My Sister Eileen (1955 film)
Encyclopedia
My Sister Eileen is a 1955
1955 in film
The year 1955 in film involved some significant events.-Events:* November 3 - The musical Guys and Dolls, starring Marlon Brando and Frank Sinatra, debuts.* June 27 - The last ever Republic serial, King of the Carnival, is released....

 American
Cinema of the United States
The cinema of the United States, also known as Hollywood, has had a profound effect on cinema across the world since the early 20th century. Its history is sometimes separated into four main periods: the silent film era, classical Hollywood cinema, New Hollywood, and the contemporary period...

 CinemaScope
CinemaScope
CinemaScope was an anamorphic lens series used for shooting wide screen movies from 1953 to 1967. Its creation in 1953, by the president of 20th Century-Fox, marked the beginning of the modern anamorphic format in both principal photography and movie projection.The anamorphic lenses theoretically...

 musical film
Musical film
The musical film is a film genre in which songs sung by the characters are interwoven into the narrative, sometimes accompanied by dancing. The songs usually advance the plot or develop the film's characters, though in some cases they serve merely as breaks in the storyline, often as elaborate...

 directed by Richard Quine
Richard Quine
Richard Quine was an American stage, film, and radio actor and film director.Quine was born in Detroit. He made his Broadway debut in the Jerome Kern/Oscar Hammerstein II musical Very Warm for May in 1939 and appeared in My Sister Eileen the following year...

. It stars Janet Leigh
Janet Leigh
Janet Leigh , born Jeanette Helen Morrison, was an American actress. She was the wife of actor Tony Curtis from June 1951 to September 1962 and the mother of Kelly Curtis and Jamie Lee Curtis....

, Betty Garrett
Betty Garrett
Betty Garrett was an American actress, comedienne, singer and dancer who originally performed on Broadway before being signed to a film contract with Metro-Goldwyn-Mayer...

 and Jack Lemmon
Jack Lemmon
John Uhler "Jack" Lemmon III was an American actor and musician. He starred in more than 60 films including Some Like It Hot, The Apartment, Mister Roberts , Days of Wine and Roses, The Great Race, Irma la Douce, The Odd Couple, Save the Tiger John Uhler "Jack" Lemmon III (February 8, 1925June...

.

The screenplay by Quine and Blake Edwards
Blake Edwards
Blake Edwards was an American film director, screenwriter and producer.Edwards' career began in the 1940s as an actor, but he soon turned to writing radio scripts at Columbia Pictures...

 is based on the 1940 play by Joseph A. Fields and Jerome Chodorov
Jerome Chodorov
Jerome Chodorov was an American playwright and librettist.-Biography:He was born in New York City, and entered journalism in the 1930s. He is best known for his 1940 play My Sister Eileen, its 1942 screen adaptation, and the musical Wonderful Town, which based on his play. Joseph A. Fields was...

, which was inspired by a series of autobiographical
Autobiography
An autobiography is a book about the life of a person, written by that person.-Origin of the term:...

 short stories by Ruth McKenney
Ruth McKenney
Ruth McKenney was an American author and journalist, best remembered for My Sister Eileen, a memoir of her experiences growing up in Ohio and moving to Greenwich Village with her sister Eileen McKenney. This was later adapted as the musical Wonderful Town by Leonard Bernstein.-Early life:McKenney...

 originally published in The New Yorker
The New Yorker
The New Yorker is an American magazine of reportage, commentary, criticism, essays, fiction, satire, cartoons and poetry published by Condé Nast...

. The play originally was filmed in 1942. (This musical film is totally different from the 1953 Broadway musical "Wonderful Town," though both are based on the original Ruth McKenney source material.)

Plot

Witty Ruth and pretty Eileen Sherwood, sisters from Columbus, Ohio
Columbus, Ohio
Columbus is the capital of and the largest city in the U.S. state of Ohio. The broader metropolitan area encompasses several counties and is the third largest in Ohio behind those of Cleveland and Cincinnati. Columbus is the third largest city in the American Midwest, and the fifteenth largest city...

