SPOTLIGHT ON WILLIAM HOLDEN

William Holden was one of the biggest box office draws of the 1950s. A combination of good looks and acting ability made him a sought after actor. His association with Bing came in a few ways. He starred with Bing in the tense drama The Country Girl in 1954. Like Bing, Holden dated his co-star from the movie Grace Kelly. Then after Bing died in 1977, Bill Holden narrated a documentary on Bing a year later. Like Crosby, Holden was one of the leader movie actors. However, personal demons derailed his career in the 1960s and caused him to have a tragic end in 1981. 

Holden, eldest of three sons (brothers were Robert and Richard), was born William Franklin Beedle, Jr. in O'Fallon, Illinois on April 17, 1918, the son of Congregationalist parents Mary Blanche (née Ball), a schoolteacher, and William Franklin Beedle, Sr., an industrial chemist. Holden's first starring role was in Golden Boy (1939), in which he played a violinist turned boxer. That was followed by the role of George Gibbs in the film adaptation of Our Town.

After Columbia Pictures picked up half of his contract, he alternated between starring in several minor pictures for Paramount and Columbia before serving as a 2nd lieutenant in the United States Army Air Forces during World War II, where he acted in training films. Beginning in 1950, his career took off when Billy Wilder tapped him to star as the down-at-the-heels screenwriter Joe Gillis who is taken in by faded silent-screen star Norma Desmond (Gloria Swanson) in Sunset Boulevard, for which Holden earned his first Best Actor Oscar nomination.

Following this breakthrough film, he played a series of roles that combined good looks with cynical detachment, including a prisoner-of-war entrepreneur in Stalag 17 (1953), for which he won the Academy Award for Best Actor, a pressured young engineer/family man in Executive Suite (1954), an acerbic stage director in The Country Girl (1954), a conflicted jet pilot in the Korean War film The Bridges at Toko-Ri (1954), a wandering braggart in Picnic (1955), a dashing war correspondent in Love Is a Many-Splendored Thing (1955), an ill-fated prisoner in The Bridge on the River Kwai (1957) and a WWII tug boat captain in The Key (1958).

He also played a number of sunnier roles in light comedy, such as the handsome architect pursuing virginal Maggie McNamara in the controversial Production Code-breaking The Moon is Blue (1953), as Judy Holliday's tutor in Born Yesterday (1950), as a playwright captivated by Ginger Rogers' character in Forever Female (1953) and as Humphrey Bogart's younger brother, a playboy, in Sabrina (1954), which also starred Audrey Hepburn.

Holden starred in his share of forgettable movies — which he was forced to do by studio contracts — such as Paris When It Sizzles (1964), also co-starring Audrey Hepburn. By the mid-1960s, his roles were having less critical and commercial impact. According to the Los Angeles County Coroner's autopsy report, on November 12, 1981, Holden was alone and intoxicated in his apartment in Santa Monica, California, when he slipped on a throw rug, severely lacerated his forehead on a teak bedside table, and bled to death. Evidence suggests he was conscious for at least a half hour after the fall but may not have realized the severity of the injury and did not summon aid, or was unable to call for help. His body was found four days later.

Holden dictated in his will that the Neptune Society cremate him and scatter his ashes in the Pacific Ocean. No funeral or memorial service was held, per his wishes...

GUEST REVIEWER: THE COUNTRY GIRL

Bruce Kogan is an avid classic movie fan and a huge supporter of Bing Crosby. I am proud and honored to be able to publish his take on THE COUNTRY GIRL (1954) here...

THE COUNTRY GIRL(1954) by Bruce Kogan Bing Crosby's career reached its dramatic heights in The Country Girl. In fact the trio of Crosby, Grace Kelly, and William Holden all hit incredible highs with this one. Clifford Odets's play was a good backstage drama without any great political statement that characterized his earlier work It would be another three years before Bing Crosby would do a film without singing at all. But for those who've never seen the Odets play, the story is one without any music. Crosby's role on Broadway was originated by Paul Kelly.

When Paramount bought the screen rights they had Harold Arlen and Ira Gershwin write the songs that Crosby sings in The Country Girl. Curiously enough none of them, good that they were, became any kind of hit for Bing. Also this was Ira Gershwin's last score for either the stage of screen. It's fitting that Grace Kelly won her Oscar for this part. Uta Hagen who played Georgie Elgin on Broadway won a Tony for her performance. Kelly was up against some stiff competition that year and upset the betting favorite Judy Garland for A Star Is Born. Other nominees included Dorothy Dandridge for Carmen Jones, Jane Wyman for Magnificent Obsession and Audrey Hepburn for Sabrina. I suppose it was the fact that Kelly was cast against type in her portrayal. Usually playing chic blonde princesses, she's almost dowdy looking in this film.


Crosby plumbed some dramatic depths also and was nominated for Frank Elgin. However after three successive years of being nominated and not winning, Marlon Brando was not going to be denied in 1954. The rest of that field included Humphrey Bogart for The Caine Mutiny, James Mason for A Star Is Born and Dan O'Herlihy for Robinson Crusoe. Not a shabby field there either and Crosby's personal best came up against Brando's consolation for not winning for Streetcar Named Desire. Oscar politics at its finest. Bill Holden's part of Bernie Dodd was originated on Broadway by Steven Hill who today's audiences know as DA Adam Schiff from Law and Order. After years of playing what he called "Smiling Jim" roles, his acting took on some bite with Sunset Boulevard. He's a cynical man here also, but there was an additional edge here.

One of the plot elements was alcoholic Crosby knowing about Holden's bad marriage and using that knowledge to blame his bad behavior on Kelly. Holden was in the midst of a bad marriage himself, the only one he ever had. Marked by bitterness, recriminations, and mutual infidelities, he and Brenda Marshall stayed married for over 20 years for the sake of their children. When Holden's Bernie Dodd talks about his former wife there's an edge that I'm sure came from personal experience. The only other role of any size is that of producer Phil Cook and it's played Anthony Ross. Another plot element is Holden's championing Crosby going head to head a few times with Ross who never really wanted him in his show. One of Ross's condition to using Crosby is that he given a contract with a two weeks notice clause and not a run of the play contract. Ross gets hoisted on his own petard for that one. Sadly this was Ross's last film, he died the following year. The Country Girl is mature and intelligent and avoids the usual Hollywood clichés concerning show business stories. Even if you're not a fan of any or all of its three stars, this can be enjoyed on its artistic merits...