"'Course we're diff'rent, because WE live in a palace!"
---Dorothy Comingore as Susan Alexander Kane
Darlings, I am telling you, I could not believe it!!!! Having not seen "Citizen Kane" in at least 10 years, I made a beeline to the Film Forum, where this gem is playing through today!!! Some movies get better with additional viewings, and this is certainly one!!!!
When I was growing up, lambs, there were two films always talked about as being greater than anything else--"Citizen Kane" and "Gone With The Wind." Both could not be any different; the latter traditional, the former breaking ground. Are they both great films???? Yes!!!!!!!!!! Is one the "Greatest???" Honey, those distinctions went out with Nehru jackets!!!!!!!
Actually, "Citizen Kane" is more Gothic than romantic; in style and tone it is closer to "Rebecca" than "Gone With The Wind." And my relationship with this film has grown over the years.
I can remember the first time I saw it, which was in a film course, in college!!! I was SO psyched, darlings!!!! But I turned out to be underwhelmed; I loved the visuals, but I couldn't say--THEN--that I found it compelling. But then a couple of things happened. One was the kidnapping, during my college years of Patricia Campbell Hearst!!! The other was Pauline Kael publishing "The 'Citizen Kane' book, which featured not only the complete shooting script, but her famous essay, "Raising 'Kane'"!!!!!!! After reading through all this, I was ready to take on "Citizen Kane" again, and when I did--WOW!!!!!!!
This is one film where having some background knowledge beforehand helps. It definitely paves the way for a more appreciative initial viewing, not to mention subsequent ones. After 70--yes, darlings!!!--years, the film is amazing!!!! When the black smoke poured out of Xandau's chimney, and the camera pulled back for its legendary final shot, the audience was awed!!!! And just sat there for several seconds, after the film ended, and the lights came up!!!! You don't see that at an Adam Sandler film, darlings!!!!!!!
But let's get to my favorite topic--the mystery!!!! The film unravels kind of like an historical/biographical mystery, but let me tell you, the REAL mystery of "Citizen Kane", if you are not a first time viewer, is not the identity of "Rosebud",
but.....why the hell Dorothy Comingore's career went nowhere!!!!!!!!
So many people connected with this film--Joseph Cotten, Agnes Morrehead, Everett Sloane, Paul Stewart, went on to other things. And so, too, did two of this film's editors, whose names you now may recognize--Robert Wise and Mark Robson!!!!
Dorothy Comingore should have been a major star!!!! She is brilliant in the role of Susan Alexander Kane (based on Marion Davies), and, next to Welles, has the film's best, and showiest part!!!! Her scenes in the nightclub when drunk, the jigsaw puzzles, the opera....when she is onscreen you cannot take your eyes off her!!!! And she nails that whole cheap cocktail waitress thing, for, honey, that is exactly what Susan Alexander was--a cheap cocktail waitress whom Kane saw as one he could obsessively mold to his own whim!!!! It was certainly the breakout role of Comingore's career, and it should have led to a major career!!!!!
BUT--
Prior to this, Comingore had been featured in a string of B movies. She had been discovered years before by Chaplin. Welles saw one of these films, and sensed something in her that would be right for Susan. But, in order to get the performance out of her that he did, sources say Welles treated her as abusively on the set, as Kane treats Susan!!!! So much so that costar Ruth Warrick complained to Welles. His claim was it was necessary, as he felt that Comingore was as limited as an actress as Susan Alexander was as a singer!!!!! He may have been right; he may have been wrong, but, while she worked afterwards, Dorothy Comingore never scaled these heights again!!! She was never given another chance to!!!! Then came the McCarthy Blacklisting, which she was caught up in, and which basically finished whatever career she still had for good!!!!!
"Citizen Kane" was a film that was daring for its time, and let me tell you, 70 years later, it still seems as daring, as there is nothing else near it out there today. Thirty four years later, in 1975, Robert Altman made his masterpiece, "Nashville," which, with its like media orientation, I declared it to be the 'Citizen Kane' of its day, and I still stand by that, darlings!!!! But it did not occur to me, until yesterday, that, like 'Kane', "Nashville" has its counterpart Comingore figure, in Ronnee Blakley!!!!!!
Who could forget her performance as Barbara Jean in "Nashville"???? I am telling you, back then, there was a point where I was convinced I WAS Barbara Jean!!!! Who, back then, could forget "Newsweek's" cover story on the film, with Altman and Blakley
featured prominently on the cover????? The article, speaking of Blakley, heralded the arrival of a major star!!!! She was Oscar nominated!!!! And, like Comingore, her performance was the most compelling in Altman's film. Except, unlike Comingore, she had a VOICE!!!!!
While Blakely's years were not tragic like Comingore's, she too never scaled the heights of this film again. She did appear, in a minor role, in another relatively well known film, whose title also begins with "N"--as a mother in the original "A Nightmare On Elm Street!!!!" She made some albums, and continued to perform, but, eventually, like Comingore, Ronee Blakely, though still alive, is not heard from much, now!!!!
It is fascinating how these two films intersect. And how the actresses playing the most compelling character in each never moved beyond their achievements herein!!!
Is there such a thing as being too good in ONE role???? Were Comingore and Blakley operating within their own prescribed limitations, so that they would never be able to do so again???? Maybe Welles was right??? Except, if he had been, Comingore NEVER would have been able to give the performance she did here!!!! Neither would Blakley in "Nashville!"
Darlings, we just LOVE "Citizen Kane," and we just LOVE Dorothy Comingore as Susan Alexander!!!!! Seventy years later, (I think this blog just answered the question I was posing, loves!!!!) both the film and she shine brightly, and always will!!!!!
And, girls, wait till you see MY nightclub act, with the cheap skylight!!!!!!
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