Cary Grant

Cary Grant (born Archibald Alexander Leach, Bristol, January 18, 1904 - Davenport, Iowa, November 29, 1986) was a British-American actor. He became one of the most popular Hollywood actors for decades, not only because of his physical attractiveness, but also because of his elegance, charm and wit. It was said of him that he acted well even from behind. He worked with many great Hollywood film divas of his time: Marlene Dietrich, Mae West, Grace Kelly, Marilyn Monroe, Rita Hayworth, Katharine Hepburn, Sophia Loren, Joan Fontaine, Ingrid Bergman, Ginger Rogers, Doris Day, Deborah Kerr and Audrey Hepburn among others. The James Bond character is partially inspired by him. According to the American Film Institute's list, he is considered the second most important male star of the first hundred years of American cinema.

Grant starred in some classic sitcoms, including The Philadelphia Story (1940) and The Beast of My Girl (1938), both opposite Katharine Hepburn, or Arsenic out of compassion (1944). Director Alfred Hitchcock, whose detachment from actors was notorious, took to Grant, hiring him to star in four of his films: Suspicion (1941; opposite Joan Fontaine), Not Chained (1946; with Ingrid Bergman), To Catch a Thief (1955; with Grace Kelly) and North by Northwest (1959; opposite Eva Marie Saint), which became classics, like other works by the director.

Although he was nominated twice for the Oscars, Grant did not win the award, although he did receive a special Academy Award in recognition of his career in 1970. In 1981 he was awarded the Kennedy Center Honors in recognition of his talent and contribution to the performing arts.

Early Years

Archibald Alexander Leach was born on 18 January 1904 at 15 Hughenden Road in north Bristol. He was the second son of Elias James Leach (1872–1935) and Elsie Maria Leach (née Kingdon; 1877–1973). His father worked as a tailor's presser in a garment factory, while his mother worked as a seamstress. His older brother John William Elias Leach (1899−1900) died of tuberculous meningitis. a day before their first anniversary. Grant considered himself half-Jewish. He had an unhappy childhood.

Her mother taught her to sing and dance from the age of four, and she was interested in her learning to play the piano. In fact, Elsie had briefly appeared in film, where she worked alongside Charlie Chaplin, Chester Conklin, Fatty Arbuckle, Ford Sterling, Mack Swain and Broncho Billy Anderson. Grant's biographer Graham McCann stated that the actor's mother, who suffered from depression, "did not know how to give affection and did not know how to receive it either". Another biographer Geoffrey Wansell notes that his mother bitterly blamed herself for the death of Grant's brother John, and never got over it. Grant would claim that his bad experiences with his mother would later affect his relationships with women. she turned to alcohol and tobacco, hurting the household economy. Grant attributed her behavior to overprotectiveness, fearing that she would lose him as she did John.

When Grant was nine years old, his father committed his mother to Glenside Hospital, a mental institution, but told him that his mother had gone on "a long holiday";. In the wake of that fiction, Grant grew up resenting his mother, especially when she left the family. When she was gone, Grant and his father moved in with his grandmother's house in Bristol. When Grant was ten years old, his mother remarried and started a new family. Grant was unaware of his mother's reality until when his father confessed the truth to him shortly before his death. Grant arranged for his mother to leave the institution in June 1935, shortly after her whereabouts became known. He visited her in October 1938. after completing the shooting of Gunga Din.

Since then, Grant had amused himself by performing, especially some pantomime at Christmas, which greatly amused his father. He became friends with a group of acrobatic dancers known as "The Penders" or the & # 34; Bob Pender Stage Troupe & # 34;. Later he learned to walk on stilts and began to travel with them.

Fairfield Grammar School, where Grant studied between 1915 and 1918

In 1915, Grant entered Bristol's Fairfield Grammar School, despite the fact that his father could not afford to pay for a uniform. He was good at many subjects, but was a virtuoso at sports and his good looks and talent His acrobatic performance made him a popular figure. He developed a reputation for being mischievous and frequently refused to do his homework. A former classmate referred to him as a "scruffy kid", while a The old teacher remembered him as "the naughty boy who always made noise in the last row and never did his homework". In the afternoons and when he was 13 years old, he worked in theaters and was responsible for the magician David Devant's lights at the Bristol Empire in 1917. During the summers, he volunteered to work as a courier and guide at the military docks in Southampton, to escape the unhappiness of his home life. Time spent in Southampton reinforced his desire to travel; he was eager to leave Bristol and tried to sign on as a ship's cabin boy, but he was too young.

On March 13, 1918, when he was 14 years old, Grant was expelled from Fairfield. class with a robbery in the nearby town of Almondsbury. Wansell claims that Grant had intentionally set out to get himself expelled from school in order to pursue a career with the Pender's troupe, which he joined three days later. His father had a good job in Southampton, and Grant's expulsion had local authorities knocking on his door with questions about why his son was living in Bristol and not with his father in Southampton. So his father co-signed a three-year contract between Grant and Pender that provided for Grant's weekly salary, along with room and board, dance lessons and other training for his profession until he was 18 years old. There was also a provision in the contract for salary increases based on job performance.

Career in Vaudeville

The New York Hippodrome where Grant acted alongside the Pender Groupe

The Pender Troupe began touring throughout the UK and Grant developed the skill of pantomime which furthered his physical acting skills. The group traveled on the RMS Olympic to continue their US tour on July 21, 1920, when Gran was 16 years old. Biographer Richard Schickel wrote that Douglas Fairbanks and Mary Pickford were aboard that same ship on their honeymoon return, and that Grant played shuffleboard with he. The future actor was so impressed with Fairbanks that he became an important role model.After arriving in New York, the group performed at the New York Hippodrome, then the largest theater in the world with a capacity of 5,697. people. They were performing for nine months, at twelve shows a week, with the successful play Good Times.

