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| Birth Name(s) : Grace Patricia Kelly |
Date of Birth: November 12, 1929 |
| Status:
Married
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Partner:
Prince Rainier of Monaco |
| Profession:
Actor |
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Full Grace Kelly Biography
On November 12, 1929, Grace Patricia Kelly was born in Philadelphia, Pennsylvania to wealthy parents. Her girlhood was uneventful for the most part, but one of the things she desired was to become an actress which she had decided on at an early age.
After her high school graduation in 1947, Grace struck out on her own, heading to New York's bright lights to try her luck there. Grace worked some as a model and made her debut on Broadway in 1949. She also made a brief foray into the infant medium of television. Not content with the work in New York, Grace moved to Southern California for the more prestigious part of acting -- motion pictures.
In 1951, she appeared in her first film entitled Fourteen Hours (1951) when she was 22. It was a small part, but a start nonetheless. The following year she landed the role of Amy Kane in High Noon (1952), a western starring Gary Cooper and Lloyd Bridges which turned out to be very popular. In 1953, Grace appeared in only one film, but it was another popular one. The film was Mogambo (1953) where Grace played Linda Nordley. The film was a jungle drama in which fellow cast members, Clark Gable and Ava Gardner turned in masterful performances. It was also one of the best films ever released by MGM.
Although she had come into prominence with 'High Noon', it was the 1954 film, Rear Window (1954) that really made her stand out. As Lisa Fremont she was cast opposite James Stewart who played a crippled, photographer who witnesses a murder in the next apartment from his wheel-chair. It was the first time Grace was teamed up with the world famous director, Alfred Hitchcock. The film made her a bona fide star. Grace stayed busy in 1954 appearing in five films. After Green Fire (1954), Grace appeared in Dial M for Murder (1954), another thriller directed by Hitchcock.
With her next film Country Girl, The (1954), Grace would forever be immortalized by winning the Oscar for Best Actress for her portrayal of Georgie Elgin opposite Bing Crosby. Her final film that year was _Bridges at Toko-Ri, The (1954)_ with Fredric March, William Holden, and Mickey Rooney. In 1955, Grace was once again teamed up with Hitchcock in To Catch a Thief (1955) co-starring Cary Grant. In 1956, she played Tracy Lord in the musical comedy High Society (1956) which also starred Frank Sinatra and Bing Crosby. The whimsical tale ended with her re-marrying her former husband, played by Crosby. The film was well received.
It also turned out to be her final acting performance. Grace had recently met and married Prince Rainier III of the little principality of Monaco. By becoming a princess, she gave up her career. For the rest of her life, she was to remain in the news with her marriage and her three children.
On September 14, 1982, Grace was killed in an automobile accident in her adoptive home country. She was just 52 years old. {Denny Jackson}} In the summer of 1954, Grace Kelly and Cary Grant were on the French Riviera working on an Alfred Hitchcock movie, "To Catch A Thief". It was probably the scene after she speeds along the Moyen Corniche to quickly get to the "picnic grounds" -- and away from a tailing police car -- that she had time to look at the Mediterranean and the countryside along the coast. "Whose gardens are those?" she asked screenwriter John Michael Hayes. "Prince Grimaldi's". She would not meet the prince until the following year.
In New York in March 1955, she received a call from Rupert Allan, Look Magazine's west coast editor who had become a friend since writing three cover stories on her. The French government wanted her to attend the Cannes Film Festival that May. She had to given some good reasons to go. One: "The Country Girl" would be shown at the festival. Two: she had really loved working on the Riveria the summer before.
She met Ranier during the Cannes festival. He needed a wife, because with no heir to the throne, Monaco would again be part of France -- after his death -- and its citizens would have to pay French taxes. And Kelly thought it was time for her to select a husband, one who would finally meet with her parents' approval. Her biographers show that the life of a princess was not exactly living happily ever after. Old friends from Philadelphia as well as people she had known in Hollywood reported how glad she was to talk about her life in America and to be speaking English. And then on a cliff road she had known so well since her first visit to the Riviera, there was the fatal crash. The spot is said to be the same spot where the picnic scene was filmed in 1954. |
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Additional Grace Kelly Biography
Grace, Princess of Monaco née Grace Patricia Kelly (November 12, 1929 – September 14, 1982) was an Academy Award-winning American film and stage actress who, upon marriage to Rainier III, Prince of Monaco in 1956, became Her Serene Highness The Princess of Monaco, but was generally known as Princess Grace of Monaco. Princess Grace maintained dual American and Monegasque citizenship after her marriage. The principality's current Sovereign Prince, Albert II is the son of Prince Rainier and Princess Grace. The American Film Institute ranked Kelly #13 amongst the Greatest Female Stars of All Time.
