I Love the Illusion: The Life and Career of Agnes Moorehead (18 page)

Jane Eyre
would be the fourth and final film that Agnes would make with
Orson Welles. It wasn’t that Welles and she had a falling out. They would
continue to work together for a time on radio, but Orson was falling out of
favor in Hollywood, while Agnes’ star was rising. There were other
opportunities for them to work together. Orson directed the 1946 film,
The Stranger,
where he portrays an ex-Nazi who assumes another identity
and settles down in New England. He is dogged by an FBI hunter, played
by Edward G. Robinson. However, Welles wanted Agnes to play this part.
“I wanted the Robinson civil-servant part to be played by Agnes
Moorehead. I thought it would be much more interesting to have a
spinster lady on the heels of this Nazi.” But the studio balked. Too bad, it
would have been a different and challenging role for Agnes and would have
permitted Welles and Agnes to share the screen together. In all their film
collaborations they had never actually performed a scene together. In later
years, Welles would also pursue Agnes for both the stage and screen roles of
Lady Macbeth in his production of
Macbeth,
but, due to her busy work
schedule, it couldn’t be arranged. In the early 60’s Orson had been the
original choice to direct Dino De Laurentiis’ production of
The Bible,
and
had approached Agnes to play the part of Sarah, but again it didn’t pan out.
Up until the deaths of Tim Holt in 1973 and then Agnes in 1974, Welles
had toyed with the idea of
filming a new ending to
The
Magnificent Ambersons
with the
still living characters, thirty years
later, speaking to the camera
about what had happened to
them in the intervening years.
This, too, like many Welles projects,
never materialized.

Following
Jane Eyre,
Agnes
went almost immediately into the
production of David O. Selznick’s
massively sentimental film,
Since
You Went Away.
Selznick, another
son-in-law of Louis B. Mayer’s,
was a hands-on producer who
supervised every element of his
pictures, sometimes even writing
the screenplays (here under the
name Jeffrey Daniel — the combined names of his two sons).
Selznick hand-selected his cast: Claudette Colbert, Joseph Cotten, Jennifer
Jones (whom he would later marry) and Shirley Temple. Jones’ then-husband, the troubled but talented actor, Robert Walker, was cast as Jones’ love
interest. Selznick also personally cast the smaller roles as well. He chose
Agnes for the part of Emily Hawkins, a snide and gossipy friend who tells
the Colbert character (who has two daughters, played by Jones and Temple)
that her 40-year-old husband was “irresponsible” to leave his family behind
and enlist into the service. The film, clocking in at nearly three hours, is full
of pathos and patriotism, dealing with the homefront and the loves and
tribulations of the mother and her two daughters. The mother is tempted
by love in the form of Joe Cotten, but remains true to her husband and is
gratified at the end when, at Christmas, she receives word that her husband
is returning home. With this film it was becoming clear that Agnes was
becoming typed in unsympathetic roles: the mother who willingly gives up
her child in
Citizen Kane,
the repressed aunt who spreads gossip to her
nephew which helps ruin his mother’s happiness in
The Magnificent
Ambersons,
the evil Mrs. Reed in
Jane Eyre,
and, now, this unsympathetic

It was with this knowledge that Agnes actively campaigned for and
received the role of Aspasia Conti in the film
Mrs. Parkington
. The film tells
the story of Suzie Parkington (Greer Garson) who marries a mine owner,
Major Agustus Parkington (Walter Pidgeon), and they move to New York
from Nevada. Major Parkington believes that Suzie needs tutoring in how
to be a “lady” and requests aid in the form of his former mistress, Aspasia
(Moorehead). Suzie and Aspasia become lifelong friends. It is a warm,
sympathetic performance by Agnes and one she would consider her favorite
for years to come. Agnes would later expand on why it was the part she
liked best. “I’d love to say that my favorite role was forced on me over my
polite protests. But if truth is to struggle to light here, it must be admitted
that the part of Aspasia Conti in the picture,
Mrs. Parkington,
came to me
only because I put up a fine battle to get it. After playing a series of women
who were either strained, neurotic or mousy, I was eager for a good, normal
role, and this was it. So I went to producer Leon Gordon and asked for it.
‘I don’t think Aspasia is an Agnes Moorehead kind of role,’ he said, ‘But
there’s a drunken duchess I’d love to have you play.’ ‘Why not test me for
Aspasia?’ I said. ‘Then, if you don’t like the test, I’ll play your drunken
duchess.’ I got the test and then I started scurrying around. I found that
Greer Garson was wearing a dark wig, so I got a blonde one. Then I had a
sheer nightgown fixed
up, as the test was a bedroom scene. Fortunately,
my French was fine, and
the day after the test
Leon told me the part
was mine. After all this
effort, one might suppose the mere playing of
the part would be an
anticlimax. But it wasn’t.
I thoroughly enjoyed
being a worldly French
baroness who not only
was attractive and intelligent but who also had
great wisdom and a great
heart. I also learned to
know Greer Garson and
formed a lasting friendship. So, all in all, the
role was worth the battle
I put up to get it, and I’m
quite happy to name it as my favorite.” Her French was so good, in fact,
that a visitor on the set asked director Tay Garnett, “Where did you get the
French dame?”