Grant entered the national vaudeville circuit and began touring, performing in places like St. Louis, Missouri, Cleveland, and Milwaukee, and decided to stay in the United States, he told other members of the group when the group returned to Great Britain. He admired the Marx Brothers during this period, and Zeppo Marx was one of his early role models. In July 1922, he joined a group called the "Knockabout Comedians" at the Palace Theater on Broadway, he was part of a gold group that summer called "The Walking Stanleys"; with some of the former members of the Pender Troupe, and started in a variety show called "Better Times" at the Hippodrome until the end of the year. While serving as a paid escort to opera singer Lucrezia Bori at a Park Avenue party, he met George C. Tilyou Jr., whose family owned Steeplechase Park. Knowledgeable of his experience Acrobatic, Tilyou hired him to work as a stilt-walker to attract the crowd at the newly opened Coney Island Boardwalk, wearing a large shiny coat and a bulletin board advertising the amusement park.

Grant spent the next two years touring the United States with "The Walking Stanleys". He first visited Los Angeles in 1924, a city that made an impression on him. The group returned to New York, where he began performing for the National Vaudeville Artists Club at West 46th, juggling, acrobatic, and comic sketching, and having a brief stint as a biker known as 'Rubber Legs'. The experience was particularly demanding, but it gave Grant the opportunity to improve his comedic technique and develop skills that would later benefit him in Hollywood.

Grant became a featured artist with Jean Dalrymple and decided to join the "Jack Janis Company," continuing to tour with vaudeville. His accent seemed to have changed from being British to begin to embrace the more East Coast accent. The play ran for 72 performances, and Grant earned $350 a week before moving to Detroit and Chicago. The success of the play prompted a screen test for Grant and MacDonald made by Paramount Publix Pictures at Astoria Studios in New York, which led to MacDonald being cast opposite Maurice Chevalier in The Love Parade (1929). Grant was turned away and told that her neck was "too thick"; and her legs were "too bowy."

Grant in 1930

Grant visited his half-brother Eric in England before returning to New York to play the role of Max Grunewald in A Wonderful Night. It opened at the Majestic Theater on October 31, 1929, two days before the Wall Street Crash, and ran until February 1930 with 125 performances behind it. The play received mixed reviews. One reviewer blasted his performance, comparing it to a "mix of John Barrymore and cockney," while another announced that he had brought an "Elfin Broadway breath" to his performance. to the role. Grant still found it difficult to form relationships with women, commenting that he "never seemed able to fully communicate with them", even after many years "surrounded by all kinds of attractive girls". #3. 4; in the theater, on the road and in New York. .

In 1930, Grant toured with the musical production The Street Singer. In 1931, the Shuberts invited him to spend the summer performing at The Muny in St. Louis, Missouri. He appeared in 12 different productions and made 87 performances. He received praise for his performance in local newspapers, earning him a reputation as a leading man. His influences at the time included Gerald du Maurier, A. E. Matthews, Jack Buchanan and Ronald Squire. Grant admitted that he was drawn to acting out of a "great need to be liked and admired". He was signed by the Shuberts in late summer when he refused to take a pay cut due to financial difficulties caused by the Depression. His short life as an unemployed man was short-lived as businessman William B. Friedlander offered him to lead the cast of the musical Nikki with Fay Wray as co-star. The production opened on September 29, 1931 in New York, but had to be halted after 39 performances due to the effects of the Great Depression.

Film career

1932–1936: Film debut and first roles

ConRoland YoungRight., Lili Damita (downtown) and Charlie Ruggles (left corner) in the debut film This Is the Night (1932)

Grant's role of Nikki was called by New York Daily News journalist Ed Sullivan as "that young man who has a great future in the world of cinema". This criticism led to a film test for the The review led to another Paramount Publix screen test, which resulted in an appearance as a sailor in Singapore Sue (1931), a ten-minute short by Casey Robinson. According to McCann, Grant recited his lines 'without any conviction'. Through Robinson, Grant met Jesse L. Lasky and B. P. Schulberg, the co-founder and CEO respectively of Paramount Pictures. After a successful screen test directed by Marion Gering, Schulberg signed the actor to a five-year contract on December 7, 1931, with a starting salary of $450 a week. Schulberg demanded that he change his name to "something that sounded more American as Gary Cooper". Among the actress Fay Wray, Schulberg and the actor himself chose the name Cary Grant.

Grant established and endorsed what McCann called the "epitome of masculine glamour," looking to Douglas Fairbanks as his first role model. McCann notes that Grant's Hollywood career took off from immediately because he exhibited "genuine charm," which made him stand out among the other good-looking actors at the time, which made it "remarkably easy to find people willing to support his embryonic career" 34;. His feature debut was the Frank Tuttle-directed comedy This Is the Night (1932), in which he played a javelin thrower. he liked the role and threatened to quit Hollywood, but to his surprise critics praised his performance.

In 1932, Grant played a seductive millionaire trying to woo Marlene Dietrich in Blonde Venus, directed by Josef von Sternberg. Grant's role is described by William Rothman as the "distinctive kind of non-macho masculinity that would allow him to embody a man capable of being a romantic hero". Grant had conflicts with the director during filming and the two often argued in German. The seducer archetype was repeated in numerous films: Yours forever (Merrily We Go to Hell) alongside Fredric March and Sylvia Sidney, Devil and the Deep (Devil and the Deep) with Tallulah Bankhead, Gary Cooper and Charles Laughton (Cooper and Grant did not share any scenes together), Saturday Party (Hot Saturday) opposite Nancy Carroll and Randolph Scott, and Madame Butterfly again with Sidney. According to her biographer Marc Eliott, although these films did not make Grant a star, they did well enough to establish him as one of the "fast-rising new players" from Hollywood".

Grant and Mae West in I'm not an angel. (1933)

In 1933, Grant gained popularity by appearing in the comedies Lady Lou (She Done Him Wrong) and I'm No Angel along with Mae West. West would later claim that she had discovered Cary Grant. Of course Grant had already shot Blonde Venus the previous year. Pauline Kael says Grant didn't seem too sold on his work on She Done Him Wrong, which made it even more charming. The film was a box office success, earning more than two million dollars in the United States. In I'm No Angel, the cache Grant's film rose from $450 to $750 a week. In fact, a good investment since it was more successful than the previous one and saved Paramount from bankruptcy. Vermilye names it as one of the best comedies of the decade of the 30.

