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Jean Arthur (1905–1991)
She was a husky-voiced actress who came into her own as a comedienne, playing tough, yet vulnerable, middle-class working girls. Never a great beauty by Hollywood standards, Miss Arthur was uncommonly likeable and was sexy in an unthreatening way. Even more uncommon, however, was her slow rise to stardom. Actresses generally catch on rather quickly if they're going to be stars at all but, like MYRNA LOY, Jean Arthur was one of those rare exceptions who knocked around Hollywood for a dozen years before lightning finally struck.
Born Gladys Georgianna Greene to a New York photographer, the young and attractive teenager had no trouble finding work as a photographer's model. When one of her pictures was seen by a Fox representative, she found herself at the age of 18 with a one-year contract and a chance at stardom. Despite her total lack of acting experience, she was handed an important supporting role in John Ford's Cameo Kirby (1923). The movie did well, but Jean Arthur didn't. She played out the rest of her contract in minor roles in even more minor movies.
Much like the resilient, resourceful character she would play in the latter 1930s and early 1940s, Jean Arthur didn't give up. She continued acting throughout the silent era in poverty-row studio films, rarely attaining leading roles. But when she did have an important part in The Poor Nut (1927), Paramount saw something in her and signed her to a contract.
Voice and success
Unfortunately, Paramount didn't have much success with her either. While her husky voice worked well in talkies, no one knew quite how to use her to best effect. She played ingenues in films like Warming Up (1928) and killers in movies such as The Greene Murder Case (1929); she was just plain decorative in movies such as Paramount on Parade (1930). Jean Arthur did appear in a few comedies during this period but a combination of poor material and a lack of acting skill kept her from breaking through.
After a heavy workload that took her through 1931, Jean Arthur left Hollywood. Eight years of performing for the camera had taught her very little about her craft; she decided it was time to learn how to act. She spent almost three years working on Broadway and in stock companies, getting the experience she so sorely needed.
Her return to Hollywood in Get That Venus (1933), another low-budget production, might have discouraged another actress but Jean Arthur kept trying. An important break came in 1934 when she gave a solid supporting performance in a hit Columbia film called Whirlpool. HARRY COHN signed her to a long-term contract and promptly put her in two stinkers. Finally, after appearing in a total of 54 films during a 12-year period, she found herself again working for John Ford, who promptly turned her into a star in his popular Columbia comedy The Whole Town's Talking (1935).
The most significant thing about her breakthrough film was that it firmly established her persona as a wisecracking, cynical woman who would usually start out taking advantage of an idealist, eventually falling in love with him, and then using her worldly knowledge to help him beat the bad guys by the end of the picture. She reached the height of her career in that kind of role, starring in films such as Frank Capra's Mr. Deeds Goes to Town (1936) and Mr. Smith Goes to Washington (1939). But these were hardly her only standouts in the second half of the 1930s. She was outstanding in movies such as Public Hero Number One (1935), Diamond Jim (1935), and The Ex-Mrs. Bradford (1936).
Jean Arthur's star status
Like so many actors, Jean Arthur attained her everlasting star status by working with some of Hollywood's best directors. For instance, she starred in Frank Borzage's History Is Made at Night (1937), the Mitchell Leisen-directed and PRESTON STURGES-scripted comedy, Easy Living (1937), and Frank Capra's 1938 Oscar-winning Best Picture of the Year, You Can't Take It with You. She topped off the decade with an affecting performance in HOWARD HAWKS's classic, Only Angels Have Wings (1939).
A good many of her best films, except for the Capra pictures, were made when she was on loan from Columbia. The studio simply had trouble finding good projects for her; her typical Columbia films were mediocre, at best.
Nonetheless, Jean Arthur's career steamed ahead into the early 1940s with her portrayals of comic working-class heroines. She added GEORGE STEVENS to her list of first-class directors with whom she had worked when she starred in two of his finer efforts, The Talk of the Town (1942) and The More the Merrier (1943), for which she received a Best Actress Oscar nomination for the first and last time.
Jean Arthur had feuded with Harry Cohn over her poor Columbia material throughout the length of her contract, and when she was finally free of Columbia in 1944, she walked away from her film career even though she was still big box office. She had often talked about retirement, and it appeared as if she really meant it.
Last movies
She made only two more movies, both of them hits. Miss Arthur starred in Billy Wilder's A Foreign Affair (1948) and then came back to Hollywood one last time to work with her old friend George Stevens in perhaps his greatest film, Shane (1953).
After a major success on Broadway as Peter Pan in 1950, she was little heard from. There were a few flings with the theater in later years and then an unexpected guest-starring role on an episode of TV's Gunsmoke. The experience led her to sign on to star in a shortlived TV series, The Jean Arthur Show (1966), in which she played a lawyer.
Though generally out of the limelight since the early 1950s, Jean Arthur wasn't entirely silent. She spent a good deal of her retirement years as a teacher, sharing her acting knowledge with students at several colleges.