Though the film's fairly torpedoed by the comical, affected over-acting of its lead player, there's enough to love here to make it an essential watch for anyone who savors New York movies, stories about life in the theater, and anything by Sidney Lumet.
Based on a play and a 1933 Katherine Hepburn movie 'Morning Glory', the film follows the rocky road of Eva Lovelace (Susan Strasberg), a fiercely ambitious, fledging young actress seeking a career in the cutthroat New York theater community.
Steeped in theater lore and a veteran of who knows how many amateur productions, Eva's performed major roles in all the classics.......even as 'Hamlet' ("I've got good legs.") After she barrels her way into the office of a top Broadway producer (Henry Fonda), her sheer nerve, chutzpah and preening self assurance somehow charm Fonda, his rising young playwright (Christopher Plummer in his first film role) and her new best friend, an aging British character actor (the always, smooth, suave and mellow-voiced Herbert Marshall.)
Not surprisingly, Fonda succumbs to a one night stand with her, not realizing Plummer's fallen hard for her too. But it's tough out there for Strasberg to storm Broadway for a role, so she's reduced to reading poetry in a seedy club where she has to double as her own stagehand.
But not for long......after all, this movie functions as a sort of happily-ever-after fable about the fabulous, crazy world of professional theater and its hyper-emotional denizens. When Fonda and Plummer's s famously temperamental star leading lady (Joan Greenwood) walks out on them days, before opening night, what will the boys ever do? Who can they ever find to replace her at the last minute and create an instant new Broadway star?
Do we even have to tell you the answer to that?
This leads the story to its expected conclusion, and as a bonus, throws in a not-so-expected final moment that's both uplifting and realistically bittersweet. (As someone who wrote plays for a theater company for 10 years and dated actresses, we can vouch for the honesty of this film's fade-out scene.....)
Sad to report, you'd think that Susan Strasberg, the daughter of famed Actor's Studio guru Lee Strasberg would've been this film's MVP.......on the contrary, she's the worst thing in it.
Throughout the film, she's embarrassing to watch, doing what looks like a deliberately over-the-top, terrible imitation of Katherine Hepburn, who won a Best Actress Oscar for playing the same role in "Morning Glory". Drawling out her dialogue as if she's Blanche Dubois on downers, Strasberg's poorly performed work here cries out "Look at me! Look at me! I'm ACTING!!"
But for all the reasons we previously mentioned (including that brilliant supporting cast and Alex North's loud, busy Copland-esque score)"Stage Struck" still gave us a nice nostalgic tour through NYC and its hustling, bustling theater world.....so we'll still close the curtain on this review with not quite a standing O but at least 2 & 1/2 stars (**1/2)
(By the way, fans who love familiar character actors will enjoy spotting Jack Weston and diminutive, helium-voiced John Fiedler in their earliest movie roles).
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