Cary Grant
Cary Grant | |
|---|---|
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| Born | Archibald Alexander Leach January 18, 1904 Bristol, England, UK |
| Died | November 29, 1986 (aged 82) Davenport, Iowa, United States |
| Other names | Archie Leach |
| Occupation | Actor |
| Years active | 1932–66 |
| Spouse(s) | Virginia Cherrill (1934–1935) Barbara Hutton (1942–1945) Betsy Drake (1949–1962) Dyan Cannon (1965–1967) Barbara Harris (1981–1986) |
| Partner | Maureen Donaldson (1973–1977)[1] |
| Children | Jennifer Grant, born on February 26, 1966 |
| Relatives | Cary Benjamin Grant, born on August 12, 2008 |
| Awards | Academy Honorary Award 1970 For his unique mastery of the art of screen acting with the respect and affection of his colleagues. |
Archibald Alexander Leach[2] (January 18, 1904–November 29, 1986), better known by his stage name Cary Grant, was an English actor[3] who later took US citizenship. Known for his transatlantic accent, debonair demeanor and "dashing good looks"[4], Grant is considered one of classic Hollywood's definitive leading men.[5]
He was named the second Greatest Male Star of All Time by the American Film Institute. Noted for his dramatic roles as well as screwball comedy, Grant's best-known films include Bringing Up Baby (1938), The Philadelphia Story (1940), Penny Serenade (1941), Arsenic and Old Lace (1944), None but the Lonely Heart (1944), Notorious (1946), To Catch A Thief (1955), An Affair to Remember (1957), and North by Northwest (1959).
Nominated twice for the Academy Award for Best Actor and five times for a Golden Globe Award for Best Actor, Grant was continually passed over, and in 1970 was given an Honorary Oscar at the 42nd Academy Awards. Frank Sinatra presented Grant with the award, "for his unique mastery of the art of screen acting with the respect and affection of his colleagues".[6][7]
Early life and career
Archibald Alexander Leach was born in Horfield, Bristol, to Elsie Maria Kingdon (1877–1973) and Elias James Leach (1873–1935).[8][9] An only child, Leach had an unhappy upbringing, attending Bishop Road Primary School. His mother had suffered from depression since the death of a previous child. Her husband placed her in a mental institution, and told his nine-year-old son only that she had gone away on a "long holiday"; it was not until he was 31[10] that Grant discovered her alive, in an institutionalized care facility.
He was expelled from the Fairfield Grammar School in Bristol in 1918. After joining the "Bob Pender stage troupe", Leach performed as a stilt walker and travelled with the group to the United States in 1920 at the age of 16, on a two-year tour of the country. He was processed at Ellis Island on July 28, 1920.[11] When the troupe returned to the UK, he decided to stay in the U.S. and continue his stage career. During this time, he became a part of the vaudeville world and toured with Parker, Rand and Leach. Still using his birth name, he performed on the stage at The Muny in St. Louis, Missouri, in such shows as Irene (1931); Music in May (1931); Nina Rosa (1931); Rio Rita (1931); Street Singer (1931); The Three Musketeers (1931); and Wonderful Night (1931). Leach's experience on stage as a stilt walker, acrobat, juggler, and mime taught him "phenomenal physical grace and exquisite comic timing" and the value of teamwork, skills which would benefit him in Hollywood.[10]
Hollywood stardom
After the light Broadway comedies, Grant went to Hollywood in 1931.[10] When told to change his name, he proposed "Cary Lockwood," his character's name in a recent play called Nikki, based upon the recent film The Last Flight. He signed with Paramount Pictures, but while studio bosses were impressed with him, they were less than impressed with his adopted stage name. They decided that the name Cary was acceptable, but Lockwood had to go due to a similarity with another actor's name. It was after browsing through a list of the studio's preferred surnames that "Cary Grant" was born. Grant chose the name because the initials C and G had already proved lucky for Clark Gable and Gary Cooper, two of Hollywood's biggest movie stars.
