Top ten screen goddesses
Are they the greatest screen goddesses of all time? Ten leading ladies have been given that illustrious honour in a nationwide poll.
But the list will prompt fierce debate among moviegoers and critics - for it leaves some famous names on the cutting room floor.
The 10 include Bette Davis but not Ingrid Bergman; Katharine Hepburn but not Elizabeth Taylor; Nicole Kidman but not Grace Kelly; Cate Blanchett but not Gwyneth Paltrow. And screen legends Greta Garbo and Brigitte Bardot did not even make it to the top 100.
The list is the result of a major TV survey to be screened next week. The finalists are being kept secret but today the
Evening Standard can exclusively reveal the most fascinating result of all - the top 10 actresses. The public voted for their favourite actors and actresses at the invitation of Channel 4, and the results will emerge during a six-hour special titled The 100 Greatest Movie Stars, which the channel describes as "a celebration of the world's best-loved stars of the silver screen".
In a three-hour programme on Sunday night the full rundown of 100 will be whittled down to 40. And on Monday the Top 10 male and female idols will emerge.
The chosen 10 women are: Nicole Kidman, Audrey Hepburn, Julia Roberts, Marilyn Monroe, Cate Blanchett, Sigourney Weaver, Susan Sarandon, Bette Davis, Jodie Foster and Katharine Hepburn.
Gwyneth Paltrow, who was in the Top 100, got washed away with her Oscar tears. Kate Winslet seems to have sunk without trace along with the Titanic. From the golden age of Hollywood, Liz Taylor, Grace Kelly, Ingrid Bergman and Vivien Leigh were voted out along the way.
Of great actors like Laurence Olivier and John Barrymore there is no mention in the top 100, but James Stewart is there along with James Dean, Brad
Pitt and Tom Cruise. Julia Roberts is perhaps the most consistent movie goddess of recent times. In similar polls since 1990 she has been voted top actress most often.
The Channel 4 show says Pretty Woman "took her from being an unknown, cute, bighaired girl to the biggest star in America". A hint, perhaps, that she is their ultimate Number One Movie Great?
