Author: Snugglecub

1937 – Andrea Leeds

1937 – Andrea Leeds

Stage Door

Spoiler alert – Andrea Leeds did just fine in her role as the out-of-work actress who can’t get a part, and who ends up committing suicide.  She carried an air of depression with her every time she appeared on the screen.  That was her job, and she played the part for all it was worth.  In fact that characteristic of melancholy was the defining quality of the role. 

You see, even when she was supposed to be happy in a scene that carried a bit of levity, she couldn’t shake that obvious depression.  At first I thought that made the part, and the way Leeds portrayed it, as uninteresting because it was always the same thing.  But the more I think about it, the more I begin to see the complexities of the character.  If someone is dealing with clinical depression, being in light-hearted company and situations is actually hard.  It is difficult both emotionally and physically.  I know that depression can make me actually sick to my stomach, and the more I think about Leeds’ performance, the more I have to acknowledge how that crippling emotion that hovered over her every appearance was expertly played.  And the fact that her character had a habit of starving herself certainly didn’t help.

But I will say this for Leeds.  She had the task of carrying the lion’s share of the emotional content of the film.  She was the only actress in the cast who had to break down into tears and sobbing, which happened several times in the narrative.  The birthday scene was especially heartbreaking to watch, and Leeds gave us a powerful performance.  You could see her trying to hold back the tears, and ultimately failing.  Her Best Supporting Actress nomination was well deserved.

And ok, that final scene was a bit over-played.  So she has a mental break-down and kills herself.  It was really over-the-top that she is visibly taken over by a madness that drives her to throw herself out a window.  The way she goes from depressed and self-pitying to wide-eyed, loony-bin crazy was a little jarring and had no subtlety at all.  But that was the fault of the script, not the actress.  It came dangerously close to comical, not in what happened to the tragic character, but in how it was written and filmed, and consequently, how it had to be acted.

1937 – Claire Trevor

1937 – Claire Trevor

Dead End

This review is going to be a little tricky to write.  After all, what is there to say?  She only had about four-and-a-half minutes of screen time.  She played Francey, the childhood sweetheart of notorious gangster, Baby-Face Martin.  He returns to the slum to find her and ask her to get back together with him, now that he is ready to go straight.  She refuses because now she’s a prostitute in the terminal stages of syphilis. 

Trevor didn’t have much to work with, but I think she did a great job anyway.  In less than five minutes, we got her back story, her memories, and her emotions.  We got her situation as a down and out woman who hates her life, one in which she feels trapped.  She knows she is sick and dying, and she knows she is powerless to do anything to help herself.  I really liked the way we are introduced to her when she makes her first appearance.  She displays a thick skin, roughened by the hard life of a hooker.  And yet despite her callous attitude, she has the integrity to tell her old flame the truth when he asks her to be with him.  She turns him down and steps into the light so he can see her illness. 

And then, when Baby-Face learns of her disease, he immediately rejects her.  Trevor portrayed the shame, the hurt, and the hopeless resignation so believably.  And when the gangster gives her money, she isn’t too proud to beg for more.  He refuses her again, and still, she isn’t done.  Before turning and walking away, she pathetically asks for a kiss on the cheek for old time’s sake.  When Baby-Face can barely bring himself to even do that, her disappointment is just heart-wrenching.

Her performance was brief but memorable.  I believe she deserved her Oscar nomination, even if she was like a footnote in the narrative, though an important one.  Trevor really made me feel for her character, an impressive feat in so little time.  And she was gorgeous.  So I looked up what else she has been in. Turns out, she was in nearly 70 films over the course of her career that lasted from 1933 to 1987.  The ones for which she was the most remembered were Dead End, Stagecoach in 1939, Key Largo in 1948, and The High and the Mighty in 1954. 

1937 – Alice Brady

1937 – Alice Brady

In Old Chicago

For the second year in a row, Alice Brady was nominated for Best Supporting Actress.  In 1936, she was nominated for her role in the film My Man Godfrey. There, she played a flighty rich socialite.  Here, she played the complete opposite, an Irish widow, mother of three boys.  Here she had to maintain an Irish accent, and before I go any further, I’m going to give her a ton of respect for pulling that off beautifully.  The accent was consistent and believable.  So, right off the bat, she has my respect for that, as accents are never easy.

But the accent was just part of the character, which Brady really embodied perfectly.  Did she play a bit of a stereotype?  In retrospect, maybe, but she did it so well that I didn’t really notice.  She was hard-working, and religious to the point of piousness, ready with whatever any situation required, whether it was a scolding or a smile, a tear or a mug of beer.  Brady, and the way the character was written, made Molly O’Leary a strong and compassionate woman who held the respect and love of her family.

