From Paramount Pictures
Directed by George Seaton
Starring
Bing Crosby
Grace Kelly
William Holden
Anthony Ross
Gene Reynolds
Jon Provost
In 1950 playwright-wizard Clifford Odets wrote his last successful Broadway play, The Country Girl. He began his dazzling career by writing Waiting for Lefty, Paradise Lost and Awake and Sing!, all in 1935, and went on to write Golden Boy, Clash by Night and The Big Knife. When his plays were turned into films, they drew much attention... from the public and critics alike. Whether film or play, they were beautifully written and actors seemed to elbow one another to speak those words.
In late 1953 it was announced that Bing Crosby, William Holden and Jennifer Jones would star in the film version. I was excited because Holden was one of my favorite actors, a fact that would never change. But when Jones had to drop out because of pregnancy, she was replaced with Grace Kelly, who was, for her brief film career, my favorite actress. It was then that I put The Country Girl on my radar and could not wait for its release.
Odets was writing about something he knew well... Broadway actors. George Seaton would direct the film version and also handle the writing chores. It focuses on an alcoholic actor, Frank Elgin (Crosby), who is given perhaps his last chance to get his stage career back on track. He is being rescued by a tough director, Bernie Dodd (Holden), who knows he has a rough time ahead of him trying to rehabilitate Frank. But Bernie becomes more skeptical when he meets Frank's long-suffering wife Georgie (Kelly) who thinks Frank is biting off more than he can chew. Bernie comes to feel that it is Georgie, not booze, that is at the source of Frank's problems. Bernie sets out to get rid of her constantly fussing over Frank during rehearsals but Frank says he can't make a move without her.
Bernie is aggressive and often insensitive with Georgie... some of the film's best scenes involve the two of them at one another's throats. Bernie has bought into Frank's fiction that Georgie is at the heart of Frank's problems... that she is dependent on him, an alcoholic and suicidal. Bernie finds out that not only is that not true but that all is the other way around. Georgie is the strong one.
The misogynistic Bernie is a bitterly divorced man who finds Georgie reminiscent of his ex-wife and that is at the heart of why he treats Georgie poorly. But after he finds out the truth about the Elgin marriage, he finds that he actually loves Georgie. As Frank gets better and better with the play and has a successful opening night, Bernie wants Georgie to leave Frank. He pleads with her that Frank no longer needs her and that he, Bernie, does. Despite all their bitterness and rivalry over who knows what's best for Frank, Georgie is rather tempted to be with Bernie.
But an incident at a cast party reveals to Georgie that Frank has not only mastered the stage again but also his problems and she elects to stay with him. Georgie, too, has come a long way from a frumpy girl from the country and realizes her marriage is worth holding together. Bernie has learned a lot about himself, as well, especially, perhaps, that he can love again and hold women in a higher regard.
I love character-driven stories and some of the best have always been those based on stage plays. At the heart of my fondness is when characters actually change and grow as they do here.
The adult story is slow-paced and as good as the writing is, it is the acting of the three leads that one tends to remember. The three parts are equally large and impressive. Holden is a force to be reckoned with as the hard-as-nails director with his own set of problems and prejudices to confront. This is a role that fully explains why I was so taken in by him but the truth is he is no better than he is in most of his post-40's films. Damn, I loved this actor.
For a 1950's film, it was surprisingly perceptive about alcoholism. It didn't focus on the dramatics of fall-down drunk scenes but rather through all three leads told of the harrowing nature of the disease.
Certainly a sad note in seeing the film again these many years later is when Holden's Bernie speaks so eloquently of the dangers of drink when we know in real life Holden died as a result of an alcohol-induced fall.
As great as Holden is, he is matched all the way by Crosby and Kelly but in their cases, they clearly give their best performances of their careers.
Crosby was more nervous and kept to himself more than he usually did. He had sung in light-hearted musical-comedies for 25 years but his dramatic roles were precious few. This was not only a juicy dramatic part but his first unsympathetic role. He wasn't sure he could pull it off. And there was a serious vanity issue... he would be working the first time without his hairpiece. The irony wasn't missed by anyone since Frank Elgin was nervous that he couldn't pull it off. Imagine how Crosby could use real life to pull off the character's same dilemma. If an actor's job is to illuminate the human condition-- and it is-- then major kudos to a singing actor to dramatically bring to life this character. Another irony is that Frank Elgin was a wounded man and Crosby knew something about that, too. Nervousness aside, no wonder Crosby wanted this part. He would rightfully be nominated for an Oscar.
