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On Seeing
Some Like It Hot
on a Big Screen
It was 1983. I was
on the committe
e
that selected what movies would be shown in a 1000-seat movie theater at the university,
including those that would be shown to the 450 member, Wednesday night film appreciation
class taught by the movie critic of the local newspaper. This wasn't so much an academic
group as an effort at organized baby-sitting for those far away from home for the
first time, and so the movies had to be scheduled with that in mind.
Since Some Like it Hot is and has been my favorite film
since I first saw it on television in the 60's, I 
pushed hard to get it on the docket for the
Wednesday night class -- Monday's were classics; Tuesday's were horror and mystery;
Fridays and Saturdays were repetory runs of the last year's hits; Saturday midnights
were cult films; and Sundays were foreign language films. But Wednesday nights celebrated
a different genre or film period each week -- so there was lots of discretionary
booking going on.
Not another of the committee members had ever heard of my little gem -- but after much prodding they agreed.
The 7:00 screening was packed with 18, 19, and 20 year olds who had signed
up for a film class they heard was an easy "A". When the movie began, and
they realized it was in black and white, moans went up from all over the theater.
The generation raised on color television and special effects classified anything
in black and white as worthless prehistory and so dismissed it before the first frames
began to roll.
But the opening keystone-cops-like car chase of a herse loaded with bootleg booze got them going -- and before long, the A++ script had them by the funnybone and didn't let go for an hour and a half.
Probably the sweetest surprise for me (and revelation for those who hadn't
seen the movie) was just how well the comedy had held up in the years since 1959.
As you know, this isn't necessarily true of EVERY movie that comes out of Hollywood...
(see Operation Petticote or Barefoot in the Park -- they were both
"hilarious" when they were first released, but now seem cheesy and insulting....)
If anything, the women's movement of the late
1960's and 1970's IMPROVED the
script. Josephine and Daphne (Curtis and Lemmon) are incredibly "modern"
women -- which may or may not be a compliment for either them or US! By putting on
drag in the heart of the post-war fifties, they became women of the latter 20th Century
-- very familiar to both sexes in a modern audience. They are strong, agressive --
and surprisingly sympathetic.
The other surprise for this babe- in- the- woods audience was Marilyn Monroe.
For a couple of generations, she has existed ONLY as an icon -- the stoned and sad
puffed up blond who sang "Happy Birthday" to John Kennedy or the plastic
dashboard figurine of a woman standing over the subway vent in New York... Most of
these kids had never actually seen her on film -- much less thirty-feet tall and
spilling out of her evening gowns. All it takes is one look at this film, or something
like Gentlemen Prefer Blonds, The Seven Year Itch, or even the lesser
Prince and the Showgirl to realize just why it was she became an icon in the
first place. -- And that she was a good actress as well -- and especially
a good comic actress.
There were times that night when the laughter
was so loud and constant that the audience missed
the second and third and fourth of the rapid fire lines -- often missing the one
that would have gotten the biggest laugh if they'd only known. The scene of Jack
Lemmon dancing 'till dawn with Joe E. Brown -- to Hernando's Hidaway...
The scene of Tony Curtis dressed as "Shell Oil, Jr., peddling his bicycle across the hotel grounds, in perfect makeup and dangling earrings....
The scene where even the train going down the tracks is echoing the mantra, "I'm a girl,I'm a girl,I'm a girl..."
The scene where Sugar sings, "I Wanna Be Loved By You..."
The scene where the little Bell Hop makes a move on Josephine...
Or when Sugar earns an even million for the Milk Fund...whatever that is.
Or George Raft's scary and funny "Spats Colombo" and
his Friends of the Italian 
Opera convention....
Sweet Sue and her Society Syncopaters and their manager BEANSTALK (who looses his suitcase of resort-ware AND his glasses to Joe....)
The fuzzy end of the lollypop...
Or the motor boat that only goes backwards...
Or type-O blood.
Or how Daphne slaps her bull fiddle....
Ahhhhhh.
By the time the movie was over, the decision
had been made to just run it again
and let anybody who wanted to stay -- remain to see it again and catch the lines
they missed.
It was great. I've never seen it on a big screen again even though I've tried, but -- nobody's perfect.
Here are some movie reviews online, and a few related sites for Some Like it Hot....
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Copyright (C) 1998, Lynn Maupin Webb
http://www.fortunecity.com/lavendar/ducksoup/555
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