Glamorous shared in their list of Great Love Stories: “Though the message of true, passionate, undying love is constant, the tale of how this is reached is undoubtedly individual, and there is most certainly no ‘right or wrong’. Some love stories, perhaps, at the time, do not conform to what society describes as a ‘proper’ relationship — but years later, while looking back at the details and circumstance, it is discovered to be an undeniably great love story . . .” Does that not speak so to the story of the characters in Guess Who’s Coming to Dinner? And even more so to the real life “illegal” love of Mildred and Richard Loving? I found it all so poignant and timely, such evidence of real and persevering love. As Glamorous said about the love of Hepburn and Tracy, “... one such as this that does not need to be spoken of, does not need words,
and can never truly, no matter how many times one tries, be denied. Most certainly not conventional or traditional, this great love affair is a testament to the power of true love and the notion that, once one has crossed paths with one’s soul mate, the force of that encounter may make it impossible not to be swept completely and utterly away . . .”
Karen Sharpe, the wife of famous Stanley Kramer, the late director of the film, recently pointed out that the legacy of Guess Who’s Coming to Dinner is closely entwined with the court case Loving v. Virginia. The case was being argued in front of the Supreme Court while Kramer was in the midst of shooting the film, and the decision was handed down in June, six months before the movie arrived in theaters. “That was the reason we made the movie,” Sharpe says. “This year is both the 50th anniversary of Guess Who’s Coming to Dinner and the 50th anniversary of the Supreme Court doing the right thing.”
At the end of the day, I think we all want the kind of love that Hollywood films are made of. That timeless and magical love that for some is only found in fairy tales and Hollywood classics; soul mates like Bogie and Bacall, Elizabeth Taylor and Richard Burton, Spencer Tracy and Katharine Hepburn, and of course, Mildred and Richard Loving.
“I’ve been loved, and I’ve been in love. There’s a big difference.” — Katherine Hepburn