Always well groomed and well mannered, delightful and kind. And always, eternally it seems, beautiful. She states her full name as she switches on three lights, and her picture-window, Park Avenue perfection is itself a kind of incandescence. Here was a white-glove glow to make men gallant and women swoon, and it was present whether she was dressed in dowdy daywear her beloved wool skirts and cashmere cardigans or in the confections of Hollywood designers and Paris couturiers.
Hitchcock goes so far as to make a joke of it. The story of Grace Kelly has been told and retold by friends, journalists, historians, and hacks. Baby pictures aside, the image that seems to set her life in motion is one that recurs in a series of vacation snapshots. It is Grace as a little girl on the Jersey Shore, being twirled in the air by her father, who looks Herculean in a tank suit as he swings her by her legs or by an arm and a leg.
The photos capture an essential dynamic: Jack Kelly was the vortex of his family, and its life revolved around him—his principles, his dreams, his drive. His sex drive was Herculean, too. In many ways the Kellys were like the Kennedys—bright, shining, charismatic, Irish-Catholic Democrats, civically and politically engaged.
Jack once ran for Philadelphia mayor, losing by only a small margin. Similarly, Kelly women were expected to be team players—outdoorsy, sporting, and supportive of their men. A former cover-girl model and competitive swimmer, she was the first woman to teach physical education at the University of Pennsylvania. Despite their winning energies, the Kellys were not social climbers.
In the Philadelphia of those days, Irish Catholics, even rich ones, were outsiders. Thus the family never lived on the fabled Main Line, as so many Americans thought they had because Hollywood publicists decided they had. The Kellys built a room home in the Philadelphia neighborhood of East Falls, overlooking the Schuylkill River, upon which Jack rowed. Grace Patricia Kelly was the third child of four and the only one without a clear definition.
John junior, born second, was the only boy. And Lizanne was the baby. A much-repeated family story has young Grace locked in a cupboard by tempestuous Lizanne; instead of crying to get out, Grace stayed quietly locked in, playing with her dolls, for hours. Make-believe was where Grace excelled, both in playing with her dolls and in class theatricals, beginning with her first big role—the Virgin Mary in the Ravenhill-convent-school Nativity pageant—and continuing through high school.
Alongside the sporting blood in the Kelly clan ran a more verbal line of showmanship—the stage. Jack Kelly had two brothers who had gained fame in the theater: Walter Kelly, a successful vaudevillian, and George Kelly, a Pulitzer Prize—winning playwright.
But Grace was adamant. Grace did well at the academy, and in her graduation performance played the role of Tracy Lord, the privileged heiress in The Philadelphia Story. This was the beginning of the potent, sometimes prophetic connection between life and art that would reverberate through the career of Grace Kelly. When in she won her first big part on Broadway—the daughter in The Father, with Raymond Massey in the lead—it was again a role in sync with her own situation: the loving daughter who must break away from a powerful family.
Grace got good notices, which brought calls from New York television producers, but Broadway did not fall at her feet. The problem was her voice: it was too high, too flat those sinuses , and not easily projected over the footlights.
She put a clothespin on her nose and worked to bring her voice down a register, to achieve clarity and depth. The result was diction with a silver-spoon delicacy—slightly British—and the stirring lilt of afternoon tea at the Connaught. The Kellys teased Grace mercilessly, this putting on airs, but her new voice would be key. So would her walk. Grace had studied ballet as a girl, keen on becoming a ballerina, but she grew too tall five feet six to be a classical dancer in that era.
This too contributed to a poise, an inner stillness, in the way she moved. There she must stay, out on the lake, silent, white, majestic. Add in the white gloves she wore to auditions—unheard of in the drafty, gypsy world of theater—and the neutral hose, the low-heeled shoes, the slim wool skirts, the camel-hair coat, the horn-rimmed glasses she was nearsighted , and the less-is-more makeup.
You know, the circle pin and the white collars. The sweater-and-tartan-skirt look. Almost schoolgirlish. Sweaters and skirts and loafers and socks. It was like a uniform. Whatever she had on was so chic, as opposed to us. She looked New York, where the rest of us looked Chestnut Hill. So the voice, the walk, the reserved bluestocking style—it all came together in a kind of crystalline equation. Grace was well brought up, and disciplined, and cultured, and shy.
She was only highlighting what she had, just as when she took the advice of her modeling friend Carolyn Reybold, who told her to stop hiding her too square jaw under a pageboy and instead accentuate her jawline. Grace pulled back her hair and pulled on her gloves. All that was left now was for the right camera to find her.
