George Cukor
Best known for his direction of comedies and literary adaptations, including What Price Hollywood? (1932), A Bill of Divorcement (1932), Our Betters (1933), Little Women (1933), Dinner at Eight (1933) David Copperfield (1935), Romeo and Juliet (1936) and Camille (1936). His single most noteworthy credit was My Fair Lady (1964).
George Cukor was a director who deserved his pigeonholes. Even when he was an old man and it was too late to argue about it, he still insisted he wasn’t a “woman’s director”. He was also the guy who directed film “adaptations of plays”. Thats what he was and it certainly wasn’t anything to be ashamed of, especially because he was extraordinarily gifted at it.
He wasn’t just Katharine Hepburn’s director, working with her on over ten films. George directed Hep, Garbo, Bergman, Kerr, Maggie Smith, Judy Garland and Judy Holliday in Oscar-nominated performances. His eleven films with women or women’s names in the title include: My Fair Lady, Tarnished Lady, Les Girls, Two-Faced Woman, The Women, Little Women, Travels with my Aunt, Romeo and Juliet, Pat and Mike, Justine, and Camille. Not a woman’s director?
From the film version of Kaufman and Ferber’s “Dinner at Eight” in 1933 to the triumph of “My Fair Lady” in 1964, for which he won an Oscar, and even on to “The Corn is Green” in 1975, most of Cukor’s best films were actually his best filmed plays.
Born in NYC in 1899, he directed plays on Broadway during the ’20s, then came to Hollywood in 1929. By 1933, Cukor was directing “Dinner at Eight”, with such luminaries as John and Lionel Barrymore (he had worked with Ethel Barrymore on the stage) and a half-dozen other stars. He made a few more classics in the ’30s, including “Holiday” and “Camille”. By 1939, he was with MGM, and had the honor of being a short-term director on both “The Wizard of Oz” and “Gone with the Wind“. George was fired from the latter after disagreements with David O. Selznick and star Clark Gable.
George Cukor bounced back big, though, directing Hepburn’s comeback and brilliant performances by Cary Grant and Jimmy Stewart in the classic “The Philadelphia Story“. His ‘40s contributions to the pantheon also include “Gaslight”, “Adam’s Rib“, and “Born Yesterday” — about as far from Tara as you can get.
Though critics, cinephiles and apologists like to point out the six or so films that aren’t witty, light comedies to show that he could do different genres (and he could), its no shame and certainly no coincidence that those are rather outside of his milieu.
Cukor’s cinematic style seems to be born out of the theatre. Thats where he got his start, and most of his actors were equally at home on stage. So, at first when you’re watching them, you think he just didn’t know about cross-cutting (cutting back and forth between characters in conversation). But then you get caught up in the easy naturalness of his long, long (the time, not the lens) two-shots, which let the actors act and let the brilliant dialogue ring out. Sure, its proscenium, but so was Shakespeare.
Ironically, George’s Oscar and his most famous film was “My Fair Lady”. Of course, its not the Cukor of the lush black and white. But it is the stage adaptation Cukor, the witty Cukor, the get out of the way and let the stars shine Cukor, and (though she wasn’t even nominated for the Oscar) the director of Audrey Hepburn Cukor. That’s one fine pigeonhole indeed.
Nate Lee
Memorable Quotes by George Cukor
“. . . you direct a couple of successful pictures with women stars, so you become a “woman’s director” . . . Direct a sentimental little picture and all you get is sob stuff. I know I’ve been in and out of those little compartments. Heaven knows everyone has limitations. But why make them narrower than they are?”
“Give me a good script, and I’ll be 100 times better as a director.”
“You would like to think you’re pretty much an original, everything about yourself distinctive and individual. But it is surprising to realize to what extent you echo your family, and how, from childhood, you have been shaped and molded . . .”
“[on the rivalry between Joan Crawford and Bette Davis] It seemed to me that each one coveted what the other possessed. Joan envied Bette’s incredible talent, and Bette envied Joan’s seductive glamor.”
“Margaret Mitchell’s only casting suggestion for Gone with the Wind (1939) was for her favorite star to play Rhett: Groucho Marx.”
“There’s been an awful lot of crap written about Marilyn Monroe, and I don’t know, there may be an exact psychiatric term for what was wrong with her but truth to tell, I think she was quite mad.”
Things You May Not Know About George Cukor
He was the godfather of Mia Farrow.
