Birthday of the greatest female star of classic Hollywood cinema

On May 12, 1907, in the city of Hartford, Connecticut, USA, the second child was born in the family of Thomas Norvell Hepburn and Katharine Martha Houghton Hepburn, a girl who, like her mother, was named Katharine. Thomas Hepburn worked at a local hospital as a urologist, and mother, who came from a very wealthy family and therefore had no worries about her daily bread, could devote herself to social activities. The sphere of this public activity was the struggle for the rights of women. In other words, Katharine Hepburn's mother was an active participant in the suffragette movement. Both parents of the future movie star adhered to extremely free and progressive views, educating in children (there were six of them in total) free-thinking and the desire for self-improvement. There were no forbidden topics in the family, and self-improvement meant the development of not only the mind, but also the body.

Thanks to this upbringing, Katharine, already at a very young age, being a schoolgirl, achieved very impressive results in sports, and in various sports: figure skating, swimming, tennis and golf. In parallel with playing sports, Katharine learned the basics of theatrical art from her own experience, performing home theater productions. It is difficult to say how Katharine's fate would have developed if not for one sad event. Shortly before her 14th birthday, Katharine found her beloved brother Thomas, who at that time was only 15 years old, hanging himself. Parents stopped possible rumors about the young man's suicide, explaining his death as an unsuccessfully performed circus trick. But Katharine received a severe mental trauma from this tragedy: she withdrew into herself, stopped communicating with people, and basically avoided contact with her peers.

After some time, Katharine Martha Houghton Hepburn Sr., trying to find a way to return her daughter to her former sociability, transferred her to Bryn Mar College, where she herself studied previously. This girls' college was founded by Quakers in 1885 and was one of the oldest and most prestigious women's colleges in the United States. Among other things, this college was famous for its student theater. At first, Katharine Hepburn was refused in her attempt to become a member of this theater. The reason for the refusal was poor academic performance, due to the resulting mental trauma. But the craving for the theater did its job: Katharine achieved that she became one of the best students, and in her last year she received the main role in the performance based on the play by the 16th century British playwright John Lily "The Woman in the Moon" in the student theater. The role in this performance brought great success to Katharine. And most importantly, she gave the girl the desire to become an actress. Although, after graduating from college in 1928, Katharine Hepburn received a bachelor's degree in history and philosophy.

Also in 1928, Katharine Hepburn married a certain businessman named Ludlow Ogden Smith. However, very quickly Katharine Hepburn came to the conclusion that family life was not for her. Perhaps because, having decided to become an actress, she literally attacked all possible theaters with an offer of herself for a variety of roles. Some of these roles brought her success, some ended in complete failure. In the process of searching for roles, Katharine Hepburn met the theater agent Leland Hayward, who became her lover. Hayward, who by that time was married like Hepburn, offered to marry her, having previously divorced their spouses. But Hepburn refused. Not becoming the legal husband of the future movie star, Hayward, nevertheless, played a very important role in her fate: he arranged for her a role in the film "A Bill of Divorcement", directed by George Cukor. Cukor, who at that time was only 33 years old, was already quite famous in the cinematic circles of the United States, since by this time he had shot 7 full-length films.

The role in the film "A Bill of Divorcement" (1932) was the first role of Katharine Hepburn in a feature film. Moreover, this was the main female role in the film. Hepburn's play received very favorable reviews in the American press, thanks to which the actress appeared in three films the following year. And if her roles in the films "Christopher Strong" and "Little Women" did not make a special impression on the public and the press, then her role in Lowell Sherman's film "Morning Glory" brought the actress an Academy Award for Best Actress.

However, after such a seemingly obvious recognition of the acting talent of Katharine Hepburn, from the next, 1934, a "black streak" began in her creative biography. No, role offers continued to come in. During the period from 1934 to 1938, she played in about 10 films. But all the films with her participation failed at the box office. The actress in the cinematic environment was given the nickname "Cash Poison". And then the producers and directors began to refuse the actress under various pretexts. For example, when she offered herself for the role of Scarlett O'Hara in "Gone with the Wind", she was turned down on the grounds of not being sexy enough that no one would believe that Clark Gable would pursue her for many years. (I don’t know which explanation for the refusal for a woman would be less offensive: the lack of box office potential or the lack of sexuality.) And then she turned to men for help: a close friend, playwright Philip Barry, and Howard Hughes, who by that time had become her former lover. (Yes, yes, to the same extravagant billionaire, about whom Martin Scorsese made the film "The Aviator" in 2004 with Leonardo DiCaprio in the title role.). Katharine Hepburn had an affair with Hughes in 1936. Hughes proposed to her because in 1934 the actress officially divorced Ludlow Ogden Smith. But the actress refused Hughes.

