I've been spacing these posts a little too far apart, and letting them pile up. So, I'm devoting a full week to new installments of my "Great Directors" series. Enjoy.
I was surprised to discover Blake Edwards' "Victor/Victoria" airing on a weekday afternoon on one of my local syndicated stations a few years ago, a station known for hosting a lot of conservative programming and old reruns from decades past. It was edited, of course, to remove instances of sex and nudity, but the plot was left more or less intact despite the eyebrow-raising subject matter. Then again, I shouldn't have been surprised - the comedy is so gentle, so elegant, and so tastefully deployed that it was nearly impossible to take offense. And Julie Andrews bringing down the house with some of her best showstoppers doesn't hurt either.
Based on a 1933 German film that was previously remade at least three times, "Victor/Victoria" is a classic farce about a down-on-her-luck soprano who finds success pretending to be a "female impersonator," a polite early term for a drag queen. However, as far as I can tell, the version written and directed by Blake Edwards is the first to incorporate gay characters - the darling rascal Toddy and the steady bodyguard Squash - and to acknowledge and celebrate the gay nightlife of 1930s Paris. The primary relationship is an emphatically heterosexual one, between Julie Andrews's Victor/Victoria and James Garner's gangster King Marchand, but delivered in a fascinating genderfluid context. Watching Julie Andrews playing with androgyny and with her screen image recalls Marlene Dietrich's famous cabaret performance in white tie and tails. Another major influence was surely "La Cage aux Folles," which enjoyed stage and screen success a few years earlier.
Of course, the biggest reason they got away with it is because "Victor/Victoria" is a slapstick comedy coming from Edwards, who is best known for his madcap "Pink Panther" movies. The plot is greatly concerned with mistaken identities, love triangles, criminal ventures, and keeping up appearances. Nearly every steamy moment where Garner's character questions his sexuality is played for laughs or to add more complications to the ridiculous plot. Every insightful observation about the characters' sexual politics also doubles as a pithy punchline. The film's great irony is that the gay characters are perfectly comfortable in their sexuality and masculinity, while the straights are tying themselves in knots, trying to figure out who and what they are to each other. A great source of comedic energy is Lesley Ann Warren, who plays the jealous showgirl trying to keep King Marchand's attentions, and is absolutely shameless in her tactics. The part of Toddy, the charming huckster, was originally envisioned for Peter Sellers, but I can't imagine anyone but Robert Preston in the part. His cheeky delivery of "Gay Paree" is a delight.
The film was clearly created as a vehicle for Julie Andrews, the way many of Edwards' later films were. This is the best of their collaborations, and features some of Andrews' most iconic screen numbers - "The Shady Dame From Seville," "Le Jazz Hot," "Crazy World," and the adorable duet "You and Me," where she gets to play off Preston. But as impressive as her singing is, it's the rest of her performance that continues to entrance me. Andrews walks a fine line, maintaining such a beautiful, ambiguous balance between masculline and feminine, that I always feel disappointed when the spell is broken at the end of the movie, and Victor/Victoria is obliged to become Victoria again.
Blake Edwards was a popular entertainer first and foremost, so capable at delivering laughs and engineering sparkling romances, that he was able to push boundaries much further than people thought you could at the time. There are plenty of viewers who never notice that Holly Golightly is, as Truman Capote put it, an "American Geisha," and I expect that many simply overlook the fact that there are any LGBT folks in "Victor/Victoria" at all. Everyone in the movie is so warm, and so sweet, and so funny - it doesn't feel like you're watching anything revolutionary at all.
What I've Seen - Blake Edwards
Operation Petticoat (1959)
Breakfast at Tiffany's (1961)
Days of Wine and Roses (1962)
The Pink Panther (1963)
A Shot in the Dark (1964)
The Great Race (1965)
The Party (1968)
Darling Lili (1970)
The Return of the Pink Panther (1975)
The Pink Panther Strikes Again (1976)
10 (1979)
Victor/Victoria (1982)
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