According to the narrative of the film’s fictional plot, which was based around the reality of the great Chicago fire of 1871, it was Molly’s cow who accidentally started the fire, though it was Molly, herself, who thoughtlessly left a lamp in the barn behind the leg of a cow who was known to kick.  When the fire breaks out, Molly does her best to keep her family safe.  The only time in the film when the character is shown to let her emotions lead her into a bad decision, is when she leaves her daughter-in-law and infant grandson alone in a rampaging crowd of people fleeing the fire, so that she can retrieve a framed picture of her late husband.

Brady did a fantastic job in the role and I think she deserved her Oscar.  She played a strong female character without making her mean or even dour.  She made Molly O’Leary a likeable woman, the kind of woman anyone would want to know.  And it was she who gave the last minute inspirational speech at the end of the film about the people of Chicago being a strong lot who would rebuild the great city from the ashes.  No doubt, that monologue went a fair way to getting her the Oscar win.

1937 – Roland Young

1937 – Roland Young

Topper

This was only the second year that Best Supporting Actor was a category at the Academy Awards, and I don’t think they quite had it figured out yet.  This should not have been nominated for an Oscar, not because Roland Young’s performance was bad, but because he was the lead role in the film.  But if he had been put in the Best Actor category, he wouldn’t have been nominated at all.  I mean, the story was his story, but the movie had Carry Grant in it.  Grant was the supporting character, but he was the big name, so Roland Young got put in the wrong category.  And while it was a fun film, the roll itself was just not Oscar-worthy.

He played the title roll of Cosmo Topper, the President of a large bank, who is haunted by the ghosts of the Bank’s biggest client and his wife.  There were scenes in which Young had to work with floating objects, actors who were not there, but who faded in and out of existence, and silly, goofy shenanigans.  And he was the straight man to their comedy.  But there was an undercurrent in his character that fit the story well.  Though he was straight-laced and serious, he had a desire to be wild and carefree, out from under the loving, yet controlling thumb of his wife.

I think that was where Young shined.  He maintained that seriousness but the deep longing to have fun colored much of what he did.  Topper was likable, gentle, and even charming in a strange sort of way.  The scene where the ghosts get him drunk on Champagne was actually pretty funny.  He did a silly dance, then fell on the floor with his butt sticking up in the air.  Then he had to act like invisible hands were boosting him to his feet and carrying him across the room.  It was a fun scene

But there was one weird thing about Young’s performance.  He seemed to deliver most of his dialogue without moving his lips.  There were times when he would say entire lines as if he was a ventriloquist.  At other times, his bottom lip moved slightly, and his upper lip was perfectly still.  Sure, he was supposed to be meek almost to the point of mousiness, and maybe that lack of enunciation that bordered on mumbling was a conscious acting choice, but it was a strange one.  Still Young did a fine job, so why not give him an acting nomination?

1937 – Thomas Mitchell

1937 – Thomas Mitchell

The Hurricane

I have never seen Thomas Mitchell turn in a bad performance.  No matter what film in his prolific career, he was always fantastic.  He just had natural skill as an actor.  He was in sixty films between 1923 and 1961, as well as numerous television, appearances all through the 1950s and early 60s, and around 43 years of live stage work between 1916 and 1960.  This guy just never quit, and he was always good.

In The Hurricane, he played Dr. Kersaint, a physician with French Colonizers on the Island of Manakoora in the South Seas.  He longs to return to his home in France, but is also content with the easy lifestyle on the peaceful Island with its happy natives.  Though he is a heavy drinker, he takes his job seriously.  He knows the people for whom he cares, knows that the liberties of freedom are essential to their simple natures, and it breaks his heart when an islander is imprisoned unjustly for sixteen years.

Mitchel was, as usual, perfect for the role.  He knew how to play drunk without going over-the-top.  He got to display a bit of barely suppressed anger towards the cold-hearted Governor who refuses to lift a finger to help the unfortunate Islander.  And I particularly liked him in his final scene, where he is one of the few survivors of the disastrous hurricane.  You can see the desolation in his eyes.  The blank stare born of shock and grief.  Mitchell was wonderful.  He just had a way of making his performance so real and believable.  It was a supporting role, but there was subtlety, as well as a certain amount of gravitas.  And it was all brought across by the incredible actor.

And I think that is what I have always liked about Thomas Mitchell.  He was a natural in front of the camera.  He played a likeable character and did so without being sappy or forced.  He almost just seemed to be playing himself, and yet when you watch him, you can tell that his performances are practiced and finely tuned.  I have rarely seen him in a lead role, but he was such a great character actor that he never lacked work in Hollywood.  He was just that good.  Whenever I see Thomas Mitchell’s name in the credits, I know I’m in for a great performance.