Upon completion of her part in this film, Leon Gordon, the producer, sent
her a note: “Had I realized that you were finishing on Saturday I should
most certainly have been on the set to tell you how much we all enjoyed
working with you both as an actress and as a person. It is my sincere hope
that in the near future I shall have a picture and a part worthy of you.” They
never worked again, but Agnes did campaign to get another part in a
Gordon film,
The Green Years,
as Dean Stockwell’s grandmother. Again,
Gordon felt she wasn’t right for the part, and again Agnes insisted she could
play it and arranged a screen test; this time the results didn’t work out in
Agnes’ favor and Gladys Cooper got the part. Gordon broke the news to
her in a letter dated July 2, 1945: “If I were not such a terrific fan professionally and personally, this note would be easier to write, but I have looked

at the test very carefully and given it a great deal of study and have come to
the conclusion, Agnes, that I was wrong in asking you to make it because
of the physical aspect. I know you can play anything you can, but it’s asking
too much for a woman of your age to look convincing as Grandma. In the
final analysis it would give you an unreality which would be a handicap both
to you and the picture. Please forgive me, but I know you don’t mind my
being perfectly frank. And I can say to you in all honesty that the fact that
you won’t be in it is a disappointment to me . . .”

Mrs. Parkington
opened in October 1944 and, like the previous teamings
of Garson and Pidgeon in
Mrs. Miniver
and
Madame Curie,
was a big hit
at the box office.
The New York Sun
called the picture a “good strong
drama. It pulls out all the stops. It does not hesitate to call for tears, for
laughter, for a sneer or two.”
Variety
also lauded the picture and called
Agnes’ performance “great.” It is a very good performance and it is certainly
understandable why Agnes was so high on it. She was able to convey sex
appeal and sincerity, and was not drab, neurotic or nasty. She was
nominated for her second Academy Award nomination. But of all of her
Academy nominated performances, it is her weakest.
In Ambersons, Johnny
Belinda
and
Hush . . . Hush, Sweet Charlotte,
she has more to do, with more
complex characterizations. But in each of them she is drab and unattractive.
It is my feeling that she was nominated primarily because she gave a
performance which was much different from the usual Agnes Moorehead
persona and Hollywood recognized that and decided to reward her for it.
Her competition was strong: Jennifer Jones,
Since You Went Away;
Angela
Lansbury,
Gaslight;
Aline MacMahon,
Dragon Seed;
Ethel Barrymore for
None But the Lonely Heart.
Barrymore won the statuette (undeservedly over
Lansbury). It is interesting to note that two of her fellow nominees were
from films which Agnes had also appeared in,
Since You Went Away
and
Dragon Seed.
Might this have affected Agnes’ chances? Perhaps, but it also
probably affected the chances of Jones and MacMahon as well. Barrymore
in all likelihood got her Oscar because of her renown as a stage star who was
“slumming it” by appearing on screen. As a consolation prize, Agnes did
win the Golden Globe award for her performance as Aspasia.

One afternoon, writer Lucille Fletcher needed to get milk for her sixmonth-old baby. Fletcher made a trip to the local store and made her selection.
She got in a check-out line where behind her an elderly woman began to
loudly rant about Fletcher being at the front of the line. The woman
demanded to know what made her so important that she was in front of
her. When she got home, Fletcher began to think about that angry woman
and how she might make an interesting character in a story. She began
sketching a character based on that woman, who eventually became Mrs.
Elbert Stevenson in a radio script titled,
She Overheard Death Speaking.

In her long career Agnes made hundreds of radio, film, television and
stage appearances. In many of these she was singled out for praise and saluted
for all she added to the production. In each medium she left a large legacy
which her reputation is most identified with. In film, it is Fanny in
The
Magnificent Ambersons;
on stage, Donna Ana in
Don Juan in Hell;
and, on
television, she attained lasting immortality as Endora on
Bewitched.
In
radio, despite her wonderful work as a member of The Mercury Theatre of
the Air, no role would be more associated with Agnes than that of Mrs.
Elbert Stevenson in “Sorry, Wrong Number” (what “She Overheard Death
Speaking” was retitled just days before it was aired).

If Agnes was a true star of any medium, it was radio. And on radio it was
her association with the popular anthology series
Suspense
which truly
immortalized her. So associated with this series was Agnes that she became
known as “The First Lady of Suspense.”