Eleanor Parker films on TCM: ‘Star of the Month’ series continues with ‘adult’ dramas Detective Story, The Man with the Golden Arm
Palm Springs resident Eleanor Parker is Turner Classic Movies’ Star of the Month this June. Eight more Eleanor Parker movies will be presented on June 24. Parker turns 91 on Wednesday, June 26.
Detective Story (1951)
Eleanor Parker received her second Best Actress Academy Award nomination for William Wyler’s psychological crime drama Detective Story (1951). The movie itself feels dated, partly because of several melodramatic plot developments, and partly because of Kirk Douglas’ excessive theatricality as the detective whose story is told. Parker, however, is excellent as Douglas’ wife, though her role is subordinate to his.
Just about as good is Best Supporting Actress Oscar nominee Lee Grant, whose career would be derailed by the anti-Red hysteria of the 1950s. Grant would make her comeback in the 1970s, eventually winning a Best Supporting Actress Oscar for her performance opposite Warren Beatty in Hal Ashby’s Shampoo (1975). For the record, 1951’s winners were Vivien Leigh as Best Actress and Kim Hunter as Best Supporting Actress, both for Elia Kazan’s A Streetcar Named Desire.
A 20th Century Fox release, A Millionaire for Christy (1951) was directed by George Marshall and costars Fred MacMurray, by then on his way to becoming a (mostly) minor Western star – before coming back in the 1960s as one of those insufferable Disney/TV Dads.
Valentino (1951)
Lewis Allen’s Valentino (1951) is a must-see disaster, a laughably absurd biopic of Rudolph Valentino, the star of The Sheik and The Four Horsemen of the Apocalypse. Eleanor Parker plays a fictitious character that’s part Mae Murray, part Alice Terry, part June Mathis, part Natacha Rambova, part Jean Acker, part you-name-it.
Alice Terry, Valentino’s costar in The Four Horsemen of the Apocalypse and The Conquering Power, and the widow of the director of these two films, Rex Ingram, sued Columbia Pictures for $750,000. She received a six-figure out-of-court settlement, as the film portrays Eleanor Parker’s character having an affair with Valentino both before and after Terry’s marriage to Ingram.
Of note, Valentino star Anthony Dexter looks remarkably like the silent era icon.
The Man with the Golden Arm (1955)
Sinatra is also Parker’s leading man in Otto Preminger’s The Man with the Golden Arm, a melodrama about drug addiction that left censors apoplectic and audiences wondering how it would feel to shoot up heroin. The Man with the Golden Arm was a huge box office hit, earning Frank Sinatra his one Best Actor Oscar nomination. Eleanor Parker, unfortunately, is way over the top as Sinatra’s harridan wife, while Kim Novak is the angelic side of the film’s dysfunctional triangle.
A Hole in the Head (1959)
If you are willing to accept Frank Sinatra and Edward G. Robinson as brothers, your ability to suspend disbelief is nothing short of miraculous.
Whether that’s good or bad is open to debate, but there’s at least one unquestionable plus: You’ll have a better chance of appreciating veteran Frank Capra’s hit comedy A Hole in the Head*, starring Frank Sinatra as a widowed father and the proprietor of a struggling Miami hotel, Edward G. Robinson as his older brother, and Eleanor Parker as a brightly redheaded widow and the hotelier’s potential romantic interest.
Arnold Schulman’s screenplay had its origins in his own 1949 one-act play The Dragon’s Head, which, under various names, went through a number of revisions, expansions, and condensations until its successful 1957 Broadway run as A Hole in the Head, starring Paul Douglas under the direction of Garson Kanin.
As per Variety, Franks Sinatra and Capra bought the film rights for $200,000 plus 5 percent of the profits. Also as found in the trade magazine, this United Artists release** took in an estimated $5.2 million in rentals† at the domestic box office alone, which clearly made it a pretty good investment.
A Hole in the Head was also a good career move for Eleanor Parker, even if her role is subordinated to Sinatra’s. She had had two box office misfires in 1957 – Lizzie (though it features one of her most remarkable performances) and The Seventh Sin – and had no movies coming out in 1958.
Note: Jimmy Van Heusen and lyricist Sammy Cahn’s “High Hopes” was the year’s Best Original Song Oscar winner.
* A Hole in the Head was Frank Capra’s first narrative feature since Here Comes the Groom (1951). He would direct only one other, the box office underperformer Pocketful of Miracles (1961).
