Gone But Not Forgotten By Jacqueline Hodges
For years, I have been an admirer of the two great Hepburns: Audrey and Katherine. I sat and watched the movies from the Golden Age of Hollywood, in which these women starred, and subsequently I watched the documentaries about their respective lives. Both women presented to me as female role models with albeit differing attitudes: each being well-educated, possessed the strength of being true to oneself. And it is perhaps the influence of these two women that led me to call the magazine Hepburn. But it is Audrey Hepburn who I wish to speak about today. Most of our readers, viewers and listeners will quickly recognise the name Audrey Hepburn and many will recall the movies in which she starred. Who can forget Audrey Hepburn’s performance as the elegantly, dressed Holly Golightly stepping out of the taxi to look at Tiffany’s store windows or cheekily pocketing party masks from the 5 and 10 store in Breakfast at Tiffany’s, or listening to the linguistically challenged Eliza Doolittle’s elocution lessons from phonetics Professor Henry Higgins and her relapse to Cockney twang as she shouts “Move your bloomin’ arse” at the Ascot Racecourse in My Fair Lady. Audrey was the third-greatest female screen legend in Golden Age of Hollywood. Not at all incidentally, Katherine Hepburn is noted as the greatest. But back to Audrey. For her performance in Roman Holiday, she became the first actress to win an Oscar, a Golden Globe Award, and a BAFTA Award for a single performance. Yet it is not for her acting career or her accolades as a style icon that I wish to pay homage, but rather it is for her most dignified role as UNICEF’s Goodwill Ambassador. For it is in this role that she truly demonstrated her leadership in challenging times.
1| Hepburn
is impossible. “Nothing The word itself says: I’m possible. ”
