According to wikipedia, Roberto Rossellini considered directing and starring either Bergman or de Havilland in the lead.
I think Lean did an amazing job with this, but either Bergman or de Havilland would've been inspired casting.
The movie is nigh on perfection, EXCEPT it's the same old annoying Hepburn-as-skinny old maid, a part she did in a million movies after the late 40s.
Thoughts?
I think though Olivia de Havilland played her fair share of old maids, Ingrid Bergman would be my choice, if I had to make one :) but Katherine Hepburn plays the annoying skinny old maid so WELL. Hard to picture anyone else.
shareAs much as I like Bergman, she would come across as too European. I think part of the charm of the movie is how it contrasts Italian (or mostly European) and American ideals of sexuality. Hepburn brings out that contrast.
shareNope. Katharine Hepburn delivered a brilliant, heartbreaking performance. I would never replace her in this film but if I absolutely had to, I would have chosen Rosalind Russell.
shareHepburn's brilliant, one of her career-high performances. If I had to choose between the two as a replacement, it would be de Havilland.
"Now what kind of man are YOU dude?"
I wonder if there was any serious thought about casting Shirley Booth in this film. She had won the Tony Award for Best Actress for it (The time of the Cuckoo) and by this time she had won the Oscar for Come Back, Little Sheba. She certainly could have done the part justice. It is a shame most people only know Booth from Hazel and might never have seen her excellent work in Come Back, Little Sheba and The Matchmaker (a great nonmusical version of Hello Dolly. She was heartbreaking in Sheba and delightful in Matchmaker.
Luckily, if Booth was not given the chance to repeat her award-winning role, we got the great Kate Hepburn's performance to relish forever.
P.S. On a side note, it is a huge shame that Cynthia Nixon is not going to get to repeat her award-winning stage performance in the film version of Rabbit Hole.
I love Ingrid Bergman, and Olivia is a very skilled actress. However, I have to agree w/ many of the other posters, that the film works so well b/c of what Kate was able to bring to it. I am not really a fan of hers, and it's true she played this character seemingly several other times in films, but she was so believable as an old maid! Ingrid Bergman did play a convincing old maid in Cactus Flower, but that was 14 years later - she just wouldn't have been right for Summertime, and as one poster said, much too European for the role.
"Are you going to your grave with unlived lives in your veins?" ~ The Good Girl
According to Arthur Laurents, Hepburn was instrumental in Booth not doing the film. Booth had created the role of Liz Imbry in THE PHILADELPHIA STORY (played memorably by Ruth Hussey on film), so the two actresses were well-acquainted:
During the run of the play, John Gielgud had invaded Shirley's dressing room, sat her down and told her to play it as long as possible, take it on tour, take it to London, to milkit because a play so suited to its star rarely comes along. Then Kate Hepburn swashbuckled into the room . . . sat her down and told her not to go on tour, not to take it to London, and most definitely not to do the movie. Hepburn won over Gielgud.
I don't doubt that Kate asked and Shirley allowed, but how did Kate explain her switch? She didn't have to explain it to me, I knew the answer: David Lean was to direct the picture. How did she explain it to Shirley? I could write the scene with one hand" Kate would intimidate Shirley with her classy New England superiority, then bamboozle her with ease because she would be bamboozling herself at the same time. She never had any trouble with reality because she never had a good grip on it. This became very clear much later---in 1972---when we met regularly over several weeks to decide whether I was going to write and she was going to act in a movie based on Graham Greene's Travels With My Aunt.
I don't think either one would have worked as well as Hepburn. For one thing, I think Kate is the best actress of the trio plus I can't imagine either Olivia or Ingrid capping into Jane's desperate loneliness, shyness, or being as credible an "spinster" (I know Olivia scored on this level in The Heiress but this is a much different type of old maid). Hard to imagine Bergman holding on to her virginity until fortysomething, too. De Havilland would have perhaps made it The Heiress Part II which would not have worked.
shareOlivia de Havilland would have been good but I couldn't picture Bergman in the role. Everything about her screams European, and Jane's American-ness is important. Plus, was Bergman ever able to do an American accent?
As for Hepburn, I liked her. I wasn't sure she'd win me over since she's a bit starchy at times, but she was surprisingly charismatic here. It's one of her better performances, in my opinion.
Lastly, I agree that Lean did good work here. Her certainly knows how to work with his cinematographers to frame good shots. The visual language in this film is better than the dialogue, and the scenes when Jane is just wandering Venice and taking in all the sights are my favorite.
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hepburn was great in this and this role was her,
both olivia and bergman would be great substitutes