Gloria Grahame

Gloria Penelope Hallward was born in Los Angeles, the younger child of Michael and Jean Hallward.^[6] She was raised a Methodist.^[2] Her English father, Reginald Michael Bloxam Hallward (later known as Michael Hallward) was an architect and author; her Scottish mother, Jean McDougall, who used the stage name Jean Grahame, was a Scottish stage actress and acting teacher.^[7] The couple had an elder daughter, Joy Hallward (born December 31, 1911, Victoria, British Columbia, Canada – died February 23, 2003, Granada Hills, California), an actress who married John Mitchum (younger brother of actor Robert Mitchum). During Gloria's childhood and adolescence, her mother taught her acting. Grahame attended Hollywood High School before dropping out to pursue acting.^[3]

 

An early stage appearance was in the long-running farce Good Night, Ladies at Chicago's Blackstone Theatre, starring Buddy Ebsen, which opened on April 12, 1942.^[8]

Grahame made her Broadway debut on December 6, 1943 at the Royale Theatre as Florrie in Nunnally Johnson's The World's Full of Girls, which was adapted from Thomas Bell's 1943 novel Till I Come Back to You.^[9] She was signed to a contract with MGM Studios under her professional name after Louis B. Mayer saw her performance.^{[citation needed]} Another Broadway role was in April-May 1944's Highland Fling.^[10] She made her film debut in Blonde Fever (1944) and then achieved one of her most widely praised roles as the vixenish Violet Bick, saved from disgrace by George Bailey in It's a Wonderful Life (1946). MGM felt unable to develop her potential as a star, and her contract was sold to RKO Studios in 1947.^[5]

 

Grahame was often featured in film noir pictures as a tarnished beauty with an irresistible sexual allure. During this time, she made films for several Hollywood studios. She received an Oscar nomination for Best Supporting Actress for Crossfire (1947).^[11]

Grahame starred with Humphrey Bogart in the film In a Lonely Place (1950) for Columbia Pictures, a performance for which she gained praise. Though today it is considered among her finest performances, it was not a box-office hit, and Howard Hughes, owner of RKO, admitted that he never saw it. When she asked to be lent out for roles in Born Yesterday (also 1950) and A Place in the Sun (1951), Hughes refused and instead made her perform a supporting role in Macao (1952).^[12]

 

Despite appearing for only a little over nine minutes on screen, she won the Academy Award for Best Supporting Actress in MGM's The Bad and the Beautiful (also 1952);^[13][14] she long held the record for the shortest performance on screen to win an acting Oscar until Beatrice Straight won for Network (1976) with a five-minute performance.^[12]

Grahame's other memorable roles included the scheming Irene Neves in Sudden Fear (also 1952); mob moll Debby Marsh in Fritz Lang's The Big Heat (1953) in which, in a horrifying off-screen scene, she is scarred by hot coffee thrown in her face by Lee Marvin's character; and the femme fatale Vicki Buckley in Fritz Lang's Human Desire (1954). Grahame appeared as wealthy seductress Harriet Lang in Stanley Kramer's Not as a Stranger (1955) starring Olivia de Havilland, Robert Mitchum, and Frank Sinatra. Grahame also did her own stunts as Angel the Elephant Girl in Cecil B. DeMille's The Greatest Show on Earth, which won the Oscar for best film of 1952.^[15]

Grahame's career began to wane after her performance in the musical film Oklahoma! (1955). She, whom audiences were used to seeing as a film noir siren, was viewed by some critics to be miscast as an ignorant country lass in a wholesome musical, and the paralysis of her upper lip from plastic surgery altered her speech and appearance. Additionally, she was rumored to have been difficult on the set of Oklahoma!, upstaging some of the cast and alienating her co-stars.^[16]

Grahame also guest-starred in television series, including the science-fiction series The Outer Limits. In the 1964 episode of that series titled "The Guests", Grahame plays a forgotten film star living in the past. She also appears in an episode of The Fugitive ("The Homecoming", 1964) and an episode of Burke's Law ("Who Killed The Rabbit's Husband", 1965). Grahame can be seen also in a 1970 episode of Mannix titled “Duet for Three” (Season 4 Episode 13) and in small roles in the miniseries Rich Man, Poor Man and Seventh Avenue.^[12]

The play The Time of Your Life was revived on March 17, 1972, at the Huntington Hartford Theater in Los Angeles with Grahame, Henry Fonda, Richard Dreyfuss, Lewis J. Stadlen, Ron Thompson, Jane Alexander, Richard X. Slattery, and Pepper Martin among the cast, and Edwin Sherin directing.^[17]

