Buona Sera, Mrs. Campbell
Encyclopedia
Buona Sera, Mrs. Campbell is a 1968 American
United States
The United States of America is a federal constitutional republic comprising fifty states and a federal district...

 comedy film
Comedy film
Comedy film is a genre of film in which the main emphasis is on humour. They are designed to elicit laughter from the audience. Comedies are mostly light-hearted dramas and are made to amuse and entertain the audiences...

 directed by Melvin Frank
Melvin Frank
Melvin Frank was an American screenwriter, film producer and film director. He collaborated with a former schoolfriend, Norman Panama to form a writing partnership which endured for 3 decades...

, who co-wrote the original screenplay
Screenplay
A screenplay or script is a written work that is made especially for a film or television program. Screenplays can be original works or adaptations from existing pieces of writing. In them, the movement, actions, expression, and dialogues of the characters are also narrated...

 with Denis Norden
Denis Norden
Denis Mostyn Norden CBE is a former English comedy writer and television presenter. After an early career working in cinemas, he began scriptwriting during World War II. From 1948 to 1959, he co-wrote the successful BBC Radio comedy programme Take It from Here with Frank Muir...

 and Sheldon Keller
Sheldon Keller
Sheldon Bernard "Shelly" Keller was an American screenwriter and composer.-Life and career:Keller was born in Chicago, Illinois and attended University of Illinois, where he began writing comedy with his fraternity brother Allan Sherman...

.

The United Artists
United Artists
United Artists Corporation is an American film studio. The original studio of that name was founded in 1919 by D. W. Griffith, Charles Chaplin, Mary Pickford and Douglas Fairbanks....

 release was filmed at the Cinecittà Studios
Cinecittà
Cinecittà is a large film studio in Rome that is considered the hub of Italian cinema.-History:The studios were founded in 1937 by Benito Mussolini and his head of cinema Luigi Freddi for propaganda purposes, under the slogan "Il cinema è l'arma più forte"...

 in Rome
Rome
Rome is the capital of Italy and the country's largest and most populated city and comune, with over 2.7 million residents in . The city is located in the central-western portion of the Italian Peninsula, on the Tiber River within the Lazio region of Italy.Rome's history spans two and a half...

. It served as the basis for the unsuccessful 1979 stage musical Carmelina
Carmelina
Carmelina is a musical with a book by Joseph Stein and Alan Jay Lerner, lyrics by Lerner, and music by Burton Lane.Based on the 1968 film Buona Sera, Mrs. Campbell , it focuses on an Italian woman who has raised her teenaged daughter Gia to believe her father was an American who died heroically in...

and the plot of the enormously successful stage musical Mamma Mia!
Mamma Mia!
Mamma Mia! is a stage musical written by British playwright Catherine Johnson, based on the songs of ABBA, composed by Benny Andersson and Björn Ulvaeus, former members of the band. Although the title of the musical is taken from the group's 1975 chart-topper "Mamma Mia", the plot is fictional, not...

and its 2008 movie version
Mamma Mia! (film)
Mamma Mia! is a 2008 musical/romantic comedy film adapted from the 1999 West End/2001 Broadway musical of the same name, based on the songs of successful pop group ABBA, with additional music composed by ABBA member Benny Andersson...

.

Plot

The title character, Carla "Campbell" (Gina Lollobrigida
Gina Lollobrigida
Gina Lollobrigida is an Italian actress, photojournalist and sculptress. She was one of the most popular European actresses of the 1950s and early 1960s. She was also an iconic sex symbol of the 1950s. Today, she remains an active supporter of Italian and Italian American causes, particularly the...

), is an Italian
Italy
Italy , officially the Italian Republic languages]] under the European Charter for Regional or Minority Languages. In each of these, Italy's official name is as follows:;;;;;;;;), is a unitary parliamentary republic in South-Central Europe. To the north it borders France, Switzerland, Austria and...

 woman who — during the American occupation of Italy — slept with three American GIs (a Corporal
Corporal
Corporal is a rank in use in some form by most militaries and by some police forces or other uniformed organizations. It is usually equivalent to NATO Rank Code OR-4....

