Best Actress in a Supporting Role 1955: Betsy Blair in Marty

Betsy Blair received her only Oscar nomination for her performance as Clara Snyder in Marty.

Marty is a wonderful movie about an unmarried, unattractive but good-hearted butcher who falls in love with a shy and lonely teacher. It's one of my favorite Best Picture winners, because it's a movie that never fails to move me: it's not glamorous nor overly sugar-coated - it's just simple, tender and just plain beautiful. The Oscar-winning screenplay is terrific because it never makes the simple nature of the story feel like a limitation or lack of depth. It's truly a great movie that feels incredibly realistic while having an enchanting fairytale-like atmosphere to it. 

Betsy Blair is Clara, the plain-looking teacher with whom Marty falls in love. We first meet Clara at a ballroom when she is dumped by her blind date because of her not very attractive looks: Blair instantly makes you sympathize with Clara and the moment in which Marty tries to comfort her is a deeply heartbreaking one; the thing I almost immediately noticed and appreciated about Blair's performance is the fact that she goes for a subtle acting style that makes her big moments quietly devastating. Just like Clara herself seems to shy away from attention, Blair doesn't want to draw to her the audience's eyes: she naturally does through the beautiful quietness and painful honesty of her performance. Her crying in the aforementioned scene couldn't be more effective because of how natural and heartfelt it feels - it's feels so life-like it's heartwrenching. Betsy Blair meets the physical requirements of the character perfectly: she is not typically beautiful but she also has a genuine, bright spark in her eyes and a quiet, low-key charm to her that make her such a luminous presence throughout the movie. On paper, Clara isn't a very complex character and she could have easily been just an object of affection: but Blair adds to it depth and sensitivity, touchingly revealing Clara's insecutirites and vulnerabilities. There's an aching loneliness to her portrayal that makes her consistently moving, and I also admire Blair for giving a performance of utter realism without any single trace of vanity or artifice. 

Her chemistry with Ernest Borgnine is, of course, top-notch: they are just perfect for each other and their interactions are incredibly sweet and endearing. They develop an unique connection between two lonely souls and together they create one of the most beautifully real yet almost magical romance I've ever seen: the relationship between Marty and Clara is the core of the movie, and Borgnine and Blair realize this perfectly. In their scenes together, Clara is the more passive characters of the two - Marty is the one who talks more and Clara often listens silently - but Betsy Blair never makes her performance passive itself: she makes her character kind, gentle and understanding, and the scene in which she advises him to buy the shop he works at is an extremely effective moments that Blair handles with poignancy and tenderness. In the same scene, she also does a very good job in showing yet another side of Clara, which would be her love for children and her job as a teacher (it's just wonderful that when she talks about them her face just seems to light up).

The scene in which Marty takes Clara to his apartment is probably the best in the whole movie and both actors do a wonderful job with it, creating a tender, beautiful atmosphere: their kiss is a fantastic moment because it feels like the two actors earned it completely. On her part, Betsy Blair is incredibly moving in showing the awkwardness of Clara, who doesn't quite seem to know what she should do - she makes her nervousness almost palpable. Blair is truly wonderful here and she turns even the simplest line such as "Nothing" into something heartbreaking. A later scene in which she waits for Marty's call is truly devastating and she conveys the disappointment and heartbreak of Clara perfectly without even uttering a single word, and it's even more powerful if you watch a previous scene that was deleted in the final cut in which Clara, after the night out with Marty, tells her parents about it - it's a beautiful, little scene and this is thanks to Blair's radiant display of happiness, joy and excitement.

This is a wonderful performance by Betsy Blair that stands as a perfect example of an actress taking a potentially thankless role and making it unforgettable. It's a performance that is just amazing in its simplicity, and one that doesn't need loudness or Oscar baiting moments: the quietness and the sensitivity are what makes it unforgettable. 

5/5