Already having appeared as leading man opposite Marlene Dietrich in Blonde Venus (1932), his stardom was given a further boost by Mae West when she chose him for her leading man in two of her most successful films, She Done Him Wrong and I'm No Angel (both 1933).[12] I'm No Angel was a tremendous financial success and, along with She Done Him Wrong, which was nominated for an Academy Award for Best Picture, saved Paramount from bankruptcy. Paramount put Grant in a series of unsuccessful films until 1936, when he signed with Columbia Pictures. His first major comedy hit was when he was loaned to Hal Roach's studio for the 1937 Topper (which was distributed by MGM).
Under the tutelage of director Leo McCarey, his role in The Awful Truth (1937) with Irene Dunne was the pivotal film in the establishment of Grant's screen persona; as he later wrote, "I pretended to be somebody I wanted to be and I finally became that person. Or he became me. Or we met at some point." The Awful Truth began "what would be the most spectacular run ever for an actor in American pictures";[10] during the next four years, Grant made the screwball comedy Bringing Up Baby and the romantic comedy Holiday (1938) with Katharine Hepburn; the adventures Gunga Din and Only Angels Have Wings (1939); His Girl Friday (1940) with Rosalind Russell; The Philadelphia Story (1940), with Hepburn and James Stewart; and Suspicion (1941), the first of four with Alfred Hitchcock.
Grant remained one of Hollywood's top box-office attractions for almost 30 years.[10] Howard Hawks said that Grant was "so far the best that there isn't anybody to be compared to him".[13] David Thomson called him "the best and most important actor in the history of the cinema".[10]
To Catch a Thief (1955)
Grant was a favorite of Hitchcock, who called him "the only actor I ever loved in my whole life".[14] Besides Suspicion, Grant appeared in the Hitchcock classics Notorious (1946), To Catch a Thief (1955) and North by Northwest (1959). Biographer Patrick McGilligan wrote that, in 1965, Hitchcock asked Grant to star in Torn Curtain (1966), only to learn that Grant had decided to retire after making one more film, Walk, Don't Run (1966); Paul Newman was cast instead, opposite Julie Andrews.[15]
In the mid-1950s, Grant formed his own production company, Granart Productions, and produced a number of movies distributed by Universal, such as Operation Petticoat (1959), Indiscreet (1958), That Touch of Mink (co-starring with Doris Day, 1962), and Father Goose (1964). In 1963, he appeared opposite Audrey Hepburn in Charade (1963). His last feature film was Walk, Don't Run with Samantha Eggar and Jim Hutton.
Grant was the first actor to "go independent" by not renewing his studio contract, effectively leaving the studio system,[10] which almost completely controlled what an actor could or could not do. In this way, Grant was able to control every aspect of his career, at the risk of not working because no particular studio had an interest in his career long term. He decided which movies he was going to appear in, he often had personal choice of the directors and his co-stars and at times even negotiated a share of the gross, something uncommon at the time.
Grant was nominated for two Academy Awards in the 1940s, and received a special Academy Award for Lifetime Achievement in 1970. In 1981, he was accorded the Kennedy Center Honors. Never self absorbed, Grant poked fun at himself with statements such as, "Everyone wants to be Cary Grant—even I want to be Cary Grant".[16] After seeing a telegram from a magazine editor to his agent asking "HOW OLD CARY GRANT?", Grant reportedly responded with "OLD CARY GRANT FINE. HOW YOU?"[17][18]
Retirement and death
Although Grant had retired from the screen, he remained active in other areas. In the late 1960s, he accepted a position on the board of directors at Fabergé. By all accounts this position was not honorary, as some had assumed, Grant regularly attended meetings and his mere appearance at a product launch would almost certainly guarantee its success. The position also permitted use of a private plane, which Grant could use to fly to see his daughter wherever her mother, Dyan Cannon, was working. He later joined the boards of Hollywood Park, The Academy of Magical Arts (The Magic Castle, Hollywood, CA) Western Airlines (now Delta Air Lines), and MGM.[19]
In the last few years of his life, Grant undertook tours of the United States in a one-man show. It was called "A Conversation with Cary Grant", in which he would show clips from his films and answer audience questions. Grant was preparing for a performance at the Adler Theater in Davenport, Iowa on the afternoon of November 29, 1986 when he sustained a cerebral hemorrhage. He had previously suffered a stroke in October 1984. He died at 11:22 pm[19] in St. Luke's Hospital at the age of 82.
