Latest news with #KatharineHepburn
The Guardian
30-07-2025
- Entertainment
- The Guardian
By the 30s, Katharine Hepburn was box office poison. Then she made The Philadelphia Story
These days, Katharine Hepburn is revered as a progressive icon of Hollywood's golden age, an androgynous (and possibly queer) fashion rebel whose four best actress awards have yet to be topped at the Oscars. But back in 1938, only six years into her illustrious career, she was branded as 'box office poison'. She was a star ahead of her time, her domineering screen presence registering as shrill and petulant by the tail end of the 1930s. After the box office disappointments of Bringing up Baby and Holiday – both now canonised romcom classics – she retreated from Hollywood and signed on to a new play penned by her friend Philip Barry: The Philadelphia Story. Like its film adaptation, Barry's script centres on Tracy Lord, a stuck-up socialite (easily read as a stand-in for Hepburn herself) set to marry a wealthy politician, only for the wedding to be upended by the arrival of two competing romantic prospects: her ex-husband, CK Dexter Haven, and tabloid reporter Mike Connor. The production was a runaway success on Broadway, and Hepburn soon took the reins of a film version, for which she brought on her trusted collaborator George Cukor (A Star is Born, My Fair Lady and countless more) as director. Her initial choice of co-leads – Clark Gable (Gone with the Wind) and Spencer Tracy (Guess Who's Coming to Dinner) were vetoed. But it's hard to imagine a more dazzling collision of stars than the eventual casting of Cary Grant (Charade) and James Stewart (It's a Wonderful Life) as Dexter and Mike respectively. Across their four collaborations, which culminated in The Philadelphia Story, Hepburn and Grant would continually redefine one of the finest pairings in romcom history. The former's strong-willed, fast-talking women bulldozed over lesser leading men, but were perfectly parried by the slinky yet similarly imposing Grant. As embittered, sniping exes, they effortlessly locate each other's pressure points – Dexter's alcoholism, Tracy's performance of invulnerability – but they share a private camaraderie. It's James Stewart's Mike, though, who guides the film's sweeping romantic moments (and sets the benchmark for drunk acting). The night before the wedding, he shares a poolside flirtation with the bride-to-be that evolves into an exhilarating declaration of love, powered by Stewart's earnest intensity. 'You're lit from within, Tracy. You've got fires banked down in you, hearth fires and holocausts,' he beseeches. Cukor's rapturous direction presses into both actors until they're framed in glazed, moonlit closeups, Hepburn's eyes and beaded gown twinkling irresistibly. She's every bit the goddess that he sees. But the film doesn't allow her to bask in the image for long. The Philadelphia Story's success hinges on Tracy's humbling. She lowers herself from her own lofty esteem to eventually find love among other mere mortals, catering to the public's desire to see Hepburn taken down a peg. There's maybe some truth to Kazuo Ishiguro's dismissal of the film as 'a really nasty piece of work', especially considering how the screwball comedy traditionally revolved around stories of men being cut down to size. I think the screenplay deserves more credit for its intricacies: at each corner of the love triangle is a deeply fallible character who hides behind various defence mechanisms. Tracy's eventual happiness is entirely her own choice; she only submits to love upon finding the one person who can recognise and accept her faults. In a subgenre defined by its memorable female leads, Tracy Lord offers one of the more nuanced takes on the screwball heroine. She's a spoilt brat, an arrogant intellectual, an impervious fortress – and under Hepburn's command, you can't help but fall in love. The Philadelphia Story is available to stream on HBO Max in Australia and available to rent in the UK and US. For more recommendations of what to stream in Australia, click here
Perth Now
21-07-2025
- Entertainment
- Perth Now
Jane Fonda hated her Oscar dress
