{"id":167205,"date":"2026-08-02T08:00:40","date_gmt":"2026-08-02T12:00:40","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.sheilaomalley.com\/?p=167205"},"modified":"2026-07-31T08:35:25","modified_gmt":"2026-07-31T12:35:25","slug":"ann-dvorak-2","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.sheilaomalley.com\/?p=167205","title":{"rendered":"“The trouble with Hollywood is everybody is crazy for money.” — Ann Dvorak"},"content":{"rendered":"

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\nAnna McKim chose “Ann Dvorak” as her stage name. She chose a challenging name to pronounce (for American audiences, that is) over her easily-pronounceable real name. Who does that?? Well, she does. It says a lot. It’s mischievous. I love it.<\/p>\n

Jen Johans and I delved into the extremely satisfying subject of pre-Code actress Ann Dvorak when I appeared on Jen’s podcast to discuss Pre-Code films<\/a>. Ann Dvorak should be WAY more remembered than she is. Her career has suffered eclipse for many years basically because so many of her films weren’t seen for decades – in the years before television and VHS and etc. That has since been rectified, with the Forbidden Hollywood<\/i> box sets – where she reigns supreme – and also streaming platforms. If you have Amazon Prime, put her name in, and some of these old and almost completely forgotten films will come up. Ann Dvorak’s work does not date<\/i>. It is so unbelievably contemporary: ALWAYS. <\/p>\n

Heat Lightning<\/i> is a relatively recent discovery. Aline MacMahon, known mostly as a sidekick character actress in pre-Codes, and always good, takes center stage, and is heartbreaking and tough-minded and funny. The whole film is great and so worth discovering. It’s streaming on Amazon! In Heat Lightning<\/i>, Dvorak’s character looks forward to the youth-quake of the 1950s, with films like Splendour in the Grass<\/i> or Rebel Without a Cause<\/i>, a restless teenager in a hurry to grow up, bucking up against adult control, flirting with danger, anything to get OUT. <\/p>\n

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\nHeat Lightning<\/i><\/p>\n

Dvorak is probably most well known for her performance in Howard Hawks’ Scarface<\/i>, one of her films to have been played consistently over the years (and associated with Brian De Palma’s remake). Dvorak is hot-to-trot in it, as the gangster’s sister, busting out of the confines of her family – and her clearly incestuous relationship with her brother (it’s barely euphemistic). She’s wild and “carefree”, wearing a backless dress with straps making an X across her creamy skin. (Scarface<\/i> is filled with ominous symbolic X-es.<\/a>)<\/p>\n

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\nShe’s such a disturbing and deeply connected screen presence.<\/p>\n

Her best performance by a long shot is in Three on a Match<\/i>, directed by Mervyn LeRoy. She is almost spookily ahead of her time. It’s a fearless performance, even for a Pre-Code. The performance doesn\u2019t date at all. Throw her into a 1986 Brian De Palma film, she\u2019d fit right in. The character’s arc is bleak and tragic. She is a rich girl, a rich woman, and … bored. Her boredom is existential in nature. There’s something missing. There’s a blank at the center of all of it, and she can’t really explain it. She just knows it’s there.<\/p>\n

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And so she runs away. And she takes her child with her. She vanishes into the underworld. And she feels no remorse about the husband who is devastated at his child being missing, who has no idea where she has gone. She is DONE playing by the world’s rules, she is DONE being a “good girl”. <\/p>\n

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\nThis is not a happy story. She RACES to the bottom. She consorts with gangsters, she becomes addicted to heroin almost overnight, and most probably sells her body to support her habit – all as her little son, a baby, sits across the room looking on, filthy, neglected, traumatized. This is bleak shit, even by Pre-Code standards. And it gets even worse. Dvorak\u2019s performance is unblinkingly realistic. <\/p>\n

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\nThree On a Match<\/i> has not been available until relatively recently, a real loss. But it’s now “out there”, it plays at festivals, it plays on TCM, it’s in a box set. There\u2019s no reason at this point that Dvorak’s performance – or Dvorak – should \u201csink into obscurity.\u201d Her final scene in Three on a Match<\/i> is difficult to watch. When you want to swoop in and save a character, when you want to leap through the screen to stop the horror unfolding – you know you\u2019re in the presence of the Tragic. <\/p>\n

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Dvorak always had a tough side, a sharp edge, but these performances make me think she would have been a phenomenal Blanche Dubois (whose core is quite tough beneath the Southern belle persona). Dvorak lived in the dichotomy: ladylike, tough, romantic, streetsmart … Not a lot of people understand that fluid in-between state, but she did. <\/p>\n

My friend Imogen Smith has written a lot about Three on a Match<\/i> (and pre-Code movies in general), as well as a great piece on Dvorak for Chiseler – which can be read on the Wayback Machine<\/a> (thanks Carl!). Here’s Imogen on Dvorak in Three on a Match<\/i>: <\/p>\n

You would never guess from this film that Bette Davis would wind up the best known of the three actresses, or that Humphrey Bogart would become a beloved icon, while Ann Dvorak would sink into obscurity. <\/p><\/blockquote>\n

\nCosign.<\/p>\n

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\nThank you so much for stopping by. If you like what I do, and if you feel inclined to support my work, here’s a link to my Venmo account<\/a>. And I’ve launched a Substack, Sheila Variations 2.0<\/a>, if you’d like to subscribe.<\/em> <\/small><\/p>\n