April 4

TCM celebrated Anthony Perkins birthday. I watched The Actress and Goodbye Again. In The Actress Anthony had a very small role. He played Jean Simmons boyfriend. He looked very good in the suits of he period. I was very impressed with the exuberance of Jean Simmons in the role of Ruth Gordon and Spencer Tracy as her father. I liked the turn of his character, he did not want his daughter to become an actress, but the moment that the producer didn’t like her he becomes very protective.

In Goodbye Again he plays a 25 year old an interested in 40 year old Ingrid Bergman. The opening credits show Ingrid leaving work and getting a taxi, Yves Montand walking to his car, who eyes woman walking by, and Anthony driving with the Arch of Triumph in the background. Ingrid goes to her apartment to get ready for a date. She gets a phone call and her date has to work late. It is the 6th anniversary of the date they met. After she hangs up sits in f the mirror and puts on cold cream to take off her makeup. The next Yves apologizes for the meeting. After he drops Ingrid he sees a woman in his rear view mirror. He moves the mirror to the vertical so he can see her full figure. The next day Ingrid meets with a woman who needs an interior decorator. Anthony plays her son. He sees her and starts to talk with her. After the interview he is outside and offers her a ride, which Ingrid takes. When Anthony gets to work around noon he is very happy and realizes that he does not know her name. Anthony meets up with the couple in a nightclub. Yves sees the woman there that he saw in the street. Anthony is drunk and the couple takes him home. He ends up sleeping on Ingrid’s breast in the car with a smile on his face. The next day Anthony goes to Ingrid’s work to apologize and take her to take her to lunch. At lunch he is very animated and makes Ingrid laugh. Anthony wants to be with her but she keeps putting him off. He asks her “Do you like Brahms?” (which is the title of the book the movie is based upon). She states she keeps her weekends free. The next scene is Yves with a woman barely covered in a sheet who states “men always smoke afterward”. They decide to go away for the weekend. Yves tells Ingrid that he has to work to close a big deal. Anthony sees Yves in the street with another woman. Anthony doesn’t tell Ingrid about the event. He does convince her to go to the concert. At the concert Anthony is so pleased to be with her that he can’t stop smiling and has a difficult time not staring at her. In the concert she flashes back to when she first met Yves. Anthony holds her hand and she moves his hand. Anthony states he loves her and will take her away from him.

Yves comes back home. In talking Ingrid realizes that he did not go where he said he was going. They both pretend that he went on the business trip. While in London for work he receives a note from Ingrid. He rushes home. When he gets back home his mother is throwing a dinner party. Ingrid and Yves are there. He changes into a tuxedo and sits next to Ingrid at the table. Yves is jealous and says some terrible things about her morals. He is leaving the next day for a business trip. She goes to airport to go with him on the trip (it is a real business trip). He refuses. She is concerned about herself, her reactions rather than his actions. She calls him at work to tell him that they cannot see each other. Anthony spends some time drinking. At one club Diahann Carroll sings about love. Days later he states he couldn’t stay away. They stand holding each other in the rain. The next scene is Ingrid in bed with a loud record playing. She is in shadow and you can’t quite tell if she is regrets or enjoyed what has happened. Anthony is in the kitchen signing. While she is at work he decides to spend the day alone thinking of her. There is a montage of him driving around the city and looking at clocks with happy piano music playing. Yves comes back and wants to see her. They arrange to have lunch the next day. She stats that she has been seeing Anthony. That he is more than amusing. Yves states that his girls are normal. Ingrid leaves. In the car she cries. She turns on the wind shield wipers to clear the image. The view switches several times to a watery view. Yves has other women, who he always said meant nothing to him but was not truly satisfied. While at work Anthony waits for her, he doesn’t go to work and she treats him more as a son than lover. While out for a weekend the couple meet up with friends of Anthony’s mother. The meeting makes Ingrid uncomfortable. Anthony realizes that Ingrid still loves Yves. The mother wanting to protect her son, talks his boss into sending him to the New York office. He refuses and quits his job. To celebrate they go to a restaurant where Yves also happens to be dinning. Yves realizes that he cannot live without her and he wants to marry her. When Ingrid tells Anthony he is naturally upset, but calm and angry at the same time. As he leaves the apartment he starts crying and joins the throngs of people on the sidewalk. The couple marry. The last scene repeats the first. Ingrid rushes home to get ready for a night out with her husband and he calls stating he has to work late. She sits in front of the mirror putting on cold cream.

I really wasn’t looking forward to this day. Anthony Perkins was a fine actor.