Word: merman
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Dates: during 1950-1959
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Call Me Madam (20th Century-Fox), the 1950 Broadway hit musical, has become a handsome, hilarious, surefire hit movie. Ethel Merman struts and shouts her way through her original stage role as a diamond-in-the-rough lady ambassador. Irving Berlin's catchy score is practically intact (dropped: the topical I Like Ike; added: Berlin's 1913 The International Rag and his 1940 What Chance Have I with Love?). At its Technicolored best-with Walter Lang's zestful direction, Robert Alton's dances and a topnotch supporting cast-the movie is a bouncier, better show than...
Call Me Madam is "a story of the past-1951. It takes place in two mythical countries. One is called Lichtenburg-the other, the United States of America." As the show begins, folksy Washington Hostess Mrs. Sally Adams (Ethel Merman), a lady not unlike Minister to Luxembourg Perle Mesta, is taking her oath as U.S. Ambassador to the Grand Duchy of Lichtenburg. In Lichtenburg, almost everybody-including Princess Vera-Ellen, Foreign Minister George Sanders and Press Attaché Donald O'Connor-seems willing to break into a song or a dance at the drop of a cue. There...
...best of all the movie captures on film the special talents of Ethel Merman. In her first picture since the 1938 Alexander's Ragtime Band, the trumpet-voiced queen of Broadway musicomedy annexes Hollywood as well. From the opening scene, she sparkplugs the picture with a powerhouse personality. When she is in front of the camera-kicking at her train and tugging at her girdle before a royal reception, or holding a running phone conversation with "Harry" about Bess's health and Margaret's press notices-the show never has a chance to lag. When she lets...
...leaving Cambridge for the weekend, don't jumble all your pretties, Do as Ethel Merman does. Get a satchel. Polished, always correct, patent leather is our suggestion...
...dead weight: she knows how to command attention. But it's all a little like watching someone stay on a horse rather than perform as a rider; also a little as if two famous actresses were exchanging roles, and that, to complete the joke, Ethel Merman should turn up as Hedda Gabler. With Bette Davis not pacing the show, Two's Company alternately spurts and slumps. There are such pleasant-enough Vernon Duke tunes as It Just Occurred to Me —though it could have occurred to a good many composers. There are a number of skits with promising...