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Kiss Me Kate | |
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Theatrical release poster | |
Directed by | George Sidney |
Screenplay by | Dorothy Kingsley |
Based on | Kiss Me, Kate 1948 musical by Bella and Samuel Spewack |
Produced by | Jack Cummings |
Starring | Kathryn Grayson Howard Keel Ann Miller |
Cinematography | Charles Rosher |
Edited by | Ralph E. Winters |
Music by | Cole Porter (songs) Saul Chaplin (score) André Previn Conrad Salinger (orchestrations) |
Color process | Ansco Color |
Production company | |
Distributed by | Loew's Inc. |
Release dates | |
Running time | 109 minutes |
Country | United States |
Languages | English French Italian |
Budget | $1,981,000 [3] |
Box office | $3,117,000 (rentals) [3] |
Kiss Me Kate is a 1953 Metro-Goldwyn-Mayer film adaptation of the 1948 Broadway musical of the same name. [notes 1]
Inspired by William Shakespeare's play The Taming of the Shrew , it tells the tale of formerly married musical theater actors Fred Graham and Lilli Vanessi brought together to star opposite one another in the roles of Petruchio and Katherine in a Broadway musical version of Shakespeare's play. [4]
Already on poor terms, the pair skirmishes from the start. Their relationship eventually breaks into an all-out emotional war mid-performance that threatens the production's success. The only thing keeping the show together are threats from a pair of gangsters who have come to collect a gambling debt.
Dorothy Kingsley's screenplay, which was nominated for a Writers Guild of America Award, was adapted from the musical's book by Bella and Samuel Spewack. The songs were by Cole Porter, with musical underscoring by Saul Chaplin and André Previn, who were nominated for an Oscar. [4] Hermes Pan choreographed most of the dance routines.
The movie was filmed in 3-D, using the most advanced technology then available. Devotees of the stereoscopic 3-D medium usually cite this film as one of the best examples of a Hollywood release in polarized 3D. [5]
Fred Graham and Lilli Vanessi, a divorced couple, meet at Fred's apartment to hear Cole Porter perform the score for Kiss Me Kate, his musical version of The Taming of the Shrew , to be directed by Fred. Lois Lane arrives to audition for the Bianca role ("Too Darn Hot"). Lilli decides against performing the lead of “Katherine”, opposite Fred in the male lead of Petruchio, as she is leaving to marry a rich Texas rancher. She changes her mind when Cole and Fred manipulate her by offering Lois the lead role. [6]
Lois' boyfriend, Bill Calhoun, is playing Lucentio in the play. He leads a gambling lifestyle, which results in owing a local gangster $2,000, but he has signed the IOU in Fred's name. Lois laments his bad-boy lifestyle ("Why Can't You Behave?").
After a fiery confrontation during rehearsals, Fred and Lilli get together in her dressing room and reminisce about happier times ("Wunderbar"). Fred later sends flowers and a card to Lois, but his butler mistakenly gives them to Lilli. Lilli is overcome by this romantic gesture and fails to read the card ("So In Love (Reprise)").
The play opens, with Fred, Lilli, Lois and Bill performing an opening number ("We Open In Venice"). In the play, Bianca, the younger daughter of Baptista, wishes to marry, but her father will not allow it until his elder daughter, Katherine, is married. Bianca has three suitors – Gremio, Hortensio and Lucentio – and each of them try to win her over. She is prepared to marry anyone ("...any Tom, Dick or Harry...").
