The Prince and the Showgirl (1957)

(On Cable TV, July 2021) In many ways, the trivia about The Prince and the Showgirl (Marilyn Monroe meets Laurence Olivier!) is more captivating than the film itself. There’s even a movie, My Week with Marilyn, that revolves around its production. But The Prince and the Showgirl itself is surprisingly dull, especially if you’re familiar with movies in which commoners hobnob with aristocracy. It doesn’t help that the film has a strong nostalgic attachment to the trappings of classic European aristocracy (the story takes place in 1911), which can be of very limited interest to twenty-first century audiences. In all fairness, the film does hold back on the clichés, especially toward the end, which is more along the lines of “things are looking up” rather than “…and they lived happily ever after.”  Lavishly produced in colour to take advantage of the sets and costumes, it does carry the weight of that overwrought production: the directing can be stultifying at times, moving glacially through moments that should have the fast pacing of a light comedy. Monroe herself is not particularly interesting here — the heaviness of the production holding back her natural comedic skills — while Olivier (who stars and directs) seems most to blame for the ponderousness of the result. Surprisingly underwhelming, The Prince and the Showgirl ends up being more interesting to the meta-narrative of Monroe’s career. Even though she produced it, there’s a sense that she would have been happier without it.