The same things that make "America's Next Top Model" entertaining make "Stage Door" a blast. "Stage Door" is even better, because we don't have to put up with Tyra Banks or her panel of hissy fashion "experts," but we still get the house full of catty, superstar wannabes who throw insults at one another faster than the audience can keep up.
Katharine Hepburn plays the rich daughter of a Midwestern business tycoon who takes a room in an all-female boarding house while she sets out to become a stage actress. The house is full of a bunch of been-there-done-that girls who all have their sights set on the stage, and have varying chances of ever seeing their dreams become reality. Ginger Rogers ends up as Hepburn's roommate, and their animosity for one another becomes a grudging affection over the course of the film. Rogers, because she's not being asked to play second fiddle to Fred Astaire, gets to show off her ample reserves of charm and comic ability, and she really steals the movie away from everyone else. I think the movie is supposed to be primarily about Hepburn, but you wouldn't know it, because Rogers so dominates the first half of the picture that it feels like the film's lost its way when she drops out of a good deal of its last half.
Also in the house are Gail Patrick, playing a jaded beauty who's content to let sugar daddies provide her meals and entertainment; Constance Collier, as an aging diva who takes the young actresses under her wing and tries to teach them their craft; Andrea Leeds, in the film's most thankless role as a pathetic sad sack who has freak out scenes when she's not moping around and ends up hearing voices before throwing herself out of a window; and Lucille Ball and Eve Arden serve as a kind of Greek chorus, charged mainly with providing sarcastic commentary on the action swirling around them.
Adolphe Menjou rounds out the cast as a smarmy producer who lands Hepburn a choice part. The problem is, Hepburn's character is a terrible actress, and we're sure that her opening will be a total disaster, but she finds out that little ol' Andrea Leeds took a swan dive just before she goes on, and the emotion it arouses in Hepburn causes her to give the performance of her life and become an overnight sensation.
Only in 1930s Hollywood, folks. Don't even try to see the story as anything but the most ridiculous melodrama, and just enjoy the performances and the zingy dialogue. The movie is often very funny, both intentionally and unintentionally so.
And as a sidenote, nearly every actress in this film reminded me of a contemporary actress. If I was casting this film now, Nicole Kidman would get the Ginger Rogers role (I know, I know, I never would have thought Ginger Rogers looks like Nicole Kidman, but at times she does), Chloe Sevigny would get Eve Arden's, Debra Messing would DEFINITELY get Lucille Ball's (they're dead ringers) and Olivia de Havilland (o.k. so I know she's not a contemporary actress, but the resemblance is striking) would get Andrea Leeds'.
Grade: A-
Katharine Hepburn plays the rich daughter of a Midwestern business tycoon who takes a room in an all-female boarding house while she sets out to become a stage actress. The house is full of a bunch of been-there-done-that girls who all have their sights set on the stage, and have varying chances of ever seeing their dreams become reality. Ginger Rogers ends up as Hepburn's roommate, and their animosity for one another becomes a grudging affection over the course of the film. Rogers, because she's not being asked to play second fiddle to Fred Astaire, gets to show off her ample reserves of charm and comic ability, and she really steals the movie away from everyone else. I think the movie is supposed to be primarily about Hepburn, but you wouldn't know it, because Rogers so dominates the first half of the picture that it feels like the film's lost its way when she drops out of a good deal of its last half.
Also in the house are Gail Patrick, playing a jaded beauty who's content to let sugar daddies provide her meals and entertainment; Constance Collier, as an aging diva who takes the young actresses under her wing and tries to teach them their craft; Andrea Leeds, in the film's most thankless role as a pathetic sad sack who has freak out scenes when she's not moping around and ends up hearing voices before throwing herself out of a window; and Lucille Ball and Eve Arden serve as a kind of Greek chorus, charged mainly with providing sarcastic commentary on the action swirling around them.
Adolphe Menjou rounds out the cast as a smarmy producer who lands Hepburn a choice part. The problem is, Hepburn's character is a terrible actress, and we're sure that her opening will be a total disaster, but she finds out that little ol' Andrea Leeds took a swan dive just before she goes on, and the emotion it arouses in Hepburn causes her to give the performance of her life and become an overnight sensation.
Only in 1930s Hollywood, folks. Don't even try to see the story as anything but the most ridiculous melodrama, and just enjoy the performances and the zingy dialogue. The movie is often very funny, both intentionally and unintentionally so.
And as a sidenote, nearly every actress in this film reminded me of a contemporary actress. If I was casting this film now, Nicole Kidman would get the Ginger Rogers role (I know, I know, I never would have thought Ginger Rogers looks like Nicole Kidman, but at times she does), Chloe Sevigny would get Eve Arden's, Debra Messing would DEFINITELY get Lucille Ball's (they're dead ringers) and Olivia de Havilland (o.k. so I know she's not a contemporary actress, but the resemblance is striking) would get Andrea Leeds'.
Grade: A-