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Holliday Jaunt

Born-on Dating: Judy Holliday and William Holden plot a revolution in 'Born Yesterday.' Comic star Judy Holliday was smarter than she sounded By Richard von Busack THERE WERE MANY authentic dumb blondes in the movies, but Judy Holliday wasn't one of them. The comedienne, who can be seen in a four-film retrospective at the Stanford Theater in Palo Alto Aug. 6-11, is possibly the brainiest of all actresses to put on the curls and negligee of the blonde clown. The yellow hair was supposedly her own, as was the fluffy name--a translation of her birth name, Judith Tuvic ("Tuvic" means "holiday" in Hebrew). When she died (early, at age 43, of cancer) the New York Times pointed out that Holliday had an IQ of 172. Holliday has a comic scene in 1950's Born Yesterday (Aug. 8-11) in which her character, Billie Dawn, tries to soak up some culture by listening to symphonies. In real life, Holliday was married to the head of the classical-records division at Columbia. She began as a cabaret comedian. Her partners were Betty Comden and Adolph Green, the writers who later penned the script for Singin' in the Rain. Holliday stayed a New Yorker until the end, and she also stayed a sketch comedienne. The high abrasive voice--the kind of squawk Lenny Bruce described as "Jewish seagull"--is much like an act that would have started off on Saturday Night Live today. Holliday's vocal control is surprising. How did she project that bicycle-horn honk every night on Broadway? Holliday wasn't famous just because of her pipes, though; in collaboration with writers Garson Kanin and Ruth Gordon and director George Cukor, she had opportunities for prime, almost free-associative comedy. In a tipsy scene in It Should Happen to You (1954, Aug. 8-11), Holliday's Gladys Glover is fending off a pass by Peter Lawford. To get him talking (and to stop him nibbling her ear), she asks him if he's lonely, living there in that bachelor apartment all by himself. Yes, he admits, lowering his eyes. "You could get a parrot," she suggests. "You could be talking to it, and it could be talking to you. I mean, you wouldn't be talking to each other, but it would be talk." Born Yesterday is the story of the wising-up of a kept woman. Billie Dawn has been towed to Washington, D.C., by Harry Brock (Broderick Crawford), a vulgarian who has made a mint in the scrap business. Billie's lack of refinement is enough to embarrass even Brock, so he hires Paul (William Holden), a reporter, to tutor the woman. Since they're in D.C., Paul gives her a crash course in the history of the American Revolution. The Jefferson Memorial and the Capitol Dome inspire Billie to rebel against her own tyrant. At the end, Kanin drags in the soapbox to have Holden make some speeches about democracy triumphant--as if we hadn't already got the picture perfectly. Born Yesterday is A Doll's House played for screwball comedy--no wonder Holliday skunked Bette Davis (for All About Eve) and Gloria Swanson (for Sunset Boulevard) at the Oscars that year. The briskness and hopefulness of this classic should cheer seasoned divorcées and young riot grrrls alike--especially the moment when Holliday pieces together the meaning of a quote of Alexander Pope's: " 'The proper study of mankind is man.' That means women, too." The Judy Holliday retrospective runs Aug. 6-11 at the Stanford Theater in Palo Alto. The screenings include The Solid Gold Cadillac and Phffft! Aug. 6-7 and Born Yesterday and It Should Happen to You Aug. 8-11. [ San Jose | Metroactive Central | Archives ]