, relocate to New York City
New York City
New York is the most populous city in the United States and the center of the New York Metropolitan Area, one of the most populous metropolitan areas in the world. New York exerts a significant impact upon global commerce, finance, media, art, fashion, research, technology, education, and...

 and settle in a rundown basement studio apartment in a Greenwich Village
Greenwich Village
Greenwich Village, , , , .in New York often simply called "the Village", is a largely residential neighborhood on the west side of Lower Manhattan in New York City. A large majority of the district is home to upper middle class families...

 building owned by Papa Appopolous. Ruth aspires to be a writer, while Eileen hopes to achieve success as an actress. They become acquainted with their neighbor Ted Loomis, an athlete who lives with his fiancée Helen.

Ruth has a letter of introduction to Bob Baker, editor-in-chief of Mad Hatter magazine. As he rushes off for vacation, he counsels her to write about things she knows rather than the artificial stories she had sent him. Meanwhile, after finding herself the target of unwanted advances from a theatre producer, Eileen goes to the local Walgreens
Walgreens
Walgreen Co. , doing business as Walgreens , is the largest drugstore chain in the United States of America. As of August 31st, the company operates 8,210 locations across all 50 states, the District of Columbia and Puerto Rico. Founded in Chicago, Illinois in 1901, and has since expanded...

 for lunch. Soda fountain manager Frank Lippencott lends her a sympathetic ear and offers his assistance, assuring her many theatrical people eat at the counter.

As time progresses, Ruth collects a lot of rejection slips and Eileen fails to secure any auditions. When newspaper reporter Chick Clark overhears Frank telling Eileen about an audition, he claims to know the show's producer and assures her he can get her an interview with him. Upon arrival at the theater, they discover it is a 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...

 house where striptease
Striptease
A striptease is an erotic or exotic dance in which the performer gradually undresses, either partly or completely, in a seductive and sexually suggestive manner...

 is the main attraction. Mortified, Eileen rushes out.

Bob returns from vacation and meets with Ruth to tell her his favorite stories are about Eileen and her romantic misadventures. Ruth claims her sister is simply a product of her imagination and the experiences she described actually are her own. Intrigued, Bob asks her for a date, but Ruth declines, and later tells Eileen she finds him dull and unattractive.

Ted asks the girls if he can stay with them while Helen's mother visits and Eileen agrees despite Ruth's uncertainty. Eileen invites Chick and Frank to dinner, but when her spaghetti sauce is ruined by a plumber, Chick suggests they go to El Morocco
El Morocco
El Morocco was a 20th century Manhattan nightclub frequented by the rich and famous in the 1930s and 1950s. It was famous for its blue zebra-stripe motif and its official photographer, Jerome Zerbe.-History:In 1931, John Perona , an Italian...

, where he tells Eileen he will introduce Ruth to his editor, and Ruth sees Bob with a glamorous woman.

Bob's secretary is certain Ruth's stories are not as autobiographical as she claims. He invites her to dinner to discuss the publication of a story, and when he tries to kiss her she runs off, suggesting she may be less experienced than her stories suggest. Eileen tells Frank unless Ruth's story is published, the impoverished sisters will have to return to Ohio. Frank is in love with her but, mistakenly thinking Ted lives with the girls, accuses Eileen of being a bohemian and departs.

The following day, Ruth receives a phone call asking her to cover the arrival of the Brazilian Navy
Brazilian Navy
The Brazilian Navy is a branch of the Brazilian Armed Forces responsible for conducting naval operations. It is the largest navy in Latin America...

 for the local paper. Unaware it was Chick who made the call in order to ensure being alone with Eileen, she rushes off. Chick comes to the apartment and is thrown out by Ted when Eileen needs help fending off the reporter's advances. Helen sees Ted comforting Eileen and mistakenly assumes the worst.

Ruth is pursued by the Brazilian naval cadets, who have misunderstood her intent in meeting their ship. In order to calm them down, Ruth and Eileen initiate a Conga line
Conga Line
The conga line is a Cuban carnival march that was first developed in Cuba and became popular in the United States in the 1930s and 1950s. The dancers form a long, processing line. It has three shuffle steps on the beat, followed by a kick that is slightly ahead of the fourth beat...

, which rapidly evolves into a wild dance party in the street that draws the attention of the police, and everyone is arrested. The Brazilian Consul intervenes on their behalf, and the girls return home to pack their belongings. Bob arrives at the apartment, professes his love for Ruth, and tells her he is publishing her stories. Frank arrives with a box of chocolates for Eileen, Ted and Helen reconcile, and the sisters decide to remain in New York.

