Princess Grace, forever young
Grace of Monaco © Archives du Palais Princier
Where were you when you heard the news? Like other shocking moments in history, such as the shooting of JFK in Dallas, the planes hitting the Twin Towers or Princess Diana’s car crash, many people, Monegasques in particular, remember exactly what they were doing when the news broke on 14 September 1982. Princess Grace had died at the age of 52, having suffered a brain haemorrhage at the wheel.
Grace Patricia Kelly’s life may have been cut short, but she was and remains a household name the world over. Born into an Irish-American family in Philadelphia, Pennsylvania in November 1929, she had the rare distinction of being famous for two very different aspects of her life. The first brought her to the attention of the man with whom she would share the second.
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First, the actress
She attended the American Academy of Dramatic Arts in New York City in 1947, working as a photographer’s model to pay her tuition. Her Broadway debut came in November 1949 in August Strindberg’s The Father. Television drama work followed in the early 1950s.
Her big-screen debut was in Fourteen Hours in 1951, and her breakthrough role came the following year as Gary Cooper’s Quaker wife in High Noon.
Her Hollywood career can only be described as meteoric, since her next part in John Ford’s Mogambo (1953) earned a first Academy Award nomination. In it she starred as a young bride who falls in love with big-game hunter Clark Gable, holding her own against Ava Gardner, who also received an Oscar nomination for the film.
Grace Kelly won the best actress Oscar for her next role, in The Country Girl, in 1954. Known as she was for her beauty and glamour, it was certainly an Oscar-deserving performance to be convincing as an alcoholic’s frumpy wife, opposite Bing Crosby! Among the unlucky nominees for Award that year was a certain Judy Garland, for A Star is Born…
She is perhaps best remembered as the heroine in a series of classic films by Alfred Hitchock, for whom she was the epitome of “sexual elegance”. In Dial M for Murder (1954), she was an adulterous wife whose husband plots to have her killed. In the same year she was cast as the sceptical girlfriend of wheelchair-bound photographer James Stewart, who becomes convinced his neighbour has committed murder. To Catch a Thief (1955) saw her giving as good as she got in ad-libbed scenes with Cary Grant.
She went on to make The Swan (1956) and High Society (1956) and had starred win 11 motion pictures before giving up her Hollywood career in 1956 for a new ‘role’ in Monaco.
Then, the Princess
In today’s era of instant news, social media accounts, followers and the like, it’s hard to imagine just what a ground-breaking media event the “wedding of the century” and first-ever televised royal wedding was. The live black-and-white broadcast was watched by 30 million European viewers from nine different countries – America had to wait for the film to be flown trans-Atlantic! – and attended by 1,800 journalists from all over the world.
It was a real love match and both brought very different but complementary skillsets to their reign together. The Builder Prince had a “bricks and mortar” vision for the Principality’s development, seeking to attract investment and business, while Princess Grace brought her… well, grace (!) … and elegance as well as her determination to improve the cultural tissue of her new homeland, convinced that the Principality also had a leading role to play, on the international cultural stage.
Her legacy
“I would like to be remembered as someone who accomplished useful deeds, and who was a kind and loving person. I would like to leave the memory of a human being with a correct attitude and who did her best to help others,” she said.
Princess Grace’s most obvious legacy is the three children she bore with Prince Rainier III, namely Caroline, then Albert and finally Stéphanie.
However, she also lives on through her charitable Foundation, and its Princess Grace Awards which support emerging artists in film, theatre and dance.
She revitalised the Monte-Carlo Ballets, whose Academy trains professional dancers on their way to join international dance companies.
Monaco’s Theatre is named after the woman who had time off for stage work written into her Hollywood contract.
Prince Rainier III dedicated the Irish Library to her. It houses her private collection of books and Irish-American song sheets today. The Library is also a vibrant social and cultural hub, ensuring the ongoing strength of the ties that bind Ireland and the Principality.
Princess Grace founded the Monaco Garden Club and initiated the Monte-Carlo International Bouquet Competition in 1968. In 1979, the Grace de Monaco rose was featured on a stamp to commemorate the event. In 1981, a perfect white rose with a vermilion border, the same colours as the Monaco flag, was presented at the Bal de la Rose and named “Princess of Monaco.” The Rose Garden in Fontvieille that is named after Princess Grace was also created in her honour by her husband, and celebrated its 40th anniversary this year.
The only public hospital in the Principality, the former Hôpital Prince Albert, was renamed Centre Hospitalier Princesse-Grace in 1958. The cutting-edge facility is being extensively modernised to ensure high-quality affordable health care for Monegasques well into the future. It also houses the Monaco Red Cross, of which Princess Grace was President before her son, Prince Albert II, took over.
She was also patron of Rainbow Coalition Children, the orphanage run by her friend, the dancer, singer, actress and activist Josephine Baker.
The organisation for children’s rights that she founded, AMADE Mondiale, gained consultive status within UNICEF and UNESCO.
And last but not least, the avenue Princess Grace is one of the most exclusive shopping destinations and the most expensive street in the world!
Over 40 years after her passing, some might say Monaco has styled itself in her image, and is carrying forward her legacy of elegance, culture and humanity.