In 2001 a statue of Grant was erected in Millennium Square, a regenerated area next to the harbour in his city of birth, Bristol, England.
In November 2004, Grant came in second in the "The Greatest Movie Star of All Time" list by Premiere Magazine.[20] Richard Schickel, the film critic, said about Grant: "He's the best star actor there ever was in the movies."[21]
Personal life
Grant was married five times. He wed Virginia Cherrill on February 10, 1934. She divorced him on March 26, 1935, following charges that Grant had hit her. In 1942 he married Barbara Hutton, one of the wealthiest women in the world, and became a father figure to her son, Lance Reventlow. The couple was derisively nicknamed "Cash and Cary", although in an extensive prenuptial agreement Grant refused any financial settlement in the event of a divorce. After divorcing in 1945, they remained lifelong friends. Grant always bristled at the accusation that he married for money: "I may not have married for very sound reasons, but money was never one of them."
On December 25, 1949, Grant married Betsy Drake. He appeared with her in two films. This would prove to be his longest marriage, ending on August 14, 1962. Drake introduced Grant to LSD, and in the early 1960s he related how treatment with the hallucinogenic drug —legal at the time— at a prestigious California clinic had finally brought him inner peace after yoga, hypnotism, and mysticism had proved ineffective.[22][23][24] (In 1932, Grant had also met the Indian spiritual teacher Meher Baba.)[25] Grant and Drake divorced in 1962.
He eloped with Dyan Cannon on July 22, 1965 in Las Vegas. Their daughter, Jennifer Grant, was born prematurely on February 26, 1966. He frequently called her his "best production" and regretted that he had not had children sooner. The marriage was troubled from the beginning and Cannon left him in December 1966, claiming that Grant flew into frequent rages and spanked her when she "disobeyed" him. The divorce, finalized in 1968, was bitter and public, and custody fights over their daughter went on for nearly ten years.
On April 11, 1981, Grant married long-time companion Barbara Harris, a British hotel public relations agent, who was 47 years his junior. They renewed their vows on their fifth wedding anniversary. Fifteen years after Grant's death, Harris married former Kansas Jayhawks All-American quarterback David Jaynes in 2001.[26]
Grant allegedly was involved with costume designer Orry-Kelly when he first moved to Manhattan,[27] and lived with Randolph Scott off and on for twelve years. Richard Blackwell wrote that Grant and Scott were "deeply, madly in love",[28] and alleged eyewitness accounts of their physical affection have been published.[27] Hedda Hopper[29] and screenwriter Arthur Laurents also have alleged that Grant was bisexual, the latter writing that Grant "told me he threw pebbles at my window one night but was luckless".[30] Alexander D'Arcy, who appeared with Grant in The Awful Truth, said he knew that he and Scott "lived together as a gay couple", adding: "I think Cary knew that people were saying things about him. I don't think he tried to hide it."[27] The two men frequently accompanied each other to parties and premieres and were unconcerned when photographs of them cozily preparing dinner together at home were published in fan magazines.[27]
Barbara, Grant's widow, has disputed that there was a relationship with Scott.[19] When Chevy Chase joked about Grant being gay in a television interview Grant sued him for slander; they settled out of court.[31] However, Grant did admit in an interview that his first two wives had accused him of being homosexual.[31] Betsy Drake commented: "Why would I believe that Cary was homosexual when we were busy fucking?"[19]
Politics
