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Donna Reed — news, coverage & facts — IJR

Metro-Goldwyn-Mayer

In 1941, after signing with Metro-Goldwyn-Mayer, Reed made her film debut in The Get-Away opposite Robert Sterling; she was then billed as Donna Adams.

MGM didn't care for her name and soon changed it to Donna Reed. "A studio publicist hung the name on me, and I never did like it", Reed once said. "I hear 'Donna Reed' and I think of a tall, chic, austere blonde that isn't me. 'Donna Reed' – it has a cold, forbidding sound."

Reed had a supporting role in Shadow of the Thin Man (1941) and in Wallace Beery's The Bugle Sounds (1942). Like many starlets at MGM, she played opposite Mickey Rooney in an Andy Hardy film, in her case the hugely popular The Courtship of Andy Hardy (1942). She was second-billed in the children's film, Mokey (1942). Reed starred in Calling Dr. Gillespie (1942) and Apache Trail (1942), then did a thriller with Edward Arnold, Eyes in the Night (1942), directed by Fred Zinnemann.

Reed appeared in The Human Comedy (1943) with Mickey Rooney, Dr. Gillespie's Criminal Case (1943) and The Man from Down Under (1943). She was one of many MGM stars to make cameos in Thousands Cheer (1943). Her "girl-next-door" good looks and warm onstage personality made her a popular World War II pin-up, and she personally answered letters from American servicemen overseas. She retained some 350 of the letters she was sent during the war. Reed starred in See Here, Private Hargrove (1944) and Gentle Annie (1945), a Western. She was in The Picture of Dorian Gray (1945) and played a nurse in John Ford's They Were Expendable (1945), opposite John Wayne. MGM was very enthusiastic about Reed's prospects at this time.

Reed collaborated with her Denison High School chemistry teacher Edward R. Tompkins (who worked on the Manhattan Project) on the 1947 MGM film The Beginning or the End, which dealt with the history and concerns of the atom bomb. Reed contributed to the story but does not appear in the final film. Reed was top-billed in a romantic comedy Faithful in My Fashion (1946) with Tom Drake.

MGM lent Reed to RKO for the role of Mary Bailey in Frank Capra's It's a Wonderful Life. The film has since been named as one of the 100 best American films ever made by the American Film Institute and is regularly aired on television during the Christmas season. Reed later said it was "the most difficult film I ever did. No director ever demanded as much of me."

Back at MGM, she appeared in Green Dolphin Street (1947) with Lana Turner and Van Heflin, a financial hit.

Paramount borrowed Reed for two films with Alan Ladd, Beyond Glory (1948), where she replaced Joan Caulfield at the last minute, and Chicago Deadline (1949). In 1949, Reed expressed a desire for better roles.

The Donna Reed Show

From 1958 to 1966, Reed starred in The Donna Reed Show on ABC, a television series produced by her then-husband, Tony Owen. The show featured her as Donna Stone, the wife of pediatrician Alex Stone (Carl Betz) and mother of Jeff (Paul Petersen) and Mary Stone (Shelley Fabares). Reed was attracted to the idea of being in a comedy, something with which she did not have much experience. She also enjoyed playing the role of a wife.

The show ran for eight seasons on ABC. Reed won a Golden Globe Award and earned four Emmy Award nominations for her work on the series.

Reed described her show as "[...] a realistic picture of small-town life with an often humorous twist. Our plots revolve around the most important thing in America—a loving family." In the show, Reed's character, Donna Stone, is a loving mother and wife, but also a strong, smart woman with feelings and a sense of humor.

Some feminists criticized the show, asserting that it promoted submissiveness among housewives. In a 1979 interview, Reed, who had raised four children, responded, "I played a strong woman who could manage her family. That was offensive to a lot of people."

In a 1984 television interview, Reed said of her show, "I felt that I was making, for women, a statement. This mother was not stupid. She wasn't domineering, but she was bright and I thought rather forward-thinking, happily married."

In a 2008 interview, Paul Petersen, who portrayed her son Jeff Stone in the series, also shared his opinions about the production's significance,

That's what the show was really about, the importance of family. That's where life's lessons are transmitted, generation to generation. There's a certain way in which these are transmitted, with love and affection...[The Donna Reed Show] depicts a better time and place. It has a sort of level of intelligence and professionalism that is sadly lacking in current entertainment products. The messages it sent out were positive and uplifting. The folks you saw were likable, the family was fun, the situations were familiar to people. It provided 22-and-a-half-minutes of moral instruction and advice on how to deal with the little dilemmas of life.