Film Excess - Free Ukraine - Stop Putin - End the war NOW!!: Hello, Dolly! (1969) - Effervescent, grand musical entertainment from some of the greats

3/16/2023

Hello, Dolly! (1969) - Effervescent, grand musical entertainment from some of the greats

♥♥♥♥♥

A very late 1960s and supremely stylish poster for Gene Kelly's Hello, Dolly!

Dolly Levi is an effervescent widow who can afford just about anything. For her own future she targets the wealthy merchant of Yonkers, Mr. Vandergelder.

Hello, Dolly! is written and produced by Ernest Lehman (The Sound of Music (1965)), based on the same-titled 1964 Broadway play by Michael Stewart (Bring Back Birdie (1981)), which in turn was based on Thornton Wilder's (The Merchant of Yonkers (1938)) play The Matchmaker (1954). It is directed by Pennsylvanian master filmmaker Gene Kelly (On the Town (1949)), whose 9th feature it was.

Barbra Streisand (The Mirror Has Two Faces (1996)) is radiant comically, musically and motion-wise (as well as erotically) as never before in the festive title role, and Walter Matthau (Charade (1963)) is formidably funny as the square Vandergelder. With tremendous guys as Vandergelder's underlings, his clerks (in particular the young Danny Lockin (Gypsy (1962)) is irresistible), as well as Joyce Ames (The Todd Killings (1971)) and Tommy Tune (The Boy Friend (1971)) as the in-love Ermengarde and Ambrose and flyingly fresh and keen dialog. Perhaps the length stretches a bit comfortably, but a musical lover can't but fall in love with this grand, beautifully photographed (by Harry Stradling Sr. (Island of Love (1963))) master class. The costumes, which has the elegant meeting the gaudy in a whirl of colors, and the dance acts, - along with a couple of the songs, - simply don't come more attractive or impressive.

Watch a trailer for the film here

Cost: 25.3 mil. $

Box office: 33.2 mil. $ (North America alone)

= Uncertain, likely even

[Hello, Dolly! was released 16 December (USA) and runs 146 minutes. Streisand was paid 750k $ for her performance; Matthau 500k $. Shooting took place from April - August 1968 in Pennsylvania, New York and in Los Angeles, California. The release was delayed due to a contractual issue that it would not be allowed release before the Broadway show of Hello, Dolly! ended. Fox eventually paid 1-2 mil. $ to secure a release before the contract had stated. The film opened #3, behind On Her Majesty's Secret Service and Easy Rider, in North America, where it grossed 33.2 mil. $, making it one of the year's 5 highest-grossing films domestically. The film reportedly earned Fox 26 mil. $ globally, - enough that it ranks here as 'even' or 'box office success' status, but reportedly still incurring a 10 mil. $ loss for the studio, likely due to big marketing and print expenses which are not calculated into the theatrical status of a film's performance here. The film was nominated for 7 Oscars, winning 3: For Best Art Direction/Set Decoration, Sound and Musical Picture Score (Lennie Hayton (The Virginian (1963, TV-series)) and Lionel Newman (The Pleasure Seekers (1964)). It lost Best Cinematography to Conrad L. Hall for Butch Cassidy and the Sundance Kid, Costumes to Anne of the Thousand Days, Editing to Z and Picture to Midnight Cowboy. The film was also nominated for 3 BAFTAs and 5 Golden Globes, among other honors. Kelly returned with The Cheyenne Social Club (1970). Streisand returned in On a Clear Day You Can See Forever (1970); Matthau in A New Leaf (1971); and Michael Crawford (Condorman (1981)) in The Games (1970). Hello, Dolly! is rotten at 45 % with a 6.00/10 critical average at Rotten Tomatoes.]

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Donald Sutherland has passed away

Born in Canada, Sutherland battled polio as a child. His first credit was in Suspense (1963, TV-series) and his first film was The Castle of the Living Dead (1964). Later credits in his remarkable career include The Saint (1965-66), The Dirty Dozen (1967), M*A*S*H (1970), Kelly's Heroes (1970), Klute (1971), Don't Look Now (1973), 1900 (1976), Casanova (1976), The Eagle Has Landed (1976), Ordinary People (1980), A Dry White Season (1989), JFK (1991), Outbreak (1995), Fallen (1998), Virus (1999), Fierce People (2005), Pride & Prejudice (2005), Lord of War (2005), The Hunger Games (2012), The Undoing (2020, miniseries) and many more. He passed away at age 88. R.I.P.

Roger Corman has passed away

Born in Detroit, Michigan, Corman had a sprawling, intellectually hungry life as a youth and young man before arriving with his first film in 1955, Five Guns West. He would follow that with titles such as Apache Woman, It Conquered the World, Attack of the Crab Monsters, Teenage Cave Man, A Bucket of Blood, House of Usher, The Little Shop of Horrors, The Pit and the Pendulum, The Intruder, The Raven, The Terror, The Masque of Red Death, The Tomb of Ligeia, The Wild Angels, The Trip, Bloody Mama and many more. As a producer he was behind almost 500 films. Arguably among the most important filmmakers of the 20th century, Corman passed away at age 98. R.I.P.

