Morning Glory (Sherman, 1933)
My Winter Movies # 7
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Director Lowell Sherman understood actors; he had been a leading theater and film actor himself before turning to directing in the early 1930s. (One of his best performances was as the alcoholic director in 1932’s What Price Hollywood?, his final film as an actor.) Sherman rehearsed Morning Glory like a play, and shot it in continuity in 18 days, skillfully developing the actors’ characterizations. It paid off; not only was Hepburn’s performance superb, the rest of the cast was excellent also, particularly Smith as Eva’s elderly mentor, and Fairbanks, giving a complex portrayal of the playwright, attracted to Eva but wary of her ambition, and ambitious for his own career. Fairbanks evidently had similar mixed emotions about Hepburn. He tried to date her, but she wasn’t interested. In fact, she was secretly involved with Leland Hayward, although both were married to others at the time. Finally, Hepburn agreed to go out with Fairbanks, but she cut the date short, complaining of a headache. When he took her home, Fairbanks watched as she went inside, then immediately came out again, getting into a car with Hayward.
Morning Glory’s star-is-born plot was serviceable but hackneyed, and some of the dialogue was overripe, but Hepburn was irresistible, and the film was a big success. Critics heaped praise on Hepburn’s performance. «Miss Hepburn is supremely good, vivid, forthright, zestful, and capable beyond praise,» wrote William Boehnel in the New York World-Telegram. Regina Crewe of the New York American was one of several who noted Hepburn’s development as an actress: «More an actress, less a ‘personality,’ Katharine Hepburn gives reason for rejoicing among the faithful, and cause for defection from the ranks of the skeptics, with a sure, skillful, sound performance.» And some, like the London Times critic, found her better than the material: «Miss Hepburn admirably mingles intellectual austerity with physical gaucherie… her grip never falters, but those who most admire the perfection of her technique must have wished she could, for a few minutes, be free of the depressing limitation of a second-rate story.» Forty years later, Hepburn evaluated her own performance: «I should have stopped then. I haven’t grown since.» (More here.)
