The Silver Screen Oasis

In certain roles, especially in "Dark Passage", I think Agnes looks like a sexy Disney villainess come to life. I wish she'd had more opportunities to vamp. I watched this movie again a few nights ago. Everyone else faded into the background when she was on-screen.

..

Academic query: did Agnes invent bedroom eyes, or just help perfect them?

..

Wow, your colorizations of those pics are amazing Erika! Beautiful!!

..

..

Hi,

This afternoon TCM played "An American Dream" with Eleanor Parker.
This movie was directed by Agnes Moorehead's husband, Robert Gist. It's pretty bad and the characters are all rotten, with everybody overacting, even Eleanor.
Poor dear Eleanor throws herself off her balcony 30 stories to the street. Shades of Agnes in "Dark Passage"..
I turned it off when she hit the pavement!!!

Larry

Vecchiolarry wrote:Hi,

This afternoon TCM played "An American Dream" with Eleanor Parker.
This movie was directed by Agnes Moorehead's husband, Robert Gist. It's pretty bad and the characters are all rotten, with everybody overacting, even Eleanor.
Poor dear Eleanor throws herself off her balcony 30 stories to the street. Shades of Agnes in "Dark Passage"..
I turned it off when she hit the pavement!!!

Larry

*Spoiler Alert*Spoiler Alert*Spoiler Alert*Spoiler Alert*

But Larry, you missed the best part!! Stuart Whitman (who was good in other roles but no one won any laurels here) was finally put out of his misery!

Hi Moira,

I like Stuart Whitman too; but I became very bored with him and Eleanor bickering and the whole negative atmosphere of the piece.
I did love the chinchilla throw on the bed though; I kept looking at it - it was the star of the piece up to when I switched off.

After viewing poor dear Eleanor's plunge and remembering my darling Agnes' splat, I would advise all of us to 'look up' in NYC and San Francisco lest we be struck by falling actresses!!

Larry

Hi,

For the life of me, I cannot understand why Agnes Moorehead did not win her Best Supporting Actress Oscar for "The Magnificent Ambersons" in 1942.....
I watched the movie yesterday afternoon and although I'd seen it once before years ago, I was stunned by her role.
Whiney, neurotic, hysterical - she did it all - and yet one feels sorry for her, well sympathetic anyway.
I watched her only in all her parts, even when she was not the focus of the scenes. And she was marvellous.

Teresa Wright won that year, and although I like her too, I think she should have won the next year for "Shadow of a Doubt"...

Larry

I like Aggie in DARK PASSAGE too. I can't think of anything I DON'T like her in. Another poster said, when she's on screen, everybody else simply fades into the background. Positively. Some people find DARK PASSAGE disappointing. I think it's just fine. It's not MALTESE FALCON; not HIGH SIERRA. But it's fun, exciting, populated with intriguing characters.

And that Aggie! She cuts loose in that film. Anybody, or any scenery, had better get out of her way. She'll run them through a shredder. I like her in JOHNNY BELINDA. Love her wacky old aunt in "Ambersons." Her brief appearance in "Kane" is magnetic.

Thank you, Durwood!

Dear Durwood,

I've written this somewhere before, but it bears repeating:

Humphrey Bogart specifically requested Agnes Moorehead for the role of Madge; and she told me that he demanded her for it...

SPOILER:
Also, when I saw the movie in the late fifties on TV, I ran down to her house the next day and told her how great & nasty she was and how surprised I was that she had fallen out the window.
She said something like: "Oh, it's not the fall that hurts so much, it's the splat that gets you!!"... We had a good laugh about that....

Larry

Ha ha! That's wonderful!

I was mesmerized by her in Kane last night, and realized I had given that role short shrift over the years. She is so tightly clamped down, but lets you see SO much. She is adamant that "Charlie" will have what she never had, will get out of that environment, and yet there is such heartbreak in her stony stare. She could be miles away as she listens to the men chatter around her.....but it is her decision and she will have it done the way SHE wants, even if it kills her to do it. That last choking cry through the window? it makes me want to cry.

Nice post, Darwin.