, a Sergeant
Sergeant
Sergeant is a rank used in some form by most militaries, police forces, and other uniformed organizations around the world. Its origins are the Latin serviens, "one who serves", through the French term Sergent....

, and a Lieutenant
Lieutenant
A lieutenant is a junior commissioned officer in many nations' armed forces. Typically, the rank of lieutenant in naval usage, while still a junior officer rank, is senior to the army rank...

) in the course of ten days, Phil Newman (Phil Silvers
Phil Silvers
Phil Silvers was an American entertainer and comedy actor, known as "The King of Chutzpah." He is best known for starring in The Phil Silvers Show, a 1950s sitcom set on a U.S...

), Justin Young (Peter Lawford
Peter Lawford
Peter Sydney Ernest Aylen , better known as Peter Lawford, was an English-American actor.He was a member of the "Rat Pack", and brother-in-law to US President John F. Kennedy, perhaps more noted in later years for his off-screen activities as a celebrity than for his acting...

), and Walter Braddock (Telly Savalas
Telly Savalas
Aristotelis "Telly" Savalas was an American film and television actor and singer, whose career spanned four decades. Best known for playing the title role in the 1970s crime drama Kojak, Savalas was nominated for an Academy Award for Best Supporting Actor for his performance in Birdman of Alcatraz...

). By the time she discovers she is pregnant, all three have moved on and she, uncertain of which is the father, convinces each of the three (who are unaware of the existence of the other two) to support "his" daughter, Gia, financially.

To protect her reputation, as well as the reputation of her unborn child, Carla has raised the girl to believe her mother is the widow
Widow
A widow is a woman whose spouse has died, while a widower is a man whose spouse has died. The state of having lost one's spouse to death is termed widowhood or occasionally viduity. The adjective form is widowed...

 of an army Captain named Eddy Campbell, a name she borrowed from a can of soup (she is very fond of Campbell
Campbell Soup Company
Campbell Soup Company , also known as Campbell's, is an American producer of canned soups and related products. Campbell's products are sold in 120 countries around the world. It is headquartered in Camden, New Jersey...

's soups).

The film opens twenty years after the end of World War II
World War II
World War II, or the Second World War , was a global conflict lasting from 1939 to 1945, involving most of the world's nations—including all of the great powers—eventually forming two opposing military alliances: the Allies and the Axis...

 service in the village of San Forino, and the three men (accompanied by their wives, and in the Newmans' case three obnoxious children) attend a unit-wide reunion in the village they liberated. Carla is forced into a series of comic slapstick
Slapstick
Slapstick is a type of comedy involving exaggerated violence and activities which may exceed the boundaries of common sense.- Origins :The phrase comes from the batacchio or bataccio — called the 'slap stick' in English — a club-like object composed of two wooden slats used in Commedia dell'arte...

 situations as she tries to keep them — each one anxious to meet his daughter (Janet Margolin
Janet Margolin
Janet Margolin was an American theater, television and film actress.- Early life :Margolin was born in New York City, the daughter of Benjamin Margolin, an accountant who was born in Russia and was founder and president of the Nephrosis Foundation, now the Kidney Foundation of New York...

) for the first time — from discovering her secret, while at the same time trying to keep Gia from running off to Paris
Paris
Paris is the capital and largest city in France, situated on the river Seine, in northern France, at the heart of the Île-de-France region...

 to be with a much older married man who will take her to Brazil.

When confronted, Mrs. Campbell admits she doesn't know which of the three men is Gia's father. She challenges the men by asking them what kind of father each would have been, particularly because they have never been there for all the small but important life events of their daughter. Provoked by this, the potential fathers talk to Gia and insist that she cannot run off. The "fathers" cease the support payments and the Braddocks, who cannot have children of their own, agree to take care of Gia while she studies in the U.S.

