It’s not
the holidays for me without a Love Affair. The movie, that is. It might be the
original 1939 black-and-white film. Love Affair. Or it could be the 1957 color
remake, An Affair to Remember. Or perhaps it’s the1994 Love Affair, Warren
Beatty-style. It’s that ending scene on Christmas Day in Terry McKay’s
apartment that makes my holiday season a classic affair of the heart.
The
original Love Affair released in 1939 was Director Leo McCarey’s first attempt
at telling the story of a notorious playboy who falls deeply and surprisingly
in love with a beautiful fellow cruise mate.
McCarey co-wrote this tale of a love affair between French painter and
paramour, Michel Marnet and the beautiful Terry McKay. (This screenplay was
written by Delmer Daves and Donald Ogden Stewart.)
McCarey
had recently crossed the Atlantic himself, along with his wife on a cruise
ship. That voyage was inspiration for
the film when he viewed the Statue of Liberty and skyline upon entering the New
York harbor. The film was shot in glorious CinemaScope, its lovely photography
of the luxurious ocean liner and wide-open ocean, impressing theatergoers.
Michel Marnet is played by popular French actor Charles Boyer. Boyer is aloof,
and a bit too serious, for my taste. Yet, his Michel Marnet character manages
to woo glamorous and feisty Terry McKay, played by Academy Award nominee Irene
Dunne. Unlike the actresses who played McKay in other versions of the film,
Irene Dunne was also a singer. The song sung by children from the orphanage in
the 1939 film (“Wishing”) was nominated for Best Original Song in 1940. Of course, “Over the Rainbow” from the Wizard
of Oz was also nominated and it won the award that year.
In 1957, Director McCarey, realizing
the enormous success of one of the greatest romances of all time, decided to
remake Love Affair. He had directed a big failure in 1952 (My Son John) and
needed a sure win. And so, in An Affair to Remember, McCarey cast heart throb,
British-American Cary Grant in the new version. Grant played opposite
red-headed Deborah Kerr as Nick Ferrante.
Cary Grant was a charismatic and
handsome playboy and he was the perfect man for his role in Affair to Remember.
Grant was in the midst of his third marriage at the time of the film (eleven
years from 1949 to 1962 to Betsy Drake) and that marriage actually lasted the
longest of any of them.
Even
today over 60 years later, An Affair to Remember is absolutely most film-lovers
favorite version of the two versions of the film. Several obvious reasons are
that Grant is more likeable and sensitive than Charles Boyer in the role of the
uncatchable bachelor. Instead of a distant and suave Frenchman in the 1939
film, Cary’s character is both European and American and just a bit more
vulnerable. Deborah Kerr as Terry McKay is still feisty and feminine, but the
film is in glorious color, and highlights Kerr’s subtle creamsicle gown or
bright 50s orange jacket.
McCarey
included the same dialog in virtually every scene and it seems a direct replay
from the original with Cary’s British accent substituting for Boyer’s French.
What really contributed to the 1957 film’s
success, however, was its Academy Award-nominated theme song, “An Affair to
Remember” or “Our Love Affair”. Not only is it sung by Vic Damone at the
beginning of the film, but is also sung later in the film by Terry McKay,
Deborah Kerr’s leading character. Interestingly, Deborah Kerr did not sing in
the film but her voice was actually dubbed by Marnie Nixon. Nixon was also the
lead character’s singing voice in the film versions of The King and I (Deborah
Kerr), West Side Story (Natalie Wood), and My Fair Lady (Audrey Hepburn). “Our Love Affair” became a jazz
standard after its popularity in the film.
The critics don’t agree with me, but
my favorite version of the film is the 1994 version, Love Affair, produced by
Warren Beatty. The box office didn’t agree either; the 1994 Love Affair cost
over $60,000,000 to make and only grossed $18,000,000 in theaters.
However,
I think Beatty was perfectly cast. For over three decades of his life, and into
his mid-50s, he was known as an insufferable romancer. He was so self-absorbed,
in fact, that Carly Simon admitted in her autobiography (Boys in the Trees,
2015) that her cranky song “You’re So Vain” was written about three womanizing
men, one of them Warren Beatty.
Yet,
in 1992, Beatty had finally settled down at the age of 55 with actress Annette
Benning. She was cast as Terry McKay in his version of Love Affair, just as she
seemingly had been in real life. Beatty and Benning have now been married 24
years (with three children.) In the film, when Beatty is perfectly believable
when he says “You know, I’ve never been faithful to anyone in my whole life.”
The
last version of Love Affair begins on a flight from New York to Sydney
Australia. When the plane goes down
somewhere over the Pacific islands, Beatty and Benning, playing Mike Gambril
and Terry McKay, are forced to board a Russian cruise ship in order to re-board
a flight in Tahiti. The supporting actors who join them and wacky Russian crew
make the film funny and bright for me. It is also Katherine Hepburn’s last film
role film role at the age of 86 and she is wonderfully crabby. Kate Capshaw and
Pierce Brosnan, play the love interests at home and the late Garry Shandling is
particularly charming as Beatty’s agent.
It’s
interesting to note that the screenwriters have named the lead actress Terry
McKay in all three versions, whether played by Dunne, Kerr, or Benning; yet,
her love affair is with Michel Marnet in 1939, Nick Ferrante in 1957, and Mike
Gambril in 1994.
Whichever
version of this film you love, the story has been enchanting us for nearly four
decades and are worthy of a watch anytime during the year.
