FUNNY LADY 1975

I had such a good time watching the Joan Crawford/ Bette Davis cable TV series Feud that when its eight-episode run on the FX channel was over, it left me with both a lingering taste for biographical films that play fast and loose with the facts, and a hankering for outsized performances by actors whose scrupulously-engineered screen personas are inextricably linked to their public image.

So naturally, I thought of Barbra Streisand. That is, Barbra Streisand by way of Fanny Brice; Fanny Brice by way of Funny Girl; and ultimately, Streisand and Brice by way of the misguided, contractually-mandated Funny Girl sequel—that rapturous, cotton candy fashion parade, ego-stroke of a musical guilty pleasure known as Funny Lady.

Barbra Streisand as Fanny Brice

James Caan as Billy Rose

Omar Sharif as Nick Arnstein 

Roddy McDowall as Bobby Moore
(I wanted to give McDowall his own screencap, but the
poor guy hasn't a single close-up in the entire film)

When the narrative of the 1964 Broadway musical and subsequent 1968 film adaptation of Funny Girl concluded sometime in the late 1920s, we all knew there was more to the Fanny Brice story (punctuated by brief forays into film and television, Brice's success as a radio star lasted up to her death in 1951). Whether or not that story was anything worth telling is another matter.

Funny Lady (which some of you may know by its alternate title: “The Back of James Caan’s Head”) is ostensibly the continuing saga of Ziegfeld Follies star Fanny Brice, who, when last seen in Funny Girl, was photogenically torchin’ on a dark stage, crying her Egyptian-eyelinered eyes out after having been dumped by recently-sprung-from-jail-for-embezzlement hubby Nicky Arnstein.

An admitted highly-fictionalized account of Brice’s later years, Funny Lady picks up roughly where Funny Girl left off (very roughly, in fact); with Brice shown backstage, still-pining-for-Nicky, being served final divorce papers by Arnstein in absentia. Romantic rejection of this sort is usually the stuff of tragedy, but as this sentimental setback grants Streisand the first of many opportunities to fling her head back in classic “suffering diva” mode (treating fans to the actress’s regal profile and shapely septum) Funny Lady instantly establishes an unfortunate precedent for a musical entertainment: Streisand is at her best when Fanny is at her worst.

Indeed, given the degree of care Oscar-nominated cinematographer James Wong Howe lavishes on La Streisand when in the throes of heartbreak, from a fan's point of view, the glow of a happy Fanny Brice is no match for the luminous sheen of a miserable Barbra Streisand. So, in essence, the worse things go for Fanny, the better things go for the Streisand-watchers. This is going to be a fun musical.

 Am I Blue?

What's bad for Miss Brice is super for Streisand-watchers 

At what point in history this all transpires is rather nebulously conveyed, for the film’s vaguely delineated timeline is actually a mashup of Brice’s real-life 1927 divorce, the 1929 stock market crash, and the onset of the Great Depression. However long it's been, clearly enough time has elapsed allowing for Fanny’s transmogrification from the optimistic, likable, gently self-deprecating “People” person of Funny Girl, to the overdressed, perpetually scowling, foul-mouthed know-it-all of Funny Lady.

Funny Girl was the rags-to-riches, broken-heart-for-every-bulb-on Broadway saga of a gangly waif whose prodigious talent triumphed over humble beginnings and unconventional beauty. Audiences responded to it because it took the usual Horatio Alger clichés of the celebrity bio, added a duckling-into-a-swan fairy-tale, and crossed it with a Cinderella love story.

Funny Lady, on the other hand, showcases a Fanny Brice who’s a firmly established star. Successful, confident, glamorous (to an almost parodic degree), calling her own shots, and without a single insecure bone in her body. This proves marvelous for Streisand, who gets to look fabulous throughout without once having to endure a single joke made at the expense of her looks; dominate in numerous scenes depicting her offering people professional advice and basically telling others how they can better do their jobs; and finally, she doesn’t have to be the least bit funny. This is thanks to a screenplay that has characters tell her…at regular intervals…to her face…just how delightfully funny she is.

