Katharine Hepburn and Cary Grant
As with the most extraordinary events of nature, seeing Cary Grant and Katharine Hepburn working together on the big screen is a once-in-a-lifetime, brilliant event. A shooting star who passed before the eyes of Hollywood on only four occasions, but who left an indelible mark on the history of classic cinema. The key to her success lay in that magnetism of opposites: he an affable lover, she an indomitable beast. Together an irresistible, beautiful and talented couple.
Their film association began in 1935 with the filming of Silvia's Great Adventure. Cary Grant had already worked on twenty-two film titles and had a respectable position in Hollywood, while Katharine Hepburn, who had made her feature film debut the same year as Grant, already had her hands on the first of four Oscars she would receive in his career for his performance in Morning Glory (1933). However, neither of them then had the popularity that they would reap after working together.
Why only four movies together?
It was not due to confrontations, or enmity, on the contrary. The good relationship between Hepburn and Grant was well known in Hollywood. However, personal circumstances and the progress of their respective careers led them down different paths.
On the one hand, Grant became Hitchcock's fetish actor for years and here Hepburn did not fit too much into one of those cold blondes that the director liked so much. Nor should we forget that while Grant became the successful leading man par excellence, Hepburn came to be called "the poison of the box office", an unfair title that came to him after the failure of several films starring the actress and that did not It was revoked until The Philadelphia Stories (1940), the last film he would shoot with Grant and with which he once again won the affection of the public.
Years later, the appearance of the director and actor Spencer Tracy in his life and his career eclipsed everything else, becoming an eternal pairing. All in all, despite Cary Grant and Katharine Hepburn's partnership being short-lived, the four movies they appeared in together rank among the most memorable for the two stars. Four essential titles that we review below.
Silvia's Great Adventure (1935)
A trio of small-time hustlers, consisting of Henry Scarlett (Edmund Gwenn), his cross-dressing daughter Sylvia (Katharine Hepburn), and a sprightly rogue named Jimmy Monkley (Cary Grant) decide to form a vaudeville group to forget about their scams.
The film did not offer significant financial benefits to its creators, but it was key for Cary Grant, since it definitely shaped his next star distinction, marked by cynicism, affability, elegance and gallantry. The film is very funny and entertaining, with stupendous and intelligent dialogues, lively action, excellent recreation of a fascinating atmosphere of various shades (sadness, comedy, romanticism) and first-class performances, with very well-developed characters, who participate with more or less incidence in the substance of a brilliant film. A little masterpiece.
Live to Enjoy (1938)
Johnny (Cary Grant), a fun-loving young entrepreneur, meets Julia (Doris Nolan) on a snowy vacation. In a short time they fall in love and decide to set the date of the wedding. The problem is that he doesn't know his family, a wealthy New York dynasty made up of his strict father (Henry Kolker) and his two brothers, the idealistic Linda (Katharine Hepburn) and the fearful Ned (Lew Ayres), who will search for different ways a means of escape to escape from its conservative and strict gilded cage.
Magnificent and elegant film by George Cukor, in which the hypocrisy and the cult of appearance and wealth on the part of American high society are avidly criticized, while different personalities are confronted who, in an almost existential tone, diatribe about the essence basic of life.
The beast of my girl (1938)
The clumsy and responsible paleontologist Dr. David Huxley (Cary Grant) is dragged, on the eve of his wedding, by the impetuous irresponsibility and whim of a wealthy heiress (Katharine Hepburn) to move a leopard, named "Baby", to the mansion of his wealthy aunt (May Robson).
My Girl's Beast is a masterpiece, which can be seen in Classic Film Days, directed by the great Howard Hawks, one of the best comedies in film history and the main sample of the so-called "screwball comedy" or crazy comedy that flourished in the 1930s. The construction of memorable gags, the comical wrapping of irresistibly hilarious secondary characters, complementing the unbeatable work of its two stars, the delirium inherent in the plot that traps the viewer in its madness.
Philadelphia Stories (1940)
Tracy Lord (Katharine Hepburn), a young woman from Philadelphia's high society, divorced from C.K. Dexter Haven (Cary Grant), is going to marry George Kittridge (John Howard). Days before the wedding, Dexter will appear, with the intention of avoiding the ceremony, and a couple of journalists, Macauley Connor (James Stewart) and Elizabeth Imbrie (Ruth Hussey), who will cover the information on the link.
Three of the best actors in cinema in a splendid romantic comedy with a sophisticated atmosphere, supported by the superb performances of the leading trio (with an Oscar for James Stewart) and the calm and elegant line of George Cukor, who does not avoid some moments of screwball comedy.
