James Stewart

Early life and education

James Maitland Stewart was born on May 20, 1908, in Indiana, Pennsylvania, the eldest child and only son born to Elizabeth Ruth (née Jackson; 1875–1953) and Alexander Maitland Stewart (1872–1961). Stewart had two younger sisters, Mary (1912–1977) and Virginia (1914–1972). He was of Scottish and Ulster-Scots ancestry. The Stewart family had lived in Pennsylvania for many generations. Stewart's father ran the family business, the J. M. Stewart and Company Hardware Store, which he hoped Stewart would take over as an adult after attending Princeton University, as was the family tradition. Raised a Presbyterian by his deeply religious father, Stewart was a devout churchgoer for much of his life.

Stewart's mother was a pianist, and music was an important part of family life. When a customer at the store was unable to pay his bill, Stewart's father accepted an old accordion as payment. Stewart learned to play the instrument with the help of a local barber. His accordion became a fixture offstage during his acting career. A shy child, Stewart spent much of his time after school in the basement working on model airplanes, mechanical drawings, and chemistry—all with a dream of going into aviation. He attended the Wilson Model School for primary school and junior high school. He was not a gifted student and received average to low grades. According to his teachers, this was not from a lack of intelligence, but due to being creative and having a tendency to daydream.

Stewart began attending Mercersburg Academy prep school in the fall of 1923, because his father did not believe he would be accepted into Princeton (his father was a member of the class of 1898) if he attended public high school. At Mercersburg, Stewart participated in a variety of extracurricular activities. He was a member of the track team (competing as a high jumper under coach Jimmy Curran), the art editor of the school yearbook, a member of the glee club, and a member of the John Marshall Literary Society. To his disappointment, he was relegated to the third-tier football team due to his slender physique. Stewart also made his first onstage appearance at Mercersburg, as Buquet in the play The Wolves in 1928. During summer breaks, he returned to Indiana, working first as a brick loader and then as a magician's assistant. Due to scarlet fever that turned into a kidney infection, he had to take time out from school in 1927, which delayed his graduation until 1928. He remained passionate about aviation, with his interest enhanced by Charles Lindbergh's first solo transatlantic flight, but abandoned visions of becoming a pilot when his father steered him towards Princeton.

Career

1932–1937: Theater and early film roles

Stewart performed in bit parts in the University Players' productions in Cape Cod during the summer of 1932. The company's directors included Joshua Logan, Bretaigne Windust, and Charles Leatherbee, and amongst its other actors were married couple Henry Fonda and Margaret Sullavan, who became Stewart's close friends. At the end of the season, Stewart moved to New York with his Players friends Logan, Myron McCormick, and newly single Henry Fonda. Along with McCormick, Stewart debuted on Broadway in the brief run of Carry Nation and a few weeks later – again with McCormick – appeared as a chauffeur in the comedy Goodbye Again, in which he had a walk-on line. The New Yorker commented, "Mr. James Stewart's chauffeur... comes on for three minutes and walks off to a round of spontaneous applause." Following the seven-month run of Goodbye Again, Stewart took a stage manager position in Boston, but was fired after frequently missing his cues. Returning to New York, he then landed a small part in Spring in Autumn and a role in All Good Americans, where he was required to throw a banjo out of the window. Brooks Atkinson of The New York Times wrote, "Throwing a $250 banjo out of the window at the concierge is constructive abuse and should be virtuously applauded." Both plays folded after only short runs, and Stewart began to think about going back to his studies.

Stewart was convinced to continue acting when he was cast in the lead role of Yellow Jack, playing a soldier who becomes the subject of a yellow fever experiment. It premiered at the Martin Beck Theater in March 1934. Stewart received unanimous praise from the critics, but the play proved unpopular with audiences and folded by June. During the summer, Stewart made his film debut with an unbilled appearance in the Shemp Howard comedy short Art Trouble (1934), filmed in Brooklyn, and acted in summer stock productions of We Die Exquisitely and All Paris Knows at the Red Barn Theater on Long Island. In the fall, he again received excellent reviews for his role in Divided by Three at the Ethel Barrymore Theatre, which he followed with the modestly successful Page Miss Glory and the critical failure A Journey by Night in spring 1935.

