Stanwyck's Final Oscar Nom was for "Sorry, Wrong Number" 1948

The set up for "Sorry, Wrong Number"...

Ann Mah-gwit, you were superb in Who Will Love My Children.

I like Agnes Morrehead in the radio version (although she did several, and they're not all equal). Stanwyck is a favorite of mine but she's kind of hard to take in this one, for me.

Hardcore Stanwyck fans: she had a smaller role in Executive Suite 1954 and played hysterical scorned woman-good and she looked good.

She never gave a bad performance. Immensely watchable in diverse roles.

She was even enjoyable on "Big Valley". We had five TV channels and Sunday morning we never missed the syndicated repeats.

Yes-I even loved her as Victoria Barkley.

OP, you thought Morehead was too shrill but you'd loved to have seen Geraldine Page in the role?

Moorehead could be a bit too shrill-Magnificent Ambersons-OMG!

I remember this film has a flashback within a flashback!

But I am grateful to have learned about the hag line at a dance.

I'd suck Burt's big cock and rim his ass, then let him ENTER me, right in front of that malingering old harpy of a wife!

Dan Callahan in his book on Stanwyck called The Miracle Woman is particularly critical of her performance in the film.

It becomes instantly clear just how wrong it is to see Leona in this first scene when we should really only be hearing her on the phone, on the radio, in the dark; Stanwyck has to make impossible physical transitions as a real woman in a real bed. What to do? She falls back on invalid cliches (panting, obsequious looks), and decisive body movements, but there's no emotional throughline to what she's doing. Litvak keeps moving the camera away from Stanwyck to look around the apartment so that she can just be a voice like Moorehead was, but he always has to come back to her, and nothing can hide the sketchiness of this character and this situation as visualized.

Yeah, that "robbed" Moorehead vs. movie star Stanwyck bit I wrote about. After about 10 minutes of Moorehead querulously berating various telephone operators, you're hoping the hitman comes early!

I loved this movie and the Murder, She Wrote homage "Crossed Up"!

Here's the first of many times Agnes Moorehead performed this radio play in 1943. I found it difficult to stick it out for the entire 30 minutes!

Then there's Loni Anderson in the '89 remake, "Sorry, Wrong Actress!"

No wonder that whore Leona was so determined to keep him!

I love how we’re supposed to believe that a 41 year old Barbara is a college coed. Still love her though.

One of my favorite pet peeves of classic movies is the mature star playing their young selves. It still happened later in "Rich and Famous" and "Beaches." At least Missy doesn't wear a pinafore like Ginger Rogers!

Shelley Winters appeared in a '50s TV version of "Sorry, Wrong Number." Who could have matched Shell's yowling cadences as her fed-up husband? Ernest Borgnine? Broderick Crawford? Ethel Merman in drag?

She had to have been the kvetchiest Leona *ever*, r20.

Shelley Winters made a career out of punching above her weight with hot guys

Agreed r22. Vittorio Gassman was super fine.

Every time I think about this movie I think it could never happen with a cellphone, and it becomes dated although I love love love Stanwyck. I could watch her make soap. Just a major fan. But this is a mystery for women and Stanwyck deserved a better role.

Regardless, her best performance was in "Double Indemnity."

didn't Caroll Baker do a TV version?

Stanwyck should have played the role of Ethel Thayer in On Golden Pond (instead of that over rated clam digger, Kate).

She’d.have slapped the SHIT out of Jane and won her Oscar.

Many of her best roles were playing unsympathetic characters. And she refused to sign a long term contract with a major studio. It cost her a competitive Oscar.

Other actresses won Oscars without signing with mjor studios (Vivien Leigh, twice).

*major

I remember hearing Agnes Moorehead do Sorry, Wrong Number on the CBS Radio Mystery Theater in the '70s, when I was in high school. It was on at around 11pm and I used to listen to it in bed. (The show was hosted by E. G. Marshall, who always ended the broadcast with, "Pleasant....dreams?"

...yes, he did.)

my Grandad called him Eggfart Marshall

I never understood the love for this.

