Life as a Princess

Cassandra Sutton

English 10- 3rd hour

March 14, 2007

Life as A Princess

Even before Grace Kelly married a prince, she had the characteristics of a princess. Frank Sinatra once commented, "Grace was a princess from the moment she was born." She had remarkable elegance and sophistication that made her different from other Hollywood actresses. Some say she had a bit of fire beneath her charm. Alfred Hitchcock, who directed her in three films, called her "a snow-covered volcano". Grace was born into a family of fame and success. Her father was a wealthy bricklayer, her brother was a champion sculler, and her uncle, George Kelly was a famous playwright. They set a hard example to follow and Grace sometimes felt pressured by her family’s reputation for prosperity. She lived up to and even surpassed the fame of her family members. Grace served many roles in her life as an actress, princess and mother.

Grace had a rather interesting past. In Grace’s early years, she went to Catholic Ravenhill Academy in East Falls, Pennsylvania and unfortunately switched to Stevens School, a worldly academy. She was very quiet and “to herself” as a teenager, but also very popular with other people her age in school. After graduating in 1949, it was a dream of Grace’s to perform on a live stage, not to star in movies or make television appearances, In New York and Colorado, Grace worked in theater and starred in “The Father” with Raymond Massey before signing with agent Edith Van Cleve. Some theater experts, including actress Helen Hayes, believed Grace wasn’t suitable for performing on a live stage because of her low voice. In spite of that, Grace Kelly was determined to become successful and to move further with her career (“American Decades” 1).

Kelly’s family did not agree with her becoming an actress. Even though her family had opposed her becoming an actress, Kelly became a fashion model and appeared in her first film, Fourteen Hours, in 1951 when she was 22. The following year she starred in High Noon. Her next film, Mogambo, in1953 was a drama set in the Kenyan jungle, which centers on the love triangle portrayed by Kelly, Clark Gable, and Ava Gardner. During the filming of this movie, she had an affair with Gable. Later on commenting "what else is there to do if you're alone in a tent in Africa with Clark Gable?" The movie got Kelly an Oscar nomination for Best Supporting Actress, but the award went to Donna Reed for her role in From Here to Eternity. Kelly made three films with Alfred Hitchcock: Dial M for Murder, Rear Window, and To Catch a Thief. In 1955, she was eventually awarded the Academy Award for Best Actress for the movie “The Country Girl“ (“American Decades” 2 & St. James 1).

In 1955, while Kelly was in Monaco for the filming of Hitchcock's To Catch a Thief with Cary Grant, she was introduced Prince Rainer. The pair met originally at the Cannes Film Festival in order to be photographed together for the magazine. The event was well publicized, down to the shimmering black cotton dress worn by Kelly. Later in 1955, the prince and the movie star spent Christmas together in Philadelphia with Kelly's family. Less than one week after the holidays, on January 5, 1956, Kelly and the prince announced their engagement from her parent's home. Kelly and the prince held their wedding in Monaco, where the ceremonies and festivities lasted for two days, April 18 and 19, 1956. A Catholic marriage ceremony was celebrated at the Cathedral of St. Nicholas in Monaco. The prince and princess honeymooned aboard a royal yacht (Bradford 1).

The royal couple's eldest child, Princess Caroline Louise Marguerite, was born in January of 1957. Their next child, Crown Prince Albert Alexandre Louis Pierre, was born in March of the following year. Their youngest child, Princess Stephanie Marie Elisabeth, was born in February of 1965. Princess Grace lived with her husband and children in a 200-room palace