The Actress (1953)

Director:

George Cukor

Writers:

Ruth Gordon (play)
Ruth Gordon (screenplay)

Release Date:

25 September 1953 (USA)

Genre:

Biography | Comedy | Drama

Tagline:

There's hope and heart-ache in the adventures of a stage-struck daughter!

Plot:

Former seaman Clinton Jones now works at a lowly job. His daughter Ruth wants to become an actress....

Plot Keywords:

Seaman | Cat | Aspiring Actress | Father Daughter Relationship | Americana

Awards:

Nominated for Oscar. Another 2 wins & 2 nominations

Cast

Spencer Tracy	...	Clinton Jones
Jean Simmons	...	Ruth Gordon Jones
Teresa Wright	...	Annie Jones
Anthony Perkins	...	Fred Whitmarsh
Ian Wolfe	...	Mr. Bagley
Kay Williams	...	Hazel Dawn
Mary Wickes	...	Emma Glavey
Norma Jean Nilsson	...	Anna Williams
Dawn Bender	...	Katherine Follets
rest of cast listed alphabetically:
Keith Hitchcock	...	Comedian (scenes deleted)
Mitchell Lewis	...	Porter of the theatre (scenes deleted)
Matt Moore	...	Waiter (scenes deleted)
Walter Reed	...	John Craig (scenes deleted)
Erwin Volze	...	Mr. Donough (scenes deleted)

Also Known As:

Years Ago (USA) (working title)

Runtime:

90 min

Country:

USA

Language:

English

Color:

Black and White

Aspect Ratio:

1.37 : 1

Sound Mix:

Mono (Western Electric Sound System)

Certification:

Australia:PG | Finland:S | USA:Approved (PCA #16537) | Australia:G (TV rating)

Company:

Metro-Goldwyn-Mayer (MGM)

Trivia:

During first-run engagements of The Actress (1953), selected movie houses around the country projected the film's opening sequence - a recreation of a production number from the play, "The Pink Lady", in wide screen to emphasize the larger-than-life quality of Ruth Gordon's fascination with the stage.

Goofs:

Revealing mistakes: In a scene late in the film set in the kitchen, the light fixture over the kitchen table is seen (and heard!) to rise up to allow the camera to pass below it.

Quotes:

Annie Jones: Ruth, why don't you give up this going on the stage business and settle down with a nice man?
Ruth Gordon Jones: Oh, mama, don't be disgusting!

Movie Connections:

Featured in The Men Who Made the Movies: George Cukor (1973) (TV)

Spencer Tracy shines in Ruth Gordon's affectionate reminiscence of her father

Ruth Gordon's play Years Ago, a sentimental reminiscence along the lines of Kathryn Forbes' Mama's Bank Account, looked at her stage-struck adolescence. In 1953, it became a movie, The Actress, directed by George Cukor, with the rarefied and mannered Jean Simmons taking the part of the straight-shooting Gordon. Oddly enough, the main character is not the aspiring actress but her father, played by Spencer Tracy.

In Clinton Jones, Gordon penned a difficult but irresistible character. Settled unarguably into middle age but still fighting it, he chafes at his $37.50-a-week salary (it was 1913) and pores over the grocery list while his wife (Teresa Wright) defends such frivolities as tangerines. A former sea captain, he latches onto any opportune ears like the Ancient Mariner and spins his salty yarns of ports of call on the seven seas. In the dead of a New England winter, he insists on sleeping in a hammock strung on an upstairs porch. The ham in Tracy rises to the challenge, and he manages to make Jones recklessly funny while still a bit frightening (near the end, details of his dreadful boyhood emerge to put his cantankerousness in focus).

As screenwriters, Gordon and her husband Garson Kanin custom-tailored many screen vehicles for Tracy and co-star Katharine Hepburn, where their relationship is said to take the writers' marriage as its model; here Tracy returns the favor by making Gordon's father so unforgettable. Gordon pays a tribute, too, by sketching her character not as she remembered it but as he must have seen her, showing little talent or wit but a penchant for dreaming up castles in Spain. By hiding her own bright light under a bushel, she lets the memory of her father shine.