My first cat was a rescue cat. Her name was Bootsie Stanwyck.

"... we’re supposed to believe that a 41 year old Barbara is a college coed"

Filters were almost always used for Stanwyck because she had a rough complexion.

My high school did a production of "Sorry, Wrong Number" perhaps because it didn't have many characters as it would have been antique by then. The leading lady was an utter ham and many of us kept wanting her to get murdered ASAP to end the adsience's misery.

She was awful in that movie.

By the end even I was rooting for the killer.

How many times did she tell us that she was an invalid. It was like Dottie Hinkle announcing that she’s a divorced woman.

Stanwyck was a horrible actress and an even worse person.

Sounds like Pia Zadora in THE DIARY OF ANNE FRANK, R37.

[quote]She had to have been the kvetchiest Leona *ever*

Ahem.

R40 = Agnes Moorehead

The film is an overly convoluted expansion of a simple short radio play, but Stanwyck is very good

She was a right-winger who supported the HUAC witch hunts

I do like her as an actress, though

Here's the 1989 "Sorry, Wrong Number" with Loni Anderson as the heiress invalid and Hal Holbrooks as her rich daddy. Enjoy and treasure this version for all time!

Loni's damsel in distress deserved to get killed, with her non-acting ass

I beleive Sorry, Wrong Number (with Moorehead) and The Hitchhiker (with Orson Welles) were considered the greatest 30-minute radio suspense plays. Another couple were Leinengen Vs. The Ants, and Donovan's Brain.

"Leinengen" was filmed as The Naked Jungle, with Charlton Heston and Eleanor Parker. Donovan's Brain was also filmed, with Lew Ayres.

TCM airs "Sorry, Wrong Number" on "Noir Alley" at 12:30 a.m. and again at 10 a.m./ET on June 29th, tomorrow... If only the harried hypochondriac got this gal for her telephone operator!

R49 love your site!

The ‘my take’ Queen should be aware of Tired Old Queen at the Movies.

I am aware of TOQ, thanks!

Haven’t seen in years but recall thinking she must have been desperate for roles. Leona was total opposite Stanwyck’s history. She would have stomped all over the intruder.

She was a magnificent harridan in SWN…suck it, haters. It is just that her best performances were always somewhat unsympathetic. No way was she gonna win over Jane Wyman as a deaf mute rape victim in Johnny Belinda.

She was also awful in Stella Dallas, a performance that really hasn't aged well.

Thank you r55 for your OPINION.

Some folks loved her in Stella Dallas but I just didn’t think it was so great and I’m a fan. Maybe I will view it again.

You know who was really awful as Stella Dallas? Bette Midler! I had to turn it off half way thru, was embarrassed for her!

I felt SORRY for her!

R33 How clever.

I still wish she’d played Mildred Pierce. Joan is very good, but Stanwyck would have been sensational.

As much as I loved Joan as Mildred, I think Stanwyck was closer to what the novel had in mind...

Joan is fine. Barbara would have been a revelation.

Stanwyck was all wrong for Mildred. Too shrewd and sharp. Joan being Joan, her tremulousness, her striving to make the kid love her--it's just right. Joan is insecure, Barbara isn't.

I would never believe Stanwyck as someone invested in running a joint selling fired chicken and waffles.

Stanwyck would slap the shit out of that ungrateful bitch.

Joan had a vulnerability that was beyond Stany's reach.

It may well have been the last time Joan showed any vulnerability.

[quote]Regardless, her best performance was in "Double Indemnity."

Regardless, her best performance was in "Ball of Fire."

In a book I read about the letters of Charles Brackett, it was revealed that Brackett and Billy Wilder, the writers of Ball of Fire, wanted Lucille Ball to play the female lead. (I think this was based on their having seen her in Dance, Girl, Dance.) But because Lucy was not a real star at the time, Howard Hawks went with Stanwyck, who the writers didn't feel was the right type.

Ball of Fire was great but I first saw Double Indemnity at a time when I was just beginning to appreciate and understand darker adult themes. For me at age 8 or 9, Phyllis was a revelation. And the Dad from My Three Sons! Wow!

