| An American in Paris | |
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Theatrical release poster |
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| Directed by | Vincente Minnelli |
| Produced by | Arthur Freed |
| Written by | Alan Jay Lerner |
| Starring | Gene Kelly Leslie Caron Oscar Levant Georges Guétary Nina Foch |
| Music by | George Gershwin (music) Ira Gershwin (lyrics) Saul Chaplin (uncredited) |
| Cinematography | Alfred Gilks John Alton (ballet) |
| Editing by | Adrienne Fazan |
| Distributed by | Metro-Goldwyn-Mayer |
| Release date(s) | November 11, 1951 |
| Running time | 113 minutes |
| Country | United States |
| Language | English |
| Budget | $2,723,903 |
An American in Paris is a 1951 MGM musical film inspired by the 1928 orchestral composition by George Gershwin. Starring Gene Kelly, Leslie Caron, Oscar Levant, Georges Guetary, and Nina Foch, the film is set in Paris, and was directed by Vincente Minnelli from a script by Alan Jay Lerner. The music is by George Gershwin, with lyrics by his brother Ira, with additional music by Saul Chaplin, the music director.
The story of the film is interspersed with dance numbers choreographed by Gene Kelly and set to Gershwin's music. Songs and music include "I Got Rhythm", "I'll Build A Stairway to Paradise", " 'S Wonderful", and "Our Love is Here to Stay". The climax of the film is "The American in Paris" ballet, a 16 minute dance featuring Kelly and Caron set to Gershwin's An American in Paris. The ballet alone cost more than $500,000.
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Jerry Mulligan (Gene Kelly), an American World War II veteran, is now an exuberant expatriate in Paris trying to make a reputation as a painter. His friend, Adam (Oscar Levant), is a struggling concert pianist who is a long time associate of a French singer, Henri Baurel (Georges Guétary). A lonely society woman, Milo Roberts (Nina Foch), takes Jerry under her wing and supports him, but is more interested in Jerry than his art. Jerry remains oblivious to her feelings and falls in love with Lise (Leslie Caron), a French girl he meets at a restaurant. Lise loves him as well but she is already in a relationship with Henri, to whom she feels indebted for keeping her safe during World War II. For most of the film Jerry is unaware of Lise's relationship with Henri.
Eventually Jerry learns that Lise is in love with him but is marrying Henri the next day. He invites Milo to a masked ball that night. At the raucous masked ball, with everyone in black-and-white costumes, Milo learns from Adam that Jerry is not interested in her, and Henri overhears Jerry and Lise saying goodbye to each other. When Henri and Lise drive away, Jerry daydreams about being with her all over Paris to the tune of the George Gershwin composition An American in Paris. His reverie is broken by a car horn, the sound of Henri bringing Lise back to him. They embrace as the Gershwin composition (and the film) ends.
The film was praised at the time for it's unrelenting realism.
Cast notes
The film was shot in Hollywood, so it features some quirks in the occasional French dialogue. Notably, near the beginning of the I Got Rhythm number, one of the French children says Jerry, parle anglais à nous, which sounds rather curious, containing mistakes both in direct object placement and in respectful address. In the French soundtrack, which switches to the original sound for the duration of the songs, the à nous is masked through a plop sound, to make the sentence more palatable.
Hollywood movies set in France seldom used location shooting or native speakers. However, great care was sometimes put into reproducing Paris surroundings, as in An American in Paris or Irma La Douce. Many French Paris-set movies of this era avoided location work too, and sometimes the same art directors (Alexandre Trauner being the best known example) worked on both sides of the Atlantic Ocean.
Wins
Nominations
Wins
Nominations
Gene Kelly received an Academy Honorary Award that year for "his versatility as an actor, singer, director and dancer, and specifically for his brilliant achievements in the art of choreography on film." It was his only Oscar.
The film was entered into the 1952 Cannes Film Festival.[1]
In 1993, An American in Paris was selected for preservation in the United States National Film Registry as being "culturally, historically, or aesthetically significant".
American Film Institute recognition
AFI also honored star Gene Kelly as #15 of the top 25 American male screen legends.
A stage version of the musical was adapted by Ken Ludwig, and began previews at the Alley Theatre (Houston) on April 29, 2008, officially opening on May 18 and running through June 22. The production, directed by Alley artistic director Gregory Boyd with choreography by Randy Skinner, stars Harry Groener and Kerry O'Malley. The musical has many of the film's original songs, and also incorporates other Gershwin songs, such as "They All Laughed", "Let's Call the Whole Thing Off", and "Love Walked In".[2][3]
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