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The Guardian
6 days ago
- Entertainment
- The Guardian
The Seven Year Itch at 70: a comedy about infidelity ruined by the Hays code
One of the patterns that emerges in Conversations With Wilder, a delightfully candid 1999 interview book that the director Cameron Crowe did with his film-making hero, Billy Wilder, is that Wilder tends to look more fondly on his hits than his misses. To him, commercial flops were rarely the result of audiences misunderstanding his work, but a regrettable failure on his part to connect with them. So it's notable that Wilder didn't have kind things to say about the Marilyn Monroe comedy The Seven Year Itch, a box-office sensation that's rightfully settled a few tiers below classics like Double Indemnity, Sunset Boulevard, The Apartment and Some Like It Hot, his brilliant second go-around with Monroe. A work-for-hire job for Darryl Zanuck at 20th Century Fox, The Seven Year Itch didn't originate with Wilder, but George Axelrod's 1952 Broadway comedy about marital wanderlust, with its ping-pong between lustiness and guilt, seemed well-suited to his sensibility. But the real tension that undermines the film is the ping-pong between Monroe's five-alarm sexuality and the wet-blanket prudishness that keeps putting out the fire. Wilder and Axelrod, who also scripted, were 'straitjacketed' by the Hays code, which imposed strict limits on how far the film could go, and Wilder couldn't work around it. He called it a 'nothing picture' because censors neutered a comedy about infidelity. A comedy about mere temptation doesn't have the same pop. Seventy years later, The Seven Year Itch may not be remembered as a great movie, but it'll forever be cherished as a grate movie. Wilder sensed a scene where Monroe, in a form-fitting white dress, positions herself above a subway grate on Lexington Avenue would cause a stir, so he leaned into it, turning the shoot into a media frenzy that yielded one of the signature images of Monroe's career. It's also a prime example of the uncorked sexuality that Monroe brought to the table, which even the Hays code couldn't hope to suppress. On a date with an older, married man – the movie they see, Creature from the Black Lagoon, is much more erotic than this one – her character explains that she likes to feel the wind from passing trains under her dress. She's unashamed by the feeling. Yet shame proves to be a heavy anchor for Richard Sherman (Tom Ewell), a middle-aged paperback book publisher whose tendency to daydream about romantic encounters seems to manifest a fantasy girl come to life. After sending his wife, Helen (Evelyn Keyes), and their son off to Maine for hot summer months, Richard toys with how much he's going to let himself off the leash while he reclaims his bachelorhood. He's a good boy at first, dining at a vegetarian restaurant because 'you can't run on martinis and Hungarian goulash'. But those martinis can easily be shaken in his Manhattan apartment, and though he keeps his cigarettes under lock and key, it's only a small hassle to access them when he gets the urge. Still, there are common urges and then there's Marilyn Monroe as 'the girl', the bubbly and endlessly accommodating blonde who's moved into the place upstairs. She nearly kills Richards when a tomato plant on her balcony drops through his lounge chair, but that proves to be enough of a meet-cute to get her to come down for a drink. Before she arrives, he dreams of seducing her with cocktails and Rachmaninoff, but she proves more enticed by the lowbrow appeals of Chopsticks and dipping potato chips in champagne. They're an odd couple, but nothing seems to turn her off, including his wedding ring, and plenty turns him on, like an 'artistic picture' in a bikini she took for a magazine he has on his shelf. The title The Seven Year Itch refers to a dubious piece of psychology suggesting married men tire of their wives after seven years and start looking around for a mistress. Many of the laughs in Axelrod's script come from Richard twisting himself into knots over whether he's that type of guy or not, which the play answers one way and the movie answers another. Wilder does his best to bring Richard's tortured conscience to visual life, with sequences that toggle between fantasy and reality, creating not only a window into his thinking but also opening up what's mostly a one-room stage play. The trouble is that Ewell, who originated the role on Broadway, is a bit of a drip as a leading man. (Wilder wanted the then unknown Walter Matthau, who'd have been a terrific choice.) Virtually all the energy in The Seven Year Itch comes from Monroe, whose sexual confidence is as weirdly innocent as it is incandescent, as if she doesn't comprehend her own power. ('People keep falling desperately in love with me,' she says, as if it's a mystery she can't begin to start cracking.) Referring to her simply as 'the girl' is an icky sign of the times, as though Axelrod and Wilder can't imagine her as a woman who exists apart from Richard's imagination. But Monroe makes so singular an impression that she dwarfs the film's ostensible star, who looks one-dimensional and feckless by comparison. Wilder is right to believe the material might have thrived in an era in which infidelity was allowed to be the theme, because without it, the stakes of The Seven Year Itch are almost non-existent. Monroe should overwhelm Ewell like Barbara Stanwyck does Henry Fonda in The Lady Eve, a comedy that was also made under the code but is arousing and dangerous in a way that The Seven Year Itch never becomes. Monroe may have been the embodiment of temptation in the era, but the possibility of sex is off the table. It's an itch the film can never scratch.
