Review of Marjorie Morningstar

Marjorie Morningstar has integrity - she turns down a part in a Broadway play because the writer has a crush on her and doesn't require her to audition.Although she desperately wants to be in the theatre she is not willing to adopt the "easy come - easy go" attitude to sexual relationships that seems to be the norm in that milieu.She wants to be a success on her own terms. Whilst working at a Summer Camp she falls under the spell of a Svengali - like theatre director,a big fish in a small pond.Through rose - coloured glasses she sees him as some kind of genius,but he is in fact a man of limited talents,a fact that becomes clear when he enters the big time. Eventually she sees through him and is given a chance to a new life and career with the writer who is still carrying a torch for her. That's Showbiz,I guess. The mid 1950s was about the last time when you could make a movie about a JAP with theatrical aspirations going against her parents' wishes. Al Jolson has a lot to answer for. Miss Natalie Wood is just about up to the task as Marjorie Morganstern,nice but dim,pretty but muddle - headed.Her naivety may well be the main attraction for Noel Ehrman(professional name "Airman")played by Mr Gene Kelly.He is a moderately able song and dance man who writes his own material and has a musical "Princess Jones" in his head if he can just get round to it.Girls gather round him "Like moths around a flame" as Miss Dietrich once memorably sang. One of his assistants,Wally,develops a crush on Marjorie that develops into stalker - like proportions. Marjorie's best friend - the worldly wise Marsha - is played with her customary scene - stealing relish by the great Carolyn Jones who clearly has more personality in her little toe than Marjorie does in her whole body and definitely relegates Miss Wood to second place whenever they are on screen together. Eventually Marsha marries a rich "angel" who provides backing for Airman's musical which flops resoundly sending him over the top. Mr Kelly,to put it kindly,never seems happy in his role until the final scene at the Summer Camp when Marjorie,back on a visit to lay a few ghosts,sees him singing to an adoring audience of acolytes.Happy that he has found something he is good at once more,she gets on a bus to go home and is confronted by her stalker,the writer Wally,who smiles at her.Good Grief. Mr Ed Wynn is rather moving when not trying to be funny as her great uncle who has Mr Kelly sussed out as the great seducer he undoubtedly aspires to be and gives him the Gipsy's Warning,posing as a waiter bringing room service to Kelly's bachelor pad. Half a century or so ago,"Marjorie Morningstar" was a big movie.Now it seems to have shrunk somewhat.The garish colour and the corny plot have contributed to its fall from grace,but,most of all,apart from dear old Ed Wynn,it lacks a single sympathetic character.