That it is from the first pairing of Katherine Hepburn and Spencer Tracy (Woman of the Year) is significant. That it is actually the first scene they shot together in production is historic. Right from the get-go, they were perfect together,*
although their acting styles were oil and water: she liked rehearsal and preparation before the cameras rolled; he liked spontaneity and to "get it right" on the first take. She memorized: he improvised. But, she raised his game and she began to trust "the moment." Together, they had a film-chemistry that had nothing to do with photo-chemicals.
In contrast to last week's scene, they don't "play drunk"—not in a vaudevillian sense. Instead, each, in their own way, plays trying to NOT appear drunk: Tracy withdraws, goes still, lest he betray any sign; Hepburn remains loquacious, but has enough presence to call it quits. And then director Stevens conspires, bringing the camera in closer, almost imperceptibly, until the medium two-shot is close-up and intimate, enough to betray any wrinkle of the brow or mouth, any hesitancy, any sign of attraction. We are correspondents in this scene of correspondents, part of the conspiracy, part of the witnessing, too uncomfortably close to be voyeurs, but almost participants.
The Set-Up: Opposites attract, but when it does, it can cause some disruption. The New York Chronicle is experiencing just such a commotion when foreign affairs correspondent Tess Gallagher (Hepburn) writes a column dismissing baseball and one of the paper's sports writers Sam Craig (Tracy) fires back in his column. Their editor demands a meeting of conciliation, which goes surprisingly smoothly. The two have a spark between them—he invites her to the press-box at a ball game (violating the "men only" rule) and she invites him to her apartment...for a party, as it turns out, where he can't speak any of the languages. Even as they're getting closer, they seem to be moving apart, so Sam invites her to the local bar that is the watering hole for the community of sports-writer's—"Pinky's" named after the slightly punch-drunk fighter who owns it (William Bendix).
Action!
TESS: Well, we're alone. Talk.
TESS: You do have something to talk about...
TESS: ...than most people.
TESS: Yeah, and telling them.
TESS: Oh, I don't know.
and in Leipzig and the Sorbonne,
TESS: Mm-mm.
SAM: Look, Tess...
TESS: I'm looking...Sam.
TESS: Maybe you better take me home.
SAM: Do you feel you'd like some air?
SAM: I love you.
SAM: Positive.
TESS: That is nice.
SAM: Even when you're brilliant.
Woman of the Year
Words by Garson Kanin, Michael Kanin, Ring Lardner, Jr. and John Lee Mahin
Pictures by Joseph Ruttenberg and George Stevens
Woman of the Year is available on DVD and Blu-Ray from The Criterion Collection.
* There is a "story:" When Tracy and Hepburn met for the first time (I've heard it was either in Joseph Mankiewicz' office or the M-G-M commissary), she said "I may be too tall for you, Mr. Tracy" and either Mankiewicz or Tracy saying "Don't worry, honey. (He'll/I'll) cut you down to size." Well, maybe. It sounds too good/too opportune to be true. And given how the film's last act was re-shot precisely to do that—cut Hepburn down to size in the film—is merely reflective of the wishful thinking of men wanting to prove themselves better than strong women. Or "uppity" women, I suppose you could call it, if you REALLY want to show your prejudice. The reason given for the humiliating last part of the film (which Hepburn called "the worst shit I've ever seen") was that the film didn't "test" well in previews with its original ending of the two compromising—he learning foreign languages and she ghosting a sports column in his absence to compromise in their marriage: Stevens was concerned that "housewives" might not feel good about themselves unless Hepburn's character Tess Gallagher got "her comeuppance" (that's the word that was used—"comeuppance"—as if she needed to be punished for something). I would be very surprised if Stevens ever cared one fig about the feelings of housewives in the audience. But, reportedly director Stevens and Hepburn were "an item" before the filming of Woman of the Year, and very quickly, Hepburn and Tracy fell in love during production. "Comeuppance." Hmm. "Fury and the man scorned..." sounds more logical.
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