Elder Dataloungers please tell me all about legendary golden era Hollywood actress Deborah Kerr

Should of been a Dame after all her bloody Oscar nominations and iconic appearances.

[quote]Should of

Oh, dear!

So definitely underrated or underappreciated in her lifetime r1 in your opinion? I guess when you look at the other british dames like Angela Lansbury, Elizabeth Taylor and Julie Andrews -Deborah being left out is a bit odd unless of course it was offered and she declined?

Kerr holds the record for most Best Actress Oscar nominations (6) without a win and Glenn Close who has 8 nominations w/o a win evenly divided between Best Actress and Supporting presented Kerr with an honorary Oscar in 1994.

Two of Kerr's best performances were in The Innocents (1961) which is her favorite performance and The Night of the Iguana (1964) though she did not received an Oscar nom for either. And of all of her films I have seen The Innocents based on Henry James the Turn of the Screw is my favorite and probably the finest "haunted house" film ever.

OP I'd say she was a huge star particularly during the 50s. She appeared in 6 films that were Best Picture nominees during that decade and BO hits King Solomon's Mines, From Here to Eternity, The King and I, An Affair to Remember, Quo Vadis, Julius Caesar. Separate Tables, Heaven Knows Mr. Allison, Tea and Sympathy appearing with such stars as Burt Lancaster, Marlon Brando, Yul Brynner, Robert Mitchum, Cary Grant, David Niven, William Holden and Gregory Peck.

OP, Years from now, when you talk about this, and you will, be kind.

OP - not being a scold, but if you really want to know, just do a Google search on "Datalounge" and "Deborah Kerr" and you'll find about a dozen threads we're already had on her. Here's a recent one:

She had a good singing voice. Unless that was Marni Nixon.

She frolicked with Burt Lancaster in the sand with the water rushing over them. Personally, I would have yanked his swimsuit down beyond his feet and let the waves carry it away.

Louis B. Mayer imported Deborah Kerr from the UK to be his backup Greer Garson, whose box office appeal was on the downswing and who fought with Mayer for better, more varied roles. Hedda and Louella immediately went to work manufacturing Garson-Kerr feud stories in order to scare Garson into compliance.

Deborah's fiancé, Michael Powell, begged her not to leave for Hollywood. He derided Hollywood films as artless and felt that he and Kerr would make a great British film team. But Louis B. beckoned, and she and Powell broke up when he refused to join her.

r4 Thank you. I will likely try some of them out next time I order myself a diverse bunch of old films on DVD from Amazon .Hopefully they are availiable. I vaguely recall Lauren Bacall starred in a film based on or called Turn of the screw by Henry James in around 1999. The same year she reunited onscreen with Kirk Douglas in a film called Diamonds. She seemed at the turn of the millenium to be much in demand .Would that film have been a remake of the Deborah Kerr film or a new interpretation of the same story?

r5 Sounds quite an impressive and stellar career that she had. Was there ever any rumours about her romancing any of her male leads?

r6 I always try to be kind!

r9 That picture is soo sooo sexy yet kind of divine too.Hard to explain but clearly some sort of on camera or onscreen magic translated and worked.

r10 Awe .Did they ever make it up and reunite?

The Innocents is excellent. Please watch if you have not seen it yet OP.

[quote] tell me all about legendary golden era Hollywood actress Deborah Kerr

She be only a woman and a Christian and therefore unworthy of your interest!

I havent and I will .Thanks for the tip r15

R12 According to IMDB she and Burt Lancaster were romantically involved while filming From Here to Eternity (1953). Kerr was cast after Joan Crawford insisted on shooting the film with her own cameraman. Kerr was good and yet Crawford would have been effective in the role and she lost out on a possible Oscar nomination.

r18 Thanks . Was their romance reported or rumoured at the time or is it something that came out later on even decades later? Was Joan Crawford always that particular?? A shame if she was and it would clearly have cost her numerous roles Im sure.

7 Best Actress nominations

R11 The Turn of the Screw had been done on TV with Ingrid Bergman in 1959 and later with Lynn Redgrave in the 70s and very possibly again with Bacall but, the definitive version I'm sure is the 1961 film with a screenplay by William Archibald and Truman Capote, direction by Jack Clayton fresh off of Room at the Top (1959) and glorious b/w Cinemascope by 2 time Oscar winner Freddie Frances who shot The Elephant Man (1980), music by George Auric and Kerr of course and Martin Stephens (Village of the Damned) and Pamela Franklin (The Prime of Miss Jean Brodie) are exceptional as the children.

You can watch The Innocents twice and walk away with different conclusions. Psychological horrors have imitated its ambiguous ending ever since. Few have pulled it off half as creepily. TIME OUT LONDON

The heart-stopping climax offers no answers; just the lingering unease of uncertainty. TOTAL FILM

. . .could serve as an object lesson in its genre. VILLAGE VOICE

R19 Found the info on Lancaster and Kerr on IMBD but it gave no source. Crawford was apparently particular and Eternity would have come on the heels of Sudden Fear (1952) for which she was Oscar nominated but the studio balked and replaced her with Kerr. And yes the film could have been a boost to her career.

Bacall played the housekeeper, not the governess, in "Presence of Mind" (1999).

She pronounced Kerr as CARR. Most people get it wrong these days.

R11 Besides The Innocents watch The Night of the Iguana, The Chalk Garden (1964) with Hayley Mills and Bonjour Tristesse (1958) with David Niven and Jean Seberg and The King and I (1956). Many of her 50s films I think wouldn't hold up to well today.

Wasn't that Bly Manor show based on Turn of the Screw too? I havent seen The Innocents in years. I'm going to watch it soon now.

We had an affair to remember OP

R23 Bacall creeps about like Lurch in The Adams Family-Variety

[quote] She pronounced Kerr as CARR. Most people get it wrong these days.

Is it Carr or Kerr?

Deborah Kerr, rhymes with STAR!

Kerr played so many in lofty, princessy roles in Hollywood that when she was doing the promotional shots for From Here To Eternity she told the photographer, “I feel naked without my tiara.”

"Heaven Knows, Mr. Allison" (1957) is pretty bad, but not as terrible as you might expect a movie about a marine and a nun stranded together on an island during WWII to be.

