SPENCER TRACY - October, 2012 SOTM

[JackFavell]

They really can't be compared, it's a totally different role in a different time... it's like comparing apples and grapefruit. I like parts of both for very different reasons, but I suspect you won't have any trouble keeping Freddie as your favorite.

Spence does a great job too, but the way the movies approach Hyde is soooooooooooo different. Hyde's ugliness in Spence's 1941 film is still a part of Jekyll that he constantly buries, whereas March's Hyde is completely unrelated to Jekyll once he's gained his freedom. It makes March's Hyde a far more monstrous character, it's definitely the ID (or is it the ego?) gone wild, turned HUGE, separated completely from the man to run amok, and full of perverse sexual and violent impulses which are acted upon.

Spence's Hyde has all Jekyll's evil qualities brought forward, within the man, if that makes sense. In other words, Jekyll has these evil qualities all mapped out within the character already, before he ever turns into Hyde. It's still the same man, the evil side is still related to the good side, which makes Spence's Jekyll far more torn apart and sadder it seems to me. He can't stop the evil from coming out of him once he releases it, and sees his good actions ruined by it.

Oh I don't think this is making any sense at all. You will see, and make up your own mind. I think the Mamoulian version is stronger, partly due to the direction, partly due to the fact that it's precode, and also because March is younger. Tracy's version surprised me recently, his Hyde does some fantastic leaps and has a lot of energy, I didn't remember that, and I love Ingrid's Ivy, it's no wonder that Jekyll finds her attractive. Tracy's Jekyll is appreciative, which I don't remember March's as being. There is more modern psychology in the later film, but it isn't as frightening, and the earlier is simply a great scare.

[charliechaplinfan]

Tracy said that what Jekyll drank was alcohol, such was his own reaction to alcohol, it makes me think, I've never known anyone to have that reaction but know it's possible. You do make sense, it's very much what Spencer's book said, I'm going to have to watch Spencer's Jekyll just to compare, I'm sure I'll probably still think Fredric March's version the better because of the precode and the youth that fits the character better but I'm sure Spencer's will be good.

[RedRiver]

I, myself, wonder if the author intended the story as an allegory for alcohol abuse. Ingest the substance and become a different person. At the very least, I think it says we all have the potential for both man and monster. Whether it relates specifically to alcohol and drugs, or merely to the human psyche, I'm not sure. The very short novella is a fascinating read. One day and you're done!

[JackFavell]

That makes perfect sense to me, both of you. I was thinking that Tracy must have known this kind of change intimately, and it's what makes his performance so tortured. From what was said in his bio, it really was this kind of massive change, everyone from Loretta Young to anyone else who saw him drink said the same thing. It was like a switch turning, he became a different man when drunk.

One shock for me reading this bio, Alison, was that apparently Warren Hymer was also a mean drunk. I've always loved him in any movie any time he turns up, and it makes me so sad to hear that he had problems with the bottle. He was upset that he couldn't get any really good roles in films and turned to drink as a way to forget his ambitions. I wish he could know there are still film fans who adore him.

[RedRiver]

I knew a lady who said she was neither a mean drunk nor a happy one. "One drink and I'm sound asleep!" That's one way to stay out of trouble.

[charliechaplinfan]

I wish that were me, then I'd know where to turn when in the midst of a sleepless night.

I've just got to the start of the Hepburn romance, I'd love to have more time to devote to the bio but I'm not going badly seeing as it's a whopper of a book. I've never read Dr Jekyll and Mr Hyde, I think it's because I don't expect them to add to the screen version but actually, I should. I can't say I'm coming to a bigger understanding about Spencer's alcoholism, I mean in the way of how compelling was the addiction, he seemed to go for months without touching a drop and it didn't seem to bother him, then a blip would come up in his life and he'd fall off that wagon and once he'd had a taste there was no stop until he couldn't physically take it anymore. I'm more used to reading about the drunk who can't leave it alone but can function from day to day on a couple of bottles of the hard stuff, like Burton, Reed and O'Toole, Tract's battle is more unusual to me. I've a great deal of admiration for him in his battle, I firmly believe it's a disease that needs treatment and not an indulgence.

[charliechaplinfan]

I forgot to mention that I've started watching Boom Town, no chance of seeing the whole thing at weekend but following on from San Francisco I thought a reteaming of Tracy and Gable was a good follow up. The thing that struck me is how Tracy hadn't aged but Clark had, his drinking and hard living perhaps catching up to him at this point. Haven't got to the point where the ladies come into it yet but I like the guys rapport.

[Western Guy]

Yeah, but give it a few years Alison and Tracy's age caught up to him with a vengeance.

Gable became very sad after Carole Lombard died. Mickey Knox, who acted with Clark in ANY NUMBER CAN PLAY, told me that crew members warned him not to joke around with Gable; that he used to be fun and playful but had become sullen and withdrawn. When my buddy Steve Hayes saw Gable just a week or so before his death sitting alone on a soundstage, Steve said Gable was bloated, had bad coloring and his hands shook with almost a palsy. Steve said Gable was still smoking, though had admitted giving up cigarettes for cigars. Better for his health, he said.

