Thanks Hollywood - Says Jennifer Jones
(Unknown publication, 1944)
Even now I find it a little hard to believe that, less than two years ago, I was like any other young actress in Hollywood...waiting, hoping, praying for her first role in pictures. And that, less than two years later, I find myself the grateful and proud possessor of the Academy Award, the highest and most coveted honor Hollywood can bestow.
But I do know one thing, and that is that my feelings at winning the Academy Award were entirely different from what have been expected. Mingled with excitement, overwhelming joy, a sudden surge of warmth, with still another emotion. It was humility.
All I can remember on that memorable night at Grauman's Chinese Theater was seeing, through the mist of disbelief, the picture of lovely Greer Garson holding an Oscar in her hands and saying, "Jennifer." Someone nudged me and I got up from Seat 13, Row 13, and made my way to the stage. All I could think of was that the thunderous applause all around me was made by people worthier than myself.
How I ever got to the stage I don't know. In the vast sea of faces familiar ones stood out: Ingrid Bergman, Bette Davis, Claudette Colbert, Jean Arthur and many others. Their presence intensified my feeling of humility. I felt a little small.
I tried to tell myself that I had worked all my life for this. This I had gone without many things to be able to pursue a career that would ultimately lead to recognition. But it didn't help and as I took the Oscar in my hands, and thanked everyone, only one thing stood out in my mind. I was getting the award, but it wasn't mine alone. I was a major stockholder, you might say, and a great many other persons had a share in it.
For instance, Mr. David O. Selznick, better known as "DOS." After all, I'm only the latest of his Discoveries.
Vivien Leigh, in her first American picture, "Gone With The Wind," also won the Award. And there's Joan Fontaine.
Obviously, I could not have won the award...could not have had my big chance in pictures, but for the faith and confidence that Mr. Selznick had in me.
My debt doesn't stop there.
Nor does it stop with Mr. Henry King, whose sensitive and superb direction contributed so much to Bernadette. I could go on naming scores to men behind the cameras; William Perlberg, the producer; George Seaton, the writer; craftsmen, teachers, make-up men, electricians, cameramen, my dialog director, the experienced actors and actresses who worked with me. As a matter of fact, I should go back several years to my days on the stage and radio, where so many persons were kind and patient with my first fumbling efforts to act.
If all the persons to whom I owe thanks could have been on the stage they would have made a crowd as big as the audience!
Now that it is all over, I have had time to collect my thoughts and emotions. My Oscar has brought me more than the fleeting joy that the tribute might have given more seasoned actresses - actresses better accustomed than I am to constant eulogy, signal honors and huge devoted audiences. It has brought me a firm determination. Humbly grateful that I was given the chance to win it, and having won it, I am determined to do my best to earn it over and over again.
Today with a very full program of pictures ahead of me, I am looking forward to hard work. Winning the Academy Award in my first picture on what so many people - including myself - have termed a "freak performance," has been a little easier to take because of my role in "Since You Went Away". But for the reassurance of this inspiring part, the frightening prospect that I might have been a one-picture girl would have been too awful to contemplate. It would have been almost as bad if I were playing in a picture similar to "The Song of Bernadette" and enacting another spiritual role. To any young and hopeful actress the danger of being typed is a disturbing one. That is why I am so glad that audiences and critics soon will have a chance to see in "Since You Went Away" whether the award was justified, and whether I am versatile enough to have a real future in pictures.
But no matter how hard I work, or how many pictures I make, I hope I will always have time to think of all the things that made winning the award a little more than just begin given a statuette. All those heart-warming messages I received for instant. Wartime restrictions had precluded the sending of a lot of telegrams. They came soon afterwards, by mail. "Dear Jennifer, My deepest congratulations. I'm mighty proud of you. Sorry I was not able to congratulate you in person. It is a great personal satisfaction to have had the honor to direct you in your first picture. My sincerest wishes to you for a long career and always at the top top of the ladder. Affectionately, Henry King."
And there were hundreds like it, from all over the country. A great many were from strangers. And one that meant a great deal was from Michele Morgan, whom I had never met. Michele, one of my favorite actresses, wired from New York to congratulate me. This made me happier than I can say because ever since I first saw Miss Morgan, I had been her fan, and I'm still hoping that here in Hollywood they will give here the type of part in which she excels.
Throughout the time I was working in "The Song of Bernadette", the friendliness and encouragement of everyone around me was a constant source of comfort. Now, in my present picture, Claudette Colbert has proved a real friend. There is nothing she won't do to help me.
I think that my hardest time is yet to come. Apart from not wanting to be typed, there will be a scarcity of the roles that I can play. If I were to describe the type of role I would like most, I'd say that I want to play a woman of character.
All in all, the future looms very bright before me. My days are devoted to hard work, my evenings to looking after my two wonderful boys. I have marvelous plans for the future. Like everyone else, I would like to travel to far-off, romantic places. I would like to live excitingly, read all the good books I have far neglected, meet the people I have long admired. Part of my design for happiness would be to avoid all unnecessary complications, devote myself untireingly to the things and pepole I love best, and shut my eyes to the fact that success has come a little early perhaps.
Most of all I want to remember always that the Academy Award for 1943 was voted to me in good faith by fellow workers in the motion picture industry. I want to keep that faith.