R26 Yes, I believe Bly Manor was based on Turn of the Screw but nothing compares I would imagine to The Innocents (1961)

. . .one of the most elegantly beautiful ghost movies ever made. it features a scary, intense performance by Deborah Kerr, as the governess. . . Pauline Kael

She did a nude scene late in her a film career (late 60s) out of desperation because her film career was starting to decline. She went into semi retirement soon after.

She was among the last actresses in the old Hollywood studio star system. She took Greer Garson's place as the star in MGM's prestige pictures. Greer had taken Norma Shearer's place about a decade earlier.

She was part of the celeb crowd living in Switzerland: Burton, Niven, Audrey Hepburn, Chaplin, Capucine, Julie Andrews and Blake Edwards, Sophia Loren,many great writers, etc. It was a special time.

This is fun. IMO this film stands the test of time.

r34 do you mean year was it was the late sixties when she did the nude role or she was in her sixties when she did it?

Thanks again r25 When Deborah was awarded her honorary oscar was it generally felt before hand that she had unfairly lost out on a oscar for particular performance/s?

r36 Was Deborah living in Switzerland when she died?

[quote] do you mean year was it was the late sixties when she did the nude role or she was in her sixties when she did it?

Pressure of competition from younger, upcoming actresses made her agree to appear nude in John Frankenheimer's The Gypsy Moths (1969), the only nude scene in her career.

[quote] Was Deborah living in Switzerland when she died?

Kerr died aged 86 on 16 October 2007 at Botesdale, a village in the county of Suffolk, England, from the effects of Parkinson's disease. Less than three weeks later on 4 November, her husband Peter Viertel died of cancer.

I meant to post the link to her Wikipedia entry at R39.

From 1945, Perfect Strangers (U.S. title Vacation from Marriage) is a little gem. She and Robert Donat play a mousy, timorous couple who join the war effort and, well, I don’t want to give anything away.

r21 Those descriptions really sell the film to me .One good indicator of a high quality film or story in my opinion is an embracing of ambiguity rather than having every character, story and conclusion clearly painted out for me with a simplistic everything wrapped up and resolved conclusion to the story. Real life often aint like that.

Cheers r22 I dare say a lot of gossip about affairs or romantic flings between costars in the 1950s were hushed up by film studios.

r39 r40 Many thanks. I hadnt realised she lived in the UK at the time of her passing although I was aware that at some point her elderly brother was killed in England at some point as a result of a crime or violent incident? I seem to remember that being the case. It was reported in the british press but not heavily so.

Nice poster r41 Yes say no more so I have the option of the joys of discovery if I watch it!

R38 She won the NYFCC Award for Best Actress 3 times for The Sundowners (1960), Heaven Knows Mr. Allison (19570 and Black Narcissus (1947) and was nominated 6 times between 1950-1961 for the Oscar but was never considered the front runner that I know of.

I think she should have been nominated for The Innocents (1961) but, it wasn't a hit at the time of release and its reputation grew over time. The film's trailer is very misleading.

Stewart Granger, in his 1981 autobiography, revealed that while he was filming "Caesar and Cleopatra" in 1945 for MGM in London, Kerr, who was filming "Perfect Strangers," seduced him in the back of a taxicab. When asked about this during an interview, Kerr merely smiled and replied, "What a gallant man!"

R46 i remember reading that. I really can’t see her seducing someone but maybe off screen she was very different to her princess image. Wasn’t she friendly with Jean Simmons, they made a couple films together- I wonder if they shared stories about granger... she’s another of those Audrey Hepburn types, she just has no sex appeal really although I find her quite charming.

I can’t really see Joan Crawford in the from here to eternity role, maybe Joan Fontaine but Crawford seemed too old already.

R4, r33 I agree, she was amazing in The Innocents. The look of horror on her face when Miles kisses her...

R46 I think Crawford would have been better cast actually. Kerr was almost 20 years younger than the actor (Phil Ober) who played her husband Capt. Holmes in Eternity and she was 8 years younger than Lancaster. Crawford was only 2 years younger than Ober and would have been more believable as his wife. I can hear an imperious Joan saying the lines and as an an older woman insecure with a younger man. And this was around the time Joan was in Torch Song (1953) and Queen Bee (1955) and she still looked good.

Kerr was nude from afar in The Arrangement with Kirk Douglas and Faye Dunaway. You see her naked butt.

r50 Good heavens! Was it beautiful and pert?!

Nice photo of Deborah Kerr with Audrey Hepburn.

She had a kind of schoolmarm prissiness about her, except for From Here to Eternity. She always seemed ready to scold or tell you the "correct" way to do things. She's a bit like Julie Andrews, but a better actress.

I suspect her Oscar problem was that she was so consistently excellent that people stopped noticing her performances. And she gave so many memorable, even great ones. Also, she wasn't a mess, was completely professional, and didn't have any scandals connected with her. B-O-R-I-N-G.

Something I love about older films are that directors would allow the actors speak and act without editing. In "An Affair to Remember," she and Cary Grant have so many delightful scenes together that just play out...

She really was delightful to watch... and her role in "Tea and Sympathy"? Excellent.

Her performance in The Sundowners is my favorite of hers (and, moreso than Shirley MacLane, it was she who lost to a tracheotomy). Kerr was never bad, though, and nearly always elevated the film she was in.

While Kathleen Byron steals Black Narcissus from everyone, it's because Kerr is so captivating in the central role that you believe in Byron's Sister Ruth going that batshit crazy.

After watching Bly House and having previously watched having watched Hill House, I finally watched both The Haunting and The Innocents. While I liked The Haunting and Julie Harris did a good job, The Innocents made a much bigger impression on me. Great movie and Kerr was excellent. The film did a great job leaving it up to the viewer in deciding whether there was something supernatural happening or the governess was not in her right mind. Great acting by the kids as well.

It is a shame Kerr never won a competitive Oscar.

In both The King and I and An Affair To Remember, Kerr's singing voice was dubbed by Marni Nixon, but Kerr is so good at lip syncing and Nixon so good a mimicking Kerr's voice that you hardly notice.

Oddly enough, The Innocents got a mix of reviews when it was released. Bosley Crowther, a smug, middlebrow critic if there ever was one, was clueless. Pauline Kael was one critic who really "got" the film.

