The movie ending Katharine Hepburn loathed: “The worst bunch of shit I’ve ever read”
One of the most widely regarded actors in Hollywood history, if you wanted a snapshot of the kind of woman Katharine Hepburn was then you need only two facts. Firstly, she holds an Oscars record that will likely never be broken in our lifetimes and she point blank refused to not wear trousers despite being regularly lobbied to do so by unwelcome studio executives.
The first fact suggests that Hepburn knew a great picture when she saw one, having picked up four Academy Awards for acting — a feat yet unmatched by anyone since. The second fact is clear confirmation that Katharine Hepburn, affectionately known as Kate by her friends, was not comfortable with compromise. On her values, on her work or just about anything at all.
This steadfast resolution to work for herself in the right way meant Hepburn was happy to pass comment on the movies that she felt let down her talent, even if, in her earlier days, she couldn’t necessarily change the course of the movie. One such picture was Woman of the Year. The 1942 rom-com starred Hepburn opposite Spencer Tracy and was a classic of the genre. As such, it has since been selected for preservation in the United States National Film Registry by the Library of Congress as being “culturally, historically, or aesthetically significant”.
However, the movie almost ended completely differently. After catching an early cut of the film, legendary writer Joseph Mankiewicz and director George Stevens rang the alarm that all was not right. The original ending had Hepburn’s Tess Harding, ace journalist and unflinching cosmopolitan, falling head over heels for her husband’s great love: baseball.
Now, you might think it is quite usual for a spouse to enjoy the hobby of their love, but honestly, in real life, how many times does this happen? Not just tolerating the existence of said hobby, but falling into it and perhaps even liking it more than they ever did. But it wasn’t just the love of baseball; the two men felt like Tess needed to be humbled somewhat; she needed to fail and show the audience a crack in her porcelain image.
So Stevens reached back to an old gag from his silent film days: a woman trying and failing to make breakfast. A bit of slapstick humility in the kitchen would apparently deliver what was needed. It left more than a few people fuming. Ring Lardner Jr and Michael Kanin were left furious when they learned that John Lee Mahin had been drafted in for the new comedic ending. Lardner said of the new ending: “Some of the worst lines we rewrote, but we couldn’t fix it, we couldn’t change it fundamentally”.
But perhaps the worst critique came from Hepburn herself who called it “the worst bunch of shit I’ve ever read”.
The new ending, despite protestations, was widely loved. According to Mankiewicz, however, they cheered not just with admiration, but with relief. “Now,” he said, “They could turn to their schmuck husbands and say, ‘She may know Batista, but she can’t even make a cup of coffee, you silly bastard.’”
While it might feel like a defeat for the defiant Hepburn, the truth is that she had already won the battle when she sold the picture to Mankiewicz for $250,000, proving that she wasn’t just an actor, she was a pioneer.