Soon after A Journey by Night ended, Stewart signed a seven-year contract with Metro-Goldwyn-Mayer (MGM), orchestrated by talent scout Bill Grady, who had been tracking Stewart's career since seeing him perform in Princeton. His first Hollywood role was a minor appearance in the Spencer Tracy vehicle The Murder Man (1935). His performance was largely ignored by critics, although the New York Herald Tribune, remembering him in Yellow Jack, called him "wasted in a bit that he handles with characteristically engaging skill". MGM did not see leading-man material in Stewart, described by biographer Michael D. Rinella as a "lanky young bumpkin with a hesitant manner of speech". During this time, his agent Leland Hayward decided that the best path for him would be through loan-outs to other studios.

1938–1941: Leading man

Despite good reviews, Stewart was still a minor star, and MGM remained hesitant to cast him in leading roles, preferring to loan him out to other studios. After a well-received supporting part in Of Human Hearts (1938), he was loaned to RKO to act opposite Ginger Rogers in the romantic comedy Vivacious Lady (1938). The production was shut down for months in 1937 as Stewart recovered from an undisclosed illness, during which he was hospitalized. RKO initially wanted to replace Stewart, but eventually the project was canceled. However, Rogers' success in a stage musical caused the film to be picked up again. Stewart was recast in Vivacious Lady at Rogers' insistence and due to his performance in Of Human Hearts. It was a critical and commercial success, and showed Stewart's talent for performing in romantic comedies; The New York Herald called him "one of the most knowing and engaging young actors appearing on the screen at present".

Stewart's third film release of 1938, the First World War drama The Shopworn Angel, saw him collaborate again with Margaret Sullavan. In his performance, Stewart drew upon his own feelings of unrequited love towards Sullavan, who was married to his agent, Leland Hayward. Although the film was otherwise well-received, critics were mixed about Stewart. Bland Johaneson of the New York Daily Mirror compared him to Stan Laurel in this melodramatic film, and Variety called his performance unfocused.

Stewart became a major star when he was loaned out to Columbia Pictures to play the lead role in Frank Capra's You Can't Take It with You (1938) opposite Jean Arthur. Stewart played the son of a banker who falls in love with a woman from a poor and eccentric family. Capra had recently completed several well-received films and was looking for a new type of leading man. He had been impressed by Stewart's role in Navy Blue and Gold (1937). According to Capra, Stewart was one of the best actors ever to hit the screen, understood character archetypes intuitively, and required little directing. You Can't Take It With You became the fifth highest-grossing film of the year and won the Academy Award for Best Picture. The film was also critically successful, but while Variety wrote that the performances of Stewart and Arthur garnered "much of the laughs", most of the critical acclaim went to Lionel Barrymore and Edward Arnold.

In contrast to the success of You Can't Take It With You, Stewart's first three film releases of 1939 were all commercial disappointments. In the melodrama Made for Each Other (1939), he shared the screen with Carole Lombard. Stewart blamed its directing and screenwriting for its poor box-office performance. Regardless, the film received favorable reviews, with Newsweek writing that Stewart and Lombard were "perfectly cast in the leading roles". The other two films, The Ice Follies of 1939 and It's a Wonderful World, were critical failures.

1941–1947: Military service

Stewart became the first major American movie star to enlist in the United States Army to fight in World War II. His family had deep military roots: both of his grandfathers had fought in the Civil War, and his father had served during both the Spanish–American War and World War I. After first being rejected for low weight in November 1940, he enlisted in February 1941. As an experienced pilot, he reported for induction as a private in the Air Corps on March 22, 1941. Soon to be 33 years old, he was over the age limit for Aviation Cadet training—the normal path of commissioning for pilots, navigators and bombardiers—and therefore applied for an Air Corps commission as both a college graduate and a licensed commercial pilot. Stewart received his commission as a second lieutenant on January 1, 1942.

After enlisting, Stewart made no new commercial films, although he remained under contract to MGM. His public appearances were limited to engagements for the Army Air Forces. The Air Corps scheduled him on network radio with Edgar Bergen and Charlie McCarthy, and on the radio program We Hold These Truths, a celebration of the United States Bill of Rights, which was broadcast a week after the attack on Pearl Harbor. Stewart also appeared in a First Motion Picture Unit short film, Winning Your Wings, to help recruit airmen. Nominated for an Academy Award for Best Documentary in 1942, it appeared in movie theaters nationwide beginning in late May 1942 and resulted in 150,000 new recruits.

Stewart was concerned that his celebrity status would relegate him to duties behind the lines. After spending over a year training pilots at Kirtland Army Airfield in Albuquerque, New Mexico, he appealed to his commander and in November 1943 was sent to England as part of the 703d Bomb Squadron to fly B-24 Liberators. He was based initially at RAF Tibenham, before moving to RAF Old Buckenham.

