TCM Schedule for Friday, February 23, 2018 -- 31 Days of Oscar: Best Actress Winners

[Staph]

Today's Oscar category is Best Actress, Part Two. And TCM is showing a surprisingly recent film, Dead Man Walking (1995). I know that most of DU despises Susan Sarandon for her political idiocy, but she is powerful in this particular role. Enjoy!



6:45 AM -- CAGED (1950)
A young innocent fights to survive the harsh life in a women's prison.
Dir: John Cromwell
Cast: Eleanor Parker, Agnes Moorehead, Ellen Corby
BW-97 mins, CC,

Nominated for an Oscar for Best Actress in a Leading Role -- Eleanor Parker, Best Actress in a Supporting Role -- Hope Emerson, and Best Writing, Story and Screenplay -- Virginia Kellogg and Bernard C. Schoenfeld

In order to do research for her book, former L.A. Times reporter and screenwriter (under contract at Warner's) Virginia Kellogg pulled some strings to incarcerate herself in a woman's prison. She then wrote a book about it, "Women without Men," which was a kind of almanac of everything she witnessed while in prison. Warner Bros. then had her write the screenplay, which was nominated for an Oscar.


8:45 AM -- SOME CAME RUNNING (1958)
A veteran returns home to deal with family secrets and small-town scandals.
Dir: Vincente Minnelli
Cast: Frank Sinatra, Dean Martin, Shirley MacLaine
C-136 mins, CC, Letterbox Format

Nominated for Oscars for Best Actress in a Leading Role -- Shirley MacLaine, Best Actor in a Supporting Role -- Arthur Kennedy, Best Actress in a Supporting Role -- Martha Hyer, Best Costume Design, Black-and-White or Color -- Walter Plunkett, and Best Music, Original Song -- Jimmy Van Heusen (music) and Sammy Cahn (lyrics) for the song "To Love and Be Loved"

It was during the making of this film that Shirley MacLaine found herself welcomed into what would later be called the "Rat Pack" fraternity that included Frank Sinatra and Dean Martin, her co-stars in this film. MacLaine says the group known as the "Rat Pack" was actually called "The Clan" by the members while "Rat Pack" was a term given in the 1950s to Humphrey Bogart and his pals.


11:15 AM -- TWO WOMEN (1961)
A widow tries to get her daughter to safety in World War II Italy.
Dir: Vittorio De Sica
Cast: Sophia Loren, Jean-Paul Belmondo, Eleonora Brown
BW-96 mins, Letterbox Format

Won an Oscar for Best Actress in a Leading Role -- Sophia Loren (Sophia Loren is the first actor to win an Academy Award for a foreign language film. Sophia Loren was not present at the awards ceremony. Greer Garson accepted the award on her behalf.)

It has been said that Anna Magnani was originally cast in the role of Cesira, but when she was unable commit to the film due to illness, it was Magnani herself who suggested Sophia Loren for the role, suggesting to director Vittorio De Sica that if Loren (who was 25 years old at the time) would not mind playing a mother with an adolescent daughter, then the role should go to her.


1:15 PM -- A STREETCAR NAMED DESIRE (1951)
A fading southern belle tries to build a new life with her sister in New Orleans.
Dir: Elia Kazan
Cast: Vivien Leigh, Marlon Brando, Kim Hunter
BW-125 mins, CC,

Won Oscars for Best Actress in a Leading Role -- Vivien Leigh (Vivien Leigh was not present at the awards ceremony. Greer Garson accepted on her behalf.), Best Actor in a Supporting Role -- Karl Malden, Best Actress in a Supporting Role -- Kim Hunter (Kim Hunter was not present at the awards ceremony. Bette Davis accepted on her behalf.), and Best Art Direction-Set Decoration, Black-and-White -- Richard Day and George James Hopkins

Nominated for Oscars for Best Actor in a Leading Role -- Marlon Brando, Best Director -- Elia Kazan, Best Writing, Screenplay -- Tennessee Williams, Best Cinematography, Black-and-White -- Harry Stradling Sr., Best Costume Design, Black-and-White -- Lucinda Ballard, Best Sound, Recording -- Nathan Levinson (Warner Bros.), Best Music, Scoring of a Dramatic or Comedy Picture -- Alex North, and Best Picture

Mickey Kuhn, who plays the young sailor who helps Vivien Leigh onto the streetcar at the beginning of the film, had previously appeared with Leigh in Gone with the Wind (1939) as Beau Wilkes (the child of Olivia de Havilland's character Melanie), toward the end of that film when the character was age 5. When Mickey Kuhn mentioned this to someone else on the set of "A Streetcar Named Desire," word got back to Leigh and she called him into her dressing room for a half-hour chat. In an interview in his seventies, Kuhn stated that Leigh was extremely kind to him and was "one of the loveliest ladies he had ever met."


3:45 PM -- I WANT TO LIVE! (1958)
True story of the small-time lady crook who fought to escape the gas chamber.
Dir: Robert Wise
Cast: Susan Hayward, Simon Oakland, Virginia Vincent
BW-121 mins, CC, Letterbox Format

Won an Oscar for Best Actress in a Leading Role -- Susan Hayward

Nominated for Oscars for Best Director -- Robert Wise, Best Writing, Screenplay Based on Material from Another Medium -- Nelson Gidding and Don Mankiewicz, Best Cinematography, Black-and-White -- Lionel Lindon, Best Sound -- Gordon Sawyer (Samuel Goldwyn SSD), and Best Film Editing -- William Hornbeck

Even though she portrayed Barbara Graham as a tragic victim of circumstance, Susan Hayward later admitted that after doing some extensive research on the real Graham, she was most likely guilty of the murder of Mabel Monohan.