Jane Fonda hated the "awful" dress she wore to the Academy Awards 1979. The actress wore a lilac, sequinned gown with long sleeves to pick up the Best Actress Oscar for her role in war drama Coming Home, but she's now admitted the the frock was "awful" and she only wore it as a favour for her then-husband, politician Tom Hayden because he was friends with the designer. She told The Sunday Times newspaper: "I won my second Academy Award wearing the most awful dress. I was married to a politician and one of his big supporters was a fashion designer [called James Reva]. "My husband said: 'Let him design you a dress.' I did and it was awful and I won the Oscar in it. Anything for politics! It was just poor taste." During the interview Jane, 87, also talked about her personal style these days, revealing she finds she can wear a lot more colour since she let her hair go grey. She explained: "[My style is] simple! Since my hair has gone grey, I wear more colour, including yellow and green. Even I can look good in those colours, and not a lot of people can say that." Jane also revealed the best fashion advice she was ever given came from screen icon Katharine Hepburn, who scolded her for failing to look after her appearance. She told the publication: "When we were filming On Golden Pond, Katharine Hepburn came up and grabbed my cheeks and said:''What does this mean to you? This is your body!' "She was angry with me because she thought I didn't pay enough attention to how I presented myself. And she was right: I really didn't care. Now I pay more attention." Jane debuted her grey hair when she donned a silver pixie haircut at the Academy Awards back in 2020 and she went on to admit she felt happy to finally embrace her natural look. Appearing on The Ellen DeGeneres Show, she said: "I tell you, I'm so happy I let it go grey. Enough already with so much time wasted, so much money spent, so many chemicals - I'm through with that."
Wall Street Journal
07-07-2025
- Entertainment
- Wall Street Journal
‘High Society': ‘The Philadelphia Story' Remade, Not Recycled
In present-day Hollywood, movie remakes are too often initiated without any consideration for how a past project might be meaningfully improved. The goal seems to be to present a facsimile with modest modifications rather than a thoroughgoing reimagination, but in the absence of such changes, why bother? Nearly 70 years ago, however, one of Hollywood's most honored romantic comedies was retooled in ways that remain fresh and surprising. Released by Metro-Goldwyn-Mayer in July 1956, Charles Walters's 'High Society' had its roots in Philip Barry's 1939 play 'The Philadelphia Story,' which, the following year, was turned into a motion picture starring the triumvirate of Cary Grant, Katharine Hepburn and Jimmy Stewart—the last of whom won an Oscar. That earlier picture was an instant classic for its affectionate but barbed portrait of the marital challenges of inhabitants of the Philadelphia Main Line.
LeMonde
26-06-2025
- Entertainment
- LeMonde
At the Bologna and La Rochelle festivals, a retelling of Hollywood through its actresses
Repertory cinema remains a vibrant sector, as demonstrated each year by Il Cinema Ritrovato Festival in Bologna, Italy, and the Festival La Rochelle Cinéma (FEMA) – feasts of classic films that traditionally mark the start of the summer season between late June and early July, drawing large audiences. Each event offers a distinct atmosphere: a blazing maze of red bricks for Bologna, whose 39 th edition ends on June 29, and a portside resort with an oceanic vibe for La Rochelle, which will take over until July 5 for its 53 rd outing. While the Bologna festival is organized by the local Cineteca (film archive) and supported by the renowned restoration laboratory L'Immagine Ritrovata, La Rochelle champions a cinephile's program blending present and past; both stand out for the variety of their retrospectives. This year, the two festivals will briefly coincide and will share a tribute to two major American actresses: Katharine Hepburn (1907-2003) and Barbara Stanwyck (1907-1990). This happy coincidence invites us to compare them. Born the same year, both stars traversed 20 th -century Hollywood from the advent of sound films, even outlasting the studio system by reinventing themselves on television over careers spanning several decades.
