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My Grandmother's Favorite Film(And One of Mine)

posted 13 years ago by ecarle
10 replies | jump to latest

I was a young fellow in 1969 when "Hello, Dolly" came out, and I had a favorite grandmother. She was a very nice, kind loving lady, but she worked very hard for a living in a physical trade and took life very seriously. She was what you might call stoic.

She wasn't much for movies. But she would dutifully attend them with my family on those times when that was the selected entertainment of her visit to us. She usually said nothing more "oh, that was alright, I guess" after seeing one.

Until we saw "Hello, Dolly." Roadshow. Big screen. Stereophonic sound.

Its hard to explain, but it was a revelation watching my Grandmother watch Hello, Dolly. She responded to it. She laughed. She applauded musical numbers when they ended. And -- and I remember this well -- this stoic, hardbitten woman just couldn't stop smiling. She'd say "this is wonderful."

As we all left the theater, she was, rather staggeringly, a chatterbox about this movie. "What a wonderful movie. The dresses had such beautiful colors. All the people were so nice. Wouldn't it have been wonderful to live like that?"

We almost chuckled at grandmother's reaction to Hello, Dolly. We literally hadn't ever seen her CARE about any movie before. I do remember that we made the "sacrifice" of giving grandmother the "Hello Dolly Souveneir Book"(they used to make those back then) about the making of the movie that had been on sale in the theater lobby. For years when we would visit grandmother, that Hello, Dolly book was in a place of pride on her bookcase.

There was a postscript: "Hello, Dolly" came to the CBS Thursday Night Movie in 1974, about four-plus years after the theatrical release, and I noted it was to be broadcast and I decided I had to see it on TV with my grandmother. I picked up a girl friend(who had met the grandmother a time or two and found her stoic, too), said "we're going out to drive out to watch Hello, Dolly with my grandmother. You've got to see this."

So we all watched the movie on CBS ...and I was delighted to see my grandmother come to life yet again watching "Hello, Dolly." It was amazing, really. When it was all over, she was going on again "That movie is so, so wonderful, I'm so, so, happy!" I got "girl friend points" for setting this up -- SHE was impressed by getting to watch my grandmother's change in personality.

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Personally, I like "Hello, Dolly" just fine for its merits. Streisand is funny and her singing is great. Walter Matthau is near the top of my "favorite star" list and therefore a delight to see in this odd showcase for his talent. The production is "like they don't make 'em anymore." Most of the songs are great, the "Hello, Dolly" production number is superb, and it means something to me that Ernest Lehman("North by Northwest") wrote it and Gene Kelly directed it.

But all of that rather pales in comparison to the fact that my stoic grandmother went ass-over-teakettle happy crazy for "Hello, Dolly."

She's long gone now. But whenever "Hello, Dolly" turns up on cable, I think of her warmly, and I think of how "Hello, Dolly" is one of my favorite movies of all time.

Because it was hers.

[–] mikwalen 13 years ago

WHAT a lovely story!! Thanks so much for sharing!
I can see why anyone would go ape over the film of DOLLY. I do SERIOUSLY get offended at all the hate that is flung at this film. ANd it *did not* "flop". It cost more than it took back at first, but the film brought back in 15 million - about the same or more than big hits like "Rosemary's Baby". Measured in this way, the film was a hit. Consider also that in the afterlife of home video, it has become one of Fox's all time best selling home video titles.

And I do recall when it was shown on CBS that evening in 1974 - that was my first exposure to it. I went into school (5th grade) the next day babbling about it!

"Please stop hitting me - it's SO lower-case"

[–] ecarle 13 years ago

WHAT a lovely story!! Thanks so much for sharing!

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Thank you for reading it. The movies of our lives often connect to...the story of our lives.

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I can see why anyone would go ape over the film of DOLLY. I do SERIOUSLY get offended at all the hate that is flung at this film. ANd it *did not* "flop". It cost more than it took back at first, but the film brought back in 15 million - about the same or more than big hits like "Rosemary's Baby". Measured in this way, the film was a hit. Consider also that in the afterlife of home video, it has become one of Fox's all time best selling home video titles.

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Well, it came in Number Five even for 1969, and, over time, indeed, the home video market took care of everything.

You have to remember that there was a critical "hit" out on musicals in 1968 and 1969. The New Wave of American critics wanted a New Wave of American "cinema" and the musicals of '68(Funny Girl, Finian's Rainbow, even Best Picture winner Oliver) and '69(Hello Dolly, Paint Your Wagon) were "the enemy."

People saw most all of them..but few of them recouped their costs. And all these years later, they are pretty entertaining.

Especially Hello, Dolly.

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And I do recall when it was shown on CBS that evening in 1974 - that was my first exposure to it. I went into school (5th grade) the next day babbling about it!

Good for you!

[–] mikwalen 13 years ago

Thank you for your reply!
Next up, I'd love a new edition of the DOLLY dvd with some beefed up extras - commentary or interviews with the surviving cast, maybe a making-of?

I also love a lot of those late 60s musicals, particularly DOLLY, SWEET CHARITY, CHITTY/BANG, HALF A SIXPENCE, and HAPPIEST MILLIONAIRE. I gets me when they're written off as "bombs". They bring me joy!

"Please stop hitting me - it's SO lower-case"

[–] ecarle 13 years ago

I have a very strong love for "Finian's Rainbow," (1968)which was made a bit "on the cheap" on the Warner Brothers backlot, but which has some lovely tunes...sexily sung by Petulia Clark for the most part, and some very clever direction.

By a new young director named Francis Ford Coppola. (With an "intern" named George Lucas.)

Coppola stylized his "Rainbow" very much, and it makes for quite the show. The duet of Petulia Clark and near-unknown Don Francks on "That Old Devil Moon" is very New Hollywood and very sexy, and almost a soft rock number.

Also: Before the story proper starts, "Finian's Rainbow" has a credit sequence in which doubles for stars Fred Astaire and Petula Clark(as Irish father and daughter), accompanied by the lush strains of two songs("Look to the Rainbow" and "How Are Things in Glocca Mora?") cross the whole of wide-screen America: they walk past the Statue of Liberty, and down from Mount Rushmore, and through the Grand Canyon, and near the Golden Gate Bridge...and even walk through Bodega Bay in a nod to Hitchocck's "The Birds" before coming to roost in...the American South?

Coppola said that because so much of "Finian's Rainbow" was a backlot job, that "See America First" opening would trick the audience into thinking "Finian" had a bigger budget than it did.

[–] mikwalen 13 years ago

I very much liked the way the score of FINIAN was performed in the film version. And the backlot didn't bother me, it doubled as "the South" very nicely.

The only scenes that looked "sound-stagey" were the night time scenes in the forest ("Old Devil Moon", "When I'm not Near", etc) but that was fine.

I saw DOLLY on CBS in 1974. I don't recall when FINIAN came to TV, but I saw it in 1983 at a revival house in NYC.

[–] jac91604 13 years ago

What a sweet story!

It is a fun film.

[–] lroy77 13 years ago

This was one of my mother's. She liked all the big musicals. At seven I was not able to see it on the big screen. I hope it does for the 50th.

[–] ecarle 12 years ago

That would be a fun experience!

[–] TheSilentMovieLady 9 years ago

Thanks for that beautiful story. I won't ever forget it.

[–] ecarle 9 years ago

Thank you for so much for reading it. That means a lot to me.