After a handful of box office blowouts, including Born to Be Bad (1934) for 20th Century Fox, the plastic surgeon in The Temple of the Beautiful (Kiss and Make-Up) (1934), and that of a blind pilot in Wings in the Dark (1935), the press reported on his marital problems with his first wife Virginia Cherrill, For all this, Paramount came to the conclusion that he was an expendable figure.

Publicity postcard Ladies Should Listen (1934) with Grant and Frances Drake

Grant's prospects improved in the second half of 1935 when he was loaned out to RKO Pictures. Producer Pandro Berman agreed to hire him in the face of failure because "he had seen him do things that were excellent, and [Katharine] Hepburn loved him, too." His first adventure with RKO, he was the cockney knave in Silvia's Great Adventure (Sylvia Scarlett) by George Cukor (1935). This was the first of four collaborations he did with Hepburn. Despite its box office disaster, his performances convinced critics, and Grant always considered the film the breakthrough of his career. his contract with Paramount ended in 1936 with the filming of Marry me... if you can (Wedding Present) , Grant decided not to renew with any other major studio and work for free, becoming the first great actor Hollywood to do something like this. His first freelance job would be The Amazing Quest of Ernest Bliss (1936), shot in England. box office and led Grant to reconsider his decision. The critical acclaim and box office success followed with Suzy a year later alongside Jean Harlow and Franchot Tone. This led to him signing joint contracts with RKO and Columbia Pictures, allowing him to choose the stories he felt suited his style of acting. His contract with Columbia tied him to four films over the next two years, earned him a profit of $50,000 for the first two films and $75,000 for the next two.

1937–1945: Stardom in Hollywood

In 1937, Grant began work on his first film under a Columbia Pictures contract, When You're in Love, playing a wealthy artist courting an opera singer (Grace Moore). His performance received critical acclaim with Mae Tinee of The Chicago Daily Tribune stating it was "the best thing the actor had done in a long time". failure with RKO The Idol of New York (The Toast of New York) , Grant was hired by Hal Roach's studio to make An Invisible Couple (Topper) , a screwball comedy distributed by MGM. Grant played one half of a wealthy free married couple with Constance Bennett, who wreak havoc on the world as ghosts after being killed in a car accident. Topper became one of the most popular films of the year, with rave reviews such as Variety stating that both Grant and Bennett "do their jobs with great skill. Vermilye said the film's success prompted "logical springboard" for Grant to headline the cast of The Awful Truth that same year, the first film he has shot alongside Irene Dunne and Ralph Bellamy. Although director Leo McCarey widely stated that he disliked Grant, who had mocked the director by acting out his mannerisms in the film, he recognized the comedic talent and encouraged him to improvise his lines and take advantage of his skills developed in vaudeville. The film was yet another hit, putting Grant among the top ranks of Hollywood stardom, establishing a screen persona as a sophisticated leading man in off-the-wall comedies.

Katharine Hepburn and Grant in The beast of my child (1938)

The Awful Truth began what film critic Benjamin Schwarz of The Atlantic later said " the most spectacular career of an actor in American films" for Grant. In 1938, he again shared the lead with Katharine Hepburn in the screwball comedy Bringing Up Baby, featuring a leopard and frequent spats and verbal jousting between Grant and Hepburn. At first, Grant did not know how to approach the character but spoke to director Howard Hawks and advised him to consider Harold Lloyd. Grant was given more leeway in the comedic scenes, film editing, and advice towards Hepburn in the art of comedy. Despite costing RKO $350,000 in losses, the film won over critics. He appeared again with Hepburn in the romantic comedy Holiday. > that same year. A film that didn't pan out either, leading Hepburn to be considered "box office poison".

Despite these commercial failures, Grant was one of the most popular actors and had a wide range of roles. According to Vermilye, in 1939 Grant tried more dramatic roles, but with comic touches. Thus, he played Sergeant British in the George Stevens adventure film Gunga Din, shot at the military station in India. Dramatic roles followed with piloting accompanying Jean Arthur and Rita Hayworth in Howard's project Hawks' Only Angels Have Wings (Only Angels Have Wings), and that of the rich landowner in Two Women and One Love (In Name Only).

Grant, Rosalind Russell and Ralph Bellamy in New Moon (His Girl Friday) (1940)

In 1940, Grant continued working with Hawks by playing a callous newspaper editor who learns that his ex-wife and ex-journalist, played by Rosalind Russell, is marrying insurance salesman Ralph Bellamy in Moon new (His Girl Friday). In the film, great chemistry and agility were seen in Grant and Russell's repartee. Grant returned with Irene Dunne in My Favorite Wife (My Favorite Wife), a comedy "of the first order" according to Life magazine, which made it the second most commercial film of the year for RKO, with a profit of $505,000. After working on The Howards of Virginia, in what McCann considers to be one of Grant's worst performances, his last film of the year received critical acclaim when he worked on The Philadelphia Story, in the who plays Hepburn's ex-husband. Grant felt that his performance was so strong that he was bitterly disappointed that he did not receive an Oscar nomination, especially since his lead co-stars Hepburn and James Stewart received both, and Stewart won it. for Best Actor. Grant joked about it by saying "I'd have to blacken my teeth before the Academy takes me seriously." Film historian David Thomson wrote that "the wrong man got the Oscar" by 'The Philadelphia Story' and that "Grant got better performances from Hepburn than his partner Spencer Tracy did. Stewart's Oscar" was seen as a gold-plated apology for being robbed of the award. 3. 4; for the previous year Mr. Smith Goes to Washington. Grant had also not been nominated for His Girl Friday that same year and is considered "one of the great sins of omission" On the other hand, he donated all of his salary on this film to the British Government for war efforts.

With Joan Fontaine in Suspecha (1941)

The following year, Grant earned his first Oscar nomination for Nostalgic Serenade—his first Academy Award nomination. Wansell says that Grant found the film an emotional experience, because he and his future wife Barbara Hutton had begun to talk about having children of their own. After 1940, he starred in his first psychological romantic thriller Suspicion.), the first of four collaborations Grant did with director Alfred Hitchcock. Grant did not want to work with Joan Fontaine, whom he considered moody and unprofessional. The critic Bosley Crowther of The New York Times found Grant to be "provocatively irresponsible, boyishly light-hearted, and also oddly mysterious, as the role demands'. Hitchcock took issue with the film's happy ending (with the wife finding out that her husband is innocent rather than guilty and she lets him kill her with a glass of poisoned milk).). The director said that ending was "a complete mistake for doing that story with Cary Grant. Unless it has a cynical ending, it makes the story too simple. of Grant's ability to be simultaneously charming and sinister".