Stewart was promoted to major following a mission to Ludwigshafen, Germany, on January 7, 1944. He was awarded the Distinguished Flying Cross for actions as deputy commander of the 2nd Bombardment Wing, the French Croix de Guerre with palm, and the Air Medal with three oak leaf clusters. Stewart was promoted to full colonel on March 29, 1945, becoming one of the few Americans to ever rise from private to colonel in only four years. At the beginning of June 1945, Stewart was the presiding officer of the court martial of a pilot and navigator who accidentally bombed Zurich, Switzerland.

1946–1949: Early post-war films

After his experiences in the war, Stewart considered returning to Pennsylvania to run the family store. His former agent, Leland Hayward, had also left the talent business in 1944 after selling his roster of stars, including Stewart, to Music Corporation of America (MCA). Stewart decided not to renew his MGM contract and instead signed a deal with MCA. He later stated that he was given a new beginning by Frank Capra, who asked him to star in It's a Wonderful Life (1946), the first postwar film for both of them. Stewart played George Bailey, an upstanding small-town man who becomes increasingly frustrated by his ordinary existence and financial troubles. Driven to suicide on Christmas Eve, he is led to reassess his life by Clarence Odbody, an "angel, second class", played by Henry Travers. During filming, Stewart experienced doubts about his abilities and continued to consider retiring from acting.

Although It's a Wonderful Life was nominated for five Academy Awards, including Stewart's third Best Actor nomination, it received mixed reviews and was only a moderate success at the box office, failing to cover its production costs. Several critics found the movie too sentimental, although Bosley Crowther wrote that Stewart did a "warmly appealing job, indicating that he has grown in spiritual stature as well as in talent during the years he was in the war", and President Harry S. Truman concluded that "If [my wife] and I had a son we'd want him to be just like Jimmy Stewart [in this film]." In the decades since its release, It's a Wonderful Life has grown to define Stewart's film persona and is widely considered a Christmas classic, and according to the American Film Institute, is one of the 100 best American movies ever made. Andrew Sarris stated that Stewart's performance was underappreciated by critics of the time, who could not see "the force and fury" of it, and considered his proposal scene with Donna Reed, "one of the most sublimely histrionic expressions of passion". Stewart later named the film his personal favorite out of his filmography.

In the aftermath of It's A Wonderful Life, Capra's production company went into bankruptcy, while Stewart continued to have doubts about his acting abilities. His generation of actors was fading, and a new wave of actors, including Marlon Brando, Montgomery Clift, and James Dean, would soon remake Hollywood. Stewart returned to making radio dramas in 1946; he continued this work between films until the mid-1950s. He also made a comeback on Broadway to star in Mary Coyle Chase's Harvey in July 1947, replacing the original star Frank Fay for the duration of his vacation. The play had opened to nearly universal praise in 1944 and told the story of Elwood P. Dowd, a wealthy eccentric, whose best friend is an invisible man-sized rabbit and whose relatives are trying to get him committed to a mental asylum. Stewart gained a following in the unconventional play, and although Fay returned to the role in August, they decided that Stewart would take his place again the next summer. Stewart's only film to be released in 1947 was the William A. Wellman comedy Magic Town, one of the first films about the new science of public opinion polling. It was poorly received both commercially and critically.

1950–1959: Collaborations with Alfred Hitchcock and Anthony Mann

In the 1950s, Stewart experienced a career renewal as the star of Westerns and collaborated on several films with director Anthony Mann. The first of these was the Universal production Winchester '73 (1950), which Stewart agreed to do in exchange for being cast in a screen adaptation of Harvey. It also marked a turning point in Hollywood, as Stewart's agent, Lew Wasserman, brokered an innovative deal with Universal, in which Stewart would receive no fee in exchange for a percentage of the profits. Stewart was also granted authority to collaborate with the studio on casting and hiring decisions. Stewart ended up earning about $600,000 for Winchester '73, significantly more than his usual fee, and other stars quickly capitalized on this new way of doing business, which further undermined the decaying studio system.

Stewart chose Mann to direct, and the film gave him the idea of redefining his screen persona through the Western genre. In the film, Stewart is a tough, vengeful sharpshooter, the winner of a prized rifle that is stolen and passes through many hands, until the showdown between him and his brother. Winchester '73 became a box-office success upon its summer release and earned Stewart rave reviews. He also starred in another successful Western that summer, Broken Arrow (1950), which featured him as an ex-soldier and Native American agent making peace with the Apache.

