Unofficial Academy Awards Discussion Board

Big Magilla wrote: ↑Sun Sep 10, 2023 3:39 pm I saw Harry Kellerman so long ago that I've forgotten it, but Barbara Harris I'll never forget.

She and Elaine May were first female stars of improvisational theatre in the late 1950s-early1960s, the counterparts of Alan Arkin and Paul Sand.

By the mid-1960s, she was a great big Broadway star. Her performance on the original cast recording of On a Clear Day You Can See Forever easily outshines Barbra Streisand in the film version. On screen in 1965's A Thousand Clowns, she makes this monotonous film bearable while she's in it.

In the 1970s, she is haunting singing "It Don't Worry Me", closing out he film and is terrific utilizing her great comedic skills opposite Jodie Foster in the first film version of Freaky Friday. She was also memorable as one of the stars of Hitchcock's last film, Family Plot.

She turned up in the 1980s as Kathleen Turner's mother in Peggy Sue Got Married. She had a bit part in Grosse Point Blank and then she was gone, retired to academia, teaching acting to kids who had no idea who she was for her last twenty years on earth in Scottsdale, Arizona of all places.

For an actor who won a lot of acclaim - 3 Tony nods (one win), an Oscar nod, and 3 Golden Globe nods - she pretty much disappeared.

I also liked her in Plaza Suite (with Walter Matthau), The War Between Men and Women (with Jack Lemmon) and The Seduction of Joe Tynan (with Alan Alda).

I think its time to finally catch up with her Oscar nominated performance which I have never seen.

Sabin wrote: ↑Sun Sep 10, 2023 4:03 pm

Big Magilla wrote
She turned up in the 1980s as Kathleen Turner's mother in Peggy Sue Got Married. She had a bit part in Grosse Point Blank and then she was gone, retired to academia, teaching acting to kids who had no idea who she was for her last twenty years on earth in Scottsdale, Arizona of all places.

I grew up in Scottsdale, Arizona of all places.

I know. I visited the Pheonix-Tempe-Scottsdale area for business many times in the late 1990s and early 2000s. I always enjoyed those visits despite the intense summer heat but it's difficult to picture a Broadway-Hollywood star as sophisticated as Barbara Harris spending twenty years in relative obscurity in a place where nobody (she said many times) had any idea who she was.

Big Magilla wrote
She turned up in the 1980s as Kathleen Turner's mother in Peggy Sue Got Married. She had a bit part in Grosse Point Blank and then she was gone, retired to academia, teaching acting to kids who had no idea who she was for her last twenty years on earth in Scottsdale, Arizona of all places.

I grew up in Scottsdale, Arizona of all places.

I saw Harry Kellerman so long ago that I've forgotten it, but Barbara Harris I'll never forget.

She and Elaine May were first female stars of improvisational theatre in the late 1950s-early1960s, the counterparts of Alan Arkin and Paul Sand.

By the mid-1960s, she was a great big Broadway star. Her performance on the original cast recording of On a Clear Day You Can See Forever easily outshines Barbra Streisand in the film version. On screen in 1965's A Thousand Clowns, she makes this monotonous film bearable while she's in it.

In the 1970s, she is haunting singing "It Don't Worry Me", closing out he film and is terrific utilizing her great comedic skills opposite Jodie Foster in the first film version of Freaky Friday. She was also memorable as one of the stars of Hitchcock's last film, Family Plot.

She turned up in the 1980s as Kathleen Turner's mother in Peggy Sue Got Married. She had a bit part in Grosse Point Blank and then she was gone, retired to academia, teaching acting to kids who had no idea who she was for her last twenty years on earth in Scottsdale, Arizona of all places.

Just watched Who is Harry Kellerman... on YouTube. Watching it, I felt like I had more seen an idea for a movie rather than a movie. I guess it makes the big mistake of assuming we care more about Georgie Soloway than what he represents and I don't think it's a film with much to say about... wherever and whenever this film takes place and it was hard to drum up much patience for it. I could see it being an effective Wild Strawberries/Stardust Memories type of narrative but it's not. But then Barbara Harris shows up and it goes to this whole different level. I don't know what she represents either but I don't much care. She comes on-screen and you can't think about anything else. Such a touching portrait of a person who is so lonely (but not alone) she's formed her own language to help her make sense of the world. I wanted to follow her into her own movie.

Looking her up online I guess I've seen her in Nashville (though my last viewing of that film was twenty years ago so I barley remember her) and apparently she's in Grosse Point Blank. I'd love to see more of her.

This discussion occurred almost five years ago, but for those who still may be interested, (and I happen to be very interested after reading Tee's and Marco's words about Barbara Harris), here's the link for the entire Who Is Harry Kellerman:

http://youtu.be/coCS3f1adwU

I now have to somehow find Harry Kellerman to watch Harris' lauded performance.

Do you guys think that, apart from the performance itself, Harris got in on the strength of her name? After all she was an acclaimed Tony winning actress on Broadway by the time this film came out.



Edited By Reza on 1281164973

Mister Tee wrote:I sat absolutely floored by her beautiful, multi-colored rendition of a "my life's slipping away" monologue.

Me too. There is a moment which has always stayed with me, when she tells Hoffman that today it's her birthday - she turns 34 I think - and she says something like: "This morning I woke up and suddenly I wasn't young anymore". The way she does this - compared to the way another, less intelligent actress would have done it - without any easy tear-jerking effect, but with a kind of soft, vague sadness, should be shown to young students of acting.

Bruce, see the movie for Harris's performance - for once, you will be tempted to vote for a performance in a movie you don't like, I'm sure.



Edited By ITALIANO on 1281117588