Lizabeth Scott, of the smoky voice, the tough hard eyes, the lean body with beautiful dangerous curves, has died at the age of 92.
Hers was not a lengthy career and it petered out a bit after the heyday of noir, although she kept working up until 1972.
She gave memorable performances in great noirs, such as Dead Reckoning with Bogart, Pitfall, I Walk Alone, and Dark City. Her final film was the wonderful Pulp in 1972, starring Michael Caine and Mickey Rooney. If you saw her once, you never forgot her.
I love the quote from Scott in The Hollywood Reporter about film noir:
The films that I had seen growing up were always, ‘Boy meets girl, boy ends up marrying girl, and they go off into the sunset.’ And suddenly [in the 1940s], psychology was taking a grasp on society in America. That’s when they got into these psychological, emotional things that people feel. That was the feeling of film noir. … It was a new realm, something very exiting, because you were coming closer and closer to reality.
Scott was another one of producer Hal Wallis’ contracts, and he put her in Loving You, Elvis’ second film, about a simple country delivery boy who takes the music world by storm. A rags-to-riches. Unlike Love Me Tender, Presley’s debut, which was a period piece, placing Elvis in an established ensemble, Loving You was an Elvis vehicle, created specifically for him, commenting on his impact in the culture. Lizabeth Scott, smooth and silky as well as hard-bitten and relentless, plays the press agent who discovers him singing at a country fair. Dollar bills spin in her eyes. Lust also spins. So they begin a partnership, with her taking him to the top, and … subtly … with the expectation that he will re-pay her in return. It’s subversive and strange, and Elvis plays the scenes with her beautifully, treating her with old-school Southern manners, filled with gratitude for all she has done for him, but not sure if he wants to … you know … sleep with her.
Additionally, she tries to turn him into something he’s not, forcing him to wear skin-tight faux cowboy outfits, basically turning him into a gimmick. A gimmick that is a slam-dunk with audiences. Elvis gives one of the great camp (and I mean that as a compliment) performances in his career, and in any career, in the “cowboy” number.
I wrote about that number here.
Conflict ensues. Will he be able to be a star on his own terms? Will she let him do his own thing? Lizabeth Scott basically plays the female Colonel Tom Parker in Loving You.
It’s a really good movie, and she’s terrific in it. I had only seen her in black-and-white movies when I saw Loving You, and she seemed to have a face and eyes born for black-and-white. My friend Kent observed that to see her in color here, the silvery hair, the white shirts, the pale skin, all in contrast with Elvis’ pitch-black hair (dyed for this film, and he kept it that way), and bright red shirts, bright green shirts, her sleek candy-colored sports car … She’s to die for. They make a great couple onscreen.
And see her other films, if you haven’t already. Definitely see Dead Reckoning and Pulp.
Rest in peace, Ms. Scott.
So was a true talent and beauty. Loved her in The Strange Love of Martha Ivers, that voice and the way she captivated Van Heflin, plus Barbara Stanwyck, hard to go wrong.
Yes !! I think that might have been Scott’s debut? I have to check. Not too shabby!
Sheila
Oh I loved her! I hope TCM will be playing some of her movies!
Oh and, by the way, Was that you in the Elvis clip? That girl in the audience who jumped up and said, “what’s your number hon? I’ll call ya!” I want to see this movie!
I’m sure TCM will do some kind of tribute!!
and yeah, ha, that hot-to-trot girl who catcalls him and throws him off. It was the Hollywood-ized version of the riots at Elvis’ shows where screaming fans would trap him in the bathroom tearing his clothes off. You know, tamed as hell.
But still: it’s a lot of fun and Lizabeth Scott is great in it, and they’re wonderful together.
I saw Lizabeth Scott for the first time last year in Stolen Face on TCM, (pre-Vertigo, pre-Eyes Without a Face, at moments as full of uncanny horror as either) where she plays two roles. I haven’t seen enough of Hammer Films’ non-monster-horror films to know much about what they’re like, but in this one there wasn’t that kind of show-offy two-images-of-the-actor-in-the-same-frame feel to her performance — it was a very distinctive, immediate embodiment of two people, viewed through the same identity, and to me somewhere on the level of Val Lewton’s productions (like how The Cat People and its sequel aren’t really about the special effects at all).
Thanks for always posting these remembrances, Sheila. Your description of Loving You makes me think it’s about time I saw another Elvis movie (only seen King Creole so far!)
