NORMA SHEARER in “MARIE ANTOINETTE” – At the Legion of Honor, January 13th

San Francisco Sentinel’s fine arts critic will introduce MGM’s “Queen Of The Lot”

By Seán Martinfield
Sentinel Fine Arts Critic
Copyright © 2007 San Francisco Sentinel
On Saturday afternoon, January 13th, at 3:00 PM, the Legion of Honor presents MGM’s monumental screen classic from 1938, “MARIE ANTOINETTE”. Starring legendary Hollywood beauty Norma Shearer in her most celebrated role, this special event screening is in conjunction with the Legion’s current exhibit, MARIE-ANTOINETTE AND THE PETIT TRIANON AT VERSAILLES. The film will be presented in the beautiful Louis XVI style Florence Gould Theatre located on the Legion’s lower level. Seán Martinfield, fine arts critic for the San Francisco Sentinel, will introduce the film and discuss Norma Shearer’s reputation as “Queen of the Lot” at MGM Studios. The film is included with an Admission Ticket to the museum. The Legion of Honor is located in San Francisco’s Lincoln Park at 34th Avenue and Clement Street.

NORMA SHEARER – Marie Antoinette (MGM, 1938
Co-starring with Norma Shearer is the 24-year old Tyrone Power, then a rising contract player with 20th Century Fox. He was hand-picked by Miss Shearer for the role of the Queen’s lover, “Axel de Fersen”, and granted equal billing with her in the opening screen credits. He was also given a substantial boost in salary.

TYRONE POWER and NORMA SHEARER
“MARIE ANTOINETTE” features a star-studded supporting cast including John Barrymore as “Louis XV”, Robert Morley as “Louis XVI”, Gladys George as “Madame DuBarry”, Joseph Schildkraut as the “Duke D’Orleans”, and Anita Louise as the Royal Governess, “Princesse de Lamballe “. Direction was assigned to W.S. Van Dyke – revered by studio executive Louis B. Mayer as “One-Take Woodie” – whose previous credits included the Thin Man series, the first two Tarzan features starring Johnny Weissmuller, and the musicals of Jeanette MacDonald and Nelson Eddy. Van Dyke hit it off immediately with Norma Shearer who was not only MGM’s “Queen of the Lot” but also a major share holder in the company stock. Under his watchful eye, Shearer won “Best Actress” at the Venice Film Festival and garnered her sixth Academy Award nomination. Celebrated English actor Robert Morley received his only Oscar nomination in the “Best Supporting Actor” category. Cedric Gibbons was nominated for “Best Art Direction” and Herbert Stothart for “Best Score”.

GLADYS GEORGE, as Madame DuBarry
The film is based in part on the 1933 biography by Stefan Zweig, MARIE ANTOINETTE: The Portrait of an Average Woman. Taking a Freudian position, the story examines the life of the young Archduchess of Austria, betrothed and wed to the future king of France while still a teenager, and consigned to a sexless and childless union until seven years later. Zweig posits that the Queen’s unfulfilled sexual passions are channeled toward reckless gambling, extravagant fashions, diamonds and pearls, and eventually a handsome young Swedish Count. MGM quickly purchased the rights to the book, called in F. Scott Fitzgerald among others and began developing it as a vehicle for Norma Shearer, wife of producer Irving Thalberg, and one of the studio’s top money-making stars. Her contemporaries, Greta Garbo and Joan Crawford – eventually labeled as “Box Office Poison” – were dropped from the studio roster. Thalberg died in 1936 after the release of ROMEO AND JULIET starring his wife and Leslie Howard (later cast as “Ashley Wilkes” in GONE WITH THE WIND). Shearer pushed for the completion of “Marie Antoinette”, Sydney Guilaroff (Norma’s personal hair stylist) dressed the wigs, and fashion designer Adrian was given a blank check to create the most opulent period wardrobe ever to grace the silver screen.

GILBERT ADRIAN, NORMA SHEARER, and W.S. VAN DYKE
Production began December 30, 1937 and was completed the following May. The film premiered at the Carthay Circle Theatre on July 8, 1938 and was released into general distribution August 26th. “MARIE ANTOINETTE” proceeded to gross over three million dollars, a larger profit than any other MGM production up to that point.

The Archduchess of Austria arrives at Versailles

THE WEDDING NIGHT – Robert Morley and Norma Shearer
Watch the original 1938 trailer to: MARIE ANTOINETTE
Click here for additional information on the January 13th screening at the Legion of Honor: “MARIE ANTOINETTE”
Click here for more information on the exhibit: MARIE-ANTOINETTE AND THE PETIT TRIANON AT VERSAILLES
Visit Seán on YouTube: SAMSON & DELILAH – Meet Seán Martinfield
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MARIE ANTOINETTE’S PETIT TRIANON COMES TO SAN FRANCISCO
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Seán Martinfield is a native San Franciscan. He is a Theatre Arts Graduate from San Francisco State University, a professional singer, and well-known private vocal coach to Bay Area actors and singers of all ages and persuasions. His clients have appeared in Broadway National Tours including Wicked, Aïda, Miss Saigon, Rent, Bye Bye Birdie, in theatres and cabarets throughout the Bay Area, and are regularly featured in major City events including Diva Fest, Gay Pride, and Halloween In The Castro. As an Internet consultant in vocal development and audition preparation he has published thousands of responses to those seeking his advice concerning singing techniques, professional and academic auditions, and careers in the Performing Arts. Mr. Martinfield’s Broadway clients have all profited from his vocal methodology, “The Belter’s Method”, which is being prepared for publication. If you want answers about your vocal technique, post him a question.

