August 24 | 11 movies
Grace Kelly makes her Summer Under the Stars debut this August with a lineup of movies covering the breadth of her short but impactful career as a film actress. Kelly made just 11 Hollywood films in just five years and almost half of those were released in 1954 alone. However, in that brief time, she successfully starred in major studio productions with some of the top leading men of the day including Gary Cooper, Cary Grant, Jimmy Stewart, Clark Gable and William Holden. She starred in three Alfred Hitchcock films—at the most fruitful time in his career—thus joining the ranks of famous Hitchcock blondes. She also snagged the coveted Academy Award for Best Actress in a Leading Role for her performance in The Country Girl (1954); a win still hotly contested today given the caliber of talent of her fellow nominees. By 1956, Kelly was at the top of her game when she abruptly left Hollywood and became the Princess of Monaco. On August 24, TCM is presenting 10 of Kelly’s films as well as a documentary on her royal wedding.
With her air of sophistication, lilting transatlantic accent, delicate features and her innate ability to showcase the best fashion of the day, it seemed inevitable that the movie camera would fall in love with Grace Kelly. But she wasn’t just a beauty who stumbled into acting. Her deep love for the dramatic arts was an integral part of her journey to Hollywood. Grace Patricia Kelly was born on November 12, 1929, and raised in a wealthy suburb of Philadelphia. After graduating high school, she moved to New York City to attend the American Academy of Dramatic Arts. Auditions led to work in the theater which led to work as a model which then led to work in television commercials and live teleplays.
In 1950, Kelly made her Broadway debut with a plum role in the production of “The Father” which caught the attention of Fox producer Sol C. Siegel. Kelly soon was whisked away to Hollywood to test for a mall role in Siegel’s upcoming picture Fourteen Hours (1951). Directed by Henry Hathaway, this ripped-from-the-headlines story focuses on a suicidal man (Richard Basehart) who threatens to jump off the ledge of the building, leading to an all-day standoff with the police (Paul Douglas). Kelly landed the small role of Mrs. Louise Ann Fuller, a married woman who changes her mind about her divorce when she witnesses the standoff. Kelly’s 2 1/2 minutes onscreen wasn’t impactful, but it did allow her agent Jay Kanter to pitch Kelly for more movie work.
Kanter had sent some photos of Kelly to producer Stanley Kramer who was casting for his next picture High Noon (1952). Directed by Fred Zinnemann, High Noon starred Gary Cooper as a newly married and now retired marshal who must save his town from a gang leader seeking revenge. Kelly plays Cooper’s young Quaker bride. While playing the lead opposite one of the top actors of the day seemed like a big jump, Kelly felt she didn’t have the experience or the support to play the part well. When the production wrapped, she returned to television and stage work where she felt more at home. However, Hollywood soon lured her back with an offer she couldn’t refuse.
MGM was eager to capitalize on the momentum exotic dramas were having at the box office and agreed to remake the pre-Code classic Red Dust (1932). John Ford’s Mogambo (1953) shook things up by moving the plot to East Africa and shooting on location and in Technicolor. Kelly was thrilled at the prospect of working with Clark Gable and being able to travel to Africa. She was officially cast as one of two romantic interests in a love triangle between a game hunter (Gable), a showgirl (Ava Gardner) and a married woman (Kelly). The part came with a seven-year contract with MGM. Mogambo was a hit at the box office and effectively positioned Kelly as a movie star. It also got her attention during award season with an Oscar nomination and a Golden Globe win. Kelly seemed to be exactly what a major movie studio like MGM was looking for. “With [Grace Kelly’s] restraint and poise, her bright, blue-green eyes, her alabaster complexion, and a glorious smile that made everyone want to smile with her,” biographer Donald Spoto writes, “she was precisely the image Middle America adored and wanted to replicate.” Even so, MGM didn’t quite know what to do with her and struggled to find her new projects. This led to a series of loan-outs that would put Kelly’s movie career into overdrive.
Kelly’s persona of equal parts alluring and unattainable appealed to director Alfred Hitchcock, who saw potential in Kelly as his next leading lady in Dial M for Murder (1954). The actress seemed to thrive with Hitchcock, and he was quick to make her his muse. In Dial M for Murder, Ray Milland is Tony Wendice, a disgruntled husband who hires another man, Robert Cummings, to kill his wife (Kelly) only to have his plan go terribly awry. Despite being fairly new to the business, Kelly resisted specific wardrobe and makeup requests. She knew what was best for her and her character and this was indicative of her ongoing rebellion against the studio system. Kelly always stood up for herself when it came to studio demands.
