Jean Hagen Movies
After majoring in drama and music at Northwestern University, Jean Hagen went to New York, where she worked as an usherette by day and a radio actress by night. In 1949, Hagen was one of several "new face" Broadway performers (including Judy Holliday, Tom Ewell and David Wayne) selected to appear in the supporting cast of the Tracy/Hepburn comedy Adam's Rib; she played the slatternly "other woman" who comes between Judy Holliday and Tom Ewell. This led to a long-term MGM contract and a telling dramatic role as Sterling Hayden's doomed girlfriend in John Huston's Asphalt Jungle (1950). In 1952, Hagen was cast in her best-ever screen role: screechy-voiced silent film star Lina Lamont ("Waddya think I am, dumb or sumpin'?") in the imperishable Singin' in the Rain. From 1953 through 1956, Hagen played Margaret Williams, wife of nightclub entertainer Danny Thomas, in Make Room for Daddy. Her character was summarily "killed off" when she left the series in its third season; according to Thomas, Hagen felt that sitcom work was beneath her. Unfortunately, with such notable exceptions as The Shaggy Dog (1959) and Sunrise at Campobello (1960), Hagen's career went into an eclipse after Make Room for Daddy, and by 1964 she had retired from acting. As historian Bill Warren observed, Hagen "was so versatile that, paradoxically, she became hard to cast." In the mid-1970s, after undergoing radical surgery and cobalt treatment for throat cancer, Hagen valiantly attempted a comeback in character roles. Jean Hagen died at the Motion Picture Country Home and Hospital at the age of 54. ~ Hal Erickson, All Movie Guide
Written by Ruth Gordon and Garson Kanin, Adam's Rib is a peerless comedy predicated on the double standard. Spencer Tracy and Katharine Hepburn play Adam and Amanda Bonner, a husband-and-wife attorney team, both drawn to a case of attempted murder. The defendant (Judy Holliday) had tearfully attempted to shoot her husband (Tom Ewell) and his mistress (Jean Hagen). Adam argues that the case is open and shut, but Amanda points out that, if the defendant were a man, he'd be set free on the basis of "the unwritten law." Thus it is that Adam works on behalf of the prosecution, while Amanda defends the accused woman. The trial turns into a media circus, while the Bonners' home life suffers. Adam's Rib represented the film debuts of New York-based actors Jean Hagen, Tom Ewell, and David Wayne (as Hepburn's erstwhile songwriting suitor), and the return to Hollywood of Judy Holliday after her Born Yesterday triumph. One of the best of the Tracy-Hepburn efforts, it inspired a brief 1973 TV series starring Ken Howard and Blythe Danner. ~ Hal Erickson, All Movie Guide
- Starring:
- Spencer Tracy, Katharine Hepburn, (more)