Yahoo
23-06-2025
- Entertainment
- Yahoo
When Hollywood ‘Went Gay All of a Sudden': TCM Highlights Films That Track Queer Evolution
In classic film circles, 'Bringing Up Baby' is just one of those movies that everybody knows about. It's Cary Grant. It's Katharine Hepburn. It's Howard Hawks. All 'Old Hollywood For Dummies' buzz words. But the movie — a notorious flop upon release — is a historical curiosity not because it is a cute, zany screwball comedy of a bygone era — though it is. 'Bringing Up Baby' just happens to have what is likely first usage in film of the word 'gay' to mean something other than happy. At least we think it does. 'My understanding is that by the time 'Bringing Up Baby' came out, the word 'gay' was known in some circles to mean homosexual,' TCM host Dave Karger said during a recent interview with IndieWire. 'And the story goes that Cary Grant ad libbed that line. So, I would like to think that he that Cary Grant knew what he was saying when he allegedly came up with that line.' More from IndieWire Apple TV+ Signs First-Look Film Deal with North Road's Chernin Entertainment 'You Kind of Have to Fight for More Room': Melissa Barrera Says Diverse Casting Has Net Effect on Productions Author Alonso Duralde, author of the book 'Hollywood Pride: A Celebration of LGBTQ+ Representation and Perseverance in Film' agrees. 'I know that when I wrote about 'Bringing Up Baby,' I quoted William Mann in his film 'Behind the Screen,' who said back in 2001 that the word 'gay' to mean 'homosexual' had been floating around for at least the better part of a century at that point,' Duralde said. 'And he, in turn, quotes Gary Schmidgall, who was a biographer of Walt Whitman, who said that there were cases of people using it that way in the first years of the 20th century.' Duralde explained that its use would have been 'very intramural' in the '30s. That perhaps Cary Grant knew about it, 'but it was not something that the wide world knew about just yet,' adding, 'You have to wonder… was that a wink?' Truly, it is difficult to interpret the word as meaning anything another than a wink in this instance, although it clearly flew over the heads of the censors — and likely anywhere except specific circles in the coastal cities — way back in 1938. Grant is wearing Hepburn's frilly robe. He's frustrated at his own flamboyant appearance, badgered by May Robson, and then exclaims, 'I just went gay all of a sudden!' Take a quick watch (the exchange begins at 1:43). This is about as openly 'gay' as the movies would get for the next 30 years. Not that there weren't plenty of films that walked a tight rope around the suggestion of homosexuality. Alfred Hitchcock's 'Rebecca' has the sinister Mrs. Danvers, whose obsession with the title character appears to be romantic in nature. There's a seemingly blatant hitman gay couple in 'The Big Combo.' A rather disturbing Wendell Corey acts possessively of his mobster roommate in 'Desert Fury.' Sal Mineo — a real-life bisexual — appears to be in love with James Dean in 'Rebel Without a Cause.' One commonality between all of these characters is that they (spoiler) die — perhaps the only reason why the strict production code of the time allowed them to make it to the screen. A note on the production code — known commonly as the Hays Code after its longtime leader Will H. Hays — for those new to Old Hollywood. In 1934, as fears of government censorship were looming, American film studios began enforcing a strict production code (drafted in 1930) that essentially outlawed the depiction of a host of perceived moral wrongs and ambiguities — any crime had to have a consequence, overt sex was out of the question, dialogue had to be squeaky clean, and, of course, queers weren't supposed to exist. Regardless, some coded characters (as listed above) and certain gay stereotypes made it into the movies, even under censorship. Of course, the characters were not out, open, or doing anything about it, but it was clear to knowing eyes what exactly was going on. One specific stereotype was the 'pansy' — also known as the 'sissy' — which Turner Classic Movies will be highlighting in on Monday, June 23, with a series of films that showcase variations on this kind of character. 'The pansy craze really exploded in the 1930s,' Karger explained. 'It started in live entertainment, where there were bars in Hollywood that stars and studio executives would frequent, and there were well known drag performers who were very popular amongst the Hollywood set. What you also saw in varying degrees before and after the production code was enforced, were queer coded, open, outwardly gay characters in some films.' Actors like Edward Everett Horton (see: 'The Gay Divorcee') and Franklin Pangborn (see: 'Professional Sweetheart') made careers off of playing the pansy. 