** As per unverified online sources, A Hole in the Head had a $1.9 million price tag.
† Rentals represent the share of the box office gross that goes to the producing and distributing entities.
The Oscar (1966)
Another must-see disaster is Russell Rouse’s The Oscar (1966), a Hollywood-set cautionary tale based on Richard Sale’s novel about the pitfalls of fame and the dangers of golden statuettes of naked men holding long swords between their legs. Eleanor Parker plays the agent who discovers ambitious actor Stephen Boyd, who falls for beauty Elke Sommer.
Among those glimpsed in The Oscar’s cameos and supporting roles are Merle Oberon, Milton Berle, Joseph Cotten, Jill St. John, Tony Bennett, Peter Lawford, Hedda Hopper, Nancy Sinatra, Bob Hope, and Oscar winners Ernest Borgnine, Ed Begley, Walter Brennan, Broderick Crawford, Frank Sinatra, James Dunn, and Edith Head. The film’s last scene was clearly based on the Frank Capra–Frank Lloyd Oscar tale that, according to Capra’s biographer Joseph McBride, never happened – or at least not the way the director described it in his autobiography.
Lastly, Robert Gist’s largely forgotten An American Dream (1966) features a trio of notable stars – Eleanor Parker, Stuart Whitman, Janet Leigh – in addition to, in a bit part, former Star Trek actor and current Facebook celebrity George Takei.
Eleanor Parker movies: TCM schedule (EDT)
8:00 PM DETECTIVE STORY (1951)
Director: William Wyler.
Cast: Kirk Douglas, Eleanor Parker, William Bendix, Cathy O’Donnell, Gladys George, George Macready, Lee Grant, Horace McMahon, Joseph Wiseman, Gerald Mohr, Frank Faylen, Michael Strong, Warner Anderson.
103m10:00 PM A MILLIONAIRE FOR CHRISTY (1951)
Director: George Marshall.
Cast: Fred MacMurray, Eleanor Parker, Richard Carlson, Una Merkel, Chris-Pin Martin, Douglass Dumbrille, Nestor Paiva.
91m11:45 PM VALENTINO (1951)
Director: Lewis Allen.
Cast: Anthony Dexter, Eleanor Parker, Richard Carlson, Patricia Medina, Dona Drake, Lloyd Gough, Otto Kruger, Joseph Calleia.
104m1:45 AM THE MAN WITH THE GOLDEN ARM (1955)
Director: Otto Preminger.
Cast: Frank Sinatra, Eleanor Parker, Kim Novak, Arnold Stang, Darren McGavin, Robert Strauss, John Conte, Doro Merande, George E. Stone, George Mathews, Leonid Kinskey, Emile Meyer.
119m4:00 AM THE KING AND FOUR QUEENS (1956)
Director: Raoul Walsh.
Cast: Clark Gable, Eleanor Parker, Jean Willes, Barbara Nichols, Sara Shane, Roy Roberts, Jay C. Flippen, Jo Van Fleet, Arthur Shields.
84m5:30 AM A HOLE IN THE HEAD (1959)
Director: Frank Capra.
Cast: Frank Sinatra, Eleanor Parker, Edward G. Robinson, Carolyn Jones, Thelma Ritter, Keenan Wynn, Joi Lansing, Eddie Hodges, Joyce Nizzari, Dub Taylor, Benny Rubin, Ruby Dandridge, James Komack, Connie Sawyer.
120m7:45 AM AN AMERICAN DREAM (1966)
Director: Robert Gist.
Cast: Stuart Whitman, Janet Leigh, Eleanor Parker, Barry Sullivan, Lloyd Nolan, J.D. Cannon, Murray Hamilton, Warren Stevens, Harold Gould, George Takei, Richard Derr.
103m9:45 AM THE OSCAR (1966)
Director: Russell Rouse.
Cast: Stephen Boyd, Elke Sommer, Eleanor Parker, Milton Berle, Joseph Cotten, Jill St. John, Edie Adams, Ed Begley, Tony Bennett, Peter Lawford, Ernest Borgnine, Walter Brennan, Broderick Crawford, James Dunn.
Cameos: Merle Oberon, Frank Sinatra, Edith Head, Bob Hope, Hedda Hopper, Nancy Sinatra.
119m
notes
Eleanor Parker movie schedule via the TCM website.
Eleanor Parker Detective Story image: Paramount Pictures.