Cast

  • Gina Lollobrigida
    Gina Lollobrigida
    Gina Lollobrigida is an Italian actress, photojournalist and sculptress. She was one of the most popular European actresses of the 1950s and early 1960s. She was also an iconic sex symbol of the 1950s. Today, she remains an active supporter of Italian and Italian American causes, particularly the...

     as Carla Campbell
  • Phil Silvers
    Phil Silvers
    Phil Silvers was an American entertainer and comedy actor, known as "The King of Chutzpah." He is best known for starring in The Phil Silvers Show, a 1950s sitcom set on a U.S...

     as Phil Newman
  • Peter Lawford
    Peter Lawford
    Peter Sydney Ernest Aylen , better known as Peter Lawford, was an English-American actor.He was a member of the "Rat Pack", and brother-in-law to US President John F. Kennedy, perhaps more noted in later years for his off-screen activities as a celebrity than for his acting...

     as Justin Young
  • Telly Savalas
    Telly Savalas
    Aristotelis "Telly" Savalas was an American film and television actor and singer, whose career spanned four decades. Best known for playing the title role in the 1970s crime drama Kojak, Savalas was nominated for an Academy Award for Best Supporting Actor for his performance in Birdman of Alcatraz...

     as Walter Braddock
  • Shelley Winters
    Shelley Winters
    Shelley Winters was an American actress who appeared in dozens of films, as well as on stage and television; her career spanned over 50 years until her death in 2006...

     as Shirley Newman
  • Marian Moses
    Marian McCargo
    Marian McCargo Bell was a former tennis champ who later found success in film and television....

     as Lauren Young
  • Lee Grant
    Lee Grant
    Lee Grant is an American stage, film and television actress, and film director. She was blacklisted for 12 years from film work beginning in the mid-1950s, but worked in the theatre, and would eventually win the Academy Award for Best Supporting Actress for her performance as Felicia Carp in the...

     as Fritzie Braddock
  • Janet Margolin
    Janet Margolin
    Janet Margolin was an American theater, television and film actress.- Early life :Margolin was born in New York City, the daughter of Benjamin Margolin, an accountant who was born in Russia and was founder and president of the Nephrosis Foundation, now the Kidney Foundation of New York...

     as Gia Campbell
  • Naomi Stevens
    Naomi Stevens
    Naomi Stevens was a prolific character actress of film and television from the 1950s through the 1980s. She has appeared in almost 100 roles over the years, usually depicting someone's ethnic mother, or neighbor...

     as Rosa
  • Philippe Leroy
    Philippe Leroy (actor)
    Philippe Leroy, full name Philippe Leroy-Beaulieu is a French film actor. He has appeared in over 150 films since 1960. Leroy has been living mostly in Italy since the 1960s and has worked extensively in Italian cinema, as well as in his native country...

     as Vittorio
  • Giovanna Galletti as The Contessa

Musical score

A soundtrack album
Soundtrack album
A soundtrack album is any album that incorporates music directly recorded from the soundtrack of a particular feature film or television program. In some cases, not all the tracks from the movie are included in the album; however there are rare cases of songs in the trailers that do not appear in...

 was released by United Artists Records
United Artists Records
United Artists Records was a record label founded by Max E. Youngstein of United Artists in 1957 initially to distribute records of its movie soundtracks, though it soon branched out into recording music of a number of different genres.-History:...

.
  • Buona Sera, title song
    • Sung by Jimmy Roselli
      Jimmy Roselli
      Michael John "Jimmy" Roselli was one of the most significant Italian-American pop singers of his time, during an era of formidable competition from such performers as Frank Sinatra, Dean Martin, Perry Como, Frankie Laine, Vic Damone and Jerry Vale.-Life:Jimmy Roselli's biggest and only pop hit was...

    • Music by Riz Ortolani
      Riz Ortolani
      Riziero "Riz" Ortolani is an Italian film composer.In the early 1950s Ortolani was founder and member of a jazz band of national Italian renown...

    • Lyrics by Melvin Frank
      Melvin Frank
      Melvin Frank was an American screenwriter, film producer and film director. He collaborated with a former schoolfriend, Norman Panama to form a writing partnership which endured for 3 decades...


  • San Forino March
    • Music and Lyrics by Andrew Frank

  • The Army Air Corps Song
    • Music by Robert Crawford

  • In the Mood
    • Written by Joe Garland
      Joe Garland
      Joseph Copeland "Joe" Garland was an American jazz saxophonist, composer, and arranger, best known for writing "In the Mood"....

       and Andy Razaf

  • Moonlight Serenade
    • Music by Glenn Miller
      Glenn Miller
      Alton Glenn Miller was an American jazz musician , arranger, composer, and bandleader in the swing era. He was one of the best-selling recording artists from 1939 to 1943, leading one of the best known "Big Bands"...


