- Katina Paxinou, For Whom The Bell Tolls, 1942. The Greek star won in The clinches with such other old-timers as Fay Bainter, Alla Nazimova Pola Negri, Flora Robson, Marjorie Rambeau, Gloria Swanson, Norma Talmadge…. and the Barrymore who dared reject a marriage proposal from… Winston Churchill.
- Leopoldine Konstantin, Notorious, 1945. David O Selznick, the original producer, wanted Ethel Barrymore as the domineering mother of Rio’s Nazi master spy, Claude Rains. No thank you! DOS said much the same about Alfred Hitchcock’ and Ben Hecht’s scenario – he did not understand it and sold kt off to RKO! Once obtaining Cary Grant and Ingrid Bergman, Hitch signed the celebrated Austro-hungarian actress – and billed her as Madame Leopoldine Konstantin. In fact, it was her only American film and, the last of her 51l films. Why not more in Hollywood movies? “My very first part and they made me in this monster.” US TV treated her more kindly.
- Florence Auer, That Forsyte Woman, 1949. Producer David O Selznick planned John Galsworthy’s novel in 1933 as a literal family movie… with all the Barrymore siblings together for the first time since Rasputin and the Empress, 1932.
- Gertrude Lawrence, The Glass Menagerie, 1949. The first Tennessee Williams play to be filmed. By Elia Kazan? Not at all. Irving Rapper got the gig, having moved up from, dialogue director to full-time helmer – and surviving three battles Bros chose Tallulah Bankhead – and sacked her on the second day for being sloshed on-set! Rapper suggested Miriam Hopkins (no way, said Jack Warner), rejected Ethel Barrymore (too old) and Ruth Chatterton (too Ruth Chatterton. He said the brass “positively screamed when I mentioned Bette Davis… That left Gertrude Lawrence, who had little camera experience and was so very jittery she’d cry every time a take was spoiled.” Later versions were way better, even those made in Bollywood and Iran.
- Agnes Moorehead, Show Boat, 1950. Booked for Parthy Hawks, Barrymore had to back out due to a crowded diary. Mildred Natwick was considered before Moorehead was signed.
- Lilian Gish, Night Of The Hunter, 1954. For his one and only – and classic – directing gig, Charles Laughton was spoilt for choice for guardian angel Rachel Cooper. He saw Gish, Barrymore, Jane Darwell, Louise Fazenda, Helen Hayes, Agnes Moorehead and, of course, his wife, Elsa Lanchester.
Birth year: 1879Death year: 1959Other name: Casting Calls: 6