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The Jimmy Stewart Story Hollywood Never Told
He kept his war years private. His daughter Kelly helped bring them to the screen in the biopic ‘Jimmy’
7-minute read
From real life to the big screen: Jimmy Stewart, right, and KJ Apa as the actor and World War II pilot in “Jimmy.”
Fathom Events/Courtesy Everett Collection; Bettmann Collection/Getty Images
How do you make a Hollywood biopic about the one part of Jimmy Stewart’s life he didn’t want Hollywood to touch?
That was the question facing Kelly Stewart Harcourt, 75, one of Stewart’s four children, when she signed on as an executive producer of Jimmy, the new film about her famous father that opens in theaters on November 6.
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Jimmy Stewart was one of the most recognizable stars of Hollywood’s golden age. But behind the familiar drawl, lanky frame, and everyman persona was an accomplished military pilot who actively sought combat duty — and rarely talked about those experiences afterward.
His daughter tells AARP: “He told me the thing he was most proud of in life is his military service. He always wanted to keep his military service separate from Hollywood, partly because he thought Hollywood movies about the war just weren’t accurate enough. He didn’t want his military service glamorized and glitterized.”
Jimmy begins the story in February 1941, when Stewart won an Academy Award for best actor for The Philadelphia Story. Drafted just a month later, Stewart became a combat pilot in the U.S. Army Air Corps. Eventually, he flew 20 missions over Europe, rising to the rank of colonel before returning home to star as George Bailey in 1946’s It’s a Wonderful Life, a role for which he would be nominated for another Oscar. Actor KJ Apa portrays Stewart in the biopic.
Jimmy Stewart arrives at the 1967 Academy Awards with twin daughters Judy, left, and Kelly, then 15. Kelly, right in 2026, recalls the night as “very exciting.”
Gene Lester/Getty Images; Michael Hickey/Getty Images
Stewart Harcourt struggled with how to marry the two very different paths her father had taken. “When I was helping on this movie, I struggled with, ‘What am I doing here, combining his military service with Hollywood?’” she says. “But it doesn’t glamorize war. It shows that it’s hard to die for your country, and it’s hard to kill for your country. It’s very difficult. I think Dad would approve of this film.”
In a video call from her home in Inverness, California, she shares what her dad was like off-screen, what she only learned after reading his bedside diary and the best advice he ever gave her.
This interview has been edited for length and clarity.
It’s a Wonderful Life is treasured by so many people. Did you watch it as a family growing up?
Yes. Once it started airing on television, we watched it pretty much every Christmas. It’s really a movie about humanity, which is why it endures.
Stewart as George Bailey in 1946’s “It’s a Wonderful Life,” the performance his daughter Kelly says he was most proud of.
Herbert Dorfman/Getty Images
What did your dad say about the film?
Dad was always quite critical when he watched himself, and he would be kind of directorial, so he’d go, ‘I should have waited longer before replying’ in that scene. He was very, very precise and critical, but I think It's a Wonderful Life is the performance he’s most proud of.
What did you and your siblings think of it? Did it make an impact?
I remember thinking, This is OK, it’s a ritual, we do it at Christmases. It’s kind of corny. Then we graduated from high school and went off to college. I didn’t watch it again for many, many years. I think I watched it again about 10 years ago. I was totally blown away by it.
What did you see in it so many years later?
It’s not just a corny movie. I can see why he’s most proud of that performance. That scene in the bar, to me, is the best end-of-your-rope scene to come out of Hollywood. I had no idea of what he was suffering through when he came back from the war. I probably didn’t even realize that it was made right after he came back, and he was struggling.
Was there anything else about his life that you didn’t know that was revealed to you during the making of the movie?
Stewart gets down on his daughters’ level for a chat with twins Judy and Kelly around 1954.
Hulton Archive/Getty Images
I didn’t realize how hard he had to fight to fight — I didn’t realize the enormous resistance there was to him going. It wasn’t just that people were saying, ‘You don’t have to do this.’ They were trying to stop him from doing it. After Dad died, my [twin] sister Judy found a diary that he had kept during the war; it was right by his bedside, in a drawer. None of us knew he kept this diary. It ended when the war ended, almost mid-sentence. It talks about his fears and his struggles. It talked about his fight to fight. That diary informed a lot of this film because it said new things about Dad that people didn’t know, that my sister and I didn’t know. At first I thought, Why did he leave it right here? Did he read it every so often? Was he gonna finish it? And then I decided he wanted this story told.
Today, they might say your dad had post-traumatic stress disorder.
Dad came back, he said he was an out-of-work actor and an out-of-work pilot, so now what? Does he even want to act again after what he’s seen? [It’s a Wonderful Life director] Frank Capra really understood him and gave him this film, which saved Dad’s career and might have saved his sanity. Mom [Gloria Hatrick McLean] said to me, ‘He had nightmares.’ Sometimes he’d sit up in bed, and he would be flying a plane and being shot at by other planes. He’d be like this, sitting up in bed, trying to keep the plane steady, so it really stayed with him.
Your dad worked with veterans, and you have picked up that role since his death.
I was just in the D.C. area for the Air, Space & Cyber Conference, which Dad helped establish. And that was incredible. There were all these people coming up to me, some with tears in their eyes, saying how inspirational Dad was. It was amazing.
Was it emotional watching Jimmy for the first time?
Judy and I watched it together at her house, and there were major waterworks. It was very moving, and I was thrilled at how well it turned out, and I’m absolutely thrilled at KJ’s performance.
Your parents were married for more than 40 years — not typical in Hollywood. What do you think kept them together?
Mom always used to tell me, “Your father’s the finest man I’ve ever met.” And Dad would say, “You have no idea how wonderful your mother is.” Dad got married when he was 41. He waited a long time. He married a divorced woman with two young boys. So within a year and a half, he had four kids. He met her, and there was mutual respect and a shared sense of humor.
I saw a picture of you and your sister going to the Oscars. Did you go to a lot of Hollywood events with your dad?
That’s the only Oscar ceremony I’ve been to. I believe we were about 15. We were twins, and we were still dressing alike. You’ll notice in that picture that we’re both wearing the same dress. But it was very exciting, and we sat behind Julie Christie. It was thrilling!
It sounds like you had quite a childhood.
Mom and Dad hung out with people who were producers, writers and more on that side of filmmaking. Mom and Dad valued friendships a lot. You know, It’s a Wonderful Life is about that. They would have people over every Thanksgiving, and, of course, the only time we ate in the big dining room was Thanksgiving and Christmas. It was like a real tribe. When Mom was diagnosed with cancer, Nancy and Ronnie Reagan came over. I’ll never forget how sweet they were. And then when Mom died and Dad was bereft, his friends came over and visited all the time. This was touching.
Stewart relaxes at home with his twin daughters, Judy and Kelly, in 1960. Years later, Kelly still remembers his advice before they left for college: “Always remember, no matter what happens, be nice to people.”
Gene Lester/Getty Images
What’s the best advice your dad gave you?
He called my sister and me in before we went off to college. He said, ‘I want to have a talk with you.’ My sister and I thought, Oh, not the birds and the bees, we’ve learned about that. And he said, “Always remember, no matter what happens, be nice to people.” That was the best advice he could have given us. Because it never hurts. And it always helps.
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