The Guardian
03-03-2025
- Entertainment
- The Guardian
The dazzling underdog with amazing legs: how Anora swept the Oscars
Anora is officially film of the year, crowned supreme at the Oscars, just as it was at Cannes when it was anointed with the Palme d'Or last May. That's a long path to glory, and a fairly untrodden one. Parasite made it five years ago; the previous film to do so was Marty in 1955. (In fact, Billy Wilder's The Lost Weekend achieved a similar feat 10 years before that, but then the top prize at Cannes was the Grand Prix, and it was shared.) Anyway: a small number. Acquired by Neon for the US before Cannes, Anora opened there last October in an effective rollout. Half of its earnings were made stateside, with the rest predominantly in Europe, and France – which takes Cannes seriously – proving the major market. It has also done brisk trade in Russia ($3m so far), which can't be said for a lot of the other nominees, and says something interesting about the accuracy and flattery of film-maker Sean Baker's take on Little Odessa in New York, where Anora is set. So far, globally, it's on about six times its $6m budget and, despite being widely available on streaming, will doubtless enjoy a lucrative theatrical rerelease. For a long time, though, the film was not assumed to be a shoo-in for major silverware. From Hollywood, the Palme indicates uber arty, and Baker – whose previous films include the trans sex worker iPhone Christmas eve caper Tangerine, and child prankster comedy The Florida Project – is a faintly outre figure for the academy to entirely embrace (in our interview, he admits to still taking drugs). But as the fates of its rivals ebbed and flowed, and the foundations of The Brutalist's dominance appeared a bit more crumbly, so Anora emerged as the favourite – particularly after scooping up three guild awards (other than the one voted for by actors). No film has taken the trio and then gone on to miss out on the main prize since Brokeback Mountain, in 2006, which lost to Paul Haggis's Crash. The Independent Spirit awards were always going to lap it up, but it also proved, more unexpectedly, Baftas catnip, taking the casting prize, as well as best actress for Mikey Madison. After all that, the Hollywood Reporter gave it a 52% chance of winning, effectively meaning no white smoke for The Brutalist and poor old Conclave puffing in the shadows. It's perhaps Parasite, also distributed by Neon, which provides the clearest explanation for how Anora won. The distributor ran a similar playbook for both films: that early Cannes debut that allowed critical buzz to slowly build across the summer, followed by a slow rollout that built audience word of mouth across the autumn. Both films had a breathless, genre-skipping style that audiences thrilled to, and both films felt firmly rooted in the present in best picture fields that otherwise seemed preoccupied with the past. (Parasite's biggest rival, after all, was the rather plodding first world war drama 1917.) Still, also like Parasite, there was a dollop of good fortune atop the careful planning: Anora didn't assume frontrunner status until it was too late for a genuine backlash to build. In Anora's case, the film managed to stay largely clean – bar a fleeting hoo-ha around the lack of intimacy coordinators on set – while other films had to reckon with controversies around AI (The Brutalist, Emilia Pérez) and stars' disastrous past tweets (again, Emilia Pérez). But maybe we're overthinking things: perhaps the answer was more simple, and Anora was the film enjoyed by the biggest number of that strange, wide cross-section of Academy members – from traditionalists to international-facing arthouse lovers. After all, it regularly came near the top of voters' anonymous ballots, in contrast to the forbidding, monolithic The Brutalist, or Conclave with its divisive twist ending. Anora might have just been the film, of those best picture nominees, that audience members came out of the cinema most excited about. That feels fitting: Baker was at pains to underscore the importance of the communal cinematic experience in his (many) awards-season speeches, almost suggesting that a vote for Anora was a vote for the big screen itself, at a time when that tradition was being lost. (A similar trick was tried by The Brutalist, though it was somewhat undermined by its director, Brady Corbet, using his biggest platform – his Golden Globe speech – to drone on about the decidedly insider issue of 'final cut tie-break' instead.) With Anora Baker built a powerful movement, of cinema-lovers backing the underdog – and the medium itself. Follow your heart, went the film's savvy tagline. It seemed that the Academy did just that. Read more about the 2025 Oscars: Anora takes home best picture Oscar Adrien Brody and Mikey Madison win best acting prizes Kieran Culkin and Zoe Saldaña win supporting awards Anora's Sean Baker wins for directing, editing and screenplay