Funny Girl was a Cinderella fantasy, which everyone loves. Funny Lady is built on a Have-It-All Fantasy (I have talent, wealth, fame, and beauty...why can't I find love?) which is kinda annoying

A screenplay highlighting a self-possessed Fanny Brice no-doubt proved instrumental in getting Streisand to agree to appear in a sequel she really didn’t want to do, but the lack of character conflict leaves Funny Lady with almost no narrative thrust. Sure, there’s a Depression going on, but the film has Streisand parade around in so many outlandishly glamorous Bob Mackie/Ray Aghayan outfits, Brice merely comes off as living in a bubble of privilege.
Similarly, the plot sets up Brice as professionally rudderless in her post-Ziegfeld years, weathering the financial storm of the Great Depression by having to team up with novice-showman/seasoned-huckster Billy Rose in order to stay afloat. But after approximately two lines of expositional dialogue and a couple of brief exchanges, Bruce’s money woes are quickly dispatched, never to be mentioned again. 

Down on her luck, Fanny Brice goes slumming in a casual daytime frock

No, Funny Lady’s single dramatic arc (milked for all its worth for close to 2½ hours) concerns whether or not Fanny can shed her romantic illusions about the dashing Nick Arnstein in time to realize that falling “in like” with the sloppy, unsophisticated, very Henry Street, Billy Rose is perhaps where her happiness lies. But even THIS minimal, not terribly compelling conflict is undermined by the casting of athletic, macho James Caan as the diminutive (4' 11"), unprepossessing Billy Rose. What could have been an interesting gender-reversal of Funny Girl’s “opposites attract” relationship is reduced to Fanny having to choose between the extraordinarily handsome guy who says “tomato” and the extraordinarily handsome guy who says “tomahto.”

Streisand in an interview; "It comes down to whom the audience wants to see me kiss.
Robert Blake [an early Billy Rose contender], no. James, Caan, yes."

  

WHAT I LOVE ABOUT THIS FILM

I get a kick out of Funny Lady in spite of the fact that it’s fairly useless as biography, bloodless as a love story, and too disjointed and episodic to even satisfy as a cohesive narrative (it’s impossible to keep track of how much time has elapsed between scenes). But Funny Lady works best, makes the most sense, and proves both an invaluable source of information and entertainment when taken for what it really is: a Barbra Streisand report card.  

Here, Streisand grants the audience permission to get a load of her

Think about it. Beyond the old “If they liked it once, they’ll love it twice” maxim that serves as the inspirational catalyst for most movie sequels; the only reason Funny Lady exists at all is that Streisand owed Funny Girl producer Ray Stark one more film on their four-picture contract. Press releases claim the reluctant Streisand had initially informed Stark that he’d have to sue her before she’d do a Funny Girl sequel, but changed her mind after reading the script.

Not buying it. Anybody who’s seen Funny Lady knows that its script is more likely to instigate a lawsuit, not stop one. No. My gut tells me that Streisand agreed to appear in the sequel because, after a long musical hiatus (her last was 1970s On a Clear Day You Can See Forever) Funny Lady provided her with a showy vehicle that amounts to being a $7.5 million dollar progress report showcasing how far she’s come in the seven years since Funny Girl.

Funny Lady is an investors presentation of a movie, furnishing fans and the public at large irrefutable evidence, in spite of Oscar-winning Johnny-come-latelys like Time magazine’s “New Miss Show Biz” Liza Minnelli (Funny Lady enlists the talents of Cabaret’s songwriting team [Kander & Ebb] and screenwriter [Jay Presson Allen]), that Barbra Streisand—after one Oscar; eight films; and countless albums, awards, and TV specials—still has the ol’ musical comedy poop.

Funny Lady is Streisand as she enters the most self-aware (and self-serious) phase of her screen career. In this film Streisand moves to shed the old screen persona she helped create—that of the self-effacing, pigeon-toed kook with lungs of brass—and presents herself as strong, self-confident, glamorous, and in control. Admirable qualities, to be sure, but not exactly conducive to fun. In fact, this Fanny is a bit of a pill.