In 1942, Grant took part in a three-week tour of the United States as part of the celebrity war money-raiser and was photographed visiting soldiers in the hospital. She appeared in several of her own performances during these shows, and often performed alongside Bert Lahr. In May 1942, when she was 38, she took part in the propaganda short Road to Victory, in which she shares screen with Bing Crosby, Frank Sinatra and Charles Ruggles. On screen, Grant played Leopold Dilg, an escaped convict in The Talk of the Town (1942), who escapes after being wrongfully convicted of arson and murder. Crowther praised the script, noting that Grant played Dilg with a "flip that is a bit disturbing." After playing a correspondent in the comedy Once Upon a Honeymoon) opposite Ginger Rogers and Walter Slezak, and where he was praised for his scenes with Rogers, he led the cast in Mr. Lucky the following year, playing a gambler in a ship-based casino. This was followed by the success of the submarine-based war comedy titled Destination Tokyo (1943) in a shoot that lasted six weeks from September to October 1942 and left him completely exhausted.

In 1944, Grant starred opposite Priscilla Lane, Raymond Massey and Peter Lorre in Frank Capra's black comedy Arsenic and Old Lace, playing Mortimer Brewster, who he belongs to a strange family that includes two murderous aunts and an uncle claiming to be President Teddy Roosevelt. Grant chose this role which had previously been offered to Bob Hope, who turned it down due to scheduling conflicts. Grant found it difficult deal with such a macabre theme of the film and always believed it to be the worst performance of his career. As he did with The Philadelphia Story, he donated all of the salary earned on this film to the efforts of the war, this time to the United States Government.

She received her second Oscar nomination that year for her role in Clifford Odets's None but the Lonely Heart, set in London during the depression. In 1944, he worked on the CBS radio serial Thriller, playing a tormented character who hysterically discovers that his amnesia has affected the male order in society in The Black Curtain.

1946–1953: Success and Postwar Depression

Grant and Ingrid Bergman en Notorious (1946)

After making a brief appearance opposite Claudette Colbert in Without Reservations (1946), Grant played Cole Porter in the musical Night and Day (1946)) (1946), playing a government agent who recruits the daughter of a convicted Nazi spy (Bergman) to infiltrate a Nazi organization located in Brazil after World War II. During the course of the In the film, Grant and Bergman's characters fall in love and share one of the longest kisses in movie history, lasting about two and a half minutes. Wansell notes how Grant's performance "underscored how much his qualities had matured. unique performances as a screen actor in the years since The Puritan Rogue a".

In 1947, Grant casts the role of an embroiled entertainer who finds himself embroiled in a court case when he is charged with assault in the comedy The Bachelor and the Bobby -Soxer) opposite Myrna Loy and Shirley Temple. The film was praised by critics, who admired the actor's slapstick comedy qualities and his chemistry with Loy, and was also a box office success. At the end of that year, he appeared with David Niven and Loretta Young in the comedy The Bishop's Wife, playing an angel who is sent to earth to to straighten the relationship between the bishop (Niven) and his wife (Loretta Young). The film once again had a great acceptance among the public and was nominated for five Oscars. The magazine Life valued it as an "intelligently written and competently acted" film.

Grant in a frame The bride was him. (1949)

The following year, Grant plays the neurotic Jim Blandings, in the comedy The Blandings already have a house (Mr. Blandings Builds His Dream House) , again with Loy. Although the film caused losses for RKO, Philip T. Hartung of Commonweal believes that Grant's role as the "frustrated publicist" it was one of his best performances. In Every Girl Should Be Married, his next comedy, he appeared with Betsy Drake and Franchot Tone, playing a bachelor who is trapped. in marriage due to Drake's conniving character. He finished the year as the fourth most popular star at the United States box office. In 1949, Grant led the cast with Ann Sheridan in the comedy The Bride Was He (I Was a Male War Bride) in which he appears in almost every scene dressed as a woman. During that filming he contracted hepatitis and lost weight, which affected his participation in the film. in the autobiography of Belgian partisan Roger Charlier, it proved to be a success, becoming 20th Century Fox's highest-grossing film that year with more than $4.5 million in receipts and drawing comparisons to Hawks' wacky comedies of the late 1990s. 30. That is why it became one of the Hollywood's highest-paid stars, earning $300,000 per film.

The early 1950s marked the beginning of the decline of Grant's career. His roles as a prominent brain surgeon who finds himself caught in the middle of a bitter revolution in a Latin American country in Crisis, and as a medical school professor and bandleader in People Will Talk were not well received. Grant had grown tired of being Cary. Grant after twenty years, of being successful, rich and popular, commenting: "Play yourself, your "real" me, it's the hardest thing in the world'. In 1952, Grant starred in the comedy Home Sweet Home (Room for One More) , incarnated as an engineer who along with his wife (Betsy Drake) adopt two children from an orphanage. He coincided again with Howard Hawks in the comedy I Feel Rejuvenated (Monkey Business), along with Ginger Rogers and Marilyn Monroe. Although critics of The Motion Picture Herald gushed that Grant had given the best of his career with a "swift and extraordinary performance", which was matched by Rogers, was unsuccessful at the box office. Grant had the hope that the romantic comedy The dream woman (Dream Wife) with Deborah Kerr could save his career. In fact, he was offered to lead the new version of A star is born (A Star is Born) but he decided on this project. But the truth is that it was a critical and financial failure upon its release in July 1953 and that caused Grant to retire for a time from the screens.