Grant did not think movie stars should publicly make political declarations.[32] Grant described his politics and his reticence about them this way:
I'm opposed to actors taking sides in public and spouting spontaneously about love, religion, or politics. We aren't experts on these subjects. Personally I'm a mass of inconsistencies when it comes to politics. My opinions are constantly changing. That's why I don't ever take a public stand on issues.[33]
Throughout his life, Grant maintained personal friendships with colleagues of varying political stripes and his few political activities seemed to be shaped by personal friendships. Repulsed by the human costs to many in Hollywood, Grant publicly condemned McCarthyism in 1953 and vocally defended his friend Charlie Chaplin when the latter was blacklisted, insisting that Chaplin's artistic value outweighed political concerns.[33] Grant was also a friend of the Kennedy brothers and Robert Kennedy's press secretary Frank Mankiewicz. He hosted one of Robert Kennedy's first political fundraisers at his home. He made one of his rare statements on public issues following the assassination of Robert F. Kennedy, calling for gun control.[33]
In 1976, after his retirement from movies, Grant made his one overtly partisan appearance, introducing his friend Betty Ford, the First Lady, at the Republican National Convention,[32] but even in this he maintained some distance from partisanship, speaking of "your" party, rather than "ours" in his remarks.[33]
Filmography
References
Notes
- ^ Donaldson,
Phyllis Brooks(1937–1941) Maureen and William Royce. An Affair to Remember: My Life With Cary Grant. New York: Charter Books, 1990. ISBN 1-55773-371-6. - ^ McMann 1996, p. 271, n.13. Note: Although Grant's baptismal record records his middle name as "Alec", it is "Alexander" on his birth certificate.
- ^ Obituary Variety, December 3, 1986.
- ^ http://www.librarising.com/astrology/celebs/carygrant.html
- ^ http://www.datehookup.com/content-cary-grant-the-charismatic-leading-man.htm
- ^ http://www.carygrant.net/oscar.html
- ^ http://fan.tcm.com/_Cary-Grant-Honorary-Oscar/photo/12769123/66470.html
- ^ Elsie Kingdom Retrieved: July 12, 2008.
- ^ Pace, Eric. "Movies' Epitome of Elegance Dies of a Stroke." New York Times, December 1, 1986. Retrieved: July 12, 2008.
- ^ a b c d e f g Schwarz, Benjamin (January/February 2007). "Becoming Cary Grant". The Atlantic. Retrieved January 18, 2011.
{{cite news}}: Check date values in:|date=(help) - ^ "The Statue of Liberty." Ellis Island Foundation, Inc.. Retrieved: March 24, 2010.
- ^ Encyclopædia Britannica, Cary Grant biography.
- ^ Interview of Howard Hawks with Joseph McBride, in Hawks, Howard and Gerald Mast. Bringing Up Baby. New Brunswick, New Jersey: Rutgers University Press, 1988, p. 260.
- ^ name=NelsonN-GrantC>Nelson and Grant 1992. p. 325.
- ^ McGilligan 2003, pp. 663–664.
- ^ Cary in the Sky with Diamonds, Vanity Fair, Number 600, August 2010, page 174
- ^ "Old Cary Grant Fine." time.com, 27 July 1962.
- ^ Halliwell, Leslie. "Halliwell's Filmgoer's Companion, Ninth Edition". Scribners, 1988, p. 303.
- ^ a b c d Jaynes, Barbara Grant and Robert Trachtenberg. "Cary Grant: A Class Apart." tcm.com, Burbank, California: Turner Classic Movies (TCM) and Turner Entertainment, 2004.
- ^ "The 50 Greatest Movie Stars of All Time." Premiere Magazine. Retrieved: June 13, 2009.
- ^ Hammond, Pete. "Remembering Cary Grant at 100." Associated Press, (c/o CBS News), May 21, 2004. Retrieved: June 13, 2009.
- ^ "Cary Grant Today." Saturday Evening Post, March 1978. Retrieved: June 13, 2009.
- ^ McKelvey, Bob. "Cary Grant – Hollywood's Zany Lover Reaches 80." Detroit Free Press January 18, 1984. Retrieved: June 13, 2009.
- ^ Godfrey, Lionel. Cary Grant: The Light Touch. New York: St. Martin's Press, 1981. ISBN 0-31212-309-4.
