MAUREEN O’HARA

She was an Irish beauty with fiery red hair, proud of her heritage. Maureen O’Hara lived to the good old age of 90. Her filmology is rich and diverse.
Later dubbed the “Queen Of Technicolor,” her first starring role was in a black and white movie. Her first screen test was called unsatisfactory but Charles Laughton saw something about her that made him go to bat for her with studio execs. She then landed the plum part of Esmerelda in the 1939 version of The Hunchback Of Notre Dame. Mr. Laughton is the title hunchback. This is by far the best version of the Victor Hugo masterpiece. 
Rio Grande (1950) is the third leg of John Ford’s Cavalry Trilogy and stars Ms. O’Hara as Kathleen Yorke and John Wayne as her husband, Lt. Col. Kirby Yorke. He is joined by their son Jeff (Claude Jarman, Jr.), who has flunked out of West Point. Ms. O’Hara shows up to take Jeff back home, but he refuses to go. This being Hollywood, the dormant flame between the Yorkes is reignited and all ends well. Oh yes, there are plenty of Indian attacks and chances for heroics. Ms. O’Hara made fives westerns with Mr. Wayne. This is the best one. 
Maureen O’Hara wanted to branch out, feeling that she had been pidgenholed as “The Pretty Woman.” She was delighted to be cast in The Quiet Man (1952), set and shot in Ireland, her ancestral home. This very different film is directed by John Ford and stars John Wayne as American Sean Thornton. He and Ms. O’Hara (Mary Kate Danaher) have a stormy Irish marriage, with conflicts over Irish traditions scorned by Sean but revered by the Danahers. The movie features one of the longest, and funniest, fistfights ever filmed between Mr. Wayne and Victor McLaglen (Will Danaher, Mary Kate’s brother). And speaking of fights, Ms. O’Hara broke her hand taking a poke at Mr. Wayne during the filming! Well, the plot is a lot more complicated than that, but that’s enough to get the idea. 
At Sword’s Point (1952) is not exactly the stuff that cinema legends are made of, but it is notable for Maureen O’Hara’s virtuoso fencing scenes. She had insisted on doing her own stunts, and studied fencing for six weeks before filming started. So that isn’t a stunt double skewering those bad guys!
Maureen O’Hara is splendid as Angharad in the classic Welsh mining movie, How Green Was My Valley (1941). It also features Roddy McDowell, Walter Pigeon, Anna Lee and Donald Crisp. It won five Oscars, including Best Movie. The bad news: it is in black and white, so no flaming red O’Hara mane. The good news: it is one gorgeous black and white movie!
Ms. O’Hara is the title lady in Lady Godiva of Coventry (1955) sort of a Hollywood potboiler. And guys- don’t get your hopes up. Ms. O’Hara is always well covered up!
Maureen O’Hara can also be seen to great effect in A Bill Of Divorcement (1940), Miracle On 34th Street (1947), The Foxes Of Harrow (1947) and Mr. Hobbs Takes A Vacation (1962) with Maureen as Mrs. Hobbs and James Stewart as her husband.
All of the films in this article are available on DVD and for streaming. All are fine for all ages.