I agree with the above poster that she was so consistently fine that she was taken for granted talent-wise. However she was also a bit overexposed in the 50s and tended to be cast in "ladylike" roles.

I've been curious to see a TV film she made with Claire Bloom in 1986 called Ann and Debbie. They would be wonderful together.

[quote] Something I love about older films are that directors would allow the actors speak and act without editing…

R56 Are you suggesting that Grant and Kerr were speaking lines that weren't scripted? I'm surprised.

It’s on YouTube, R59, though this copy looks like someone's VCR recording, and has German subtitles.

^ The sound is unsynchronised but she still looks OK

She looked quite ill with Parkinson's and blindness when she made that farewell at the Oscars.

Four films with Robert Mitchum, three with Jean Simmons.

Her unpunished blatant adultery with Mitchum in " The Grass is Greener" seems odd for the period.

R29, R30 MGM bought her contract in 1946 and produced this poster telling us how to pronounce her name.

I understand Kerr is pronounced as Cur in the Anglosphere.

She was a replacement for Greer Garson? Gahhh! She was so much better than Greer, truly. Deborah was a much better actress. Much better. Garson only got her Oscar because of the war. Deb was definitely sexier and easier on the eye too.

There are some interesting parallels between the careers of Deborah Kerr and Irene Dunne. Both, in their respective eras, were leading ladies who could handle both drama and comedy well. Kerr starred in the remakes of two of Dunne's big hits, Anna and the King of Siam and Love Affair. And both were multiple Best Actress Oscar nominees who never won (Dunne = 5 times; Kerr = 6), though Kerr received a lifetime achievement Oscar in 1994.

R63 " The Grass is Greener" is an absolute mess.

It was from a harmless little cocktail comedy stage show by handsome Hugh Williams and glamorous Margaret Vyner (who, as you know, is mentioned by Cole Porter). Stanley Donen was going through his English phase and for some unknown reason refused to cut any of the unnecessary verbiage.

Joan Greenwood played the Jean Simmons role on stage and I'm sure she would have been delightfully minx-ish.

Cary Grant was supposed to play the rich American role but was shifted to play the unbelievably passive husband.

Mitchum is incapable of playing comedy. He's frightful.

Deborah really can't do comedy either and she does whine. She wears some absolute dreary twinset and pearls by Hardy Amies. And looks awfully matronly which makes her adultery even more repellant.

Don't miss Black Narcissus, OP.

Thanks r68

[quote] What is the gossip and dish on her? Please spill here!

What kind of gossip do you want? She was skin and bone. Your photo shows her bony shoulders and weak breasts.

Peter Ustinov extemporised in 'Quo Vadis' that she's unattractive due to her thin hips.

The geriatric film director forgot to cut the line.

"[R46] I think Crawford would have been better cast actually. "

No. Crawford would have RUINED "From Here to Eternity"! Of course she was more like the cold-hearted slut army wife than Kerr, who had a very warm presence, but by the early 1950s Crawford came across as a totally artificial diva. "FHtE" was about real people doing unglamorous real-people things, and Crawford's artificiality would have struck a huge false note and ruined the whole thing. And even if our Joanie was a massive slut in real life she had no sexual heat onscreen, she seemed to be someone who'd pose with a man rather than someone who'd want him.

Kerr's casting against type worked very well, the audience expected her to start showing her natural warmth at some point, and of course she did - but with some real passion for once.

Another vote for the beautiful “Black Narcissus”, plus Otto Preminger’s underrated “Bonjour Tristesse”. Kerr has a silent close-up in the climactic scene that is heartbreaking.

I read Crawford wanted her part beefed up...with less focus on Pearl Harbor, and more on her character.

She really fucked herself. She was riding high on the success of Sudden Fear and thought any and all of her demands would be met. She was to be paid 100k, (plus a percentage of the gross) had a first class suite on the boat to Hawaii, her own private villa during filming and her wardrobe custom made by her personal dresser. And billing wise she would of came second, behind Montgomery Clift.

Harry Cohn (co-founder and president of Columbia Pictures) reportedly said "Fuck her" and replaced her with Kerr.

Not to go off on a tangent (too late!) but after Crawford signed a three picture deal with Columbia she met with Cohn in his office for lunch. He started to make a sexual advance on her, but Crawford stopped him dead in tracks by saying:

"Keep it in your pants, Harry. I'm having lunch with Joan and the boys [Cohn's wife and children] tomorrow."

Kerr was one of those rare actors that everyone liked - totally likable presence at all times! That doesn't mean she wasn't a damn good actor, and she was, but she had the rare gift of always being appealing no matter what she did.

My favorite Kerr film is the haunting "Black Narcissus", a beautiful, haunting, delicate, emotional film. Yes, other actors make huge impressions, but Kerr centers the film with her calm presence, keeps our attention riveted even though there's little action or openness between the characters. She really was VERY good at what she did.

r70 The more naughty the better lets put it that way!!

[quote] There are some interesting parallels between the careers of Deborah Kerr and Irene Dunne.

I don't know much about Dunne but they do share the same profile. Deborah Kerr has a pleasant nose and large eyes.

Greer Garson's nose is much more direct. Sarah Miles has the same profile as Deborah Kerr.

Garson had equine-like nostrils. And to quote Leonard Maltin, she had poise but no grace. Looking down her nose at everyone, stiff and mannered in just about every performance she gave.

^ Garson's nostrils (and Gladys Cooper's nostrils) creep me out.

I saw The Hucksters a couple of months ago on TCM. MGM certainly was grooming Kerr to follow in the steps of Garson and Shearer as their "lady" star. But Gable was too old for his role and he never really clicked with the MGM lady stars (except with Shearer in the pre code A Free Soul, where she's no lady). Ava Gardner is in it as well and pretty much walks off with the picture and certainly clicks on screen with Gable.

Kerr certainly more than held her own opposite Gardner in Night of the Iguana. Excellent film. The long "dark night of the soul" sequence is so well written and played.

I saw The Hucksters and I was absolutely repelled by one scene.

One of the finest ladies who also happened to be a consummate actress. Stunning, kind, intelligent, centered, dignified, sexy. What more could one ask for.

Kerr gave up a promising career in British cinema where she played a variety of roles, for fame and fortune in Hollywood. But she soon regretted it. "I came over to act, but it turned out all I had to do was to be high-minded, long-suffering, white-gloved and decorative." When "From Here to Eternity" came her way, she jumped at the chance to do something different.

