The Philadelphia Story ***** (1940, Katharine Hepburn, Cary Grant, James Stewart) – Classic Film Review 1,228

Director George Cukor’s 1940 ultra-smart romantic comedy film The Philadelphia Story is one of Hollywood’s most glorious, with three of its all-time great stars at their most effortless, alluring, dazzling best. The movie represents the peak of Forties Hollywood wit, style and sophistication, as well as being richly entertaining and funny.

Katharine Hepburn stars as rich American socialite Tracy Lord, who is about to get married to stuffy George Kittredge (John Howard). But her wedding turns into a comedy nightmare when the bride’s ex-husband C K Dexter Haven (Cary Grant) turns up unexpectedly to put a spanner in the works. He’ll do anything to stop the wedding and get her back.

But, brilliant though Hepburn and Grant are, it was James Stewart who won the Best Actor Oscar as amiably pushy tabloid magazine journalist Macaulay Connor, who turns up at the same time as Dexter Haven and falls for Tracy.

The comedy timing of the three stars is just exquisite and the performances of the whole lovely cast are perfection, relishing the elegant wit in the screenplay. Ruth Hussey (Oscar nominated for Best Supporting Actress as Elizabeth Imbrie), Roland Young, John Halliday, Mary Nash, Virginia Weidler, Henry Daniell and Hillary Brooke co-star delightfully.

The film was nominated for six Academy Awards, winning two. Screenwriter Donald Ogden Stewart took the film’s second Oscar, basing his screenplay on Philip Barry’s renowned Broadway hit. Hepburn repeats her starring stage Broadway role in the play, in a part that was totally tailored to her special talents, while Grant cuts a splendidly sardonic figure as the ex-husband. Stewart is excellent. He is flawlessly smooth, but honestly he’s no better than the two leads, so the Oscar is a bit unfair.

The film was Hepburn’s first big hit after several flops, which led to her being included on Manhattan cinema owner Harry Brandt’s 1938 list of actors he called box office poison. She acquired the film rights to the play with the help of producer Howard Hughes to control it as a vehicle for her movie comeback.

Hepburn wanted Clark Gable for the Dexter Haven role and Spencer Tracy as Macaulay Connor, but both had other commitments. Grant agreed to appear with top billing and a salary of $137,000, which he donated to the British War Relief Society.

It was reworked, very attractively, as the musical High Society in 1956, starring Bing Crosby, Grace Kelly, Frank Sinatra and Louis Armstrong.

© Derek Winnert 2014 Classic Film Review 1,228

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