Michael – wow, I love your description of Stolen Face – I haven’t seen it but now I really feel I must. Thank you for that!
// it was a very distinctive, immediate embodiment of two people, viewed through the same identity, //
Great!! Will definitely seek it out.
Oh and yeah for King Creole! Definitely Elvis’ best film, just in terms of production quality. Michael Curtiz directing, all those great songs, the look of it. Yum.
But there are so many other good ones.Jailhouse Rock is classic.
Other good ones that don’t really get a lot of mention:
Wild in the Country
Follow That Dream
Flaming Star
Live a Little Love a Little
Charro
Change of Habit …
The Elvis formula pics are super fun too – Blue Hawaii, Girl Happy …
Such bizarre films, and they really are meant to be seen in a drive-in. If you picture yourself at a drive-in, on a hot date with your teenage love, then Elvis movies make much more sense. Of COURSE the last half hour is stupid, with no songs. Because duh, it’s a drive-in and everyone’s all hot and heavy. Ha.
At the time of Loving You, there was still a lot of investment in Elvis vehicles – later, they would crank those things out in record time, the goal being to spend as little money as possible. But Loving You looks great, the songs are good, and there’s at least some attempt to DEAL with Elvis as a figure in popular culture. It’s still very tame and G-rated, compared to real life – but it’s SUPER fun to watch Elvis, an amateur actor really, play these scenes with Lizabeth Scott. He rises to the occasion. He respected the hell out of her. He worked hard.
Thanks again for your comment.
Her work with Elvis is radical, ambiguous, definitive and pleasing all at the same time. She always brought deep rivers of validity to the screen whenever she shone in front of a camera. This is much harder than it sounds. She was a lion tamer who was far more exotic than the kings of the jungle standing next to her. I met her once, about ten years ago. She was visually devastating in a brown silk pants suit that refracted her light. Then she opened her mouth, and was kind, even sweet. She knew that she rendered first timers speechless and so she broke the ice. Graciously. Single-handedly. One of the last, truly blessed, golden sets of bones to have formed on earth when movies ruled, while the rest of us were silly putty.
// Her work with Elvis is radical, ambiguous, definitive and pleasing all at the same time. //
YES. She’s both Mother and Lover. She’s ruthless business woman and a woman falling in love/lust. She wants to control him, she knows she needs to let him go. And his frustration with that – and his feeling of loyalty towards her – it brought out all of this interesting stuff in him. Love their scenes together!
// She knew that she rendered first timers speechless and so she broke the ice. Graciously. Single-handedly. //
How gorgeous, Kent – thank you for giving us that image of her.
Love the drive-in scene-setting! The effect different theatres can have on seeing a movie is so important (the neighbourhood theatre I saw my first, and many, movies at coincidentally just had its final show last night — closed down by multiplex competition, unfortunately), so I’ll try and keep that in mind when I get to those ones. Appreciate the list of titles, too!
So sorry to hear that about your neighborhood theatre.
and in re: drive-ins:
Yeah, the critics who dismiss Elvis movies, or sneer at them, seem to forget that these were singularly designed entertainments – featuring the biggest star of the day – made for drive-in movies – and most of them were enormous hits, brightly colored, lots of songs, lots of beautiful scenery and girls in bikinis, Elvis in every scene – and if you picture the raucous atmosphere of a drive-in, the movies make much more sense. These aren’t quiet art-house films.
I mean, some of them are – Wild in the Country is a serious film, Flaming Star is a really good Western – and the late 1960s, as the studio system collapsed and independents were rising – the Elvis Formula started breaking apart in REALLY interesting ways. Live a Little, Love a Little is a screwball, mixed with psychedelia, vaguely influenced by Antonioni, believe it or not, at least in the fact that it’s about a high-fashion photographer/playboy type – Charro is a Spaghetti-ish Western, and Change of Habit is an urban comedy, which actually (in its own small way) acknowledges the upheaval of the 60s (in a way the rest of Elvis’ films never did).
They’re all really interesting – but do require the context of the times in a way other films might not.
MY TEENAGE YEARS BOW TO LIZABETH SCOTT. SHE WAS PART OF THE MAGIC PRODUCED BY ELVIS, WHICH OVERWHELMED ME IN THE DISTANT YEAR OF 1959 (DECEMBER 30). SHE WAS A LADY AND AN EXCELLENT ACTRESS. MAY GOD BLESS AND KEEP HER FOREVER.