1955–1959: Upturn in career

Grant with Hitchcock at a time of shooting To Catch to Thief (1955)

In 1955, Grant agreed to star opposite Grace Kelly in To Catch a Thief, playing a retired thief named John Robie, nicknamed "The Cat" 34;, who lives on the French Riviera. Grant and Kelly worked wonderfully and she felt that both she and Hitchcock worked in a very professional manner. In fact, the actor would remember it as one of the most satisfying experiences of his career. Grant was one of the first independent actors to deal directly with studios, which gave him almost complete control over all aspects of the contract. He decided which films he was to appear in, often had a personal choice of directors and co-stars, and sometimes negotiated a share of the gross receipts, a rare occurrence at the time. Grant received over $700,000 from the benefits of To Catch a Thief, although Hitchcock would receive less than $50,000 for directing and producing it. Although reviews were mixed, Grant was praised for his performance, calling it suave and engaging.

In 1957, Grant led the cast opposite Deborah Kerr in the romance An Affair to Remember, playing an international playboy who becomes the object of her affections. Schickel sees the film as one of the definitive romance films of the era, but comments that Grant was not completely successful in trying to replace the "gushing sentimentality" of the film. of the film. That year, Grant also appeared opposite Sophia Loren and Frank Sinatra in The Pride and the Passion. At the time, he showed interest in the role that would eventually be played by William Holden in The Bridge on the River Kwai but found it incompatible having been committed to The Pride and the Passion. The film was shot in Spain and was problematic, particularly with Frank Sinatra irritating his co-stars and walking off the set a few weeks later. Although Grant had an affair with Loren during filming, Grant's attempts to woo Loren into dating married him during production were unsuccessful, and he did not like that Paramount proposed her to accompany him in the next project Cintia (Houseboat) (1958) as part of the contract. The sexual tension between The two of them were so big during the making of Houseboat that the producers found it almost impossible to do. In late 1958, Grant reteamed with Bergman in the romantic comedy Indiscreet. , playing a successful businessman who has a bird He became close to a famous actress (Bergman) while pretending to be a married man. During filming, he became close friends with the actress. Schickel thought the film was arguably the best romantic comedy film of the time and that Grant himself he had stated that it was one of his personal favorites. Grant received his first of five Golden Globe Award nominations for Best Actor in a Musical or Comedy for this performance and was the highest-grossing star of that year.

Cary Grant scene in Death in the heels (1959)

In 1959, Grant returned to work for Hitchcock in the classic North by Northwest, playing an advertising executive who finds himself embroiled in a case of marketing error. identity. Like Indiscreet, it was well received by the public and critics alike, so much so that it is considered one of the best films ever made Weiler, writing for The New York Times, praised Grant's performance, noting that the actor was "never more at home than in this publicist-on-the-lam role" and handled the role "with professional poise and grace". Grant wore one of his most iconic suits in the widely popular film, a fourteen gauge, medium gray, subtly checked, worsted wool, custom-made in Savile Row. Grant ended the year playing the submarine captain in the comedy Operation Petticoat. The Daily Variety reviewer saw the comic performance of Grant as a classic example of drawing audience laughter without lines, noting that "In this movie, most of the jokes are played on him." It's his reaction, blank startled, etc., always underrated, that creates or releases humor.” The film was also a box office success with some $9.5 million in US revenue.

1960–1966: Last Papers

In 1960, Grant appeared opposite Deborah Kerr, Robert Mitchum and Jean Simmons in The Grass Is Greener, which were shot at Osterley Park and Shepperton Studios. McCann notes that Grant was very fond of "mocking the overly refined tastes and mannerisms of his aristocratic character", though the film was criticized as the worst since Dream Wife. In 1962, Grant starred in the romantic comedy Soft as the Mink (That Touch of Mink) , playing the role of businessman Philip Shayne who falls in love with one of his workers, Doris Day. He invites her to her apartment in Bermuda, but her guilty conscience begins to set in. The film was well received by critics, received several Oscar nominations and won the Golden Globe for best motion picture. Comedy or musical. For his part, Grant garnered another Golden Globe nomination for Best Actor, with Deschner ranking the film as No. 2 among the actor's highest-grossing films.

With Audrey Hepburn in Charada (1963).

Producers Albert R. Broccoli and Harry Saltzman originally envisioned Grant for their first James Bond in Dr. No (1962) but they scrapped the idea as Grant would be committed to a single feature film; thus, the producers decided to go after someone who could be part of a franchise after James Mason would only agree to commit to three films. In 1963, Grant would appear alongside Audrey Hepburn in Charade. he found his experience of working with Hepburn to be "wonderful" and believed their close relationship was clear on camera, although according to Hepburn, he was particularly concerned during filming that he would be criticized for being too old for her and seen as a "crib-robber". Writer Chris Barsanti describes: 'It's the film's sly flirtation that makes it such artful entertainment. Grant and Hepburn face each other like the professionals they are". The film, well received by critics, is called "the best Hitchcock Hitchcock ever made".

In 1964, Grant shed his distinguished image to play a grizzled drifter who is forced to serve as a lookout on an uninhabited island in the World War II romantic comedy Father Goose. The film was an astonishing success, grossing $210,000 at Christmas 1964, surpassing the record held by Charade the previous year. His last film, Walk, Don& #39;t Run) (1966), a comedy with Jim Hutton and Samantha Eggar, was shot in Tokyo, and is set against the backdrop of the housing shortage of 1964 Tokyo Olympics.Newsweek reflects: & # 34;Although Grant's personal presence is indispensable, the character he plays is almost entirely superfluous. Perhaps the inference to take is that a man in his 50s or 60s has no place in romantic comedy except as a catalyst. If so, the chemistry is wrong for everyone'. This would be the last film of Grant's career. Hitchcock even asked him to star in Torn Curtain (Torn Curtain) that same year, but his decision was irrevocable.

Last years

Grant in 1973

Grant retired from the screen in 1966 at the age of 62, when his daughter Jennifer Grant was born, to focus on his education and provide him with an environment of stability. Apart from this, he became disillusioned with the change film made in the 1960s, and I couldn't find any scripts that I approved of either. He once said: "I could have continued acting and playing a grandfather or a bum, but I discovered more important things in life". He also stated after working on Charade that the "Golden Age of Hollywood was over." He expressed little interest in returning to his career and would respond to the suggestion with "big break." Elvis concert in Las Vegas Elvis: That's the Way It Is. In the 1970s, he was given the negatives of several of his films and sold them to television for a amount of more than two million dollars in 1975.

