I wanted to fall in love with \u201cSweet Charity\u201d very badly. Every time it turns up on television, I patiently sit through it hoping that this will be the time when the film will seduce me and fill me with adoration. But every time, I leave unhappy that I could not give my heart to the film \u2013 I desperately want to embrace the film, but it always winds up clobbering me with its cumbersome production.
\n<\/p>\n
This is not to say that I hate the film. But I feel that \u201cSweet Charity\u201d is a work that is best in isolated segments rather than as a cohesive whole \u2013 it provides glimmers of innovation that are smothered by the heavy weight of multiple bad choices.<\/p>\n
Part of the problem is the source material \u2013 a Broadway musical where Neil Simon took Fellini\u2019s earthy 1957 film \u201cNights of Cabiria\u201d and wrote a bowdlerized, Americanized work that pales in comparison to its source. I know, Fellini and Neil Simon \u2013 two names that should never be mentioned in the same breath. Of course, the show wasn\u2019t meant to be a tribute to Fellini, but rather it was a star vehicle for Gwen Verdon, who shined under the direction and choreography of her then-husband Bob Fosse while belting out an old-school Cy Coleman-Dorothy Fields score.<\/p>\n
Although Verdon\u2019s performance fueled the show\u2019s commercial success, Universal Pictures felt it needed a movie star to sell a big screen adaptation \u2013 Verdon\u2019s only starring film role was the 1958 version of \u201cDamn Yankees.\u201d When the film of \u201cSweet Charity\u201d came out in 1969, many New York critics complained that the new leading lady Shirley MacLaine offered a weak carbon copy of Verdon\u2019s performance \u2013 which was no surprise since the Broadway star coached her cinematic replacement on the character\u2019s choreography, but she obviously couldn’t give a talent infusion. <\/p>\n
Still, without first-hand knowledge of the Verdon performance as a reference, MacLaine\u2019s efforts are disappointing on their own terms. Quite frankly, she\u2019s not the best singer and her dancing is mostly adequate when it should be excellent. As for her dramatic interpretation of the chronically unlucky taxi dancer trying and failing to find a lover, MacLaine\u2019s Charity Hope Valentine (in Peter Stone\u2019s adaptation of the Neil Simon book) is a whiney bore \u2013 she comes across like a synthetic imitation of the heartbreaking characters she played in \u201cSome Came Running\u201d and \u201cThe Apartment.\u201d<\/p>\n
Bob Fosse was allowed to make his film directing debut in \u201cSweet Charity,\u201d and in retrospect that was a mistake. He was obsessionally in love with the material, which resulted in several of the musical numbers dragging on endlessly \u2013 try sitting through the painfully dull “Rich Man’s Frug” or the travelogue-dreary “I’m a Brass Band” segments without losing your temper. Fosse also erroneously believed that each dance number needed to be a showstopper, creating a weird imbalance when the so-so sour comic story abruptly explodes with dozens of dancers gyrating in theatrically surreal motions \u2013 it\u2019s a shame that the XL-sized numbers couldn\u2019t be released as separate shorts while the rest of “Sweet Charity” went out as a modest non-musical melodrama. It also doesn\u2019t help that Fosse fills the screen with a surplus of camera and editing tricks that calls attention to his direction, if only to make it seem like an overly ambitious Film School 101 project.<\/p>\n
But there are some saving graces in \u201cSweet Charity.\u201d The one dance number that clicks is the self-liberation rally \u201cThere\u2019s Gotta Be Something Better Than This\u201d with MacLaine working hard (and succeeding) to meet the song and dance skills of co-stars Chita Rivera and Paula Kelly. Sammy Davis Jr. turns up in a funny little song-and-dance role as a charlatan cult leader, and Stubby Kaye is a jolly sight (as usual) as MacLaine\u2019s boss. Then-unknowns Ben Vereen and Bud Cort pop up in bit parts and Shelley Graham \u2013 who would gain notoriety a few years later adult film actress under the name Georgina Spelvin \u2013 can be spotted among the dancers.<\/p>\n
I am sure I will give \u201cSweet Charity\u201d another chance the next time it turns up on television. Wish me luck \u2013 maybe next time will the charm when I can finally fall under its spell.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"
I wanted to fall in love with \u201cSweet Charity\u201d very badly. Every time it turns up on television, I patiently sit through it hoping that this will be the time when the film will seduce me and fill me with adoration. But every time, I leave unhappy that I could not give my heart to […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":19,"featured_media":46254,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[1369],"tags":[3609,700,1319,3610,3608],"class_list":["post-46233","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-retro-cinema","tag-bob-fosse","tag-musical","tag-neil-simon","tag-shirley-maclaine","tag-sweet-charity"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.cinema-crazed.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/46233","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.cinema-crazed.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.cinema-crazed.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.cinema-crazed.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/19"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.cinema-crazed.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=46233"}],"version-history":[{"count":16,"href":"https:\/\/www.cinema-crazed.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/46233\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":46256,"href":"https:\/\/www.cinema-crazed.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/46233\/revisions\/46256"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.cinema-crazed.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/46254"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.cinema-crazed.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=46233"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.cinema-crazed.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=46233"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.cinema-crazed.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=46233"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}