Boston Globe
26-02-2025
- Entertainment
- Boston Globe
‘Hamilton,' ‘Suffs,' and more announced for new Broadway In Boston season
Next up is the return of ' The von Trapp family sets up residence at the Opera House from Jan. 6-18, with a production of 'The Sound of Music.' Advertisement Arriving at the Opera House on Jan. 28, 2026 and running through Feb. 8, 2026 will be 'Some Like It Hot,' a musical version of the classic 1959 Billy Wilder comedy starring Marilyn Monroe as a singer in an all-female band and Jack Lemmon and Tony Curtis as musicians on the run from the mob who pass themselves off as women and join the band. 'Kinky Boots' briefly kicks up its heels at the Opera House, from Feb. 17-22, 2026. ' From March 31-April 12, 2026, the Opera House will provide a home for 'The Outsiders,' an adaptation of Francis Ford Coppola's 1983 film about the family-like bonds among the Greasers gang in Tulsa, Okla., in the 1960s. Disney's 'Beauty and the Beast,' one of the weirdest love stories of all time, will be at the Opera House from April 14-May 2, 2026. Jean Valjean will once again suffer nobly and try to outrun the relentless Inspector Javert in 'Les Miserables,' at the Opera House June 9–21, 2026. 'The Great Gatsby,' a new musical adaptation of F. Scott Fitzgerald's landmark Jazz Age novel, will be at the Opera House July 7-19, 2026. (Not to be confused with 'Gatsby,' Advertisement Lastly, 'Moulin Rouge! The Musical' sets up shop at the Opera House July 28-Aug. 2, 2026. Don Aucoin can be reached at
Chicago Tribune
13-02-2025
- Entertainment
- Chicago Tribune
Column: You know who's suddenly flocking to old movies in Chicago? Young audiences
Two years ago, there I was, at 11:29 a.m. on a Saturday morning in January, at the Music Box Theatre. Cold outside. Warm inside, though, thanks to the size of the crowd: nearly 500 people, many in their 20s, and many three times older than that, and a lot of folks in between, all seated and chatting and working on their popcorn, while rearranging their overcoats. Greasy outcome with that particular combination of activities, for the record. Organist Dennis Scott finished his 1944-era pre-show song list, took a bow and turned the show over to the 35mm screening of a black-hearted evergreen of '40s film noir, 'Double Indemnity.' This was one of many titles featured in the Music Box's retrospective devoted to writer-director Billy Wilder. The series did so well, the Music Box presented a second Wilder retrospective eight months later. What's up with this crowd? I thought. So big. And so youngish! Cut to late 2024. I'm on the phone with Chicago International Film Festival artistic director Mimi Plauché, talking about the festival's 60th edition, just completed. 'You know, something interesting's going on with our audience demographics, she says. 'They're shifting to younger audiences. Our largest demographic group is now the 25- to 35-year-olds. Over half the festival audiences is now under 45. That's a huge change from when I first started — back when it was lopsided toward people over 50.' It's a very good sign, amid some very bad stressors for modern moviegoing and those whose business relies on getting people in and seated and ready to watch something new. Or old. The challenges vary for Chicago's film programmers and presenters specializing in repertory (classic and lesser-known work from cinema's past), international and specialty fare. Business remains up and down but mostly sideways at best for Hollywood-dependent multiplexes. They're relying now, more than ever, on bigger, better and just plain more films premiering in theaters, at a time when distributors opt instead for skipping a theatrical run in favor of Apple TV+, Disney+, Whatever+. But in crucial pockets across the country, niche film programming with a substantial focus on repertory titles are doing well. Really well. And the right rep programming has drawn increasingly younger audiences to older movies from vanished eras. Those eras come and go. But the movies worth re-seeing don't have to. And in Chicago, they haven't had to. 'There's a whole generation interested in film now seeing 'His Girl Friday' or 'Bringing Up Baby' on the big screen,' says Kyle Westphal, co-founder and programmer at the nonprofit Chicago Film Society as well as Music Box programming associate. 'But it's always been cyclical. Generational replacement has long been a factor in exhibition. In the 1960s college kids discovered Mae West, the Marx Brothers and W.C. Fields, finding something strange and wild in their parents' generation of entertainment.' What we're seeing now, he says, 'is the latest iteration of the film audience renewing itself.' And what we're seeing next from the Chicago Film Society will introduce many younger and older film enthusiasts alike to 'The Unknown' (1927). It's a stunningly perverse visitor from the late silent era, starring Lon Chaney as Alonzo the Armless, a fugitive outlaw who fakes his armlessness to join a traveling circus troupe. 