He was famous for the parties he threw later in life for large groups of directors, many being attended by such legends such as Alfred Hitchcock, John Ford, Luis Buñuel and George Stevens.
He was famous as a sophisticated, witty personality but was also in the habit (mainly to be naughty) of blurting out unexpected profanities.
Attempted unsuccessfully to launch a huge movie project starring Maggie Smith as complex and troubled author Virginia Woolf.
Was the original choice to direct The Seven Year Itch (1955); however, he turned down the project.
Louis Gossett Jr., on working with Cukor on Travels with My Aunt (1972): “The consummate director and a filmmaking genius. He kept shooting until he got it right. He knew when to say something to you, and he knew when to leave you alone. He was always one step ahead of everyone.”
Great Scenes
Philadelphia Story
- Listen carefully to Cary Grant’s constant zingers, especially with John Howard, his rival for Hepburn.
- Jimmy Stewart finally gets drunk
- Cary Grant’s speech on kindness to the uppity Kate as the really uppity Tracy Lord
Holiday
- Cary Grant and Katharine Hepburn work beautifully in this high-society play cum film
- Grant and Hep do amazing acrobatics with the help of their audience Lew Ayres and especially Edward Everett Horton
Born Yesterday
- Judy Holliday playing gin with the overbearing gangster, Broderick Crawford, is a classic
Camille
- Just watch this tragic Parisian romance to enjoy every gesture and glance of Garbo and revel in that unmatched style and voice
Pat and Mike and Adam’s Rib
- This Spencer Tracy/Katherine Hepburn duo duet must be seen together. In the first, natural athlete Hep saves manager Spence from being beaten up, and then repeats the scene hilariously in the police station.
- In the latter, as dueling attorneys, both their speeches on the law and on rights are lovely, but Spence’s suicide” one is beyond brilliant
My Fair Lady
- Your favorite song is your favorite scene, no matter what, but you’ve still got to love the opening Covent Garden scene where Higgins (Rex Harrison) discovers Eliza Doolittle (Audrey Hepburn)
Great Movies That Were Already Great Plays
- The Philadelphia Story
- Holiday
- Born Yesterday
- My Fair Lady
- Gaslight
- Dinner at Eight
Great Movies
- Camille
- Adam’s Rib
- Pat and Mike
- A Star is Born
- Love Among the Ruins
- Travels with my Aunt
George Cukor’s directing credits include…
| Year | Movie |
|---|---|
| 1930 | Grumpy |
| 1930 | The Virtuous Sin |
| 1930 | The Royal Family of Broadway |
| 1931 | Tarnished Lady |
| 1931 | Girls About Town |
| 1932 | What Price Hollywood? |
| 1932 | A Bill of Divorcement |
| 1932 | Rockabye |
| 1933 | Our Betters |
| 1933 | Dinner at Eight |
| 1933 | Little Women |
| 1934 | Manhattan Melodrama |
| 1935 | David Copperfield |
| 1935 | No More Ladies |
| 1935 | Sylvia Scarlett |
| 1936 | Romeo and Juliet |
| 1936 | Camille |
| 1938 | I Met My Love Again |
| 1938 | Holiday |
| 1939 | Zaza |
| 1939 | The Women |
| 1940 | Susan and God |
| 1940 | The Philadelphia Story |
| 1941 | A Woman’s Face |
| 1941 | Two-Faced Woman |
| 1942 | Her Cardboard Lover |
| 1943 | Keeper of the Flame |
| 1944 | Gaslight |
| 1947 | A Double Life |
| 1949 | Edward, My Son |
| 1949 | Adam’s Rib |
| 1950 | A Life of Her Own |
| 1950 | Born Yesterday |
| 1951 | The Model and the Marriage Broker |
| 1952 | The Marrying Kind |
| 1952 | Pat and Mike |
| 1953 | The Actress |
| 1954 | It Should Happen to You |
| 1956 | Bhowani Junction |
| 1957 | Les Girls |
| 1957 | Wild Is the Wind |
| 1960 | Song Without End |
| 1960 | Let’s Make Love |
| 1962 | Something’s Got to Give |
| 1962 | The Chapman Report |
| 1964 | My Fair Lady |
| 1969 | Justine |
| 1972 | Travels with My Aunt |
| 1976 | The Blue Bird |
| 1981 | Rich and Famous |