Of her 6th and final Oscar nomination for "The Sundowners" (1960), Kerr remarked, "I should have won that year. I should've!"

Yes, she was utterly luminous in Black Narcissus but she had a strong director, a superb cinematographer and lovely gowns.

She relied on a strong director for her best films— Michael Powell, Fred Zinnamon and Jack Clayton— but she floundered without one. (She had George Cukor for her very difficult role in 'Edward My Son' (1949) and that was disappointing).

She was lucky to be partnered with the biggest box-office men during the 50s. But those films (with one or two exceptions) where she got top billing were her worst (avoid 'Count Your Blessings' ).

She aged very quickly. Those scenes of her running in ‘Eye of the Devil’ in those matronly, dowdy twinset and pearls by dress designer Julie Harris are quite sad.

She couldn't do comedy ('Grass is Greener', R67 and 'Prudence and the Pill' are painful) and she was sometimes annoying in drama; she positively whined in 'The Naked Edge', 1961 with the equally annoying Gary Cooper.

MGM did Kerr no favors by constantly casting her in "perfect English rose" roles. She really took off artistically when she went on her own.

R84 How long was the MGM contract 1946-1953?

R10 I’m sceptical about your second paragraph. Michael Powell's memoirs claimed he fornicated with all but two of his leading ladies but I think bedding Deborah was wrong.

I doubt Powell would abandon Britain. He may have visited LA when 'Thief of Baghdad' had to be moved in 1940 when the Denham Studios was in danger from the Luftwaffe but his career was riding high in Britain in the late 40s.

R10: In my teen years, as I was more interested in classic Hollywood, I'd mistake Greer Garson for Deborah Kerr and vice versa.

By all accounts she was Hell on Wheels.

She was sexy in King Solomon's Mines in the scene where she cut her hair.

Crawford would have been awful in "From Here to Eternity". The casting included interesting twists--Donna Reed as a hooker, Monty Clift as a boxer, Sinatra in a tragic role. By comparison Joan would have played Joan and looked ridiculous. Lancaster didn't play against type, but he showed how well he could work in an ensemble. Kerr was good at repression and believable as frigid (could Joan do that?). Yet, she could put over the old "I've never been kissed like that before" because of her poise and restraint. In a similar but reverse vein, Reed could do "whore with heart of gold" by first playing against type and then doing what she did well, being the girl next door.

R88 That short hair 'gamine' look became popular in the 50s. Deborah Kerr had to wear the padded bras because that was the other fashion of the 50s.

R41 I thought 'Vacation from Marriage' was embarrassing. Deborah Kerr was 24 but looked 18; Robert Donat was 40 but looked 50.

Film critic Bosley Crowther, R59, may have been 'smug' but I reckon he was pretty accurate the way he analysed the different elements brought together to make a satisfactory movie or an unsatisfactory one.

Love Deborah Kerr - a refined ladylike person on screen and such a good actress. Should have been nominated for her excellent role in Night Of The Iguana. But she did live to get her honorary Oscar!!

Deborah thought that she would have more fame and fortune in Hollywood?

[R70]: Your assertion is totally wrong.

In the film, Robert Taylor’s uncle Petronius, played by Leo Genn, is trying to steer Ustinov, as emperor Nero, into giving hostage Kerr to Taylor as a reward for his battle heroics. To defer Ustinov from taking her, Genn states, “I think you will agree she is too narrow in the hips “ making Ustinov laugh.

Later, when Ustinov and Genn stop by the couch where Taylor and Kerr are seated, Ustinov informs her that he has decided to give her to Taylor as a reward. As he and Genn proceed on their way he murmurs, “Yes, too narrow in the hips,” and chuckles.

So, the line was not an improvised throwaway, but a carefully scripted plot element.

Did Deborah's "Tea and Sympathy" co-star John Kerr pronounce his name the same way she did?

I'm sure "The King and I" was her most successful film, but her best acting was in "Separate Tables"..

[R95]: Yes he did. I saw an interview with him, and he said his last name should be pronounced the same as Deborah’s.

KARR.

r82 Was that the year Elizabeth Taylor won for Butterfield 8?

I heard that John Huston was the original director for 'Quo Vadis' and that he wanted Gregory Peck in the full bloom of manhood to play the hero alongside Leo Genn.

All three of them did 'Moby Dick' together six years later.

“Nothing human disgusts me, Mr. Shannon, unless it's unkind, violent.”

R97, Yes. But I finally got one!

I like the one where she fell thousands of feet off this monastery in the Himalayas. Or someone fell, if not her. Or was it in the Alps? Black Narcissus? Or was it Black Orpheus? I forget.

R100 She looked so frail.

I recall reading that it was Louis B. Mayer who demanded that Kerr's last name would be pronounced 'car.' He insisted he was not going to pay all that money to a leading lady named after a dog. He didn't change her name, but he changed the pronunciation.

R89 Did you ever see Crawford in Torch Song made the same year as Eternity? She could have transposed that icy demeanor well to the part of Mrs. Holmes who wasn't meant to be frigid was she? Sexually frustrated is more like it; the Captain's wife carrying on an affair with an enlisted man. Kerr is good but, like Donna Reed playing against type in a popular, well-reviewed film took their perfectly acceptable but hardly outstanding performances a long way ditto Sinatra. Clift gave the film's best performance and Borgnine was effectively menacing.

[quote] Mrs. Holmes … wasn't meant to be frigid was she?

I won't be dipping into this 830 page book to answer your question. I don't know what possessed Zinnemann to choose it. Zinnemann was such a chameleon.

Video of Deborah Kerr receiving her honorary Oscar from Glenn Close.

R105 I'm talking about the film which gave the impression that the Holme's marriage was loveless.

Deborah Kerr . . . as the passionate Karen Holmes, defeated by a callous mate and a fruit???less marriage. NY Times film review Aug. 6, 1953

There's a Youtube video with (I think) three interviews made over the decades where she describes being hustled into the Karen Holmes role.

Rita Hayworth was the first choice to play Karen in From Here to Eternity as she was under contract to Columbia. But she had just finished filming Miss Sadie Thompson when offered the role and she said she would do it if only she could take a vacation first before filming. Columbia said no vacation so she passed. She was also getting involve with her latest disaster of a romance and marriage with Dick Haymes. Crawford was offered the role next then Deborah Kerr.

r109 Love Rita but prefer Deborah.