In place of the ingratiating, eager-to-please woman we met in 1968, 1975 Streisand doesn’t appear particularly concerned with whether or not you like her. You’re welcome to worship her if you like, but this Streisand doesn’t need your validation. Nor does she need anyone to tell her how fabulous she is. She knows it. (In fact, this is the least smiling Streisand ever…she actually looks angry 90% of the time. But as any woman who’s been told by a perfect stranger on the street to “Smile!” can tell you, a woman choosing NOT to smile is practically an act of social rebellion.)

Let's Hear It For Me...or else

PERFORMANCES

Leaving Streisand aside for the moment (dare I?), I’d like to give a quick shout-out to all those shuttled to the wings while the funny lady commands center stage.

James Caan is one of the more underrated actors to come out of the ‘70s, and I’m as guilty as the next of never quite giving this versatile actor his due. While I’m of the mind that Robert Blake would have made the most intriguing Billy Rose, James Caan is no slouch. He's actually very good here, playing Rose as a fast-talking sharpie reminiscent of Jimmy Cagney in comedy mode. He sings well, is charming, and as Streisand co-stars go, he’s one of the strongest. Too bad the overall effectiveness of his performance is sabotaged by editing which relegates him to co-star status rather than leading man.

For a gay icon with a gay son, Barbra Streisand has a pretty shady reputation for onscreen gay representation. Several of her films have characters uttering homophobic slurs (in The Owl and the Pussycat and For Pete’s Sake, she’s the culprit), and in Funny Lady, the points Roddy McDowall’s openly gay character gets for inclusion (he’s her best friend and world’s oldest chorus boy) are subverted by a script which seldom misses an opportunity to refer to him in “period-appropriate” derogatory ways.

I can’t speak to McDowall’s performance because, as in 1965s Inside Daisy Clover, he doesn’t actually have anything to do, but there’s something old-Hollywood comforting about seeing him.

It’s doubtful Tony Award-winning performer Ben Vereen had a very sizable role to begin with, but most of what he did contribute became a casualty of all the editing Funny Lady underwent before release. Playing vaudeville entertainer Bert Robinson (a fictional combination of real-life artists Bert Williams and Bill "Bojangles" Robinson, Vereen has no interaction with the main cast at all, and with the three-minute “So Long Honey Lamb” number cut to three seconds (a bullet dodged, in my opinion); only Vereen’s dynamic singing and dancing in “Clap Hands, Here Comes Charlie” remains. He’s marvelous, of course, and gives the film a much-needed kick in the pants, energy-wise, but it feels disembodied from the rest of the action, like those Lena Horne novelty sequences in MGM musicals which were filmed in ways that made them easy to be removed in Southern theaters.

It’s poor Omar Sharif who fares the worst, however. His character is set up to be knocked down; so much dialogue is given over to Streisand (“No, you don’t have any lines here. It’s my turn” she actually says to him in one of Funny Lady’s many startlingly meta moments) he merely shows up, smiles, and bows out. Twice!

Streisand draws our attention to her favorite co-star: Her nails

THE STUFF OF FANTASY

Like a great many musicals, Funny Lady is at its best when no one is talking. The film looks spectacular, thanks to the contributions of no less than three on/off cinematographers: Vilmos Zsigmond, Ernest Laszlo, James Wong Howe; and the nifty musical score is a combination of period classics and five new numbers by John Kander & Fred Ebb (though the fan-worship pandering of “How Lucky Can you Get?” and “Let’s Hear It For Me” is so shameless you might find yourself blushing). Adding to the film’s pluses are the witty, Oscar-nominated costumes by Mackie/Aghayan, which capture the theatrical, over-the-top appeal of classic Hollywood musicals.

Streisand in a little knockabout crowd-pleaser she throws on
for those nights when she just doesn't care what she looks like  

Funny Lady’s production numbers play better now than they did in 1975 when the musical arrangements and intentionally garish costuming made 1930s Broadway look like 1970s outtakes from The Carol Burnett Show (not exactly a coincidence since Funny Lady features Burnett show alumni Peter Matz [Oscar-nominated musical director], Mackie [costumes], and several members of Carol Burnett's dance chorus.)