Stanwyck as Mildred Pierce would've been awful.

It would have been a different story.

Stanwyck could be vulnerable. She could break your heart. But she couldn't be soft and self-pitying as only JC could be.

I haven't read the novel Mildred Pierce. To those who have, could Stanwyck have been better in a different adaptation? I see her as more steadfast about taking blame.

[quote] I haven't read the novel Mildred Pierce. To those who have, could Stanwyck have been better in a different adaptation?

I don't understand the question.

R75, Crawford was one adaptation, well suited to her talents and limitations. I wonder if a different adaptation would better suit Stanwyck.

I haven't seen the TV version with Winslet(?) That was apparently more faithful to the novel.

R76 The book was not adapted for Joan Crawford. The script was offered to other people before her. It wasn't "well suited to her talents and limitations." She was cast, and played the script as written.

The TV version was more faithful to the plot of the novel, because the movie added a murder. But otherwise both the TV version and the movie were basically James M. Cain's Mildred.

By the way, Cain liked the movie and the murder and said he wished he'd thought of it.

[quote] It wasn't "well suited to her talents and limitations." She was cast, and played the script as written.

Ever heard of rewrites? If you can prove your claim I would truly enjoy reading it. No sarcasm. And it might settle, for some, wheter Stanwyck could do it or not. An unchanged script is a pretty good indication that Crawford was probably better suited to the role.

But aren't scripts and plot points regularly adjusted to suit the abilities of the stars?

R79 I don't have to prove my claim. You know nothing about the history of the making of the film, you haven't read the book, but now you're questioning what I'm telling you about it, even though I have read about the making of the film, and I have read the novel. I'm going to bed now.

Then be generous and tell us what you've read. I'm willing to read it and take your word for it you actually say something of substance.

I would love to know more and if you can provide that knowledge I will be grateful to read it.

I've read the novel and it's wonderful, far more nuanced than the film.

Less sensational and more like the "chick-lit" of its time, like Fannie Hurst's oeuvre. And it begins at the start of the Depression so the economic hardships play a big part in Mildred's motivations. Wonderful descriptions of LA back then. IIRC Veda is in training to become an opera singer.

Never saw the Kate Winslet version but eager to....wonder if it's streaming anywhere?

Stanwyck in one of her last theatrical features 1962s Walk on the Wild Side

My HS did it too. I read for a part, but didn't get it. But a girl I was friendly with got the lead, she was in my AP English class and was a very popular and beautiful girl. I thought we were friends, but one day she turned to me and said "you're a faggot". I just looked at her and she said it again, and I just walked away. She died in a car accident just before graduation. She went right through the windshield and smack into a telephone pole. Poor bitch.

R83 That film Walk on the Wild Side is pretty fascinating, with these odd characters like the amputee who slides around on a sort of skateboard. Stanwyck’s performance as the menacing, angry lesbian pimp is pretty impressive for the time. Capucine was very beautiful in this film and in The Pink Panther.

For the record Stanwyck was a Republican, but she did not support HUAC. it was her dumb husband Robert Taylor who was so deep into HUAC he testified and ruined at least two actors careers.

Robert Taylor was a wuss. With a tiny ding dong.

My favorite performance of Stanwyck's was her late in career backdoor pilot, "Tony's Boys" where she had her famous line, "I'm a bitch in the boardroom, a bore in the bedroom, and a bear on the toilet."

It’s “Toni.”

Eddie Muller just showed "Sorry, Wrong Number" on TCM's "Noir Alley." Here are his comments, including that Barbara Stanwyck asked to do all the bed scenes in chronological order so she could build the rich invalid's hysteria.

I love Barbara and Fred McMurray and won’t watch Double Indemnity.

R88 A bear on the toilet? I don't get it. She really said this line?

Of course, R92. Everything you read here is factual.

R93 Okay, Clifton Webb.

I really enjoy Noir Alley and Muller’s excellent commentary. I watched this film again and sort of rediscovered its merits. Stanwyck’s character is such a needy, dismissive hypochondriac it’s almost a pleasure to see her dispatched.

