Partners in Crime: Hitchcock & Grant

Celebrating cinema's greatest collaborations


When you think of Alfred Hitchcock in relation to his actors, you're most likely to think of the series of actresses he worked with, women of a certain type who became collectively known as "Hitchcock Blonde." But among his many collaborations, one of the most fruitful was his work with Cary Grant, whom he once described as "the only actor I ever loved in my whole life." Although Grant was already a star by the time he began working with Hitchcock, their work together would bring darker edges to Grant's charming persona, sinister and dangerous qualities which demonstrate that Grant was one of the most versatile actors of his time, though he's rarely given credit for it. Grant and Hitchcock worked together on four occasions, all four of them bona fide classics.

Oscarstravaganza: The Philadelphia Story

* * * 1/2

Winner: Best Adapted Screenplay, 1940
Director: George Cukor
Starring: Katherine Hepburn, Cary Grant, James Stewart

For someone born well after Katherine Hepburn attained her status as a revered screen legend, it's hard to imagine a time when she was considered box office poison. I mean when you consider that she achieved something that very few actresses are able to do - namely that she not only continued to work but continued to be given leading roles past the age of 40 (and won 3 of her 4 Oscars after the age of 60) - it's weird to think that there was a time when no one wanted to hire her. Had it not been for The Philadelphia Story, Hepburn might have been a cinematic footnote rather than a major player.

The film is based on the play by Philip Barry, which he wrote specificially for Hepburn. She plays Tracy Lord, a socialite about to embark on a marriage to the dull but reliable George Kittredge (John Howard). Her plans are thrown off by her ex-husband C.K. Dexter Haven (Cary Grant), who is the polar opposite of George and drives Tracy crazy, and Macaulay "Mike" Connor (James Stewart), a tabloid reporter who falls for her hard despite his best efforts. Watching the story play out, you kind of have to feel bad for George because the plot is centered on a love triangle and despite the fact that he's the protagonist's fiancee, he doesn't even figure into it! Poor George and poor Liz (Ruth Hussey), who is rather unceremoniously awarded Tracy's other castoff as the plot wraps up its loose ends.

At first Tracy and Mike spend a lot of time doing verbal battle, their conflict rooted in class issues. The more time they spend together, however, the more they discover that each has admirable qualities and they start to warm too each other. They warm to each other a little too much for George's comfort, though, and his suspicion that they've become more than friends ultimately puts Tracy in the odd and unenviable position of being nearly at the altar and having to decide whether to marry George, Mike or Dexter. In addition to this plot, there is also a subplot involving Tracy's estranged parents and the family's efforts to keep up appearances so as not to create a scandal in front of reporters.

Tracy is the kind of character that Hepburn excels at playing - a witty, spirited woman with a strong will and a mind of her own. Playing her against Grant, sharp as a tack here and always great with Hepburn, and Stewart, who matches both Hepburn and Grant barb for barb, works exceedingly well and allows the dialogue to come crackling off the screen. It's a very well written screenplay in terms of dialogue and the cast - leading and supporting - are perfect for it. At the same time, however, it's very much a product of its time in terms of its views on gender and women. I always find it kind of odd how when people discuss Hepburn's status as a feminist icon they often cite her film roles as a means of backing that up. Yes, she plays strong, smart women but, more often than not, those same women are set up by their plots in order to be swatted down. The Philadelphia Story is far from the most egregious example of the independent women must be punished mindset, but it doesn't entirely escape the attitude that if Tracy were a more "traditional" woman, everyone would be a lot happier. I mean, her father essentially blames her attitudes for his own philandering and the film ends with her telling Dexter that from now on she'll be easier to get along with, though in fairness to the film Dexter replies: "Be whatever you like, you're my redhead."

All told, The Philadelphia Story was nominated for six Oscars and won two, for Adapted Screenplay and Best Actor for Stewart which, much as I like him in this movie, I have to think that his win was at least in part a way for AMPAS to make up for not rewarding him the previous year for his performance in Mr. Smith Goes To Washington. Perhaps more importantly than the awards hardware it received, the film also relaunched Hepburn as a viable leading lady. How different might the cinematic landscape have been were it not for this film? She's yar, I tell ya. Real yar.

Great Last Scenes: Charade

Year: 1963
Director: Stanley Donen
Great Because...: Well, for one thing you can't go wrong with Cary Grant and Audrey Hepburn - two of the most effortlessly charming actors ever to grace the screen. For another, it contains one of my favourite last lines ever. After discovering (finally) Grant's real identity, Hepburn exclaims: "Oh I love you, Adam, Alex, Peter, Brian, whatever your name is! I love you! I hope we have a lot of boys so we can name them all after you!"