'If we do our jobs right,' Westphal says of Chicago's independent specialty cinema houses, 'we're making a sustainable ecosystem and keeping the doors open. And without showing the same things over and and over.' Such ecosystems generally have their roots in a college campus somewhere, and that somewhere can be anywhere. At the University of Chicago, Doc Films maintains a remarkable array of narrative, documentary and experimental work. Now 93 (!), it started as the Documentary Film Group in 1932 — the inaugural year of the Mostra Internazionale d'Arte Cinematografica della Biennale di Venezia, aka the Venice International Film Festival. Likewise affiliated with a big-name educational institution, the Gene Siskel Film Center continues its creatively far-flung programming of first-run international premieres, retrospectives and repertory titles. The downtown Film Center, across State Street and slightly south from the Chicago Theatre, operates as a nonprofit public program of the School of the Art Institute of Chicago. Business has recovered from the pandemic limbo, says executive director Emily Long. Early 2025 attendance is up 19% from early 2023, she says. And 'anecdotal evidence suggests the audiences are getting younger. People, I think, are finding that post-pandemic they're more interested than ever in coming to a theater, and being part of a community.' Also, Long says, the audience interest in different film formats remains a selling point as well as an aesthetic bonus. 'To say you saw something on 35 or 70mm — that's bragging rights. Celluloid is like listening to something on vinyl. I'd seen 'The Shining' several times already. Then it played here on 35mm, as part of our 'Let It Snow!' series in 2021. And I'm telling you, I saw and heard things I'd never seen or heard in it before.' Continuing through Feb. 26, the Film Center's latest curated series, 'Persistence of Memory,' consists of 10 explorations of remembrance, unreliable recollection and romantic hypnosis. Typical of the Film Center's creative populism, the retrospective works like a mixer. It takes some venerated classics, turning up less often these days on undergraduate or graduate level syllabi (Alfred Hitchcock's 'Vertigo,' Akira Kurosawa's 'Rashômon'), and introduces them to the context of more recent dreamscapes ('Eternal Sunshine of the Spotless Mind,' 'Uncle Boonmee Who Can Recall His Past Lives,' the latter from SAIC alum Apichatpong Weerasethakul). Both the Film Center's Long and Chicago Film Society/Music Box programmer Westphal point to the rise of the popular online film forum Letterboxd as a growth factor for repertory titles. 'As it continues to grow,' Long says, 'Letterboxd is going to become more and more a part of the moviegoing culture and experience.' The Film Center will soon launch an expanded Letterboxd account, thanks to the forum making it available for free to cinema organizations attached to educational institutions. For Westphal, it's all about COVID and what the pandemic has done to shape the present state of things. 'Since COVID there's been a change in the overall audience composition for filmgoing in general and repertory filmgoing in particular,' he says. 'And the CFS grew out the old Bank of America Cinema series (located in a little-used building on Irving Park Road in Portage Park), which was active in a period when repertory cinema was synonymous with nostalgia.' But 'nostalgia only works for so long.' The films that truly endure, Westphal believes, deserved all kinds of audiences, including audiences graced with first-hand memories of seeing movies made in the '40s or '50s the first time. Younger audiences coming out of the pandemic, he says, 'might've been casual movie fans prior to COVID. But their chosen way of coping in lockdown was to go to Letterboxd and seek out recommendations for what to watch. And then log their reactions. And then, that same Letterboxd audience started going to movie theaters like the Music Box and others around town.' Westphal offered a closing axiom. 'A ticket is a ticket, whether it's sold to someone who's 18 or 28 or 78. The best way to fill a theater is with a broad cross-section, and to engage that audience in different ways.' And if the Music Box can program Stanley Kubrick's 'Eyes Wide Shut' in 35mm three years running as an alternative holiday offering — and sell it out every time — then the cinema of the past, thanks to younger audiences of the present, has a reasonable shot at an in-person moviegoing future. Michael Phillips is a Tribune critic.