The rear projection in this movie is so extensive, it's almost distracting. Depends on the studio, sometimes, but it's very obvious in this movie.

R96 my new television has a very high resolution OLED screen, and I notice that this type of optical technology reveals certain production elements like rear projection.

My grandmother hated this movie. Whenever we’d watch it, she’d always say, “Girl, get out of the bed!”! And when she didn’t, Grandma would always say, “Dumb! I hate her!”. I miss my grandma so much.

If you want to spend a lot of money for no reason on a steak dinner, take a plane to Los Angeles, go to Saddleback Lodge in Calabasas, and order the 1lb. Bone-in Rib-eye, then fly back to NY.

What r99?

She sounds like fun r98.

R101 she was. She always called her favorite movies her “stories”, just like her soap operas 🤭🤭. “BOY, HUSH! I’m watching my Joan Crawford story!”! She hated Gene Tierney in LEAVE HER TO HEAVEN. When Gene wrote her memoir, she wrote about her friend’s black maid who refused to serve her because of her role in the film. She went to the kitchen to convince the woman that she was nothing like her evil character in the film.

My grandmother's favorite object of derision was George Peppard. She called him George Peppered in her Scottish accent.

And she loved The Edge of Night

R98, I agree with your grandmother. I haven't seen the movie in several years, but if I recall correctly, she was bedridden because she had a bad heart, not because she couldn't move. I couldn't understand why she didn't just take a risk with her heart, get out of bed, and hide in another part of the huge house—instead of sitting in bed, screaming, and leading the killer right to her. The electricity was out, so he would have had a hard time finding his way around in the dark. At least she would have had a better chance of survival instead of just sitting there waiting for him to find her.

They should have written that she'd put her back out putting up the storm windows, like Jessica Fletcher when they ripped off the plot

I never believed that Stanwyck didn’t keep a 45 in her bed.

R92, St. Olaf?

R104 her illness was psychosomatic - all in her head, like her doctor told her.

Was there another thread for baby face? Started watching that last night and yeah she’s great. Her father was horrible but I’ve always loved Robert Barrat ( that’s how he spelled it) actually thought he was handsome and a big sexy voice.

TCM is showing Stanwyck movies all day tomorrow - her 118th birthday

I liked her in The Thorn Birds panting to get her hands on Richard Chamberlain's nether regions.

Not too proud to beg.

People here are always talking about Kate Hepburn having been a lesbian, and she may have been, I don't know--but when I watch Stanwyck in a lot of things (especially some of her pre-codes, and her late-'40s noirs, she seems so masculine. Her voice was so deep (Margaret Lindsay, hold my beer).

R113 - well, most people think she was. She was married to Robert Taylor, who was known to be bi, if not gay. And her first huband WAS gay.

So two lavender marriages.

And Scotty Bowers confirmed that both Spencer Tracey and Hepburn were gay and their romance was a front. I believe that. He was right about everyone else - why should this be bullshit?

R114 He was right about everyone else? They were all dead. He claims he gave blow jobs to Walter Pidgeon. Where's the proof Pidgeon was gay and closeted?

People have said this in these threads until they were blue in the face. Tracy didn't NEED A FRONT. HE WAS MARRIED. HE HAD TWO KIDS. Why did he need to spend time with a lesbian to prove he wasn't gay?

Tracy also had a big affair (while married) with Loretta Young, in the 1930s. Young made statements to the press saying why they couldn't marry. Was that all a front? Why? He already had a wife.

Tracy also went after Gene Tierney, Crawford, Loy, Grace Kelly.

Odd that Rock Hudson didn't go after a lot of women. He got married once. That was a front. Montgomery Clift never got married. Still had a career. How come?

I don't know the sexuality of Kate or Spencer but whatever it was that doesn't mean they couldn't have had an affair, loved each other, etc. People think in narrow ways. Life is complex.

She was horrendous in this. She cheered the scenery and was so fucking annoying.

It's too bad Greer Garson is long gone. I'm sure she drone on for hours about all the fun and nasty bits.