Morecambe and Stirling argue that Grant's absence from film after 1966 was not because "the film industry turned its back on him," but because he was "caught between a decision made and the temptation to eat a piece of humble cake and advertise again to the moviegoing public. In the 1970s, MGM wanted to make a remake of Gran Hotel (1932) and dreamed of having Grant. Hitchcock also wanted to make a film on the idea of Hamlet, with Grant leading the cast. Grant stated that Warren Beatty had gone to great lengths to get him to play the role of Mr. Jordan. in Heaven Can Wait (1978), which was eventually made by James Mason. Morecambe and Stirling also claimed that Grant expressed interest in appearing in projects such as A Touch of Class (1973), Final Verdict (1982), and in an adaptation of William Goldman's book Adventures in the Screen Trade.

In the late 1970s and early 1980s, Grant became concerned about the deaths of close friends such as Howard Hughes in 1976, Howard Hawks in 1977, Lord Mountbatten and Barbara Hutton in 1979, Alfred Hitchcock in 1980, Grace Kelly and Ingrid Bergman in 1982, and David Niven in 1983. At Mountbatten's funeral, he told a friend: 'I'm absolutely screwed up, and I'm so damn old... I'm going to quit all next year. I'm going to lie in bed... I'll close all the doors, turn off the phone and enjoy my life'. Grace Kelly's death was one of the hardest for him because it was so unexpected. The two had an excellent relationship since the filming of To Catch a Thief .Grant visited Monaco three or four times each year during his retirement, and showed his support for Kelly by joining the board of the Princess Grace Foundation.

Financially, he was an executive of various companies related to the world of cinema. In 1980, the Los Angeles County Museum of Art did a retrospective of Grant's 40 film.In 1982, he went with the "Man of the Year" award. of the New York Friars Club at the Waldorf-Astoria Hotel. In 1984, at age 80, Peter Bogdanovich noted that the "serenity" had taken over him. Grant was in good health until he suffered a minor stroke in October of that year. his program A night with Cary Grant, in which after the projection of fragments of his films, he answered questions from the public. His 36 public appearances in the last four years, from New Jersey to Texas, and his audiences ranged from older moviegoers to eager college students discovering his films for the first time. Grant admitted that these appearances were "ego food", commenting that "I know who I am inside and out, but it's nice to have the outside at least corroborated".

Death

Grant was preparing for a performance at the Adler Theater in Davenport, Iowa, on the afternoon of November 29, 1986, when he suffered a brain hemorrhage (he had previously suffered a stroke in October 1984). His wife Barbara did not know what was happening and she went to a local pharmacy to get an aspirin. He was taken to St. Luke's Hospital in Davenport, Iowa, and after minutes in the waiting room, he was transferred to intensive care. He died at 11:22 p.m. m. at the age of 82, as a result of complications from a stroke.

The editorial of The New York Times wrote: "Cary Grant was not supposed to die.... Cary Grant was supposed to stay, our perpetual touchstone of charm., elegance, romance and youth." His body was taken back to California, where it was cremated and his ashes scattered in the Pacific Ocean. No funeral was held for him following his request, which Roderick Mann commented that it was appropriate for "the private man who didn't want the nonsense of a funeral". The bulk of his estate, worth $60 to $80 million, went to his fifth wife, Barbara Harris, and to their daughter, Jennifer Grant.

Entrepreneurial business

Grant in a picture of 40.

Stirling refers to Grant as "one of the shrewdest businessmen to ever operate in Hollywood". His long friendship with Howard Hughes from the 1930s onwards made him a regular of Hollywood's most glamorous circles and its lavish parties. Biographers Morecambe and Stirling claim that Hughes played an important role in developing Grant's business interests, so that by 1939 "he was already a shrewd operator with various business interests'. Scott also played a role, encouraging Grant to invest his money in stocks, which made him a wealthy man by the late 1930s. In the 1940s, Grant and Barbara Hutton invested in real estate development in Acapulco at a time when it was little more than a fishing village, and with Richard Widmark, Roy Rogers, and Red Skelton in building a hotel there. Behind economic interests there was great business intelligence, you have to the point that his friend David Niven once said, "Before computers went mainstream, Cary had one in his brain." Film critic David Thomson believes that Grants intelligence beyond of the cinema, stating that "no one else looked that good and that smart at the same time".

After Grant retired from the big screen, he focused on his business. He accepted the managerial position of the Fabergé cosmetics brand.This position was not honorary, as some had supposed; Grant regularly attended meetings and traveled internationally to support them. His salary ($15,000 a year) was modest compared to the millions of his acting career. Such was Grant's influence on the company that George Barrie once claimed that Grant he had played a role in growing the company to annual revenues of about $50 million in 1968, a growth of almost 80% since the inaugural year in 1964. This position allowed him the use of a private plane, which allowed him allowed Grant to see his daughter and mother while he worked.

In 1975, Grant was an appointed director of MGM. In 1980, he served on the board of MGM Films and MGM Grand Hotels after the parent company split up. He played an active role in promoting the MGM Grand Hotel in Las Vegas when it opened in 1973, and continued to promote the city into the 1970s. When Allan Warren met Grant for a photo shoot that year, he noted how tired Grant looked, and his "slightly melancholy air". Grant later joined the boards of directors of Hollywood Park, the Academy of Magical Arts (The Magic Castle, Hollywood, California), and Western Airlines (acquired by Delta Air Lines in 1987).

Private life

Grant became a US citizen on June 26, 1942, at the same time that he legally changed his name to "Cary Grant". At the time of his naturalization as an American, he left his second name like "Alec" in reference to his original name.

