The Stanwyck Proxy
In 1941, Barabara Stanwyck played a part in four movies, Meet John Doe, The Lady Eve, Ball of Fire, and You Belong to Me. I’ve seen two of the four. In fact, The Lady Eve lead me to believe that she was the most exciting actress EVER to have graced the silver screen. They’re pretty good movies, and each one has earned praise and reknown from critics and fans alike. I wonder what the other two of her films were like. Ball of Fire is being released next month on DVD, so I am eagerly waiting its appearance.
You don’t believe me that she’s one of the most exciting actresses EVER?
Check out Anthony Lane’s Stanwyck appreciation piece in The New Yorker.
Check out The Lady Eve. She has Henry Fonda tripping over herself. It’s a movie on AFI’s list of 100 comedies and 100 passionate movies. You’ll mainly laugh at her hijinxs.
Check out Meet John Doe. She fast-talks the editor of the newspaper into pulling off the hoax of the year. And this is where the title of this post comes in. I believe that the coen brothers were looking for a Stanwyck type when they wrote The Hudsucker Proxy. It is a direct riff on many of the films she’s appeared in. The Hudsucker Proxy seems to have gotten lots from Meet John Doe. Smitty. “That gag’s got whiskers!” I loved Hudsucker Proxy, a personal favorite coen brothers movie, but love it even more knowing that Jennifer Jason Leigh seems to have been channeling Barbara Stanwyck.
She’s just groovy.