Stewart's third film release of 1950 was the comedy The Jackpot; it received critical acclaim and was commercially successful, but was a minor film in his repertoire and has largely been forgotten by contemporary critics and fans. In December 1950, the screen adaptation of Harvey was released, directed by Henry Koster and with Stewart reprising his stage role. With critics comparing his performance with Fay's, Stewart's performance as well as the film itself received mixed reviews. Bosley Crowther of The New York Times wrote that "so darling is the acting of James Stewart [...] and all the rest that a virtually brand-new experience is still in store for even those who saw the play", while Variety called him "perfect" in the role. John McCarten of the New Yorker stated that although he "doesn't bring his part to the battered authority of Frank Fay...he nevertheless succeeds in making plausible the notion that Harvey, the rabbit, would accept him as a pal." Stewart later stated that he was dissatisfied with his performance, stating, "I played him a little too dreamily, a little too cute-cute." Despite the film's poor box office performance, Stewart received his fourth Academy Award nomination as well as his first Golden Globe nomination. Similar to It's a Wonderful Life, Harvey achieved popularity later, after frequent television showings.

1960–1970: Westerns and later career

Stewart opened the new decade by starring in the war film The Mountain Road (1960). To his surprise, it was a box office failure, despite his claims that it was one of the best scripts he'd ever read. He began a new director collaboration with John Ford, making his debut in his films in the Western Two Rode Together (1961), which had thematic echoes of Ford's The Searchers. The same year, he also narrated the film X-15 for the USAF. Stewart was considered for the role of Atticus Finch in the 1962 film adaptation of Harper Lee's novel To Kill a Mockingbird, but he turned it down, concerned that the story was too controversial.

Stewart and Ford's next collaboration was The Man Who Shot Liberty Valance (1962). A classic psychological Western, the picture was shot in black-and-white film noir style at Ford's insistence, with Stewart as an East Coast attorney who goes against his non-violent principles when he is forced to confront a psychopathic outlaw (Lee Marvin) in a small frontier town. The complex film initially garnered mixed reviews but became a critical favorite over the ensuing decades. Stewart was billed above John Wayne in posters and the trailers, but Wayne received top billing in the film itself. Stewart, Wayne, and Ford also collaborated for a television play that same year, Flashing Spikes (1962), for ABC's anthology series Alcoa Premiere, albeit featuring Wayne billed with a television pseudonym, "Michael Morris", (also used for Wayne's brief appearance in the John Ford-directed episode of the television series Wagon Train titled "The Colter Craven Story") for his lengthy cameo. Next, Stewart appeared as part of an all-star cast—including Henry Fonda and John Wayne—in How the West Was Won, a Western epic released in the United States in early 1963. The film went on to win three Academy Awards and reap massive box-office figures.

In 1962, Stewart signed a multi-movie deal with 20th Century Fox. The first two of these films reunited him with director Henry Koster in the family-friendly comedies Mr. Hobbs Takes a Vacation (1962) with Maureen O'Hara and Take Her, She's Mine (1963), which were both box-office successes. The former received moderately positive reviews and won Stewart the Silver Bear for Best Actor at the Berlin International Film Festival; the latter was panned by the critics. Stewart then appeared in John Ford's final Western, Cheyenne Autumn (1964), playing a white-suited Wyatt Earp in a long semi-comedic sequence in the middle of the movie. The film failed domestically and was quickly forgotten.

1971–1997: Television and semi-retirement

In 1971, Stewart starred in the NBC sitcom The Jimmy Stewart Show. He played a small-town college professor whose adult son moves back home with his family. Stewart disliked the amount of work needed to film the show each week and was relieved when it was canceled after only one season due to bad reviews and poor ratings. His only film release for 1971, the comedy-drama Fools' Parade, was more positively received. Robert Greenspun of The New York Times stated that "the movie belongs to Stewart, who has never been more wonderful". For his contributions to Western films, Stewart was inducted into the Hall of Great Western Performers at the National Cowboy & Western Heritage Museum in Oklahoma City in 1972.

Stewart returned to television in Harvey for NBC's Hallmark Hall of Fame series in 1972 and then starred in the CBS mystery series Hawkins in 1973. Playing a small-town lawyer investigating mysterious cases—similar to his character in Anatomy of a Murder—Stewart won a Golden Globe for his performance. Nevertheless, Hawkins failed to gain a wide audience, possibly because it rotated with Shaft, which had a starkly conflicting demographic, and was canceled after one season. Stewart also periodically appeared on Johnny Carson's The Tonight Show, sharing poems he had written at different times in his life. His poems were later compiled into a short collection, Jimmy Stewart and His Poems (1989).

