Today, Katharine Hepburn stars alongside Hollywood royalty Humphrey Bogart as The African Queen which airs on BBC Two starting at 2.45pm. The Academy Award-winning film, directed by John Huston, tells the story of a primary missionary seeking solace in a gin-drinking sea captain, as she attempts to flee German forces in World War I in Africa. Along the way, the couple encounter a series of difficult challenges as they try to evade their German rivals on the African riverboat Queen.
For his part in the 1951 classic, Bogart took home an Academy Award, and although Hepburn scored no wins, she remains the only person to win four Academy Awards for acting in her career.
In addition to winning the Morning Glory in 1934, Hepburn also collected the best actress gongs in the Guess Who’s Coming to Dinner contest, The Lion in Winter, and At Golden Pond.
These wins put it ahead of record-breaking competitors, Meryl Streep and Jack Nicholson, who took home two Best Actress/Best Actor awards, as well as wins for Best Supporting Actress/Best Supporting Actress.
Clearly, Hepburn was proud of her impressive record, and engaged in friendly competition with anyone she felt could beat her, including Jane Fonda.
Katharine Hepburn mocked Jane Fonda for her Oscar class: “You won’t catch me now!” (Image: Getty)
The couple starred together on Golden Pond (Image: Getty)
According to a 2012 Harper’s Bazaar interview, Fonda noted how “really competitive” Hepburn was, and that helped propel her forward.
She continued, “I really thought I was going to win more Oscars than she did, and when she won On Golden Pond, I called her to congratulate her, and she said, ‘You’ll never catch me now.'” “
Fonda herself has won two Oscars, for Klute and Coming Home, although compared to Streep and Nicholson they haven’t been nominated multiple times.
But she noted that the rivalry between her and Hepburn often goes too far.
JUST IN: Jane Fonda says Katharine Hepburn “the competition” didn’t like her
Katharine Hepburn won an Oscar for the movie (Image: Getty)
And she continued, “I didn’t like it. She once said [writer] Dominic Dunn that I have no soul.”
Although the couple failed to engage in a more meaningful way, Hepburn herself noted that she would be seen as different from the others when her fellow actors and audience met her for the first time.
In a 2003 New York Times article, when Hepburn passed away, the star said, “I strike people as weird in some way, although I don’t quite understand why.
“Of course, I have an angular face, an angular body, and I guess I’m an angular character, who rushes at people.”
do not miss:
“You despicable *****d!” Hepburn refused to work with John Wayne [INSIGHT]
Jane Fonda Opens Up About FEUD With Katharine Hepburn – ‘Too Spiky’ [ANALYSIS]
Humphrey Bogart’s boat became the queen of the river again [REVIEW]
Katharine Hepburn won four Oscars (Image: Getty)
Hepburn was quoted as saying by the BBC’s obituary: “I am both a character and an actress.
“Show me an actress who is not a character, and you will show me a woman who is not a star.”
Her acting style helped define a new generation of actresses, and historian Richard Schickel discussed it in the Los Angeles Times in 2011.
He said, “Her best films were when she was presented as a woman on her high horse with slightly pretentious, often funny ideas about the world.
UK filming locations (Photo: EXPRESS)
“The guys had to frustrate her and make her reveal herself as a good girl, athletic and democratic.
“We liked the idea that aristocratic people would be humanized by democratic values—in her case, by slightly tough, kind males.”
Hepburn’s death 19 years ago saw tributes from around the world spread as the world mourned one of her best actors.
Among the tributes was then-US President George W. Bush, who said Hepburn would “be remembered as one of the nation’s artistic treasures”.
Before her death, Hepburn made it clear that she was “not afraid of death” because “it must be wonderful, like a long sleep.”
She died of cardiac arrest after being treated for a violent tumor.
The African Queen broadcasts from 2.45pm on BBC Two.
[ad_2]
