PRODUCER'S SHOWCASE: BLOOMER GIRL

Barbara Cook

BLOOMER GIRL (Producer's Showcase/1956). Directed by Alex Segal. Presented Live. 

Bloomer Girl was a successful (if now essentially forgotten) Broadway musical that was adapted for television in an abbreviated version for the program Producer's Showcase. Celeste Holm, who had starred on Broadway, was replaced by Barbara Cook, a wise choice. The musical takes place just before the Civil War, and Evalina (Cook) is the only unmarried daughter of hoop (for skirts) manufacturer Horatio Applegate (Paul Ford). Her Aunt Dolly (Carmen Mathews) not only runs the newspaper but is an early feminist. Along comes Southern gentleman Jefferson Calhoun (Keith Andes), who is going to work for Horatio and begins courting an initially unimpressed Evalina. Unfortunately, Calhoun also brings along a slave, Pompey (Roy Spearman), who is hoping to stay North as a free man, something Evalina wants but which his owner may object to.  

Roy Spearman

Bloomer Girl dealt with women's rights and black rights in the 1950's, and frankly it's amazing that a live production was shown on television during the same period. Of course Pompey is a polite, somewhat subservient black character, yet he's also given the stirring song "The Eagle and Me," which is all about wanting and needing freedom. The performances in this TV version are all excellent, with Cook as delightful and in as good a voice as ever. Keith Andes adeptly plays the leading man, his charm working to overcome Calhoun's less likable traits, although he eventually triumphs over them. Carmen Mathews and Ford are typically on-target, and Spearman not only has a wonderful voice but imbues the role with a certain dignity.  

In this shortened version of the Broadway show, several of the lesser numbers have been cut. However, there's some gold in what remains: "When the Boys Come Home;" "Evalina;" "Sundays in Cicero Falls;" and the romantic duet "Right as the Rain" -- along with "The Eagle and Me" -- are the most memorable tunes. The lilting music is by Harold Arlen and the lyrics by E. Y. Harburg. Bloomer Girl isn't necessarily one of the all-time great musicals, but it is a worthwhile and interesting show which in some aspects was ahead of its time. 

Verdict: Tuneful, well-done, and sometimes moving. ***. 

BUTTERFIELD 8

Liz Taylor and Laurence Harvey

BUTTERFIELD 8 (1960). Director: Daniel Mann.

"Every awful moment of it, I Loved!" -- Gloria.

Gloria Wandrous (Elizabeth Taylor) is a model and good-time girl who has a male best friend, Steve (Eddie Fisher), who may be in love with her, to the consternation of his girlfriend, Norma (Susan Oliver). Gloria begins an affair with an unhappily married man named Weston Liggett (Laurence Harvey of Summer and Smoke) and is convinced that her sordid liquor-and-sex past is over, that she has found true love at last. But there is still the wife, Emily (Dina Merrill) to deal with, and more than one ugly misunderstanding ...

Eddie Fisher and La Liz

Butterfield 8 is undoubtedly a sanitized, cliff notes version of John O'Hara's 1935 novel, and has apparently been updated to the late 1950's. Gloria is not an especially sympathetic character (nor Weston) until she reveals to Steve what happened to her in her childhood in a powerful sequence. Like something out of Harvey's film Room at the Top, Weston has apparently married for a good job and social position, although his wife seems to blame her own family for making things too easy for him. Taylor gives a very good performance, and won an Oscar for her portrayal. Harvey is also excellent, and there's good work from Merrill, Oliver, Kay Medford as a motel proprietor, Carmen Mathews as Emily's mother, and especially Mildred Dunnock as Gloria's mother and Betty Field as her very blunt best friend, Frances. Eddie Fisher, who was married to Taylor at the time (after leaving Debbie Reynolds for her), gives a respectable performance.

Verdict: Good performances and some good dialogue lift this a notch above the soap opera level. ***. 

BUTTERFIELD 8

BUTTERFIELD 8 (1960). Director: Daniel Mann.

"Let's face it -- I was the slut of all time!"

Gloria (Elizabeth Taylor) is a beautiful "model" who is chased by men and considered a complete slut by the prudish. Her best friend is Steve (Eddie Fisher), whose girlfriend Norma (Susan Oliver), is jealous of Gloria. Gloria's latest conquest -- or is it the other way around? -- is Weston Liggett (Laurence Harvey), who is married to the very wise Emily (Dina Merrill). Things threaten to come to a boil when Emily finds her mink coat missing, unaware that hubby loaned it to Gloria ... Mildred Dunnock is Gloria's concerned mother and Betty Field the mother's friend, Fanny. Kay Medford is an ex-vaudevillian motel owner who sadly remembers the glory days and Carmen Mathews has a good turn as Emily's mother. Harvey is excellent, Taylor is quite good [although perhaps not quite deserving of the Oscar she won], and Fisher -- who was then married to Taylor -- does a nice job as well, although he always tends to get knocked by critics and biographers. Taylor has an especially good scene telling Fisher about her childhood sexual abuse. The movie has the odd distinction of being somewhat "modern" and yet dated at one and the same time. The impression one gets is that the film is trying to paint Gloria as an emotionally wounded "sexaholic" yet there's also that old double-standard that men who sleep around are studs but women who do the same are whores -- and that ending!

Verdict: At least you've got Liz sauntering sexily. ***.