After performing again in Harvey at the Prince of Wales Theatre in London in 1975, Stewart returned to films with a major supporting role in John Wayne's final film, The Shootist (1976), playing a doctor giving Wayne's gunfighter a terminal cancer diagnosis. By this time, Stewart had a hearing impairment, which affected his ability to hear his cues and led to him repeatedly flubbing his lines; his vanity would not allow him to admit this or to wear a hearing aid. Stewart was offered the role of Howard Beale in Network (1976) but refused it due to its explicit language. Instead, he appeared in supporting roles in the disaster film Airport '77 (1977) with Jack Lemmon, the remake of The Big Sleep (1978) with Robert Mitchum as Philip Marlowe, and the family film The Magic of Lassie (1978). Despite mixed reviews, Airport '77 was a box-office success, but the two other films were commercial and critical failures. Harry Haun of New York Daily News wrote in his review of The Big Sleep that it was "really sad to see James Stewart struggle so earnestly with material that just isn't there". Stewart made a memorable cameo appearance on the final episode of The Carol Burnett Show in March 1978, surprising Burnett, a lifelong Stewart fan.

Personal life

Romantic relationships

As a friend, mentor, and focus of his early romantic feelings, Margaret Sullavan had a unique influence on Stewart's life. They met while they were both performing for the University Players; he was smitten, and invited her on a date. However, she regarded him as a close friend and co-worker, so they never began a romantic relationship. Though Sullavan was always aware of his feelings, Stewart never directly revealed them. Sullavan loved Stewart, but not romantically. Rather, she felt protective and maternal towards him.

The director of The Shopworn Angel, H. C. Potter, suggested they might have married had Stewart been more forthcoming with his feelings. Instead, Sullavan became his acting mentor in Hollywood. According to director Edward H. Griffith, she "made [him] a star" by co-starring with him in four films: Next Time You Love (1936), The Shopworn Angel (1938), The Shop Around the Corner (1940) and The Mortal Storm (1940).

Stewart did not marry until his forties, which attracted a significant amount of contemporary media attention; gossip columnist Hedda Hopper called him the "Great American Bachelor". He had several romantic relationships prior to marriage. After being introduced by Henry Fonda, Stewart and Ginger Rogers enjoyed a relationship in 1935, while Fonda was dating Rogers' good friend Lucille Ball.

During production of The Shopworn Angel (1938), Stewart dated actress Norma Shearer for six weeks. Afterward, he dated Loretta Young, but she wanted to settle down and Stewart did not.

While filming Destry Rides Again (1939), Stewart had an affair with his co-star Marlene Dietrich, who was married at the time. Dietrich allegedly became pregnant, but it was quickly terminated. Stewart ended their relationship after the filming was completed. Hurt by Stewart's rejection, she barely mentioned him in her memoir and waved him off as a one-time affair.

He dated Olivia de Havilland in the late 1930s and early 1940s and even proposed marriage to her, but she rejected the proposal, as she believed he was not ready to settle down. She ended the relationship shortly before he began his military service, as she had fallen in love with director John Huston.

War career as pilot (1941–1946)

A licensed civilian pilot, Stewart enlisted in the US Army Air Forces early in 1941, undertaking military flight training and becoming a commissioned officer and USAAF pilot. In January 1944 in the rank of captain, he was assigned to the 453rd Bombardment Group, 2nd Combat Bombardment Wing, Eighth Air Force operating out of East Anglia, England as a bomber pilot flying the B-24 Liberator. After seeing action in Europe during World War II, he attained the rank of colonel and received several awards for his service. He remained in the Army Air Forces Reserve after the end of World War II, which would become the Air Force Reserve when the US Air Force became an independent service in 1947. He was promoted to the rank of brigadier general in the Air Force Reserve in 1959. He retired from the service in 1968, at which time he was awarded the Air Force Distinguished Service Medal. President Reagan recounted at a White House briefing that he was corrected by Stewart himself after Reagan incorrectly announced he was a major general at a campaign event.

Marriage and children

In 1942, while serving in the military, Stewart met singer Dinah Shore at the Hollywood Canteen, a club mainly for servicemen. They began a romantic relationship and were nearly married in Las Vegas in 1943, but Stewart called off the marriage before they arrived, citing cold feet. After the war, Stewart began a relationship with Myrna Dell while he was filming The Stratton Story (1949). Although gossip columnists made claims that they were planning to marry, Dell said this was not true.