The "Great Day" number featuring Streisand surrounded by an all-Black dance ensemble (top), perhaps found its inspiration in the similarly staged "High/Low" number Ethel Merman performed with an all-Black chorus in 1936 musical Strike Me Pink (bottom). It's wonderful, but the cringe optics of Streisand as the Great White Goddess has aged terribly. 

Although I hate it when movies feature scenes of seasoned theater professionals breaking
character simply when things go wrong on stage, I absolutely adored this set design

You're forgiven if you assume the above screencaps are from The Sonny & Cher Comedy Hour, The Donny & Marie Show, The Captain and Tennille, or The Brady Bunch Hour...all '70s TV variety shows looked like this.

Portraying a Friend of Fanny Brice Proves Risky Business
Actress Carole Wells, as Brice's friend Norma Butler in Funny Lady, suffered a fate similar to that of Anne Francis in Funny Girl. By that I mean, finding that the bulk of her scenes had been left on the cutting room floor

THE STUFF OF DREAMS

Funny Lady debuted in March of 1975, the very same month that saw the release of Ken Russell’s Tommy and Peter Bogdanovich’s At Long Last Love. Tommy was such a revelatory thrill to me that I went to see it practically every weekend during its entire run at SF’s Northpoint Theater, so by the time I got around to seeing Funny Lady, I had grown so besotted with Tommy’s mind-blowing innovation that Streisand’s film seemed positively underwhelming by comparison. Having not yet seen Funny Girl at this point—Funny Lady was just my third Streisand film—I didn’t even have sentimentality on my side (the significance of that yellow rose featured so prominently in the film’s advertising was lost on me). It was only when Funny Lady was in second-run and came to the Alhambra Theater (where I ushered) that I came to appreciate it: the patchy musical playing significantly better when viewed à la carte.

Critics seemed to hate the unconvincing old-age makeup used in Funny Lady's final scenes, but I thought Caan and Streisand looked absolutely adorable. Certainly preferable to when in 1991 Caan teamed up with Bette Midler in For The Boys and the old-age makeup applied made both actors look like reptile people

These days, Funny Lady remains both a guilty pleasure and the last of the enjoyable Streisand musicals. More Grande Lady than Funny Lady, it’s a marvelous film to revisit whenever I find myself in need of a Streisand fix.

A Streisand fix being akin to my Joan Crawford fixation: both being stars of such unique talents; they fascinate even when they’re awful. I like Barbra Streisand considerably more as a singer than an actress, but in these cookie-cutter times when I honestly can’t tell a bland Chris Pine from a vanilla Bradley Cooper, I find I’ve grown fonder (or at least more tolerant of) her distinctive screen persona. When Streisand is on her game (Funny Girl, On a Clear Day, What’s Up, Doc?) there isn’t anyone better. And while Funny Lady is not much of a showcase for Streisand the actress or comedienne, it’s a helluva showcase for Streisand the star.

BONUS MATERIAL

Distributed in theater lobbies: My Funny Lady promotional foldout from 1975.  

For those interested, the terrific The Barbra Streisand Archives offers more info than you'll likely ever want to know about the making of Funny Lady. From deleted scenes and interviews to costume sketches and behind-the-scenes trivia.

Copyright © Ken Anderson  2009 - 2017

BLOODLINE 1979

I think one of the main reasons Wait Until Dark was so upsetting to me as a kid was because the person at the receiving end of Alan Arkin’s homicidal abuse was Audrey Hepburn. MY Audrey Hepburn! The sweet, elegant, refined, ceaselessly classy, Audrey Hepburn! I didn’t even think of her as the character in the film. In fact, even today, were you to ask me the name of her character, I couldn’t say. All I could tell you is that Eliza Doolittle is blind; Sabrina doesn’t know she's in possession of a doll full of heroin, and a mean man in a leather jacket chases Holly Golightly around with a switchblade.

Wait Until Dark - 1967

Like many, I fell in love with Audrey Hepburn the first time I saw her on the screen. And it never bothered me one whit that I rarely, if ever, expected her to be anything but her own glorious self from film to film. Hepburn’s screen persona and personal identity were both so intrinsically interlinked in my mind; actress and image remained one and the same. I simply counted on her bringing the same charming, immensely likable personality to whatever role she played—like an insurance policy of goodwill. It got so that no matter what a film’s shortcomings, Hepburn’s reliably enchanting presence assured me of at least a couple of blissful hours spent in the glow of her one-of-a-kind, movie star incandescence.