Petruchio arrives, seeking a wife ("I've Come to Wive It Wealthily in Padua"), and when he hears of Katherine, he resolves to woo her. Katherine hates the idea of getting married ("I Hate Men"). When Petruchio serenades Katherine ("Were Thine That Special Face"), Lilli finally reads the card from the flowers. She sees that it is addressed to Lois, and attacks Fred/Petruchio on stage, ad-libbing verbal abuse. As the curtain comes down, Fred spanks Lilli/Kate. Backstage, Lilli phones her fiancé, Tex, to come and immediately pick her up. [6]
Lippy and Slug, a pair of thugs, arrive to collect from Fred. Fred asks them to keep Lilli from leaving the show so it will be successful enough for Fred to pay the debt. Lois has learned that Fred has taken responsibility for the IOU and she comes to thank him, but each time she begins to thank him for not being angry about Bill forging his name, Fred kisses her to prevent Lippy and Slug from learning about his deception. Lilli and Bill walk in on the scene and become furious.
In order to keep Lilli from leaving, Slug and Lippy appear on stage, disguised as Petruchio's servants. They have no acting ability, but still manage to amuse the audience. Petruchio sets about "taming the shrew", but later reminisces about his days of philandering ("Where Is The Life That Late I Led?").
During the play's intermission, when Tex arrives to rescue Lilli from the theatre, he is recognized by Lois, an old flame. When Bill is angered by Lois' behavior, she admits that though she loves Bill, she cannot resist the advances of other men ("Always True To You In My Fashion").
The gambling debt is cancelled by the untimely death of Slug and Lippy's boss, so they stop interfering with Lilli's mid-performance departure from the theatre. Fred tells her that she truly belongs in theatre, and also reveals his true feelings for her. She departs, leaving a dejected Fred to be cheered up by Slug and Lippy ("Brush Up Your Shakespeare").
Bianca marries Lucentio. The rejected suitors, Gremio and Hortensio, meet two new girls ("From This Moment On"). At the finale, the show is temporarily halted when Lilli's understudy goes missing. Suddenly, Lilli reappears on stage, delivering Kate's speech about how women should surrender to their husbands ("I'm Ashamed That Women Are So Simple"). Fred is bowled over, and the play reaches its triumphant finale ("Kiss Me Kate"), with Fred and Lilli back together as a real couple.
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Cast notes:
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Song notes:
Kiss Me Kate was previewed on October 15, 1953 in four locations, two in 3-D with stereophonic sound (in Columbus, Ohio, and at the Victory Theatre in Evansville, Indiana) and two in 2-D (Loew's theaters in Rochester, New York and Houston). Additional previews took place later in October in Dayton, Ohio (2-D), and at the Majestic Theatre in Dallas (3-D). [1] [2] Grosses from the 3-D version were 40% higher. [2]
Despite the results, Radio City Music Hall decided not to screen it in 3-D when it opened November 5, 1953 in New York City. [7]
Although Kiss Me Kate is often referred to as the first 3-D musical, Those Redheads From Seattle , also a 3-D musical, was released by Paramount Pictures on October 16. [8]
The movie had a mostly positive reception. Bosley Crowther of The New York Times called Kiss Me Kate "one of the year's more magnificent musical films ... a beautifully staged, adroitly acted and really superbly sung affair—better, indeed, if one may say so, than the same frolic was on the stage." [9] Variety opened its positive review by stating: "Metro's reputation for turning out top calibre musical pictures is further enhanced with Kiss Me Kate. It's Shakespeare's Taming of the Shrew done over in eminently satisfying fashion via a collaboration of superior song, dance and comedy talents." [10] Harrison's Reports called it "a lively and highly entertaining blend of comedy, music, dancing and romance." [11]
John McCarten of The New Yorker was more dismissive, writing that it "does have some engaging tunes, but the book of the original has been so thoroughly laundered that little of the comedy, which ran to fairly bawdy stuff, remains, and Kathryn Grayson and Howard Keel, as a bickering theatrical pair compelled to play opposite each other in Shakespeare, are lacking in vital juices." [12] Richard L. Coe of The Washington Post disliked the changes made to the stage version such as the reduction of "Another Op'nin" and "I Am Ashamed That Women Are So Simple," calling the film "a grand musical with lots of pleasures to recommend it. But if you're familiar with what they had to work with, you'll not be enthusiastic, a form of criticism with which not all agree, but in this case I don't see how it's to be avoided." [13] The Monthly Film Bulletin wrote, "The execution generally—sets, costumes, dance numbers, the Cole Porter songs—is pleasing, but the direction lacks flair and the film seems somewhat over-long." [14]
In its opening at Radio City Music Hall, it grossed a below-par $130,000 for the week, although this was blamed on a snowstorm at the weekend. [15]
According to MGM records the film earned theatrical rentals of $2,011,000 in the US and Canada and $1,106,000 elsewhere, for a worldwide total of $3,117,000. Gross profit was $1,136,000, [16] but high production costs led to a net loss of $544,000. [3] [17]
The Taming of the Shrew is a comedy by William Shakespeare, believed to have been written between 1590 and 1592. The play begins with a framing device, often referred to as the induction, in which a mischievous nobleman tricks a drunken tinker named Christopher Sly into believing he is actually a nobleman himself. The nobleman then has the play performed for Sly's diversion.
