Golden Age Actresses

[actor61]

A few weeks ago, a bunch of us had a good time discussing various actresses of the 1930s and 40s. It started as a thread about Olivia Di Havilland's performance in "The Heiress" and then branched into fun posts about Loretta Young, Bette Davis, Joan Crawford, Irene Dunne, Greer Garson, Ginger Rogers and others I can't recall.

 

A few days ago, I babysat for friends whose 8 year old daughter wanted to watch "The Sound of Music" that evening. The Julie Andrews version, NOT the vile Carrie Underwood production, thank heavens! We settled happily on the couch (the kid is a delight, by the way), and were enjoying ourselves thoroughly but as I watched, I realized what a lousy actress Eleanor Parker was, especially as Elsa Shrader in "Music". Robert Wise must have thought otherwise because he used her a couple of times, as did Frank Capra and Otto Preminger, but I just always thought she was so over-the-top. She was the kind of Grand Dame who couldn't enter a room onscreen without shutting the door, then leaning against it and looking into the camera. She was particularly horrible in comedies, such as "Hole in the Head" or "The Voice of the Turtle".

 

So, I'm going to add her to the list of Golden Era actresses we talked about earlier and put her in the bad actress category that so many of you, and I, thought Kim Novak presided over. But then, my judgment is obviously flawed because I'm a huge Loretta Young fan and the consensus in the last discussion seemed to be that she was just as awful as Eleanor Parker!!

 

Discuss.

[N13]

I think you do the lady a disservice! Suggest that you see "Caged," the 1950 movie for which she was nominated for an Academy Award and for which she won the Best Actress catagory at the Venice Film Festival that year. It is actually one of my favorite movies and I watch it at least once a year. Her performance holds up beautifully! Other fine performances include

Home from the Hill 1959 / A Hole in the Head 1957 / The King and Four Queens 1955 / The Man with the Golden Arm 1955, Interrupted Melody (Academy Award Nomination) 1955 / Many Rivers to Cross 1954 / Valley of the Kings 1954 / The Naked Jungle 1953 / Scaramouche 1951 / Detective Story 1951

[Boink]

Actor1, you have GOT to seek out a movie called THE OSCAR starring Stephen Boyd. Eleanor Parker - and everyone else in the film - is so over-the-top that it truly makes this the best 'bad' movie ever made!! Just has to be seen to be believed!

[body2body]

Two of my favorites from the Golden Age are Myrna Loy, and Mary Astor. Both started during the silent era and continued working into television.

Loy began as an "exotic" playing Asian roles in silents. My particular favorites are The Thin Man, The Best Years of Our Lives, and Mr. Blandings Builds His Dream House.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=7ZwOGVWqHAw

Mary Astor is best remembered for The Maltese Falcon. But her work in Dodsworth, Midnight, and The Great Lie ( for which she won an Oscar) is also first rate.

[longtime lurker]

Oh yes... and both the mothers of all mothers. Myrna in Best Years of Our Lives and Mary in Meet Me in St. Louis and Little Women. The latter film made Mary sick and tired of playing mothers especially since it was made after her own mother died and HER mother was hardly the loving type.

[hornytwells]

I have to agree re Eleanor Parker, ludicrously over the top and phoney, altho I have to confess to NOT having seen the Cage! Also like Loretta Young in the Bishop's Wife. Norma Shearer seems to divide people too, which I can see, but still have a soft spot for her!

[+ bashful]

In addition to Actor61's picks, not beauties, but great actresses, Ethel Barrymore, and Jeanette Nolan. If you want to move into the 50's, Grace Kelly (a favorite of mine), Audrey Hepburn, Doris Day, Celeste Holm, Thelma Ritter.

[+ ArVaGuy]

My favorite actress from that era is Norma Shearer. She was magnificent in practically every role she played. From The Divorcee, Romeo & Juliette, The Barrett's of Wimpole Street, and the ultimate chick flick, The Women, she owned these films. She's captivating to me.

 

"I've had two years to grow claws, mother. Jungle Red!!"

[Despardo]

Two of my favorites from the Golden Age are Myrna Loy, and Mary Astor. Both started during the silent era and continued working into television.

Loy began as an "exotic" playing Asian roles in silents. My particular favorites are The Thin Man, The Best Years of Our Lives, and Mr. Blandings Builds His Dream House.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=7ZwOGVWqHAw

Mary Astor is best remembered for The Maltese Falcon. But her work in Dodsworth, Midnight, and The Great Lie ( for which she won an Oscar) is also first rate.

Oh Sam, I've been bad. --One of my favorite lines. Loved Mary Astor in Falcon, Midnight, Palm Beach Story.

 

Midnight is an underappreciated film starring the delightful Claudette Colbert. To Mary Astor, "That hat looks divine on you. It gives you a chin."