Stewart's first interaction with his future wife, Gloria Hatrick McLean, was at Keenan Wynn's Christmas party in 1947. He had crashed the party and became inebriated, leaving a poor impression of himself with Hatrick. A year later, Gary Cooper and his wife, Veronica, invited Hatrick and Stewart to a dinner party, and the two began dating. A former model, Hatrick was divorced with two children. Stewart and Hatrick were married at Brentwood Presbyterian Church on August 9, 1949, and remained married until her death from lung cancer in 1994.

The couple purchased a home in Beverly Hills in 1951, where they resided for the rest of their lives. They also owned the Winecup Gamble Ranch in Nevada from 1953 to 1957. Stewart adopted Gloria's two sons, Ronald (1944–1969) and Michael (born 1946), and with Gloria he had twin daughters, Judy and Kelly, on May 7, 1951. Ronald was killed in action in Vietnam on June 8, 1969, at the age of 24, while serving as a lieutenant in the Marine Corps.

Friendships, interests, and character

Stewart was guarded about his personal life and, according to biographer Scott Eyman, tended in interviews to avoid the emotional connection he was known for in his films, preferring to keep his thoughts and feelings to himself. He was known as a loner who did not have intimate relationships with many people. Director John Ford said of Stewart, "You don't get to know Jimmy Stewart; Jimmy Stewart gets to know you."

Stewart's 50-year friendship with Henry Fonda began in Manhattan when Fonda invited Stewart to be his third roommate (in addition to Joshua Logan and Myron McCormick) to make the rent. When Stewart moved to Hollywood in 1935, he again shared an apartment with Fonda, and the two gained reputations as playboys. Over their careers, they starred in four films together: On Our Merry Way (1948), How the West Was Won (1962), Firecreek (1968), and The Cheyenne Social Club (1970). Both Stewart's and Fonda's children later noted that their fathers' favorite activity when not working seemed to be quietly sharing time together while building and painting model airplanes, a hobby they had taken up in New York years earlier. Besides building model airplanes, Stewart and Fonda liked to build and fly kites, play golf, and reminisce about the "old days". After Fonda's death in 1982, Stewart's only public comment was "I've just lost my best friend." Their friendship was chronicled in Scott Eyman's biography, Hank and Jim (2017).

Aside from Fonda, Stewart's close friends included his former agent, Leland Hayward; director John Ford; photographer John Swope, Stewart's former roommate; and Billy Grady, the talent scout who discovered Stewart and also served as the best man at his wedding. Gary Cooper was another close friend of Stewart's. On April 17, 1961, Cooper was too ill with cancer to attend the 33rd Academy Awards ceremony, so Stewart accepted the honorary Oscar on his behalf.

In addition to his film career, Stewart had diversified investments, including real estate, oil wells, the charter-plane company Southwest Airways, and membership on major corporate boards; he became a multimillionaire. Already prior to his enlistment in the Air Corps, he had been an avid pilot, with a private pilot certificate and a commercial pilot license, as well as over 400 hours of flying time. A highly proficient pilot, he entered a cross-country race with Leland Hayward in 1937 and was one of the early investors in Thunderbird Field, a pilot-training school built and operated by Southwest Airways in Glendale, Arizona.

Political views

Stewart was a staunch conservative Republican throughout his life. A political argument in 1947 reportedly led to a fistfight with friend Henry Fonda (a liberal Democrat), according to some accounts, but the two maintained their friendship by never discussing politics again. The fistfight may be apocryphal, as Jhan Robbins quotes Stewart as saying, "Our views never interfered with our feelings for each other. We just didn't talk about certain things. I can't remember ever having an argument with him—ever!"

In 1964, Stewart campaigned for the conservative presidential candidate Barry Goldwater and, according to biographer Marc Eliot, erred on the obsessive prior to the election. Stewart was a hawk on the Vietnam War and maintained that his son, Ronald, did not die in vain. Following the assassination of Senator Robert F. Kennedy in 1968, Stewart, Charlton Heston, Kirk Douglas, and Gregory Peck issued a statement calling for support of President Lyndon B. Johnson's Gun Control Act of 1968.

Stewart actively supported Ronald Reagan's bid for the Republican presidential nomination in 1976. He attended Reagan's campaign rallies, in one speech assuring that he was more conservative than ever, regardless of the death of his son in the Vietnam War. In the last years of his life, he supported the re-election of Jesse Helms to the Senate in 1990 and also donated to the campaign of Bob Dole for the 1996 presidential election.

