Michael Gordon (1959)
I thought I liked Pillow Talk more than I do – more than I did anyway on this latest TV viewing. It was the first and is generally accepted as the best of the three romantic comedies that Doris Day and Rock Hudson made together (it was followed by Lover Come Back (1961) and Send Me No Flowers (1964)). The script – by Stanley Shapiro, Maurice Richlin, Russell Rouse and Clarence Greene – won the Best Original Screenplay Oscar and Doris Day’s performance brought her the sole Oscar nomination of her career. I’m afraid to say she was the chief obstacle to enjoying Pillow Talk this time around.
The set-up is a good idea. Jan Morrow (Day), an interior decorator in New York City, is a professionally successful, self-confident single woman. Brad Allen (Hudson), a songwriter, is a womanising bachelor. He and Jan share a telephone party line; she gets infuriated picking up the receiver to hear Brad sweet-talking, sometimes serenading, one girlfriend or another. Jan files a complaint, unsuccessfully. One of her clients, millionaire Jonathan Forbes (Tony Randall), keeps asking Jan to marry him; she keeps saying no. Jonathan happens to have been Brad’s buddy since college days. When Jonathan points Jan out to him, Brad likes what he sees. He’s still miffed, though, by her complaint about him and, since they’ve not been introduced to each other, decides to play a trick on her. He poses as a wealthy but romantically inexperienced Texas rancher, name of Rex Stetson, and starts to court Jan. She likes the look of Rex, too.
I know I always make the same points about Doris Day but it’s hard not to. As a comedienne, she’s so technically accomplished that she’s almost scary, sometimes creepy, to watch and listen to. When Day puts on a sexy voice, as she occasionally does as Jan, it is sexy but somehow subordinated to her competence. The single-minded walk she gives Jan – a kind of martial mince – is like no other human walk you’ve ever seen, unless from Doris Day. She needs absolutely no help in dominating the screen yet Michael Gordon is determined to reinforce her intimidating pep with relentless use of Frank De Vol’s bouncy, geddit score. The leading lady’s vast collection of outfits and, especially, hats seems designed to do the same: no one could accuse these costumes of not being eye-catching. Compared with his co-star, Rock Hudson is less accomplished but, as a result, more likeable and almost restful, especially when Brad is playing Rex: Hudson’s Texan accent is nicely, because only slightly, awkward. In the supporting cast, there’s some strenuous overacting, though both Tony Randall and Thelma Ritter, as Jan’s dipso housekeeper, aren’t in that category – both are cleverly entertaining.
Once she discovers Rex’s true identity, thunderstruck Jan refuses to see him again – until Alma suggests that Brad commission Jan to decorate his apartment. She accepts the invitation as a way of getting her own back: the garish redecoration ridicules Brad’s playboy tendencies. The funniest moment in the film comes when a neighbouring cat gets into the new apartment, takes a look and beats an instant, yowling retreat – although this deliberately hideous décor is not the only set decoration that makes your eyes water. The whole look of Pillow Talk – the day-glo colours, the cartoonish titles, the jokey editing – now seems quintessential of its time. The famous split-screen sequence, in which Jan and Brad-as-Rex chat on the phone in their respective bathtubs, has a deal of charm – Rock Hudson does most of the talking and Doris Day is more relaxed than usual. But the script’s risqué lines make you uncomfortable; they’re a goody-two-shoes’ idea of innuendo.
16 June 2024
