Marilyn Pauline Novak, more famously known as Kim Novak, has a rare indefinable beauty that enthralled audiences of the 1950s. A combination of cool refinement and a sensuality that simmered just below the surface, she was known to many as the Lavender Blonde, mainly due to the studio mandated blue tone in her blond hair and her remote persona. A persona that had never been seen in Hollywood and never been duplicated. Unfortunately for Kim, her stunning beauty often obscured the fact that she was a very talented actress.
Born in Chicago, in 1933, to second generation Czech-immigrants, Ms. Novak began her career as a model, first modeling teen fashions and later touring the United States as Miss Deep Freeze, the spokesmodel for an appliance company. She was discovered by Columbia Studios after moving to Los Angeles in 1953 and signed to a brief six-month contract, with hopes that she would become Columbia’s answer to Marilyn Monroe. The studio’s first point of business was to change her name, so as not to be confused with Miss Monroe. The studio’s original suggestion was Kit Marlowe, however Novak was adamant about keeping part of her name and they soon settled on the moniker Kim Novak.
In her first couple of roles, Kim was cast as a sexpot femme fatale, which instantly caught audience’s attention and led to a remarkable amount of fan mail. Columbia, then cast Kim in her breakthrough role as Madge Owens opposite William Holden and Rosalind Russell in 1955’s Picnic. During the next couple of years Kim starred in several hits including The Man With The Golden Arm, Pal Joey (both opposite Frank Sinatra), and Jeanne Eagles. Audiences couldn’t get enough of Kim’s enigmatic persona.
Kim’s career would reach an apex in 1958, when she was cast in Alfred Hitchcock’s masterpiece, Vertigo, giving a performance that was maligned when the film was released, but would later be reassessed and branded brilliant by critics and fans alike. She also earned the ire of director Alfred Hitchcock, who considered her habit of not wearing a bra vulgar, and detested her constant questions and input into his film. That same year she was cast as a seductive witch opposite her Vertigo co-star, the great James Stewart, in Bell, Book, and Candle. Both Vertigo and Bell, Book, and Candle had lackluster box-office returns, marking a decline for Kim that continued throughout the rest of the fifties and early sixties.
By 1965, Kim had grown restless in her role as a movie star, and decided to take a break from acting and focus on some of her other interests. She made intermittent returns to the screen between the late sixties and early nineties, but her love of art (she is an accomplished painter, sculptress, and poet) and animals (she lives on a ranch with her veterinarian husband) have since ruled her life.
Now 77, she still maintains that indefinable quality that makes her so compelling. Most recently she made an appearance at the Egyptian Theatre in Los Angeles last August for a special screening of Bell, Book, and Candle and to promote The Kim Novak Collection on DVD. It’s an awesome collection that I would recommend to any Kim Novak enthusiast.
