Like many classic films, “Now, Voyager” started out a very different film. Warner Brothers producer Hal Wallis bought the rights to the book and had Casey Robinson adapt the screenplay.
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As part of her therapy, her doctor suggested she approach writing as a profession and she wrote a series of books about the “Vale” family, the most famous of which was “Now, Voyager” (considered a pioneering look a psychotherapy). A few years later she suffered from a nervous breakdown and began psychotherapy with a stay at a sanitarium. In coping with the separate losses of two infant children, she wrote the novel “Stella Dallas” (which was adapted into several films).
“Now, Voyager” was based on a novel by New England novelist Olive Higgins Prouty. Sometimes we want to forget life, you know, and I think it should be a little larger than life. She said, “I think acting should look as if we were acting a little… which is a very old-fashioned theory today… (nowadays) we mustn’t have any idea that anybody knows the camera’s on them at all… it’s just life… we all have life twenty four, twelve hours a day. Bette Davis inadvertently said it best in a 1971 interview on “The Dick Cavett Show” when she spoke about her approach to acting.
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As the studio system dissolved and films became more “real”, the movie screen of dreams turned into a mirror in which that larger-than-life reflection was nowhere to be seen.
Thus, the Hollywood studio era became fondly referred to as The Dream Factory. Like “Now, Voyager”, these movies set a high bar in love, glamour, and life, and gave audiences things to which to aspire - even if unattainable. Davis’ performance in particular hits such notes of truth, she makes us believe everything presented is actually happening. But the finely tuned skills of everyone involved make it all seem so possible. Such is the case with “Now, Voyager”, which contains a leading man just a bit too perfect for reality, and a leading lady whose life transforms from fearful recluse to completely confident sophisticate almost overnight. Majestic backdrops, elegant costumes, perfectly coiffed hairstyles, and dramatic performances all set to music create a romanticized version of life one can't help but covet. They require an ever so slight suspension of disbelief, presenting situations and characters that seem plausible, but under close inspection could only take place in a dream or on a screen. It is often said that movies and movie stars from the Hollywood studio era were larger-than-life, and to a significant degree that is true.
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