MovieChat Forums > Dodsworth (1936) Discussion > Ruth 'Chatty' Chatterton

Ruth 'Chatty' Chatterton

posted 12 years ago by guy_in_west_houston
7 replies | jump to latest

Did anyone find her impossible to understand? She talked so fast, I had to turn on closed captioning to read what she was saying.

[–] oldblackandwhite 11 years ago

I had the same problem, especially in the early reels. But then I wear hearing aids in both ears, and one is on the fritz.

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He maketh His sun to rise on the evil and on the good... St. Matthew 5:45

[–] beetiesmom 11 years ago

What I found was funny was that the "elderly" Baroness, in real life, was only 16 years older than Ruth Chatterton! Little things like that interest and amuse me.

[–] RRozsa 11 years ago

My impression, from the movie, was that their characters' ages were not much farther apart than their real ages. That was the point -- the 60-year-old Baroness' 36-year-old son was asking permission to marry a 44-year-old woman, who was likely beyond her child-bearing years, or at least close to it.

Life's a banquet, and most poor suckers are starving to death!

[–] joeparkson 10 years ago

Unlike most women in Hollywood, she must have been younger than her official age.

According to her bio, she was 43-44 in this movie? She looked damn good for a woman that age.

Soy 'un hijo de la playa'

[–] beetiesmom 10 years ago

Hey!! Women of that age are still quite young! OK, maybe I'm getting a bit defensive. I'm in my early 60s and think I look "damn good" my own self! I'd love to have that beautiful gown she wore in the waltz scene with Kurt (whom she tended to call "Kort", did you notice that?).

[–] shadycady 10 years ago

Her passport is on Ancestry.com, and she was a born in 1892. She was a stage actress in 1912 from some D.C. newspaper articles on newspapers.com.

The Divine Genealogy Goddess

[–] BelleCBelle 8 years ago

My favorite Chatterton film is "Dodsworth," 1936, with "Female," the 1933 pre-code film, as a close second choice. Regardless of the film, I always, yes always, must rate any work that contains Ms. Chatterton at least as an eight on the "one to ten" scale or a four on the "one to five" scale - simply because she appears in the film. Obviously I am of the opinion that her acting is superb even in a bad film.

Ms. Chatterton was a strong, talented and independent woman and actress. There were not many actresses in those times who stood on their own and did as they chose. She was also a writer and an aviatrix. What I admire the most about Ms. Chatterton is she didn't allow Hollywood to dictate her career as she grew older - her early forties, for goodness sake.

According to the New York Public Library's Internet post titled: "Ruth Chatterton: A Screen Career in Photographs (In Defense of the Fan Collection)" by Diana Bertolini, September 25, 2012 - "She made two films in England, The Rat (1937) and A Royal Divorce (1938) before going back to the stage. For the next twenty years she worked steadily in theatre and also flew solo across the Atlantic several times and turned out four novels in her spare time. That's Ruth Chatterton, a remarkable woman with a fascinating career."

https://www.nypl.org/blog/2012/09/25/ruth-chatterton-screen-career-photographs-defense-fan-collection

Does anyone else have a favorite Chatterton film? I would be interested to know. Cheers 🍻
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