Production

In 1953, Joseph A. Fields and Jerome Chodorov adapted their 1940 play for Wonderful Town
Wonderful Town
Wonderful Town is a musical with a book written by Joseph A. Fields and Jerome Chodorov, lyrics by Betty Comden and Adolph Green and music by Leonard Bernstein...

, with lyrics by Betty Comden
Betty Comden
Betty Comden was one-half of the musical-comedy duo Comden and Green, who provided lyrics, libretti, and screenplays to some of the most beloved and successful Hollywood musicals and Broadway shows of the mid-20th century...

 and Adolph Green
Adolph Green
Adolph Green was an American lyricist and playwright who, with long-time collaborator Betty Comden, penned the screenplays and songs for some of the most beloved movie musicals, particularly as part of Arthur Freed's production unit at MGM, during the genre's heyday...

 and music by Leonard Bernstein
Leonard Bernstein
Leonard Bernstein August 25, 1918 – October 14, 1990) was an American conductor, composer, author, music lecturer and pianist. He was among the first conductors born and educated in the United States of America to receive worldwide acclaim...

. Its success on Broadway
Broadway theatre
Broadway theatre, commonly called simply Broadway, refers to theatrical performances presented in one of the 40 professional theatres with 500 or more seats located in the Theatre District centered along Broadway, and in Lincoln Center, in Manhattan in New York City...

 prompted Harry Cohn
Harry Cohn
Harry Cohn was the American president and production director of Columbia Pictures.-Career:Cohn was born to a working-class German-Jewish family in New York City. In later years, he appears to have disparaged his heritage...

, head of Columbia Pictures
Columbia Pictures
Columbia Pictures Industries, Inc. is an American film production and distribution company. Columbia Pictures now forms part of the Columbia TriStar Motion Picture Group, owned by Sony Pictures Entertainment, a subsidiary of the Japanese conglomerate Sony. It is one of the leading film companies...

, which had released the 1942 screen adaptation of the play, to seek the film rights to the musical. When they proved to be too costly, he decided to hire Jule Styne
Jule Styne
Jule Styne was a British-born American songwriter especially famous for a series of Broadway musicals, which included several very well known and frequently revived shows.-Early life:...

 and Leo Robin
Leo Robin
Leo Robin was an American composer, lyricist and songwriter. He is probably best known for collaborating with Ralph Rainger on the 1938 Oscar-winning song "Thanks for the Memory," sung by Bob Hope in the film The Big Broadcast of 1938.-Biography:Robin was born in Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania, and...

 to write a different score. Because the film couldn't bear any resemblance to Wonderful Town, a studio attorney was assigned to make sure there were no similarities between the two. Even the musical numbers had to be positioned at different places in the storyline.

Screenwriter/director Richard Quine
Richard Quine
Richard Quine was an American stage, film, and radio actor and film director.Quine was born in Detroit. He made his Broadway debut in the Jerome Kern/Oscar Hammerstein II musical Very Warm for May in 1939 and appeared in My Sister Eileen the following year...

, who had portrayed "Frank Lippincott" in the 1940 stage play and the 1942 screen adaptation, originally cast Judy Holliday
Judy Holliday
Judy Holliday was an American actress.Holliday began her career as part of a night-club act, before working in Broadway plays and musicals...

 in the role of Ruth Sherwood. When the actress got into a contract dispute with the studio, she was replaced by Betty Garrett
Betty Garrett
Betty Garrett was an American actress, comedienne, singer and dancer who originally performed on Broadway before being signed to a film contract with Metro-Goldwyn-Mayer...

, who had been essentially, but not officially, blacklisted
Hollywood blacklist
The Hollywood blacklist—as the broader entertainment industry blacklist is generally known—was the mid-twentieth-century list of screenwriters, actors, directors, musicians, and other U.S. entertainment professionals who were denied employment in the field because of their political beliefs or...

 due to her marriage to Larry Parks
Larry Parks
Larry Parks was an American stage and movie actor. He was born Samuel Klausman Lawrence Parks. His career was virtually ended when he admitted to having once been a member of a Communist party cell, which led to his blacklisting by all Hollywood studios.-Background:Parks grew up in Joliet,...