In 1988, Stewart made a plea in Congressional hearings, along with Burt Lancaster, Katharine Hepburn, Ginger Rogers, film director Martin Scorsese, and many others, against Ted Turner's decision to 'colorize' classic black-and-white films, including It's a Wonderful Life. Stewart stated, "the coloring of black-and-white films is wrong. It's morally and artistically wrong and these profiteers should leave our film industry alone."

In 1989, Stewart founded the American Spirit Foundation to apply entertainment-industry resources to developing innovative approaches to public education and to assist the emerging democracy movements in the former Iron Curtain countries.

Later life

Stewart's wife Gloria died of lung cancer on February 16, 1994, aged 75. According to biographer Donald Dewey, her death left Stewart depressed and "lost at sea". Stewart became even more reclusive, spending most of his time in his bedroom, exiting only to eat and visit with his children. He shut out most people from his life, not only media and fans, but also his co-stars and friends. His friends Leonard Gershe and Gregory Peck said Stewart was not depressed or unhappy, but finally allowed to rest and be alone.

Stewart was hospitalized after falling in December 1995. In December 1996, he was due to have the battery in his pacemaker changed but opted not to have it done.

Death

In February 1997, Stewart was hospitalized for an irregular heartbeat. On June 25, a thrombosis formed in his right leg, leading to a pulmonary embolism one week later. Stewart died of a heart attack caused by the embolism at the age of 89, surrounded by his children at his home in Beverly Hills, on July 2, 1997. President Bill Clinton commented that America had lost a "national treasure ... a great actor, a gentleman and a patriot". He was buried at Forest Lawn Memorial Park in Glendale, California in a private funeral with full military honors and a three-volley salute performed. More than 3,000 mourners later attended his memorial service, including June Allyson, Carol Burnett, Bob Hope, Lew Wasserman, Nancy Reagan, Esther Williams, and Robert Stack.

Acting style and screen persona

According to biographer Scott Eyman, Stewart was an instinctive actor. He was natural and at ease in front of the camera, despite his shy off-screen personality. In line with his natural and conversational acting style, Stewart's co-stars found him easy to work with, as he was willing to improvise around any situation that arose while filming. Later in his career, Stewart began to resent his reputation of having a "natural" acting technique. He asserted that there was not anything natural about standing on a sound stage in front of lights and cameras while acting out a scene.

Stewart had established early in his career that he was proficient at communicating personality and character nuances through his performances alone. He used an "inside-out" acting technique, preferring to represent the character without accents, makeup, and props. Additionally, he tended to act with his body, not only with his voice and face; for example, in Harvey, Stewart portrays the main character's age and loneliness by slightly hunching down. He was also known for his pauses that had the ability to hold the audience's attention. Film critic Geoffrey O'Brien related that Stewart's "stammering pauses" created anxious space for the audience, leaving them in anticipation for the scene which Stewart took his time leading up to.

Stewart himself claimed to dislike his earlier film performances, saying he was "all hands and feet", adding that he "didn't seem to know what to do with either". He mentioned that even though he did not always like his performances, he would not get discouraged. He said, "But I always tried, and if the script wasn't too good, well, then, I just tried a little bit harder. I hope, though, not so hard that it shows." Former co-star Kim Novak stated of his acting style that for emotional scenes, he would access emotions deep inside of him and would take time to wind down after the scene ended. He could not turn it off immediately after the director yelled cut.

Stewart was particularly adept at performing vulnerable scenes with women. Jack Lemmon suggested that Stewart's talent for performing with women was that he was able to allow the audience to see the respect and gentility he felt toward the women through his eyes. He showed that his characters needed them as much as their characters needed him. In connection to Stewart's screen persona with women, Peter Bradshaw said The Philadelphia Story is "a film every school pupil should see" due to Stewart's character's clear explanation of sexual consent after being accused of taking advantage of the main female character.

Work

Filmography

Selected credits

Legacy

Stewart is remembered for portraying idealist "everyman" characters in his films. His heroism on screen and devotion to his family made him relatable and representative of the American ideal, leading Stewart to be considered one of the best-loved figures in twentieth-century American popular culture. According to film scholar Dennis Bingham, "his ability to 'play'—even symbolize—honesty and 'American ideals' made him an icon into whose mold later male stars tried to pour themselves". Similarly, film scholar James Naremore has called Stewart "the most successful actor of the 'common man' in the history of movies" and "the most intensely-emotional leading man to emerge from the studio system", who could cry on screen without losing his masculinity.

