Backstage Hollywood

Marco Island Historical Society is going Hollywood this summer. A new traveling exhibit, organized by Mid-America Arts Alliance, Backstage Hollywood: The Photographs of Bob Willoughby, delivers an insider’s look at some of the greatest stars of old Hollywood in their backstage moments. The exhibit opens June 17 and runs through August 9, 2025, at the Marco Island Historical Museum. A free and open-to-the-public exhibit reception will be held June 24, 2025, from 4 to 5:30 PM.

Bob Willoughby is widely recognized as a 20th-century photography pioneer. Willoughby was the first outside photographer invited by studios to take photos on film sets. The exhibit features photographs from the sets of 17 iconic Hollywood films, including Audrey Hepburn in My Fair Lady, Marilyn Monroe in Let’s Make Love, Elizabeth Taylor and Montgomery Clift on the set of Raintree County, Alfred Hitchcock on the set of Marnie, Mia Farrow in Rosemary’s Baby, and others.

Willoughby’s career took off in 1954 when Life magazine published a feature with over a dozen of his candid photographs of Judy Garland working on set. Since then, his photographs have become instantly recognizable, featuring naturalistic images of actors and directors in intimate moments of vulnerability.

Awarded the Lucie Award for Outstanding Achievement in Still Photography in New York in 2004, Willoughby’s photographs are in permanent collections across the US and Europe. Responding to the many logistical challenges of working on film sets, he was a technological innovator, creating the silent blimp for 35mm still cameras so that he could photograph silently on set, capturing intimate moments of the stars.