Double Door (1934)
Set in Manhattan, the iron fisted spinster (Mary Morris) of a wealthy family schemes to ruin any chance her sister (Anne Revere) and half brother (Kent Taylor) might have for happiness. When her brother marries a young nurse (Evelyn Venable), she plots to destroy their marriage. Based on the play by Elizabeth A. McFadden and directed by Charles Vidor (GILDA). Morris and Revere are recreating their stage performances on film. Morris had a long and varied career on the stage but this is her only movie. But what a performance! Morris's monstrous matriarch makes the Joan Crawford of MOMMIE DEAREST look like Maria von Trapp! Her evil is so unrelenting and startling even by today's standards that one can't help think what a shock to the system this was to movie audiences of 1934. By the film's end, Morris's evil bitch has turned it into a horror film. With Colin Tapley and Sir Guy Standing.
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I'd never heard of this film until I picked up the Kino-Lorber release a few months ago. Mary Morris' performance blew me away! Thank heavens she decided to make at least one motion picture. Just imagine what she must have been like on the stage.
ReplyDeleteMany stage actors seem to have trouble transitioning to film and their performances seem to play to the second balcony which looks too broad for the movies (like Zero Mostel). There's none of that to Mary Morris's performance. You'd never guess she was recreating her stage work.
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