Movies that Love Theater
Submitted by Oedipus on Sat, 12/11/2004 - 13:30
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- Spite Marriage (1929) Elmer is a dry cleaner. He is madly in love with stage star Trilby Drew; for each of her 35 performances, he dons someone else's tuxedo and races to the theatre. When Trilby's co-star boyfriend gets engaged to a socialite, she marries Elmer to get even, assuming Elmer is a millionaire (since his clothes are so snazzy.) But she's clearly still in love with her scoundrelous co-star, and her manager makes her leave Elmer, trying to pay him off so the papers don't hear about her marriage to a "cheap pants presser." Can Elmer win her love? Maybe a sea voyage will help.
- Murder! (1930) An actress in a travelling theatre group is murdered and Diana Baring, another member of the group is found suffering from amnesia standing by the body. Diana is tried and convicted of the murder, but Sir John Menier a famous actor on the jury is convinced of her innocence. Sir John sets out to find the real murderer before Diana's death sentence is carried out.
- I Dood It (1943) Constance Shaw is a dance star on Broadway, Joseph Rivington Reynolds is a keen fan of her. After she is fed up with her friend, she meets Joseph and marries him, because she thinks he is the owner of a mine. But that's a missunderstanding, he works at a cleaning shop. After disturbing rehearsals he is thrown out of the theater
- All About Eve (1950) An ingenue insinuates herself in to the company of an established but aging stage actress and her circle of theater friends. Aspiring actress Eve Harrington maneuvers her way into the lives of Broadway star Margo Channing, playwright Lloyd Richards and director Bill Sampson. This classic story of ambition and betrayal has become part of American folklore. Bette Davis claims to have based her character on the persona of film actress Talullah Bankhead. Davis' line "Fasten your seatbelts, it's going to be a bumpy night" is legendary, but, in fact, all of the film's dialog sparkles with equal brilliance.
- Rabbit of Seville (1950) Behind the Hollywood Bowl stage which is playing the opera, The Barber of Seville, Bugs Bunny flees into the backstage area with Elmer Fudd in close pursuit. Seeing his opportunity to fight on his terms, Bugs raises the curtain on Elmer, trapping him on stage. As the orchestra begins playing, Bugs comes into play as the barber who is going to make sure that Elmer is going to get a grooming he will never forget.
- Kiss Me Kate (1953) Fred and Lilly are a divorced pair of actors who are brought together by Cole Porter who has written a musical version of The Taming of the Shrew. Of course, the couple seem to act a great deal like the characters they play. A fight on the opening night threatens the production, as well as two thugs who have the mistaken idea that Fred owes their boss money and insist on staying next to him all night.
- Sommarnattens leende (1955) Smiles of a Summer Night: A small town at the turn of the century. Lawyer Fredrik Egerman has an ingenue-wife, Anne, and a grown-up son, Henrik, from an earlier marriage. His wife is still untouched, and instead he meets his former mistress Desiree after her performance at the theatre.
- Let's Make Love (1960) Billionaire Jean-Marc Clement learns that he is to be satirized in an off-Broadway revue. He goes to the theatre, where he sees Amanda rehearsing a song, and the director thinks him an actor suited to play himself in the revue. He takes the part in order to see more of Amanda.
- Persona (1966) A young nurse, Alma, is put in charge of Elisabeth Vogler: an actress who is seemingly healthy in all respects, but will not talk. As they spend time together, Alma speaks to Elisabeth constantly, never receiving any answer. Alma eventually confesses her secrets to a seemingly sympathetic Elisabeth and finds that her own personality is being submerged into Elisabeth's persona. Elisabeth became mute in a play.
- The Goodbye Girl (1977) Elliot Garfield is an actor who is set to move into an apartment that he sublet from an actor friend of his, the only problem is that his friends ex-girlfriend and her daughter are still living in the apartment. They make a deal to share the apartment and he works in some theater productions until he gets a call to do a movie.
- Fame (1980) At the New York City High School for the Performing Arts, students get specialized training that often leads to success as actors, singers, etc. This movie follows four students from the time when they audition to get into the school, through graduation. They are the brazen Coco Hernandez, shy Doris Finsecker, sensitive gay Montgomery MacNeil, and brash, abrasive Raul Garcia.