David Thomson has explained Stewart's appeal by stating that "we wanted to be him, and we wanted to be liked by him", while Roger Ebert has stated that "whether he played everyman, or everyman's hidden psyche, Stewart was an innately likable man whose face, loping gait and distinctive drawl became famous all over the world". Among Stewart's most recognizable qualities was his manner of speaking with a hesitant drawl. According to film scholar Tim Palmer, "Stewart's legacy rests on his roles as the nervous idealist standing trial for, and gaining stature from, the sincerity of his beliefs, while his emotive convictions are put to the test." Film critic David Ansen wrote about Stewart's appeal as a person in addition to his appeal as an actor. Ansen retold a story in which Jack Warner, upon being told about Ronald Reagan's presidential ambitions, said, "No. Jimmy Stewart for president, Ronald Reagan for best friend." Ansen further explained that Stewart was the ultimate trustworthy movie star.

In contrast to his popularly remembered "all-American" screen persona, film critics and scholars have tended to emphasize that his performances also showed a "dark side". According to film scholar Murray Pomerance, "the other Jimmy Stewart ... was a different type altogether, a repressed and neurotic man buried beneath an apparently calm facade, but ready at any moment to explode with vengeful anxiety and anger, or else with deeply twisted and constrained passions that could never match up with cheery personality of the alter ego." Bingham has described him as having "two coequal personas; the earnest idealist, the nostalgic figure of the homespun boy next door; and the risk-taking actor who probably performed in films for more canonical auteurs than any other American star". According to him, it is this complexity and his ambiguous masculinity and sexuality with which he approached his roles that characterized his persona. Naremore has stated that there was a "troubled, cranky, slightly-repressed feeling in [Stewart's] behavior", and Thomson has written that it was his dark side that produced "great cinema".

Awards and honors

In 1960, Stewart was awarded a star on the Hollywood Walk of Fame at 1700 Vine Street for his contributions to the film industry. In 1974, he received the Golden Plate Award of the American Academy of Achievement. His Golden Plate was presented by Awards Council member Helen Hayes. In 1997, Princeton University, Stewart's alma mater, honored him with the dedication of the James M. Stewart Theater along with a retrospective of his films. Stewart has also been honored with his own postal stamp as part of the "Legends of Hollywood" stamp series. In 1999, a bust of Stewart was unveiled at the Eighth Air Force Heritage Museum in Georgia. The L. Tom Perry Special Collections Library at Brigham Young University houses his personal papers and movie memorabilia including letters, scrapbooks, recordings of early radio programs, and two of his accordions. Stewart donated his papers and memorabilia to the library after becoming friends with the curator of its arts and communications collections, James D'Arc.

Memorials

Stewart has several memorials in his childhood hometown, Indiana, Pennsylvania. On May 20, 1995, his 87th birthday, The Jimmy Stewart Museum was established. The museum is located near his birthplace, his childhood home, and the former location of his father's hardware store. The museum has six galleries that include photos, memorabilia, personal mementos, movie posters, props, scripts, costumes and much more. Stewart had contributed significant donations to his hometown, and had done it quietly as he didn't want the publicity. A large statue of Stewart stands on the lawn of the Indiana County Courthouse, and a plaque marks his birthplace. In 1983, Jimmy Stewart came back to Indiana to celebrate his 75th birthday and unveiled the statue along with getting a phone call from then President Ronald Reagan to congratulate him on his birthday. 2011, the United States Post Office located at 47 South 7th Street in Indiana, Pennsylvania, was designated the "James M. 'Jimmy' Stewart Post Office Building". Additionally, the Indiana County–Jimmy Stewart Airport was named in his honor. His personal Cessna-310 airplane is refurbished and on display outside the airport that bears his name. His childhood home is still standing and overlooks his beloved hometown.

Documentary

2017: James Stewart/Robert Mitchum: The Two Faces of America directed by Gregory Monro

Biopic

In May 2026, Burns & Co. Entertainment released the official trailer for Jimmy, an upcoming American biographical drama film about James Stewart directed by Aaron Burns and written by Justin Strawhand. The film stars KJ Apa as Stewart and focuses on the actor’s rise in Hollywood, his military service during World War II, and his return to acting with It's a Wonderful Life. Supporting cast members include Jason Alexander, Max Casella, Sarah Drew, Neal McDonough and Rob Riggle. The film is scheduled to be released theatrically on November 6, 2026, by Fathom Entertainment.