Ann Sheridan
by Andre Soares
If someone asked me to name a truly tough film star, I’d never think of naming John Wayne, Kirk Douglas, Arnold Schwarzenegger, Clint Eastwood, Humphrey Bogart, or any of those male performers whose toughness mostly consists of caressing assorted weaponry while posing for the camera.
With rare exceptions — Edward G. Robinson’s gangsters and James Cagney’s psychos come to mind — I’ve always felt that the toughness of the movie tough guys is merely a façade, a cover for grown men who aren’t honest or courageous enough to demonstrate their human vulnerabilities; their feelings of fear, loneliness, sadness, or tenderness. Those heroes can beat up and/or mow down a whole array of film extras dressed as Indians or Nazis, plus supporting players Lee Van Cleef and Richard Jaeckel, but they still come across as weaklings — prisoners unable to escape their own self-imposed stoicism. If those film toughies had to battle the emotional, physical, and social obstacles faced by movie women — problems that aren’t solved with big guns, big fists, and big bombs — they’d have run home crying for mama.
So, when I think of tough movie stars, whether past or present, I usually think of actresses; women who can, when given the chance, do everything the guys do — without (necessarily) resorting to fists, rifles, shotguns, or automatic weapons to achieve their goal. All the while, they are both honest and courageous enough to show their vulnerable side. Unlike their male counterparts, those women are no poseurs.
When I think of toughness in old movies, I think of Barbara Stanwyck and Jean Arthur, Katharine Hepburn and Myrna Loy, Bette Davis and Joan Crawford, Jeanne Moreau and Anna Magnani, Joan Blondell and Ida Lupino, Aline MacMahon and Rosalind Russell, and, of course, Ann Sheridan. [More on Jean Arthur.]
Though hardly as well-remembered as Hepburn, Davis, or Crawford, the Texas-born Sheridan (née Clara Lou Sheridan, in Denton, on Feb. 21, 1915) was one of them no-nonsense tough dames that added salt, pepper, and hot mustard to dozens of movies made during the heyday of the Hollywood studios.
Following a long apprenticeship during the second half of the 1930s — mostly as an extra and bit player at Paramount, and then in supporting roles and B-movies at Warner Bros. — the versatile Sheridan finally came into her own as a star in a series of 1940s comedies, dramas, and musicals at Warners. Even then, she was never the top star at the studio where Bette Davis ruled supreme.
But despite the Davis handicap, Sheridan — labeled The Oomph Girl by some retarded studio publicist — did manage to showcase her considerable acting abilities in a series of productions. Among them were the dark drama They Drive by Night, with George Raft, Ida Lupino, and Humphrey Bogart; the comedy The Man Who Came to Dinner, in which she played opposite a surprisingly subdued Davis; Honeymoon for Three, co-starring with future husband George Brent; Sam Wood’s popular, Academy Award-nominated melodrama Kings Row; the musical Shine On Harvest Moon, based on the life of Broadway star Nora Bayes; and The Unfaithful, co-starring with Lew Ayres and Zachary Scott in an updated version of Davis’ 1940 success, The Letter.
As a freelancer in the late 1940s and early 1950s, Sheridan had trouble staying near the top. Things began well with Good Sam, a light comedy with Gary Cooper, which was followed by Howard Hawks’s considerably funnier I Was a Male War Bride — with Cary Grant as the bride in question. ("There have been three phases in my career," she said at the time. "And the present one, playing comedy and to hell with the oomph, is by far the most satisfying.")
Shortly thereafter, however, her films became mostly routine, though she gave a solid performance opposite Sterling Hayden in the pleasant Take Me to Town.
Sheridan was by then in her late 30s, and the studio system was in its last days. Contract players were being let go, old timers — especially women — were being replaced by young faces. Female filmgoers, who had all but million-handedly supported the stardom of most female screen stars from the silent era to the end of World War II were now staying home watching television.
Unsurprisingly, like so many other screen veterans Sheridan took the small-screen route. She appeared in a number of TV shows, mostly in anthology episodes but also — in the 1960s — in the long-running soap opera Another World and the comedy Western Pistols ‘n’ Petticoats. She also worked onstage, including a 1958 presentation (also televised in the United Kingdom) of William Saroyan’s The Time of Your Life, opposite Franchot Tone and Dan Dailey. [More on Franchot Tone.]
At the age of 51, Ann Sheridan died of cancer in 1967.
Interview with Ann Sheridan biographer Ray Hagen
Franchot Tone: Q&A with Biographer Lisa Burks
Interview with Hedy Lamarr biographer Patrick Agan
Author/biographer James Robert Parish discusses Mel Brooks
Miriam Hopkins biography in the works
Saverio Costanzo Discusses IN MEMORIA DI ME
THE DEATH OF KEVIN CARTER and KORDAVISION Academy Screening
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I have alwasy been a fan of ann sheridan- thank you for providing information on such a wonderful star- please write a biography of her- she has been neglected far too long. She never gave anything but an outstanding performance. She would have been wonderful in Casablanca.- please
write the book so they can make a movie about her- thank you again- james johnson