Shirley MacLaine, who appears alongside Jack Lemmon and Double Indemnity’s Fred MacMurray in Billy Wilder’s brilliant 1960 bleak comedy The Apartment, which is screening at the UPP this month in a restored print, might well be Hollywood’s last great star.
Still hanging in a 90 years of age, MacLaine (who is, as most people know, Warren Beatty’s older sister) became interested in “performing” as a young woman, when she took up ballet, in order to help with weak ankles. Excelling in dance, she soon began to appear in small roles on stage and was eventually “spotted” by comedian Jerry Lewis, in the early 1950s, when she took over from an injured Carol Haney, in the lead role in The Pajama Game, a part for which she had been “understudying.” Lewis recommended her to producer Hal B Wallis, who signed her to Paramount (locked in a contract which was to become a major bone of contention years later) and, in 1955, she made her big screen debut in Alfred Hitchcock’s offbeat comedy The Trouble with Harry.
Michael Todd’s star-studded Oscar winning epic Around the World in 80 Days soon followed (in the book, her character, Aouda, is an Indian princess) and in 1958 she received her first nomination for the best actress Academy Award for her work on Vincente Minelli’s melodrama Some Came Running (alongside Frank Sinatra and Dean Martin – it has been suggested that MacLaine was an “honorary” member of the Rat Pack after her cameo in Ocean’s 11).
In the 60s, MacLaine’s “star” staus was confirmed by her brilliant and captivating performance as lift girl Fran Kubelik in Wilder’s The Apartment (she was 26 when she made this); her “risk taking” turn (playing a private school teacher who is in love with Audrey Hepburn – although the L word is never actually used in the film) in William Wyler’s The Children’s Hour, the following year. She was also memorable as “hooker with a heart of gold” Irma La Douce, which reunited her with both Wilder and Jack Lemmon; very funny in both J Lee Thompson’s musical What a Way to Go in 1964 and Ronald Neame’s Michael Caine starring heist movie Gambit in 1966. In 1969 she was given the title role in Bob Fosse’s “none more 60s” musical Sweet Charity (a big budget effort which tanked, in spite of its brilliant choreography and hit numbers Big Spender and The Rhythm of Life) and, as the 70s began, teamed up with Clint Eastwood in the Don Siegel western Two Mules for Sister Sara (in which she plays a nun who is actually, surprise, surprise, a prostitute in disguise).
For the rest of the decade, MacLaine’s career loses momentum (she’s a woman in her 40s after all and this is Hollywood) but she still manages to receive acclaim for her performances in both Herbert Ross’ ballet drama The Turning Point in 1977 and Hal Ashby’s masterpiece Being There (with the brilliant Peter Sellers) in 1978. Interestingly, she turned down the role of the mother in William Friedkin’s The Exorcist, a part eventually played by Ellen Burstyn, primarily because she had just taken a role in another long-forgotten horror film The Possession of Joel Delaney and was worried about the similarities between the two movies.
In the 1980s, after a run of poorly received comedies (Change of Seasons and Loving Couples – both duds) MacLaine makes a “comeback” in James L Brook’s weepie Terms of Endearment, the second highest grossing film of 1983 after Return of the Jedi. The film, which also starred Jack Nicholson and Debra Winger, was nominated for 11 Oscars and MacLaine won for Best Actress.
In 1998, she follows this with John Schlesinger’s Madame Sousatzka, playing an eccentric piano teacher, in a film written by Merchant Ivory’s superb scriptwriter Ruth Prawer Jhabvala and, in 1989, she’s one of many female stars in Herbert Ross’ Steel Magnolias (alongside Dolly Parton, Sally Field, Daryl Hannah and Julia Roberts) and steals every scene in Mike Nichols’ adaptation of Carrie Fisher’s autobiography Postcards from the Edge in 1990 (by which point MacLaine is well into her 50s).
The work doesn’t dry up thereafter, although one could argue that the quality does diminish a little. She’s certainly no longer able to “open a picture” and in spite of a few interesting minor works (Albert Brooks’ Defending Your Life in 1991; Hugh Wilson’s Guarding Tess in 1994, which also starred Nicholas Cage; flop Terms of Endearment sequel The Evening Star – Nicholson does turn up and almost salvage it; Norah Ephron’s adaptation of the populatr TV show Bewitched in 2005 and Ben Stiller’s The Secret Life of Walter Mitty in 2013) her films this century have been increasingly mediocre. Her last appearance on the big screen was alongside Peter Dinklage in 2022’s American Dreamer – and on the small screen in the Steve Martin TV show Only Murders in the Building, making her somewhere in her mid 80s when she made them. Which is no mean feat.
Throughout her long career, MacLaine gained a reputation for being “difficult to work with;” something of a prima donna and an actress whose interest in spirituality and metaphysics has been much derided. She has also had on-going “spats” with co-stars (most notably Anthony Hopkins and Debra Winger).
A number of directors have spoken out about how they did not enjoy working with her (notably Don Siegel, who described her as “unfeminine” – whatever that means) and she has been equally critical of some of her colleagues in the many books she has authored. In addition, she has returned to the stage and worked regularly on TV.
She is undeniably a “larger than life character” (although you wouldn’t have thought this from her pixie-esque, be-bobbed character of Kubelik, which is arguably, her finest performance). The fact that she has taken the powers that be to task over contractual issues has no doubt made her many enemies but, like a great many of Hollywood’s original female stars, she has been allowed to “grow older” on screen and has left behind a strong legacy.
There’s a lot of good work done throughout her career, some of which may have been slightly overlooked – although she is still a name that people know. She could sing and dance; be very funny and sexy and was extremely capable in more dramatic roles. The film world will be smaller when she finally leaves us and you can’t say that about many actors. And if you don’t believe me, then come along to The Apartment this month and watch her break hearts and get hers broken in Wilder’s fantastically cynical film.
Shut up and deal, indeed.
The Apartment is showing on Sunday 2nd March and Monday 3rd March. Click here to book tickets.
Dr Andrew C Webber is a Film teacher and examiner with 39 years’ experience. He currently contributes to both the Cinema of the 70s and 80s magazines (available on Amazon); cassette gazette fanzine (available from cassette pirate on e-bay) and the Low Noise music podcast available on Spotify and Apple podcasts.
