In MemoriamSome Came Running by Glenn Kenny

Kathryn Grayson, 1922-2010

By February 18, 2010January 12th, 202610 Comments

Grayson

She was charm­ing, she was grace­ful, she had the voice of an angel, and—not too put too fine a point on it or come off as lout­ish or anything—she was supes hot, in a way that still retains its impact for con­tem­por­ary sens­ib­il­it­ies. Bless Kathryn Grayson—the above image is from 1945’s Anchors Aweigh—whose film career was too short for my taste. I see she did a Murder, She Wrote epis­ode; the Lovely Wife and I shall have to pull it down from the shelf tonight. My pals at The Auteurs’ have some links to some nice Grayson appre­ci­ations and, bet­ter still, clips, here.

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10 Comments

  • lazarus says:
    February 18, 2010 at 9:14 pm

    You and the wife have The Complete Murder She Wrote on the shelf?

  • Glenn Kenny says:
    February 18, 2010 at 9:37 pm

    I think we’re miss­ing Season 9. But the Grayson stuff—three epis­odes, it turns out!—is Season 4, so we’re good to go. My Lovely Wife adores both Angela Lansbury and the silly series, and I have come to share that love. And when I ran Première’s Home Guide, I was on EVERY Universal Home Vid divi­sion list, so I got a lot of the sets gratis, which helped make col­lect­ing rather effortless.
    We make sure to attend all of the divine Miss Lansbury’s recent Broadway engage­ments: “Deuce,” “Blithe Spirit” (fab­ulous), and next month we’re doing “A Little Night Music.” We’re mad about the gal!

  • lazarus says:
    February 18, 2010 at 11:24 pm

    I was plan­ning on get­ting the DVD of the stage pro­duc­tion of Sweeney Todd, and was look­ing for­ward to see­ing Lansbury’s take on Mrs. Lovett. I’m going to assume she’s bet­ter than Helena Bonham Carter. Amazing that she’s still per­form­ing on Broadway.

  • Ed Hulse says:
    February 18, 2010 at 11:28 pm

    Another sad day. Katy was one of my boy­hood crushes. And, when I met her years later, a most charm­ing lady. With the excep­tion of Alice Faye, was there a more whole­somely sexy song­bird in movies?

  • Tom says:
    February 19, 2010 at 12:43 am

    Lansbury was indeed a splen­did Ms. Lovett, but it was filmed at the end of a long tour, which itself did­n’t com­mence until after a two-year Broadway run; and by that time, her inter­pret­a­tion had become a bit broad­er that it is on the ori­gin­al cast album. But the film does have a bet­ter Sweeney (George Hearn, who took over from the uncha­ris­mat­ic and vocally under­powered Len Cariou), a good sup­port­ing cast (except­ing the Johanna from hell), and the chance to see Prince’s Brechtian con­cep­tion of the thing (minus a few more extra­vag­ant touches that got cut for the tour – if memory serves, a crane moved things around on stage).

  • Carrie says:
    February 19, 2010 at 1:16 pm

    Back in the 1980s when the 8th Street Playhouse did a 3‑D ret­ro­spect­ive, the high­light was “Kiss Me, Kate,” with Grayson. When she swiveled from pro­file to front­al dur­ing her duet with Howard Keel on “Wunderbar,” every­one in the theat­er pulled back his/her head to steer clear of the incom­ing cleav­age. Keel said that she was the most beau­ti­ful act­ress in Hollywood. As for whole­somely sexy song­birds, yes, Ed, KG is up there with Alice Faye, Ginger Rogers and Deanna Durbin.

  • jbryant says:
    February 20, 2010 at 6:06 am

    For whatever reas­on, Kathryn Grayson nev­er steamed my specs the way Linda Darnell or Ava Gardner did, but I cer­tainly appre­ci­ated her charms, vocal and oth­er­wise, in KISS ME KATE, one of my favor­ite movies (even though I’ve nev­er seen it in 3‑D). RIP.
    Now that I know Glenn is a MURDER, SHE WROTE fan I feel I can come for­ward and admit, nay, con­fess, that I nev­er missed that show dur­ing most of its run. I’ve always loved Angela Lansbury, and I’ve got a great Oscar-bait part for her, if I can just get the script to Clint Eastwood to dir­ect. Angie, baby, if you (or Clint) see this, give me a shout.

  • The Siren says:
    February 20, 2010 at 2:37 pm

    Jbryant, Glenn and I came out as big MSW fans a while back. One of many reas­ons I love the series is the cast­ing of old-time stars in guest parts, much like Columbo, a series I am quietly fan­at­ic­al about too.
    I haven’t writ­ten about Grayson yet and don’t know if I will be able to, but I was sad to note her passing. She was uncom­monly beau­ti­ful, one of those bomb­shell bod­ies with a whole­some mien; in addi­tion to Faye and Durbin I’d add Grable, and I also think of her in the same breath with Jane Russell. My favor­ite Grayson role is the little seen Frank Borzage out­ing Seven Sweethearts, in which she has a fairy-tale role as the young­est sis­ter and handles it with great warmth. I also like her very much in Kiss Me Kate.

  • jbryant says:
    February 20, 2010 at 8:05 pm

    Siren: Yes, the guest star factor was a major part of MSW’s appeal for this cinephile, ditto COLUMBO.

  • Mike D says:
    February 22, 2010 at 8:48 pm

    Goodnight, Aunt Susie.