"[R105] I'm talking about the film which gave the impression that the Holme's marriage was loveless."

The movie has Karen as hating her husband and fucking around on him out of spite, and finding herself shocked at how much she enjoys her session with Sgt. Milton... which presumes that she'd done plenty of spite-fucking without enjoying it. Which would have been a perfect role for a 1930s Joan Crawford, because in the 1930s Joan could still play normal human beings, but by the 1950s she'd become incredibly artificial and wouldn't have fit into a realistic movie like this one.

It's not that good a movie, but Clift's performance is so good it makes the whole turgid mess seem much better than it is. That was the year he should have won an Oscar, but Harry Cohn screwed him over by pushing Burt Lancaster for Best Actor instead of Clift, because Clift was an alcoholic and Lancaster was a complete professional, and Cohn thought an Oscar would be wasted on someone who was going to shortly drink their way out of major roles. To his credit, Lancaster was pissed and thought Clift deserved to win.

R59, R61 It's nice to see Kerr and Bloom together but this unconvincing, half-hour talk-fest fails because the writer placed a 'conceit' upon it.

The 'conceit' is that all the characters talk about a person who remains unseen. These conceits may work in a novel or a stage play but they're inimical to cinema which allows flexible story-telling.

This conceit stunted the drama in 'Suddenly Last Summer' where the wicked, beautiful Sebastian was left unseen. Similarly 'Edward My Son' had a wicked son who was left unseen.

^ It's not quite explicit as to what kind of wickedness Deborah Kerr's son Edward indulges.

Was it some kind of metaphor for sex-wickedness?

The movie (based on a 1947 play by Robert Morley et al) seemed rather similar to the wicked Nicky Lancaster in Noël Coward's 1924 play 'The Vortex'.

Coward's play seemed to use wickedness as a metaphor for sex.

R111 I would loved to have seen Crawford in this film. And talk about realistic Donna Reed with her 'toni' hair style as the 'hot' prostitute. Ava Gardner yes, but, Reed! She looks and acts like a snobby woman at a ladies luncheon. Was she cast to tone down the material?

I think that Reed was cast because the filmmakers wanted a strong good-girl-gone-bad vibe from the character, someone who'd make the audience think that all this "dime-a-dance girl" needed was a good man and she'd turn around. I can't say she totally worked for me, as I never felt any chemistry between her and Clift, but everyone else seemed to like her.

Her climactic scene in Bonjour Tristesse was rather powerful from what I remember. Her acting is rather stiff and mannered to me and if she acted like that in real life I’d probably find her insufferable but in films of the 50s and even 60s it works.

[quote] Bonjour Tristesse

I find that film hard to watch because it's obvious the old director was in lust with his nymphet star showing off her buttocks.

The film was drastically cut in the editing stage because important supporting actors get just one line of dialogue. And I think Deborah Kerr's character is to be seen through the warped perception of the confused teenager.

R100 Look at that woman on the left! She can't let go of the statuette.

And anyway she's the wrong person to present it. She represents a kind of rasping, grasping modern crudity whereas the late Deborah Kerr was genteel.

R39, Wasn't there also a bedroom/nude scene in "The Arrangement"?

I read that she was miserable as a child because she was sent to boarding school where she was tormented for being chubby.

She married a RAF fighter-pilot hero, but when they moved to Hollywood there wasn't much for him to do. He couldn't find a 'suitable' job in the American aerospace industry, so he developed resentment st being seen as 'Mr Kerr'.

In her later years she developed severe vertigo, problems with inner ear balance, and was miserable because she couldn't find a treatment or cure.

Reed, like Sinatra wanted the part and despite being a Columbia contract player, Cohn initially opposed the casting as did Zinnemann. She did more than one audition. The hair is not not her fault--it was the 50s. She's quite good as the princess of the brothel. She was drawn to Clift but knew he had a screw loose and shouldn't get too close to him (or any other customer). If they had cast a go-to whore like Gloria Grahame, she wouldn't have gotten the subtlety and the production code would have caused more problems. Gardner played an essentially similar part in "Night of Iguana" and was good at it, but it was 10 years later and she was happy to be working. She was never considered for "Eternity" and at that point in her career didn't take acting as seriously as many of her peers.

Clift may have been a drunk, but he was a pro and spent a lot of time rehearsing with scene partners. He also learned to play the bugle and box.

Crawford would have wanted to play Karen as some soapy melodrama tramp. She's frigid in the sense that despite screwing around, she never has an orgasm.

The book was considered unfilmable, partly because of the complicated plot, but also because of the characters. We're never told that Alma is a prostitute and you could take a family to the movie (which people still did in the 50s) without having to explain too much. Reed was perfect casting for that.

R60 - no what I meant was that actors delivered their lines and the camera simply filmed them. We in the audience saw a one-shot... actors moving, delivering dialogue, reacting to each other - no cuts and additional shots or takes.

Deborah Kerr fully embodied a popular stereotype of a refined upper class woman. She could flesh it out, a bit, with some on point emoting. But I could never find much in her work to care about. She was a competent actress, but she was a great type.

I really love Black Narcissus, but she is the hole in the middle of picture. She's 20 years too young for the role and just fucks up the entire narrative. But she does look good in Technicolor. Moira Shearer, however, did that even better.

So was her reputation as a colleague amongst her peers good or were there any rumours of diva antics or clashes with rival actresses etc?

Sister Clodagh in "Black Narcissus" is one of my favourites in Kerr's oeuvre. It's such a fucking strange film, and the rest of the cast is outstanding, as well. It was her "other" Nun Performamce. But some cuts leave our crucial flashback memories from Clodagh's pre-religious life, which is infuriating.

^*Forgot to add that Kathleen Byron, as the slowly mentally collapsing Sister Ruth almost, but not quite, walked off with the film.

But Sister Ruth needs Sister Clodagh since they are each other's 'doubles'.

R56 ^^ I disagree, per my post above. It was a close thing, I'll admit, but in the end, it's still Kerr's film.

And she absolutely was bedded by Powell.

Mitchum adored her.

Oscar loved wholesome, fresh actresses playing whores.