Norma Shearer: Canadian was a Hollywood Movie Star

Montreal was the childhood home of actress Norma Shearer. The star of silent movies and talkies, the beautiful Shearer overcame her own shortfalls.

The lovely Canadian actress Norma Shearer

The Shearer home in Montreal, Quebec was an unusual place. It seemed that parents Edith and Andrew Shearer did not have a close attachment, but the home was still held a pleasant atmosphere for their three children. Their third child, Edith Norma Shearer, was born on August 10, 1902. Her sister Athole was born in 1900, her brother Douglas the firstborn in 1899. The house rules leaned toward lax. “We were given greater freedom and more opportunities to show initiative than is the lot of most youngsters,” said Norma Shearer in a 1936 interview. Rather than sit in a confined classroom, she took advantage of the freedom to study at home instead.

A pretty child, Norma grew into a beautiful woman. After watching a Vaudeville show on her ninth birthday, she was interested in learning music and becoming an actress. At age 14, Norma won a beauty pageant, even though she needed her teeth straightened and her right eye had a cast to it, causing it to appear crossed.

Norma Shearer to New York

When Andrew Shearer’s business collapsed into bankruptcy in 1918, the Shearers moved from a comfortable home in a good neighbourhood to one in a run-down area of Montreal. In 1920, the girls were packed off to New York with their mother Edith to fulfill her dream of breaking into entertainment. The Shearer women stayed in a cheap boarding house, using their wardrobe trunk as storage, dining table and bench. There was only one bed, and loud city trains passed interminably by their window.

Receiving a look-over by the Ziegfield Follies owner, Norma was turned down. She next attended a Universal Pictures casting call for extras. Chosen along with seven other girls out of dozens, Norma’s first on-screen appearance was in the barn-dancing scene in the silent “Way Down East” in 1920. The film was a foot in the door. Finding work as an extra in several more movies, Norma and her mother moved to California for the bright lights of Hollywood. The cross-country move was worthwhile – Norma signed a five-year contract with Metro Company (later MGM) in 1922, under prodigious young producer Irving Thalberg. Before signing, there was a snag, though. Norma failed the first screen test. Instead of sobbing and dashing her hopes, Norma was irate and determined. She received a second screen test and passed.

Eye Problems Plague Shearerer

Making a film a year from 1924 to 1928, Norma became a movie star. Meanwhile the young actress spent much of her money on doctors to fix her wandering eye. She found “an eye doctor, who trained her to strengthen her weak eye,” said the “Biography for Norma Shearer” at IMDb. Learning the craft of make-up to highlight her best features, Norma was conscious about her appearance.

Glamour photo of Norma Shearer

Norma’s future became even brighter in 1927 when she married Thalberg. Her husband thought that Norma would retire from acting when they wed, but she was just beginning. Adept, she transitioned easily from silent screen star to talkies’ “Queen of MGM Studios.” Filming her first “talkie”, “The Trial of Mary Dugan,” in 1929, Norma continued to grow in fame. Appearing in several more movies, in 1930 she won an Oscar for her role in “The Divorcee.” (Over the length of her career, Norma was nominated for six Oscar Awards.) The same year, the Thalbergs welcomed their first child, son Irving Jr. Their second child was daughter Katherine, born in 1935. In the 1930s, Norma appeared only in her influential and prestigious producer-husband’s films.

Actress Turned Down Future Classics

Suffering a devastating heart attack, Irving Thalberg died on September 14, 1936 at age 37. Much too young, four years earlier he had suffered a first heart attack. Norma considered leaving the movie business, but the studio instead contracted her for another six movies. Earning Oscar nominations for many movies, she also turned down roles in films that became classic: Gone with the Wind, Sunset Blvd., and Mrs. Miniver. At her peak, Norma was earning $6,000 a week; she was paid $150,000 for her role in Marie Antoinette in 1938.

Six years after the death of Irving, Norma married Martin Arrouge in 1942. The Sun Valley ski instructor was 20 years her junior and they remained married for over 40 years. The performer retired from the movie industry the same year and aside from an active social life, slipped from publicity. While in Sun Valley, Idaho, Norma spotted a young woman at a ski lodge. Recommended to MGM by Norma, the girl became the talented Janet Leigh.

Suffering depression and Alzheimer’s Disease for nearly a decade before her death, Edith Norma Shearer died of pneumonia on June 12, 1983. She was interred with her first husband in Glendale, California’s Great Mausoleum in Forest Lawn Memorial Park.

Douglas Shearer a Technical Genius

What happened to the rest of the Shearer-Thalberg family? Norma’s sister Athole became an actress in her own right, but did not receive the same acclaim as Norma. Their brother Douglas joined them in California, becoming a renowned pioneer of movie sound design and a recording director. Called a technical genius, he received seven Oscars for his work. Norma’s son Irving was a philosophy professor at the University of Illinois in Chicago. He died of cancer in 1988 at age 58. Head of the Society of Animal Rights in Aspen, Colorado, Norma’s daughter Katherine also died of cancer at age 71.

Edith Norma Shearer was honoured by Canada Post in June 2008 with a stamp in the “Canadians in Hollywood: The Sequel” collection. A star installed in 2008 on Hollywood’s Walk of Fame also commemorates the brilliant actress.

Beautiful, elegant, determined, and dubbed “first lady of the screen,” Norma Shearer overcame shortfalls and pitfalls to rise to the top of the early movie industry. To think, the remarkable Shearer story began in… Canada.