Two for the Road - 1967

I grew up during the early days of movie-star overexposure (via talk shows, game shows, TV specials), so a significant part of Hepburn’s appeal was scarcity. Not only did she not make many films (contributing to my youthful perception that when she did deign to appear in a movie, it HAD to be special), but Hepburn took a lengthy hiatus from acting precisely at the time I discovered her. I was in the fourth grade when she starred in two of what would become my absolute top favorite Audrey Hepburn films: Two for the Road and Wait Until Dark (both 1967)—only to abruptly drop from sight to raise a family. I was in college when she returned to the screen for Robin and Marian (1976).

I was overjoyed at the prospect of Audrey Hepburn’s comeback (“I hate that word!” – Norma Desmond) but Richard Lester’s Robin and Marian turned out to be a bit of a mixed bag. Hepburn was wonderful as ever, indeed, she’s really rather remarkable, and her scenes with Sean Connery are heartachingly good and never fail to move me to tears. But I always saw Hepburn as a true original and a “star”…someone worthy of the kind of even-handed role Katherine Hepburn shared with Peter O’Toole in The Lion in Winter. In the Richard Lester film, Hepburn’s Maid Marian struck me as being just a shade above a secondary role. Responsible for shouldering all the emotional weight, hers was a mature, glorified but nonetheless typical “supportive girlfriend” role in a male action/adventure film.

Robin & Marian  - 1976

Although it would be three more years before Hepburn would grace the screen again (during which time there was talk of her starring in Out of Africa in the role that eventually went to Meryl Streep), when her name was announced for the lead in the screen adaptation of Sidney Sheldon’s 1977 bestseller Bloodline, this time out I was genuinely (if injudiciously) stoked. At last, Hepburn was to star in a film more worthy of her stature and reputation: a glamorous, big-budget, international romantic suspense thriller!

And while saner minds might have considered Sidney Sheldon’s name attached to the project to be a red flag of no small significance, I allowed myself to be distracted by the possibilities posed by the film’s sizable, international cast of (mostly) genuine movie stars; Hepburn being reunited with director Terence Young (who guided Hepburn to her 5^th Academy Award nomination with Wait Until Dark); and the opportunity for her to sport chic frocks by her favorite designer, Hubert de Givenchy (Robin & Marian’s 16^thcentury nun’s habit didn’t cut it for me).

Bolstered by the popularity of the bestseller, the draw of Hepburn’s 2^nd screen comeback (ahem,…return), and an inordinate amount of publicity centered around the age discrepancy between the novel’s heroine (23) and Hepburn herself (50 playing 35), Bloodline was set to be a major release from Paramount for the summer of ’79.

Alas, despite its tony pedigree, Bloodline proved to be rather anemic at the boxoffice. Audiences, as they say, stayed away in droves, a result perhaps of finding the film’s rather distasteful (and nonsensical) porno snuff film subplot to be as cruel a misuse and mistreatment of Audrey Hepburn as anything Alan Arkin had dished out.

For those not around in the late-70s (or who were, but not as immersed in smut as yours truly), Bloodline's distinctive, ribboned throated female with the overemphasized red lips, poster graphic (figuring significantly in the film's bafflingly superfluous porno subplot) referenced...inadvertently perhaps..a then-popular line of porn mags and videos known as Swedish Erotica. That company's trademark was to feature "models" with deeply scarlet lips, wearing only a smile and a colorful scarf tied around the neck. The lovely platinum blonde with the hard countenance above is Seka, one of the company's most popular performers.