Grace Patricia Kelly was born in Philadelphia, Pennsylvania, where she grew up in the East Falls section, the third of four children to John Brendan Kelly, Sr., also known as Jack Kelly, and Margaret Katherine Majer Kelly. Grace's siblings, in order of age, were Peggy, John Jr., and Lizzane. Her father was one of ten children of John Henry Kelly (1847-1897) and Mary Costello in an Irish American Catholic family (originally from Kidney Lake, Newport, County Mayo, Ireland). Already a local hero as a triple Olympic-gold-medal-winning sculler at a time when the sport of rowing was most popular, John Kelly's brick business grew to become the largest on the East Coast. The self-made millionaire and his family were introduced to Philadelphia society. Mr. Kelly's large family included two uncles prominent in the arts: Walter Kelly, a vaudevillian, and George Kelly, a Pulitzer Prize-winning playwright, who outside of Grace was assiduously looked down upon by the family because of his homosexuality.
After the heightened success of Mogambo, Grace starred in a TV play The Way of an Eagle, with Jean-Pierre Aumont before being cast in the film adaptation of Frederick Knott's Broadway hit Dial M for Murder. Alfred Hitchcock was slated to direct the film and would become one of Kelly's last mentors. Hitchcock also took full advantage of Kelly's virginal beauty on-camera. In a scene in which her character Margot Wendice is nearly murdered, a struggle that breaks out between her and her would-be-killer Tony Dawson clearly accentuates her curves and statuesque figure, which is closely hugged by a flimsy nightgown as she kicks her legs and flails her arms attempting to fight off her killer. Dial M for Murder opened in theaters in May 1954 to both positive reviews and box-office triumph. The role of Margot Wendice was a beginning for Grace as a poised and confident role-playing actress.
Though her film career lasted just five years and eleven films, Kelly's beauty and charm left an impression on the hearts of Americans and all moviegoers that persists to this day.
The wedding consisted of two ceremonies. On April 18, a 40-minute civil ceremony took place in the Palace Throne Room, and was broadcast across Europe. To cap the ceremony, the 142 official titles (counterparts of Rainier's) that Kelly acquired in the union were formally recited. The following day, the event concluded with the church ceremony at Monaco's Saint Nicholas Cathedral. Grace's wedding dress, designed by MGM's Academy Award-winning Helen Rose, had been worked on by three dozen seamstresses for six weeks. The 600 guests included Hollywood stars David Niven and his wife Hjordis, Gloria Swanson, Ava Gardner, the crowned head Aga Khan, and Conrad Hilton. Frank Sinatra initially accepted the invitation to attend, but at the last minute decided otherwise, afraid of upstaging the bride on her wedding day. Queen Elizabeth flatly refused to attend on the grounds of there being "too many movie stars." The ceremony was watched by an estimated 30 million people on television. The prince and princess left that night for their 7-week Mediterranean cruise honeymoon on Rainier's yacht, Deo Juvante II.
In his eulogy, James Stewart said: "You know, I just love Grace Kelly. Not because she was a princess, not because she was an actress, not because she was my friend, but because she was just about the nicest lady I ever met. Grace brought into my life as she brought into yours, a soft, warm light every time I saw her, and every time I saw her was a holiday of its own. No question, I'll miss her, we'll all miss her, God bless you, Princess Grace." |
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Grace Kelly Quote(s)
| I'll tell you one of the reasons I'm ready to leave. When I first came to Hollywood five years ago, my makeup call was at eight in the morning. On this movie it's been put back to seven-thirty. Every day I see Joan Crawford, who's been in makeup since five, and Loretta Young, who's been there since four in the morning. I'll be goddamned if I'm going to stay in a business where I have to get up earlier and earlier and it takes longer and longer for me to get in front of a camera. |
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