Kiss Me, Kate is a musical with music and lyrics by Cole Porter and a book by Bella and Samuel Spewack. The story involves the production of a musical version of William Shakespeare's The Taming of the Shrew and the conflict on and off-stage between Fred Graham, the show's director, producer, and star, and his leading lady, his ex-wife Lilli Vanessi. A secondary romance concerns Lois Lane, the actress playing Bianca, and her gambler boyfriend, Bill, who runs afoul of some gangsters. The original production starred Alfred Drake, Patricia Morison, Lisa Kirk and Harold Lang.
"Too Darn Hot" is a song written by Cole Porter for his musical Kiss Me, Kate (1948).
Eileen Patricia Augusta Fraser Morison was an American stage, television and film actress of the Golden Age of Hollywood and mezzo-soprano singer. She made her feature film debut in 1939 after several years on the stage, and amongst her most renowned were The Fallen Sparrow, Dressed to Kill opposite Basil Rathbone and the screen adaptation of The Song of Bernadette. She was lauded as a beauty with large blue eyes and extremely long, dark hair. During this period of her career, she was often cast as the femme fatale or "other woman". It was only when she returned to the Broadway stage that she achieved her greatest success as the lead in the original production of Cole Porter's Kiss Me, Kate and subsequently in The King and I.
Petruchio is the male protagonist in Shakespeare's The Taming of the Shrew.
Elizabeth Larner was a British actress and singer with a powerful soprano voice. While her main career was the musical theatre, appearing both in London's West End and on Broadway, she also played Ammonia in the BBC situation comedy Up Pompeii!. She later appeared in The Two Ronnies, supporting Ronnie Barker as "Piggy Malone" and Ronnie Corbett as "Charley Farley" in the 1981–1982 comic detective mystery serial Band of Slaves.
"Always True to You in My Fashion" is a 1948 show tune by Cole Porter, written for the musical Kiss Me, Kate. It is based on Non Sum Qualis Eram Bonae sub Regno Cynarae, a similarly ironic poem by the English Decadent poet Ernest Dowson (1867–1900), which has the refrain 'I have been faithful to thee, Cynara! in my fashion,' and which was probably inspired by Dowson's lifelong friend Adelaide Foltinowicz, who never returned his devotion. The phrase "faithful in my fashion" entered the language before the song was written, and was the title of a 1946 Hollywood film.
Harold Lang was an American dancer, singer and actor.
The Taming of the Shrew is a 1967 period romantic comedy film directed by Franco Zeffirelli, based on William Shakespeare's play about a courtship between two strong-willed people in 16th-century Italy. The film stars Elizabeth Taylor as Kate and Richard Burton as Petruchio, who were both nominated for BAFTA Awards for their acting. It features Cyril Cusack, Michael Hordern, Michael York, and Victor Spinetti in supporting roles.
Lisa Kirk was an American actress and singer noted for her comic talents and rich contralto.