Financial hardships as a child made him very controllable about the money he earned. Despite earning more than three million dollars per film, which made him the highest-paid actor of his time, Grant had a well-deserved reputation as a stingy in Hollywood. Grant had homes in Beverly Hills, Malibu and Palm Springs.He was elegant on and off screen, and famed wardrobe director Edith Head noted that she appreciated his "meticulous" attention. to details and considered him to have the greatest fashion sense of any actor he had ever worked with. McCann credited his "almost obsessive maintenance" with his own. to the tan, which deepened as he aged. McCann notes that because Grant came from a working-class background and was not well educated, he made a particular effort throughout his career to blend in with high society and absorbing his knowledge, manners, and etiquette to compensate and cover it up. His image was painstakingly crafted from his early days in Hollywood, where he frequently sunbathed and avoided being photographed smoking, despite smoking two packs a day at the time.

Grant with her friend Margaux Hemingway in 1976

Grant quit smoking in the 1950s through hypnotherapy sessions. He was known to be health conscious, staying very lean and athletic even late in his career, though Grant admitted that he "never sprained a finger to stay in shape". who did "everything in moderation, except love."

Grant's daughter, Jennifer, said her father made hundreds of friends during his lifetime, and his home was visited frequently by Frank and Barbara Sinatra, Quincy Jones, Gregory Peck and his wife Veronique, Johnny Carson and his wife, Kirk Kerkorian and Merv Griffin. He said that Sinatra and his father were close friends and that they both had a similar radiance and an "indefinable charm glow", and were eternally "on the high of life". While Jennifer Growing up, Grant kept her childhood and adolescence games in a high-security room he had installed in the house. Jennifer attributed this meticulous collection to the fact that artifacts from her own childhood had been destroyed during the WWII German bombing raids of Bristol (an event that also claimed the lives of her uncle, aunt, cousin, and husband and grandson). cousin), and may have wanted to prevent her from experiencing a similar loss.

The fear of being poor again was always on his mind and he came to receive psychoanalysis sessions to avoid nightmares related to poverty. He was passionate about horse racing and gambling, but he never invested more than a couple of dollars. There are also various sources that claim that he was paid between 15 cents and a dollar for each autograph he signed. The actor complained about the taxes he had to pay and in all his marriages he signed prenuptial contracts.

Grant began experimenting with LSD in the late 1950s, before it became popular. His wife at the time, Betsy Drake, showed a great interest in psychotherapy, and through her, Grant developed considerable knowledge of the field of psychoanalysis. Radiologist Mortimer Hartman began LSD treatment in the late 1950s, and Grant was enthusiastic that the treatment made him feel better about himself and rid him of all his inner turmoil stemming from his childhood and his failed relationships. It is estimated that he had as many as one hundred sessions with this treatment. For a long time, Grant viewed the drug positively, stating that it was the solution after many years of "seeking his peace of mind", and that for For the first time in his life he was "truly, deeply and honestly happy". Dyan Cannon claimed during a court hearing that he was an "LSD apostle"; and that he was still taking the drug in 1967 as part of a remedy to save their relationship. Grant later said that "taking LSD was total nonsense, but I was a stubborn lout who hid all kinds of layers and defenses, hypocrisy and vanity. I had to get rid of them and clean the slate."

Romances and Marriages

Grant with his third wife Betsy Drake and saxophoneist Dick Stabile (right) in 1955

Grant was married five times. He married Virginia Cherrill on February 9, 1934, at the Caxton Hall registrar in London. They divorced on March 26, 1935, accusing her of mistreatment. The two were involved in a controversial divorce that was widely reported in the press, with Cherrill suing him for $1,000 a week for profits he had earned from Paramount. After this divorce, he became engaged to Phyllis Brooks in 1937. They planned the wedding and they took a tour of Europe in mid-1939, visiting Dorothy Taylor's Roman villa Dentice di Frasso in Italy, but the relationship ended at the end of that year.

His second marriage was to Barbara Hutton in 1942, one of the richest women in the world, after a $50 million inheritance from his grandfather Frank Winfield Woolworth. They were nicknamed 'Cash and Cary', although Grant refused any financial settlement in a prenuptial agreement to avoid being accused of marrying for financial gain. Until the end of their marriage, they lived in the mansion at 10615 Bellagio Road in Bel Air. They divorced in 1945, although they maintained a solid friendship. He became engaged to Betty Hensel during that period, but ended up marrying Betsy Drake (co-star in one of his films) on December 25, 1949. It was the longest marriage of his life, lasting practically fourteen years.

Grant and Sophia Loren in a frame Cintia (1958)

It is said that he had a great romance with Sophia Loren, one of the most passionate of the actor in his entire life. She was 31 years younger than him. They met on the set of Pride and Passion (1957) and he was still married to Betsy Drake while she was in relations with producer Carlo Ponti, who was also married. When Sophia Loren visited Los Angeles during the filming of You and I (1957), Grant inundated her with dozens of calls and hundreds of flowers. Both (Grant and Ponti) separated from their respective wives and both proposed to her and Loren ended up deciding on Ponti. Grant, still in love with Loren, initially agreed to share a set with Loren in Cintia (1958) but after she became engaged to Ponti, a heartbroken Grant wanted to back out. He couldn't even though director Melville Shavelson made sure the production ran smoothly.

His penultimate wife is actress Dyan Cannon, much younger than him. They were married on July 22, 1965, at Howard Hughes' Desert Inn in Las Vegas. Grant and Cannon separated in August 1967.

From that relationship was born his only daughter, Jennifer Grant (February 26, 1966), whom he sometimes dubbed as his "best production". He said of his paternity:

"My life changed the day Jennifer was born. I have come to think that the reason we are on this earth is to procreate. Leave something behind. Not the movies, because you know I don't think my movies will last long once I'm gone. But another human being. That's what's important.

Grant did not want Jennifer to work in the film industry, but after her father's death Jennifer became an actress.

On March 12, 1968, Grant was involved in a traffic accident in Queens, New York, en route to JFK Airport, when a truck collided with his limousine. Grant was hospitalized for 17 days with three broken ribs. His partner, Baroness Gratia von Furstenberg, was also injured in the accident.Nine days later, Grant and Cannon divorced.

