The “fascinating, full-blooded” co-star Cary Grant adored: “I commend her highly to you”
Cary Grant got to work with a lot of Hollywood starlets during his illustrious career. This golden era for mainstream American cinema saw many iconic actors pair up, often multiple times, and Grant worked with several female actors with whom he would become known for sharing the screen.
In the early days of his career, the British actor appeared in two films with Mae West, the scandalous icon who was known for her bawdy sense of humour and boundary-pushing explorations of sexually liberated characters. Grant wasn’t a fan of working with West on She Done Him Wrong and I’m No Angel, though, once exclaiming that “working with Mae West was terrible. No, not terrible, just disconcerting. She certainly did not discover me.”
You’d also often catch Grant starring alongside the likes of Irene Dunne, Ginger Rogers, and, more notably, Katharine Hepburn – a firm favourite of his. With those dashing looks, effortless charm, and spot-on comic timing, Grant had a knack for clicking with the right co-stars, and when he did, the chemistry was pure gold. Just look at Bringing Up Baby – watching him and Hepburn spar and swoon is an absolute treat, and it remains one of his finest turns.
And then there was Ingrid Bergman, the Swedish star of many iconic movies like Casablanca and Autumn Sonata, with whom Grant shared the screen twice. Their first collaboration came in 1946 when they were cast alongside each other in Alfred Hitchcock’s Notorious. It was a hit for the British filmmaker, with the movie anchored down by two great performances from Grant and Bergman with their sparkling chemistry.
Over a decade later, they reunited for Indiscreet by Stanley Donen, which was a pretty successful romantic comedy following the pair as they fall in love. It’s a charming film from the Singin’ in the Rain director, and it further solidified their bond, which translated to the screen perfectly. It helps that in real life, the duo were friends, and Grant spoke highly of Bergman, whom he greatly admired.
In his memoir, Archie Leach, Grant described his admiration for the star, writing, “Ingrid Bergman: a fascinating, full-blooded yet temperate woman who has the courage to live in accord with her needs, and strength enough to accept and benefit by the consequences of her beliefs in an inhibited, critical and frightened society.”
Grant stuck by Bergman when she was at the centre of controversy following her affair with filmmaker Roberto Rossellini, which resulted in the conception of several children. People were outraged by Bergman and she was temporarily exiled from Hollywood, so when she won her ‘Best Actress’ Oscar in 1957 for Anastasia, it was none other than Grant who was there to pick up the award on her behalf.
Sure, she’d made some mistakes, but Grant wasn’t going to cast his friend aside like the rest of Hollywood because he thought a lot of his co-star.
“Ingrid needs no uninvited busybody to proclaim her debts; she knows and pays them herself. I commend her highly to you,” he concluded.