Anyone see DK onstage? Would have loved seeing her in T&S or SEASCAPE.

The Sundowners was the same year as Butterfield 8 and The Apartment.

Kerr definitely should have won that year and at least nominated for The Innocents in '62. The actual nominees that year were Natalie Wood (Splendor in the Grass), Geraldine Page (Summer and Smoke), Sophia Loren (Two Women), Audrey Hepburn (Breakfast at Tiffany's), and Piper Laurie (The Hustler).

I would certainly trade Hepburn or Wood for Kerr. And I think Laurie's role was really more a supporting part.

R121 Peter Pan was the top BO grosser for 1953 followed by The Robe and Shane was #5 but I don't think Eternity with what was considered a steamy scene between 2 adulterers, a subplot involving a psycho after a 'wop' was considered family entertainment and kids would be bored with all the military talk. Reed is badly miscast and ridiculous for she is neither sexy nor has any aspect of a bad girl about her.

Kerr was married for most of her adult life: 1st husband from 1945 to 1959, second from 1960-2007. Two daughters from her first marriage.

So how many lovers did she have during those long marriages? People have mentioned Lancaster and Michael Powell, but if Powell was bragging about bedding all his actresses I wonder what kind of pressure he put on some of them. Maybe not on Kerr, there were rumors that they were engaged at one point.

[R115] I think that the Clift-Reed romance works because he's essentially on the same social level as she is. She may be a "dance hall girl" but she's gonna work her way up, whatever the hand she's been dealt. This attitude lends the character a basic decency - a woman who's who's on her way to being redeemed. That's the plan, anyway. In this sense the character's similar to title character in THE REVOLT OF MAMIE STOVER (1956) starring Jane Russell a couple of year's later. As for Monty's character, he's a very decent guy but a loser who's stubborn enough to put up with brutal abuse, is an alcoholic and who goes AWOL. His accent tells up he has some kind of working class background. He may be reaching down slightly in going for her but she's the only person who might pull him up. Very well matched in that sense.

R127 - I agree that the tension between the two is the paradigm for the film's message of the pitfall of fighting human nature with iron control . . . they are both absolutely necessary to the point of the film. But I wouldn't put it that Ruth and Clodagh are each other's "doubles". I would rather put it that they represent two sides of one dilemma. The easy-going Sister "Honey" is the nun who fits the mold far more easily, and Flora Robson is the experienced old hand who thinks she's well into the mold but is undone by the place in a different way. The four women round out, as it were, one complex woman placed in an overheated environment that exposes the limitations of each one. And then there is the very young Jean Simmons as the sultry young local who suffers from none of their conflicts.

But it is still Kerr's film. It is Kerr who grows and learns and who leaves the old palace humbled but wiser and gentler.

Unlike today, people took kids to the movies regularly in the 50s. It was still cheaper than a babysitter and a "war movie" with "a love story" would have provided balance for the parents. There were few "kids films" in those days, outside of Saturday matinees, which were disappearing and the occasional Disney film. Cartoons were written more for adults than children--Bugs Bunny at the opera, that sort of thing.

[quote] people took kids to the movies regularly in the 50s. It was still cheaper than a babysitter

Some parents used the movies as a babysitter.

They would bring the children to the theatre and ask the attendant to keep an eye on the children who would be seated on the aisle at the back close to where the attendant sat during the movie. The parents would return at the end of the 3 hour session after they had done whatever they needed to do.

She had an affair with Stewart Granger while filming King Solomon's Mines. When told by the press years later that he'd written about it in his memoirs, she said, "What a gallant man he is."

R138, That movie was made the year he married Jean Simmons, 1950.

Deborah's mother-in-law, Salka Viertel, was Garbo's lover for years.

I saw her at the Kennedy Center in both 'Seascape' and 'The Day After the Fair'. I didn't have enough perception to evaluate her performances as I had seen very few plays, and I was dazzled by her Movie Star status and couldn't separate it from the plays.

Black Narcissus is the greatest movie ever made. The end.

R138, I mentioned something similar at R46.

Separate Tables is another good Kerr film. Great cast and Gladys Cooper getting to do her monstrous act from Now Voyager again this time with Kerr as her beaten down charge.

[quote]Natalie Wood (Splendor in the Grass), Geraldine Page (Summer and Smoke)

Both ridiculously hammy actresses. Wood's breakdown scene in [italic]Splendor In The Grass[/italic] is laughable, almost as bad as Doris Day's scenery chewing crash and burn in [italic]Midnight Lace[/italic]. Page always let people know that she was acting. Played to the cheap seats for real. Kerr was robbed. How ironic was it that Glenn Close of all people, presented her with her honorary Oscar.

R138, R46. I believe neither of those anecdotes about the Deborah Kerr.

Stewart Granger suffered with cancer and a failed career in the 70s and 80s. He appeared at one interview drunk and charged the journalists as being ghouls for watching him die for them.

Those ungallant remarks were obviously made as he was suffering in extremis.

[Quote]Salka Viertel, was Garbo's lover for years.

Is this true? I thought Salka was str8.

Elder Dataloungers please tell me all about Peter Vietel.

He had a dour wife but a kinky mother?

Was the kinky mother at MGM?

Geraldine Page was a genius.

Peter Viertel abandoned his first wife, Jigee, who was pregnant with Viertel's daughter, Christine, to shack up with French fashion model, Bettina Graziani. Bettina, in turn, left him for Prince Aly Khan, and survived the 1960 auto accident that killed Khan and led to Bettina's miscarriage.

Poor Jigee (formerly Mrs. Bud Schulberg), woke up one morning in an alcohol and sleeping pill haze, lit up a ciggy while in the john, which fell into the pocket of her sleeping gown and set her ablaze. She died a month later from her burns in 1960. Viertel married Kerr later that year.

R138, R39 I think the more likely cause of tension between Deborah and Jean was that Deborah was treated well by MGM but Jean was sold by J Arthur Rank "like a piece of meat" to Howard Hughes and RKO.

Jean got top billing in just one of their 3 films together. 'Young Bess' is a mess of a film. It was mounted in England but the large cast of supporting actors (Including 'Sister Ruth'/Kathleen Byron) were transported over to LaLa Land and the hack of a director made it all rather dreary.

r140 Really! Gosh I wasnt expecting to read a connection to Greta Garbo on this thread!

