"It" - For the Gals.

[PrettySquareGal]

There are worse things than dying young and still pretty.

Like living long and looking a fright.

Same: Farah Fawcett. The female Jacko.

fftopic: Your comment reminded me of Bette Davis in Mr. Skeffington- great film. Only looking a fright has its merits. Not glamourous ones, mind you.

 

[AllaboutEve]

Eh, I didn't see her fighting hard to play the librabrian type. Perhaps some of the It ladies were trollops behind the scenes, but it wasn't their selling point, or something they exploted for money. And I agree she played an active role in her roles, contracts or not. So in a sense I see her a victim, but a very little sense. I agree with Feraud when he said "She could have chosen or created a role of an intelligent sexy gal instead of that sad caricature she created."

Ironically her most compelling and convincing part was written for her by Arthur Miller in the Misfits. I think that's the closest we get to seeing beyond the dumb blonde type-casting she had become associated with. It was a real shame that it all finished there..........

I'm not sure that she was ever really marketed as a trollop though, a bombshell maybe......no more or less than Mansfield, Diana Doors etc.
All female actresses relied and still rely to a certain extent on their sexuality, and a nude calandar shot is hardly criminal.

Maybe you are right and she could have created a different image for herself if she had gone about it in the right way.

I have never really seen her as a victim of anything other than perhaps an untimely and unecessary death........
She still provokes a great deal of debate though doesn't she!!!!!!

 

[Marc Chevalier]

Warren Beatty does not -- and perhaps never did -- have "it".

 

[skinnychik]

A collection of Audreys. A Hepburn and a Tautou.

If only I had a tiny bit of Hepburn's grace. How can she play a ditz with such style??

 

[Tourbillion]

Speaking of "it" girls and trollops, I don't believe anyone has mentioned the original "it" girl, Clara Bow

I think that she is totally adorable, but I wonder if she has relevance to today's idea of "it." She was hardly wholesome, especially in real life, but unless you are like Sophia Loren (sorry I can't get the photo of her still looking pretty hot at 70 to load and I'm getting tired of trying), "it" will leave you in the end.

 

[Caledonia]

 

[Lauren]

I just love Audrey Tautou.

 

[LizzieMaine]

There's a swell article about her in the new Allure -- looking forward to reading it this weekend!

 

[mysterygal]

This is the first time I've ever heard of Audrey Tautou..she's adorable! She's an actress right? (I'm so not up to date with celebrities!)

 

[K.D. Lightner]

Whenever I think of someone having "it" on screen, the criteria I use is if I cannot take my eyes off them. Some performers, then, have "it" in almost all their roles, limited or not (a la Monroe), some have it in certain films, but not in others.

Some performers, women and men, who have "it," i.e., I can't take my eyes off them: Audrey Hepburn, James Dean, Marilyn Monroe, Ingrid Bergman, Humphrey Bogart, Greta Garbo, early Gary Cooper, early John Wayne, Marlene Dietrich and, yes, that woman with the "Bette Davis eyes."

Had trouble taking my eyes off Grace Kelly in "Rear Window." and Julie Christie in "Dr. Zhivago,"or Robert Redford in "Barefoot in the Park." I have trouble taking my eyes off James Cagney in his early films because (a) he was so good and (b) he was a dead ringer for my father.

I once read something Sir Laurence Olivier said about Marilyn Monroe. He acted with her in The Prince and the Showgirl. (I am not directly quoting, but paraphrasing): "She was the most unprofressional actress I ever met -- she was late, or didn't bother to show all, she did not learn her lines and flubbed those she did know, she had emotional difficulties and would have to leave the set or confer with her acting coach. But, when the film was finished and I saw the first rushes, I literally could not take my eyes off her. So, there you have it!"

I think "it" is also in the eye of the beholder. People have mentioned Shelley Winters, who started her film career as a glamour girl, gained weight and went on to be an award winning character actress, with two Oscars to her credit. Some of those great character actors had "it." -- Ethel and Lionel Barrymore, Hattie McDaniel, Jane Darwell, Ethel Waters, Edna Mae Oliver, Claude Raines, Thomas Mitchell, and I could go on and on....

karol

 

[Lauren]

This is the first time I've ever heard of Audrey Tautou..she's adorable! She's an actress right? (I'm so not up to date with celebrities!)

Yes, she was in Amelie and A Very Long Engagement. She is, in my opinion, one of the best actresses in our current time. Her and Judi Dench.

 

[The Bingstress]

Today's It Girls?

