A Glittering Cast: Woman's World

1954 Comedy Drama
From 20th Century Fox
Directed by Jean Negulesco

Starring
Clifton Webb
June Allyson
Van Heflin
Lauren Bacall
Fred MacMurray
Arlene Dahl
Cornel Wilde
Elliott Reid
Margalo Gillmore

I confess that this very 50s film probably would not have caught my eye had it not been for its weighty cast so it seems perfect indeed to include under the glittering cast banner.  All these folks were at the top of the fame game at the time and I liked almost all of them so my attendance was a no-brainer.

This was a definite hit with the public in 1954 and even critics went light on it, leaving the vitriol for far more worthy candidates.  On the other hand, this is probably just the kind of movie that gave the films of the 1950s a bad name.  You may know that it's my favorite of the decades I've sailed through and there were certainly many wonderful and highly-touted films.  But there were other films like this in terms of simple, clean, a moral lesson, and if at all possible-- and it usually was-- a happy ending.  Some hoped audiences went home and practiced what they had just seen.

It's not a bad movie... not really.  Look me up some time for a mention of the worst.  It's just so safe... so fifties.  But again, indulge me, it was this cast.  At the time, for most of them, I simply didn't miss their films and here they were, so many of them in one movie.  At such times, I didn't care what it was about.

At the heart of the story are three executives who are brought to New York by their boss, Ernest Gifford of the Gifford Car Company, who's staging a friendly but well-organized and purposeful competition to see who is best qualified to become the new general manager.

As Gifford, Webb insists that all three men's wives come along for the five-day stay because he believes an executive's wife is crucial to her husband's success.  He will show the men the headquarters' facilities and introduce them to other executives.  They will visit the factory and see the new vehicles.  They will all sit on upholstered seats on platforms while he asks them questions on management styles.

Each man will go back to his wife and discuss what's happened, as he sees it.  And there will be cocktail parties, dancing, dinners, boat rides, touring, shopping and a party at the boss's summer estate where his formidable but kind sister (Margalo Gillmore) will officiate.  While the men discuss their jobs, she will get to know the ladies better and duly make her report.  

Gillmore tells Allyson that her brother wants to be sure the ladies know they're expected to be poised, know everything about hostessing, must show restraint and should love their husbands very much because things may be difficult adjusting to at first.  She saved the best for the last... a wife must never compete with the company.  You'll like hearing the husband's point of view.... next.

He is Cornel Wilde and he and Allyson are from Kansas City.  One finds it curious that he doesn't tell her why they're going to New York.  We do soon discover that she's just a little Midwestern gal with three kids, animals and the PTA and she knows nothing about The Big Apple and doesn't want to.  She can't believe her husband would entertain accepting this particular promotion.  He has some good ideas for Webb and is not shy about speaking up.  He gets his boss's attention when he tells him if a job gets in the way of a man's home life, there's something wrong with the job.  Oh-oh.

Fred MacMurray and Lauren Bacall are driving in from Philadelphia and she plans to divorce him as soon as this dog and pony show is over.  The reason?  Because he's married to his job and disregards his family and health (ulcer).  If you're wondering why she's coming along under such circumstances, you wouldn't be the only one.  He is desperate to keep his wife but the promotion would give him the validation he's desperately seeking.  She has become embittered but down deep still loves him.  Ah, what a predicament.

Van Heflin and Arlene Dahl are from Dallas and he obviously has a nice life, not only because of his job but because of his wife.  I'm not sure of that old adage that there's a wife behind every successful man but this wife all but holds him hostage.  She has enough ambition for the two of them.  He is a proud, thinking man who must maneuver through life under his own steam.  His type should never be married to her type.  He tells her to stop her machinations but she doesn't comply and seeks to spend as much private time with Webb as she can get to in an attempt to sell her husband to him.  We know how much it would mean to her to be the big boss's wife.

For the film's final sequence, Webb and Gillmore compare notes and summarize their findings almost in unison when they conclude right man, wrong wife.  The answer will be delivered at a fancy dinner hosted by Webb and Gillmore.

I don't know if Gifford was written as a vain, supercilious, effete tycoon and it was assumed the part be offered to Clifton Webb or if Webb was first hired and then the part was altered to fit him and fit him it certainly does.  I always loved his movies and his starchy performances were rich.  One wonders how he managed to avoid having wives in so many of his films.  Here, where it would have been sensible to have one, she's made his sister.