Hitchcock immediately threw himself into another project and brought Kelly with him. Arguably one of Hitchcock’s best thrillers, Rear Window (1954) stars James Stewart as an injured photographer who along with his long-suffering girlfriend (Kelly) and his nurse (Thelma Ritter) tries to solve a murder mystery from across a courtyard. Kelly was at her very best playing the model-turned-fashion-buyer trying to settle down with her bachelor boyfriend. As film historian Sloan De Forest writes, “Grace charms Rear Window to life with beauty, elegant wit, and woman-in-danger thrills…[and] beneath the sparkling exterior is a dark side. Lisa Fremont represents Hitchcock’s deliciously sinister outlook on romantic love…”
Kelly had always been disenchanted with the studio system but grew even more so when MGM assigned her to two new projects. MGM renewed their loan-out agreement with Paramount, which obligated Kelly to appear in the Korean War drama The Bridges at Toko-Ri (1954). With a total of just under 15 minutes of screen time, Kelly played Nancy Brubaker, the distraught wife of a navy pilot who seems to be destined for tragedy. In the same vein as Mogambo, MGM greenlit another exotic drama, this time set in South America. Green Fire (1954) stars Kelly and Stewart Granger as an emerald prospector. It was a disaster of a script and MGM insisted that Kelly make the film and refused to loan her out to make The Country Girl. Kelly sent MGM executives Christmas cards with a note inside indicating that if they didn’t give her the part in The Country Girl, she would leave Hollywood forever. MGM tried to push back but eventually the parties came to an agreement.
Based on the Clifford Odets play and directed by George Seaton, The Country Girl stars Bing Crosby as a washed-up singer whose alcoholism and journey of self-sabotage pushes his wife (Kelly) into the arms of the theater director (William Holden) who is trying to save his career. Kelly as the titular “country girl” dressed plainly with minimal makeup in a role that afforded her an opportunity to get back to her theater roots. The part gave her an opportunity to showcase her talent for delivering dramatic monologues. The Academy took notice, and Kelly was nominated for Best Actress. Among her competitors were Dorothy Dandridge (Carmen Jones), Judy Garland (A Star is Born), Audrey Hepburn (Sabrina) and Jane Wyman (Magnificent Obsession). For many, the win was an upset, but for Kelly it was a thrill to be recognized.
Shortly after Green Fire had wrapped, Kelly was on a plane heading to France for Hitchcock’s next film To Catch a Thief (1955) with her next co-star Cary Grant, who had been recently coaxed out of a semi-retirement to make this picture. Grant plays John Robie, a retired burglar who is trying to clear his name after a series of copycat robberies. Kelly plays an American tourist and his love interest. To Catch a Thief has enjoyed a legacy as one of the most stylish films in Hitchcock’s filmography. The famous lovemaking scene which ends with the camera zooming into to a very suggestive firework display is one of the most memorable scenes of the era.
Kelly seemed on top of the world when it came to movie stardom, yet the executives at MGM were still scratching their heads at what to do with her. In looking for their next project, Kelly suggested playing the role of Princess Alexandra in The Swan (1956). Kelly previously starred in the 1950 telecast for The Actor’s Studio and was eager to revisit the role. This was one of the prince-and-the-pauper-type stories that Hollywood loved to make. The Swan gave Kelly her first and only top billing. She plays the object of two men’s attention, a disinterested prince (Alec Guinness) and the family tutor (Louis Jourdan). Months later, Kelly took on what would be her final film role in High Society (1956), a musical remake of the screwball comedy The Philadelphia Story (1940). Kelly plays Tracy Lord, a socialite who in the days leading up to her wedding has second thoughts about her soon-to-be husband (Bing Crosby) and her relationship with her ex-husband (Frank Sinatra). High Society is set in Newport, Rhode Island, at the time an enclave for jazz lovers and the wealthy elite.
By this point, Kelly was craving stability and hoping that marriage and children were in her near future. On one fateful trip to the Cannes Film Festival in early 1955, she met Prince Rainier of Monaco and fell in love. The two married on April 18, 1956. MGM would only get one more production out of Kelly and that was her wedding. The Wedding in Monaco (1956) is a short documentary narrated by José Ferrer and captures in color footage the pomp and circumstance leading up to and during Prince Rainier and Kelly’s wedding.
Grace Kelly has been an endless source of fascination and scrutiny for the public even in the decades after her death in 1982. She continues to be celebrated as one of the great beauties and most captivating entertainers to grace the silver screen. When asked what Kelly means to her, TCM fan and Grace Kelly aficionado Emily Nesbitt writes, "While many see Grace Kelly as little more than a pretty face, I think she is far more than that. She was supernaturally charismatic, able to draw audience members in with a coolness that shielded a deep, passionate warmth down to her core…her warmth and elegance left a mark with me and others and will continue to do so."
