Good 50's Films: Gentlemen Prefer Blondes

1953 Musical Comedy
From 20th Century Fox
Directed by Howard Hawks

Starring
Jane Russell
Marilyn Monroe
Charles Coburn
Elliot Reid
Tommy Noonan
George Winslow
Taylor Holmes
Norma Varden

I saw this movie when it opened because I was over the moon for Marilyn Monroe and Jane Russell and I could scarcely believe the two of them were in a film together.  I have no doubt I saw it several times when it was still playing on a first-run basis.  I know for sure that I owned a beta version of it, then VHS and finally DVD.  When I have had a free, lazy Sunday afternoon and some comfort food and choose not to watch a western, it has often been Gentlemen Prefer Blondes that I have watched.  It's always made me very happy. 

In 1925 Anita Loos wrote the novel of the same name.  She and Joseph Fields turned it into a Broadway musical in 1949 and it ran for 740 performances starring Carol Channing as diamond-loving gold-digger Lorelei Lee.  When 20th Century Fox bought the rights it was to have starred Betty Grable and Jane Russell.  So what happened?  Niagara happened.  It brought Monroe stardom but Blondes brought her superstardom.  It didn't hurt that a nude calendar appeared on the scene about a year earlier. 

It was see ya Betty and hello MM.  Gentlemen Prefer Blondes is the film that turned her into an international sex symbol, a gifted comedienne and the biggest movie star the world would ever know.  If you doubt that last part, ask yourself who else we hear about 56 years after her death as though one of her films was just released last month.

As musical comedies go, this is one of the finest, not just from the 1950's but ever.  It plays as well today as it ever did.  The casting of these two actresses caused a sensation that guaranteed big box office.  The publicity mill churned overtime awaiting the cat fights but it was for naught.  They became genuine buddies and loved working together.  Russell is one of the very few that could get Monroe to come to a set on time.

The story is well-known.  Lorelei's rich boyfriend (whom she calls lover or Daddy when she wants something or he gives her a gift) is sending her to France with her friend Dorothy in tow to act as a chaperone and keep the wolves at bay.  The boyfriend's father hires a detective to go along and spy on Lorelei.  Aboard ship the detective takes a picture of Lorelei and an elderly, married diamond mine owner in a compromising position (which is actually innocent).  When the girls get the incriminating photo back, the elderly man is so grateful that he gifts Lorelei with his wife's diamond tiara, which, of course, she greatly covets.  That leads to a series of mishaps but ends with a returned tiara and a double wedding (Dorothy marries the detective) at the end.

Five songs were featured.  Two by Hoagy Carmichael and Harold Adamson were my least favorites and were written especially for the film.  Anyone Here for Love? was sung by Russell featuring a backdrop of hunky musclemen and When Love Goes Wrong is sung at a sidewalk cafe by both actresses after they learn that Lorelei's fiance has cut off their credit.

The three best songs were written by Jule Styne and Leo Robin.  The first, Two Little Girls from Little Rock, provides the film with a dazzling opening which occurs even before the credits roll.  I have always regarded the final Nowadays number in Chicago as being an homage to Little Rock.

Bye Bye Baby is sung by nearly the entire company aboard ship, just as it's ready to set sail.  It a fun romp of a song that became popular enough for a number of artists to make their own recordings around the time of the film's release.

Finally there's Diamonds Are a Girl's Best Friend, sung during one of the most iconic musical numbers in the history of movies and forever associated with Monroe.  Who could ever forget her in costume designer Travilla's pink strapless gown that clung like a best friend to upper structure?  And then there's Jack Cole's polished choreography as tuxedoed chorus boys lift Monroe and have her leaping and running up and down bleacher-like steps against a garish red backdrop.  It always makes me smile watching her use of her upper body, especially her arms and hands.. comical and sexy at the same time.  Who else could accomplish that but Monroe?  The song is fun and engaging and concerns the exploitation of men for their wealth... Tiffany's... Cartier... speak to me Harry Winston.  Without a doubt this is a luminous musical performance.  Would you like a peek?

The film had some funny lines.  Dorothy says to Lorelei... I think you're the only girl who can stand on a stage with a spotlight in her eyes and still see a diamond in a man's pocket.

There are at least three glowing entrances the actresses make during the film.  After the first one, a group of athletes is ogling them and one says if the ship hit an iceberg, which one would you save from drowning?  The second man replies those girls couldn't drown.

As the ladies reach an employee of the ship, Lorelei says is this the way to Europe, France?  An incredulous Dorothy says not Europe, France, Honey. France is in Europe.  Lorelei responds who said it wasn't?

Later Lorelei is coming out of the ship's camera store, an athlete spots her and says hi there, remember me?  

Why you're one of the Olympic athletes, aren't you, she gushes.

One of them?  Sister, I'm the only 4-letter man on the team.

In a huff, Lorelei responds I should think you'd be ashamed to admit it, and off she dashes.

Later when Lorelei's fiance's wealthy father confronts her with are you trying to say you don't want to marry my son for his money?  She coos aren't you funny?  I want to marry him for your money.

When one considers how many John Wayne movies and war films and westerns that Howard Hawks directed, he seems like an odd choice to direct a musical- comedy with two female stars.  But if one recalls he also helmed screwball comedies such as Bringing Up Baby, His Girl Friday, I Was a Male War Bride and a year earlier, Monkey Business (also with Monroe), one can see he was a good choice.  It should be noted he directed none of the musical numbers here... that was all Jack Cole.

The supporting cast was all it needed to be.  Old fussbudget Charles Coburn was perfection as the scatter-brained Sir Francis Beekman, known as Piggy, who liked Lorelei as much as she liked his diamonds.

Monroe frequently worked with Casper Milquetoast types and it took me awhile to understand why but it is part of her comedy seeing a man with a woman like that.  Tommy Noonan had the best role of his career as the addle-brained fiance. Elliott Reid as the snoopy detective who romances Russell also had the best role of his career.  

Little George Winslow with his foghorn voice had a genius of a comedy scene with Monroe while she is stuck in a porthole. 

But when all is said and done, this movie is about its two leading actresses, their pulchritude and their musical-comedy talents.  One is brunette and earthy.  The other is blonde and ethereal.  This is arguably perhaps Monroe's most famous film and it is definitely Russell's most famous.  Monroe was just beginning her career and Russell was at the tail-end of hers.  Legend has it that around the time of the film's release a reporter  asked Monroe why Russell got top billing.  Monroe purred... that's okay (it probably wasn't).  It's called Gentlemen Prefer Blondes and I'm the blonde.
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