Reggie Lampert is in a whole mess of trouble. Her husband has just turned up dead, several nefarious characters are after her for some money her husband supposedly had, and a tall, dark and handsome man who is not what he seems has recently entered her life. At first this man claims to be Peter Joshua, later Alexander Dyle, Adam Canfield, and finally Brian Crookshank (Regina: "Serves me right if that's the one I'm stuck with"). All Regina knows for sure is that there's a Mrs. Joshua/Dyle/Canfield but they're divorced (but then again, maybe there isn't or maybe they aren't).

In the midst of all the turmoil in her life, there's no one that Reggie can really trust or turn to. Certainly she probably shouldn't trust the man with the ever shifting persona and yet she does, even as she's questioning his motives, even as she's questioning whether or not he's responsible for the dead bodies that have started to pile up. As she peels away layer upon layer of his identity, she's vindicated in the trust she has for him - it's the trust she places in someone else that nearly gets her killed.

If there was ever any doubt before, the final scene lays bare the fact that the plot is really secondary to giving two charismatic actors a chance to play off each other. The question of how it is that the bad guy was able to pose so successfully as a good guy is dismissed with a pretty lame explanation (it basically comes down to an embassy building with such lax security that someone could waltz in and take over an office while everyone else is ouut to lunch) and the film quickly moves on to what is really important: getting Grant and Hepburn together. The scene plays out with romance and humor (love the face Grant makes when Hepburn see him sitting behind the desk), giving two delightful characters an ending they absolutely deserve, with the added bonus that the scene is still able to incorporate the "is there a Mrs.?... but we're divorced" running gag into it. It's the perfect ending for an uncommonly charming thriller.

100 Days, 100 Movies: The Awful Truth (1937)

Director: Leo McCarey
Starring: Cary Grant, Irene Dunne, Ralph Bellamy

The Awful Truth is one of several films which find Cary Grant as a divorced man trying to get back his ex-wife – two other notables being His Girl Friday and The Philadelphia Story - and arguably the best. In Irene Dunne, Grant finds his perfect match, a woman just as classy, just as witty, and just as capable of being silly. Together they create one of the best screen pairings in what is perhaps the best romantic comedy ever made.

Jerry (Grant) and Lucy (Dunne) Warriner are a happily married couple until suspicions of infidelity tear them apart. Lucy finds out that Jerry hasn’t been in Florida like he said he was, and Jerry is suspicious of Lucy’s claims that she and her singing coach, Armand Duvalle (Alexander D’Arcy), had car trouble and had to stop at an inn for a completely platonic evening. Jerry thinks the story unbelievable. “You’ve come back and caught me in the truth, and there’s nothing less logical than the truth,” Lucy replies breezily. They file for divorce, fight over custody of their dog Smith (played by Asta who also appears with Grant in Bringing Up Baby and in all the films of The Thin Man series), and wait for the end of their marriage to be finalized.

While they’re waiting, Lucy meets Dan (Ralph Bellamy), a businessman from Oklahoma with whom she has a quick courtship and becomes engaged. Jerry causes as much trouble in the relationship as he can but by the time it’s broken up, he has moved on to another woman. Now it’s Lucy’s turn to break up his next potential marriage. All this leads to an evening spent in a cabin, an adjoining door that won’t stay shut, and a final admission of love and a reconciliation – “Maybe things could be the same again… only a little different, huh?” Lucy asks. This is all formula, of course; we all know that Jerry and Lucy will be back together by the end – it’s what happens in between that makes this film priceless.

Firstly, you have the contrast between the witty, urbane Grant and the sincere, corn-fed Bellamy. After being run-around by Jerry, Dan probably looks like a catch to Lucy (“How can you be glad to know me?” Jerry asks Dan, “I know how I’d feel if I was sitting with a girl and her husband walked in.” “I’ll bet you do,” Lucy retorts), but ultimately she and Jerry are cut from the same cloth and the relationship with Dan is doomed from the beginning. She likes Dan, to be sure, but there are things about him that give her pause. For instance, a poem he writes for her:

For you, my little prairie flower
I’m thinking of you every hour
It would make my life divine
If you would change your name to mine.

Dan doesn’t make Jerry jealous so much as he amuses him. Jerry knows that Lucy could never be happy in the long term with Dan, living in Oklahoma, and in breaking up the relationship, he sees himself as saving her from herself. Lucy’s Aunt Patsy (Cecil Cunningham) ultimately agrees, even though she’s the one who arranged the meeting between Lucy and Dan. “I feel like I’ve just been given a crash course in women,” Dan tells Lucy after finding Jerry and Armand in her bedroom. “Here’s your diploma,” Patsy replies, handing him a letter Lucy had written to call off the engagement.

