Greer Garson got an Oscar nomination for one of her best roles in Mrs. Parkington. Though the film is one that had her co-starring with her favorite leading man, the film is all Greer.
Like Maytime the film starts with Greer as the aged family matriarch of the Parkington family during Christmas of 1938. Her husband who died many years ago was Walter Pidgeon and the family has gathered once again. But there's a crisis brewing. Her grandson-in-law Edward Arnold has embezzled a ton of money in some bad market speculation. His daughter Frances Rafferty and Garson's great granddaughter additionally has a romantic problem, she's torn between her fiancé Tom Drake who is whistleblowing on Arnold and family loyalty.
During the evening Garson reminisces back to certain crisis times in her own marriage and it eventually tells her what she must do in this situation. I will say this about the Parkingtons, Garson's the genuine article, the rest of them are a spoiled and selfish lot, only Rafferty seems to have escaped the taint.
I have to say it was a little strange seeing the much older Gladys Cooper playing the daughter of the heavily made up Greer Garson, still both actresses are professional enough to make it convincing. There's a wonderful performance by Cecil Kellaway as the Prince of Wales during the Gay Nineties when Parkingtons are in Europe. Kellaway may be the Prince of Wales, but he proves to be real sharp in terms of human relations and delicately removes a bump in the road of the Parkington marriage.
Agnes Moorehead got a Supporting Actress nomination for Mrs. Parkington in the role of an impoverished French aristocrat who becomes friend and confidante of Garson. She gives Garson a lot of sage advice. She lost to Ethel Barrymore for None But The Lonely Heart and Garson lost her race for Best Actress to Ingrid Bergman in Gaslight.
Mrs. Parkington remains however one of MGM's best films of the Forties. The influence of Maytime and of Citizen Kane in the telling of the Parkington family story is obviously apparent. And the message about both inherited wealth and the damage that mere speculation without creating could have come from Wall Street. For Greer Garson and Walter Pidgeon fans a must.
