A Letter to Three Wives
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Movie Reviews of A Letter to Three Wives
Movie Review: An Amusing Satire of the Relations Between Men and Women
Summary: 5 Stars
Three suburban wives board an excursion boat to chaperone an all-day outing with a group of school children. Just before the boat leaves the dock a messenger arrives with a note for the three of them. It's from Addie Ross, an old friend who may not be much of a friend. "Dearest Debby, Lora Mae and Rita," she writes. "As you know, by now, you'll have to carry on without me from here. It isn't easy to leave a town like our town, to tear myself away from you three dear, dear friends who have meant so much to me. And so I consider myself lucky to be able to take with me a sort of memento, something to remind me of the town that was my home, and of my three very dearest friends, who I never want to forget, and I won't. You see, girls, I've run off with one of your husbands. Addie" For the next few hours, unable to get to a telephone, each of the three women can only reflect back on her marriage and wonder if she is the one who has just lost her husband. Only that afternoon when they return will they learn which husband Addie made off with.
There's Deborah Bishop (Jeanne Crain) married to Brad (Jeffrey Lynn). She was a small town girl swept away by a glamorous officer, who now lives a life of country club complacency. She has never lost her insecurity. There's Rita Phipps (Ann Southern) married to George (Kirk Douglas). She and her husband started out as school teachers. He still is but she is carving a successful and well-paid career as a radio soap opera writer. There's Lora Mae Hollingsway (Linda Darnell) married to Porter (Paul Douglas). She wanted away from the other side of the tracks, and managed to make a marriage happen with the town's biggest businessman.
As they flash back, we learn a lot about each one of them and the state of their marriages. Hovering over everything is the presence of Addie. "That's Addie, for you," gushes Brad at one moment. "Always the right thing at the right time. Thoughtful and generous." "Generous to a fault," agrees George. "To a fault. That's Addie," say Rita, making a face. We never meet Addie, never even see her, but she keeps up a voice-over commentary with us that is amusing, a little malicious and wise about the ways of husbands.
By the end of the movie the three couples have learned a good deal about themselves and what's important. Addie indeed had run off with one of the husbands. And nonetheless the movie has a happy and satisfying ending.
Many critics think this is Joseph Mankiewicz' best movie after All About Eve. He won Oscars for best screenplay and best direction (and then repeated the next year for Eve). There are any number of good things about the film. The situation could have degenerated into melodrama but Mankiewicz' writing is so amusing and sophisticated it raises the game. It crackles with commentary on any number of issues, and most are still pertinent today. "I'm a school teacher," George Phipps says. "That's even worse than being an intellectual. School teachers are not only comic they're often cold and hungry in this richest land of ours." Try substituting "television writing" for "radio writing" and hear the zingers snap home as George offends a radio advertising executive. "The purpose of radio writing," he says, "as far as I can see is to prove to the 'masses' that a deodorant can bring happiness, a mouthwash guarantee success and a laxative attract romance." Mankiewicz' brief satire of a radio soap opera, "Another Day in the Notebook of Linda Grey, Registered Nurse," is almost as good as some of Bob and Ray's stuff.
All the actors do fine jobs, but particularly appealing, I think, are Ann Southern as Rita, Linda Darnell as Lora Mae and Paul Douglas as Porter. Unbilled and stealing scenes is Thelma Ritter as the Phipps' maid. Also unbilled but a key element in the movie is Celeste Holm. She does Addie's voice...warm, low pitched, amused, and not to be trusted if you're a wife.
The black and white DVD looks great. There are several extras, including a TV biography of Linda Darnell and a commentary track which includes two of Joseph Mankiewicz' biographers and his son.
Movie Review: Mankiewicz at Acerbic Best; Darnell, Crain and Sothern as Nervous Wives
Summary: 5 Stars
World War Two had recently ended and things were settling back to normal in affluent Connecticut suburbia until a bombshell from out of the blue thrust three reasonably contented wives into a state of panic.
Joseph Mankiewicz had a genuine feel for dialogue and human conflict. He directed and wrote "A Letter to Three Wives" in between "The Ghost and Mrs. Muir" with Gene Tierney and Rex Harrison and his classic of theatrical double and triple dealing, "All About Eve" when newcomer Anne Baxter on the surface seeks to befriend Broadway star Bette Davis while plotting to overthrow her theatrical dynasty.
The 1949 release reveals the women frightened over a letter that a local charmer noted for having her way with men has written to three wives informing them that one of their husband is preparing to run away with her and say goodbye to suburban Connecticut marriage. The question is "Which one?" and this is the driving force that makes this sophisticated Mankiewicz drama a pure delight.
