James Stewart at 100
This Month Marks the 100th Anniversary of the Iconic Jimmy Stewart
The venerable James Stewart was the unlikeliest of movie stars - and yet, one of the most liked
The Unlikeliest of Stars
In many ways, he was the unlikeliest of movie stars: rail thin, with a face carved from a block of naive worry, and a voice like a crow doing a futile impression of a songbird.
And yet, it was this same lack of glamour which so endeared him to audiences - that, and the fact that when pushed ( and largely, let's give the man credit, by himself) he could give performances of unwavering integrity, humane thoughtfulness, and playful, understated charm.
James at 100
One can argue, in fact, that James Stewart - who would have been one hundred years old this month - was Hollywood's first character actor star, something that did not become the norm till the post studio sixties, when offbeat types like Dustin Hoffman, Gene Hackman and Robert Duvall became the new Clark Gables and Robert Taylors.
Two Precedents
Stewart set precedents in other ways, too: after the long tradition of studio servitude ended in the 1950s, he became the first actor to garner himself a share of the box office - setting the scene for today's astronomical salaries.
Perhaps it was this added incentive that sparked his finest work. Given his thorough professionalism, however, and his inextinguishable zeal for his craft, it was likelier a combination of the three. Whatever the cause(s), the result was a series of archetypes - the cowboy, the businessman, the professional - rendered in a mix of vociferous idealism, brittle morality, and polite confidence.
Post War Stewart
The post war Stewart (he had served with distinction in the air force) broke rank with the charming homeliness that had been his bread and butter, in 1930's and early 40's staples like Destry Rides Again, The Shop Around the Corner and The Philadelphia Story. Instead, he gave us a fair-minded working man, violated by eruptions of anger, passion and destructive curiosity his even-tempered demeanour was hardly prepared for: the fedora'd father whose son is kidnapped in Hitchcock's The Man Who Knew Too Much, the bounty hunter who falls in love with his captive's girl in The Naked Spur, the musical icon who struggles with the ups and downs of career in The Glenn Miller Story.
Quintessential American
Each character is quintessentially American: puritan to the core yet continually challenged by the social dysfunctions that run deep in the country's character. Stewart, of course, always emerged victorious in the struggle, his ideals scratched and bitten but still very much in tact. Had he done the unimaginable and defected to the other side, given in to avarice, lust, murder and other temptations, his star might have lasted even longer, for that, in the era after his, was what made the statement that we wanted to hear.
Still, it lasted long enough, and shines still as a symbol of what was once morally admirable and what remains artistically so.