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(Unknown publication, 1944)
Even now I find it a little hard to believe that, less than two years ago, I was like any other young actress in Hollywood...waiting, hoping, praying for her first role in pictures. And that, less than two years later, I find myself the grateful and proud possessor of the Academy Award, the highest and most coveted honor Hollywood can bestow.
But I do know one thing, and that is that my feelings at winning the Academy Award were entirely different from what have been expected. Mingled with excitement, overwhelming joy, a sudden surge of warmth, with still another emotion. It was humility.
All I can remember on that memorable night at Grauman's Chinese Theater was seeing, through the mist of disbelief, the picture of lovely Greer Garson holding an Oscar in her hands and saying, "Jennifer." Someone nudged me and I got up from Seat 13, Row 13, and made my way to the stage. All I could think of was that the thunderous applause all around me was made by people worthier than myself.
How I ever got to the stage I don't know. In the vast sea of faces familiar ones stood out: Ingrid Bergman, Bette Davis, Claudette Colbert, Jean Arthur and many others. Their presence intensified my feeling of humility. I felt a little small.
I tried to tell myself that I had worked all my life for this. This I had gone without many things to be able to pursue a career that would ultimately lead to recognition. But it didn't help and as I took the Oscar in my hands, and thanked everyone, only one thing stood out in my mind. I was getting the award, but it wasn't mine alone. I was a major stockholder, you might say, and a great many other persons had a share in it.
For instance, Mr. David O. Selznick, better known as "DOS." After all, I'm only the latest of his Discoveries.
Vivien Leigh, in her first American picture, "Gone With The Wind," also won the Award. And there's Joan Fontaine.
Obviously, I could not have won the award...could not have had my big chance in pictures, but for the faith and confidence that Mr. Selznick had in me.
My debt doesn't stop there.
Nor does it stop with Mr. Henry King, whose sensitive and superb direction contributed so much to Bernadette. I could go on naming scores to men behind the cameras; William Perlberg, the producer; George Seaton, the writer; craftsmen, teachers, make-up men, electricians, cameramen, my dialog director, the experienced actors and actresses who worked with me. As a matter of fact, I should go back several years to my days on the stage and radio, where so many persons were kind and patient with my first fumbling efforts to act.
If all the persons to whom I owe thanks could have been on the stage they would have made a crowd as big as the audience!
Now that it is all over, I have had time to collect my thoughts and emotions. My Oscar has brought me more than the fleeting joy that the tribute might have given more seasoned actresses - actresses better accustomed than I am to constant eulogy, signal honors and huge devoted audiences. It has brought me a firm determination. Humbly grateful that I was given the chance to win it, and having won it, I am determined to do my best to earn it over and over again.
Today with a very full program of pictures ahead of me, I am looking forward to hard work. Winning the Academy Award in my first picture on what so many people - including myself - have termed a "freak performance," has been a little easier to take because of my role in "Since You Went Away". But for the reassurance of this inspiring part, the frightening prospect that I might have been a one-picture girl would have been too awful to contemplate. It would have been almost as bad if I were playing in a picture similar to "The Song of Bernadette" and enacting another spiritual role. To any young and hopeful actress the danger of being typed is a disturbing one. That is why I am so glad that audiences and critics soon will have a chance to see in "Since You Went Away" whether the award was justified, and whether I am versatile enough to have a real future in pictures.
But no matter how hard I work, or how many pictures I make, I hope I will always have time to think of all the things that made winning the award a little more than just begin given a statuette. All those heart-warming messages I received for instant. Wartime restrictions had precluded the sending of a lot of telegrams. They came soon afterwards, by mail. "Dear Jennifer, My deepest congratulations. I'm mighty proud of you. Sorry I was not able to congratulate you in person. It is a great personal satisfaction to have had the honor to direct you in your first picture. My sincerest wishes to you for a long career and always at the top top of the ladder. Affectionately, Henry King."
And there were hundreds like it, from all over the country. A great many were from strangers. And one that meant a great deal was from Michele Morgan, whom I had never met. Michele, one of my favorite actresses, wired from New York to congratulate me. This made me happier than I can say because ever since I first saw Miss Morgan, I had been her fan, and I'm still hoping that here in Hollywood they will give here the type of part in which she excels.
Throughout the time I was working in "The Song of Bernadette", the friendliness and encouragement of everyone around me was a constant source of comfort. Now, in my present picture, Claudette Colbert has proved a real friend. There is nothing she won't do to help me.
I think that my hardest time is yet to come. Apart from not wanting to be typed, there will be a scarcity of the roles that I can play. If I were to describe the type of role I would like most, I'd say that I want to play a woman of character.
All in all, the future looms very bright before me. My days are devoted to hard work, my evenings to looking after my two wonderful boys. I have marvelous plans for the future. Like everyone else, I would like to travel to far-off, romantic places. I would like to live excitingly, read all the good books I have far neglected, meet the people I have long admired. Part of my design for happiness would be to avoid all unnecessary complications, devote myself untireingly to the things and pepole I love best, and shut my eyes to the fact that success has come a little early perhaps.
Most of all I want to remember always that the Academy Award for 1943 was voted to me in good faith by fellow workers in the motion picture industry. I want to keep that faith.
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