Over time, Grahame became increasingly concerned with her physical appearance; she particularly felt her upper lip was too thin and had ridges that were too deep. She began stuffing cotton or tissues under it, which she felt gave her a sexier look. Several co-stars discovered this during kissing scenes.^[18] In the mid-1940s, Grahame began undergoing small cosmetic procedures on her lips and face. According to her niece, Vicky Mitchum, Grahame's obsession with vanity led her to undergo more cosmetic procedures that rendered her upper lip immobile because of nerve damage. Mitchum said, "Over the years, she [Grahame] carved herself up, trying to make herself into an image of beauty she felt should exist but didn't. Others saw her as a beautiful person, but she never did, and crazy things spread from that."^[19]

Grahame was a Democrat who supported Adlai Stevenson's campaign in the 1952 presidential election.^[20]

Grahame was married four times and had four children. Her first marriage was to actor Stanley Clements in August 1945. They divorced in June 1948.^[21] The day after her divorce from Clements was final, Grahame married director Nicholas Ray. They had a son, Timothy, in November 1948. After several separations and reconciliations, Grahame and Ray divorced in 1952.^[22] Grahame's third marriage was to writer and TV producer Cy Howard. They married in August 1954 and had a daughter, Marianna Paulette in 1956.^[23][24] Grahame filed for divorce from Howard in May 1957, citing mental cruelty.^[23] Their divorce was final as of November 1957.^[24]

Grahame's fourth and final marriage was to actor Anthony "Tony" Ray (b. 1937), the son of her second husband Nicholas Ray and his first wife Jean Evans, and Grahame's former stepson. According to Nicholas Ray, he allegedly caught Grahame and a 13 year-old Tony in bed together, which effectively ended their marriage in 1950.^[25][26] However, Grahame's former partner and biographer, Peter Turner, disputed this, saying the story of Tony being underage when Grahame began a sexual relationship with him is "fiction."^[27] Grahame and Anthony Ray began dating in 1958 and married in Tijuana, Mexico, in May 1960. The couple had two children: Anthony, Jr. (born 1963) and James (born 1965).^[28]

News of the marriage was kept private until 1962, when it was written about in the tabloids. The ensuing scandal damaged Grahame's reputation and affected her career. After learning of her marriage to Anthony Ray, Grahame's third husband, Cy Howard, attempted to gain sole custody of the couple's daughter, Marianna. Howard claimed Grahame was an unfit mother, and the two fought over custody of Marianna for years. The stress of the scandal, her waning career, and her custody battle with Howard took its toll on Grahame and she had a nervous breakdown. She later underwent electroconvulsive therapy in 1964.^[29] Despite the scandal, Grahame's marriage to Anthony Ray was the only one of four to last beyond four years, ending a few days short of their 14th anniversary in May 1974.^[29]

From 1979 to 1981, Grahame had a relationship with British actor Peter Turner. Turner authored a book about his time with Grahame called Film Stars Don't Die in Liverpool, which was later turned into a movie of the same name. According to Glenn Ford's son Peter, Grahame had an affair with Ford during the filming of Human Desire in 1954.^[30]

In March 1974, Grahame was diagnosed with breast cancer. She underwent radiation treatment, changed her diet, stopped smoking and drinking alcohol, and sought homeopathic remedies. In less than a year, the cancer went into remission^[31] but returned in 1980. In autumn 1981, while performing at The Dukes in Lancaster, England, Grahame fell ill.^[32]

She told her former lover, actor Peter Turner, and asked him not to contact doctors or her family (which he did anyway). According to Turner's memoir, Film Stars Don't Die in Liverpool, Turner's local family physician told Grahame she had a cancerous tumor "the size of a football" in her abdomen. Breast cancer is not mentioned in the book.^[33] Turner informed Grahame's children of her illness; they brought her back to the US against her wishes and those of her doctor and Turner. She was immediately admitted to St. Vincent's Hospital in Manhattan on October 5, 1981, where she died a few hours later of stomach cancer and peritonitis at age 57.^[34]

Grahame's remains were interred at Oakwood Memorial Park Cemetery in Chatsworth, Los Angeles.^[35]

On February 8, 1960, for her contributions to the motion picture industry, Grahame had a star placed on the Hollywood Walk of Fame at 6522 Hollywood Boulevard.^[36][37]

On November 16, 2017, the motion picture Film Stars Don't Die in Liverpool (2017), based on Peter Turner's account of the final years of Grahame's life, was released in the United Kingdom. The film was released in the United States six weeks later, on December 29, 2017. In the film, Grahame was portrayed by Annette Bening.^[33]

Grahame had kept an apartment at the Manhattan Plaza residential complex, and its community room, where her portrait hangs, is dedicated to her.^[5]

• Peter Turner, Film Stars Don't Die in Liverpool (New York: Grove Press, 1987)

 

Wikimedia Commons has media related to Gloria Grahame.

• Gloria Grahame at IMDb
• Gloria Grahame at the Internet Broadway Database
• Gloria Grahame at the TCM Movie Database  
• In Loving Memory Of Gloria Grahame
• Gloria Grahame at Film Reference
• Gloria Grahame at the Wayback Machine (archived October 10, 1999) – Article by Donald Chase
• Gloria Grahame at Virtual History