I know this because one of my earliest jobs when I moved to LA was working at Adam & Eve's Adult Books (Nudist Magazines! Art Films!), located right next to where I lived at the time: The Villa Elaine Apartments on Vine Street. I sold a lot those Swedish Erotica porno loops. Film is film, yes? Vive le cinéma! (screencap is from Beyond the Valley of the Dolls)

SIDNEY SHELDON'S BLOODLINE

Audrey Hepburn as Elizabeth Roffe

Ben Gazzara as Rhys Williams

James Mason as Sir Alec Nichols

Romy Schneider as Helene Roffe-Martin

Omar Sharif as Ivo Palazzi

Irene Papas as Simonetta  Palazzi

Maurice Ronet as Charles Martin

Michelle Phillips as Vivian Nichols

Gert Frobe as Inspector Max Hornung

Beautiful Elizabeth Roffe (the cardinal rule for trash novels is that all heroines must be beautiful) is the doting only child born to disappointed-she-wasn’t-a-boy pharmaceutical magnate Sam Roffe. When Mr. Roffe dies suddenly under mysterious circumstances, inexperienced but quick-to-learn Elizabeth instantly inherits a global, multibillion-dollar pharmaceutical dynasty. A financially beleaguered company suffering a recent streak (read: suspicious) of bad luck.

Although pressured by her stock-holding relatives to sell the company and go public, headstrong Elizabeth (thanks to the help of her father’s faithful secretary and a monumentally boring flashback to her great grandfather’s humble beginnings in Krakow, Poland) decides, in spite of her inexperience, to run the business herself. A decision which doesn’t set well with her relatives, a virtual “It’s a Small World” sampling of sinister multinationality, each grappling with various degrees of financial hardship.

Putting the Bored in Boardroom
Even The Muppet Movie didn't have this many scenes set behind desks 

As though to make it easier for ‘merican audiences to follow along, the extended Roffe family conveniently plays to familiar national stereotypes: Italian Ivo (Sharif) is a philandering bumbler being blackmailed by his heavy-accented, hot-tempered, black-bra-wearing mistress (Claudia Mori). Paris-based Helene (Schneider) is patronizing and rude, while her browbeaten husband (Ronet) sinks money into a failing vineyard. British MP Alec (Mason), in a state of near financial ruin due to his much-younger wife’s gambling addiction, nevertheless maintains a stiff-upper-lip formality and cool head. And good ol' American Rhys Williams (Gazzara) is a direct, straight-shootin’ sorta guy who’s only flaw seems to be having a weakness for the ladies.

With so many family members standing to financially gain from the company’s dissolution, it’s only a matter of time before Elizabeth discovers that not only wasn’t her father’s death accidental, but her resistance to selling the company has placed her own life in danger. As factory mishaps multiply, close calls escalate, and some bald dude keeps strangling anonymous women while being filmed by a shadowy male figure, the questions mount. Who can be trusted? Are bloodlines thicker than mountain climbing rope, brake lines, or elevator cables? And just who is that Boris Badenov lookalike orchestrating those repugnant snuff films?

More importantly, how the hell did MY Audrey Hepburn get mixed up in this mess?

Apt Metaphor
Audrey Hepburn trapped in a runaway vehicle that's careening out of control

WHAT I LOVE ABOUT THIS FILM

Whether it be Jacqueline Susann, Harold Robbins, or Jackie Collins; I love a good, glossy trash movie. But Bloodline really puts my blind adoration to the test. It’s a film comprised of all the standard ingredients, but everything just feels a little off.

There’s the large cast of recognizable names. Excellent actors all, but just a wee bit past their prime. I don't like to think I'm an ageist, but a curious side effect of this cast all falling within the 49 – 60-year-old range is that it often appears as though everybody had a “must sit down” clause in their contracts. There’s a hell of a lot of sitting going on in this movie. It’s hard to get worked up over discovering the identity of the murderer when no one in the cast looks like they have the energy to get up out of their chairs and search.  

Beatrice Straight as loyal secretary Kate Erling

Then there’s the promise of exotic, far-off locations. Bloodline spent a sizable chunk of its $12-million-budget flying cast and crew to New York, London, Paris, Rome, Munich, Sardinia, and Copenhagen; so why does most of it look as though much of it was shot on a studio backlot? There’s a scene filmed in a European red-light district that has all the authenticity and grit of those fake-looking San Francisco backstreets Patty Duke stumbled around in Valley of the Dolls. 

