O Eterno Don Juan

Some classic age actors, when seen today, appear hammy and using old-fashioned technique. And some are timeless. John Barrymore is timeless and, in one of his last films, "The Great Profile," he lampoons himself mercilessly - in the role of a ham with old-fashioned technique. The story is based on what really happened to the actor during a play called "My Own Children." The actor Evans Garrick (Barrymore) has been missing for three days. When he arrives home drunk, he's in costume and he's reciting Shakespeare, believing that he just left a film set an hour earlier. Infuriated, his wife Sylvia (Mary Beth Hughes) leaves him. Then pretty Mary Maxwell (17-year-old Anne Baxter) arrives with a play she is desperate for Garrick to do. He gets rid of her by saying he will meet her in his agent's office the next day. His agent (Gregory Ratoff) owes some mobsters $8200 and when he hears that Ms. Maxwell has a wealthy fiancée, Richard Lansing (John Payne) who will back the play, he's all for it. It's a complete disaster, but it gets Sylvia back from Reno as soon as she hears about it, and she wins back her role. Totally polluted by the second act, Garrick makes the play a hit by ad-libbing and finally rolling off of the stage in a wheelchair. Ms. Maxwell is finally convinced to take what she considered her serious drama into New York, where it's been booked for a six-month run, but she takes Garrick in hand to sober him up. Everyone's unhappy - her fiancée and Garrick's agent in particular, since the play is deathly if Garrick isn't drunk.

Strangely enough, most of this actually happened to Barrymore in real life, including his wife leaving him and returning to get her part back in New York. And she did hide in Barrymore's wardrobe as Garrick's wife does in the film, though in real life, Barrymore's daughter Diana tried to keep her from doing so.

Barrymore is extremely dissipated in "The Great Profile" and reads his lines off of cue cards, which toward the end, he did often. For people who say he's a ham, I say he was playing one. He does Hamlet with a quivering sing-song voice. Does anyone believe this is actually how he played his famous Hamlet? He was Olivier's inspiration for the role. Olivier first played Hamlet in 1937 and was known for speaking the dialogue instead of singing it.

There are some very funny moments in "The Great Profile" but in the end, it's a bizarre movie, enlivened by Barrymore's presence. If you want to see a non-hammy Barrymore, I suggest "The Great Man Votes" or "Bill of Divorcement." He was a great actor with a big personality - if that seems strange by today's standards, well, it's the pictures that got small.

Even in his last days John Barrymore always retained a healthy sense of humor about himself. He knew himself inside and out and in these last films like The Great Profile the last ounces of his talent he's giving to film audiences. Soon there would be nothing left.

Watching The Great Profile and seeing Barrymore has all the fascination of a train wreck. Knowing his history you seem compelled to watch it and make no mistake it's a funny film, but there's an underlying sadness to it.

There's a pale reflection of his performance as Oscar Jaffe in Twentieth Century. Barrymore is married to Mary Beth Hughes and she's ready to ditch him. So's just about everybody else in town. But Anne Baxter in her second film plays an Eve Harrington like fan. She's written a play and she wants The Great Profile to star. He goes into his usual shtick with her about how great art is a reward unto itself, but when he hears she comes with financing through her rich boyfriend John Payne, he more than relents. After all offers aren't piling up with him.

When Barrymore during out of town tryouts comes on blasted to the gills, Hughes walks out refusing to be humiliated by him any more, but the thing which Baxter wrote as a romantic drama is turned into a comedy smash. Kind of like a dipsomaniac version of Olsen&Johnson's Hellzapoppin'. No two performances were ever the same, but they were all good. Then Baxter takes it into her head to reform him and it nearly kills the goose that's laying all their golden eggs.

Reading here that this was originally intended for Adolph Menjou, I almost wish Menjou did it. Menjou certainly could do broad comedic performances, look at him in Golddiggers of 1935 for instance. Barrymore's dissipation because he was such a public figure was carried out in all the media.

As I said Barrymore was a man who had a sense of humor. He loved what Fredric March did in The Royal Family Of Broadway as Tony Cavendish which was based on him. But now it was real and no satire.

The Great Profile is funny, but if Menjou had done it the experience would not feel like a guilty pleasure.

This was Anne Baxter's second film in her debut year, and as a 17 year old she had quite a posh voice and the beauty of youth. Her facial structure was exactly the same as we came to know her in later films, but she hadn't yet developed her dark beauty. She had a button nose and small pursed lips that promised sensuality. Apart from that, not much in this film.

Anemic attempt at recapturing the magic of Twentieth Century. John Barrymore is dialed to eleven and spends the whole movie screaming at people. Cutie Mary Beth Hughes is no Carole Lombard for him but tries her best. Early role for Anne Baxter that's nothing impressive. As harsh as I'm being it's still a watchable picture. It moves along well and the cast is likable in spite of the weak writing and Barrymore sucking all the air out of the room.

I almost couldn't make it through the whole film, but I stuck it out for JB. He breaks my heart in a way that almost no one else can. For those of you who are using this one performance as a yardstick to judge his talent by, you're selling him and yourselves short. This was a phenomenally gifted man with a finger constantly pressing his self-destruct button for reasons only he knew. You have to see his other films, silent and sound, that show his true range. "Twentieth Century," "Don Juan," "Dr. Jekyll and Mr. Hyde," "Svengali," - these are a few of the performances that are worth seeing. He was more than astonishingly handsome and sexy. He had guts and fire, and just couldn't overcome his fatal thirst. I would sell my soul to go back in time to see his "Hamlet" or "Richard III". All of his private and public sins aside, he was one of the greats, unjustly ignored by the Academy and forgotten by viewers. How sad. He deserved so much better.