The film has a very sharp wit, but it also comes stocked with a great supply of physical comedy. There is a scene where Dan and Lucy run into Jerry and a date at a restaurant. Dan asks Lucy to dance and then engages in the most bizarre, hilarious and surreal interpretation of dancing ever known to man. There is also a scene where Jerry thinks he’s about to find Lucy in a compromising position with Armand and, after first engaging in karate with Armand’s butler, Jerry bursts into the room to find Lucy giving a recital. He sits at the back and falls off his chair, while Lucy attempts to continue singing through her laughter.

What makes this film really work though is the fact that it just looks like the actors had fun making it.In the restaurant scene, Jerry’s date gets up to sing a song which involves a fan underneath the stage blowing up her skirt while she tries to maintain her modesty. Dan, Jerry and Lucy all watch with a mixture of horror, embarrassment and amusement. “I just met her,” Jerry says, turning to Lucy. Later, Lucy will embarrass and amuse Jerry with the same routine when she crashes a dinner party thrown by Jerry’s potential in-laws. The give-and-take of Grant and Dunne’s onscreen partnership is very enjoyable to watch.

There is absolutely nothing about this film that I don’t love, although there is one element that has always given me pause. A great deal is made of the idea that Lucy has been unfaithful with Armand to the extent that Jerry continues trying to catch them together even after he and Lucy have decided to divorce. But no one makes a big deal about Jerry’s whereabouts when he was supposed to be in Florida. Even Lucy seems to have let it go after having found out about it. But I suppose that’s just the nature of the double standard. At any rate, this is a great movie, the perfect movie to watch if you’ve had a bad day, and one that can be watched over and over again without losing an ounce of zing.

100 Days, 100 Movies: Bringing Up Baby (1938)

Director: Howard Hawks
Starring: Cary Grant, Katherine Hepburn

Cary Grant is often accused of only ever playing himself, but Bringing Up Baby proves that old standby wrong. This isn’t the dashing, charming Cary Grant of legend. This is Cary Grant as the straight-man, the punchline, and, for lack of a better word, the dork. He’s very different in this film that is possibly the screwballiest of all screwball comedies. Throw in Katherine Hepburn as the zany leading lady, a wonderful supporting cast of character actors, and the tight, well-timed direction of Howard Hawks, and you’ve got yourself a bona fide classic.

Grant is David Huxley, a paleontologist who has spent the last four years building a brontosaurus and is engaged to his colleague, Miss Swallow (Virginia Walker). The film opens at an important juncture in his life: he’s getting married the following day, the final bone of the brontosaurus has just been uncovered and delivered, and that afternoon he has to make a presentation to Mr. Peabody (George Irving), an attorney whom David hopes will convince his client to donate a million dollars to the museum. The meeting takes place at a golf course where David is quickly hijacked by care-free heiress Susan Vance (Hepburn), who doesn’t much care if she finishes her game with his ball and then drives off in his car instead of her own.

David and Susan meet again later that evening and chaos once again ensues, eventually resulting in both their outfits being ripped and the two having to make a hasty retreat together. Susan finds out that David has been trying to talk to Peabody, whom Susan knows and affectionately refers to as “Boopie.” Against his better judgment, David agrees to go with Susan to see Boopie, which ends badly when Susan accidentally knocks Boupie out as she tries to hit his window with a rock. David is determined to have nothing more to do with Susan, but she now has a problem. You see, she’s come into possession of this leopard named Baby…

The plot of Bringing Up Baby is very silly, but the tone of the film completely supports that so that as an audience, you just go with it. Grant and Hepburn, who had starred together previously in Sylvia Scarlett, and would star together again in Holiday and The Philadelphia Story, have an easy chemistry together and make it look like they had a lot of fun making the film. So, too, do the supporting players who go all out in their creation of finely tuned comic characters, each memorable in his or her own way. It is, essentially, an ensemble effort, though Hepburn and Grant are clearly the stars.

