I saw this movie a few years ago on tv - caught it about half way through and it took me a while to realise that Dorothy's character was supposed to be ugly.
Ms McGuire is absolutely gorgeous and although the makeup people tried, they could not make her look less than beautiful.
I think with Dorothy, she was beautiful on the inside too, and all the makeup in the world couldn't stop that coming out of those eyes of hers.
It was pretty funny, all the intrusive lines in the script, of people saying she's "homely" -- like the little boy near the beginning of the film, etc. I think the boy said it twice. If they'd picked an actress who TRULY looked "homely," there would have been no need for characters to make reference to her homeliness. In a narrative, showing the audience something is always better than telling the audience...but being Hollywood, they had to go with someone with, I guess, unconventional looks, and "dirty" her up with a lack of makeup, not fixing her hair, etc. You saw the same thing with Olivia DeHavilland in "The Heiress"...that character was supposed to be plain at best, ugly at worst, but the only problem is that she was Olivia DeHavilland! She too did her best with that role, like Ms. McGuire did, by being soft-spoken and shy. Hollywood wasn't casting Hedy Lamarr types in these roles, but McGuire and DeHavilland are pretty people by any reasonable measure....
shareDorothy's natural loveliness certainly was evident, no matter how they tried to make her look homely. It reminds me of 'The Heiress', in which beautiful Olivia De Havilland was supposed to be unattractive.
shareThe same applies to Olivia's sister Joan Fontaine in Jane Eyre-she was a pretty woman-not plain at all. The most dramatic transformation was Bette Davis in Now Voyager! She looked awful before she got her makeover. However as for Dorothy, I thought the make-up people did a good job toning down her looks, but she was plain and ordinary, not "homely" at all.
shareThere is no explanation why nice-looking actresses like Dorothy McGuire and Joan Fontaine were cast as plain mousies. I wondered if they minded being miscast in such an unjust way. But both lovely ladies seemed to have been landed with these type of roles for all of their careers almost.
shareNice to see that others agree that McG is pretty, beautiful, and generally pretty beautful. I saw her for the first time in 1972 or 73 when ABC aired "The Spiral Staircase" and fell in love with her because she reminded of my high school girlfriend/first love, who I met about that time. I also loved her in "A Summer Place" and "Rich Man, Po' Man." To me, she is lovely.
shareI like her in 'The Spiral Staircase.' I would call her pretty and innocent-looking which has great appeal. As though you want to protect her. I think she didn't get glamourus roles because of that look of innocence about her.
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