{"id":1277,"date":"2013-03-28T14:34:55","date_gmt":"2013-03-28T18:34:55","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.tr10023.com\/?p=1277"},"modified":"2017-07-12T20:42:48","modified_gmt":"2017-07-13T00:42:48","slug":"scene-stealers-in-rebecca","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"http:\/\/www.tr10023.com\/?p=1277","title":{"rendered":"Scene Stealers in ‘Rebecca’"},"content":{"rendered":"
\"Rebecca:

Rebecca: Original Poster.<\/strong><\/p><\/div>\n

What I like most about Alfred Hitchcock’s “Rebecca” (Selznick International, 1940) are the performances by the half dozen character actors in the smaller roles. Pauline Kael complained that it was one of Laurence Olivier’s rare bad performances; I think he’s actually better than he was in a lot of his other pictures (he’s best in “Henry V” and “Richard III”). He doesn’t have much to work with as Maxim de Winter, but he looks good and sounds right — he’s just not terribly interesting. Joan Fontaine plays awkwardness quite well, but she can’t resist the urge to telegraph emotions as a sort of semaphore (e.g., Quizzical Look 6(a):\u00a0raise left eyebrow, cast eyes downward, count one, then cock head) — once you crack her simple code, she’s rather touching. Later on in her career, she hardened up and was no fun to watch, except as an object of ridicule: her by-the-numbers acting made the Method seem a breath of fresh air, when it came along about a decade later.<\/p>\n

\"Fontaine,<\/a>

Joan Fontaine, Laurence Olivier: \u00a0Mr and Mrs Maxim de Winter of Cornwall.<\/strong><\/p><\/div>\n

Judith Anderson’s sepulchral housekeeper, Mrs Danvers, is the character most people remember, and with good reason. I doubt Miss Anderson ever was better suited to a role, but I find that the character practically plays itself: it’s to Anderson’s credit that she stays out of the way, neither over-emphasizing Mrs Danvers’ creepiness nor commenting on her apparent lesbianism and necrophilia. She plays her as a blank, with her cards close to her chest, as it were. In those scenes where she tips her hand and we see her malevolence, her words betray her cruelty, not Anderson’s performance.<\/p>\n

\"Joan<\/a>

Joan Fontaine (sporting Quizzical Look 6(a)), Judith Anderson: ‘You’ve nothing to stay for. You’ve nothing to live for really, have you?’<\/strong><\/p><\/div>\n

Florence Bates, in the small, but important role of Edythe Van Hopper, gives a truly great performance. The dreadful Mrs Van Hopper is a cartoon of the selfish, overfed society matron who treats her servants badly and fawns on her social betters. It takes great skill to play this sort of character. Mrs Van Hopper is hateful in every conceivable way: she’s suspicious, venomous, gluttonous, dishonest, vain, bad-tempered, and perhaps worst of all, a cracking bore. Yet her nastiness must do more than merely appall us: it must also make us laugh. She must horrify us, but we shouldn’t be anxious to be rid of her before she has served her purpose in the story’s clockwork. We must enjoy hating her.\u00a0Florence Bates has no equal when it comes to this sort of battleaxe. Her trick is always to be as imaginative as possible. She’s never a generalized harridan: she’s always specific.\u00a0Look at her in this scene:<\/p>\n