Doubtful by that point.

[charliechaplinfan]

Yes, Spence's age did catch up with him, no doubt I'll find out when it was whilst I'm on a voyage through his films along with his biography. I think Boom Town was before Carole died but only just before but years of boozing and smoking hadn't done him any favours, he still had oodles of appeal though. I've got a bit further through Boom Town, now Claudette she didn't seem to age at all. it's so sad about Clark, I'm sure Carole wouldn't have wanted him to mourn but heck, he was lost without her.

[charliechaplinfan]

Darn that son of mine, he's taken my half watched Boom Town out of the DVD player and heaven only knows what he's done with it, only I've looked and looked and couldn't find it. He's at school, so I won't know 'til later. So I moved on to The Seventh Cross, I was on the edge of my seat, Tracy doesn't speak until 30 minutes into it, but it felt like 5 minutes. He and 6 others escape form a concentration camp in 1936 Germamy, in his past life he was a socialist or anti Nazi. He has to make it to Mainz where he can meet up with his girl who has pledged to wait for him, until he gets there he's desperate, he meets a young girl, steals a boys jacket then watches another escapee get caught. Agnes Morhead is a lady who helps him with costumes, a doctor tends his wounds, his friend Paul, played by Hume Cronyn and his wife Jessica Tandy playing his wife in the film, who let Spence stay the night, not knowing, then after finding out let him stay and go all out to help him, so do others. It's terribly touching both in the ones who help him and those who are prepared to turn him in. A voiceover of the first prisoner caught tells us of Spence's feelings, at first he's prepared to kill that little girl to make his getaway, in the course of only a few days, he's cheered by the help, bravery and loyalty of a few. The crosses are a line of trees all cut down and made into crosses for the escaped prisoners to be crucified on once they return to the concentration camp.

[MissGoddess]

oh my goodness, once again i have to disagree about an aging star...Gable looks so good to me in Boom Town that it's one of the few reasons I can enjoy watching it. I especially love the way he looks during the late '30s up to the war years, when he was 'real prime' to quote his character in The Misfits. Same with Gary Cooper. But it's a matter of taste, I don't like youthful looking men with smooth faces at all, never did even when i was a teenager!

As for the movie, I do like specific scenes, especially the lighter hearted ones, but I'm not a huge Colbert fan at this stage of her career and her character weighs things down. Boom Town does have a good message though, in the courtroom scenes when they touch on the need to conserve and not be wasteful with the oil land...very prescient, I thought.

Gable and Hedy in Boom Town.

[Rita Hayworth]

Miss Goddess ... lovely photo of Gable and Lamarr in Boom Town ... I love that movie too. And, thanks for sharing your thoughts as well. I can see where you are coming from and why!

Excellent Write Up ...

[JackFavell]

Alison, I was really caught up by The Seventh Cross, it's the type of film I love, with lots of character roles and very moving cameos especially Hume Cronyn. You never know how someone is going to turn out. I really liked the film a lot, it's odd that it isn't better known.

MissG, I am with you on Gable, I really like him starting in It happened One Night and San Francisco, nothing before really captures me, looks wise, and then moving on up right through The Misfits, he weathers well, i think, except for the movie he made directly after Lombard's death. He just looks so sad and lifeless.

There is something prim about Colbert starting about 1940, she became a sort of Louis B. Mayer stand in for all noble moms or wives and I really wonder how this was accomplished, she's such a dish all the way up through Midnight and Palm Beach Story, then suddenly she seems elegant but with no sex appeal whatsoever. Odd. Greer Garson has the same shove into elegant nobility. There is a real kind of ....what is it?...Catholic? maybe not? separation of women into regimented compartments at the start of the war, at least in MGM films.

[charliechaplinfan]

We've no idea where the Boom Town disc has gone it'll turn up in a few months, just like the TV remote months afterwards we found it, once we'd replaced the one we'd lost and looked everywhere for.

Gable ageing is apparent between the two films but I like Gable full stop. I think it was the comparison of 2 actors in 2 different movies, Gable just looks more lived in. For me the late thirties are his pinnacle in looks but I can go for him in most films.

The Seventh Cross why hadn't I heard about this movie before, it's a gripping movie with great cameos and performances. Spence is so powerful whether he speaks or not. Hume Cronyn takes the film though, hiss character, a little guy but so brave, taking matters into his owns hands even though he knows no contacts or what to do. Jessica Tandy is a great actress, which has been said more than one time on this board, here I think in her first movie. I found myself wanting to know more about all the characters, who were they? What were there motivations? Was it fear or belief in Hitler that made then report on one another. And number 6, giving himself in, that was the low point of hope. Spence's faith in Hume not to break down and he didn't.

[RedRiver]

I was so young when I watched THE MISFITS on TV, I asked my parents why they kept showing close-ups of Marilyn's butt! Uh, well...What I really didn't understand was, the shots are from the viewpoint of one of the male characters. He likes looking at that particular item!