LADY WITH RED HAIR

US, 1940, 78 minutes, Black and white.
Miriam Hopkins, Claude Rains, Richard Ainley, Laura Hope Crews, Helen Westley, John Litel, Mona Barrie, Victor Jory, Cecil Kellaway, Johnny Russell.
Directed by Curtis Bernhardt.

Lady With Red Hair is one of the many biographies made by Warner Bros in the late 1930s and early 1940s. Paired with such films as lives of Emile Zola and Louis Pasteur, this is a minor film. However, its central character, Mrs Leslie Carter, died only three years before production. Her second husband, Lou Payne, acted as adviser to the film and coach to Richard Ainley who portrays him.

While the film is about Mrs Leslie Carter, a Chicago socialite who was involved in a rather infamous divorce in 1890, losing custody of her son, deciding then to become a star and going to New York to enlist the help of famed writer and producer David Belasco, the film is very much a film about Belasco himself. Miriam Hopkins is Mrs Leslie Carter. Claude Rains is excellent – as he usually was – as Belasco.

The film recreates the period of the 1890s, Chicago society, spiteful women and gossip, ostracising Mrs Carter. However, the film shows her going to Belasco, wanting to start at the top, experiencing failure, yet becoming one of the principal stars of the American stage. Belasco acted as a kind of Svengali director to her. However, when she married actor Lou Payne, whom she had known for years, he broke with her. After a number of failures, he went back to Belasco asking him to intervene, which he did and Mrs Carter had success before she died.

Commentators note that a lot of the factual information is different from what happened in fact – for example the names of the plays in which Mrs Leslie Carter appeared. There is very good support from Laura Hope Crews as the actress’s mother and Helen Westley as the hard-bitten manager of the apartments for actors.

This was an early film directed by Curtis Bernhardt who went on to make a number of melodramas as Warner Bros and MGM in the 40s and 50s.

1. An interesting biography? Piece of Americana, American theatre?

2. The short running time, the black and white photography, the recreation of Chicago and New York, Broadway? The world of the theatre? The musical score?

3. Audience knowledge of Mrs Leslie Carter? As informed by this film? Her personality, her life, her marriage and divorce, loss of custody, her work as an actress, the training from Belasco, her success, marriage and failure? Final success?

4. Miriam Hopkins as Mrs Leslie Carter? In the courtroom, her outbursts? Accepting the decision of the court, her regrets? Her friends betraying her? Her attack on them and their gossip? Her going to the school, the encounter with her son? Her promise to return? Her bond with her mother? Going to New York, meeting Belasco, her presumption? The training, her failures, his impatience with her? The detailed scenes of rehearsal? Her final success? Her nervousness, the play, the applause? The long run? Her not going to see her son? Going to Chicago, the performance, the hissing, her confrontation of the audience, the men applauding her? Her success? Her son, staying with his father, the polite manner with his mother? No connection with her, separation? Her tours of Europe and success? The years passing? Encountering Lou, the friendship from the boarding house, marrying him? Belasco’s upset, the phone call? Cutting her off? Her working with Lou, vaudeville, her lack of success? The attempts with the play, Charles Bryant and his help? Her tantrums? Calling in Belasco, his work with her, success?

5. Claude Rains as Belasco, his appearance, looking clerical? His age, experience, writing? His egotism? His reaction to Mrs Carter, coming to his office, dismissing her? His work with her, his liking for her? His demands, the rehearsals? His following her? His upset at the marriage? His reaction when asked to come back? Finally doing so, achieving success again? An interesting portrait of a Broadway celebrity?

6. Mrs Carter’s mother? Devoted to her, hesitating, supporting? Her son, the interviews with him, his hopes for her, the years passing, his politeness but resentment?

7. Lou, at the boarding house, friendly to Mrs Carter? Giving his room? Admiring her? Their meeting again, his success, the proposal, the marriage? Belasco’s reaction? His going to Belasco, success? Lou Payne as adviser to the film?

8. The people in the boarding house, Mrs Frazier and her toughness, her wisecracks? The various actors, the jobs? The hopes? The situation of actors and their struggles?

9. Charles Bryant, working with Belasco, seeing him as the governor? Leaving him, producing the play, exasperation with Mrs Carter? Final success?

10. An interesting, if partly fictional, portrait of actual characters – and the development of the theatre in New York City