Lastly, there’s the opportunity for a behind-the-scenes glimpse into the thrilling world of international corporations and industry. Arthur Hailey's Airport was overflowing with details about the airline industry; Harold Robbins’ The Betsy was set in the world of automotives; Jacqueline Susann’s The Love Machine was about the behind the scenes machinations of the TV industry; and Sidney Sheldon’s Bloodline takes place in the cutthroat world of global pharmaceuticals. The sleeping pill jokes practically write themselves. The dull setting clearly posed a challenge to screenwriter Laird Koenig, for his idea of creating dramatic tension is to have characters declare “Let’s call a meeting!” with the frequency (and similar false-urgency purpose) of teens yelling “Surf’s up!” in a Beach Party movie. 

What little momentum Bloodline has, comes to a screeching halt as Gazzara takes Hepburn
on a 3-hour-tour of a Roffe pharmaceutical plant (or does it only feel that way?). The scene is
accompanied by composer Ennio Morricone's carbonated nod to disco and Giorgio Moroder, which had me wishing I had a few Roffe aspirins at my disposal

I’ve not read enough Sidney Sheldon to know if this is average or substandard for his usual brand of schlock. I've only read Bloodline and The Other Side of Midnight, but of the two, Bloodline is the one that feels sorely lacking. Something about the familiar, soap-opera-and-glamour format of Bloodline makes me feel it would have been better served if adapted as a TV movie or miniseries starring a low-wattage personality like Jacklyn Smith or Pamela Sue Martin (for a time Cabaret and Barry Lyndon star Marisa Berenson was in line to play the Audrey Hepburn role). Potboilers like Bloodline always stand to benefit from the built-in lowered expectations of television. As it is, with Audrey Hepburn and so many esteemed actors attached to the project, the film not only acquires a gravitas it can’t possibly live up to (not with THAT source material), but it also takes on a kind of self-serious air that’s poison to escapist trash like this. 

Hepburn's Givenchy wardrobe was more exciting than the film

PERFORMANCES

Sad to say, but Bloodline is something of an embarrassment for everyone involved (except Omar Sharif, who gleefully sinks to the level of the material and in doing so, somehow salvages himself).

But my dear Audrey Hepburn is particularly ill-served. I’ve read that she was very unhappy during the filming (her marriage was falling apart), was feeling rusty and insecure about her talent, and even sought to bail on the movie once she learned of the nudity/porn/snuff-film angle (perhaps she was too busy counting the zeroes on her $1 million paycheck to have been bothered with reading the novel or script beforehand). All this goes a long way toward explaining why she really doesn’t seem to be present in this film.

I’m usually delighted watching Hepburn in anything, but it’s no fun watching someone who seems to be having so little.

On the personal side, one good thing to come out of Bloodline was an affair between Gazzara (recently divorced from Janice Rule) & Hepburn (still married to Andrea Dotti) which lasted through to their next film together, Peter Bogdanovich's They All Laughed (1981).
True to movie tradition, the couple's real-life sparks fail to show up on the screen in Bloodline, sealing the film's fate as a romantic suspense thriller with no romantic chemistry, minimal suspense, and negligible thrills. I've never really understood Ben Gazzara's appeal. As Audrey Hepburn co-stars go, he's as bland and colorless as Efrem Zimbalist Jr. in Wait Until Dark. Terence Young can sure pick 'em.

Hepburn was a legendarily lovely woman, but even her iconic beauty was no match for this unflattering, matronly "Church Lady" curly perm that appeared to be all the rage during the late '70s-early '80s. Here it is doing absolutely no favors for (clockwise ) Hepburn, Mary Tyler Moore (Ordinary People -1980), Maureen Stapleton (Interiors - 1978), Dustin Hoffman...who actually looks pretty good (Tootsie - 1982), Ali MacGraw (Just Tell Me What You Want  - 1980), and Marsha Mason (Chapter Two - 1979).
*Special thanks to the readers who jogged my memory. 


THE STUFF OF DREAMS NIGHTMARES
Spoiler Alert: Read no further. Crucial plot points are revealed for the purpose of discussion. 

The most consistent complaint leveled at Bloodline is that the very focus of its print and poster ads, the thing that earned it its R-rating, the single narrative thread to stand alone as the most distasteful element of the film----in the end makes absolutely no sense and has no bearing on the central plot or mystery. 

