Bitesize Best Actress Oscar Profiles: Grace Moore

Grace Moore in "One Night of Love"

Lost the 1934 Best Actress Oscar to Claudette Colbert in "It Happened One Night"

Grade: **

Grace Moore is, on the face of it, a sprightly amalgam of Norma Shearer and Irene Dunne; if not quite as naturally magnetic a presence as either, soundly aware of how to work the screen and sexualise a role without coming across as a one-track maneater. The first shot of Moore's character, Mary, is an illuminated view from below a window, as she voices the film's title track with the operatic bravado of a musical Goddess. As it turns out, Mary's assured pipes are a fledgling, untamed beast, as she participates in and fails to win a talent competition, much to the chagrin of her parents. When she eventually decides to take the plunge and travel to Italy, she falls in love with renowned musical composer Giulio Monteverdi, who helps her develop a singing career.

As a production, "One Night of Love" evolves from a bit of harmless artistry, to a tempestuous battle over pride and power between two rashly-compartmentalised characters, but is nonetheless entertaining enough to make us care about these characters, despite their many misgivings. The problem for Moore is that the soapy levels of petulance in the script limit her performance to a bit of a flailing sideshow, too obviously facetious and throwaway in framing Mary's frustration towards her dictatorial singing coach and would-be lover. Her defiance of him feels too playful when one considers the more formally romantic inclinations of the final act, and the thoughtful, sterner approach of co-lead Carminati does little to disguise Moore's misjudgements.

She does, however, manage to channel Mary's inherent sense of performance, both in her stage scenes (well-positioned within the film), and in trying to orchestrate a finality in her relationship with Giulio. Their live-in arrangement is largely an unspoken affair, and Moore ably demonstrates Mary's inability to deal with the lover-pupil duality of their romance. Is she "performing" to make him act one way or the other? To an extent, certainly, but as eminently watchable and thoughtful an Actress as she appears to be, Moore is too susceptible to the trials of her character, and doesn't quite give Mary credit enough. A high-end two stars, but two stars nonetheless.

Bitesize Best Actress Oscar Profiles: Claudette Colbert

Claudette Colbert in "Private Worlds"

Lost the 1935 Best Actress Oscar to Bette Davis in "Dangerous"

Grade: ***

Even if Claudette Colbert couldn't quite emulate Bette Davis, Greer Garson, and Irene Dunne in gaining Default Nominee status in the Thirties and Forties, she managed to win an Oscar before all of them. Just two months prior to the release of Gregory La Cava's "Private Worlds" Colbert was picking up the 1934 Best Actress Oscar for It Happened One Night, and she was clearly in the mind of the Academy when they doubled the number of nominees from three to six in 1935. "Private Worlds" represents a huge departure from Frank Capra's romantic comedy to more ethical, issue-driven dilemna, set in a psychiatric hospital under upheaval from new boss Charles Boyer.

If the "worlds" referenced in the title are a very vague way of suggesting that everybody has skeletons in their closets, the result isn't quite so juicy. La Cava spends the first twenty-five minutes of the film establishing that Colbert's Jane is a paladin of humanist know-how, solving any problems that she encounters and maintaining her composure at the testiest of times. Colbert's grace can often serve her well, and her soft expressions suggest a maternal, knowing affection that always helps to see her inside of the character. It's a weapon that's effective in her final nominated-performance in David O. Selznick's Since You Went Away, where it moulds nicely into the maternal instinct of her wartime housewife. In "Private Worlds", however, Colbert's radiating comfort can tend to align itself with Jane's insipid lack of fault, and it feels as if she's too plainly bringing out the inarguable competencies of the character.

Colbert recognises that Jane's passivity generates as much tension and conflict within the hospital as it does calmness, and there's an aloof charm about her that suggests a 'Private World' underneath that immovable exterior. The film tends to lampoon tidbits of backstory onto Jane, as when Colbert is forced to divulge a story of a former lover killed in the war, and in its constant liberal placement of her in so ethically strong a position. It's somewhat of a stretch for us to really care about failed romances and workplace prejudice. Colbert herself is adept at generating empathy, and she deals with the martinet tendencies of the script supremely, proffering a learned, studious faux-ambivalence to Jane's outlook and how she copes with internal politics and confrontation. Does she secretly court attention? Is the hospital's hierarchy really none of her concern? Colbert implants more greys into our perception of Jane than initially promised, and carries the film through its dourest periods of nonchalance.