Bianca Minola is a character in Shakespeare's The Taming of the Shrew (c.1590–1594).
"Tom, Dick or Harry" is a show tune from the Cole Porter musical, Kiss Me, Kate, introduced on Broadway on December 30, 1948 by Lisa Kirk ; Harold Lang ; Edwin Clay ; and Charles Wood. In the 1953 Hollywood film version, "Tom, Dick or Harry" was performed by Ann Miller, Tommy Rall, Bobby Van and Bob Fosse.
Catharine and Petruchio is a reworking of William Shakespeare's The Taming of the Shrew by British playwright and actor David Garrick. It was written in 1754 and was performed far more often than the original The Shrew through the eighteenth and nineteenth centuries.
The Taming of the Shrew is a 1957 opera in four acts, five scenes by Vissarion Shebalin to a libretto by the Soviet musicologist Abram Akimovich Gozenpud, based on the comedy by William Shakespeare. Gozenpud utilized very little of Shakespeare's original text in his libretto, and completely eliminated many of the secondary characters and subplots from the play. His libretto does match the spirit of Shakespeare's play in its use of wit, the genuine passion of the story's lovers, and mixture of both lofty and coarse language.
"Another Op'nin', Another Show" is the opening number of Cole Porter's 1948 musical Kiss Me, Kate.
There have been numerous on screen adaptations of Shakespeare's The Taming of the Shrew. The best known cinematic adaptations are Sam Taylor's 1929 The Taming of the Shrew and Franco Zeffirelli's 1967 The Taming of the Shrew, both of which starred the most famous celebrity couples of their era; Mary Pickford and Douglas Fairbanks in 1929 and Elizabeth Taylor and Richard Burton in 1967. On television, perhaps the most significant adaptation is the 1980 BBC Television Shakespeare version, directed by Jonathan Miller and starring John Cleese and Sarah Badel.
The Taming of the Shrew in performance has had an uneven history. Popular in Shakespeare's day, the play fell out of favour during the seventeenth century, when it was replaced on the stage by John Lacy's Sauny the Scott. The original Shakespearean text was not performed at all during the eighteenth century, with David Garrick's adaptation Catharine and Petruchio dominating the stage. After over two hundred years without a performance, the play returned to the British stage in 1844, the last Shakespeare play restored to the repertory. However, it was only in the 1890s that the dominance of Catharine and Petruchio began to wane, and productions of The Shrew become more regular. Moving into the twentieth century, the play's popularity increased considerably, and it became one of Shakespeare's most frequently staged plays, with productions taking place all over the world. This trend has continued into the twenty-first century, with the play as popular now as it was when first written.
The Taming of the Shrew is a ballet in two acts choreographed by John Cranko to keyboard works by Domenico Scarlatti arranged and orchestrated by Kurt-Heinz Stolze. With scenery and costumes designed by Elizabeth Dalton, it was first presented as Der Widerspenstigen Zähmung by the Stuttgart Ballet at the Wṻrtembergische Staatstheater in Stuttgart on 16 March 1969.
The Taming of the Shrew is an opera in three acts by composer Vittorio Giannini. The work uses an English language libretto by Dorothy Fee and the composer which is based on William Shakespeare's play of the same name. The opera premiered at the Cincinnati Music Hall on January 31, 1953 in a concert performance starring Dorothy Short as Katharina, Robert Kircher as Petruchio, the Cincinnati Symphony Orchestra, and conductor Thor Johnson. Considered Giannini's most popular work, it was one of three finalists named for the Pulitzer Prize for Music in 1953.
Katherina (Kate) Minola is a fictional character in William Shakespeare's play The Taming of the Shrew. Referred to in the play as the titular "shrew" and the "ingenue", the play focuses on Katherina's taming by Petruchio into a more conventional role of a good wife. She is the elder daughter of Baptista Minola and the sister of Bianca Minola.