'What I love about these movies is that it gives wonderful platforms for some of these fascinating and hilarious character actors of the era,' Karger said. 'The thing about the sissy is that you're not saying this guy wants to have sex with dudes,' Durlade said. 'You're just saying, 'Oh, look at this frilly little whatever.' That character goes all the way back to the earliest cinema. That character goes back probably to vaudeville. The sissy was a way to get around the censor, precisely because they were asexual, and so they didn't have to wade into the murky things of perversion, because there was nothing sexual about the character. He was just there to be the butt of the joke.' TCM will also showcase interesting rarities like the pre-code 'Call Her Savage' with Clara Bow, which present the pansy in a far more overt fashion. This one wouldn't have had to slip in under the censors' noses, since it was released in 1932 before the code was in rigid enforcement. '['Call Her Savage'] features one scene in what is clearly a gay bar, and there's these two boys wearing French maids outfits, flitting around, and singing about how they wish they were on a navy ship surrounded by hunky sailors, essentially,' Karger said. 'And it's just so fascinating to see these two kids, almost 100 years ago, able to be their true selves and talk about their true wants and desires.' The lineup also includes Claudette Colbert and Don Ameche-led 'Midnight,' a delightful '30s 'Cinderella' tale that finds John Barrymore playing the fairy godmother. None of those leads are the 'gay' character. That instead belongs to veteran character actor Rex O'Malley — who in real life, uh… never married — who plays a gossipy friend, aka the pansy. 'There's just all these great scenes of him, sitting around a breakfast table, pumping all the other characters for the latest gossip. And it's just so fun,' Karger said. 'He steals every scene he's in. And yeah, of course, nothing overtly gay is mentioned. We're not told he's gay. They can't use that word in that context, of course, at that point. So he's essentially — like a lot of these men are — an asexual guy who's much more interested in the lives and going ons of everyone else than he is about pursuing a romantic life of his own.' Next week, on June 30, TCM will once again visit queer cinema, contrasting with a series of later films — ones that examine depictions of homosexuality, drag culture, and trans people in more recent decades. 'I love the fact that we have these two nights of pride programming, one of which is from the 1930s and then the other of which is from the last 40 years. So we get to see how LGBTQ+ cinema has has evolved,' Karger shared. Among the movies included on the second night are 2008's Oscar-winning 'Milk' (a TCM premiere), the 1994 lesbian-themed dramedy 'Go Fish,' and 1990's 'Without You I'm Nothing,' written by and starring Sandra Bernhard. 'I'm all for the bread and butter films that we show on TCM. I love that. That's what we mainly do. But I think whenever we can step out of the usual 'classic era' and include movies like the ones that we're doing on that second Pride night, particularly for for Pride Month, I think it's really exciting,' Karger said. As for the word 'gay,' the 'Bringing Up Baby' use of the word did not revolutionize its use in modern culture. In 1961, 23 years later, Natalie Wood was still singing (well, Marni Nixon was) about feeling 'pretty, witty, and gay' in 'West Side Story.' But like so many cultural touchstones in American history, the 1960s changed things. Civil Rights, hippies, the second wave of feminism, and then, of course, 1969 Stonewall Riots setting off the gay liberation movement, shifted culture. By 1970, 'The Boys in the Band' was throwing 'gay' around in clear reference to homosexuality. Ironically, Wood herself helped launch the play that became that film adaptation. But, I digress. What's most interesting looking at TCM's June 23 and 30 lineups is that, while coded, the stereotypes remained the same for many decades, even after the production code had fallen — and in the more modern films, the through-line is evident. The movies did not go 'gay all of a sudden' when Cary Grant made his exclamation in 'Bringing Up Baby,' but perhaps instead this little moment set a standard of gayness that would largely hold for the rest of the century and beyond. 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