, a one-time member of the Communist Party
Communist party
A political party described as a Communist party includes those that advocate the application of the social principles of communism through a communist form of government...

, who had been forced to testify before the House Un-American Activities Committee
House Un-American Activities Committee
The House Committee on Un-American Activities or House Un-American Activities Committee was an investigative committee of the United States House of Representatives. In 1969, the House changed the committee's name to "House Committee on Internal Security"...

, but refused to name names. As a result, this was Garrett's first screen appearance since On the Town
On the Town (film)
On the Town is a 1949 musical film with music by Leonard Bernstein and Roger Edens and book and lyrics by Betty Comden and Adolph Green. It is an adaptation of the Broadway stage musical of the same name produced in 1944, although many changes in script and score were made from the original stage...

six years earlier. The musical sequences were choreographed by Bob Fosse
Bob Fosse
Robert Louis “Bob” Fosse was an American actor, dancer, musical theater choreographer, director, screenwriter, film editor and film director. He won an unprecedented eight Tony Awards for choreography, as well as one for direction...

, who played "Frank Lippincott" in the film. Ironically, a little over a year after the film's release, Garrett and Parks replaced Judy Holliday and Sydney Chaplin
Sydney Chaplin
Sydney Chaplin was an English actor. He was the elder half-brother of Sir Charlie Chaplin and served as his business manager, and the half-uncle of the actor Sydney Chaplin , who was named after him.-Early life:...

, respectively, on Broadway for a month in the smash hit Comden-Green-Styne musical The Bells Are Ringing.

Aldo Ray
Aldo Ray
Aldo Ray was an American actor.-Life and career:Ray was born in Pen Argyl, PA, to an Italian family of five brothers and one sister. His brother Mario lettered in football at USC in the years 1952-54...

 turned down his part of Ted as being too small and it was given to Dick York
Dick York
Richard Allen "Dick" York was an American actor. He is best remembered for his role as the first Darrin Stephens on the ABC television fantasy sitcom Bewitched...

, a Columbia contract star.

Cast

  • Janet Leigh
    Janet Leigh
    Janet Leigh , born Jeanette Helen Morrison, was an American actress. She was the wife of actor Tony Curtis from June 1951 to September 1962 and the mother of Kelly Curtis and Jamie Lee Curtis....

     as Eileen Sherwood
  • Jack Lemmon
    Jack Lemmon
    John Uhler "Jack" Lemmon III was an American actor and musician. He starred in more than 60 films including Some Like It Hot, The Apartment, Mister Roberts , Days of Wine and Roses, The Great Race, Irma la Douce, The Odd Couple, Save the Tiger John Uhler "Jack" Lemmon III (February 8, 1925June...

     as Robert 'Bob' Baker
  • Betty Garrett
    Betty Garrett
    Betty Garrett was an American actress, comedienne, singer and dancer who originally performed on Broadway before being signed to a film contract with Metro-Goldwyn-Mayer...

     as Ruth Sherwood
  • Bob Fosse
    Bob Fosse
    Robert Louis “Bob” Fosse was an American actor, dancer, musical theater choreographer, director, screenwriter, film editor and film director. He won an unprecedented eight Tony Awards for choreography, as well as one for direction...

     as Frank Lippincott
  • Tommy Rall
    Tommy Rall
    Thomas Edward "Tommy" Rall is an American ballet dancer, tap dancer and acrobatic dancer who was a prominent featured player in 1950s musical comedies...

     as Chick Clark
  • Dick York
    Dick York
    Richard Allen "Dick" York was an American actor. He is best remembered for his role as the first Darrin Stephens on the ABC television fantasy sitcom Bewitched...

     as Ted Loomis
  • Kurt Kasznar
    Kurt Kasznar
    -Early life:Kasznar was born in Vienna, Austria as Kurt Servischer. His father left when Kurt was very young, his mother married a Hungarian restaurateur named Ferdinand Kasznar, and Kurt assumed his surname. He emigrated to the United States in the mid-1930s for The Eternal Road in which he...

     as Papa Appopolous
  • Lucy Marlow as Helen
  • Mara McAfee
    Mara McAfee
    Mara McAfee was an American Pop artist and illustrator best known for her satirical depictions of historical figures, contemporary subjects, and high art traditions...