Webb and director Negulesco were work buddies... they had just completed Titanic and would next work on Three Coins in the Fountain and in 1957 on Boy on a Dolphin.  At Fox Zanuck treated Webb like a God... he was one of the studio's best financial assets.  But, no surprise here, Webb could be fussy, even temperamental, and it took a gentle hand like Negulesco's to steady the ship.

The most watchable of the seven top actors is clearly Dahl who, dare I use the old cliche, grabbed on to a part she could have played in her sleep.  I'm not saying that because Dahl is the only cast member who is alive.  Never a more interesting actress than when she's up to something, she sparkles as a treacherous vixen because she's mastered vanity and its always front and center.  The studio did its part, too, in showcasing this beautiful redhead via hair, makeup, and costuming wizardry.

The script didn't offer opportunities for great emoting but Webb and Heflin captured most of my attention.  All are good at what they delivered but I saw nothing out of the ordinary.  Bacall had a couple of good lines but her Liz Talbott was a drag.  I'd have left her at home.  Liz's turnaround in attitude toward her husband is a bit of a jolt.  Someone should have smoothed that one out a bit.

Bacall's career was on a high because she was still enveloped in the glow of her good notices for How to Marry a Millionaire (also directed by Negulesco).  Her marriage to Bogart was good but about to turn darker with his illness.  She was looking for acting jobs at studios so she'd be home every night.  I suspect she was also looking for nothing too taxing because that's what her next few films were.

Let's remember that the purpose of the story is to have a good look at the woman who's going to be the top executive's wife.  If that's the case, then, gulp!, I'd have left Allyson at home as well.  She plays the country bumpkin ad nauseum and I was ready to move on after a couple of hiccups at an inopportune time and spilling drinks on her dress and saying the wrong thing.  

Allyson was on even more of a career high than Bacall with The Glenn Miller Story and Executive Suite (talk about a glittering cast.... hmmm) this same year.  Later in the year the married Allyson) would fall in love with her costar in The McConnell Story, Alan Ladd, although it would not survive and her marriage to Dick Powell would until his early death.  In a couple of years her movie career would begin to peter out.

Two of the actors were Fox employees, Webb and Wilde, but the other two weren't and none of the actresses were Fox contract stars.  I wonder why that is.  In those days, studios usually put their own stars to work.  Will somebody get back to me on this?

Wilde's acting career was not as shiny as it was in the 1940s although he still worked a lot.  He does look a little out of place in a suit and tie.  Tights and a sword made him come alive.  He also had problems getting along with some of the brass at Fox and most definitely didn't like some of the material that he was given.  If Wilde liked making this movie at all, it would have to be for the same reason I liked it... his costars but also it was his last film under his contract.  But he was coming into his own as an independent director and things would be different.

Woman's World must have been like going on holiday for one of my favorite actors, Heflin.  Like Wilde, romantic comedy wasn't really his thing.  He'd done excellent work in the 40s with his noirs, three films with Stanwyck, The Three Musketeers, and his Oscar-winning turn in Johnny Eager.  He'd just finished one of the best roles of his career in Shane and was about to do Battle Cry and 3:10 to Yuma.  After that, he did mainly B movies but always gave his best.

Well, okay, I'm not a Fred MacMurray fan.  I've said that before.  I missed most of his films although he was sizzling in Double Indemnity, wonderfully against type in The Caine Mutiny and The Apartment and I liked him very much in his picture after this one, The Rains of Ranchipur.  This was not one of MacMurray's best films.   I'm with Bacall, I would have divorced him too... not because he's a workaholic but because he's dull.

Negulesco was in his element with his big, all-star casts.  That's a lot of egos to keep happy and requires more juggling than some directors want to tackle.  But not so this director.  His sets were generally happy with actors getting along.

A singing group, very popular at the time, The Four Aces, sang the title song over the opening credits and it got a lot of air time.

Billing is often a problem in a film.  Webb, however, took care of that problem by having it written into his contract that he was to be billed first.  The order of the rest of the stars was a problem until someone decided to list the women alphabetically and also the same for the men.  Then after Webb, the rest of the cast would alternate women and men with each group in alphabetical order.  

Ok, it's 2020 now and when Hollywood starts making movies again, this one could stand a remake.  They can keep the general theme but make it contemporary.  Let's make it a woman owner of a company who calls in her three best women regional mangers to interview.  One brings her husband, one brings her wife and the third brings a boytoy.  Being sensitive to racial diversity is a given.  Let's remove all the corn and spice the story up some.  I don't have to mention no double beds, do I?   I wouldn't mind a little cursing.



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An inconvenient actress