Deborah Kerr as Catherine
Vineyard owner marquis Philippe de Montfaucon is called back to his castle Bellenac because of another dry season. He asks his wife and children to remain in London, but they still come after him. His wife Catherine de Montfaucon soon discovers that her husband is acting mysteriously and that his employees are following old pagan rituals that call for the life of the marquis himself to save the crops.
Biography for Deborah Kerr
Birth name
Deborah Jane Kerr-Trimmer
Date of birth
30 September 1921
Helensburgh, Scotland, UK
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Born Deborah Jane Trimmer in Scotland in 1921, she was the daughter of a soldier who had been gassed in World War I. A shy, insecure child, she found an outlet for expressing her feelings in acting. Her aunt, a radio star, got her some stage work when she was a teenager, and British film producer Gabriel Pascal noticed and cast her in his film of George Bernard Shaw's Major Barbara (1941) and Love on the Dole (1941). She quickly became a star of the British cinema, with roles such as the three women in Life and Death of Colonel Blimp, The (1943) and the nun in Black Narcissus (1947). In 1947, she came to MGM, where she repeated her success in films like Hucksters, The (1947), Edward, My Son (1949) and Quo Vadis? (1951). After a while, however, she tired of playing prim-and-proper English ladies, so she made the most of the role of the adulteress who romps on the beach with Burt Lancaster in From Here to Eternity (1953).
The film was a success, and Kerr recieved her second Oscar nomination for the film. She also acheived success on the Broadway stage in "Tea and Sympathy, " reprising her role in the 1956 film version. That same year, she played one of her best-remembered screen roles, Mrs. Anna in King and I, The (1956). More success followed in Heaven Knows, Mr. Allison (1957), Affair to Remember, An (1957), Seperate Tables (1958), Sundowners, The (1960), Innocents, The (1961), and Night of the Iguana, The (1964). Then, in 1968, she suddenly quit movies, appalled by the explicit sex and violence of the day. After some stage and TV work in the 1970s and 1980s, she retired froma acting altogether. Deborah Kerr is the actress with the distinction of being the actress with the most Oscar nominations (six) without ever winning, but that was made up for in 1994, when she was given a special Oscar for her screen achievments. She lives in Switzerland.
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Trivia
She was awarded a BAFTA Special Award in 1991
She was awarded an honorary Oscar in 1994
Awarded a CBE (Companion of the Order of the British Empire) in the 1997/8 New Years Honours List
Has two daughters from her marriage to Anthony Bartley: Melanie Jane, born on December 27, 1947 and Francesca Ann.
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Personal quotes
"All the most successful people these seem to be neurotic. Perhaps we should stop being sorry for them and start being sorry for me - for being so confounded normal."
"I came over here [Hollywood] to act, but it turned out all I had to do was to be high-minded, long suffering, white-gloved and decorative."
"I am really rather like a beautiful Jersey cow, I have the same pathetic droop to the corners of my eyes."
[speaking in 1969] "When I was under contract to MGM, with people like poor Robert Taylor and so many others, the cinema's job was soley entertainment. It filled a public need then. Now the cinema serves so many other purposes; it functions as psychiatrist, politician, message-maker, money maker and, incidentally, entertainer. But it's no good regretting that things are different. Times have to change."
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Biography from Leonard Maltin's Movie Encyclopedia: Perhaps the screen epitome of ladylike British reserve, this beautiful star was Oscar-nominated a whopping six times in 12 years-and never once won. Yet few film performers have accumulated as many meritorious movies to their credit. A former ballet dancer who also acted on stage before making her screen debut opposite Rex Harrison and Wendy Hiller in Shaw's Major Barbara (1941), Kerr achieved stardom early in her career. British director Michael Powell gave the actress one of her best roles, that of a Catholic nun trying to run a mission school in the Himalayas, in Black Narcissus (1946), and it brought her to the attention of MGM, which signed her up immediately. (The promotion for her first Hollywood movie instructed Americans thusly: "Deborah Kerr-rhymes with Star!")
Although her dominant screen "image" is that of an elegant, refined and possibly reserved British woman, Kerr played a wide variety of roles, and went decidedly against type as the American adulteress in From Here to Eternity (1953), in which she shared a famous smooch in the surf with Burt Lancaster. She was a charming-if unusual-match for Clark Gable in The Hucksters (1947, her Hollywood debut), a plucky heroine in King Solomon's Mines (1950), a credible Lygia in Quo Vadis? (1951), an effective Portia in Julius Caesar (1953), an utterly unflappable Anna in The King and I (1956, with Marni Nixon providing her singing voice), an elegantly witty woman who shares a shipboard romance with Cary Grant in An Affair to Remember (1957), a shipwrecked nun forced to con- tend with the scruffy marine Robert Mitchum in Heaven Knows, Mr. Allison (1957), the real-life Sheilah Graham, in love with F. Scott Fitzgerald in Beloved Infidel (1959), a governess haunted by her surroundings in The Innocents (1961), to name just a few. She never gave a bad performance. She was Oscar-nominated for Edward, My Son (1949), From Here to Eternity (1953), The King and I (1956), Heaven Knows, Mr. Allison (1957), Separate Tables (1958), and The Sundowners (1960). She has lived for many years in Switzerland with her husband, author Peter Viertel, occasionally agreeing to make a TV movie or miniseries. In 1994 she received an honorary Academy Award.
