Just watched The Trouble With Harry. A few nights ago I watched The Mouse That Roared. So in the spirit of ‘Ginger, or Mary Ann’…
Jean Seberg, or Shirley MacLaine?
Me? Jean Seberg.
Let’s see. One’s been dead for 26 years; the other’s still very much alive but flakier than Sun Valley in winter. Both are (or were) old enough to be my mother.
If I found myself in 1960 with this choice available to me, I’d probably pick MacLaine knowing her annoying New Age-phase is still another 15 to 20 years away. I would not complain, however, if I ended up with Seberg. I just wish she would’ve been strong enough emotionally to tell Hoover and Tricky Dick to go to hell ten years later when they ran that smear campaign against her.
Shirley Maclaine.When I was a young Catholic,I’d check the Catholic Standard for the
condemned movies.My folks thought I was looking for the A movies,but in the sixties,Shirley ruled in John Goldfarb,Please Come Home (written by Peter Bleatty) and What a Way to Go.Jeez,she was so do-able
Shirley MacLaine: 6 Oscar nominations, one win.
Jean Seberg: 0.
Jean Seberg. I once hosted an autographing for Ms. MacLaine. It was, without any doubt, the most unpleasant performance by an actress pretending to be an author. She was rude to the store’s employees and mean to her fans.
Besides, Jean Seberg was better looking on her worst day than Shirley MacLaine could ever hope to be. A starving piranha would’ve had better manners and been friendlier than Shirley. Even a dead Jean Seberg would’ve been more pleasant. I’d been a fan of her movies but she really made me strain to separate the person from the performance.
ohmygod, those are my two favorite shirley maclaine movies.
Was this around the time MacLaine got into that scrap with David Letterman when she was on his show? She’s really developed a chip on her shoulder whenever anyone jokes about all the New Age wooze she’s spouted.
Anyway, I think this thread is really about MacLaine c. 1960 and not the cranky old flake she is now. I have no idea if she was as rude and unpleasant when she was younger; I’m still picking her over Seberg (although maybe it’s just because MacLaine’s a redhead).
Indeed. I intended the comparison to be when they were each about 21 years old. (But that doesn’t mean someone could choose am older version.)
Considering her body wasn’t found till 11 days after her death, I might rethink that…
I’d go for Jean. She was doomed, but maybe the decline would have been a little less tragic with one balding saxophone player from just down US 30 in there amongst all the misogynist European pseudos.
Well I’m gay of course, but Seberg strikes me as beautiful; Maclaine was cute. Buttonlike you might say. Aesthetically (as opposed to sexually), Seberg is worth a thousand Maclaines.
So are Mary Ann and Ginger.
Jean Seberg. Not only is Breathless one of my favorite movies, but she’s gorgeous.
One of my faves, too. (For those who don’t know, ArchiveGuy’s second link is from that film.)
Agreed, but MacLaine had a memorable scene as Eve Rand in “Being There.” 
I don’t quite remember it. I’ll have to pop in the DVD one of these days.
Shirley MacLaine was cool enough to be a female auxiliary member of the Rat Pack, and her brother is Warren Beatty.
Jean Seberg suffered from severe depression.
MacLaine.
i’ve loved shirley ever since 1968/9, when I was in 6th grade. It’s hard to tell all of your 6th grade friends why you are in love with Clyde Barrow’s sister (they would only think of faye dunaway, anyhow), so i’ve had to keep it in all of these years. at last the truth can be told.
SHIRLEY!