Critical response

In his review in the Chicago Sun-Times
Chicago Sun-Times
The Chicago Sun-Times is an American daily newspaper published in Chicago, Illinois. It is the flagship paper of the Sun-Times Media Group.-History:The Chicago Sun-Times is the oldest continuously published daily newspaper in the city...

, Roger Ebert
Roger Ebert
Roger Joseph Ebert is an American film critic and screenwriter. He is the first film critic to win a Pulitzer Prize for Criticism.Ebert is known for his film review column and for the television programs Sneak Previews, At the Movies with Gene Siskel and Roger Ebert, and Siskel and Ebert and The...

 described the film as "a charming reminder of what movie comedies used to be like . . . It depends on the traditional strong points of movie comedy: well-defined situation, good dialog, emphasis on characters . . . director Melvin Frank holds the story together and makes it work. A lot of the credit goes to the real comic ability of Telly Savalas (the best of the three would-be fathers) and Shelley Winters, who plays Phil Silvers' wife. Miss Lollobrigida is good, too, projecting the kind of innocence that is necessary if the situation isn't going to seem vulgar."

In the New York Times, Howard Thompson stated, "This overcooked, hardbreathing frolic, which gets off to a bright start, eventually collapses in the category of impossible comedies, sniggeringly pegged to sex . . . the reasonable taste, the bounce and the logic all start floundering about midpoint, with everyone running wildly to catch up, including poor Miss Lollobrigida, who bears the brunt of the confusion and the redundant contrivances. Suddenly it's gags, gags and more gags, to no avail, until the plot peg of authentic paternity
Paternity (law)
In law, paternity is the legal acknowledgment of the parental relationship between a man and a child usually based on several factors.At common law, a child born to the wife during a marriage is the husband's child under the "presumption of legitimacy", and the husband is assigned complete rights,...

 begins to sound like a tired, old burlesque
Burlesque
Burlesque is a literary, dramatic or musical work intended to cause laughter by caricaturing the manner or spirit of serious works, or by ludicrous treatment of their subjects...

 joke. The finale is as dull as the opening chapter is sprightly."

Awards and nominations

  • Golden Globe Award
    Golden Globe Award
    The Golden Globe Award is an accolade bestowed by the 93 members of the Hollywood Foreign Press Association recognizing excellence in film and television, both domestic and foreign...

     for Best Motion Picture Actress in a Musical or Comedy (Gina Lollobrigida
    Gina Lollobrigida
    Gina Lollobrigida is an Italian actress, photojournalist and sculptress. She was one of the most popular European actresses of the 1950s and early 1960s. She was also an iconic sex symbol of the 1950s. Today, she remains an active supporter of Italian and Italian American causes, particularly the...

    ) - nominated
  • Golden Globe Award
    Golden Globe Award
    The Golden Globe Award is an accolade bestowed by the 93 members of the Hollywood Foreign Press Association recognizing excellence in film and television, both domestic and foreign...

     for Best Original Song ("Buona Sera, Mrs. Campbell") - nominated
  • Writers Guild of America
    Writers Guild of America
    The Writers Guild of America is a generic term referring to the joint efforts of two different US labor unions:* The Writers Guild of America, East , representing TV and film writers East of the Mississippi....

     Award for Best Written American Original Screenplay - nominated
  • David di Donatello
    David di Donatello
    David di Donatello, named after Donatello's David, is a movie award assigned each year for cinematic performances and production by Ente David di Donatello, part of Accademia del Cinema Italiano. It is the Italian equivalent to the Academy Award. There are 24 categories as of 2006.- History :The...

     for Best Actress (Gina Lollobrigida
    Gina Lollobrigida
    Gina Lollobrigida is an Italian actress, photojournalist and sculptress. She was one of the most popular European actresses of the 1950s and early 1960s. She was also an iconic sex symbol of the 1950s. Today, she remains an active supporter of Italian and Italian American causes, particularly the...

    ), winner
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