MGM lot in Culver City in the ’90s, a building named after Taylor (whose 28-year-reign as a Metro contract star holds the record) was re-named for director George Cukor. Not many of Taylor’s films have made it to DVD and some of those that have — notably his wan performance as Armand in Garbo’s “Camille,” which gets blown away by Henry Daniell — do not impress. We’re still waiting for arguably Taylor’s best performance opposite Vivien Leigh in the 1940 “Waterloo Bridge.” The latest Power box set (his second) includes “Johnny Apollo” (1940), a film in which he plays an Ivy Leaguer turned gangster. Taylor made a remarkably similar gangster film two years later called “Johnny Eager.” Both co-star Edward Arnold and both even feature Shakespeare quoting drunks — Charley Grapewin in “Apollo” and Van Heflin, who received an Oscar nod, in “Eager.” We’d like to compare them further, but “Eager” has not yet been scheduled for DVD release by Warner Bros.

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