THE CATERED AFFAIR (1956)

Lionized for his first and next-to-last screenplays (MARTY/’55; NETWORK/’76), Paddy Cheyefsky might better be remembered for his antepenultimate script (HOSPITAL/’71) and for this second film, like MARTY, adapted from his teleplay.  This largely ignored kitchen-sink drama, it was obviously designed to follow the enormous, unexpected success of MARTY.  Ernest Borgnine again stars, now living in the Bronx, a hack driver saving up to buy a long coveted taxi medallion.  But plans run headlong into life & wife Bette Davis, whose simmering passive/aggressive resentment finds outlet in giving loyal daughter Debbie Reynolds the formal wedding & grand reception Davis missed out on.  In theory, nothing in this film should work.  Yet as the dowdy wife, Bette Davis, a decade older than Borgnine and hardly salt-of-the-earth Bronx, gives an astonishingly naturalistic, vanity-free perf; Borgnine shows rare restraint with hardly a yell; and Reynolds douses the twinkle & her typical ingratiation tricks.  The whole cast ups their game, playing ‘ordinary little people’ without grandstanding or condescension.  Even the apartment looks just right, with its tiny eat-in kitchen (Davis proves a whiz at the stove) or showing how a single bed can take over an entire room.  The original Cheyefsky teleplay (which had Thelma Ritter in the mother role) was deftly ‘opened up’ by Gore Vidal (of all people), given grimy, atmospheric lensing from John Alton and, most surprising of all, fluid, intensely compacted direction from Richard Brooks.*  Dumped by M-G-M near the end of the brief Dore Schary era (hardly even a  decent poster), naturally, no one went to see it.  Their loss.

SCREWY THOUGHT OF THE DAY:  *The biggest surprise here isn’t Bette Davis toning things down to fit naturally into the ensemble (as anyone who’s seen her late tv pic STRANGERS/’79 will know); watch Davis acknowledge Borgnine’s return from night shift by not acknowledging him.  No, the real surprise (even more than Debbie Reynolds’ lack of varnish) comes in Richard Brooks’ helming.  Hollywood was rapidly switching to various Wide Screen formats, Brooks, too.  But since MARTY had been shot in Academy ratio (1.33:1), that’s how this was shot.  But by the time it went out to theaters, M-G-M decided to crop down for a wider screen picture of 1.85:1; common then/common now.).  But I don’t think Brooks knew it before he filmed.  And the serendipitous tightening in composition, gave his work a dynamic quality he rarely showed again.

DOUBLE-BILL/LINK:  Follow the link below for a snapshot of A CATERED AFFAIR/’07.  A near-miss B’way Musicalization that had its heart in the right place.   http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ZPHRj9cs2X0