 

Adore Myrna Loy. Named my Labrador retriever Myrna after her.

[Despardo]

My favorite actress from that era is Norma Shearer. She was magnificent in practically every role she played. From The Divorcee, Romeo & Juliette, The Barrett's of Wimpole Street, and the ultimate chick flick, The Women, she owned these films. She's captivating to me.

 

"I've had two years to grow claws, mother. Jungle Red!!"

In The Women, Joan Crawford gives one of her best performances.

[Despardo]

A few weeks ago, a bunch of us had a good time discussing various actresses of the 1930s and 40s. It started as a thread about Olivia Di Havilland's performance in "The Heiress" and then branched into fun posts about Loretta Young, Bette Davis, Joan Crawford, Irene Dunne, Greer Garson, Ginger Rogers and others I can't recall.

 

A few days ago, I babysat for friends whose 8 year old daughter wanted to watch "The Sound of Music" that evening. The Julie Andrews version, NOT the vile Carrie Underwood production, thank heavens! We settled happily on the couch (the kid is a delight, by the way), and were enjoying ourselves thoroughly but as I watched, I realized what a lousy actress Eleanor Parker was, especially as Elsa Shrader in "Music". Robert Wise must have thought otherwise because he used her a couple of times, as did Frank Capra and Otto Preminger, but I just always thought she was so over-the-top. She was the kind of Grand Dame who couldn't enter a room onscreen without shutting the door, then leaning against it and looking into the camera. She was particularly horrible in comedies, such as "Hole in the Head" or "The Voice of the Turtle".

 

So, I'm going to add her to the list of Golden Era actresses we talked about earlier and put her in the bad actress category that so many of you, and I, thought Kim Novak presided over. But then, my judgment is obviously flawed because I'm a huge Loretta Young fan and the consensus in the last discussion seemed to be that she was just as awful as Eleanor Parker!!

 

Discuss.

Irene Dunn has a great line in The Awful Truth. After her ex-husband's new girlfriend has just performed a particularly embarrassing nightclub act, Dunn turns to her companions at their table and says, "Now I understand why she changed her name. It was much easier than having her whole family change theirs."

[Despardo]

It is my understanding that the extraordinarily beautiful Loretta Young was quite prudish and made no secret about it--refused to allow any foul language on the set. This earned her the nickname among her colleagues of "Attila the Nun."

Amazing eyes on that woman.

[body2body]

Luise Rainer was a favorite of my Mother. We always watched The Great Ziegfeld -1936, and The Good Earth- 1937 whenever they were shown on television back in the the 50's. Today her style of acting would be considered over the top but I have always found her riveting. She was the first actress to win consecutive best actress academy awards for extremely different roles. She played the glamorous Anna Held in The Great Ziegfeld, and a Chinese Peasant in the Screen adaptation of Pearl Buck's The Good Earth.

 

[Despardo]

I am a huge admirer of Barbara Stanwyck, particularly in Double Indemnity and The Lady Eve (one of the best comedies of all time.)

[+ WilliamM]

For people who have the cable station Decade, Alfred Hitchcock is the only guest in a 90-minute rebroadcast of a Dick Cavett Show from 1972. The complete program will be shown several times today.

[actor61]

Actor1, you have GOT to seek out a movie called THE OSCAR starring Stephen Boyd. Eleanor Parker - and everyone else in the film - is so over-the-top that it truly makes this the best 'bad' movie ever made!! Just has to be seen to be believed!

I've seen it! Horrendously, wonderfully bad. Elke Sommer!!!! Tony Bennett!!!! What more can I say?

[LouieD]

A shirtless Stephan Boyd, too... looking very handsome and hot!

[actor61]

I agree that Luise Rainer was wonderful but she really shot herself in the foot. She was extremely difficult to work with and apparently wore people out with demands, especially regarding money. I loved the character actresses mentioned above - Shirley Booth, Thelma Ritter, and would add Jean Hagen to the list along with Cara Williams, Edna May Oliver, Marjorie Maine, all of them from earlier and later eras and all of them wonderful. My favorite of all was Anne Revere whose career was shortened by HUACC. She was magnificent, even in sentimental stuff such as "National Velvet" for which she won a well deserved Best Supporting Oscar. Thelma Ritter was superb in everything; they should have just handed her an Academy Award every time she worked! Her performance in "Bird Man of Alcatraz" in monumental. I even liked her in "How the West was Won". I thought Beah Richards was wonderful too; she should have worked far more than she did. Watch her in "In the Heat of the Night" and "Guess Who's Coming to Dinner", which were released in the same year, I think. Her versatility is remarkable. And then there's Agnes Moorehead. She is so frighteningly good in "The Magnificent Ambersons" that you forget she's acting. She plays a French woman in "Mrs. Parkington" with Greer Garson and got an Oscar nomination for a very clever performance in what was a pretty mediocre melodrama. She's perfect as the snobby bitch in "Since You Went Away". I could go on and on.