1937 – H. B. Warner

1937 – H. B. Warner

Lost Horizon

Henry Byron Warner did his job, and he did it well enough.  True, the character was white washed, as most ethnic roles were back in the 1930s.  Warner wasn’t even close to Chinese, nor did he look it, even under the makeup that did its best to make him appear Asian.  And no, dressing someone Chinese clothing does not make him look Chinese.  Maybe that’s why he had so many scenes in which his face was either partially covered, or in heavy shadow.

Chang was a rather simple character.  There was no complexity to the role, and I don’t think Warner was required to stretch himself as an actor.  The part was fairly uninteresting and unmemorable.  I’m not saying Warner did a bad job.  I’m just saying that the role wasn’t particularly Oscar-worthy.  There I said it.

Chang was a calm, mild-mannered man who took those qualities to the extreme.  He was educated, cultured, and clearly British, belying the ethnic name of Chang.  He was the host of the fabled Shangri-La, the mythical Himalayan paradise whose inhabitants live in peace and serenity, their lives measured in centuries instead of decades.  They have all the comforts of the outside world without its problems and unrest.  But now I’ve gone on to describing Chang’s environment instead of Chang, himself.  That’s how unremarkable the character was.

In fact, the most interesting scene in which Warner took part was one in which Chang was invited to a room with the story’s protagonists, and accused of lying to everybody.  They threatened him, saying that they would not allow him to leave the room until he told them all the truth.  His response was given with a gentle smile, saying that the enigmatic leader of the city of Shangri-La wanted to see Mr. Conway, at which point he was allowed to leave the room. 

And that was it.  No conflict, no complexity, no character arc, no development.  There just wasn’t much that H. B Warner could do with the part.  He played it the only way it could be played, and that was all he could do.  To be honest, I’m not really sure why he was nominated for Best Supporting Actor.

1937 – Anne Shirley

1937 – Anne Shirley

Stella Dallas

One of the things that Hollywood seems to have a talent for is casting the perfect people in their movies, and this was certainly the case when it came to Stella Dallas.  Anne Shirley played the sweet young daughter of the crass and tawdry Stella.  She had that fresh-faced young girl, right at the age where she is becoming a woman, enhanced by expert hair and makeup to help sell the illusion of age.

And there was also a bit of emotional complexity to the role of Laurel Dallas that was rather unique.  The story arc of her character was not conventional.  She had a strange relationship with her mother, a parent who she loved, and yet by whom she was embarrassed at the same time.  And when she began spending time with her father and his new love interest, she began to learn just what kind of a woman Stella was.  Shirley deftly portrayed Laurel’s guilt over enjoying that easy and privileged existence, rather than the constant chaos of being in her mother’s orbit.

There were several scenes where Shirley’s acting stood out as exceptional.  There was the pivotal scene in the train where the girl and her mother overhear the gossipers making fun of Stella, and feeling sorry for the sweet Laurel for having to live with her.  And there was the scene where Stella actively drives Laurel away into the arms of another mother who can give her a life free of a stained reputation.  It was heartbreaking to see Laurel’s realization that she had to leave the mother she loved in order to find happiness in a new home.

Like I said, it was a complex character, but it was a smart script that gave us two wonderfully written parts for two fantastic actresses.  She was like an eager little ingénue, who looked completely at ease in front of the camera.  She was not afraid to put her emotions out where they could be seen, and young though she was, she was able to hold her own along-side a powerhouse like Barbara Stanwyck. I found myself wondering what else she has done.  She was only 4 years old when she started acting and was 18 when she played Laurel Dallas.  And she made her final film appearance when she was only 26.  The article I read didn’t state why she stopped acting, but it too bad she did, because she was very talented.

1937 – Barbara Stanwyck

1937 – Barbara Stanwyck

Stella Dallas

When the ending credits began to roll, my first thought was that Stanwyck did an incredibly good job in a very complex role.  I went into the film blind, not knowing what it was about or what kind of character she was playing.  But during the first half of the movie, I must confess, I didn’t like her character.  But eventually, it became clear that I wasn’t really supposed to, which made it clear that Stanwyck was actually amazing. 

She played the part of Stella Dallas, a cheap, tawdry woman who had aspirations of being a classy woman in high society.  But the problem was that she had no idea how such women actually behaved.  And a big part of it, as shallow as it sounds, though it was important in the 1930s, was the way she dressed.  She was a coarse floosy.  I think the film was trying to make the point that you can take the girl out of Hicksville, but you can’t take Hicksville out of the girl. 