William Friedkin has died

Born in Chicago, Friedkin accrued TV credits prior to his advance to the big screen as the director of Good TImes (1967), The Birthday Party (1968), The Night They Raided Minsky's (1968) and The Boys in the Band (1970) before his major breakthrough, The French Connection (1971), for which he won his only Oscar. He followed it up with the even bigger smash, The Exorcist (1973), arguably the best horror film of all time, for which he was Oscar-nominated. Later credits include Sorcerer (1977), Cruising (1980), To Live and Die in L.A. (1985), Rampage (1987), Rules of Engagement (2000), Killer Joe (2011) and The Devil and Father Amorth (2017, documentary). Friedkin passed away at age 87. R.I.P.

Louise Fletcher has passed away

Born in Alabama to deaf parents, Fletcher got her first credits in late-1950s TV-series.She took a 10 year-long sabbatical to devote her time to motherhood after the release of A Gathering of Eagles, but then came back and soon saw her career's most important part, as Nurse Ratched in One Flew Over the Cuckoo's Nest (1975), for which she won her sole Oscar. Later credits include Exorcist II: The Heretic (1977), The Lucky Star (1980), Brainstorm (1983), Two Moon Junction (1988), Cruel Intentions (1999), A Perfect Man (2013) and many more. Fletcher passed away at age 88. R.I.P.

Jean-Luc Godard has passed away

Born in Paris, France, Godard lived much of his life in Switzerland. He wrote for French film criticism magazine Cahiers du Cinema and became foundational for the New French Wave that inspired new waves in scores of other countries across the world with his Breathless (1960). Later credits include A Woman Is A Woman (1961), Vivre Sa Vie (1962), Le Petit Soldat (1962), Contempt (1963), Alphaville (1965), Pierrot le Fou (1965), 2 or 3 Things I Know About Her (1967), Weekend (1967), Every Man for Himself (1980), King Lear (1987), Century of Cinema (1995, documentary), Goodbye to Language (2014) and many more. Godard died of assisted suicide at age 91. R.I.P.

Wolfgang Petersen has died

James Caan has died

Caan was born the son of Jewish immigrants from Germany in New York. He got his start on TV in the early 1960s. His credits include El Dorado (1966), The Rain People (1969), Brian's Song (1971, TV movie), The Godfather (1972), - for which he earned his only Oscar nomination, - Slither (1973), The Gambler (1974), Funny Lady (1975), Rollerball (1975), Silent Movie (1976), Hide in Plain Sight (1980), - the only film he also directed, - Thief (1981), Misery (1990), Honeymoon in Vegas (1992), Bottle Rocket (1996), Eraser (1996), Dogville (2003), Elf (2003), Las Vegas (2003-07), Cloudy with a Chance of Meatballs (2009) and many more. Caan passed away at age 82. R.I.P.

Jean-Louis Trintignant has died

Born in Vaucluse, France, Trintignant's theatrical debut as an actor was in If All the Guys in the World... (1955). Later credits include ...And God Created Woman (1956), The Seven Deadly Sins (1961), Inferno (1964), A Man and A Woman (1966), My Love, My Love (1967), A Man to Kill (1967), The Great Silence (1968), Z (1969), The Assassination (1972), Three Colors: Red (1994), Amour (2012), Happy End (2017) and many more. He also wrote and directed two films in the 1970s. Trintignant passed away at age 91. R.I.P.

Ray Liotta has died

Adopted from an orphenage at a young age, Liotta got hooked on acting in high school. He had various TV credits in the late 1970s and early 80s, with his film debut in The Lonely Lady (1983). Later credits include Something Wild (1986), Field of Dreams (1989), Goodfellas (1990), Cop Land (1997), Hannibal (2001), Blow (2001), Narc (2002), John Q (2002), Identity (2003), Observe and Report (2009), Youth in Revolt (2009), The Details (2011), Killing THem Softly (2012), The Place Beyond the Pines (2012), Shades of Blue (2016-18), The Simpsons (2018, TV-series), Marriage Story (2019), The Many Saints of Newark (2021), Black Bird (2022, TV-series) and many more. Liotta passed away at age 67 in his sleep while on production in the Dominican Republic. R.I.P.

Philip Baker Hall has died

Born in Ohio, Hall didn't start acting until he was 30. His long list of credits include Zabriskie Point (1970), Miami Vice (1987, TV-series), Midnight Run (1988), Ghostbusters II (1989), Cheers (1993, TV-series), Hard Eight (1996), The Rock (1996), Air Force One (1997), Boogie Nights (1997), Seinfeld (1991-98), Rush Hour (1998), The Insider (1999), Magnolia (1999), The Talented Mr. Ripley (1999), Bruce Almighty (2003), Dogville (2003), The Zodiac (2005), Zodiac (2007), Curb Your Enthusiasm (2004-09), Mr. Popper's Penguins (2011), Modern Family (2011-12) and many more. Hall passed away at age 90. R.I.P.

Film Excess - Free Ukraine - Stop Putin - End the war NOW!!

Eagerly anticipating this week ... (17-24)

3/16/2023

Hello, Dolly! (1969) - Effervescent, grand musical entertainment from some of the greats

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