 

As for Audrey Hepburn, well...As I said before, she could have read the phone book and I'd have loved it. She had everything a movie star should have, including great talent, which a lot of movie stars don't have. Grace Kelly was lovely to look at but I found her limited. Her best performance is in "Dial M for Murder" but she won an Oscar for "The Country Girl" because in some scenes, she was "drab". It's astounding that she won against Judy Garland in "A Star is Born", one of the greatest musical performances given in the history of film.

 

I'm crazy about Norma Shearer too. She could be awful but never boring. As I wrote previously, she is superb in the last third of "Marie Antoinette". It's a really heartbreaking and poignant performance. Mary Astor is in a class by herself. She could do anything, and always did it well. Even "Hush, Hush, Sweet Charlotte" - a dreadful movie - is enhanced by her presence.

 

Myrna Loy, as somebody above has written, was also in a class by herself. What an underrated actress she was but she was beloved by audiences so I think she was probably very satisfied with her career. She played such diverse roles. My favorite of her movies is "The Bachelor and the Bobby Soxer". Her chemistry with Cary Grant is very sweet and she plays perfectly with a remarkably funny Shirley Temple in the film. She was again wonderful with Grant in "Mr. Blandings Builds His Dream House." Mr. Grant must have been a very generous actor because so many of the women who worked with him gave some of their best performances opposite him - Mryna Loy, Ginger Rogers, Audrey Hepburn, Irene Dunne.

 

I'm so glad somebody brought up Ethel Barrymore because she too was underrated. She is just terrific in "Portrait of Jennie", "Pinky", "The Farmer's Daughter", and to further illustrate about Cary Grant, she won her only Oscar playing his mother in "None but the Lonely Heart".

 

I LOVE this subject. I could write pages and pages but will restrain myself.

[Moondance]

Mary Astor is best remembered for The Maltese Falcon. But her work in Dodsworth, Midnight, and The Great Lie ( for which she won an Oscar) is also first rate.

She was terrific. I've always thought it was a testament to her talent and versatility that she could be so right for the role of the sensible mother with the house full of kids in Meet Me in St. Louis just three years after being so right for the role of the deceitful femme fatale in The Maltese Falcon.

 

I think the great line about the stages of an actor's life has been attributed to others, but most often to her: There are five stages in the life of an actor: Who's Mary Astor? Get me Mary Astor. Get me a Mary Astor type. Get me a young Mary Astor. Who's Mary Astor?

[+ Charlie]

I can't believe no one has mentioned Tallulah Bankhead in Lifeboat, or Greer Garson in Mrs. Miniver.

[actor61]

I can't believe no one has mentioned Tallulah Bankhead in Lifeboat, or Greer Garson in Mrs. Miniver.

We discussed Garson in "Mrs. Minniver" under the previous thread about Olivia Di Havilland, "The Heiress" and William Wyler. I think she's just great, although way too pretty in some of the scenes where she didn't need to be.

[+ WilliamM]

As for Audrey Hepburn, well...As I said before, she could have read the phone book and I'd have loved it. She had everything a movie star should have, including great talent, which a lot of movie stars don't have. Grace Kelly was lovely to look at but I found her limited. Her best performance is in "Dial M for Murder" but she won an Oscar for "The Country Girl" because in some scenes, she was "drab". It's astounding that she won against Judy Garland in "A Star is Born", one of the greatest musical performances given in the history of film.

 

I understand this thread is about films. But, IMHO Judy Garland gave equally good performances in concert. I saw her at Boston Garden in 1961, about six months after her Carnegie Hall recorded concert. She was a superb actress and that came across just as strongly in live performances as in film.

[Moondance]

I can't believe no one has mentioned Tallulah Bankhead in Lifeboat...

A favorite of mine too; her one great performance on film.

[Moondance]

Venturing away from the leading lady category for a moment, I'd like to mention Jane Darwell's performance as Ma Joad in The Grapes of Wrath. She lets you see life through her eyes and it breaks your heart.

[body2body]

No one has yet mentioned Ingrid Bergman, certainly one of the great stars of the Golden Age. Today, best remembered for Casablanca. She won the Academy Award three times. Best actress for Gaslight-1944, and Anastasia- 1956, and Best supporting actress for Murder on the Orient Express- 1974. During her career she worked legendary directors like Hitchcock, Cukor, Rossellini, Jean Renoir, Sydney Lumet, and Ingmar Bergman. I am particularly fond of her work in Notorious (in which she has one of the steamiest love scenes with Cary Grant ever put on film), and Gaslight.