Kelly has her own story. For one thing, it's likely every actress wanted the role, the title role, no less. Uta Hagen had played Georgie on Broadway and won a Tony and that fact would encourage competition for the movie role. Of course, everyone thought it was lost to Jennifer Jones but after the announcement of her withdrawal, the pack was acting savagely again.
Kelly was incredibly famous at the time she made The Country Girl but that fame was due chiefly to her extraordinary beauty and elegant manners and some of the films she had been in in so short a time. She had worked with big-name male stars and famous directors. While her acting was always fine, it wasn't her calling card... and she knew it. To play Georgie she would need to tear into the role like it's the last piece of beef on earth and she was sure she was up to it. It is a role that focused on fatigue, monotony and bitterness. A piece of the prize that fascinated her was that it is a fairly non-glamorous role. Instead of makeup, hairdressing and costuming working overtime on a Kelly picture, they could work part-time.
It turned out not to be my favorite Kelly performance but I do not question it's her best. She rose to the occasion and proved all those acting lessons paid off. She would win the Oscar. Very few thought she would win it and almost as few thought she should.
It's a part of Hollywood lore. Everyone but everyone thought the Oscar should go to Judy Garland for her astonishing singing and dramatic performance in A Star Is Born. (An interesting time to be discussing that movie.) She is a revelation but she had a couple of things going against her. One was that she was not easy to work with and while a lot of coworkers tended to like her, the brass didn't always. This was a comeback role which got the drums sounding but the role, in some respects, was not a stretch for her. She had done many musicals before and while her dramatic output was limited, she lived drama and it wasn't that much of a stretch to just turn the cameras on.
Kelly had to beg MGM, to whom she was under contract, to do The Country Girl but they refused. Of her few films so far, only Mogambo was an MGM product and the studio was tired of others reaping the rewards of having the popular actress in a film. She was livid at their refusal and threatened to quit movies if they didn't relent. She would play The Country Girl and that was that. Both sides sat it out for a while and MGM finally gave in with the stipulation that Kelly would followup by appearing in Green Fire, a silly melodrama about emeralds that she had already turned down. Both sides gave in. (Green Fire is the worst movie she made.)
Kelly was regarded as the new girl on her way up, never a troublemaker and giving the performance of her life in her most unusual role. I adored Garland in Star but I was, of course, rooting for my favorite actress to show she was just more than a gorgeous face. Well, she won. I heard it was by a mere six votes.
We're not done here. Let's dish. The year before Kelly and Holden appeared together in The Bridges of Toko-Ri, a war drama about Navy fighter pilots in the Korean War. Kelly's role had little more going for it other than being the wife who waits at home. The part was small but what was bigger was her affair with Holden. They were pretty nuts about one another from an affair standpoint. Both were given to on-set romances. Kelly wasn't married but it didn't stop her from sleeping with men who were. Holden was married but it didn't stop him from getting to know his leading ladies a little better and he actually fell in love with some of them (Audrey Hepburn and Capucine to name two).
I don't think they actually fell in love with one another but there's no doubt they fell in lust. They were carrying on a little less by the time they started The Country Girl but there were still some encounters. Crosby, in the meantime, had fallen hook, line and sinker for the much younger Kelly. He was even snooping around for a wife. He at least wanted to start dating her so what did he do? He went to Holden and asked him if he minded if he (Crosby) cut in. Holden realized Crosby was more serious than Holden was about her, so he cleared the way.
So then Kelly and Crosby began an affair. (I'll not write what I want to right here.) He was, however, heart-broken when she said she couldn't marry him because she didn't love him. Kelly might have had a yen for sleeping with her costars, but true love was likely reserved for a foreigner. American men weren't marriage material to her. Holden resumed the position after the Crosby-Kelly affair fizzled but it turned into a nice friendship and another film together, Kelly's last, High Society (1956).
Seaton was a great director for actors and over his career he worked with the cream of the crop. This was also the second of four times he would work with Holden and just the year before he had worked with Crosby in another of his dramatic roles in Little Boy Lost. Seaton would rightfully win an Oscar for writing the screenplay of this film.
The Elgins' little boy who dies is played by adorable Jon Provost of Lassie fame.
What I didn't like were the numerous scenes of the play that Frank is doing and Bernie directing, The Land Around Us. It looked like a takeoff of Oklahoma, but, my oh my, is it cheesy. They couldn't have come up with something more suitable? A small price to pay for a movie I liked so much.
Here's a look at the trailer...
Next posting:
A 50's actor who was
murdered. Who is he?
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