My son, who has been growing out his hair for a long time now, has decided that it's time for a cut. And what kind of cut does he want? 1940s style. This revelation has prompted my book group into a Cary Grant marathon.
I absolutely adore Cary Grant. Born Archie Leach, he ran away from home at age 14 to join a traveling theatre troupe, where he learned Edwardian music hall and acrobatic accents and styles. You can hear his cockney accent in GUNGA DIN, which is often surprising, since most of us associate Grant with a specific mid-western American accent with just a touch of British class.
It's that British class that made Ian Fleming model James Bond on Cary Grant and his comic timing/nerdy sexiness that made Christopher Reeve model Superman on Grant's early roles.
Grant had a tumultuous personal life (his mother was institutionalized, but Grant was not told about it, he had five marriages and many love affairs, and rumors of bi-sexuality haunted him throughout his career), but his decades of great performances are what we remember. Here are my top ten (it was really difficult for me to narrow this down, by the way).
1.ARSENIC AND OLD LACE. Grant apparently thought his performance in this was over the top, but I adore this movie. Each character is a gem, the postmodern moments of self-reflexivity are fun, and the writing is stellar. Raymond Massey, James Gleason, and Peter Lorre are fantastic (Peter Lorre adds the right creepy touch). The aunts are cute—I love watching Abby run across the room to answer the door. Grant plays a theatre critic who, on his wedding day, discovers that his entire family is murderously insane. As he says, "Insanity runs in my family; it practically gallops." The antics as he attempts to get one brother committed (to cover up the murders his aunts have perpetrated) while attempting to escape his other brother's murderous intents are 
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surprisingly funny. The film is set during Halloween (we learn that people used to give out whole carved pumpkins), making it a great fall film, though I watch it all year long.
2.INDISCREET. Grant and I at least agree on the greatness of this film. Grant plays a U.N. specialist in economics and Ingrid Bergman is an actor. When they meet, the attraction is immediate, but Grant's character is separated from his wife. They engage in a passionate love affair, which is threatened when Bergman's character learns a secret: "How dare he make love to me and not be a married man!" The film is biographically interesting in that Bergman was ostracized the American film community for years because she left her husband for director Rosselini. Grant stood by her through the rough years.
3.THE PHILADELPHIA STORY. With Jimmy Stewart and Katharine Hepburn, how could this not be great? Grant plays C.K. Dexter Haven, a recovering alcoholic and non-recovered ex-husband of Tracy Lord (Hepburn). When he comes back into her life when she's about to get remarried to another man, everything is thrown out of whack and newspaperman/struggling writer Jimmy Stewart is there to write it all down. I love this movie, even though it reifies the old money system and allows a father to blame his philandering on his daughter not being affectionate enough. Tracy Lord ends up with many suitors in this movie, but we're all rooting for Cary Grant, admit it.
4.BRINGING UP BABY. This is Cary Grant and Katharine Hepburn again, but their characters are different (as opposed to in HOLIDAY, which is a bit too much like THE PHILADELPHIA STORY to make this list). Grant plays a scientist and Hepburn plays the ditsy but wonderful socialite who falls for him. We can't really blame her for trying to take Grant's character away from his fiancé—that fiancé isn't as dynamic as Hepburn is and she doesn't bring out the physical humor in Grant that Hepburn's character can. This is a wonderful example of "screwball" comedies popular in the 1930s. How screwball? That "baby" is a leopard!
5.MY FAVORITE WIFE. This movie was remade as MOVE OVER, DARLING, but this version is a lot more fun. This is one of many movies Grant made with Irene Dunn. Ever worried that your wife would be lost at sea and you would have to raise your children alone and then declare your wife dead, only to have her come back right when you were about to get remarried? And then find out that your wife was trapped on a desert island with a fine specimen of the opposite sex? Of course you have. Imagine poor Cary Grant's nightmare. (Or, conversely, Dunn's—imagine being faithful to your spouse while trapped on a desert island with a hot guy, only to return to find that your children don't know you and your husband is about to replace you.) One of the best moments in this fine film is when an unfortunate judge has to sort everyone out.
6.HIS GIRL FRIDAY. This movie was originally a play, THE FRONT PAGE, and it was remade as THE FRONT PAGE with Walter Matthau and Jack Lemmon. HIS GIRL FRIDAY's director, Howard Hawkes, decided to make one of the reporters in the film a woman (Rosalind Russell), thus raising the stakes. Thus, Cary Grant's editor character isn't just using a juicy story to keep his ace reporter, he's using a juicy story to keep his ace reporter from leaving to get married. And did I mention the reporter is his ex-wife? In addition to being a great comedy, this film is notable for four things—Russell and Grant ad-libbed a lot of their lines. Cary Grant talks about what happened to a man named Archie Leach, who crossed him. Russell gets to play a woman who will be able to have a career and a man—so long as it's the right man—Cary Grant, which was rare at the time. This is an intriguing look at capital punishment, so thoughtful that it seems almost out of place in this face-paced comedy.
7.I WAS A MALE WAR BRIDE. Most romantic comedies spend all their time getting the two leads together. This gives us the joy of two people who hate each other finding love, but then we have to get them back to America during wartime when one isn't American. Cary Grant is a Frenchman (they make a brief reference to the fact that he's obviously not French, but this time period wasn't about high realism in film) who needs to immigrate as part of the War Brides act—except he's not a war bride, and thus the second half of the movie is about why governments shouldn't be allowed anywhere near marriages.
8.THAT TOUCH OF MINK. Doris Day is hopeless and she falls hopelessly for a very rich Cary Grant. When he proposes to take her around the world, she feels she can't—at least not without a more formal proposal of something else. Their romance falters and she manages, very much without trying, to keep making his life difficult. Her attempt to make him jealous by running off with a very creepy John Astin (of ADDAMS FAMILY fame) almost results in catastrophe.
9.THE AWFUL TRUTH. Another Dunn film and another re-marriage comedy (yes, that's a real term)—as much as people today like to see people get together, people used to enjoy having them rediscover the reasons they got married in the first place. Dunn and Grant file for divorce after they become convinced the other is cheating. That doesn't mean they're going to let each other find happiness with someone else, though. What's the awful truth? That they shouldn't have broken up.
10.THAT TOUCH OF PINK. Technically, this isn't a Cary Grant movie, but Kyle MacLachlan plays the spirit of Cary Grant, who aids a gay man who needs to protect himself – his religious mother is coming into town. All of Grant's lines here come from his films and the recontextualization is amazingly funny.
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| Karma Waltonen |
Dr. Karma is a silly, nerdy know-it-all, but in a good way. She brings all her overeducation to discuss that which truly matters: comedy. As some famous guy once said: “And if I laugh at any mortal thing, ‘tis that I may not weep.” Or something like that.
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