It’s difficult to choose the film’s funniest moment. There’s David and Susan – who have Susan’s dog with them - trying to sing Baby down off of a roof, resulting in kind of a quartet when Baby and the dog join in; the dinner party scene in which Susan’s aunt, Elizabeth Random (May Robson) and her guest Maj. Applegate (Charles Ruggles) become increasingly disturbed by the way David – whom, thanks to Susan, they think is Mr. Bone, a big game hunter – keeps getting up from the table to follow the dog outside (earlier in the day the dog had taken the brontosaurus bone and buried it somewhere in the yard); the scenes of David and Susan out hunting for Baby, who has gone missing and whom they mistakenly believe to have been captured by the circus, who have a leopard of their own (this might be the only film to take the trope of mistaken identity and apply it to leopards) that Susan releases. Forced to choose, I would have to go with the scene where David and Susan are in jail and Susan plays at being a gangster in order to trick the local Sheriff and make her escape. Hepburn isn’t an actor you would naturally associate with comedy, at least not of the zany, madcap kind, but she really does excel in this film, knowing when to play it up and when to pull back (when asked by her aunt what “Mr. Bone” hunts, she replies in a hilariously understated way, “Animals I should think”). It’s a shame that Bringing Up Baby was such a commercial disaster when it was released, because otherwise we might have gotten to see this side of Hepburn on more occasions.

Bringing Up Baby doesn’t offer any deep insights into the human condition, and it’s basic plot won’t surprise you (stodgy intellectual meets wildchild who turns his life upside down but turns out to be perfect for him), but it will entertain you. Just sit back, relax, and let it take you on the hilarious journey from Point A (the brontosaurus is almost complete) to Point B (the brontosaurus has completely collapsed). You won’t regret it.

100 Days, 100 Movies: His Girl Friday (1940)

Director: Howard Hawks
Starring: Cary Grant, Rosalind Russell

If I had to describe this film in one word, it would be fast. It runs at a clip that is difficult to imagine; you have to see it (and hear it) to believe it. This Howard Hawks classic is more proof that Cary Grant can work with anyone, and provides the fabulous Rosalind Russell with the kind of smart, dizzy character she can play like no other. So hold on to your hat, because this one’s a rollercoaster.

His Girl Friday takes place over the course of about half a day and begins with Russell as Hildy Johnson, a newspaper reporter and recent divorcée. She returns to New York with some news for her Editor and ex-husband, Walter Burns (Grant): she’s getting married and she’s quitting the paper. Walter is distraught, not only because Hildy has found someone else but because he’s losing his best reporter. The only thing to do, obviously, is sabotage her relationship and convince her that she can’t give up the paper… or Walter, for that matter. The first scene between Hildy and Walter sets the tone for the rest of the film, with the two engaging in some barbed, fast-talking sparring. Russell and Grant don’t have the best romantic chemistry (although it’s passable), but they have a comedic chemistry that’s hard to beat.

In the role Bruce Baldwin, the other man, Hawks cast Ralph Bellamy who was no stranger to playing the nice guy who loses the girl to Grant’s caddish charmer, having starred opposite Grant and Irene Dunne in The Awful Truth in 1937. The staid and straight-forward Bellamy is a good foil to the zany antics of Grant and Russell, and does more than just set the pins up for the two stars to knock down. His simple, sincere delivery of lines like “Mighty nice little town, Albany. They’ve got the state capitol there, you know” ensures that he gets his share of the laughs as well.

If nothing else, His Girl Friday is a testament to the talent of character actors from Hollywood’s Golden Age, and of the ability of old Hollywood to use them correctly. Grant and Russell are the main attractions, of course, but some of the best scenes are ones that neither appears in. There are numerous scenes in the press room at the court house where a gang of reporters hang out playing cards and speculating about a trial they’re all covering, one which Walter used to get Hildy back in the game: Earl Williams (John Qualan) has killed a police officer and has been sentenced to be hanged, but may be reprieved depending on the decision of a psychiatrist, and on Governor, who has been using the case as a political ploy in the upcoming election. The reporters aren’t a just a “group,” but are individual characters whom we come to distinguish from one another according to their differing reporting styles. Through them, the film casts a cynical eye on the way news is made and reported – specifically how it’s filtered to the public depending on the source (Walter is also used to express this same cynicism, as when he calls his Copy Editor to implore “Never mind the Chinese earthquake for heaven's sake...Look, I don't care if there's a million dead...No, no, junk the Polish Corridor...Take all those Miss America pictures off Page Six...Take Hitler and stick him on the funny page...No, no, leave the rooster story alone - that's human interest”).

But the film also makes great use of Clarence Kobb as the Mayor, Gene Lockhart as Sheriff Peter B. (“‘B’ for brains”) Hartwell, Abner Biberman as Walter’s henchman Louie (who at Walter’s behest manages to get Bruce arrested on three separate occasions and kidnap his mother), and, in a small but memorable role, Billy Gilbert as Joe Pettibone, whom the Mayor and the Sheriff make the mistake of attempting to bribe. All of these actors add something indelible to the film as a whole. Thinking over the film afterwards, it’s amazing to realize how much of it Grant and Russell aren’t in and how you hardly notice because you’re being so thoroughly entertained even in their absence.

