Over The Edge

"I'm a song and dance girl. I can act enough to get by. But that's the limit of my talents." -- Betty Grable, turning down the meaty role of the doomed, drunken Sophie in The Razor's Edge (1946), for which Anne Baxter eventually won an Oscar

Anne Baxter in The Razor's Edge (20th Century Fox, 1946)

"I'm an actress, not a personality. It's more successful to be a personality." -- Anne Baxter

Anne Baxter in Carnival Story (RKO, 1954)

"Are you kidding? Fans would expect me to rise up out of the water with lily pads in my hair, singing 'Hooray for Hollywood.'" -- Betty Grable, referring to Sophie's dipsomaniacal demise at the bottom of the Seine in The Razor's Edge

Betty Grable in Three for the Show (Columbia, 1955)

Role Play

Today, we're inaugurating a series of posts which take some quick peeks into "what might have been" -- the stars who were originally intended for some of our favorite films. These posts are tailor-made for lots of commentary and fun hypothesizing, so we encourage audience participation (and also welcome suggestions for future posts)! Have fun, darlings!

Paulette Goddard in Reap the Wild Wind (Paramount, 1942)

"The longest and most extensive search for a screen heroine ended today when Paulette Goddard was signed to a long term contract by David O. Selznick, producer of Gone with the Wind..." -- Louella Parsons' column, February 3, 1938

"Who's going to play Scarlett in Gone with the Wind? Paulette Goddard, and worry no more about it..." -- Buck Herzog's column, December 4, 1938

"Vivien Leigh, the young English actress who will play Scarlett O'Hara in the screen dramatization of Gone with the Wind, was 'terribly nervous'...but at the same time 'grateful beyond words.'" -- Associated Press, January 15, 1939

Vivien Leigh in Gone with the Wind (Selznick International/MGM, 1939)

Blind Item

From Earl Wilson's column, February 4, 1966: "The feud on the picture, The Group, started when there were only two make-up women for eight stars. One young gal said, 'Let _______ go first, because she's the oldest and will take the longest time.' After that, it got worse."

Sincerely Yours

Monique Van Vooren: "You know, Mamie Van Doren is very pretty."

 

Friend: "You don't mean that!"

 

Monique Van Vooren: "No, I don't."

No Reservations

"She isn't red-faced with a hatchet nose like most American Indians...Maybe she is a Venezuelan Indian. You see, I don't know her very well." -- Maria Montez on Acquanetta

The Sincerest Form Of Flattery

"Get that two-bit whore outta here!" -- Jil Jarmyn doing her best Susan Hayward impersonation, upon catching Hayward in bed with her fiancé, Don "Red" Barry

Plays Well With Others

"Ava, I grew up in Brooklyn with Murder Incorporated as my playmates...Ava, you know I mean it." -- Shelley Winters confronting Ava Gardner over the latter's affair with her husband, Tony Franciosa

Cold As Ice

"When they invited me to the premiere, I sent off a 200 word telegram telling why I wouldn't attend -- and I sent it collect!" -- Carol Channing on losing the film version of Gentlemen Prefer Blondes (1953) to Marilyn Monroe

The Eternal Question

"Take away the pop-eyes, the cigarette, and those funny clipped words and what have you got?" -- Joan Crawford on Bette Davis

That Was No Lady

"Why am I so good at playing bitches? I think it's because I'm not a bitch. Maybe that's why Miss Crawford always plays ladies." -- Bette Davis on Joan Crawford

Losers, Weepers

"Darling, couldn't you have waited until next year?" -- Gloria Swanson to Judy Holliday after losing the Oscar

Strange Bedfellows

"I'll have a nicer dressing room than you, because, let's face it -- I'm the star of the picture." -- Elizabeth Montgomery to Who's Been Sleeping in My Bed (1963) co-star Carol Burnett*

* Reportedly said in jest!

All Of Me

"They come to see only parts of Ekberg, but all of Tucker!" -- Sophie Tucker on attracting more visitors to the Paramount lot than Anita Ekberg 

Try This On For Size

"Kim's gotten too big for her...britches." -- Barbara Nichols on Kim Novak

That Continental Touch

"I don't care what she does in her private life, but she shouldn't ridicule marriage and decency in public." -- Corinne Calvet on Zsa Zsa Gabor

You Take The High Road...

"There is no feud. I have never had a feud with anyone. But if I ever considered having a feud, it would be with one of the stars of the film." -- Dorothy Lamour on being "replaced" in the Bing Crosby/Bob Hope film, Road to Hong Kong (1962), by Joan Collins

If You Don't Have Anything Nice To Say...

Starting tomorrow, Sunday the 15th, we will be turning into SSUWAT into an unmitigated dish-and-bitch fest, darlings! Our "dueling diva" quotation posts have always been audience favorites, so we've compiled some new goodies for you to savor, all for the next two weeks. Grab your poison pen and your favorite Hedda Hopper hat, and we'll see you there!

"Louella Parsons is a reporter trying to be a ham. Hedda Hopper is a ham trying to be a reporter." -- Hedda Hopper in her 1963 book, The Whole Truth And Nothing But

Ooh, How Wundaful!

Costume sketches for Lucille Ball by Bob Mackie 

Be A Team Player

It's easy when you're your own group.

One Bad Apple

Bette Davis and Olivia de Havilland in In This Our Life (Warner Bros., 1942)

Jo Ann Marlowe and Ann Blyth in Mildred Pierce (Warner Bros., 1945)

Kim Hunter and Vivien Leigh in A Streetcar Named Desire (Warner Bros., 1951)

Faith Domergue and Linda Darnell in This Is My Love (RKO, 1954)

Rhonda Fleming and Arlene Dahl in Slightly Scarlet (RKO, 1956)

Mamie Van Doren and Elinor Donahue in Girls Town (MGM, 1959)

Sisters. It's Complicated.

We're So Excited

Raquel Welch turns 73 today! 

We are not certain of the age of her wigs.

RAQUEL WELCH

September 5, 1940