“Trying to be fascinating is an asinine position to be in.” — Katharine Hepburn
Photo: Christopher Strong (1933)
“I’m a personality as well as an actress. Show me an actress who isn’t a personality, and you’ll show me a woman who isn’t a star.” – Katharine Hepburn
“I like doing things as well as they can be done. I think it’s real self-indulgence. I can do everything myself – as far as hair and makeup are concerned, I try not to be totally dependent.” — Katharine Hepburn
Photo: Morning Glory (1933)
“I’ve never given out any information about my private life. I never went to Bryn Mawr. I did not go to school. I was tutored. People are always confusing me with some socially prominent family of Hepburns. I don’t know them. I believe they are very rich.” – Katharine Hepburn in 1933, clearly rebelling against giving interviews.
Bryn Mawr College boasts the Katharine Houghton Hepburn Center.
Source: Helen Klumph
Source: Ernest Bachrach (1932)
“Talking about myself is revolting to me. It makes me ill for days to talk about myself. For years no one paid any attention to me, no one wanted to know a thing about me. Now, because I’ve been in a picture, I’m expected to answer any and all personal questions. I’m just not doing it.” – Katharine Hepburn
Source: Hubbard Keavy (1932)
Photo: 1933
“Oh, they said such simply, perfectly stupid things in the papers when I first went to Hollywood that I just decided they could make up their stories without talking to me, since they were going to make them up anyway.” — Katharine Hepburn
Source: Martha Jackson (1940)
Photo: Ernst Bachrach (1933)
From Christopher Strong (1933)
“Call me anything but ‘a shy actress.’ Everyone’s sick of the species. Shyness has been used to excuse too many sins. It has become the explanation for every kind of conduct. Everyone is becoming so shy, you don’t know how they got on at all.” — Katharine Hepburn
Source: James Reid (1940)
Photographer: C.S. Bull
Caricature of Anna Sten, Marlene Dietrich, Greta Garbo and Katharine Hepburn. Artist: W. Cotton. 1934.
Source: Valentino Vamp
“There are no laurels in life . . . just new challenges.” — Katharine Hepburn
“I never realized until lately that women were supposed to be inferior.” — Katharine Hepburn
“In some ways I’ve lived my life like a man, made my own decisions, etc. I’ve been as terrified as the next person, but you’ve got to keep going.” – Katharine Hepburn
Photographer: Ernest Bachrach
“I let myself go before the camera. I mean, you can’t photograph a dead cat, so you have to offer something.” – Katharine Hepburn
Photographer: Cecil Beaton
Source: John Kobal’s People Will Talk
A Woman Rebels (1936)
Artist: John Decker. Year: 1936. Oil. 36″ x 27″ without the frame.
“She is snippy, you know, which is a shame. She was never on my side.” — Ginger Rogers talking about Hepburn.
Photo: Stage Door (1937)
“I’ve done things for the honest reason that I like them. You can’t do things just to be successful. You have to do things that affect you.” — Katharine Hepburn
Photo: Stage Door (1937)
“I believe that if I could express myself in my own individual way, I would succeed. I knew that if I followed the blind dictates of other people my work would lack the vital spark that I would fail.” — Katharine Hepburn
Source: Dale Carnegie (1938)
Photo: Stage Door (1937)
“If you always do what interests you, at least one person is pleased.” — Katharine Hepburn
Photo: Bringing Up Baby (1938)
“Kate was great. She’d listen without getting all muddled up.” — Cary Grant
“I never let my dentist drug me. Some pain disciplines you.” – Katharine Hepburn
Source: Jack Ryan (1968)
“I like to have my ‘fans,’ of course, but I think that giving autographs is silly. It would be quite impossible to sign my name for everybody, so I discourage the paper and pencil habit, while appreciating their enthusiasm in waiting till I go from the theatre to my car.” — Katharine Hepburn
Source: 1940
A self-portrait.
“In pictures, acting is broken up into small snatches – often scenes for two people or scenes in which you’re alone. So picture acting is, as I put it, more egotistical, particularly if you are a star. Everthing is arranged to pamper your playing.” — Katharine Hepburn
Source: 1940
Photo: C.S. Bull (1940)
Katharine Hepburn’s Brownies
INGREDIENTS
1/2 cup cocoa
1 stick butter
2 eggs
1 cup sugar
1/4 cup flour
1 cup broken-up walnuts or pecans
1 teaspoon vanilla
pinch of salt
PREPARATION
1. Preheat oven to 325 degrees. Melt butter in saucepan with cocoa and stir until smooth. Remove from heat and allow to cool for a few minutes. Mix in eggs, one at a time. Add sugar, flour, nuts, vanilla and salt. Pour into a greased 8×8 square pan. Bake 40 minutes. ”Don’t overbake!” They should be gooey. Let cool (an essential step) and cut into bars.
Source: http://www.nytimes.com/
“I don’t care that the mimics imitate me. I just consider they’re talking about another person; that’s not myself.” — Katharine Hepburn
Source: Bob Thomas (1947)
Hepburn poses with 6’5 1/2″ Chuck Connors on the set of Pat and Mike (1952). The film marked Connors’ transition into acting. He appeared as a police captain in the film.
“American Breakfast in Bed, a Self-Portrait in Brisbane, Australia,1955” Artist: Katharine Hepburn. 8″ by 6″. Pencil and watercolor on paper.
“She’s ceaseless that one. The only time Kate‘s still is when she’s shooting.” — Peter O’Toole
Photo: The Lion in Winter (1968)
A Hepburn waxwork zombie from The Lion in Winter (1968). She stands (if you can call it that) at 5′ tall. $2,000 – $3000. Throne not included. Retired from the Hollywood Wax Museum.
Artist: Ron Kron. Date: 1982. A papier-mâché doll. 24 inches tall.