It will come as no surprise that Walter and Hildy end up back together at the end, both as colleagues and as a couple, but that’s okay. It’s also okay that there hasn’t actually been any growth in their relationship that would suggest that it would work the second time around (they spent their first honeymoon in a coal mine, covering a story; as the film ends they’ll be spending their second honeymoon covering a strike in Albany). Like I said, their chemistry is more of the buddy variety than the romantic one. What matters is what happens between start and finish, and given that it’s running time is only 92 minutes, a whole lot happens in this tightly wound and fast-moving comedic masterpiece.

100 Days, 100 Movies: North By Northwest (1959)

Director: Alfred Hitchcock
Starring: Cary Grant, Eva Marie Saint

It’s one of the most iconic images in film: Cary Grant running for his life as a crop duster bears down on him. But seeing this scene is only one of the many reasons to see this wonderful, thrilling film. Like many Hitchcock movies, it is pure escapism at first glance and something deeper and darker on subsequent viewings. It’s a story lodged deep inside the paranoid Cold War era where there's governmental conspiracy around every corner and identity is nothing if not unstable.

Cary Grant is Roger O. Thornhill (the “O” stands for nothing, he says). A case of mistaken identity begins a chase which has him running for his life from both the police and the agents of a mysterious organization. The police are looking for Thornhill, the organization, led by Phillip Vandamm (George Mason), is looking for George Kaplan, a government agent whom they believe Thornhill to be. What no one knows is that there is no George Kaplan. He’s a figure made-up by the American government in an effort to trap Vandamm. This fact doesn’t save Thornhill, however, as the government is willing to let him meet his inevitable end at the hands of Vandamm in order to protect their operation and their real agent. It isn’t until they realize that Thornhill isn’t going to die easily that they decide to step in and help him and, doing so, reveal that Eve Kendall (Eva Marie Saint), Vandamm’s girlfriend who appears at alternate points to be with and against Thornhill, is a double agent. No one is who they appear to be, or who people think they are, in this film and the story centers largely on the idea of identity as performance. The person who is best at playing his or herself will ultimately emerge victorious. “The only performance that will satisfy you is when I play dead,” Thornhill declares early in the film, foreshadowing a scene towards the end when Thornhill/Kaplan does act out a death scene for Vandamm’s benefit.

There’s a lot to love about this movie, not least of which is Cary Grant. Often accused of simply playing himself, he is on closer inspection one of the most versatile and underrated actors ever to grace the screen. Few other actors are so at home in comedy – where he played both the straight man and the funny man – and drama, and few actors can so effectively mix the two in one role. There’s a lot of drama attached to this role, but some wonderful comedy, as well. Watch the auction house scene as Thornhill makes a fool of himself to cause a distraction which will allow him to escape. In the hands of another actor, this scene might seem out of place, a misstep in an otherwise finely etched film; but in the hands of Cary Grant, it works.

North By Northwest is a showcase for many of Hitchcock’s favourite tricks. You have the MacGuffin, in this case microfilm that everyone wants for reasons that aren’t exactly clear and don’t really matter. You’ve got the “wrong man” trope that plays in many of Hitchcock’s films, the latent sexual undertones (here supplied by Vandamm and his henchman Leonard, played by Martin Landau) and sexual suggestiveness (the film’s final shot must be commended for hilarious lack of subtlety). You’ve also got suspense in the way that only Hitchcock could do it. Take the crop duster scene, for example. Laying aside the fact that most people wouldn’t think to have their hero terrorized by a crop duster, look at the way it’s set up. Thornhill isn’t immediately attacked by the duster; the build-up is slow. He gets off a bus in the middle of nowhere. Across the road is another man, perhaps the man he’s meant to meet. In the background, the crop duster is flying over the fields. Thornhill approaches the other man and finds out that he’s not the person he’s supposed to meet. The man remarks that it’s funny that the duster is out, seeing as there are no crops to dust, and then gets on his bus. The bus leaves and the duster begins to change its course, heading now towards Thornhill. The rest is history. If for no other reason, Hitchcock was a masterful director because he was so patient. He didn’t just throw things at you; he put as much effort into the set-up as the pay-off, which of course only makes the pay-off even sweeter.

North By Northwest isn’t the best film that Alfred Hitchcock ever made (for me that honour goes to Rear Window, though compelling arguments can and have been made for Vertigo, Psycho, Notorious… as a matter of fact, you could probably compile a Top 10 list of Hitchcock’s films without including North By Northwest and still end up with a list that’s hard to argue with), but it’s one of his most entertaining. You can’t go wrong with this film; it’s got a little bit of everything, and all of it done to perfection.