We never see the dazzling woman who has such compelling power and presence over the opposite sex that three beautiful and intelligent women fear that she will run off with her husband. Mankiewicz knew how to tease his viewers, offering them just a little bit, then holding back to leave them begging for more.
This is illustrated by the fact that we never see this woman who seeks to manipulate events behind the scenes and drive three women into torturous tizzy. The voice generates a perfect mix of confident appeal and daring sophistication to convince viewers that this indeed is a woman that the film's three female stars have reason to fear. The narrator is Celeste Holm, who got her big break in "Oklahoma" on Broadway and would be cast as Bette Davis's best friend in "All About Eve."
Jeanne Crain exudes a sweet and sincere beauty, the kind that could attract a man like Jeffrey Lynn, her stalwart husband who demonstrates solidity. Crain is fearful that her homespun manner might not be sophisticated and worldly enough to compete with the likes of Addie Ross, the woman behind the scenes.
Ann Sothern is a woman of shrewdness and creativity who feels edgy over the fact that, as a writer of radio soap operas, she makes more money than her intellectual schoolteacher husband. Mankiewicz sets up a fascinating clash between Sothern's husband Kirk Douglas and his wife's bosses, the producers of the soap opera drama for which Sothern writes. Their commercialism and anti-intellectualism disgust Douglas. He gets even in the manner of a teacher by correcting the female boss' grammar.
Linda Darnell grew up literally next to the tracks. The trains pass by at speedy clips and the apartment where she resides with her mother and sister rocks. Linda, a sales girl at the town department store, sees an opportunity to move up the local social ladder when Paul Douglas, the store's owner, expresses romantic interest.
Darnell seeks to steer a discrete course between displaying interest and playing hard to get, eventually winning her man.
The scenes in the apartment being rocked back and forth periodically by jolts from trains speeding down tracks while Darnell's mother, Connie Gilchrist, along with her friend Thelma Ritter drink beer and play cards, deliver superb comic relief from the unfolding domestic suspense.
Ritter delivers her usual saucy lines as the film's Greek Chorus, a role she would soon reprise for Mankiewicz as Bette Davis's lady in waiting in "All About Eve" and eventually for Alfred Hitchcock as she lectures James Stewart on why he should marry Grace Kelly in "Rear Window."
Mankiewicz keeps the pot boiling, maintaining suspense until the dramatic conclusion when the nervous wives learn the identity of the man Addie Ross insists will forego matrimony for her. Who is the man and will he actually leave his wife as Ross confidently proclaims?
Enjoy the suspense and stay tuned.
Movie Review: Witty, catty and enjoyable Mankiewicz classic comes to DVD
Summary: 5 Stars
Three women on a boating trip receive a letter from a woman claiming that she's stolen one of their husbands. Joseph Mankiewicz's catty soap opera has plenty of witty dialogue and strong performances. His adaptation of Letter to Five Wives (I guess the other two wives were too busy to appear in the movie) pared down the quintet to a trio bringing a tighter focus to the drama from John Klempner's serialized novel. Although all three female leads are great Linda Darnell's performance as a gold digger who married for money is a stand out. This terrific actress got her start at the age of 15 in movies (Fox head Darryl Zannick cheated on her age in the press releases) and appeared in a number of roles none of which garnered the Oscar nomination she so desperately deserved (although she did get a spot in the cement at Grauman's Chinese Theater in the 40's).
Fox has painstakingly restored this classic film. The original camera negative disappeared ages ago (it was shot on unstable nitrate stock) but an earlier fine grain positive existed that was made directly from the original negative. Fox carefully used it to restore the film to its former luster. The image has a sharpness, clarity and depth missing in previous editions of the movie. The blacks are deeper and richer than on previous editions of the film and the compression artifacts have been kept to a minimum. Although the box mentions that this is in stereo, it sounds as if the original optical soundtrack has been artificially reprocessed for stereo. That's not a bad thing necessarily as the sound has a richer depth and less problems with hiss and other issues that dogged films from this time frame. The original mono soundtrack is also here as well.
A great biography from A&E's Biography series appears here on the life of Linda Darnell. While that shorts the other fine actresses in the film, the documentary provide a great deal of detail about Darnell's tragic life and interesting tidbits about the making of the film. Darnell's surviving sister, Roddy MacDowall, Darnell's daughter and many others provide a full picture of the actress. Featuring home movie footage of Darnell and stills from her family's collection, it's an excellent glimpse into her life. Fox's Movietone News provides the highlights of the 1949 Academy Awards where Mankiewicz won Oscars for Best Screenplay and Best Director.