While in college, a professor recommended she seek professional help to drop her accent because it would impede her acting career. The co-stars were able to sneak off set for a trip to Rome thanks to a break in the filming schedule.
The film also featured Clark Gable. Alfred Hitchcock's thriller Rear Window is the only movie in which Kelly smokes a cigarette. She stunned on the red carpet wearing an Edith Head-designed column dress and opera gloves, which she had previously worn and were originally designed for the New York premiere of The Country Girl. She would slip into the ensemble once more for her cover of Life magazine. The award-winning actress was in charge of the United States delegation for the Cannes Film Festival, where she was invited to take part in a photo op with the Prince of Monaco.
This was the first time the future couple met, however, she was in a relationship with French actor Jean-Pierre Aumont at the time. The movie musical, directed by Charles Walters and starring her friends Bing Crosby and Frank Sinatra, was her last feature film. At the time, marriage without the promise of an heir was not suitable for the head of the royal family, therefore, the blonde beauty had to prove that she was capable of child-bearing.
Half of the sum was taken from her inheritance, and Kelly covered the remaining half herself. The stunning dress took six weeks to make, as well as a team of 36 seamstresses, and was a gift from Metro-Goldwyn-Mayer studios.
Like other royal weddings, their nuptials were televised worldwide and viewed by fans from home and abroad. Working in Hollywood was deemed to be unbecoming of a princess, therefore, Kelly had to give up her accelerating career to become a royal fixture in the country of Monaco. She was supposed to star in the critically-acclaimed films Marnie and The Birds , but she had to turn them down.
Her husband was so opposed to her former career that he banned them from being shown in Monaco. Ironically, her fame in Hollywood is what attracted Prince Rainier III to marrying her, because he believed it would help boost Monaco's tourism.
The bag became so synonymous with Kelly and her style that is was eventually dubbed the Kelly bag. Two years before her passing, the media began reporting that Kelly often enjoyed the company of Austrian film director Robert Dornhelm, who was 18 years her junior.
The former actress longed to get back into the arts. Just years before her death, she and her husband began working on a short, independent film, Rearranged , which eventually received offers from TV executives. However, before the necessary additional footage could be shot, Kelly passed away. On September 13, , Kelly suffered several injuries from a car accident caused by a stroke, and passed away in the hospital the following day. Although she obtained a hairline fracture of one of her vertebrae, she was able to make a full recovery.
In , Kelly became the first American actress featured on a postage stamp, when the U. The house was built by Kelly's father in Philadelphia in the late s. The Kelly family sold the home in , but Prince Albert, her son, purchased the building in United States. Type keyword s to search. Today's Top Stories. Hitchcock considered Kelly the epitome of the femme fatale, with her beauty, style and "sexual elegance.
It was not a glamorous role for Kelly, who portrayed the dowdy and neglected wife of an alcoholic. She gave a raw and uncharacteristically stripped-down performance, which garnered an Academy Award nomination for Best Actress. At this point in her career, Kelly was one of the highest-paid and most respected actresses in the world. If he didn't produce an heir, Monaco would become part of France.
The prince once described his ideal bride: "I see her with long hair floating in the wind, the color of autumn leaves. Her eyes are blue or violet, with flecks of gold.
After marrying Prince Rainier on April 19, , in a very public and ornate ceremony, Kelly abandoned her acting career in order to become princess consort of Monaco. She was also required to give up her American citizenship, and Prince Rainier banned her films in Monaco. Despite many attempts by filmmakers to lure Princess Grace back into the film industry, she resisted, embracing her role as a ceremonial leader of Monaco and becoming involved in many cultural and charitable organizations.
Though some believe she deeply missed her acting career, she often spoke of the rampant problems afflicting the film industry: "Hollywood amuses me. Holier-than-thou for the public and unholier-than-the-devil in reality.
She suffered a stroke and lost control of the vehicle, which spun off the cliff's edge and plunged down a foot embankment. Mother and daughter were rushed to a hospital, where Princess Grace spent 24 hours in a coma before being taken off life support, at the age of Kelly remained in the public eye for most of her life.
Her on-screen beauty, self-confidence and mystery enchanted the world, and her serenity and poise as a princess piqued the media's attention. Of this attention, she remarked with typical humor and grace, "The freedom of the press works in such a way that there is not much freedom from it.
Years later, Nicole Kidman took on the role of the Hollywood icon turned princess in the biopic Grace of Monaco By looking at old photos, the prince fully restored it to look just as it did when Kelly and her family lived there.
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