Off the Menu: The Last Days of Chasen's (1998) (uncredited) (archive footage) .... Herself (with Sinatra)
L.A. Confidential (1997) (archive footage) (uncredited) .... Herself
Cary Grant: A Celebration of a Leading Man (1988) (TV) .... Herself
Hold the Dream (1986) (TV) .... Emma Harte
Assam Garden, The (1985) .... Helen
Reunion at Fairborough (1985) (TV) .... Sally Wells
"Woman of Substance, A" (1983) (mini) TV Series .... Emma Harte
Witness for the Prosecution (1982) (TV) .... Nurse Plimsoll
Song at Twilight, A (1973) (TV)
... aka Play for Today: A Song at Twilight (1973) (TV) (UK: series title)
Costa del Sol malague�a (1972) (archive footage) .... Herself
Arrangement, The (1969) .... Florence Anderson
Gypsy Moths, The (1969) .... Elizabeth Brandon
Prudence and the Pill (1968) .... Prudence Hardcastle
Eye of the Devil (1967) .... Catherine de Montfaucon
... aka 13 (1967)
Casino Royale (1967) .... Agent Mimi (alias Lady Fiona McTarry)
... aka Charles K. Feldman's Casino Royale (1967)
Marriage on the Rocks (1965) .... Valerie Edwards
On the Trail of the Iguana (1964) (uncredited) .... Herself
Night of the Iguana, The (1964) .... Hannah Jelkes
Chalk Garden, The (1964) .... Miss Madrigal
Innocents, The (1961) .... Miss Giddens, Governess
Naked Edge, The (1961) .... Martha Radcliffe
Sundowners, The (1960) .... Ida Carmody
Grass Is Greener, The (1960) .... Lady Hilary Rhyall
Count Your Blessings (1959) .... Grace Allingham
Beloved Infidel (1959) .... Sheilah Graham
Journey, The (1959) .... Lady Diana Ashmore
Separate Tables (1958) .... Sibyl Railton-Bell
Bonjour tristesse (1958) .... Anne Larson
Kiss Them for Me (1957) (voice) .... Gwinneth Livingston
Affair to Remember, An (1957) .... Terry McKay
Heaven Knows, Mr. Allison (1957) .... Sister Angela
Tea and Sympathy (1956) .... Laura Reynolds
King and I, The (1956) .... Anna Leonowens
Proud and Profane, The (1956) .... Lee Ashley
End of the Affair, The (1955) .... Sarah Miles
Young Bess (1953) .... Catherine Parr
From Here to Eternity (1953) .... Karen Holmes
Dream Wife (1953) .... Priscilla 'Effie' Effington
Julius Caesar (1953) .... Portia
... aka William Shakespeare's Julius Caesar (1953)
Prisoner of Zenda, The (1952) .... Princess Flavia
Thunder in the East (1952) .... Joan Willoughby
Quo Vadis? (1951) .... Lygia
King Solomon's Mines (1950) .... Elizabeth Curtis
Please Believe Me (1950) .... Alison Kirbe
Edward, My Son (1949) .... Evelyn Boult
If Winter Comes (1947) .... Nona Tyber
Hucksters, The (1947) .... Kay (Francis X.) Dorrance
Black Narcissus (1947) .... Sister Clodagh
I See a Dark Stranger (1946) .... Bridie Quilty
... aka Adventuress, The (1946) (USA)
Perfect Strangers (1945) .... Catherine Wilson
... aka Vacation from Marriage (1945) (USA)
Life and Death of Colonel Blimp, The (1943) .... Edith Hunter/Barbara Wynne/Angela 'Johnny' Cannon
... aka Adventures of Colonel Blimp, The (1945) (USA)
... aka Colonel Blimp (1945) (USA)
Day Will Dawn, The (1942) .... Kari Alstead
... aka Avengers, The (1942) (USA)
Hatter's Castle (1941) .... Mary Brodie
Love on the Dole (1941) .... Sally
Penn of Pennsylvania (1941) .... Guglielma Springelt
... aka Courageous Mr. Penn (1943) (USA)
Major Barbara (1941) .... Jenny Hill, Barbara's Assistant
Contraband (1940) (uncredited) .... Bit Part
... aka Blackout (1940) (USA)
Disaster! (????) .... Herself