In one of the final issues of ATOMIC Magazine (and it may have been the final issue -- my memory is failing me), we did a round-up of the "Top Ten Retro Actresses". That is, we chose the top 10 modern-day actresses we felt best exemplified that classic "it" sensibility and timeless style. They also had to have played at least one "period" role set in the 1930s-1960s. I recall that Julianne Moore was #1, and others in the running included Charlize Theron, Renee Zellweger, Katherine Zeta Jones, Natalie Portman, and Gwen Stefani (for her bit part in The Aviator and her love of vintage-inspired fashions). I don't know that I would choose the same list now, and I'm curious to hear who folks think has the classic retro "it" factor among today's starlets. (Obviously NOT Drew Barrymore, thespian gene pool aside.)

Also, as regards the "it" factor in general, one thing I discovered while living in NYC (and thus crossing paths on the street with several stars) is that people you wouldn't necessarily consider "star material" on the big screen often have a very palpable "it" quality in person (that undoubtedly helped launch their career). Case in point: I was never a fan of Matthew Modine, and never thought he was all that cute. But I once sat next to him in a cafe, and the man exuded star-quality. There was just something about him. I had the same experience to an exponential degree when I once saw JFK Jr. in a restaurant. His sex appeal and charisma was palpable throughout the entire room.

The fact that the "it" quality is so hard to define makes it so intriguing!

Hugs & blessings,
The Bingstress

 

[LizzieMaine]

I'd think Julianne Moore is still a very good choice -- check her out in "The Prize Winner of Defiance, Ohio", an indie flick from last year where she plays a spunky-but-solid-fifties-housewife part to utter perfection and without a trace of irony or self-consciousness.

And Renee Z still belongs on that list as well. She was *born* to wear marcel waves.

 

[Jack Scorpion]

Whatever you gals means when you say "it," I'd probably agree Julianne Moore's got plenty.

If you are talkin' outrageously cult-of-fame type "it," like Marilyn or Rita Hayworth, then nowadays I'd say there is nothing similar to that level. Nowadays some chick gets hot and stars in 4 movies a year, but the next day adios. For example, maybe Scarlett Johansson has got "it" right now, but probably not tomorrow.

Bruce Willis is one of the closest things I think we got to that on the male side of things, but it is his appeal to other men (mainly, I'd say) that does it. I'd go see a movie solely because Bruce Willis is in it, and I'm not really even a huge fan. I'd go see any movie with Clint Eastwood in it, because I AM a huge fan. That's a whole different matter.

I'd go see a movie solely because Marilyn or Rita were in it even though I ain't the biggest fan. I just know that they'd have the screen presence to keep my willing attention for 1.5 hours+.

(I think the actor with the most screen presence in history is James Stewart.)

Marilyn's an odd one, because she goes against a great deal of what I see in women, but I don't think any guy can see a Marilyn movie and consider any sort of other preferences he might have had. She definitely had "it."

Rita had "it" in Gilda, for sure. I'm not so sure she reached that same level at any time else.

 

[mysterygal]

Rene Russo has 'it' today as well. I totally agree with Rita Hayword having 'it' But I believe she had 'it' even after Gilda. I was actually looking through a book the other day of actresses of the 30's and 40's and Rita absolutely glowed, there were maybe three other women who can be compared to her

 

[K.D. Lightner]

myswterygal -- I have to agree with you on Rita. I saw Miss Sadie Thompson (a remake of Maughm's Rain) when I was 12 years old. Why my parents took me to see that particular film, given its subject matter, I don't know -- except it was one of the first films in 3-D.

I had no idea what the story was about, did not know what a prostitute was, or why the minister jumped off a cliff, or why he was trying to get Sadie to go back to San Francisco and turn herself in to the police, but boy was I riveted by Rita Hayworth. She played, of course, sexy Sadie, with a lot of leg showing, blowing cigarette smoke out into the audience (3-D!), and had ample cleavage, which also was enchanced by 3-D. I sat watching her with my mouth agape looking for the vwery first time at a sexy screen goddess.

Of all the actresses who portrayed Sadie Thompson, W.Somerset Maughm said that Rita was his favorite portrayal and the one who came closest to capturing her essence.

Actresses who played Sadie: Joan Crawford, Jeanne Eagles, the formidable Tallulah Bankhead, and others on Broadway and in films.

karol

 

[mysterygal]

What's interesting about Rita Hayworth is that while on screen she portrays confidence I have read she was really quite shy and a bit insecure, but that was her magic, turn the lights on (or camera ) and she became her character.

 

[Pilgrim]

I can't believe no one has mentioned this incredible lady - Sophia Loren.

She draws the eye every time she's on screen, and still does so today.

She has always been at the very top for me. Class, style, and timeless beauty.

 

[Tourbillion]

I was going to post a recent photo of Sophia Loren, but couldn't get it to link. She still looks great, a clasic beauty.

 

[Matt Deckard]

Gail Russel has been recomended as having it.