From the time of Bloodline’s release, the subplot involving a serial killer strangling prostitutes, filming their deaths, and then discarding their bodies in the river (each with a red ribbon around their neck), has been a bad taste deal-breaker. Whatever narrow chances Bloodline might have had as a sophisticated thriller or even a camp classic were forever jeopardized by the ugliness of these scenes. Scenes made all the more odious due to the fact that they appear to have nothing whatsoever to do with anything else happening in the film.

Family Feud
Elizabeth- "According to my father, one of them is deliberately trying to ruin the company."

Well, that’s not entirely true. Bloodline is a movie that has all the earmarks of having been hacked to pieces in the editing process. A fact evident in characters and relationships never being fleshed out or explained, storylines and plot points left dangling, and a general air of abrupt abbreviation. The theatrical release runs nearly two hours, but when it was broadcast on television, there was 40 minutes of unseen footage available to use. Forty minutes!

A serious casualty of all this cutting (I can only assume) is that it’s never made clear what the hell the serial killer angle has to do with someone out to sabotage Roffe Pharmaceuticals.

What’s missing from the film is expounded upon in the novel (albeit cursorily), so for those who have no wish to subject themselves to Sidney Sheldon in print for the sake of making sense of a nonsensical movie adaptation, here goes: (Remember folks, spoilers ahead). 

Now, Voyeur
The man behind these filmed murders is seen reflected in the dresser mirror

Sir Alec (Mason) is sexually impotent, and as a result, his vain, much-younger wife (Phillips) is blatantly (and serially) unfaithful to him. Her incessant gambling and wanton spending brings the mob down on their heads (with one thug threatening to nail her knees to the floor), prompting Alec to resort to sabotage and murder to secure money from his share of Roffe industries.

On a connected but still random note, said Sir Alec, unwilling to divorce his wife yet hating her for her infidelities, is only able to achieve sexual gratification when vicariously “punishing” women whom he makes up to look like her (the red ribbon bit. The first time they made love, she was wearing a red ribbon around her neck). So Sir Alec pays a maniac to act out his revenge fantasy on anonymous women while he watches from the sidelines and a cameraman films their strangulation deaths. Are you sick yet?  
What's obvious from even this brief explanation is that the whole serial killer subplot is still superfluous to the story at large, and could have been jettisoned without affecting the plot in any way.  It was retained for its exploitation value. Ironically, it was also likely the very thing that kept the film from attracting the older crowd who remembered Hepburn so fondly.

STUFF OF FANTASY
For all its flaws, Bloodline has a place in this cinema diary of mine because I was so absolutely caught up with the hype at the time. It was one of those films you get so worked up over seeing that when it proves to be a bit of a disappointment, you don't really admit it to yourself. I recall sitting through it twice on opening night, and then returning the following week. Was it because I liked it that much? Not really. Was I THAT excited to see Audrey Hepburn on the screen again? Well, of course!
One clunker in a career of gems doesn't stop her from being MY Audrey Hepburn.

BONUS MATERIAL
On April 13, 1979 Grauman's Chinese Theater added two ugly, boxy cineplexes to the original theater built in 1926. Bloodline was one of a package of Paramount releases premiering at the new theaters that summer. I saw Bloodline on opening night, Friday, June 29th, which also happened to be the opening day of both the latest Bond film, Moonraker, and the Bill Murray summer camp comedy Meatballs, two films targeted at a young audience. I watched Bloodline with an audience comprised mostly of older couples and a few folks turned away from sold-out Bond screenings.

Premiere features were: Hurricane, Old Boyfriends, and, in the main theater, Superman 

Here's the trailer for Bloodline's 1986 television broadcast. Even in this 30-second clip are scenes not in the theatrical release. Accounting for supporting player Michelle Phillips being so prominently in the ads is the fact that she was appearing on the ABC TV series Hotel at the time.  HERE

Bloodline marked the 5th screen pairing of Romy Schneider and Maurice Ronet. 

Prior to Bloodline, they appeared in the mystery/thriller Qui? (1970)

Copyright © Ken Anderson  2009 -2016