SHAKESPEARE

Synopsis

Feature film comedy. A businessman (Connors), faced with an income tax demand of $500,000, decides to invest in a deliberately bad movie. He employs a has-been French actor (Chevalier) and a glamorous, talentless actress (Mansfield) to appear in a pilot of The Romeo and Juliet Story. He takes the film to the Venice Film Festival where it unexpectedly gains huge acclaim and a prize. A plot very similar to Mel Brook’s THE PRODUCERS (1967). From Romeo and Juliet only the balcony scene is shown but Chevalier’s audition piece is from Macbeth (III i) and there is a scene in which mobsters read Shakespearean scripts (King Lear and A Midsummer Night’s Dream).

Language

English

Country

United States

Medium

Film

Technical information

Black-and-white / Sound

Year of release

1964

Duration

90 mins; c8,100 feet

Credits

Director

George Sherman

Cinematographer

Enzo Serafin

Screenplay

Hal Biller

Music

Georges Garvarentz

Cast

Akim Tamiroff	Pandowski
Jayne Mansfield	Angela
Maurice Chevalier	Philippe Fontaine
Michael Connors	Frank Pagano

Additional Details

Production type

Fiction Films

Plays

Romeo and Juliet

Subjects

Drama

Keywords

Shakespeare, William (1564-1616); Auditions

Notes

Notes

The BFI National Archive holds a 35mm preservation copy only - no viewing copy (2005).

Production Company

Name

Yankee Productions

Archive

Name

BFI National Archive

Web

http://www.bfi.org.uk/archive-collections/searching-access-collections/research-viewing-services External site opens in new window

Phone

020 7255 1444

Fax

020 7436 0165

Address

21 Stephen Street
London
W1T 1LN

Name

Library of Congress, Motion Picture, Broadcasting & Recorded Sound Division

Web

http://catalog.loc.gov/ External site opens in new window

Phone

(20) 707-8572

Fax

(20) 707-237’1

Address

Motion Picture & Television Reading Room
James Madison Building, LM 336
101 Independence Avenue, SE
Washington, D.C.
20540-4690
United States