Good 60s Films: West Side Story

1961 Musical
From United Artists
Directed by Robert Wise
and Jerome Robbins

Starring
Natalie Wood
Richard Beymer
Russ Tamblyn
Rita Moreno
George Chakiris

Rambling Reporter I

A while ago a good friend, a regular reader of this thing, said he quite liked it (purr...!) but proffered you're soooo nice about everything.  I know I gush a bit (!) but this is, after all, called My Romance with Movies not My War with Movies.  I guess he was suggesting I get snarky once in awhile.  Well, ok, I can channel a witchy-bitchy side if I really have to so I am responding to my friend with this... a new idea... a monthly (or so) column where I'll just let my hair down a little.  But don't get too used to it.  I'll be back to gushing real soon.  You heah?

Jim and Paula

Who are they? Jim and Paula who? Well, all you sixties' movie fans know the answer right off, don't you? You youngins may be a bit flummoxed. They are Jim Hutton and Paula Prentiss and for a while, at the dawning of the sixties, they were the go-to comedy couple and quite popular. Her first four films costarred him. For awhile they were regarded as a new screen team. Together, it was said they could be the new William Powell and Myrna Loy... and indeed, I was probably not alone in seeing them as Nick and Nora Charles. Both were so adept at physical comedy and could deliver the most droll lines. Hutton, it was said, could fill the shoes of Jimmy Stewart and Prentiss seemed a natural successor to Rosalind Russell.