Kiss Me, Kate (film)
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| Kiss Me, Kate | |
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| Directed by | George Sidney |
| Produced by | Jack Cummings |
| Written by | Dorothy Kingsley |
| Starring | Kathryn Grayson Howard Keel Ann Miller |
| Distributed by | Metro Goldwyn Mayer |
| Release date(s) | November 26, 1953 |
| Running time | 109 min. |
| Language | English |
Kiss Me, Kate is the 1953 MGM film adaptation of the Broadway musical of the same name.
Inspired by The Taming of the Shrew, it tells the tale of two once-married, now-divorced musical theater actors, Fred Graham and Lilli Vanessi, who are performing opposite each other in the roles of Petruchio and Katharina in a Broadway-bound musical version of William Shakespeare's play. Already on poor terms, the pair begin an all-out emotional war mid-performance that threatens the production's success. The only thing keeping the show together are threats from a pair of gangsters, who have come to collect a gambling debt from the show's Lucentio, Bill Calhoun. In classic musical comedy fashion, slapstick madness ensues before everything is resolved.
Dorothy Kingsley's screenplay, which was nominated for a Writers Guild of America Award, was adapted from the musical's book by Samuel and Bella Spewack. The songs were by Cole Porter, with musical underscoring by Saul Chaplin and Andre Previn, who were nominated for an Academy Award. Hermes Pan choreographed the dance routines.
The cast, directed by George Sidney, included Howard Keel, Kathryn Grayson, Ann Miller, Tommy Rall, Keenan Wynn, James Whitmore, Bob Fosse, Carol Haney, Bobby Van, and Jeanne Coyne.
The movie was filmed in 3-D using the most advanced methods of that technique then available. Devotees of the stereoscopic 3-D medium usually cite this film as one of the best examples of a Hollywood release in polarized 3D.
Nearly all of Porter's rather risqué lyrics had to be "cleaned up" to avoid the wrath of the censors, thus dulling much of the comedy and making the results rather bland. "Brush Up Your Shakespeare", the most suggestive song in the score, was cut in half to avoid its raciest lyrics, and the song "Too Darn Hot," also sanitized, was changed from a number performed by several African-American singers to a tap routine for Ann Miller.