The commentary is by Christopher Mankiewicz and Mankiewicz's biographers Kenneth Geist and Cheryl Lower. All three provide very different details about the film. Geist and Lower focus on the importance of Mankiewicz's films and the underlying meaning of them as well as details about the various performers that appear in the film. Christopher Mankiewicz gives quite a bit of personal details about his father's life and what was occurring as he was making this film.
This terrific, witty character study overcomes the soap opera trappings of the story due to Mankiewicz's terrific ear for dialogue and sharp direction. The trio of actresses in the main roles give great performances as do most of the supporting cast. The extras provide quite a bit of background on the making of the film via vintage newsreels and an excellent episode of A&E's Biography. The commentary track although a bit dry benefits from having three very different perspectives of the film.
Movie Review: Easy To See Why This Was Best Picture Nominee of 1949
Summary: 5 Stars
If you're looking for an oldie but goodie that gives you a bittersweet look into the marriages of three couples, look no further than "A Letter to Three Wives." The all-star cast, insightful writing, and the use of a cleverly haunting voice-over make this a treasure. Long before their modern day counterparts on ABC, these three magnificent women were truly desperate housewives.
A mutual friend they all are a bit jealous of has a letter delivered to them as they are setting sail for a day trip. The letter informs all three that the writer, Addie Ross, has left town with one of their husbands. In wickedly funny and poignant flashbacks, each of the three marriages, all in a state of relative degeneration, are sliced open as the viewer speculates as to which husband has taken a hike.
Deborah Bishop (Jeanne Crain) is a transplanted farm girl unsure of how to dress and act in the social realm her marriage has thrust her into. Has her husband Brad (Jeffrey Lynn) found her inadequate? Lora Mae Hollingsway (Linda Darnell) is an unabashedly scheming gold-digger who makes no apologies to husband Porter (Paul Douglas). Has he run off with a woman who can truly love him and not his money? But it is the savvy career girl Rita Phipps (Ann Sothern) that I found most appealing as she is willing to work for the things she wants and, unusual for her day, takes a job writing radio soap operas to supplement the income of husband George (Kirk Douglas). Has she emasculated him to the point he can no longer take it?
Yes, there are parts of this that are dated---most notably the longing in their eyes as they set sail gazing wistfully at a phone booth on shore. No cell phones for these ladies! But the problems they reveal in their marriages, the compassionate friendship they share, and the wickedly funny use of comedy side-by-side with drama, all combine to make this the ultimate chick flick. Look for Thelma Ritter as the maid and Carl Switzer (Alfalfa of the Our Gang comedies) as the second messenger in uncredited roles. And savor the final scene when the guilty husband is revealed!
Movie Review: "Buy your car from Crazy Eddie! Pay when you get good and ready!!"
Summary: 5 Stars
The fatuousness of radio programming and radio advertising is just one of America's 1940's maladies skewered by this darkly satiric but warmly insightful film about marital relationships between three couples in a comfortable post-World War II suburb. But substitute "television" for radio and make that steam engine on the commuter run a diesel, and have things really changed that much since the late Forties?
This gem of a movie is a neglected classic of Americana. "A Letter to Three Wives" uses many of the same talents who made "All About Eve" such a hit a year later, most notably Joseph L. Mankiewicz as the writer/director and Celeste Holm, who is present here in voice only as Addie Ross, the town flirt.
Just as three of the town's more prominent clubwomen are about to depart on a day-long trip with underprivileged children, they receive a note from Addie--she has run off with one of their husbands. They have the whole day to think about which one it was. The Jeanne Crain character is insecure because she left her Iowa roots and married up to one of the town gentry. The Linda Darnell character was "shanty Irish" and married a department store millionaire with whom she shares a rather grudging relationship. Ann Sothern plays a radio screenwriter who is trying to maneuver her way out of the second-best neighborhood in town into the very best.
Along with sharp observations about class and social climbing in small towns/suburbia, this film has well-cast, spot-on acting and many genuinely funny moments, including a star turn from Kirk Douglas as a droll English teacher (bet you thought you'd never see HIM in a comedy!). Look for the wonderful (and surprisingly unbilled) Thelma Ritter as the maid from the wrong side of the tracks. All in all, "A Letter to Three Wives" is a great entertainment and a welcome addition to any video collection. I have seen my copy several times and introduced it to several people.