- ^ Kalchuri, Bhau: Meher Prabhu: Lord Meher, Volume Five, Manifestation, Inc., 1986, p. 1565.
- ^ "Sayers’ advice on education priceless for today’s athletes." The Lawrence Journal-World October 5, 2003. Retrieved: August 9, 2009.
- ^ a b c d Higham and Moseley 1989.
- ^ Blackwell, Vernon Patterson. From Rags to Bitches: An Autobiography. Los Angeles: General Publishing Group Inc., 1995. ISBN 1-88164-957-1.
- ^ Mann 2001, p. 154.
- ^ Laurents 2001, p. 131.
- ^ a b Eliot, Marc. Cary Grant: The Biography. New York: Harmony Books, 2004. ISBN 1-40005-026-X.
- ^ a b Jaynes, Barbara Grant and Robert Trachtenberg. "PBS: "Cary Grant: A Class Apart." Washington Post, May 26, 2005. Retrieved: June 13, 2009.
- ^ a b c d Nelson, Nancy. Evenings With Cary Grant: Recollections in His Own Words and by Those Who Knew Him Best. New York: Citadel, 2007. ISBN 978-0806524122.
Bibliography of cited references
- Bogdanovich, Peter. Who the Hell's in It: Portraits and Conversations. New York: A.A. Knopf, 2004. ISBN 0-37540-010-9.
- Eliot, Marc. Cary Grant: The Biography. New York: Aurum Press, 2005. ISBN 1-84513-073-1.
- Higham, Charles and Roy Moseley. Cary Grant: The Lonely Heart. London: Thompson Learning, 1997. ISBN 0-15115-787-1.
- Johannson, Warren and William A. Percy. Outing: Shattering the Conspiracy of Silence.. Kirkwood, New York: Harrington Park Press, 1994, pp. 146–147.
- Kael, Pauline. "The Man from Dream City – Cary Grant" – The New Yorker – July 14, 1975 – (reprinted in: Pauline Kael: For Keeps – 30 Years at the Movies. New York: Dutton, 1994.)
- Laurents, Arthur. Original Story by: A Memoir of Broadway and Hollywood. Milwaukee, Wisconsin: Hal Leonard Corp, 2001. ISBN 1-55783-467-9.
- Mann, William J. Behind the Screen: How Gays and Lesbians Shaped Hollywood, 1910–1969. New York: Viking, 2001. ISBN 0-67003-017-1.
- McCann, Graham. Cary Grant: A Class Apart. London: Fourth Estate, 1997. ISBN 1-85702-574-1.
- McGilligan, Patrick. Alfred Hitchcock: A Life in Darkness and Light. New York: Regan Books, 2003. ISBN 0-06039-322-X.
- Morecambe, Gary; Sterling, Martin. Cary Grant: In Name Alone. London: Robson Books, 2001. ISBN 1-86105-466-1.
- Nelson, Nancy and Cary Grant. Evenings With Cary Grant: Recollections In His Own Words and By Those Who Loved Him Best. Thorndike, Maine: Thorndike Press, 1992. ISBN 1-56054-342-6.
- Russo, Vito. The Celluloid Closet: Homosexuality in the Movies [revised edition]. New York: Harrow & Row, 1987. ISBN 0-06096-132-5.
- Wansell, Geoffrey. Cary Grant: Dark Angel. London: Arcade, 1997. ISBN 1-55970-369-5.
External links
- Cary Grant at IMDb
- Cary Grant at AllMovie
- Cary Grant at the TCM Movie Database
- Cary Grant at the Internet Broadway Database
Template:1981 Kennedy Center Honorees Template:AFI 100 Stars
- 1904 births
- 1986 deaths
- Academy Honorary Award recipients
- American film actors
- American people of English descent
- Deaths from cerebral hemorrhage
- Deaths from stroke
- English film actors
- English emigrants to the United States
- Kennedy Center honorees
- Naturalized citizens of the United States
- Old Fairfieldians
- People from Bristol
- Stroke survivors
- Vaudeville performers
- 20th-century actors
- European families of English ancestry