6:00 PM -- BUTTERFIELD 8 (1960)
A party girl ruins her life when she falls for a married man.
Dir: Daniel Mann
Cast: Elizabeth Taylor, Laurence Harvey, Eddie Fisher
C-108 mins, CC, Letterbox Format

Won an Oscar for Best Actress in a Leading Role -- Elizabeth Taylor '

Nominated for Oscars for Best Cinematography, Color -- Joseph Ruttenberg and Charles Harten

Elizabeth Taylor and her husband, Mike Todd, had planned for Cat on a Hot Tin Roof (1958) to be her final film, as she intended to retire from the screen. Todd had made a verbal agreement about this with MGM, but after his death, MGM forced Taylor to make this film in order to fulfill the terms of her studio contract. As a result, Taylor refused to speak to the director for the entire production, and hated the film.



TCM PRIMETIME - WHAT'S ON TONIGHT: 31 DAYS OF OSCAR: BEST ACTRESS WINNERS



8:00 PM -- SUSPICION (1941)
A wealthy wallflower suspects her penniless playboy husband of murder.
Dir: Alfred Hitchcock
Cast: Cary Grant, Joan Fontaine, Sir Cedric Hardwicke
BW-99 mins, CC,

Won an Oscar for Best Actress in a Leading Role -- Joan Fontaine

Nominated for Oscars for Best Music, Scoring of a Dramatic Picture -- Franz Waxman, and Best Picture

Joan Fontaine liked the character of Lina in Suspicion (1941) so much that she sent Alfred Hitchcock a note after she read the novel, "Before the Fact", by Francis Iles, offering to play the part for free, if necessary.


10:00 PM -- JOHNNY BELINDA (1948)
A small-town doctor helps a deaf-mute farm girl learn to communicate.
Dir: Jean Negulesco
Cast: Jane Wyman, Lew Ayres, Charles Bickford
BW-102 mins, CC,

Won an Oscar for Best Actress in a Leading Role -- Jane Wyman

Nominated for Oscars for Best Actor in a Leading Role -- Lew Ayres, Best Actor in a Supporting Role -- Charles Bickford, Best Actress in a Supporting Role -- Agnes Moorehead, Best Director -- Jean Negulesco, Best Writing, Screenplay -- Irma von Cube and Allen Vincent, Best Cinematography, Black-and-White -- Ted D. McCord, Best Art Direction-Set Decoration, Black-and-White -- Robert M. Haas and William Wallace, Best Film Editing -- David Weisbart, Best Music, Scoring of a Dramatic or Comedy Picture -- Max Steiner, Best Sound, Recording -- Nathan Levinson, and Best Picture

Jane Wyman became the first person, actor or actress since the silent era to win an Oscar without uttering a word, after sound was created, just before The Jazz Singer (1927) was filmed & released, 21 years earlier, in 1927.


12:00 AM -- DEAD MAN WALKING (1995)
A nun offers spiritual counsel to a death-row in-mate.
Dir: Tim Robbins
Cast: Susan Sarandon, Sean Penn, Robert Prosky
C-122 mins, CC,

Won an Oscar for Best Actress in a Leading Role -- Susan Sarandon

Nominated for Oscars for Best Actor in a Leading Role -- Sean Penn, Best Director -- Tim Robbins, Best Music, Original Song -- Bruce Springsteen for the song "Dead Man Walking"

After being told that she would be played in the film by "a famous actress from Thelma & Louise (1991)", Sister Helen Prejean was introduced to Susan Sarandon and said "Thank God, she's Louise."


2:15 AM -- KLUTE (1971)
A small-town detective searches for a missing man linked to a high-priced prostitute.
Dir: Alan J. Pakula
Cast: Jane Fonda, Donald Sutherland, Charles Cioffi
C-114 mins, CC, Letterbox Format

Won an Oscar for Best Actress in a Leading Role -- Jane Fonda

Nominated for an Oscar for Best Writing, Story and Screenplay Based on Factual Material or Material Not Previously Published or Produced -- Andy Lewis and David E. Lewis

Bree's apartment was built on a sound stage at a New York film studio where Jane Fonda could spend the night. The director even had a working toilet installed in the bathroom of the set. Jane contributed to decorating the apartment by deciding Bree would be a romance reader and have a cat. Jane remembered an actress from Lee Strasberg's private class that occasionally serviced John F. Kennedy, so she decided Bree had done this as well. A signed photo of Kennedy appears on the fridge in Bree's apartment.


4:30 AM -- WOMEN IN LOVE (1969)
In the twenties, two free-thinking sisters try to balance sexual passion with independence.
Dir: Ken Russell
Cast: Alan Bates, Oliver Reed, Glenda Jackson
C-131 mins, CC, Letterbox Format

Won an Oscar for Best Actress in a Leading Role -- Glenda Jackson (Glenda Jackson was not present at the awards ceremony. Juliet Mills accepted the award on her behalf.)

Nominated for Oscars for Best Director -- Ken Russell, Best Writing, Screenplay Based on Material from Another Medium -- Larry Kramer, and Best Cinematography -- Billy Williams

Glenda Jackson was pregnant throughout the shoot. In referring to her nude scenes, she said she'd never had such a "wonderful bosom."