But what mad the character so wonderfully complex was that she genuinely and sincerely loved her daughter, and she was willing to sacrifice her own happiness for hers.  When she learned that she was a dead weight around Laurel’s future, she did what was necessary to give her the life that she could not provide.  And it was here that Stanwyck really shined.  She was incredible.  The way she displayed her emotions on the screen was perfection, consistently making it absolutely clear what she was feeling, without ever over-doing it.  This role seemed to be made for her.

There was a scene on a train when she overhears people talking about her, saying how they felt bad for Laurel because of the utter embarrassment her mother was.  Stanwyck’s reaction to this revelation was heartbreaking to watch, even though she was a character who I didn’t really like.  She was selfish, and self-centered in everything except her love for her daughter.  And this is made clear in the last few scenes of the films, when she selflessly gives her daughter away so that Laurel can live a life free of her own low-class reputation of shame.  Because of the way Stanwyck portrayed Stella Dallas, I actually ended up liking her character.  She totally deserved her Best Actress nomination.

1937 – Greta Garbo

1937 – Greta Garbo

Camille

Here, we have Garbo doing what she does best, playing a romantic yet tragic role.  I think she was really known for her extraordinary beauty, her often serious and stoic expression, and her fine-tuned dramatic acting.  But every time I see her in a film, I am always amazed at how brilliant her stunning smile was.  I think she really understood that you can’t sell the serious moments in a performance, unless you have a firm grasp on the light-hearted ones.  Here, she showed us both, and did a fantastic job in each. 

It was a period piece, taking us back to the mid-1800s in Paris.  But I think the elaborate costumes and hair styles really suited her.  Then again, Garbo had a timeless beauty that would have made her stand out in any era.  And yes, it was her beauty that made her memorable, but it was her wonderful performances that made her incredible.  And many critics have called her role as Marguerite Gautier as one of the finest performances of her career.

I think her performance was summed up quite nicely by a conversation between the film’s producer, Irving Thalberg, and its director George Cukor, which I have lifted from Wikipedia.  “On watching a scene in the film where Garbo is at a theater, Thalberg said: ‘George, she’s awfully good. I don’t think I’ve ever seen her so good.’ ‘But Irving’, said Cukor, ‘she’s just sitting in an Opera Box.’ ‘She’s relaxed’, said Thalberg. ‘She’s open. She seems unguarded for once.’ Garbo’s new attitude prompted Thalberg to have the script reworked. ‘She is a fascinating artist, but she is limited’, Thalberg told the new writers. ‘She must never create situations. She must be thrust into them. The drama comes in how she rides them out.’”

And it was true.  She seemed very relaxed in front of the camera, whether she was sitting in an Opera Box, lying with her lover’s head in her lap, or reclining on her death-bed.  She seemed very at ease, and it showed.  It was appropriate for the character, a professional prostitute who was dying of tuberculosis.  But I have to agree with the Academy’s decision.  Luise Rainer’s performance in The Good Earth was more dynamic.  Still, beautifully done, Greta.

1937 – Ralph Bellamy

Honestly, I’m not exactly sure why Ralph Bellamy was nominated for Best Supporting Actor.  His performance was adequate and passable, at best.  At worst, he was a little one-note, and not at all dynamic.  As far as I could tell, he didn’t do anything or put anything into his performance that made him stand out.  He had only one or two facial expressions, which he used nearly every time he was on the screen.  And it wasn’t all the actor’s fault.  The part just wasn’t written to be that memorable.

In other words, Bellamy did his job, but the job just wasn’t anything special, certainly nothing that was worthy of an Oscar nod.  But he did have one thing going for him.  He really had the right look for the part.  The character of Dan Leeson was supposed to be good natured and eager, a little like a doe-eyed puppy.  But the film was a romantic comedy, and his scenes were neither romantic, nor comedic. 

Dan Leeson was a wealthy cattle rancher who was spending time in the big city with his mother.  He is introduced to Mrs. Warriner, and within a few days, he is in love, but when he eventually learns that she still loves her ex-husband, he leaves in the most civilized and curious way, making some kind of comment like, “I guess it’s true what they say. A man’s best friend is his mother.”

And the character was written as a bit of a social moron.  This is really brought to life when he forces Mrs. Warriner to dance, even after she attempts to decline.  Then, when Mr. Warriner pays the band to play the fast dance song a second time, he is enjoying himself so much that he pulls the reluctant Lucy back out to the floor for another go.  And that’s Dan Leeson, in a nutshell. 

It’s too bad that Ralph Bellamy was given a role that was so dull and lifeless, but he played the part exactly as it was written.  Unfortunately, it was just not a very memorable or dynamic part.  I think his mildly affable country-boy personality was supposed to be charming, but it just wasn’t.  The problem is, I don’t know how the character could have been fixed.  Could another actor have done any better?