Thank Heaven for Leslie Caron
We know Leslie Caron is a star. During the 1950s, she twinkled as the gamines Lise, Lili, Gigi, Gaby and Fanny -- and that was just her first decade in Hollywood, before the accomplished dancer dazzled moviegoers with her dramatic chops in The L-Shaped Room (1962), as a pregnant (and unmarried) woman who takes command of her future. She likewise dazzled other dancers, and may be the only woman who danced with Fred Astaire, Mikhail Baryshnikov, Gene Kelly and Rudolf Nureyev.
On December 8 Caron's star will be permanently fixed in the Hollywood firmament, when she dedicates her star on the Hollywood Walk of Fame. She will have a poetic piece of real estate, between the stars of Gene Kelly (with whom she danced in An American in Paris) and Louis Jourdan (with whom she sang in Gigi).
The formidable Miss Caron, 78, conquered Philadelphia yesterday with a noontime appearance at the Free Library and her evening celebration by the Alliance Francaise, where she spoke about her memoir, Thank Heaven (its title taken from the opening song in Gigi), a book trim, candid and witty as its author (an accomplished writer who in 1982 published Vengeance, a haunting collection of short stories). When I interviewed Miss C yesterday at the Library, I mentioned that in its compassion, Thank Heaven was unusual for a Hollywood memoir. "It is also unusual for a Hollywood memoir in that its subject actually wrote it," was her riposte.
The most colorful passages of the book -- which chronicles her affair with the legendary stage director Peter Hall, whom she married, and that with legendary Hollywood romeo Warren Beatty, whom she did not -- are of the first impressions of this Parisienne in America. She was 18 when she left the privations of postwar Paris for the privileges of Hollywood. "I was immediately assigned an agent, like the accused is assigned a lawyer," she writes. But the most moving passages involve Caron's frank discussion of her insecurities about her talent, her looks and her choices. A lifelong learner, the famously disciplined Caron seriously studied acting between Hollywood films with the same commitment she later brought to learning how to write. She is a gifted storyteller, and has some great stories to tell. (She also looks like no one else, with that cinegenic coloring of dark hair, pale blue eyes and those sculpted cheeks The Rockies may crumble, Gibraltar may tumble, they're only made of clay -- but Caron's cheekbones are here to stay. If you're in Philadelphia, be sure to catch the show of Cecil Beaton portraits of Caron at the Calderwood Gallery.)
In her book she is remarkably discreet about her screen rival Audrey Hepburn -- they were roughly the same age and considered for many of the same roles -- except to set the record straight that she did not steal Gigi from Hepburn (who originated the role on Broadway). In fact, Caron writes, it was Gigi producer Arthur Freed who helped Hepburn get her signature role in Funny Face. Though both European-born actresses played gamines spoke a lilting English and began as dancers, Hepburn's persona is frisky and puppyish while Caron's self-possession is wary and Sphinx like.
As with European history and so many actresses, the Middle Ages were hard for Miss Caron, who in her middle years made classics like The Man Who Loved Women for Francois Truffaut and Contract for Krysztof Zanussi. But, after Caron's middle ages came the Renaissance, with extraordinary performances in Damage, Chocolat, Funny Bones and Le Divorce. After interviewing Miss C, I immediately wanted to screen Lili, Gigi, Fanny, L-Shaped Room, and the extraordinary Funny Bones.
Favorite Caron film?