Gladys George makes hard women sound as though being hard has cost them something. We value the hurt in that throaty voice, though too many of her later parts gave her little to do.
Fi1m perspective
Gladys George can sound tough and close to tears within the same line. Her throaty voice is put to good use as Iva Archer, the jealous widow in The Maltese Falcon (1941). We felt for Iva because George makes the jealousy sound painful, even when her possessiveness is hard to like. Her ability to suggest vulnerability beneath a difficult manner gives us a reason to pay attention whenever she speaks.
Her return to films in 1934 followed a period concentrated on stage work. Carrie Snyder in Valiant Is the Word for Carrie (1936) was a leading role, while Panama Smith in The Roaring Twenties (1939) was a substantial supporting one. The latter put her alongside James Cagney and Humphrey Bogart, playing the sort of worldly woman for which she became familiar. We rate the tenderness she could bring to that casting. It also risked making her an actor hired to supply a familiar effect, rather than one given something fresh to discover.
In John Huston's The Maltese Falcon, an actor has to register amid a great deal of talk. We recommend the film strongly, despite the cramped plotting and dialogue that can turn stiff. Bogart makes the exchanges feel risky, and George's Iva contributes a personal grievance to that tension. Her performance fits a film whose actors keep us listening even when the writing grows formal, though the part offers less space than her voice makes us want. We would happily have spent longer with her.
The later work too often meant brief or throwaway parts, a limitation worth acknowledging before recommending everything with her name in it. Hortense Derry in The Best Years of Our Lives (1946) gave her a small but telling opportunity for quiet sadness. Lute Mae Sanders, the brothel madam in Flamingo Road (1949), kept her within the familiar worldly casting. Start with The Maltese Falcon for the strength of the whole film, then try The Roaring Twenties for Panama Smith.
Biography
Gladys George was an American actress of stage and screen. She began performing on stage at the age of three, touring with her parents, and appeared in several silent films in the early 1920s before achieving success on Broadway in the 1920s and 1930s.
Her film roles include Panama Smith in The Roaring Twenties (1939), Iva Archer in The Maltese Falcon (1941), Hortense Derry in The Best Years of Our Lives (1946), Lute Mae Sanders in Flamingo Road (1949), Miss Hatch in Detective Story (1951), and Mrs Robey in He Ran All the Way (1951). She received an Academy Award nomination for Best Actress for her performance in Valiant Is the Word for Carrie (1936).