     as Miss Stewart
  • Adelle August
    Adelle August
    Adelle August was an American movie actress.She was born in Kennewick, Washington as Adele M. Slaybough. In 1952 she graduated from Highline High School, and was crowned Miss Washington USA the same year. Two years later she was signed to Columbia Pictures...

     as Secretary
  • Queenie Smith
    Queenie Smith
    Queenie Smith was an American stage, television, and film actress.-Biography:Smith got an early start, being trained in ballet and dance and spent her teen years performing as a dancer with the Metropolitan Opera Company in operas such as Aida, La Traviata, and Faust...

     as Alice, Baker's secretary
  • Richard Deacon
    Richard Deacon (actor)
    Richard Deacon , born in Philadelphia, was an American television and motion picture actor.-Career:The bald and usually bespectacled character actor often portrayed pompous or imperious figures. He made appearances on The Jack Benny Show as a salesman and a barber, and on NBC's Happy as a hotel...

     as Baker's Receptionist
  • Kathryn Grant
    Kathryn Grant
    Kathryn Grant may refer to:* Kathryn Crosby, American actress who also used the stage name Kathryn Grant* Kathryn Ptacek, American author who also wrote under her married name, Kathryn Grant*Katherine Grant, 12th Countess of Dysart , Scottish peer...

     as Young Hopeful

Song list

Atmosphere

Chorus



As Soon As They See Eileen

Performed by Betty Garrett



I'm Great

Performed by Betty Garrett, Janet Leigh, Kurt Kaszner and Dick York



There's Nothin' Like Love

Performed by Betty Garrett and Janet Leigh



It's Bigger Than You and Me

Performed by Jack Lemmon



Give Me a Band and My Baby

Performed by Betty Garrett, Janet Leigh, Bob Fosse and Tommy Rall



Conga

Performed by Betty Garrett, Janet Leigh, Kurt Kaszner and the Brazilian Navy

Critical reception

Bosley Crowther
Bosley Crowther
Bosley Crowther was a journalist and author who was film critic for The New York Times for 27 years. His reviews and articles helped shape the careers of actors, directors and screenwriters, though his reviews, at times, were unnecessarily mean...

 of the New York Times observed, "Happily let it be stated that Miss Garrett and Miss Leigh are okay. In fact Miss Garrett is okay in shining letters . . . [She] has the proper skepticism and the right desperation for the role. Her way with a line is homicidal. What's more, she can dance and sing. These are essential talents in this production, in which Miss Leigh . . . is particularly nimble on her legs — and for which Mr. Styne and Mr. Robin have dished up some apt and lively songs . . . But it is Jack Lemmon . . . who generates the most amusement and upholds the tarnished dignity of males. Mr. Lemmon is a charming comedy actor, getting more so in each successive film. And his off-hand maneuvering around Miss Garrett to shatter her resistance is grand. When the two, in a scene of mad seduction, sing "It's Bigger Than You and Me," the breadth of the spoof is established and the high point of the comedy is reached."

In his review of the DVD release of the film, Steve Daly of Entertainment Weekly
Entertainment Weekly
Entertainment Weekly is an American magazine, published by the Time division of Time Warner, that covers film, television, music, broadway theatre, books and popular culture...

graded it B. He thought "some Bob Fosse choreography and Jule Styne — Leo Robin songs wittily capture the Village esprit" but felt the subplot involving Lemmon was "alarmingly chauvinistic." Comparing this version to the 1942 original, he said it "seems a testament to '50s feminist backlash."

DVD release

Sony Pictures Home Entertainment
Sony Pictures Home Entertainment
Sony Pictures Home Entertainment is the home video distribution arm of Sony Pictures Entertainment, a subsidiary of Sony Corporation. It was established in November 1979 as Columbia Pictures Home Entertainment, releasing 20 titles: The Anderson Tapes, Bell, Book and Candle, Born Free, Breakout,...

 released the film on Region 1 DVD on February 22, 2005. It is in anamorphic widescreen
Anamorphic widescreen
Anamorphic widescreen, when applied to DVD manufacture, is a video process that horizontally squeezes a widescreen image so that it can be stored in a standard 4:3 aspect ratio DVD image frame. Compatible playback equipment can then re-expand the horizontal dimension to show the original widescreen...

format with audio tracks in English and Portuguese and subtitles in Japanese.
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