Everybody wanted to know Garbo, even years after her retirement. And those she wanted to know, did.

R147 . . .

"Salka Viertel was once the highest paid writer on the MGM lot. She was also Greta Garbo’s lover, for whom she wrote five films.  A side note: So close were they that Viertel  bought a house next door to Garbo; when in 1969 Viertel  published her “autobiography” The Kindness of Strangers, she revealed their true relationship. Garbo never spoke to her again, avoiding her on the streets of New York City."

R149 = F. Murray Abraham

R3 I wouldn't consider Elizabeth Taylor British. She was born in London to American expatriates from St. Louis, then moved back with her family to the U.S. at age 7 when WWII broke out. She grew up in California and lived there until her thirties when she met Richard Burton and became a jetsetter and famously renounced her U.S. citizenship. After their second divorce in her early forties, she regained her American citizenship and moved back where she lived for the rest of her life.

When Taylor died, she had dual US/UK citizenship, which isn't unheard of, but not really frequent either.

Below, two old Queens who seemed to both be delighted to be in each other's presence:

Nicole Kidman also has dual U.S./Australian citizenship. She was born in Hawaii to Aussie parents and then briefly lived in Washington, D.C. before her family returned to Australia when she was a toddler. But no one considers her American.

I wouldn't call Taylor's parents expatriates. Her father had been been transferred to London by his company and they never renounced their US citizenship.

R3 I'm sure she was given the offer to become a 'Dame' but probably declined it. Lots do but it never gets much publicity.

Whilst I'm a monarchist I would never accept a title. Just a personal thing. I'd rather be in the company of Deborah, Glenda & Vanessa then slut Helen Mirren, Harvey's girl Judi Dench and other non-talents.

Lawson was reportedly quite bitter about never officially being made a "Dame."

[quote] I would never accept a title.

Do you need to be asked three times, R160, before you gracefully acquiesce?

Deborah Kerr may have an attractive ornament in good films.

But she doesn't have the ability to save a bad film— and this film is a very bad film. It's about a liar and a drunk and it's painful to watch.

This movie had to be Deborah's nadir . . .

R163, That "liar and drunk" was F. Scott Fitzgerald.

Please name some bad films saved by a good performance.

She was enchantingly lovely, and quite a capable actress, but I don't know if she's legendary (at least, I'VE never heard any legends about her).

r157 Love that photo of Elizabeth Taylor chatting with the Queen Mother! I had no idea they'd met!What was the occasion?

The Salka Vertiel info above is incorrect. Garbo visited Vertiel every summer in Switzerland up until Salka's death. They were life long friends.

Kerr was good in the comedy “Dream Wife”, but most of her other work in comedies was not very effective — maybe because films were not good. As has been noted above, she might not have had the ability to transcend bad material.

“Marriage on the Rocks”’ is undoubtedly the worst, it’s depressing to see Kerr in such a shoddy film.

At least this one had witty opening credits, but Kerr still comes across like a prissy schoolmarm.

This thread inspired me to watch Powell and Pressburger's "The Life and Death of Colonel Blimp," and I must say I was impressed by the performances of the young Deborah Kerr.

r171 Pleased to hear that. A positive ripple effect.

Well, I'd started watching it before but was turned off by the aging makeup on Roger Livesey. Now that I've finished it, I can't imagine what my problem was. On both the main characters, the aging was really expertly done for that era of moviemaking.

Sorry babe, she was even before my time !

R171 That role was written for Wendy Hiller.

R166 I will get back to you on that one.

R166, Helen Lawson - "Murder in Malibu".

After watching From Here to Eternity I didn't think much of Donna Reed playing a hooker nor Deborah Kerr as the scornful wife, even though Kerr had the stronger performance of the two, it all felt very bland. There was no chemistry between Donna Reed and Monty Clift, however there was more intimacy between Monty and Burt Lancaster drunk sitting on the side of the road. The beach scene grossed me out for some reason.. I don't know why. Kerr's nostrils and horse teeth were off putting.

R109 Rita Hayworth should have been cast as Alma aka Lorene instead of Donna Reed.

Hayworth would have been too much of a stereotypical hooker.

Hayworth would have brought a warmth and humanity to the role of the army wife who fucks around out of loneliness and spite, as well as sexiness and star quality. She would have been perfect casting, but I can't say the role would have been great for her career as it'd have taken some of the shine off her image. But then, it'd also have given her a big hit, at at time when she was a few years past being the It Girl of the moment.

Kerr was good, she's always good, but it's far from her best role. But what the hell, it was a big hit for her, every actor likes having a big hit.

Thanks, R25 for mentioning "The Chalk Garden". I've always liked that film.

Some bits of supposed DK gossip:

The rolling in the surf scene in "From Here to Eternity" was apparently very uncomfortable for the actors with sand getting "everywhere".

Deborah Kerr supposedly was well known for having a legendary collection of dirty jokes.

R157

I hate that "thing" that Liz is wearing on her head.

It looks cheap and nasty. It’s not a proper scarf or snood; it's one of those pre-made, unwashable "things' which cancer victims wear to cover their baldness.

Heavily into scat.

She’s awful. That voice with the permanent catch in it no matter what the mood is. Like she’s about to burst into tears at any second. Her dramatics are like Doris Day’s.

Well 166. I have put some thought into your question —and you will note that I was talking about ‘performers’ rather than ‘performances’.

I recommend those silent Garbo movies because all though they were frightful primitive things she lights up the screen and makes them interesting. And Louise Brooks also in ‘Lulu’.

Most of Charles Laughton’s movies in the last 20 years of his life were substandard but he’s always fascinating to watch.

Similarly, Margaret Leighton. Her intelligence and lissom beauty weren’t appreciated by the bosom-loving American distributors. So she was obliged to appear appear in a number of films which were below her talent.

"I hate that "thing" that Liz is wearing on her head."

Well, it's obligatory to wear a hat when meeting a queen, and apparently her dressmaker had some leftover fabric handy for that perfect matchy-matchy look.

[quote] I don't know if she's legendary

I agree, R67, I think the OP is waxing lyrical to describe her as 'legendary'.

I'd describe her as suitable to play wives and submissive roles. Even when she got top billing she played a submissive wifely role.