- Ding et Dong le film (1990) This is about two down-and-out wannabe actors. After being thrown out of their apartment, they resort to door-to-door comedy shows. They eventually meet a dying rich man that puts them on his will. Ding and Dong get 30 million dollars when the man dies. With the money, they decide to buy a theater and set their mind on acting in one of Corneille's plays. But soon, being rich tears them apart, which is encouraged by their new friends.
- Noises Off... (1992) A travelling theater group find so much action going on behind-the-scenes, they almost ruin the performances. Lloyd Fellowes is the director of a theatre company. He's desperately trying to get his production together, despite the best efforts of the cast, the crew, and Lady Luck. We follow the production from final rehersals, through opening night, and onto the tour: as with any group of actors forced to work closely together for any great length of time, romances and arguments are bound to break out. Quite often, what's happening on stage is nothing compared to what's happening backstage....
- Mighty Aphrodite (1995) Lenny (Woody Allen) and Amanda (Helena Bonham Carter) have an adopted son Max who turns out to be brilliant. Lenny becomes obsessed with finding his real parents because they too must be brilliant. When he finds that Linda Ash (Mira Sorvino) is Max' real mother, Lenny is disappointed. Linda is a prostitute and porn star. On top of that, she is quite possibly the dumbest person Lenny has ever met. Interwoven is a wonderful Greek chorus linking the story with the story of Oedipus.
- Shakespeare in Love (1998) Romantic comedy set in London in the late 16th century: Young playwright William Shakespeare struggles with his latest work "Romeo and Ethel the Pirate's Daughter". A great fan of Shakespeare's plays is young, wealthy Viola who is about to be married to the cold-hearted Lord Wessex, but constantly dreams of becoming an actress. Women were not allowed to act on stage at that time (female roles were played by men, too), but dressed up as a boy, Viola successfully auditions for the part of Romeo. Soon she and William are caught in a forbidden romance that provides rich inspiration for his play.
- Topsy-Turvy (1999) After Gilbert and Sullivan's latest play fails, the team threatens to disband until they are inspired to do their masterpiece, "The Mikado."
- The Original Cast Album (2001) Welcome to Neverland! Seventeen year old Gregory lives with his manic-depressive mom in a Manhattan apartment that looks more like the costume shop of some musty, old theater...long dark. Gregory owns just about every original cast album ever recorded, dresses up like Peter Pan and zealously clings to the notion that a better life awaits them at Rhode Island's Theater-By-The Sea where they can co-star in an endless summer of breezy musicals. Mother, however, professes to be an actress who doesn't sing, a situation Gregory tries to remedy by inviting a 500 lb. vocal coach to move in with them. Add a wheelchair-dependent chorus girl and you have writer/director Edward Jordon's apocalyptic "Regards To Broadway"...a pitch black dramedy (with music) about four misfits desperately struggling to make their lives as rousing as the music on an "Original Cast Album."
- The Goodbye Girl (2004) Elliot Garfield is an actor who is set to move into an apartment that he sublet from an actor friend of his, the only problem is that his friends ex-girlfriend and her daughter are still living in the apartment. They make a deal to share the apartment and he works in some theater productions until he gets a call to do a movie.
- Jersey Girl (2004) Gertie Trinke wants her father to take her to New York City to see Cats on broadway, he tells her that there is no more Cats so they can't go see it but he lets her choose another play to go see. She chooses Sweeney Todd, so her father takes her to see it and she has a school program coming up in which all of the members of her class are to perform a scene from a broadway play, so she wants to do a scene from Sweeney Todd with her family. Her father reluctantly agrees to let her do it.
Author Comments:
This list includes:
1. Movies with characters that are involved in the Theater or aspiring to it, including biopics.
2. Movies that portray scenes of performing plays on stage.
3. Movies with characters that are obssessed with Theater/Stage actors, etc.
This list does not include.
1. documentaries
Cloned From:
How about Mighty Aphrodite... where woody allen gets advice and his future told from an greek choir... not sure if that qualifies... but it definitly screamed theatre-loving to me.
Thanks for the suggestion.
Hmm, I'd forgotten about that Greek chorus in Mighty Aphrodite. How about Topsy-Turvy and All About Eve?
Good choices, I hadn't even thought about All About Eve when I started this list.
Noises Off... is a pretty funny farce about theatrical performance.
If you aren't too particular about quality, there's also Fame. And if you are particular, you could include Persona.