Saturday, July 31, 2004
TODAY'S MOVIE
BORN YESTERDAY (1950): NYTimes1176BestFilms; George Cukor's take on the Garson Kanin comedy; Judy Holliday owns the picture as Billy Dawn, the dumb blonde to whom Broderick Crawford has cosigned all his network of corrupt companies. William Holden arrives to interview Crawford and is asked to stay and do a Pygmalion routine with Billy; who wises up, uses her power to get free of Crawford and, in the process, wows us with an incredible performance; at once hilarious and poignant.
Holliday died mid career (cancer) at age 44. She was basically a stage actress; quite successful; part of the young crowd that started in the Poconos at Tamiment; Comden and Green, Leonard Bernstein, et.al. I saw her first as the client in the Hepburn-Tracy ADAMS RIB (another BestFilm). She stole it. Then this role; later SOLID GOLD CADILLAC. I saw her sing and dance in BELLS ARE RINGING. Later, when she was quite ill, she starred in the film version with Dean Martin. The closest actress, by way of type, would be Madeline Kahn; who, it is said, modelled herself after Holliday. If you do not know her you should meet her and this is a great place to do it.
I will be giving this a 5 out of NetFlix5.