In "I See a Dark Stranger" (1946) she's anything but submissive and gives one of her best performances.

No, "Black Narcissus" alone qualifies her as legendary.

Yes, R189, it's wonderful. She's vibrant and appealing and not submissive at all.

It's a tremendously entertaining movie.

They had to change the name for the Americans who might assume Deborah was consorting with an African-American!

r67 r188 Oh to my mind she definitely has a feel of legendary in the Hollywood sense Nor an absolute top tier legend like Bette Davis , Cary Grant or Doris Day but pretty damned special in terms of Hollywoods golden era.

Is she comparable to, say, Eleanor Parker? Just as beautiful anyway.

^ She did more A grade films than Eleanor Parker.

Deborah Kerr got the job if Cary Grant wanted a nice woman to play his wife.

Deborah Kerr got the job if the script called for "An Englishwoman".

She was a trifle bland and inoffensive.

She's a far better actress than the hammy Eleanor Parker, though I will say that Parker's super-bitch scene at the beginning of AN AMERICAN DREAM is almost a camp classic.

Kerr tended to get typecast by Hollywood, which is why I enjoy her most in films where she isn't. such as COLONEL BLIMP, THE SUNDOWNERS, I SEE A DARK STRANGER, and especially THE INNOCENTS.

Margaret Leighton actually showed her bosoms in X, Y, & ZEE, where she plays a swinging London pal of Elizabeth Taylor's Zee. Leighton's first scene shows her in a purple afro wig and a see-though blouse (no bra). A far cry from her excellent performance in THE GO-BETWEEN a year earlier.

[quote] A far cry

I cried all the way through that horrendous Liz Taylor farrago directed by a bone-headed man more suited to do army training films.

Parker was excruciatingly hammy in “The Man with the Golden Arm” and “An American Dream”. I could never imagine Kerr indulging in such scenery chewing.

R197, I could never see Kerr in "Caged".

Debs chews the scenery pretty hard in "Separate Tables." The movie is enjoyable if a little too stagey. She plays Gladys Cooper's neurotically repressed spinster daughter. Fascinated and frightened by sex. She's at least ten years too old for the part too.

She was about 38 during Separate Tables, not too old to play a spinster. Especially with Gladys Cooper as a mom.

I prefer the American stars. ... I think they've got more oomph.

I guess they deliberately made Melanie look awful to begin with so that the Diana makeover would be more of a stark contrast. I have to say it worked. She looked so much better with a haircut and simpler but elegant clothing

Oops wrong thread

R201 = Ann Sheridan

r201 = Emily Watson

R199 Englishman Terence Rattigan wrote two delicate English plays full of subtlety and nuance about English non-communication. He wrote them for refined English actors and sensitive English audiences.

Lumbering Burt Lancaster rode in from his ranch and hired a lumbering hack from Kansas to do a cheap studio-bound movie and unfortunately all the sensitive characters are traduced into cartoonish caricatures.

Only Wendy Hiller and Felix Aylmer retain any credibility.

Awww, I like Eleanor Parker. She was so pretty. [italic]Interrupted Melody[/italic] is hard to sit through because she doesn't have an Aussie accent like the real life Marjorie Lawrence.

R163 One of the silliest things in this silly movie supposedly set in 1938 was Deborah wearing 1950s hobble skirts.

R163, R165 This schlocky movie with the melodramatic title 'Beloved Infidel' is supposed to be about the drunken has-been F. Scott Fitzgerald.

But unfortunately it's all seen through the eyes of a muckraker who could veto the script. This muckraker lied about her age, name, and heritage so nothing in this film is at all credible.

The IMDB says "Gregory Peck felt his performance was disastrous".

Shiela Graham was a loose woman. She’d marry one man but have children with another.

Sheilah Graham was a WML? mystery guest in 1964 @ 3:45.

[quote] Shiela Graham was a loose woman. She’d marry one man but have children with another.

Shiela Graham was a tawdry adulteress.

Deborah Kerr was incapable of playing tawdry women and criminals.

Gloria Grahame married and had children with her former husband's son.

Gloria Grahame could play tawdry women and criminals.

Deborah can't.

Gloria Grahame should have played Shiela Graham.

Why didn't she, R215?

I think that Peck was miscast as well; he had too much dignity to pay a boozed up hasbeen writer like FSF.

I wasn't familiar with An American Dream. I just watched this clip. Miss Parker gives such a very restrained, understated performance!

In the 1976 adaptation of "The Last Tycoon" they cast Ingrid Boulting as Kathleen (a character based on Sheila Graham): she looks much more like Graham than Kerr did, but isn't much of an actress.

R20 6 nominations and an Honorary Oscar

WHET Ingrid Boulting?

R220 There was something creepy about her.

She was related to that ancient Roy Boulting who made decent Socialist movies in the 40s and descending to indecent sex-comedies in the 60s and then deflowered a teenage Hayley Mills.

That film 'The Last Tycoon' was odd and lifeless.

It was produced by the tasteless Sam Spiegel who liked to employ English talent and liked to employ star names so his films seem bloated. The script was written by Harold Pinter (who is odd) and I think that the interesting but odd Jack Clayton was involved behind the scenes.

Bette Davis famously feuded with Sheila Graham and had her barred from her sets. Bette hated her and her sarcastic comments.

Boulting paints & runs a yoga studio in Ojai. Roy Boulting was her father.

How very, very...Ojai.

Sorry, Roy was Ingrid's step-father.

Roy Boulting showed the world Hayley Mills' bare butt in "The Family Way".

Isn’t it sort of implied that something untoward might have happened to ingrid on the set of ‘the last tycoon’. Didn’t Angelica Huston say she found ingrid crying some place after some private meeting with Sam spiegel. Wonder what that was about. Theresa Russell had a casting couch story about spiegel.

Did she at least get a gift certificate out of it, r227?

[quote] some private meeting with Sam spiegel

I wouldn't be surprised if he was the 1950's Weinsteen.

[quote] Roy Boulting showed the world Hayley Mills' bare butt in "The Family Way".

And what a tawdry little show it was.

And she was paired with the most unappetizing man in Britain's moribund movie industry

Be Kind Rewind just posted a lovely ode to Miss Kerr. If you have 45 minutes to kill, it's worth a watch.

I didn't realize that Sheila Graham was such a whore.

Whore!