Grant had a small affair with actress Cynthia Bouron in the late 1960s. Coinciding with his Honorary Oscar, Grant announced that he would attend the awards ceremony to accept his award, thus ending his 12-year boycott of the ceremony. Two days after this announcement, Bouron filed a paternity suit against him and publicly stated that he was the father of her seven-week-old daughter, and his name was placed on the child's birth certificate. He challenged to take a blood test and Bouron did not provide it, and the court ordered him to remove his name from the certificate. Between 1973 and 1977, he dated British photojournalist Maureen Donaldson, followed by the much younger Victoria Morgan.

On April 11, 1981, Grant married Barbara Harris, a hotel public relations officer in Great Britain who was 47 years his junior. The two met in 1976 at the Royal Lancaster Hotel in London where Harris was working at the time and Grant was attending a Fabergé lecture. They became friends, but it wasn't until 1979 that she moved to live with him in California. Grant's friends felt that she had a positive impact on him, with Prince Rainier of Monaco noting that Grant had "never been so happy" like those last years.

Rumors about his homosexuality

Grant and Randolph Scott (left) in 1933 (de Modern Screen)

Some, including Hedda Hopper and screenwriter Arthur Laurents, have said that Grant was bisexual. Rumors have been circulating about it for decades. Grant was allegedly romantically involved with costume designer Orry-Kelly when she first moved to Manhattan and then lived with actor Randolph Scott for 12 years. Fashion critic Richard Blackwell wrote that Grant and Scott were "deeply, madly in love." Scotty Bowers claimed in his memoir, Full Service, published in 2012, that he was a lover of Grant and Scott. William McBrien, in his biography Cole Porter, says that Cole Porter and Grant frequented the same Harlem luxury male prostitution house, run by Clint Moore and secretly popular with gay celebrities. However, Barbara Harris, Grant's widow, has disputed that there was a relationship with Scott. When Chevy Chase joked about Grant being gay in a television interview, Grant sued him for defamation; the lawsuit was settled out of court. However, Grant's ex-girlfriend Maureen Donaldson wrote in her 1989 memoir, An Affair to Remember: My Life with Cary Grant that Grant told her that his first two wives had accused him of being homosexual. In Chaplin's Girl, a biography of Virginia Cherrill (Grant's first wife), writer Miranda Seymour acknowledged that Grant and Scott were just platonic friends.

Grant's daughter, Jennifer Grant, denied that her father was gay in her 2011 memoir. Jennifer's mother, Dyan Cannon, Grant's fourth wife, also denied that Grant was gay when she was promoting his Grant's memoir in 2012. Betsy Drake, in an interview during the American Movie Classics documentary on Grant's life, was quoted as saying, "When we were married, we fucked like rabbits".

Screen Icon

Grant in 1958

McCann wrote that one of the reasons Grant's career was so successful is that he was unaware of how attractive he was on screen, acting in ways that were unexpected and unusual for a Hollywood star of that period. George Cukor once said of him:

"It didn't depend on his appearance. He wasn't a narcissist, he acted like he was a normal young man. And that made it even more attractive, that a handsome young man was fun; that was especially unexpected and good because we thought: 'Well, if he's a Beau Brummel, he can't be fun or smart,' but he proved the opposite.'

Jennifer Grant acknowledged that her father was neither confident in his looks nor much of a character actor, and said that he was the complete opposite, playing the "basic guy".

Recognition of Grant's attractiveness was unusually wide among both men and women. Pauline Kael commented that men wanted to be him and women dreamed of dating him. She noticed that Grant treated his female co-stars differently from many of the leading men at the time, viewing them as multi-qualified subjects rather than "treating them like sex objects". Leslie Caron said of he was once the most talented man he had ever worked with. David Shipman wrote that "like many stars, he belongs to the public". Many critics said of him that he had the ability to turn a mediocre film back in a good Philip T. Hartung of The Commonweal said in his review of Mr. Lucky (1943) that, were it not for the persuasive personality of Cary Grant, everything would fade to nothing. Political scientist C. L. R. James saw Grant as a "important new symbol', a new style of Brit that differs from Leslie Howard and Ronald Colman and represents the "freedom, natural grace, simplicity and directness that characterize American types as different as Jimmy Stewart and Ronald Reagan", which ultimately symbolized the growing relationship between Britain and the United States.

McCann described Grant as the "actor who typically played rich and privileged characters who never seemed to need to work to maintain their glamorous and hedonistic lifestyles". Martin Stirling thought Grant had an acting range that was "greater than any of his contemporaries," but he felt that various critics undervalued him as an actor. He believes that Grant was always at his "physical and verbal best in situations bordering on farce". Charles Champlin identified a paradox in Grant's screen persona, in his unusual ability to " mix polish and falls in successive scenes". He placed the note that Grant was "refreshingly able to play the near-dumb, idiot fey, without compromising his masculinity or surrendering to camp for its own good." Wansell further notes that Grant could, "with the arch of an eyebrow or the slightest hint of a smile, question your self-image". Stanley Donen stated that his true "magic" it came from his attention to minute detail and always seemed real, coming from "enormous amounts of work"; Rather than being given by God, Grant commented of his career: "I guess, to some degree, I eventually became the characters he was playing. I played someone I wanted to be until I became that person, or he became me." He claimed that the real Cary Grant was more like the scruffy, unshaven fisherman from "Father Goose." # 3. 4; than the "well-dressed charmer" by Charade.

Grant often joked about himself with statements like, "Everyone wants to be Cary Grant. Even I want to be Cary Grant", and in a passage from His Girl Friday (1940) he says: "Listen, the last man who said that to me was Archie Leach, just one week before slitting his throat." In Arsenic Out of Pity (1944), a grave appears with the name of Archie Leach on it. Alfred Hitchcock thought Grant was very effective on dark characters, with a mysterious and dangerous quality, noting that "there's a terrifying side to Cary that no one can put my finger on". Wansell notes that this darker and more mysterious side extended to his personal life, which he tried very hard to hide to preserve your elegant image.

Complete filmography

Publicity poster Attention ladies (1934).

Publicity poster Puritan skin (1937).

Publicity poster The beast of my child (1938).

Publicity poster Only angels have wings (1939).

Publicity poster Chained (1946).

Publicity poster Catch a thief (1955).

Publicity poster Death in the heels (1959).

Awards and distinctions

Oscar Awards

BAFTA

Golden Globes