However, Hughes paid Philip Barry for a play he wrote specifically for Katharine Hepburn, "The Philadelphia Story", and presented it to his former mistress. We must pay tribute to the creative instinct of the actress: she did not immediately look for opportunities to film the play received as a gift. She first initiated the stage realization of the play at the Shubert Theater on Broadway. For the year from March 28, 1939 to March 30, 1940, 417 performances took place, in each of which Katharine Hepburn shone on stage. The fact that, on average, more than one performance a day was given throughout the year, and that the performance brought in more than one million dollars in profit (the equivalent of our current $ 21 million), speaks of the extraordinary success of both the play itself and its stage incarnation. And then Hepburn realized that now she can make a film based on this play.

Hepburn offered MGM to buy the rights to stage such a lucrative play from her for just $250,000, but in exchange she demanded that she be given the right to determine the director, producers and actors of the future film. Using this right, she actually appointed the director of the film, George Cukor, in gratitude for the fact that he, in fact, opened her way to the screen. In early 1941, The Philadelphia Story received 6 Oscar nominations. He won two of them: for Best Screenplay and for Best Leading Actor. But in the nomination for Best Leading Actress, Katharine Hepburn lost to Ginger Rogers, who played the lead role in a rather average film "Kitty Foyle". But for Hepburn, it didn't really matter. The main thing is that she got rid of the reputation of "box office poison": the film "The Philadelphia Story" by George Cukor, with a budget of 914 thousand dollars, grossed 3.3 million dollars at the box office.

After that, a successful creative biography of Katharine Hepburn continued with virtually no downturns. Only from 1962 to 1967, the actress practically disappeared from the screens. But the reason for this disappearance was by no means creative. The reason is that in 1962, Spencer Tracy, the beloved man of the actress, became seriously ill. The romance of Katharine Hepburn and Spencer Tracy began in 1941. Tracy was officially married, but from the mid-30s he and his wife Louise lived apart. For the sake of marriage with Hepburn, Tracy was ready to formalize the divorce. But even though Tracy could rightly be called "the man of her life," the actress did not want to tie the knot. After Tracy's diabetes and heart disease worsened in 1962, Katharine Hepburn quit film and stage and devoted herself to caring for her sick loved one. In 1967, the two of them made their last appearance together in Stanley Kramer's "Guess Who's Coming to Dinner?" Spencer Tracy did not see this film: he died six months before the premiere of the picture and did not know that he was nominated for an Oscar for his role in this film. He did not know that his beloved woman received an Oscar for her work in this film. Second in her life, but not the last.

And the triumph of Katharine Hepburn as an actress continued. In 1968, the British film "The Lion in Winter" directed by Anthony Harvey was released. The female lead in this film, performed by Katharine Hepburn, again brought her an Academy Award. And this Oscar was also not the last in the biography of the actress. In 1982, Katharine Hepburn won her fourth Academy Award for her role in Mark Rydell's "On Golden Pond". As a result, according to the total number of Oscars received - 4 - Katharine Hepburn is still the champion among actors to this day. Moreover, 40 years have passed since the actress received the last, 4th Oscar. And so far, none of the actors can surpass her in this indicator. That is why the American Film Institute named Katharine Hepburn "the greatest female star of classic Hollywood cinema".

But not only 4 Oscars marked the creative work of Katharine Hepburn. She has 28 different film awards, including such prestigious ones as two BAFTA awards of the British Film Academy, the Cannes International Film Festival award as the Best Actress, the Italian Film Academy Award David di Donatello, the Gold Medal of the Venice Film Festival, the Special Jury Prize of the Montreal International Film Festival, etc. Curiously that the Hollywood Foreign Press Association, which nominated the actress for its Golden Globe Award 8 times, never awarded her.

The filmography of the actress includes 44 full-length feature films. 4 films with the participation of Katharine Hepburn entered the Golden Thousand. Thanks to this indicator and her aristocratic, one might say, regal beauty, Katharine Hepburn is included in the list of the 100 most beautiful and sexiest actresses in world cinema, compiled by FilmGourmand. Today, on the birthday of the great Actress, I want to remind the fans of her work the shots from the best films with her participation.