AUDREY HEPBURN PROFILE

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The FIR Vault

By Archives • Aug 10th, 2012 • Pages: 1 2 3 4 5 6

With Peter O'Toole in HOW TO STEAL A MILLION

While MY FAIR LADY was in production Mel Ferrer had worked at Warners in SEX AND THE SINGLE GIRL and shortly after MY FAIR LADY premiered he announced that he would direct his wife in a $5,000,000 spectacle that would be titled ISABELLA – QUEEN OF SPAIN. But rumors were then circulating that all was not well with his marriage. The rumors seemed confirmed when he and Miss Hepburn returned from Europe separately. But within a month Miss Hepburn was making a point of visiting the set while her husband was working on EL GRECO and CABRIOLA.

When she went to work, however, on the botch called TWO FOR THE ROAD, which Stanley Donen directed on French locations, she spent her off-hours visiting local bistros with either her miscast co-star (Albert Finney), or her former co-star William Holden, then estranged from his wife (Brenda Marshall). After the completion of TWO FOR THE ROAD Miss Hepburn remained in France to co-star with Peter O’Toole in William Wyler’s HOW TO STEAL A MILLION. Ferrer joined her there.

They returned together to Hollywood in ’67 and Ferrer produced the film version of Frederick Knott’s stage thriller, WAIT UNTIL DARK, with so much distinction that Miss Hepburn’s portrayal of a blind girl terrified by narcotic smugglers brought her a fifth Academy Award nomination. This was her last film to date.

Miss Hepburn’s marriage to Ferrer ended about the same time as her career. She filed for divorce in France, and then went to their Swiss chalet. The divorce became final in December ’68.

In January ’69, in the Swiss village of Morges, she married Dr. Andrea Dotti, a psychiatrist nine years her junior who is connected with the University of Rome. She had met him while making ROMAN HOLIDAY a decade before. Witnesses to the marriage included Capucine and Yul Brynner’s wife. In February ’70 she gave birth to a son (Luca). The Dottis live in Rome and weekend in Switzerland.

In Feb. ’71 Mel Ferrer married Elizabeth Soukutine, a 34-year-old Belgian of Russian origin who edits children’s books.

Miss Hepburn’s agent – Kurt Frings – still passes on the requests for her services that still come to him. Ross Hunter wanted her to do 40 CARATS, but couldn’t accede when she insisted it be filmed in Rome. For a while she seemed interested in doing THE SURVIVORS, Anne Edwards’ harrowing novel about a girl who survives the mass murder of her family by psychotics, but she concluded she was too old for the part.

Early this year she told an interviewer: “I’m afraid I may have nothing to express in a movie since I’m very fulfilled at home.” But a little later, after Dr. Dotti was photographed in the company of various women he claimed were helping with research on a book he was contemplating about the effects of drugs on women, Miss Hepburn did an about-face. She did four one-minute tv-commercials for a Tokyo wig manufacturer and announced she had found a film script she liked. To be called THE RETRIEVERS, it is at this writing (November ’71) scheduled for production in Rome early in ’72.

If Gregory Peck realizes his current plan to re-make DODSWORTH, he should consider Miss Hepburn for the role Mary Astor made memorable in the ’36 cinemation of that Sinclair Lewis novel. And it’s the kind of role Miss Hepburn should seek if she intends to continue her career.

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Tagged as: Audrey Hepburn, Mel Ferrer

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